Course Description In this course, we will explore the question of the actual and potential connections between democracy and education. Our focus of attention will be placed on a critical examination of democratic theory and its implications for the civic education roles and contributions of teachers, adult educators, community development practitioners, and community organizers. We will survey and deal critically with a range of competing conceptions of democracy, variously described as classical, republican, liberal, radical, marxist, neomarxist, pragmatist, feminist, populist, pluralist, postmodern, and/or participatory. Using narrative inquiry as a means for illuminating and interpreting contemporary practice, we will analyze the implications of different conceptions of democracy for the practical work of civic education.

Democracy and education.

The Social Psychology of Organizations.

How have Japanese companies become world leaders in the automotive and electronics industries, among others? What is the secret of their success? Two leading Japanese business experts, Ikujiro Nonaka and Hirotaka Takeuchi, are the first to tie the success of Japanese companies to their ability to create new knowledge and use it to produce successful products and technologies. In The Knowledge-Creating Company, Nonaka and Takeuchi provide an inside look at how Japanese companies go about creating this new knowledge organizationally. The authors point out that there are two types of knowledge: explicit knowledge, contained in manuals and procedures, and tacit knowledge, learned only by experience, and communicated only indirectly, through metaphor and analogy. U.S. managers focus on explicit knowledge. The Japanese, on the other hand, focus on tacit knowledge. And this, the authors argue, is the key to their success--the Japanese have learned how to transform tacit into explicit knowledge. To explain how this is done--and illuminate Japanese business practices as they do so--the authors range from Greek philosophy to Zen Buddhism, from classical economists to modern management gurus, illustrating the theory of organizational knowledge creation with case studies drawn from such firms as Honda, Canon, Matsushita, NEC, Nissan, 3M, GE, and even the U.S. Marines. For instance, using Matsushita's development of the Home Bakery (the world's first fully automated bread-baking machine for home use), they show how tacit knowledge can be converted to explicit knowledge: when the designers couldn't perfect the dough kneading mechanism, a software programmer apprenticed herself withthe master baker at Osaka International Hotel, gained a tacit understanding of kneading, and then conveyed this information to the engineers. In addition, the authors show that, to create knowledge, the best management style is neither top-down nor bottom-up, but rather what they call "middle-up-down," in which the middle managers form a bridge between the ideals of top management and the chaotic realities of the frontline. As we make the turn into the 21st century, a new society is emerging. Peter Drucker calls it the "knowledge society," one that is drastically different from the "industrial society," and one in which acquiring and applying knowledge will become key competitive factors. Nonaka and Takeuchi go a step further, arguing that creating knowledge will become the key to sustaining a competitive advantage in the future. Because the competitive environment and customer preferences changes constantly, knowledge perishes quickly. With The Knowledge-Creating Company, managers have at their fingertips years of insight from Japanese firms that reveal how to create knowledge continuously, and how to exploit it to make successful new products, services, and systems.

The knowledge-creating company

What makes organizations so similar? We contend that the engine of rationalization and bureaucratization has moved from the competitive marketplace to the state and the professions. Once a set of organizations emerges as a field, a paradox arises: rational actors make their organizations increasingly similar as they try to change them. We describe three isomorphic processes-coercive, mimetic, and normative—leading to this outcome. We then specify hypotheses about the impact of resource centralization and dependency, goal ambiguity and technical uncertainty, and professionalization and structuration on isomorphic change. Finally, we suggest implications for theories of organizations and social change.

The iron cage revisited: Institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organizational fields (Chinese Translation)

Critical thinking (CT), or the ability to engage in purposeful, self-regulatory judgment, is widely recognized as an important, even essential, skill. This article describes an ongoing meta-analysis that summarizes the available empirical evidence on the impact of instruction on the development and enhancement of critical thinking skills and dispositions. We found 117 studies based on 20,698 participants, which yielded 161 effects with an average effect size (g+) of 0.341 and a standard deviation of 0.610. The distribution was highly heterogeneous (QT = 1,767.86, p < .001). There was, however, little variation due to research design, so we neither separated studies according to their methodological quality nor used any statistical adjustment for the corresponding effect sizes. Type of CT intervention and pedagogical grounding were substantially related to fluctuations in CT effects sizes, together accounting for 32% of the variance. These findings make it clear that improvement in students’ CT skills and ...

Instructional Interventions Affecting Critical Thinking Skills and Dispositions: A Stage 1 Meta-Analysis

Focuses on the emergence of human resource development. Traces the emergence of HRD in the training and development literature. Also examines the extent to which a strategic approach to training and development is practised in industry. Concludes by examining the implications of a move towards a more strategic approach to training and development.

The emergence of strategic human resource development

Reviews the state of current HRD literature in terms of definitional issues, alternative models, dominant justifications and biases. Articulates the view that the literature is fragmented, multifaceted, and reflects a diverse range of perspectives and models.

Human resource development literature: current issues, priorities and dilemmas

A considerable body of research exists on corporate social responsibility (CSR) and corporate sustainability (CS). However, there is significantly less on the influence of employees on the adoption of CSR and CS initiatives. Given the centrality of employees as stakeholders in CSR/CS adoption, it is important to understand how barriers at individual, organizational, and institutional levels of analysis influence the adoption of CSR/CS initiatives. An understanding of these barriers will illuminate the potential contribution of human resource development (HRD) to their removal. HRD has a major role to play in changing employee behavior and organizational values and there are significant affinities between HRD and CSR/CS concerning behavior and change. This article discusses a typology of HRD interventions that may be used to address barriers to the implementation of CSR/CS initiatives.

Conceptualizing the Behavioral Barriers to CSR and CS in Organizations: A Typology of HRD Interventions

Focuses on the line manager as a key stakeholder in the human resource development process. Considers the general trend towards devolvement of human resource activities to line specialists. Examines issues involved in devolving training and development to the line, with specific emphasis on the potential difficulties. Recent empirical evidence is represented. Concludes that the shape of things to come, at least for the foreseeable future, will be a sharing of responsibilities between the specialist and the line.

Line managers and human resource development

Expatriate assignees represent a critical node in most international organizations' networks, and exploring and documenting the experiences of these assignees is important from both the organizational and individual perspective. Subsumed under the theme “International Assignments and Global Careers,” this special issue of Thunderbird International Business Review brings together a complement of selected papers originally presented at the Seventh Conference on International Human Resource Management hosted at the University of Limerick in June 2003. This introduction briefly explores the contemporary context and rationale for the international assignment in order to frame and position the subsequent contributions, which deal with, among other things, knowledge transfer, recruitment, staffing, competencies, and structural specificities in international assignments and global careers. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Noreen Heraty

Papers

The emergence of strategic human resource development

Human resource development literature: current issues, priorities and dilemmas

Conceptualizing the Behavioral Barriers to CSR and CS in Organizations: A Typology of HRD Interventions

Line managers and human resource development

International assignments and global careers