Karen Johnston
Biographic Data
| ID | 3934766 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Karen Johnston |
| GIVEN NAMES | Karen |
| FAMILY NAME | Johnston |
| SIGNATURE | JOHNSTON K |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Portsmouth |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-5663-3390 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 27 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 152 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 27 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1985 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
Last of the Jedi's
The South African apartheid regime racially organized society into race categories—one being “Coloured” to denote people of mixed‐race heritage. The term “Coloured,” even in contemporary South Africa, is a contentious categorization given the racist legacy of apartheid. This article documents the lives of “Coloured” women who struggled against apartheid whilst employed in apartheid's public education sector. The study involved interviews with 12 …
Governance paradigms and public sector innovation
Much has been written about governance as well as public sector innovation, yet there remains a lack of research on how governance paradigms shape public sector innovation outcomes. Extant research, often within a single national context, has focused on innovation processes, strategies, organizational capacity and leadership, with some research suggesting that superior governance paradigms such as new public governance are better at facilitating …
Further education workforce wellbeing
This paper considers wellbeing in the context of those working in the further education (FE) sector in England and how this has been affected by the Covid pandemic. There has been a growth of research into the impact of the pandemic on the workforce in the higher education sector and some considerations for schools. However, research that examines the FE sector's workforce, an education sector which is often considered under-resourced, can be lac…
Menstrual discrimination
Purpose Menstrual health in the workplace is a neglected topic but can have significant effects on wellbeing, absenteeism, productivity and inclusion within an organisation, and addressing these concerns is vital for fostering an inclusive workplace, especially as organisations aim to enhance equality, diversity and inclusivity. This paper explores the impact of menstrual health, particularly severe symptoms, on women's wellbeing and job performa…
Active representation and identity taxation
Drawing on the theory of representative bureaucracy, which shows that minority bureaucrats will actively represent the interests of minorities from the same sociodemographic group, we argue that institutions could use active representation for institutional performative goals through identity taxation resulting in an unintended outcome of representative labour. We contribute a novel conceptual model of representative labour, enhancing the underst…
Democratising data to address health system inequities in Australia
Understanding the health status of a population or community is crucial to equitable service planning. Among other uses, data on health status can help local and national planners and policy makers understand patterns and trends in current or emerging health and well-being, especially how disparities relating to geography, ethnicity, language and living with disability influence access to services. In this practice paper we draw attention to the …
Neo-androgynous management
The study draws on mixed methods research with further education middle managers across England in order to explore whether there are gendered differences in management. There remain debates about whether there are gender differences in management or leadership. The study adds to this debate with results that reveal that women and men are behaviourally flexible, employing a repertoire of knowledge, competencies and skills, which are not necessari…
Governance and public policies
We extend the current literature on barriers to women’s entrepreneurship by providing the perspectives of women entrepreneurs’ lived experience of governance and public policies designed to support entrepreneurship, in France and England. The research draws on primary data comprising interviews with 75 French and English women entrepreneurs as well as secondary data. The research suggests that in France the system of governance is relatively more…
Representative bureaucracy and organizational attractiveness
Drawing upon representative bureaucracy theory, this study investigates the relationship between passive and symbolic representation by examining the extent to which a more passively representative public organization would be attractive as an employer. The study involved a randomized survey experiment of members of the public in the US and UK. Overall, and contrary to the theory of representative bureaucracy, results show that women found a male…
Athena SWAN
This paper contributes to understandings of how Athena SWAN (AS) is shaping contemporary equality work in the context of the neoliberal university, and whether it is contributing to performative ways of doing equality work. We center our research on the exploration of the question of how the gender‐agenda is being captured by the neoliberal agenda, drawing on 35 in‐depth qualitative interviews with AS champions across the UK and Republic of Irela…
Local benevolent property development entrepreneurs in small town regeneration
Derived from a wider study of place-based economic, social, cultural and environmental regeneration initiatives in small regional New Zealand towns, and reflecting on international research that emphasises the importance of long-term collaborative effort, effective governance and locally-based leadership in regional regeneration, this paper examines the ways locally-based benevolent property development entrepreneurs are attempting to contribute …
Training a Fit-For-Purpose Rural Health Workforce for Low- and Middle-Income Countries (LMICs)
Equity in health outcomes for rural and remote populations in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) is limited by a range of socio-economic, cultural and environmental determinants of health. Health professional education that is sensitive to local population needs and that attends to all elements of the rural pathway is vital to increase the proportion of the health workforce that practices in underserved rural and remote areas. The Training …
Professor Duncan McTavish
Collaborative Governance and the Third Sector
The third sector is one of the main partners for European governments in policy development and implementation. However, the relationship has often been a delicate one, touching on issues of autonomy and legitimacy. In this chapter, we give an overview of different theoretical reasons for and types of collaboration between the third sector and the state. We also describe the different traditions of collaboration that have emerged across Europe. F…
A Gender Analysis of Women in Public–private–voluntary Sector ‘Partnerships’
The nature of work and traditional notions of the public sector have been changing with increasing collaborative governance and delivery of public services among public, private and voluntary sector organizations. In the UK , governments at national and devolved levels of government have adopted collaborative governance for service delivery through various networks and partnerships. This article explores collaborative governance from a gender per…
Representative bureaucracy
Representative bureaucracy theory postulates that passive representation leads to active representation of minority groups. This article investigates the passive representation of female police officers at leadership levels and the active representation of women vis-a-vis gender-based violence arrest rates in the UK. Much of the extant research on representative bureaucracy is located at street level, with evidence showing that discretionary powe…
Governance
This paper reviews governance and public governance related to an emerging area of policy interest – social innovation. The European Commission’s White Paper on European Governance (2001) focused on openness, participation, accountability, effectiveness and coherence in public policy as characteristics of good governance. The EC has prioritised social innovation to address policy problems. Yet, the extant literature and research on social innovat…
Representative bureaucracy
In public service institutions occupational gender segregation persists. These institutions are often gendered with predominantly masculine organisational cultures. The lack of passive and active representation of women has implications for public policy outcomes. This paper suggests a normative typology of the passive and active representation of women in bureaucracies, vis-à-vis institutional strategies to address the under-representation of wo…
Representative Bureaucracy, Gender, and Policing
Drawing on theories of representative bureaucracy, we examine whether increased representation of women in police forces in England leads to a higher rate of domestic violence arrests. To do so, we use panel regression techniques to analyze the links between gender representation and variations in the arrest of domestic abuse perpetrators when controlling for a range of other relevant variables, including the relative prosperity of the local popu…
Co-governance or meta-bureaucracy? Perspectives of local governance ‘partnership’ in England and Scotland
This article assesses the nature of partnerships through the research site of local governance in England and Scotland, engaging a range of debates and literature around governance and meta-governance. The research used secondary data of local authority partnership working in England and Scotland as well as primary qualitative data from participant observation and interviews with senior officials of local authorities and partner organisations. Th…
Electoral and Political Changes
This paper explores a fundamental issue in public administration:the political bureaucratic relationship or political administrative interface. Much of the research and writing hitherto has been at central government level; and while important work on local government exists, relatively little exists on local government
Women in Uk Public Administration Scholarship
The promotion of gender equality has been adopted onto many national policy agendas with the introduction of legislation, public policies and regulatory duties. Yet, gender occupational segregation and discrimination persists. This paper examines the gendered nature of the UK public sector and questions the extent to which public administration scholarship addresses gender bias. The evidence, based on secondary and primary data, reveals that publ…
Management, leadership and gender representation in UK higher and further education
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to analyse gender representation in leadership and management in further and higher education organisations. It does this, through the lens of two perspectives on bureaucratic representation, a “liberal democratic” perspective and an alternative view which states that bureaucracies are not necessarily gender blind or women friendly. The paper reviews the reform and managerial environments, vertical and horizon…
Muddling through’ in a devolved polity
This article explores the issue of devolution in the UK and argues that policy processes between the reserved and devolved polities has resulted in a landscape where there is scope for uniformity and differentiation in policy formulation and implementation between these polities. The article will explore the complexity of devolution in the UK by examining the formulation of a particular policy area: equal opportunities policy. The article provide…
Gender Segregation in the Labour Market
This article examines aspects of gender inequality in the Scottish labour market. The Scottish Executive's 1 broad policy aim of addressing this is viewed alongside some activities and practices of Scottish Enterprise and Local Enterprise Companies. The article provides an overview of the pattern of female participation in the labour market, particularly vertical gender segregation (the glass ceiling'), and outlines some measures used by the Scot…
Representative Bureaucracy, Gender, and Policing
Drawing on theories of representative bureaucracy, we examine whether increased representation of women in police forces in England leads to a higher rate of domestic violence arrests. To do so, we use panel regression techniques to analyze the links between gender representation and variations in the arrest of domestic abuse perpetrators when controlling for a range of other relevant variables, including the relative prosperity of the local popu…
Representative bureaucracy
Representative bureaucracy theory postulates that passive representation leads to active representation of minority groups. This article investigates the passive representation of female police officers at leadership levels and the active representation of women vis-a-vis gender-based violence arrest rates in the UK. Much of the extant research on representative bureaucracy is located at street level, with evidence showing that discretionary powe…
Co-governance or meta-bureaucracy? Perspectives of local governance ‘partnership’ in England and Scotland
This article assesses the nature of partnerships through the research site of local governance in England and Scotland, engaging a range of debates and literature around governance and meta-governance. The research used secondary data of local authority partnership working in England and Scotland as well as primary qualitative data from participant observation and interviews with senior officials of local authorities and partner organisations. Th…
Athena SWAN
This paper contributes to understandings of how Athena SWAN (AS) is shaping contemporary equality work in the context of the neoliberal university, and whether it is contributing to performative ways of doing equality work. We center our research on the exploration of the question of how the gender‐agenda is being captured by the neoliberal agenda, drawing on 35 in‐depth qualitative interviews with AS champions across the UK and Republic of Irela…
Governance
This paper reviews governance and public governance related to an emerging area of policy interest – social innovation. The European Commission’s White Paper on European Governance (2001) focused on openness, participation, accountability, effectiveness and coherence in public policy as characteristics of good governance. The EC has prioritised social innovation to address policy problems. Yet, the extant literature and research on social innovat…
A Gender Analysis of Women in Public–private–voluntary Sector ‘Partnerships’
The nature of work and traditional notions of the public sector have been changing with increasing collaborative governance and delivery of public services among public, private and voluntary sector organizations. In the UK , governments at national and devolved levels of government have adopted collaborative governance for service delivery through various networks and partnerships. This article explores collaborative governance from a gender per…
Representative bureaucracy
In public service institutions occupational gender segregation persists. These institutions are often gendered with predominantly masculine organisational cultures. The lack of passive and active representation of women has implications for public policy outcomes. This paper suggests a normative typology of the passive and active representation of women in bureaucracies, vis-à-vis institutional strategies to address the under-representation of wo…
Public Appointments
The paper draws on exploratory research on non-executives of NHS Health Boards in Scotland. The research investigated the gender imbalance which exists in public appointments and whether this results in a gendered phenomenon of health policy. The analysis of public appointments to NHS Scotland Health Boards reveals a disproportionate representation of men at this strategic policy level and this is seen as having key implications for the formulati…
A point prevalence study of alcoholism and mental illness among downtown migrants
Electoral and Political Changes
This paper explores a fundamental issue in public administration:the political bureaucratic relationship or political administrative interface. Much of the research and writing hitherto has been at central government level; and while important work on local government exists, relatively little exists on local government
Muddling through’ in a devolved polity
This article explores the issue of devolution in the UK and argues that policy processes between the reserved and devolved polities has resulted in a landscape where there is scope for uniformity and differentiation in policy formulation and implementation between these polities. The article will explore the complexity of devolution in the UK by examining the formulation of a particular policy area: equal opportunities policy. The article provide…
Gender Segregation in the Labour Market
This article examines aspects of gender inequality in the Scottish labour market. The Scottish Executive's 1 broad policy aim of addressing this is viewed alongside some activities and practices of Scottish Enterprise and Local Enterprise Companies. The article provides an overview of the pattern of female participation in the labour market, particularly vertical gender segregation (the glass ceiling'), and outlines some measures used by the Scot…
A point prevalence study of alcoholism and mental illness among downtown migrants
Public Appointments
The paper draws on exploratory research on non-executives of NHS Health Boards in Scotland. The research investigated the gender imbalance which exists in public appointments and whether this results in a gendered phenomenon of health policy. The analysis of public appointments to NHS Scotland Health Boards reveals a disproportionate representation of men at this strategic policy level and this is seen as having key implications for the formulati…
Gender Segregation in the Labour Market
This article examines aspects of gender inequality in the Scottish labour market. The Scottish Executive's 1 broad policy aim of addressing this is viewed alongside some activities and practices of Scottish Enterprise and Local Enterprise Companies. The article provides an overview of the pattern of female participation in the labour market, particularly vertical gender segregation (the glass ceiling'), and outlines some measures used by the Scot…
Management, leadership and gender representation in UK higher and further education
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to analyse gender representation in leadership and management in further and higher education organisations. It does this, through the lens of two perspectives on bureaucratic representation, a “liberal democratic” perspective and an alternative view which states that bureaucracies are not necessarily gender blind or women friendly. The paper reviews the reform and managerial environments, vertical and horizon…
Muddling through’ in a devolved polity
This article explores the issue of devolution in the UK and argues that policy processes between the reserved and devolved polities has resulted in a landscape where there is scope for uniformity and differentiation in policy formulation and implementation between these polities. The article will explore the complexity of devolution in the UK by examining the formulation of a particular policy area: equal opportunities policy. The article provide…
Women in Uk Public Administration Scholarship
The promotion of gender equality has been adopted onto many national policy agendas with the introduction of legislation, public policies and regulatory duties. Yet, gender occupational segregation and discrimination persists. This paper examines the gendered nature of the UK public sector and questions the extent to which public administration scholarship addresses gender bias. The evidence, based on secondary and primary data, reveals that publ…
Co-governance or meta-bureaucracy? Perspectives of local governance ‘partnership’ in England and Scotland
This article assesses the nature of partnerships through the research site of local governance in England and Scotland, engaging a range of debates and literature around governance and meta-governance. The research used secondary data of local authority partnership working in England and Scotland as well as primary qualitative data from participant observation and interviews with senior officials of local authorities and partner organisations. Th…
Electoral and Political Changes
This paper explores a fundamental issue in public administration:the political bureaucratic relationship or political administrative interface. Much of the research and writing hitherto has been at central government level; and while important work on local government exists, relatively little exists on local government
Representative Bureaucracy, Gender, and Policing
Drawing on theories of representative bureaucracy, we examine whether increased representation of women in police forces in England leads to a higher rate of domestic violence arrests. To do so, we use panel regression techniques to analyze the links between gender representation and variations in the arrest of domestic abuse perpetrators when controlling for a range of other relevant variables, including the relative prosperity of the local popu…
Representative bureaucracy
In public service institutions occupational gender segregation persists. These institutions are often gendered with predominantly masculine organisational cultures. The lack of passive and active representation of women has implications for public policy outcomes. This paper suggests a normative typology of the passive and active representation of women in bureaucracies, vis-à-vis institutional strategies to address the under-representation of wo…
A Gender Analysis of Women in Public–private–voluntary Sector ‘Partnerships’
The nature of work and traditional notions of the public sector have been changing with increasing collaborative governance and delivery of public services among public, private and voluntary sector organizations. In the UK , governments at national and devolved levels of government have adopted collaborative governance for service delivery through various networks and partnerships. This article explores collaborative governance from a gender per…
Representative bureaucracy
Representative bureaucracy theory postulates that passive representation leads to active representation of minority groups. This article investigates the passive representation of female police officers at leadership levels and the active representation of women vis-a-vis gender-based violence arrest rates in the UK. Much of the extant research on representative bureaucracy is located at street level, with evidence showing that discretionary powe…
Governance
This paper reviews governance and public governance related to an emerging area of policy interest – social innovation. The European Commission’s White Paper on European Governance (2001) focused on openness, participation, accountability, effectiveness and coherence in public policy as characteristics of good governance. The EC has prioritised social innovation to address policy problems. Yet, the extant literature and research on social innovat…
Collaborative Governance and the Third Sector
The third sector is one of the main partners for European governments in policy development and implementation. However, the relationship has often been a delicate one, touching on issues of autonomy and legitimacy. In this chapter, we give an overview of different theoretical reasons for and types of collaboration between the third sector and the state. We also describe the different traditions of collaboration that have emerged across Europe. F…
Professor Duncan McTavish
Training a Fit-For-Purpose Rural Health Workforce for Low- and Middle-Income Countries (LMICs)
Equity in health outcomes for rural and remote populations in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) is limited by a range of socio-economic, cultural and environmental determinants of health. Health professional education that is sensitive to local population needs and that attends to all elements of the rural pathway is vital to increase the proportion of the health workforce that practices in underserved rural and remote areas. The Training …
Local benevolent property development entrepreneurs in small town regeneration
Derived from a wider study of place-based economic, social, cultural and environmental regeneration initiatives in small regional New Zealand towns, and reflecting on international research that emphasises the importance of long-term collaborative effort, effective governance and locally-based leadership in regional regeneration, this paper examines the ways locally-based benevolent property development entrepreneurs are attempting to contribute …
Athena SWAN
This paper contributes to understandings of how Athena SWAN (AS) is shaping contemporary equality work in the context of the neoliberal university, and whether it is contributing to performative ways of doing equality work. We center our research on the exploration of the question of how the gender‐agenda is being captured by the neoliberal agenda, drawing on 35 in‐depth qualitative interviews with AS champions across the UK and Republic of Irela…
Democratising data to address health system inequities in Australia
Understanding the health status of a population or community is crucial to equitable service planning. Among other uses, data on health status can help local and national planners and policy makers understand patterns and trends in current or emerging health and well-being, especially how disparities relating to geography, ethnicity, language and living with disability influence access to services. In this practice paper we draw attention to the …
Neo-androgynous management
The study draws on mixed methods research with further education middle managers across England in order to explore whether there are gendered differences in management. There remain debates about whether there are gender differences in management or leadership. The study adds to this debate with results that reveal that women and men are behaviourally flexible, employing a repertoire of knowledge, competencies and skills, which are not necessari…
Governance and public policies
We extend the current literature on barriers to women’s entrepreneurship by providing the perspectives of women entrepreneurs’ lived experience of governance and public policies designed to support entrepreneurship, in France and England. The research draws on primary data comprising interviews with 75 French and English women entrepreneurs as well as secondary data. The research suggests that in France the system of governance is relatively more…
Representative bureaucracy and organizational attractiveness
Drawing upon representative bureaucracy theory, this study investigates the relationship between passive and symbolic representation by examining the extent to which a more passively representative public organization would be attractive as an employer. The study involved a randomized survey experiment of members of the public in the US and UK. Overall, and contrary to the theory of representative bureaucracy, results show that women found a male…
Active representation and identity taxation
Drawing on the theory of representative bureaucracy, which shows that minority bureaucrats will actively represent the interests of minorities from the same sociodemographic group, we argue that institutions could use active representation for institutional performative goals through identity taxation resulting in an unintended outcome of representative labour. We contribute a novel conceptual model of representative labour, enhancing the underst…
Further education workforce wellbeing
This paper considers wellbeing in the context of those working in the further education (FE) sector in England and how this has been affected by the Covid pandemic. There has been a growth of research into the impact of the pandemic on the workforce in the higher education sector and some considerations for schools. However, research that examines the FE sector's workforce, an education sector which is often considered under-resourced, can be lac…
Menstrual discrimination
Purpose Menstrual health in the workplace is a neglected topic but can have significant effects on wellbeing, absenteeism, productivity and inclusion within an organisation, and addressing these concerns is vital for fostering an inclusive workplace, especially as organisations aim to enhance equality, diversity and inclusivity. This paper explores the impact of menstrual health, particularly severe symptoms, on women's wellbeing and job performa…
Political science (22 works) · Sociology (16 works) · Public relations (14 works) · Economics (12 works) · Law (12 works) · Politics (12 works) · Public Administration (12 works) · Gender Diversity and Inequality (10 works) · Public Administration (10 works) · Bureaucracy (9 works)