World Views (world + views)

Distribution by Scientific Domains


Selected Abstracts


Evaluating e-government: learning from the experiences of two UK local authorities

INFORMATION SYSTEMS JOURNAL, Issue 1 2005
Zahir Irani
Abstract. Part of the remit of public sector management includes planning and reflecting on capital expenditure on new technology. With this in mind, the role that information systems play in supporting improvements in e-government service delivery to stakeholder groups continues to attract much attention. The authors of this paper seek to define the scope and role that information systems evaluation plays within the public sector. In particular, the authors assess whether public sector organizations might benefit from the use of established ex-ante evaluation techniques, when applied to analyse the impact of e-government information systems. Following a comprehensive review of the normative literature, an initial conceptual framework for public sector information systems evaluation is proposed, which is then empirically explored within two local government authorities. The conceptual framework is then revised by using the structured case approach, which is dependent on an iterative research cycle where triangulated data are elicited. This then supports the emergence of new concepts during each research cycle that leads to the view that information systems evaluation in the public sector is a process of experiential and subjective judgement, which is grounded in opinion and world views. This leads the authors to challenge the appropriateness of traditional modes of investment appraisal when applied in the public sector. The finalized framework embraces investment decisions, evaluation methods, culture and structure, as well as post hoc evaluation. It emphasizes the importance of situated, interpretive user assessments in evaluating e-government investments. [source]


Living and Teaching Across Cultures

INTERNATIONAL STUDIES PERSPECTIVES, Issue 2 2001
Raymond Cohen
As long as one lives within the confines of a single culture it is difficult to achieve cross-cultural awareness. Multiculturalism is often simply the tolerance of a dominant culture for minority cultures. Cross-cultural awareness is a state of mind in which one is alert to alternity, the existence of others possessing different and equally valid world views and ways of life. This can be acquired living within or alongside other cultures, when one's own and others' strangeness become readily apparent. Culture shock involves just such a realization. The challenge for the teacher of international relations is to convey the possibility of alternity to students in the classroom. After all, international relations is above all about the interaction between communities possessing separate identities and autonomous wills. The article discusses ways of cultivating cross-cultural awareness, comparing the difficulties of doing so in a society under siege,Israel,with the greater scope available in the cosmopolitan setting of an elite American university. [source]


Seizing possibilities for positive family caregiving in nursing homes

JOURNAL OF CLINICAL NURSING, Issue 8 2007
Ursula Kellett PhD
Aims., This paper explores the ways family members reconstruct meaning through seizing possibilities for positive caregiving in nursing homes. Background., The importance of the ability of family caregivers to adapt and accommodate has been well documented in international family caregiving research. Through engagement in caregiving activities, families learn to modify, adapt and accommodate to changes in their situation and relationships. The support family caregivers experience in learning to accommodate change is crucial in enabling them to reconstruct positive aspects of caregiving in a long-term aged care context. Method., In this study, a hermeneutic phenomenological approach was adopted informed by the philosophical world views of Heidegger and Gadamer. Data collected by in-depth interviews and participant observations, from a purposeful sample of 14 family caregivers, underwent hermeneutic analysis. Results., Five shared meanings associated with seizing possibilities for positive caregiving were revealed: accommodating new and different ways of caring; feeling a part of the nursing home community; seeing the whole picture; learning to care in stress-reducing ways and learning to seize possibilities for self. Conclusion., This paper illustrates how families, through caregiving experience in nursing homes, learn to become active managers, negotiating, accommodating and redeveloping a sense of future viewed with hope, strength and positive anticipation. Relevance to clinical practice., By highlighting what is attributed significance by families, a critical examination of the difficult issues which obstruct the development of meaningful partnerships among nurses, family and their relatives is facilitated. In particular, an examination of tensions at an ideological level supports the need for future research to focus its efforts on examining the ways of implementing nursing care that facilitates partnerships that incorporate and build upon positive and equal relations among staff, families and residents in the context of the nursing home setting. [source]


The power of partnership to shape the future of nursing: the evolution of the clinical nurse leader

JOURNAL OF NURSING MANAGEMENT, Issue 5 2008
FAAN, FACHE, JOLENE TORNABENI MA
Aim(s), This article describes the evolution of the clinical nurse leader role and demonstrates the vital nature of partnerships between academia and practice in the design and implementation of this new role. Background, The health care system as it exists in the United States may put patients at risk in terms of safety and quality of care. Nursing leadership from across the US recognized a need for nursing practice and academia to work in partnership to develop workable and effective solutions. The vision was of a nurse generalist who would be prepared to address the complexities that make the current systems dysfunctional. Evaluation, Review, share experiences and discuss the benefits of engaging stakeholders with broad and diverse viewpoints. Key issues, Engaging a group of stakeholders with diverse backgrounds, varied world views and experiences for the purpose of developing common mutually beneficial goals, creates synergy and greater commitment to the goals, which results in success. Conclusion(s), The power of partnership in the development and implementation of the CNL is evident. Old ways of trying to ,go it alone' are no longer viable in a complex health care environment. Implications for nursing management, With continued collaboration, practice and academia can continue to confront challenges and develop effective solutions. [source]


A view of nursing epistemology through reciprocal interdependence: towards a reflexive way of knowing

NURSING PHILOSOPHY, Issue 2 2007
Nicole Y. Pitre rn bscnmnphd (provisional candidate)
Abstract, The discipline of nursing has experienced the movement from modernism to postmodernism through expressions ranging from dualistic and polarized discourse to contradicting pluralistic positions. For the purpose of this paper, these responses are described as ways of knowing and are examined for their impact on the evolution of the nursing discipline. Reciprocal interdependence is offered as an alternate way of knowing capable of incorporating differing world views into a coherent and comprehensive systemic whole. The reflexive and potentially transformational impact of reciprocal interdependence on the advancement of nursing knowledge is reviewed through a discussion of the value of polarity, as well as the contribution of complementary and dialectical perspectives to the maintenance of interactions between the whole and its constituents. [source]


Promotion of the Good Life by Public Health Nurses

PUBLIC HEALTH NURSING, Issue 6 2001
Leena M. Uosukainen Lic.
The question of what is the good life has been discussed by philosophers since antiquity. The good of an individual and of a community is complicated. Communities influence an individual's experiences and world views, which are always individual. Public health nurses promoting the good life need multidisciplinary knowledge, as well as other skills such as personal competence and qualifications. The focus of the theoretical framework of promotion of the good life is based on models of health promotion and sustainable development. Working with different clients requires nursing theories, other theories, and multidisciplinary models in practice. Continual quality improvement is needed in order to increase customer satisfaction. This article discusses a doctoral thesis that consists of three empirical studies. The theoretical framework for promotion of the good life as the work of public health nurses is outlined, and the outcomes of the first study, the qualifications concerning health, and the environment are described. In the other parts of the study, curriculum building using future methodology and evaluation with concept maps is reported. [source]


Structures of feeling and socio-cultural formations: the significance of literature and experience to Raymond Williams's sociology of culture

THE BRITISH JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY, Issue 2 2003
Paul Filmer
ABSTRACT Williams elaborates the concept of structures of feeling in different ways at important points in his writings. This gives it a particular methodological significance in relating the extraordinariness of imaginative literature to the ordinariness of cultural process. It is employed particularly to show the significance of literature for the articulation of alternatives to dominant world views, and thus to the politics of social change. Williams's different formulations of the concept are discussed in terms of their ways of relating reflexive experience to institutional structures and in relation to the genetic structuralism of Goldmann and Bourdieu's concepts of habitus and cultural field. Three types of criticisms are considered, which have in common the contention that the concept is unclear. Operationalized in analysing literature and its symbols, it can contribute towards clarification of the complexity of the processes of reflexive communication of experience which are at the root of social order and change. [source]