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One reason why Europe went to war in 1914 is that all of the continental great powers judged it a favorable moment for them to fight, and all were more pessimistic about postponing the fight until later. Not only is this historical paradox an interesting puzzle in its own right, but it sheds light on what is arguably the reigning theory of the causes of wars in general: James Fearon's rational bargaining theory. None of Fearon's three main mechanisms—private information, commitment problems, or indivisibility of stakes—can explain the paradox of the universal, simultaneous view of 1914 as a favorable year for war. Two mechanisms that play a marginal role in his analysis, however—bounded rationality in multidimensional power assessments and attempts to mitigate power shifts through coercive diplomacy—help to explain how Europe's powers became trapped in a choice between war now and war later. These mechanisms were set in motion by background strategic assumptions rooted in the culture of militarism and nationalism that perversely structured the options facing Europe's political leaders in 1914. Whereas Fearon's theory assumes that states are paying equal attention to all relevant information, in 1914 each power's strategic calculations produced disproportionate levels of self-absorption in its own domestic concerns and alliance anxieties.

One of the challenging scenarios regarding political landscape in developing countries has to do with corruption and Nigeria is not an exception. Politicians often tow the paths of corrupt practices (while preparing for election and upon assumption of political offices) due to a number of social and economic factors. Attempts have been made by different administrations in this country to severe these twin brothers (corruption and politics) in order to ensure a lasting democracy in Nigeria. In spite of these efforts, the success story is nothing to write home about. The questions therefore are: is there any tie between corruption and culture? At what point did corruption become an identifiable feature of Nigerian politics? What are the steps taken so far to address this menace and what are the achievements over time? All these issues and others become critical as this paper examines the place of culture in corruption in Nigeria.

Scholars are divided on the merits of ethnofederalism as an institutional approach to the management of ethnically divided societies. For some, ethnofederalism is a potentially workable compromise between the demands for independence of territorially concentrated ethnic groups and the desire of a common state to preserve its territorial integrity; for critics, it is a short-cut to secession and ultimate state collapse. The argument of critics is theoretically plausible, but an examination of the universe of post-1945 states with ethnofederal arrangements, both failures and successes, shows that ethnofederalism has succeeded more often than it has failed. Within this universe of cases, moreover, ethnofederalism has demonstrably outperformed institutional alternatives, and where ethnofederal systems have failed, they have failed where no institutional alternatives could plausibly have succeeded. The increasing enthusiasm among policymakers and practitioners for prescribing federal solutions to ethnic problems is both understandable and defensible in light of these findings.

Research shows that e-Government projects have higher failure rates than similar approaches in the private sector indicating the lack of a method to transfer knowledge and apply best management practices in an effective way. After stating the fundamental principles of project management and performing an identification of shortcomings of existing methodologies, that apply to public administration IT projects, the paper presents a conceptual model for e-Government project management that can be structured and adapted to cover all types of relevant projects in an out-of-the-box approach. Being goal oriented and supported by relevant tools, this knowledge base of predefined project components can then be populated and utilised in making more informed decisions for effective project management of e-Government initiatives. This way, the proposed method supports public officials and practitioners in learning from past experience projects and in designing and running e-Government projects in a more systematic manner, thus significantly increasing the likelihood of project success.

Transformational e-Government offered the hope and promise to revitalize and modernize public services; reinvigorate and improve services to citizens, business, and governments; and create an exciting environment for employees to work and contribute. Countries world-wide are inexorably engaged and urged forward by both push-and-pull motivational pressures to use technology to improve democratic participation, social harmony, and economic sustainability. While e-Government's first decade has been much more transactional than transformational, radical changes affecting e-Government are needed in this decade. But progress achieved thus far was not without struggle. The project failure rate is so high that transformational e-Government progress is stalling. This paper identifies a synergistic compendium of ten key challenges that prevent progress in transformational e-Government and assesses the effectiveness of the North American standard for project management, the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK), in managing these challenges - and finds it wanting.

There is a dearth of civic knowledge, skills, dispositions, and interest among pre-and post-secondary students and the general public. Many people are not equipped with the necessary knowledge of American political history, democratic institutions, processes, and civic life needed to allow them to become active, effective, responsible, and empowered citizens and leaders of the future. The traditional mode of incorporating civics in the lecture format in social studies and political science curricula is ineffective. The Performing Arts for Effective Civic Engagement (PAECE) program is a cross-disciplinary, multi-institutional effort that was created to address this problem through creative, entertaining performance-based content delivery that is designed by students. This paper describes the details on the program implementation, evalution, as well as its outcomes, in an effort to disseminate pertinent information for possible replication or adaptation of the model by other institutions. The paper concludes with some implications for higher education institutions.

Through the prism of CSR industry can take a stride in evolving its relationship with the stakeholders. CSR in India is currently compulsory and statutory for certain industry, excluding activities undertaken in pursuance of the normal course of business of a company. A FGD conducted with select industry and subsequent SWOT Analysis focuses on the role of industry in effective management of water resources by using CSR funds for better results. The proposed 3C- Community Concern Consensus principle is based on FGD that should be explored further to address the issue of water management holistically. This paper contributes to the existing literature and advocates the industry to prioritized water management in their plentitude of CSR endeavor.

Citizens in post-industrialized societies such as the United States are becoming dissatisfied with some public policy decisions on the provisioning of food, prompting engagement in buycotts and boycotts as means to influence policy change. Such politically motivated consumptive behavior with social change motives is referred as political consumption. Using data from Ohio 2007 Survey of Food, Farming and the Environment, this research examines the attitudinal and demographic correlates of engagement in buycott and boycott. Findings reveal that engagement in boycott and buycott are shaped by food safety concern and knowledge of food production respectively. Both boycott and buycott behaviors are positively associated with conventional political action and organic labels. Those with greater political efficacy and high incomes are more likely to engage in buycott. These emerging forms of consumer-oriented political engagement may constitute an important force in setting the agenda for social change with respect to the issues targeted.

On the basis of existing literature and benchmarking efforts for various facets of e-Government (expected benefits, existing barriers, methodological guidelines) the paper identifies a number of factors that affect e-Government projects (broader environment, political, funding, public management and service delivery frameworks, customer engagement, technology and effort supply, core processes) and proposes a holistic model for e-Government projects. On the basis of this holistic model, it is argued that realization of the e-Government process and operation of e-Government services exhibit complexity, emergent behaviour, and a number of characteristics of open and complex systems. These arguments, applied on a real example where empirical e-Government good practice is verified ex post via laws and principles governing the behaviour of general open systems, are considered to legitimise systems thinking about e-Government. It is proposed that further pursuing a systemic approach to e-Government projects represents, together with the deeper understanding of user needs, a major direction of further work for e-Government project management.

The importance of World War I for understanding contemporary East Asia lies not in the ubiquitous analogy drawn between Anglo-German antagonism and contemporary U.S.-China relations, but rather in the more specific lessons the period preceding its outbreak offers concerning the sources of instability and conflict among states. More precisely, these lessons relate to the challenges posed by complex security arrangements, the dual-edged nature of nationalism, and the dangerous dynamics that can emerge during repeated crises. Appreciating how these factors contributed to mounting tensions and eventually the onset of war in Europe a century ago can enhance efforts to understand and manage tensions in East Asia today.

Organizational culture has long been shaped and dominated by male orientations and therefore focus on change in the organizational culture can help in addressing the issue of discrimination and isolation of women in organizations. The present paper aims at identifying the attributes of organizational culture in respect of which the perceptions of female employees differ significantly from those of male employees in State Bank of India. The study is based on the data relating to 54 variables for measuring the attributes of organizational culture. The results indicate that though there were differences between the perceptions of Female group employees and Male employees of State Bank of India regarding many of the attributes of organizational culture, they were not statistically significant. The study points out that despite the compelling evidence in support of the belief that gender discrimination does exists in most firms, some firms have been able to develop an organizational culture that is perceived to be non-discriminatory in nature by the gender minority.