Actions for PARTICIPATION AND PROFESSIONALISM IN THE POSTREFORM ERA: A STUDY OF COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT CORPORATIONS

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PARTICIPATION AND PROFESSIONALISM IN THE POSTREFORM ERA: A STUDY OF COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT CORPORATIONS

Author
PECORELLA, ROBERT FRANCIS
Physical Description
380 pages
Additional Creators
Pennsylvania State University
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Summary
This study devised and tested several models of organizational behavior in an attempt to explain the differential capacities of neighborhood-based, community development corporations to obtain assistance from organizations in the larger society. Community development corporations were examined within a framework of postreform politics which involves the reintroduction on the urban agenda of issues relating to city neighborhoods and their residents.
Structured telephone interviews were conducted with forty-eight executive directors representing community development corporations. The sample used in this study was constructed around a Request for Proposal and subsequent awarding of assistance by the Office of Neighborhood Development in 1978. Development corporations which were successful in obtaining assistance from the Office of Neighborhood Development were matched both with corporations which were unsuccessful in obtaining assistance and with corporations, which although eligible to apply for assistance, did not do so.
The models devised for this study attempted to ascertain the relationships between development corporation behavior and corporation success in obtaining outside funding from several different perspectives. The Participation Model, a function of the postreform emphasis on neighborhood resident involvement in decision processes which affect their lives, proved to have little relationship with development corporation success. While the Office of Neighborhood Development listed resident participation as a factor to be considered in the allocation of assistance, we found no evidence that resident participation either helped or hindered development corporation success in obtaining assistance.
The Professionalism Model, a reflection of the values inherent in the reform era, indicated an impressive capacity to explain development corporation success. The findings revealed that development corporations which reflect, in their intraorganizational structures and procedures, the values of professionalism, expertise and specialization tend to be successful with the Office of Neighborhood Development and other funding organizations in the larger society.
The Information Network Model, a reflection of the interdependent nature of postreform politics, proved to be, at least in part, an important explanation of development corporation success with outside funding organizations. The findings revealed that development corporations which maintain regular and frequent contacts with national groups established expressly to assist them tended to be more consistently successful in dealing with outside funding agencies than corporations which pursued these relationships less vigorously.
Finally, integrative models were devised and tested in order to determine the relationships between variables in the basic models and development corporation success. The findings revealed that professionalism and external information sources were both important independent aspects of corporation success. However, part of the explanatory power of external information sources proved to be dependent on professionalism as an antecedent element in explaining corporation success.
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Dissertation Note
Ph.D. The Pennsylvania State University 1981.
Note
Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 42-04, Section: A, page: 1775.
Part Of
Dissertation Abstracts International
42-04A
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