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In recent years, the concept of subculture has been fiercely criticized, with some scholars even claiming that it is no longer relevant in a multi-cultural world (Muggleton, 2000; Chaney, 2004; Stahl, 2004). However, the authors argue that by revisiting the Chicago School tradition and reconceptualizing subculture on the basis of acknowledging its limitations and its potential, subculture theory remains applicable in the context of contemporary China. Through an eight-month ethnographic study of a group of deviant students in a secondary school in urban China, the purpose of this paper is to contend that the subculture of these young people from lower-class backgrounds is a means to negotiate their space and power in a failing school system situated in a drastically transforming society full of diversified yet often conflicting values.

In this study, the authors undertook an ethnographic study to follow a group of deviant students for eight months, trying to understand their everyday lives and the process of their identity construction. The research was conducted in Xiamen, a coastal city located in the southeast part of mainland China. Unlike large metropolitan areas such as Beijing and Shanghai, where most studies have been conducted so far, Xiamen represents one of the medium-sized cities, which are the majority in China. After a process of sampling among 11 classes from five schools in different tiers, the authors chose one class in Grade 2 at a medium-level secondary school called “Central Park Secondary School” as a pseudonym. The authors stayed in the field for the main study and the authors also paid another visit to the school to follow up on students’ recent development.

In this study, a group of problem students identified with each other and shared the same problems and situations, and collectively formed a subcultural group, from within which they could challenge the authority of teachers and parents and negotiate power in the school; for example, reaching a truce with teachers so that they could have an easier time at school until they graduated. Their subculture and resistance may seem like a self-defeating practice, because what they learned at school and the qualifications they obtained could only assure them laboring jobs and reproduce their lower class status. However, this subculture offered an alternative way to safeguard their happiness and healthy development, which in this case is psychological well-being and better interpersonal skills.

This paper could provide the teachers and school administrators with a new perspective to look at some of their students’ poor performance and disruptive behaviors. With a deeper understanding of their “deviant” students, the teachers may develop more pertinent measures to help their students.

This paper argues that, through revisiting the Chicago School tradition and reconceptualizing subculture on the basis of acknowledging its limitations and potential, subculture theory remains applicable in the context of contemporary China.

This chapter considers the usefulness and validity of public inquiries as a source of data and preliminary interpretation for case study research. Using two contrasting examples – the Bristol Inquiry into excess deaths in a children’s cardiac surgery unit and the Woolf Inquiry into a breakdown of governance at the London School of Economics (LSE) – I show how academics can draw fruitfully on, and develop further analysis from, the raw datasets, published summaries and formal judgements of public inquiries.

Academic analysis of public inquiries can take two broad forms, corresponding to the two main approaches to individual case study defined by Stake: instrumental (selecting the public inquiry on the basis of pre-defined theoretical features and using the material to develop and test theoretical propositions) and intrinsic (selecting the public inquiry on the basis of the particular topic addressed and using the material to explore questions about what was going on and why).

The advantages of a public inquiry as a data source for case study research typically include a clear and uncontested focus of inquiry; the breadth and richness of the dataset collected; the exceptional level of support available for the tasks of transcribing, indexing, collating, summarising and so on; and the expert interpretations and insights of the inquiry’s chair (with which the researcher may or may not agree). A significant disadvantage is that whilst the dataset collected for a public inquiry is typically ‘rich’, it has usually been collected under far from ideal research conditions. Hence, while public inquiries provide a potentially rich resource for researchers, those who seek to use public inquiry data for research must justify their choice on both ethical and scientific grounds.

In this chapter, we “occupy the earth” with an overview of the anti-fracking discourse(s) of diverse local initiatives converging as a global movement opposed to fracking. By mapping the discourse(s) of the anti-fracking movement, the articulation of the problems and solutions associated with fracking raise questions not only about the environment but draw attention to a crisis of democracy and the critical need for social and environmental justice. With the help of a multiple theoretical framework we draw on insights about environmental movements and their democratizing potential; conceptualizations about power and (counter) discourse; and depictions of the environmental justice movements in the United States. Toward this end, we analyze the framing of the anti-fracking movement: the many local voices engaging in political struggles to sustain their communities, places and ways of life, and the global movements’ forum for collective solidarity, recognition, and civic action. Shedding light on the multiple frames employed by movement members, we discuss the implications and potential embodied in this widening debate.

The purpose of this paper is to argue that if the authors want to understand the role of heaviness, space and journey in innovation, the authors have to start with the interaction itself, that is the exchange process taking place between economic actors. Three major aspects will be considered: the first is that heaviness, space and journey imply restrictions, the second is that these aspects can be positively utilised in innovation processes, and the third is their joint importance to contemporary policy. All innovation processes must bypass and build on existing investments in social and material resources, related across time and space.

The theoretical foundation is a basic IMP observation: exchange has a content. Exchange is captured as an interaction process that creates specific imprints on material and social resources involved – across firm boundaries, and across time and space. The methodology is a consequence of the research question and the theoretical point of departure and is based on three earlier IMP studies, where heaviness has been measured in different ways. The authors utilize two earlier presented case studies to focus on the heaviness, space and journey dimensions.

Three main aspects are discussed: the first aspect concerns the need for utilisation of others heaviness in order for the innovation to gain heaviness in itself. The second aspect concerns the consequences that the search for heaviness has for the creation of an innovation space. The third aspect concerns the innovation journey; the specific interaction patterns between significant actors as well as places hosting heavy using, producing and developing activities created through interactions over time.

In order to change or to establish a new economic exchange interface, there is an urgent need to be aware of and utilise heaviness, to find out in what way existing investments made in related interfaces can be taken advantage of. In order to do that, there is a need for a better understanding of the function of heaviness, spatial and journey aspects included.

In contemporary policy, certain heaviness is recognised, however, only in a non-business developing setting. The first conclusion is that heaviness of established producing and using settings is a policy blind spot. This implies that analytical policy approaches are not equipped for recognitions or of estimations of heaviness, nor as a hindrance or as a possibility in producing and using settings. The second conclusion is that the policy definition of the role of place implies neglecting the innovation space. The third conclusion is that there is a need for policy to recognise the innovation journey and its consequences.

If the policy is expected to have regional effects, policy analysis has to start out from the established heaviness of the region and consider how it can be taken advantage of.

The paper draws attention to an aspect neglected in policy attempts to boost innovation, that the mobilising support has to come from actors representing heavy producing and using networks – and that these already have space and journey characteristics. A peripheral actor can come up with a suggestion for change – but it cannot alone mobilise the resources necessary for an innovation to get a space and journey in relation to established resource constellations.

The North West Change Centre at Manchester Business School has been developing collaborative programmes aimed at public sector middle managers. Evaluation recently completed, using follow‐up interviews, studied the affect of the programmes on individuals, their organisation and their work intra‐organisationally. Reference is made to management theories on strategic alignment and cultural change. The results suggest that middle managers have been highly satisfied resulting in changed attitudes, greater confidence and worked‐through project ideas being developed. However, a sense of being “out of alignment” with their organisation remains manifested in poor support for inter‐agency working. A model of strategic alignment between middle and senior managers is demonstrated which illustrates the affects of strong and weak alignment and the implications for implementing modernised services. Recommendations are made on contextualising change, how managerial signalling can be improved, how pathways to changed organisational systems can be identified and how barriers to change can be overcome.

A college lecturer looks at the delicate problem of the relations between the training boards and the colleges.

It is common that junior researchers struggle in finding their own way of doing research. The purpose of this paper is therefore to use the theory of “Muddling through” in order to theorize about the junior vs senior researcher collaboration process.

The theory of “Muddling through” is used in order to reflect on the qualities of shared collaboration between a junior and senior research colleague.

The research process share the characteristics of policy making where goals many times are fuzzy, and the relationship between means to end is far from self-evident. The research process therefore demands from the senior colleague to act firm, fair and friendly in order to support and inspire junior research colleagues.

It is a personalized single case study; still it provides advice for both junior and senior research colleagues that are in the process of research collaboration.

Junior colleagues need to have the courage of actively suggesting research topics to senior colleagues; they also need to actively reflect on the quality of their shared research collaboration process.

The study provides the research community with a sensemaking example of coaching, inspiration and mentoring in the research collaboration process.

To combat climate change, protect biodiversity, maintain water quality, facilitate a just transition for workers and engage citizens and communities, a diversity of stakeholders across multiple levels work together and collaborate to co-create mutually beneficial solutions. This paper aims to illustrate how a 7.5-year collaboration between local communities, researchers, academics, companies, state agencies and policymakers is contributing to the reframing of industrial harvested peatlands to regenerative ecosystems and carbon sinks with impacts on ecological, economic, social and cultural systems.

The European Union LIFE Integrated Project, Peatlands and People, responding to Ireland’s Climate Action Plan, represents Europe’s largest rehabilitation of industrially harvested peatlands. It makes extensive use of marketing research for reframing strategies and actions by partners, collaborators and communities in the evolving context of a just transition to a carbon-neutral future.

The results highlight the ecological, economic, social and cultural reframing of peatlands from fossil fuel and waste lands to regenerative ecosystems bursting with biodiversity and climate solution opportunities. Reframing impacts requires muddling through the ebbs and flows of planned, possible and unanticipated change that can deliver benefits for peatlands and people over time.

At 3 of 7.5 years into a project, the authors are muddling through how ecological reframing impacts economic and social/cultural reframing. Further impacts, planned and unplanned, can be expected.

This paper shows how an impact planning canvas tool and impact taxonomy can be applied for social and systems change. The tools can be used throughout a project to understand, respond to and manage for unplanned events. There is constant learning, constantly going back to the impact planning canvas and checking where we are, what is needed. There is action and reaction to each other and to the diversity of stakeholders affected and being affected by the reframing work.

This paper considers how systemic change through ecological, economic, social and cultural reframing is a perfectly imperfect process of muddling through which holds the promise of environmental, economic, technological, political, social and educational impacts to benefit nature, individuals, communities, organisations and society.

This article reports on program based performance budgeting in Florida and examines the process by which it became a reality, the problems to be expected in implementation, and the history of earlier reform efforts. Florida has a long history of failed budgetary reforms. The question is whether that unfailing series of failures will be continued or overcome. The answer lies with future legislative leadership.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss different approaches to evaluation taken in the case of two regeneration programmes in England and Wales and identify how assumptions about the nature of policy and programme implementation affect evaluation and considerations of its use in the public sector.

Using an analysis of evaluation reports relating to two regeneration programmes, a distinction is drawn between two approaches to evaluation. This distinction is then articulated further with reference to differing perspectives in policy implementation studies. Related issues of policy and programme success and failure are discussed, in addition to the potential for policy learning.

There is a difference between the two approaches to evaluation employed in the two cases, which is likely to reflect contrasting beliefs about the nature and process of implementation. Implementation research indicates that while a process of evaluating progress against a set of specific objectives clearly has legitimacy in a public sector environment, it is likely to be inconclusive or even counterproductive. This is due to the inevitability of policy evolution, the multiple reformations of policy at the micro level, and the constraints engendered by norms of appropriacy in the wider policy environment.

This article suggests how ongoing debates in implementation studies can inform and illuminate decisions made about approaches to evaluation. The dynamic between conceptions of implementation and the purpose of evaluation is illustrated through a comparison of the use of evaluation in two regeneration programmes.