1,720,993 research outputs found
Metodi qualitativi e valutazione delle politiche. Lo studio dei meccanismi causali con il process tracing
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Teaching policymaking with games. Introduction to the special issue
No full textUnderstanding how policy decisions are made is a vital skill for students and practitioners in public administration. Yet policymaking remains a complex, dynamic, and often opaque process—where ideas compete, interests clash, and change is hard-won. This special issue examines how digital serious games can teach policymaking in a manner that is both theoretically grounded and experientially rich. This introductory article addresses the unique challenges of teaching policymaking—a subject that lies at the intersection of the technical and procedural aspects of public administration and the conceptual focus of policy process theories. Teaching policymaking carries both practical and democratic value. It helps students develop strategic agency by learning how actors frame problems, build coalitions, overcome opposition, and design pathways to policy reform. At the same time, it fosters democratic competence by encouraging students to recognise the pluralistic nature of public decisions, understand power asymmetries, and resist simplistic or populist narratives. The article also argues that addressing complex policy problems requires not only sound evidence but also knowledge of policymaking, i.e. a deep understanding of how evidence is framed, contested, and mobilised within the policy process. The introductory article discusses how serious games can effectively integrate these dimensions into the classroom. By simulating real-world dynamics, games allow students to experience policymaking first-hand. This experiential approach fosters critical thinking, soft skills, and a realistic understanding of the complexity of policy decisions. The articles in this special issue expand on these themes, presenting insights from the use of the P-CUBE digital game across diverse policy fields, including social inclusion, scientific decision-making, and urban policy, and offering practical guidance on game design, classroom strategies, and learning outcomes
Focus on the finger, overlook the moon: the introduction of performance management in the administration of Italian universities
No full textThis article investigates management systems in higher education organisations by analysing the 2009 Italian reform of performance management and its implementation within Italian universities. The research is based on a survey that covered about half of Italy’s public universities. Survey results provide an account of the state of management systems of Italian universities, confirming the assumption of their relative backwardness and the importance of specific preconditions (efficient organisation and effective control systems) for a good system of performance evaluation
From cyber security incident management to cyber security crisis management in the European Union
No full textIncident management is a classical topic in cyber security. Recently, the European Union (EU) has started to consider also the relation between cyber security incidents and cyber security crises. These considerations and preparations, including those specified in the EU's new cyber security laws, constitute the paper's topic. According to an analysis of the laws and associated policy documents, (i) cyber security crises are equated in the EU to large-scale cyber security incidents that either exceed a handling capacity of a single member state or affect at least two member states. For this and other purposes, (ii) the new laws substantially increase mandatory reporting about cyber security incidents, including but not limited to the large-scale incidents. Despite the laws and new governance bodies established by them, however, (iii) the working of actual cyber security crisis management remains unclear particularly at the EU-level. With these policy research results, the paper advances the domain of cyber security incident management research by elaborating how European law perceives cyber security crises and their relation to cyber security incidents, paving the way for many relevant further research topics with practical relevance, whether theoretical, conceptual, or empirical
Noise at the street level: revealing unwanted variability in seismic safety
No full textStreet-level bureaucrats play a crucial role in translating policy statutes into services to citizens, but their discretion can have positive and negative impacts. This article examines noise–unwanted variability in decisions regarding identical cases. We conducted an experimental test with public officials managing seismic authorizations and analysed a database of all seismic audits performed between 2015 and 2020 in one Italian region (N = 17,463). The findings reveal substantial inconsistencies in seismic classification, the decision to grant building permits, administrative burdens, and the request for building changes. These findings have implications for the analysis of discretion, bias, and implementation. The conclusions explore strategies for reducing noise
The mechanisms of food waste prevention: Theory, design, and practice for changing behaviours
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