Sheldon Gen

Does “Main Street” Promote Sense of Community? A Comparison of San Francisco Neighborhoods

Creating “community” has long been a goal of urban planners. Although such rhetoric abounds in planning circles, what it all means is unclear. In this article, the authors review the community psychology and urban planning literature, defining sense of community within the context of how the built environment might facilitate or impede it. They then present their research, which tests the effects of “main street” on sense of community in four San Francisco neighborhoods. Results indicate that respondents in neighborhoods exhibiting characteristics of a main street town (Bernal Heights and West Portal) have significantly higher sense of community than do respondents from a high-density neighborhood (Nob Hill) and from a more suburban-style city neighborhood (Sunset).

Exploring the Determinants of Nonprofit Coproduction of Public Service Delivery The Case of k-12 Public Education

Americans have long formed nonprofits to voluntarily coproduce public services. However, demand perspectives on the development of the nonprofit sector and supply perspectives on the activation of civic engagement suggest potentially contradictory explanations of collective coproduction. Using the case of nonprofit support for public k-12 education, the authors explore the community- and school-level determinants of nonprofit coproduction of public education. Their findings suggest that nonprofit coproduction is influenced by unmet demand for public services and the supply of human and financial resources necessary to engage in collective action. Although the formation of a nonprofit to support a public school may be related to the demand generated by heterogeneous preferences of service beneficiaries and the human capital to self-organize, the ability to generate a significant level of financial resources to support coproduction is related to the resources of the service beneficiaries and their integration into the larger community.

Policy capacity is necessary but not sufficient: Comment on "Health reform requires policy capacity"

Policy capacity focuses on the managerial and organizational abilities to inform policy decisions with sound research and analysis, and facilitate policy implementation with operational efficiency. It stems from a view of the policy process that is rational and positivistic, in which optimal policy choices can be identified, selected, and implemented with objectivity. By itself, however, policy capacity neglects the political aspects of policy-making that can dominate the process, even in health policies. These technical capabilities are certainly needed to advance reforms in health policies, but they are not sufficient. Instead, they must be complemented with public engagement and policy advocacy to ensure support from the public that policies are meant to serve.