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Am teilweise negativen Image der öffentlichen Verwaltung in Deutschland sind die Medien schuld! Dies wird zumindest in Teilen der verwaltungswissenschaftlichen Literatur behauptet. Durch ihre negative Berichterstattung über das (Fehl-)Verhalten von Beamten bzw. über die öffentliche Verwaltung insgesamt, bilden sich in den Köpfen der Bürgerinnen und Bürger Stereotypen, die im kollektiven Gedächtnis der Bevölkerung haften bleiben. Die in diesem Zusammenhang den Medien zugeschriebene Rolle ist zwar plausibel, empirisch aber nicht belegt. Der Beitrag fasst die wissenschaftliche Diskussion über öffentliche Verwaltung und Medienberichterstattung zusammen. Zudem wird der aktuelle Diskussionsstand anhand von Sekundäranalysen ergänzt, in denen Mediennutzung einerseits und Einstellungen zur Verwaltung andererseits miteinander verbunden werden. Der Untersuchungszeitraum umfasst nahezu 30 Jahre.

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dc.contributor.author: Hermann, Christopher

Only few studies have examined innovation at the team level so far. Moreover, there are different positions when it comes to the role of leadership in engendering R&D team innovation. Innovation research outlines that high levels of team autonomy are beneficial to innovation in R&D teams and thus suggests that leaders should give as little intellectual guidance as possible. Leadership research proposes transformational leadership as a lever for facilitating team innovation. We integrate these two perspectives by arguing for a U-shaped relationship between transformational leadership and R&D team innovation. This hypothesis was supported by data from 52 R&D teams of international companies.

We develop a framework that provides a general theoretical rationale for the claim made by several authors that combining opposing action strategies fosters team innovation. We distinguish between open and closed strategies and posit that these are opposing but complementary in that each fosters one of two processes necessary for team innovation: open action strategies (e.g., delegative leadership) promote knowledge generation, and closed action strategies (e.g., directive leadership) enhance knowledge integration. We argue that each pole of a pair of opposing action strategies both energizes and detracts from elements of innovation. Thus, it could be expected that combining opposing action strategies leads to an impasse, as the negative effects of each strategy might offset the positive effects of the opposite strategy. There is currently no viable explanation in the literature for why this mutual neutralization may not occur. We aim to fill this gap by explicating why and how opposing action strategies, when implemented simultaneously, do not countervail each other's positive effects, but rather yield positive synergies that fuel team innovation.

Zimbabwe seemed to be in a political transition but only on the surface. In actual fact, the new government established under the power-sharing agreement between President Mugabe and newly elected Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai proved unsuccessful in its first 100 days owing to continued rivalry and a lack of commitment on behalf of Mugabe and his party. Mugabe managed to secure key positions in the new government for his cronies. They continued to control the relevant security organs as well as the Reserve Bank, which held a key position because its Governor guarded the budget available for the new ministers. Consequently, sabotage was an imminent threat for the new government. Mugabe benefited from the weakness of the opposition, which was split and had an indecisive and uncharismatic leader who failed to secure financial support from the West. To complicate the situation even further there were more players involved in the political arena of Zimbabwe, including the two major farmers' groupings, an emerging third party under Simba Makoni, the trade unions and white businessmen. They all had their own agenda. Mugabe and his ruling clique relied on each other as they had both committed gross human rights violations over the last 25 years. They either fall together or their mutual dependency keeps them going. Change was unlikely to occur; even the new Movement for Democratic Change ministers were aware of this.