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This paper reports on the development of an educational programme of work that is a collaboration between nursing educationalists and service users. Attention is given to the philosophical dimension of the work. The project is considered in the light of four related components that formed the basis of the enterprise, namely: philosophy, organisation, research and teaching (PORT). The perceptions of those who have participated in the project are commented upon. It is argued that in order to achieve social and mediation change within this educational setting, evidence of the mutual acceptance and understanding of difference has to be present. This can establish common ground between philosophical approaches. These approaches emerge from practice, from how people interact with each other, and not the other way around.

Service user involvement is called for at every level of NHS delivery in the United Kingdom (UK). This article describes a model of service user participation in the development of mental health nurse curricula in a UK university. Using a research model of participatory action research, the Participation In Nurse Education (PINE) project has now become mainstream in the mental health branches at the university. Service users led the design and implementation of the teaching sessions and led the data collection and analysis. Research participants were the service user trainers and the student nurses who were involved in being taught in the early stages of the project. The benefits of the work to both trainers and students are identified as well as some of the difficulties.

The purpose of this paper is to review action research approaches to changing practice through reflection, identifying themes, issues and questions relevant to a broader community of research practitioners. It invites additional layering in concept, enactment and account.

A framework for considering interwoven dimensions of action research as first‐, second‐ and third‐person inquiry is presented. The paper then works through stories to explore the complementarities of action research with other genres of research, addressing developments of practice through reflection. Questions of general relevance are identified.

Action research is a richly diverse range of approaches having much in common with a broader community who seek to develop embodied practice and practical knowing, work in collaboration, respect multiple ways of knowing, and influence change in social systems. Frames, approaches, practices and questions from action research can be applied more generally. The paper articulates a profusion of questions. These include inviting attention to researchers' reflective practices, to different ways of exploring issues of power, and to questioning (organizational) contexts in which interventions are set.

Practices of inquiry and intervention for social and organizational change are explored. Attention is drawn to issues of power and how they might affect action with a participatory intent. Ways of developing understandings and enactments are offered.

This paper offers a companion language and set of practices from which to view other genres of research/intervention interested in developing practice through reflection.

On many occasions, organizational science research has been referred to as fragmented and disjointed, resulting in a literature that is, in the opinion of many, difficult to navigate and comprehend. One potential explanation is that scholars have failed to comprehend that organizations are complex and intricate systems. In order to move us past this morass, we recommend that researchers extend beyond traditional rational, mechanistic, and variable-centered approaches to research and integrate a more advantageous pattern-oriented approach within their research program. Pattern-oriented methods approximate real-life phenomena by adopting a holistic, integrative approach to research wherein individual- and organizational-systems are viewed as non-decomposable organized wholes. We argue that the pattern-oriented approach has the potential to overcome a number of breakdowns faced by alternate approaches, while offering a novel and more representative lens from which to view organizational- and HRM-related issues. The proposed incorporation of the pattern-oriented approach is framed within a review and evaluation of current approaches to organizational research and is supplemented with a discussion of methodological and theoretical implications as well as potential applications of the pattern-oriented approach.

Communications regarding this column should be addressed to Mrs. Cheney, Peabody Library School, Nashville, Term. 37203. Mrs. Cheney does not sell the books listed here. They are available through normal trade sources. Mrs. Cheney, being a member of the editorial board of Pierian Press, will not review Pierian Press reference books in this column. Descriptions of Pierian Press reference books will be included elsewhere in this publication.

The manager who moves from manufacturing to services or the professor who wishes to research and teach service operations must recognise the key differences for developing an appropriate operations management strategy in a service business. For this process to be successful, the operations manager must participate assertively in the strategy debate. In manufacturing it is important that the functional strategy supports the corporate strategy in the marketplace and is co‐ordinated with other functional strategies. There is sufficient buffering between the manufacturing system and the customer that functional strategies can be developed within corporate strategies and then be co‐ordinated. In services, however, there are many issues where co‐ordination is not an adequate response. Virtually all strategic issues involving customer contact and front‐office operations must be the result of joint decision making involving marketing, operations, finance, and human resources. What little buffering there is occurs between the front office and the back room. This interface then becomes the locus for interfunctional co‐ordination on strategic issues. Consequently, planning for the front‐office operation differs in many ways from the manufacturing strategy development, while the back‐room strategy differs little from the manufacturing strategy model. This article outlines and contrasts the processes for both manufacturing and services, paralleling the models of Wheelwright and Hayes and Hill. The observed process differences have major implications for both teaching and research in service operations. The new and interesting issues are predominantly interfunctional and, given the intellectual backgrounds of the various functional areas, interdisciplinary.

The purpose of this paper is to address issues of corruption and governance for international humanitarian organisations (such as Red Cross, Greenpeace, the Salvation Army, and Médecins Sans Frontières). Any such corruption may be both an issue of governance within an organisation as well as an external issue, such as political corruption, with which such organisations must deal in relationships with stakeholders.

The analysis is derived from annual reports, news reports, and published articles.

A moral basis for operations is based on analysis, information, measuring and reporting.

In‐depth investigations of the ethical performance of humanitarian organisations are required.

The paper addresses issues of analyses of problems, the measurement of effectiveness, the moral dilemmas incurred by aid agencies, and offers some suggestions for improvement.

Transparency would encourage greater contributions to the important work undertaken by these organisations.

The moral obligations of humanitarian organisations are usually assessed in terms of their social impacts. This paper suggests that their future viability may also rest on their ability to demonstrate an ethical approach to their operations.

Alvin Hansen and John Williams’ Fiscal Policy Seminar at Harvard University is widely regarded as a key mechanism for the spread of Keynesianism in the United States. An original and regular participant, Richard A. Musgrave was invited to prepare remarks for the fiftieth anniversary of the seminar in 1988. These were never published, though a copy was filed with Musgrave’s papers at Princeton University. Their reproduction here is important for several reasons. First, it is one of the last reminiscences of the original participants. Second, the remarks make an important contribution to our understanding of the Harvard School of macro-fiscal policy. Third, the remarks provide interesting insights into Musgrave’s views on national economic policymaking as well as the intersection between theory and practice. The reminiscence demonstrates the importance of the seminar in shifting Musgrave’s research focus and moving him to a more pragmatic approach to public finance.

In the 1950s, a combination of technological and scientific advancement, political competition, and changes in popular opinion about spaceflight generated public policy in favor of an aggressive space program. This and that of 1960s moved forward with a Moon landing and the necessary budgets. Space exploration reached equilibrium in the 1970s, sustained through to the present. The twenty-first-century progresses signals that support for human space exploration is waning and may even begin declining in the coming years. This chapter reviews this history and analyzes five rationales suggested in support of continued human spaceflight: discovery and understanding, national defense, economic competitiveness, human destiny, and geopolitics.