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This article examines whether mayors' social capital increases local governments' performance. Putnam suggests that politicians' social networks with residents may deteriorate political transparency and thus decrease performance. However, no direct relationships have been clarified. So, we focus on the Philippines as a case and conduct a survey on national representative 300 cities and municipalities in 2011. We find that (1) by distributions, among three indexes of performance as dependent variables, valuing fundamentals of governance have the highest scores. Social governance and administrative governance follow. Among mayors' networks as independent variables, mayors meet residents most, and local politicians, provincial politicians, and the central government officers follow. (2) By regression analyses, meeting residents promotes social governance, while meeting central government officers increases administrative governance. Multi-level analyses support these results. Therefore, mayors' social capital increases local governments' performance. Yet different social capital promotes different performance.

In this thesis, we compare two organizational reforms within one policy area. How the "Modernization reform for development management" from 2002/03 and the "Reform for the organization of grant management" from 2018/19, affected the relationship between the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Norad - the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation. Central is the political choice of the overall organizational model in the reforms, with two main alternatives: an integrated model in which the directorate becomes part of the ministry, and a delegated model that assigns the directorate additional tasks (enhanced vertical autonomy). In the thesis, we examine what led to the reform in 2003, and whether the newer reform can be regarded as a continuation of the 2003 reform. We have chosen to base our analysis on the theoretical framework for reforms by Pollitt and Bouckaert. The thesis is a comparative case study, and the analysis is based on three types of data sources: semi-structured interviews, document analysis, and media coverage. In the thesis, we find that several driving forces contributed to the initiation of reform in 2002/03, but that the Minister of Development's political ambitions must be regarded as a main reason to reform. The result of the reform was a mixed model, which can best be explained by the interaction - or tug-of-war - between two ministers, between foreign policy and development policy and the meeting between political desires and what was administratively feasible. Unresolved issues in the 2003 reform led to constant attempts to find an administrative balance in the years between the two reforms. In 2019, driving forces within the political system, especially party politics, became decisive for the choice of model, after the political party KrF (the Christian Democrats) entered the government. By studying the two reforms over time, we show in the thesis that ongoing discussions about the interface between politics and administration, as well as tensions between foreign policy and development policy interests, were central to the reform processes. This may help explain why reforms are repeated. The thesis is a contribution to understanding reforms in a context that also includes the time perspective. ; publishedVersion

Rintaro Takeda a Japanese writer who had been assigned and ordered by the Japanese army as a member of the propaganda unit in Java. The previous study on Rintaro Takeda and his interaction with Indonesian writers focuses on his relationship with Armijn Pane. Armijn Pane is a famous Indonesia writer who had been known as a founder of new Indonesian literary movement, "Pujangga Baroe". In Takeda's essay of "Jawa Sarasa" (1944), Armijn Pane was introduced by Takeda as the brother of the great poet Sanusi Pane. Sanusi Pane had the reputation of being the Indonesian writer who most actively collaborated with the Japanese military during the Second World War. The present study aims to reveal the relationship between Takeda and Sanusi Pane with respect to their ideas on Asian culture. Pane was the chief editor of the literature magazine Keboedajaan Timoer ("Oriental Culture") and head of the Central Cultural Office (Keimin Bunka Shidosho) during the Japanese occupation. In Pane's earlier works during the Dutch colonial period, he included aspects of his own experience in India, and the writings were strongly influenced by the famous Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore. According to Pane, India was a representation of ancient Javanese culture (Hindu-Buddhist culture) and became an inspiration for his concept of ideal culture. From an analysis of Sanusi Pane's works, such as Kertadjaja and Sandyakalaning Majapahit, it is clear that his depiction of glorious Javanese empires of the past contains his ideas of nationalism and notions about the superiority of old Javanese culture. Sanusi's idea were similar to those of Kokuzo Okakura, who inspired most of the Japanese propagandists in Indonesia, including Rintaro Takeda.

Master i styring og ledelse ; 2017, the city council of Oslo decided that trust-based governance and management should be its guiding principle in the governance of the city. The purpose of this assignment is to provide a better understanding of the model of trust and how the boroughs in the city of Oslo have put this into practice. We have explored how trust-based governance and management is perceived by Oslo's district directors. The key issue we are addressing is: How has the idea of trust-based governance and management changed the governance practices in the management of Oslo's city districts? The study has a qualitative approach and we conducted a total of five in-depth interviews with district directors. Their subjective reflections and thoughts about trust-based governance and management provide information about how this has changed governance practices across city districts. We have looked at the instrumental and cultural perspective, as well as the theory of trust, governance and leadership and implementation. Furthermore, the City Council case from 2017 on trust-based governance and management is central. The study shows that trust-based management has no clear, standardized practice in the districts. The study also reveals that there have been few major changes related to governance and management since the introduction, but that the districts are constantly changing. By contrast, the trust model has contributed to increased awareness of the concept of trust, goal and performance management and empowerment of employees. In addition, there is a shift towards seeing things from the perspective of the user, rather than simply keeping the user in mind, in the effort to improve services across city districts. ; publishedVersion

The conflict environment is changing, and—after almost two decades of continuous COIN, stabilisation and counterterrorism missions—government and public opinion in western and allied countries are unlikely to support continued large-scale or long-duration missions of this type. Yet history demonstrates that such missions are, and are likely to remain, some of the most frequent and geographically widespread. Likewise, ground forces are critical for success in COIN and stabilisation missions, due to the need to interact closely with local government and populations, which implies the need to establish and maintain a physical presence in the area of operations, which in turn implies the need to survive and prevail in a close combat environment, which only ground forces can do. Thus, despite their unpopularity, ground forces can expect (and must be prepared) to continue engaging in these types of operations. However, the same factors that have enhanced the threat in recent decades—in particular, connectivity and the ability to conduct collaborative and remote engagement— also create opportunities for new operating methods for ground forces conducting COIN and stabilisation. These include the ability to deploy only a small element forward on the ground, conducting SFA and FID tasks, while supporting it with a QRF and other enablers that remain offshore in a sea-base or in regionally-deployed FOBs. In such a scenario the main force might be withheld from the theatre of operations and either deploy for a brief initial period only, or not at all. For a force operating in this manner, protected mobility and communications would remain essential, as would the ability to access and deliver precision fire support when required. Deployed forces would probably be modular to a very low level, operating in a mesh of multi-role, semi-autonomous small teams supporting each other and swapping roles as needed. Traditional intelligence, engineering, civil affairs, psychological operations and military governance capabilities would remain essential, but might be called forward as needed. Ultimately, however, while ground forces will almost certainly continue to play a central role in counterinsurgency and stabilisation operations, the way they perform this role, the organisation and equipment with which they do so, and the environment in which they conduct such missions is likely to change, and keep changing, into the foreseeable future.

Centre of Excellence (CoE) is a politically initiated financing scheme from the Research Council in Norway aiming for long term, high quality and innovative research, contributing towards solving the big challenges of our society. Two evaluations conclude that this scheme is a success. These evaluations does not however pay much attention to the role of the administration in that regard. This master-thesis investigate how administrative leaders in the CoE contribute towards goal achievement. This has not previously been studied. For the data collection individual interviews was chosen, because they provide an open and investigative approach, well suited to gather relevant information. The analysis are based on organizational theory for public organizations, theories about organization types and previous research regarding the role of administrative personnel in research and higher education. The administrative leaders in CoE work in the interface between academic work and administration. My research shows that most of them have an academic background. They are highly educated, on master or PhD level, and some have research experience beyond that. Most of them have relevant work experience with a good overview of how the research and university systems work. The administrative leaders can further be recognised by their ability to create a good work environment and their social integration skills. This is very important in CoE, not the least because the centres depends heavily on recruitment of international research staff. In this regard good language skills and intercultural competence are also important. These leaders contribute to goal achievement through relieving the researchers and facilitating research related tasks, like conferences and meeting places, and haveing a good overview and ensure internal and external information flow. They also organize social activities and function as a central hub or connector. The administrative leader role demands a mix of knowledge and competencies, resembling the role of the classic middle range leader in the professional bureaucracy of today. With a great variety of different assignments coupled with being a connector for tasks and functions, both vertical and horizontal in the organization. In addition the administrative leader in a CoE also works close with the research leaders and the research activities at the centre. CoE are organized as time-limited projects with high demands and expectations. My study shows that the administration apparatus in CoE is important for goal achievement, but also that it is necessary with one 100% administrative leader or coordinator in a CoE, in order to take care of and coordinate the interests of the centre, both internally and in relation to the host institution. These CoE administrative leaders are a highly selected group regarding qualifications and background, which is something to be aware of when planning these kinds of research units, but also concerning the status- and role of administrative research personnel in general. ; publishedVersion

The Global Nutrition Report (GNR) provides a global profile and country profiles on nutrition for each of the United Nations' 193 member states, and includes specific progress for each country. It will be a centerpiece of the Second International Conference on Nutrition (ICN2) in Rome on 19-21 November, organized by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Health Organization. ; Supplementary Online Materials ix Acknowledgments x Abbreviations xii Executive summary xiii Chapter 1 ntroduction 2 Chapter 2 Nutrition Is Central to Sustainable Development 7 Chapter 3 Progress toward the World Health Assembly Nutrition Targets Is Too Slow1 5 Chapter 4 The Coexistence of Different Forms of Malnutrition Is the "New Normal" 22 Chapter 5 The Coverage of Nutrition-Specific Interventions Needs to Improve 29 Chapter 6 Interventions Addressing the Underlying Determinants of Nutrition Status Are Important, but They Need to Be More Nutrition sensitive 38 Chapter 7 The Enabling Environment Is Improving, but Not Quickly Enough 47 Chapter 8 The Need to Strengthen Accountability in Nutrition 56 Chapter 9 What Are the Priorities for Investment in Improved Nutrition Data? 67 Chapter 10 Key Messages and Recommendations 71 Appendix 1 The Nutrition Country Profile: A Tool for Action 75 Appendix 2 Which Countries Are on Course to Meet Several WHA Targets? 77 Appendix 3 Which Countries Are on Course for Which WHA Targets? 79 Appendix 4 Donor Spending on Nutrition-Specific and Nutrition-Sensitive Interventions and Programs 84 Appendix 5 How Accountable Is the Global Nutrition Report? 86 Appendix 6 Availability of Data for Nutrition Country Profile Indicators 88 Notes 91 References 95 PANELS Panel 11 Types of Nutrition Investment, Lawrence Haddad 4 Panel 21 Nutrition and the Sustainable Development Goals—No Room for Complacency, Michael Anderson 11 Panel 22 Some New Data from India: What If?, Lawrence Haddad, Komal Bhatia, and Kamilla Eriksen 12 Panel 23 How Did Maharashtra Cut Child Stunting?, Lawrence Haddad 13 Panel 24 Can Improving the Underlying Determinants of Nutrition Help Meet the WHA Targets?, Lisa Smith and Lawrence Haddad 14 Panel 41 Malnutrition in the United States and United Kingdom, Jessica Fanzo 25 Panel 42 Regional Drivers of Malnutrition in Indonesia, Endang Achadi with acknowledgment to Sudarno Sumarto and Taufik Hidayat 26 Panel 43 Compiling District-Level Nutrition Data in India, Purnima Menon and Shruthi Cyriac 27 Panel 44 Targeting Minority Groups at Risk in the United States, Jennifer Requejo and Joel Gittelsohn 28 Panel 51 Measuring Coverage of Programs to Treat Severe Acute Malnutrition, Jose Luis Alvarez 37 Panel 61 Trends in Dietary Quality among Adults in the United States, Daniel Wang and Walter Willett 41 Panel 62 How Did Bangladesh Reduce Stunting So Rapidly?, Derek Headey 43 Panel 63 Using an Agricultural Platform in Burkina Faso to Improve Nutrition during the First 1,000 Days, Deanna Kelly Olney, Andrew Dillon, Abdoulaye Pedehombga, Marcellin Ouédraogo, and Marie Ruel 45 Panel 71 Is There a Better Way to Track Nutrition Spending? 48 Panel 72 Tracking Financial Allocations to Nutrition: Guatemala's Experience, Jesús Bulux, Otto Velasquez, Cecibel Juárez, Carla Guillén, and Fernando Arriola 49 Panel 73 A Tool for Assessing Government Progress on Creating Healthy Food Environments, Boyd Swinburn 51 Panel 74 Engaging Food and Beverage Companies through the Access to Nutrition Index, Inge Kauer 52 Panel 75 How Brazil Cut Child Stunting and Improved Breastfeeding Practices, Jennifer Requejo 54 Panel 81 Scaling Up Nutrition through Business, Jonathan Tench 61 Panel 82 How Civil Society Organizations Build Commitment to Nutrition, Claire Blanchard 62 Panel 83 Building Civil Society's Capacity to Push for Policies on Obesity and Noncommunicable Diseases, Corinna Hawkes 63 Panel 84 Can Community Monitoring Enhance Accountability for Nutrition?, Nick Nisbett and Dolf te Lintelo 64 Panel 85 National Evaluation Platforms: Potential for Nutrition, Jennifer Bryce and colleagues 65 Panel 86 The State of African Nutrition Data for Accountability and Learning, Carl Lachat, Joyce Kinabo, Eunice Nago, Annamarie Kruger, and Patrick Kolsteren 66 ; PR ; IFPRI1; CRP4; B Promoting healthy food systems ; DGO; A4NH; PHND ; CGIAR Research Program on Agriculture for Nutrition and Health (A4NH)