This paper examines the institutional history of the United States government's efforts from 1946 to 1950 to gather, rationalize, and communicate to private industry, in the creation of the Office of Technical Services (OTS), the wealth of information that had been generated by scientists during the Second World War. Noting that U.S. information…

A study examined the similarity or dissimilarity between the "New York Times'" editorial position on Iran and Iranian affairs and the official United States foreign policy towards Iran as reflected in the "Department of State Bulletin" for the period of 1968-1981. Each piece was categorized by major category and sub-category by…

A study examined reports of the American invasions of the Dominican Republic (1965) and Grenada (1983) to determine whether there were substantive differences in coverage as a result of differing journalistic conditions. First-day New York Times reports of both invasions were analyzed both quantitatively (number of stories published, amount of…

News reports regarding the relationship between Massachusetts Congressman Barney Frank and a male prostitute reflect a growing willingness to hold public officials responsible for private acts. The incident triggered a classic example of apologia--a speech of self-defense. As critics have long suggested, the intangible nature of the…

This study explores children's understanding of television commercials that feature the same primary characters as those in the adjacent program content, a commercial technique known as "host-selling." Responses of children 4 to 5 and 7 to 8 years of age to identical commercials presented in both a host-selling and normal viewing…

Since 1957 the Department of Defense has subjected all forms of speech of U.S. military personnel meant for publication to prepublication review based on security and policy criteria. The historical development of the Defense Department's prepublication review program and its specific implementation by the U.S. Air Force lead to questions of First…

Project Follow Through involved a diverse and major set of implementation problems: (1) The initial program mandate for an action program clashed with the later switch to an experimental focus; (2) The selection of curriculum rather than structural changes as the major intervention led to greater uncertainty regarding the practices to be…

An examination of the ways in which United States postal policies affected the development of the magazine industry before Congress passed the second-class mail category in 1863 reveals how a medium is shaped at least in part by the technology, policy, and politics of its delivery systems. In the nineteenth century, magazines depended on the mails…

America's children and their families are in trouble, trouble so deep as to constitute a serious threat to the future of our society. The major source of that threat is bureaucratic "benign neglect." We have failed to recognize that the problems of the multitroubled family in a changing society are the problems of the entire society in the midst…

The paper reviews work being done by two established Department of Education (ED) committees which are addressing concerns and issues related to rural education--the Intra-Departmental Committee on Rural Education (with representation from all 14 offices or units in the Department) and the Federal Intra-Agency Committee on Education's Rural…

The Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare outlines new government antismoking policies and programs, with emphasis on education and information dissemination, regulatory action, financial and other incentives, and research efforts. (MJB)

The author, Director of the Bureau of Health Education, Center for Disease Control, discusses (1) an emerging shift in government policy from treatment to prevention in matters of health; (2) the need for developing a definition of reasonable expectations upon which to base health education efforts; and (3) three general interests at the national…

To determine whether program evaluation will be an important tool for policymaking and management in the Reagan Administration, it would be helpful to consider what the Reagan administration expected and received from evaluation in California during the period 1971-1974. In California, program evaluation activities were frequently implemented on a…

Both empirical and theoretical considerations suggest that countries that have adopted federal systems of government have a tendency toward certain types of problems which may constrain the success of educational planning at every level in the educational system. Specific operational examples of such problems are lack of role clarification, and…

Testing practices have come under considerable scrutiny and criticism in recent years. Testing practices in the Federal government have certainly not been immune from this movement as the use of standardized written tests for selection purposes has been increasingly under attack. The most recent attacks have focused on implications or findings of…