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This article examines how social marketers and researchers can concentrate social marketing efforts around a crucial mechanism in behavior change, the notion of commitment. Citizens are committed to different forms of behavior and the success of social marketing depends upon the ability to change this commitment. This is illustrated in a case study about environmentally sustainable behaviors that is analyzed using a research tool, the Conversion Model™, based on the concept of commitment.

Understanding public opinion is integral to modern democracies. Social research and opinion polls give people the opportunity to express their views and provide an efficient way to measure public opinion. This book illustrates how public opinion polling matters in politics, in the public sphere, and more generally in globalized economies. It presents results from opinion polls in more than 30 countries, especially 12 in-depth case studies from various countries around the world.

How does a public service model based on service universalism react to the introduction of market principles of topping up? In a recent so‐called Free Municipality Scheme (an experimental scheme that allowed for greater operational autonomy locally in an effort to reduce state bureaucracy), a number of Danish municipalities were for the first time ever allowed to compete with for‐profit providers of home care in selling supplemental home care services paid entirely by the user. The take‐home message from this experience is that the introduction of supplemental home care entails challenges and eventually wider implications for the public service model, on an economic, organisational and cultural level. Supplemental services represent a new and potentially powerful combination of market and state logics that eventually redirects away from the universalist welfare state and towards a new and increasingly privatised public service model – a model where the service level is determined by the user's capacity to purchase and pay for services. The introduction of such services therefore implies a change of the potential of the Nordic welfare state to ensure equal access regardless of class and income.

There is a long-standing Danish and Scandinavian tradition for free municipality experiments where municipalities are granted exemptions from legislation so that they can experiment with new welfare solutions. Despite a strong societal focus on the phenomenon, there is a need to qualify the governance doctrines decision makers can use to develop and evaluate free municipality experiments. Through an analysis of the idea behind free municipalities and the development and content of the Danish free municipality experiments, strengths and weakness are identified in the most relevant governance doctrines historically – bureaucracy, New Public Management and New Public Governance. However, this does not provide a full understanding of the innovative logic of the programs and the associated opportunities for governance. The article introduces an innovation doctrine as an additional management doctrine that can address the innovative logic and experimental behavior of political entrepreneurs at the local level and support policies and programs provided by the state.

Der er en lang dansk og nordisk tradition for frikommuneforsøg, hvor kommuner får undtagelser fra lovgivningen, så de kan eksperimentere med nye velfærdsløsninger. På trods af et stort samfundsmæssigt fokus på fænomenet er der er behov for at kvalificere de styringsdoktriner, som beslutningstagere kan bruge til at udvikle og evaluere frikommuneforsøg. Gennem en analyse af frikommuneidéen og de danske frikommuneforsøgs udvikling og indhold identificeres styrker og svagheder i de historisk mest centrale styringsdoktriner – bureaukrati, New Public Management og New Public Governance. Disse doktriner giver imidlertid ikke et fuldt dækkende grundlag for at forstå frikommuneforsøgenes innovative kerne og de styringsmuligheder, der knytter sig hertil. I artiklen introduceres derfor en supplerende innovationsdoktrin, der direkte kan adressere centrale elementer i innovationsprocesser centreret omkring entreprenørskab og spredning inden for en statslig rammesætning af lokale innovative eksperimenter.

There is a long-standing Danish and Scandinavian tradition for free municipality experiments where municipalities are granted exemptions from legislation so that they can experiment with new welfare solutions. Despite a strong societal focus on the phenomenon, there is a need to qualify the governance doctrines decision makers can use to develop and evaluate free municipality experiments. Through an analysis of the idea behind free municipalities and the development and content of the Danish free municipality experiments, strengths and weakness are identified in the most relevant governance doctrines historically – bureaucracy, New Public Management and New Public Governance. However, this does not provide a full understanding of the innovative logic of the programs and the associated opportunities for governance. The article introduces an innovation doctrine as an additional management doctrine that can address the innovative logic and experimental behavior of political entrepreneurs at the local level and support policies and programs provided by the state.

Kompleks evaluering er en type af evaluering, der som genstandsfelt har sammensatte og bredspektrede indsatser, hvor det er vanskeligt på en entydig måde at sammenfatte, hvad der kommer ud af indsatserne – i artiklen betegnet som en evaluering af "wicked problems".En central udfordring i denne type af evaluering er at finde troværdige indikatorer for indsat-sernes virkning. Artiklen tager denne udfordring op ved at se nærmere på en evaluering af en kompleks case, der drejer sig om opsøgende sociale og sundhedsmæssige indsatser over for socialt udsatte borgere, og som har forsøgt at opgøre virkningen af indsatsen ud fra en overve-jende surveybaseret tilgang.På baggrund af evalueringen peges der på tre evalueringsmæssige læringspunkter i kompleks evaluering: behovet for et kompleksitetsreducerende evalueringsdesign, behovet for validerede måleinstrumenter og værdien af en kritisk dimension i denne type af evaluering.

Vi undersøger sammenhængen mellem et lokalpolitisk systems størrelse og demokratiets tilstand i systemet ved at anvende kommunesammenlægningerne i 2007 som et kvasi-eksperiment. Studiet ligger i forlængelse af en række nylige studier, som har brugt samme tilgang, og artiklen yder to bidrag hertil: For det første undersøger vi et bredt sæt af dimensioner i lokaldemokratiets tilstand. For det andet undersøger vi de kortsigtede konsekvenser af stigningerne i kommunestørrelse skabt af sammenlægningerne (to år efter) og de mere langsigtede konsekvenser (seks år efter) om end disse resultater skal tages med forbehold. Vores analyser viser, at borgernes vurdering af deres lokaldemokrati generelt er meget robust over for ændringer i kommunestørrelsen, og kun på få dimensioner finder vi belæg for systematiske ændringer på kortere og lidt længere sigt.

We examine the relationship between the size of a local political system and the state of the local democracy in the system, using the 2007 Danish municipal mergers as a quasi-experiment. Our study is informed by a number of recent studies that use the same approach. We make two contributions to this literature: We examine a broad set of dimensions in the state of the local democracy, and we examine both the short-term consequences (two years after their implementation) and the more long-term consequences (six years after) of the increases in municipal size created by the mergers, although the latter results should be interpreted cautiously. Our analyses show that citizens' assessments of their local democracy are very robust to changes in municipal size and only on a few dimensions do we find supporting evidence for systematic changes in the short term and the longer term.

We examine the relationship between the size of a local political system and the state of the local democracy in the system, using the 2007 Danish municipal mergers as a quasi-experiment. Our study is informed by a number of recent studies that use the same approach. We make two contributions to this literature: We examine a broad set of dimensions in the state of the local democracy, and we examine both the short-term consequences (two years after their implementation) and the more long-term consequences (six years after) of the increases in municipal size created by the mergers, although the latter results should be interpreted cautiously. Our analyses show that citizens' assessments of their local democracy are very robust to changes in municipal size and only on a few dimensions do we find supporting evidence for systematic changes in the short term and the longer term.

Scandinavian welfare states are undergoing a gradual transformation towards a more market-based mode of public service delivery. The results of these marketization reforms are, however, insufficiently documented in terms of their consequences for the price and quality of welfare services. This article presents the findings of a systematic review of Danish and Swedish experiences with private provision of welfare services within three areas: home care for the elderly, provision of child care, and the operation of nursing homes. The research shows that there is no general evidence in support of improved cost effectiveness or enhanced service quality within these three welfare areas. A part of the reason for this is that many studies are characterized by lack of data and insufficient methodological designs. The article concludes that more and better studies are needed in order to broaden the evidence base and inform future policy-making on marketization in general and within the welfare areas in particular.