case study in local

Organizing Your Social Sciences Research Paper: Writing a Case Study

• Purpose of Guide
• Design Flaws to Avoid
• Independent and Dependent Variables
• Glossary of Research Terms
• Narrowing a Topic Idea
• Broadening a Topic Idea
• Extending the Timeliness of a Topic Idea
• Academic Writing Style
• Choosing a Title
• Making an Outline
• Paragraph Development
• Executive Summary
• The C.A.R.S. Model
• Background Information
• The Research Problem/Question
• Theoretical Framework
• Citation Tracking
• Content Alert Services
• Evaluating Sources
• Reading Research Effectively
• Primary Sources
• Secondary Sources
• Tiertiary Sources
• What Is Scholarly vs. Popular?
• Qualitative Methods
• Quantitative Methods
• Using Non-Textual Elements
• Limitations of the Study
• Common Grammar Mistakes
• Writing Concisely
• Avoiding Plagiarism
• Footnotes or Endnotes?
• Further Readings
• Annotated Bibliography
• Dealing with Nervousness
• Using Visual Aids
• Grading Someone Else's Paper
• Types of Structured Group Activities
• Group Project Survival Skills
• Multiple Book Review Essay
• Reviewing Collected Essays
• Writing a Case Study
• About Informed Consent
• Writing Field Notes
• Writing a Policy Memo
• Writing a Research Proposal
• Bibliography

The term case study refers to both a method of analysis and a specific research design for examining a problem, both of which are used in most circumstances to generalize across populations. This tab focuses on the latter--how to design and organize a research paper in the social sciences that analyzes a specific case.

A case study research paper examines a person, place, event, phenomenon, or other type of subject of analysis in order to extrapolate  key themes and results that help predict future trends, illuminate previously hidden issues that can be applied to practice, and/or provide a means for understanding an important research problem with greater clarity. A case study paper usually examines a single subject of analysis, but case study papers can also be designed as a comparative investigation that shows relationships between two or among more than two subjects. The methods used to study a case can rest within a quantitative, qualitative, or mixed-method investigative paradigm.

Case Studies . Writing@CSU. Colorado State University; Mills, Albert J. , Gabrielle Durepos, and Eiden Wiebe, editors. Encyclopedia of Case Study Research . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 2010 ; “What is a Case Study?” In Swanborn, Peter G. Case Study Research: What, Why and How? London: SAGE, 2010.

How to Approach Writing a Case Study Research Paper

General information about how to choose a topic to investigate can be found under the " Choosing a Research Problem " tab in this writing guide. Review this page because it may help you identify a subject of analysis that can be investigated using a single case study design.

However, identifying a case to investigate involves more than choosing the research problem . A case study encompasses a problem contextualized around the application of in-depth analysis, interpretation, and discussion, often resulting in specific recommendations for action or for improving existing conditions. As Seawright and Gerring note, practical considerations such as time and access to information can influence case selection, but these issues should not be the sole factors used in describing the methodological justification for identifying a particular case to study. Given this, selecting a case includes considering the following:

• Does the case represent an unusual or atypical example of a research problem that requires more in-depth analysis? Cases often represent a topic that rests on the fringes of prior investigations because the case may provide new ways of understanding the research problem. For example, if the research problem is to identify strategies to improve policies that support girl's access to secondary education in predominantly Muslim nations, you could consider using Azerbaijan as a case study rather than selecting a more obvious nation in the Middle East. Doing so may reveal important new insights into recommending how governments in other predominantly Muslim nations can formulate policies that support improved access to education for girls.
• Does the case provide important insight or illuminate a previously hidden problem? In-depth analysis of a case can be based on the hypothesis that the case study will reveal trends or issues that have not been exposed in prior research or will reveal new and important implications for practice. For example, anecdotal evidence may suggest drug use among homeless veterans is related to their patterns of travel throughout the day. Assuming prior studies have not looked at individual travel choices as a way to study access to illicit drug use, a case study that observes a homeless veteran could reveal how issues of personal mobility choices facilitate regular access to illicit drugs. Note that it is important to conduct a thorough literature review to ensure that your assumption about the need to reveal new insights or previously hidden problems is valid and evidence-based.
• Does the case challenge and offer a counter-point to prevailing assumptions? Over time, research on any given topic can fall into a trap of developing assumptions based on outdated studies that are still applied to new or changing conditions or the idea that something should simply be accepted as "common sense," even though the issue has not been thoroughly tested in practice. A case may offer you an opportunity to gather evidence that challenges prevailing assumptions about a research problem and provide a new set of recommendations applied to practice that have not been tested previously. For example, perhaps there has been a long practice among scholars to apply a particular theory in explaining the relationship between two subjects of analysis. Your case could challenge this assumption by applying an innovative theoretical framework [perhaps borrowed from another discipline] to the study a case in order to explore whether this approach offers new ways of understanding the research problem. Taking a contrarian stance is one of the most important ways that new knowledge and understanding develops from existing literature.
• Does the case provide an opportunity to pursue action leading to the resolution of a problem? Another way to think about choosing a case to study is to consider how the results from investigating a particular case may result in findings that reveal ways in which to resolve an existing or emerging problem. For example, studying the case of an unforeseen incident, such as a fatal accident at a railroad crossing, can reveal hidden issues that could be applied to preventative measures that contribute to reducing the chance of accidents in the future. In this example, a case study investigating the accident could lead to a better understanding of where to strategically locate additional signals at other railroad crossings in order to better warn drivers of an approaching train, particularly when visibility is hindered by heavy rain, fog, or at night.
• Does the case offer a new direction in future research? A case study can be used as a tool for exploratory research that points to a need for further examination of the research problem. A case can be used when there are few studies that help predict an outcome or that establish a clear understanding about how best to proceed in addressing a problem. For example, after conducting a thorough literature review [very important!], you discover that little research exists showing the ways in which women contribute to promoting water conservation in rural communities of Uganda. A case study of how women contribute to saving water in a particular village can lay the foundation for understanding the need for more thorough research that documents how women in their roles as cooks and family caregivers think about water as a valuable resource within their community throughout rural regions of east Africa. The case could also point to the need for scholars to apply feminist theories of work and family to the issue of water conservation.

Eisenhardt, Kathleen M. “Building Theories from Case Study Research.” Academy of Management Review 14 (October 1989): 532-550; Emmel, Nick. Sampling and Choosing Cases in Qualitative Research: A Realist Approach . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 2013; Gerring, John. “What Is a Case Study and What Is It Good for?” American Political Science Review 98 (May 2004): 341-354; Mills, Albert J. , Gabrielle Durepos, and Eiden Wiebe, editors. Encyclopedia of Case Study Research . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 2010; Seawright, Jason and John Gerring. "Case Selection Techniques in Case Study Research." Political Research Quarterly 61 (June 2008): 294-308.

Structure and Writing Style

The purpose of a paper in the social sciences designed around a case study is to thoroughly investigate a subject of analysis in order to reveal a new understanding about the research problem and, in so doing, contributing new knowledge to what is already known from previous studies. In applied social sciences disciplines [e.g., education, social work, public administration, etc.], case studies may also be used to reveal best practices, highlight key programs, or investigate interesting aspects of professional work. In general, the structure of a case study research paper is not all that different from a standard college-level research paper. However, there are subtle differences you should be aware of. Here are the key elements to organizing and writing a case study research paper.

I.  Introduction

As with any research paper, your introduction should serve as a roadmap for your readers to ascertain the scope and purpose of your study . The introduction to a case study research paper, however, should not only describe the research problem and its significance, but you should also succinctly describe why the case is being used and how it relates to addressing the problem. The two elements should be linked. With this in mind, a good introduction answers these four questions:

• What was I studying? Describe the research problem and describe the subject of analysis you have chosen to address the problem. Explain how they are linked and what elements of the case will help to expand knowledge and understanding about the problem.
• Why was this topic important to investigate? Describe the significance of the research problem and state why a case study design and the subject of analysis that the paper is designed around is appropriate in addressing the problem.
• What did we know about this topic before I did this study? Provide background that helps lead the reader into the more in-depth literature review to follow. If applicable, summarize prior case study research applied to the research problem and why it fails to adequately address the research problem. Describe why your case will be useful. If no prior case studies have been used to address the research problem, explain why you have selected this subject of analysis.
• How will this study advance new knowledge or new ways of understanding? Explain why your case study will be suitable in helping to expand knowledge and understanding about the research problem.

Each of these questions should be addressed in no more than a few paragraphs. Exceptions to this can be when you are addressing a complex research problem or subject of analysis that requires more in-depth background information.

II.  Literature Review

The literature review for a case study research paper is generally structured the same as it is for any college-level research paper. The difference, however, is that the literature review is focused on providing background information and  enabling historical interpretation of the subject of analysis in relation to the research problem the case is intended to address . This includes synthesizing studies that help to:

• Place relevant works in the context of their contribution to understanding the case study being investigated . This would include summarizing studies that have used a similar subject of analysis to investigate the research problem. If there is literature using the same or a very similar case to study, you need to explain why duplicating past research is important [e.g., conditions have changed; prior studies were conducted long ago, etc.].
• Describe the relationship each work has to the others under consideration that informs the reader why this case is applicable . Your literature review should include a description of any works that support using the case to study the research problem and the underlying research questions.
• Identify new ways to interpret prior research using the case study . If applicable, review any research that has examined the research problem using a different research design. Explain how your case study design may reveal new knowledge or a new perspective or that can redirect research in an important new direction.
• Resolve conflicts amongst seemingly contradictory previous studies . This refers to synthesizing any literature that points to unresolved issues of concern about the research problem and describing how the subject of analysis that forms the case study can help resolve these existing contradictions.
• Point the way in fulfilling a need for additional research . Your review should examine any literature that lays a foundation for understanding why your case study design and the subject of analysis around which you have designed your study may reveal a new way of approaching the research problem or offer a perspective that points to the need for additional research.
• Expose any gaps that exist in the literature that the case study could help to fill . Summarize any literature that not only shows how your subject of analysis contributes to understanding the research problem, but how your case contributes to a new way of understanding the problem that prior research has failed to do.
• Locate your own research within the context of existing literature [very important!] . Collectively, your literature review should always place your case study within the larger domain of prior research about the problem. The overarching purpose of reviewing pertinent literature in a case study paper is to demonstrate that you have thoroughly identified and synthesized prior studies in the context of explaining the relevance of the case in addressing the research problem.

III.  Method

In this section, you explain why you selected a particular subject of analysis to study and the strategy you used to identify and ultimately decide that your case was appropriate in addressing the research problem. The way you describe the methods used varies depending on the type of subject of analysis that frames your case study.

If your subject of analysis is an incident or event . In the social and behavioral sciences, the event or incident that represents the case to be studied is usually bounded by time and place, with a clear beginning and end and with an identifiable location or position relative to its surroundings. The subject of analysis can be a rare or critical event or it can focus on a typical or regular event. The purpose of studying a rare event is to illuminate new ways of thinking about the broader research problem or to test a hypothesis. Critical incident case studies must describe the method by which you identified the event and explain the process by which you determined the validity of this case to inform broader perspectives about the research problem or to reveal new findings. However, the event does not have to be a rare or uniquely significant to support new thinking about the research problem or to challenge an existing hypothesis. For example, Walo, Bull, and Breen conducted a case study to identify and evaluate the direct and indirect economic benefits and costs of a local sports event in the City of Lismore, New South Wales, Australia. The purpose of their study was to provide new insights from measuring the impact of a typical local sports event that prior studies could not measure well because they focused on large "mega-events." Whether the event is rare or not, the methods section should include an explanation of the following characteristics of the event: a) when did it take place; b) what were the underlying circumstances leading to the event; c) what were the consequences of the event.

If your subject of analysis is a person. Explain why you selected this particular individual to be studied and describe what experience he or she has had that provides an opportunity to advance new understandings about the research problem. Mention any background about this person which might help the reader understand the significance of his/her experiences that make them worthy of study. This includes describing the relationships this person has had with other people, institutions, and/or events that support using him or her as the subject for a case study research paper. It is particularly important to differentiate the person as the subject of analysis from others and to succinctly explain how the person relates to examining the research problem.

If your subject of analysis is a place. In general, a case study that investigates a place suggests a subject of analysis that is unique or special in some way and that this uniqueness can be used to build new understanding or knowledge about the research problem. A case study of a place must not only describe its various attributes relevant to the research problem [e.g., physical, social, cultural, economic, political, etc.], but you must state the method by which you determined that this place will illuminate new understandings about the research problem. It is also important to articulate why a particular place as the case for study is being used if similar places also exist [i.e., if you are studying patterns of homeless encampments of veterans in open spaces, why study Echo Park in Los Angeles rather than Griffith Park?]. If applicable, describe what type of human activity involving this place makes it a good choice to study [e.g., prior research reveals Echo Park has more homeless veterans].

If your subject of analysis is a phenomenon. A phenomenon refers to a fact, occurrence, or circumstance that can be studied or observed but with the cause or explanation to be in question. In this sense, a phenomenon that forms your subject of analysis can encompass anything that can be observed or presumed to exist but is not fully understood. In the social and behavioral sciences, the case usually focuses on human interaction within a complex physical, social, economic, cultural, or political system. For example, the phenomenon could be the observation that many vehicles used by ISIS fighters are small trucks with English language advertisements on them. The research problem could be that ISIS fighters are difficult to combat because they are highly mobile. The research questions could be how and by what means are these vehicles used by ISIS being supplied to the militants and how might supply lines to these vehicles be cut? How might knowing the suppliers of these trucks from overseas reveal larger networks of collaborators and financial support? A case study of a phenomenon most often encompasses an in-depth analysis of a cause and effect that is grounded in an interactive relationship between people and their environment in some way.

NOTE:   The choice of the case or set of cases to study cannot appear random. Evidence that supports the method by which you identified and chose your subject of analysis should be linked to the findings from the literature review. Be sure to cite any prior studies that helped you determine that the case you chose was appropriate for investigating the research problem.

IV.  Discussion

The main elements of your discussion section are generally the same as any research paper, but centered around interpreting and drawing conclusions about the key findings from your case study. Note that a general social sciences research paper may contain a separate section to report findings. However, in a paper designed around a case study, it is more common to combine a description of the findings with the discussion about their implications. The objectives of your discussion section should include the following:

Reiterate the Research Problem/State the Major Findings Briefly reiterate the research problem you are investigating and explain why the subject of analysis around which you designed the case study were used. You should then describe the findings revealed from your study of the case using direct, declarative, and succinct proclamation of the study results. Highlight any findings that were unexpected or especially profound.

Explain the Meaning of the Findings and Why They are Important Systematically explain the meaning of your case study findings and why you believe they are important. Begin this part of the section by repeating what you consider to be your most important or surprising finding first, then systematically review each finding. Be sure to thoroughly extrapolate what your analysis of the case can tell the reader about situations or conditions beyond the actual case that was studied while, at the same time, being careful not to misconstrue or conflate a finding that undermines the external validity of your conclusions.

Relate the Findings to Similar Studies No study in the social sciences is so novel or possesses such a restricted focus that it has absolutely no relation to previously published research. The discussion section should relate your case study results to those found in other studies, particularly if questions raised from prior studies served as the motivation for choosing your subject of analysis. This is important because comparing and contrasting the findings of other studies helps to support the overall importance of your results and it highlights how and in what ways your case study design and the subject of analysis differs from prior research about the topic.

Consider Alternative Explanations of the Findings It is important to remember that the purpose of social science research is to discover and not to prove. When writing the discussion section, you should carefully consider all possible explanations for the case study results, rather than just those that fit your hypothesis or prior assumptions and biases. Be alert to what the in-depth analysis of the case may reveal about the research problem, including offering a contrarian perspective to what scholars have stated in prior research.

Acknowledge the Study's Limitations You can state the study's limitations in the conclusion section of your paper but describing the limitations of your subject of analysis in the discussion section provides an opportunity to identify the limitations and explain why they are not significant. This part of the discussion section should also note any unanswered questions or issues your case study could not address. More detailed information about how to document any limitations to your research can be found here .

Suggest Areas for Further Research Although your case study may offer important insights about the research problem, there are likely additional questions related to the problem that remain unanswered or findings that unexpectedly revealed themselves as a result of your in-depth analysis of the case. Be sure that the recommendations for further research are linked to the research problem and that you explain why your recommendations are valid in other contexts and based on the original assumptions of your study.

V.  Conclusion

As with any research paper, you should summarize your conclusion in clear, simple language; emphasize how the findings from your case study differs from or supports prior research and why. Do not simply reiterate the discussion section. Provide a synthesis of key findings presented in the paper to show how these converge to address the research problem. If you haven't already done so in the discussion section, be sure to document the limitations of your case study and needs for further research.

The function of your paper's conclusion is to: 1)  restate the main argument supported by the findings from the analysis of your case; 2) clearly state the context, background, and necessity of pursuing the research problem using a case study design in relation to an issue, controversy, or a gap found from reviewing the literature; and, 3) provide a place for you to persuasively and succinctly restate the significance of your research problem, given that the reader has now been presented with in-depth information about the topic.

Consider the following points to help ensure your conclusion is appropriate:

• If the argument or purpose of your paper is complex, you may need to summarize these points for your reader.
• If prior to your conclusion, you have not yet explained the significance of your findings or if you are proceeding inductively, use the conclusion of your paper to describe your main points and explain their significance.
• Move from a detailed to a general level of consideration of the case study's findings that returns the topic to the context provided by the introduction or within a new context that emerges from your case study findings.

Note that, depending on the discipline you are writing in and your professor's preferences, the concluding paragraph may contain your final reflections on the evidence presented applied to practice or on the essay's central research problem. However, the nature of being introspective about the subject of analysis you have investigated will depend on whether you are explicitly asked to express your observations in this way.

Problems to Avoid

Overgeneralization One of the goals of a case study is to lay a foundation for understanding broader trends and issues applied to similar circumstances. However, be careful when drawing conclusions from your case study. They must be evidence-based and grounded in the results of the study; otherwise, it is merely speculation. Looking at a prior example, it would be incorrect to state that a factor in improving girls access to education in Azerbaijan and the policy implications this may have for improving access in other Muslim nations is due to girls access to social media if there is no documentary evidence from your case study to indicate this. There may be anecdotal evidence that retention rates were better for girls who were on social media, but this observation would only point to the need for further research and would not be a definitive finding if this was not a part of your original research agenda.

Failure to Document Limitations No case is going to reveal all that needs to be understood about a research problem. Therefore, just as you have to clearly state the limitations of a general research study , you must describe the specific limitations inherent in the subject of analysis. For example, the case of studying how women conceptualize the need for water conservation in a village in Uganda could have limited application in other cultural contexts or in areas where fresh water from rivers or lakes is plentiful and, therefore, conservation is understood differently than preserving access to a scarce resource.

Failure to Extrapolate All Possible Implications Just as you don't want to over-generalize from your case study findings, you also have to be thorough in the consideration of all possible outcomes or recommendations derived from your findings. If you do not, your reader may question the validity of your analysis, particularly if you failed to document an obvious outcome from your case study research. For example, in the case of studying the accident at the railroad crossing to evaluate where and what types of warning signals should be located, you failed to take into consideration speed limit signage as well as warning signals. When designing your case study, be sure you have thoroughly addressed all aspects of the problem and do not leave gaps in your analysis.

Case Studies . Writing@CSU. Colorado State University; Gerring, John. Case Study Research: Principles and Practices . New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007; Merriam, Sharan B. Qualitative Research and Case Study Applications in Education . Rev. ed. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 1998; Miller, Lisa L. “The Use of Case Studies in Law and Social Science Research.” Annual Review of Law and Social Science 14 (2018): TBD; Mills, Albert J., Gabrielle Durepos, and Eiden Wiebe, editors. Encyclopedia of Case Study Research . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 2010; Putney, LeAnn Grogan. "Case Study." In Encyclopedia of Research Design , Neil J. Salkind, editor. (Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 2010), pp. 116-120; Simons, Helen. Case Study Research in Practice . London: SAGE Publications, 2009;  Kratochwill,  Thomas R. and Joel R. Levin, editors. Single-Case Research Design and Analysis: New Development for Psychology and Education .  Hilldsale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1992; Swanborn, Peter G. Case Study Research: What, Why and How? London : SAGE, 2010; Yin, Robert K. Case Study Research: Design and Methods . 6th edition. Los Angeles, CA, SAGE Publications, 2014; Walo, Maree, Adrian Bull, and Helen Breen. “Achieving Economic Benefits at Local Events: A Case Study of a Local Sports Event.” Festival Management and Event Tourism 4 (1996): 95-106.

Writing Tip

At Least Five Misconceptions about Case Study Research

Social science case studies are often perceived as limited in their ability to create new knowledge because they are not randomly selected and findings cannot be generalized to larger populations. Flyvbjerg examines five misunderstandings about case study research and systematically "corrects" each one. To quote, these are:

Misunderstanding 1 :  General, theoretical [context-independent knowledge is more valuable than concrete, practical (context-dependent) knowledge. Misunderstanding 2 :  One cannot generalize on the basis of an individual case; therefore, the case study cannot contribute to scientific development. Misunderstanding 3 :  The case study is most useful for generating hypotheses; that is, in the first stage of a total research process, whereas other methods are more suitable for hypotheses testing and theory building. Misunderstanding 4 :  The case study contains a bias toward verification, that is, a tendency to confirm the researcher’s preconceived notions. Misunderstanding 5 :  It is often difficult to summarize and develop general propositions and theories on the basis of specific case studies [p. 221].

While writing your paper, think introspectively about how you addressed these misconceptions because to do so can help you strengthen the validity and reliability of your research by clarifying issues of case selection, the testing and challenging of existing assumptions, the interpretation of key findings, and the summation of case outcomes. Think of a case study research paper as a complete, in-depth narrative about the specific properties and key characteristics of your subject of analysis applied to the research problem.

Flyvbjerg, Bent. “Five Misunderstandings About Case-Study Research.” Qualitative Inquiry 12 (April 2006): 219-245.

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Take action: Learn how to achieve What Works Cities Certification

Local Government Fellowship Case Studies

Every day local government leaders are making tough decisions on how to best serve their residents. Increasingly, cities and counties are placing data and evidence at the center of their decision-making to achieve the best outcomes with scarce taxpayer resources.

As part of the “Invest in What Works Policy Series,” Results for America is showcasing some of the best examples of strategies by local governments to use data and evidence to drive budget and policy decisions that help address major concerns in their communities.

These case studies highlight some of the work of RFA’s  Local Government Fellows , who are developing research partnerships with academic institutions, sharing best practices and demonstration projects, and participating in a national network that is helping to advance data-driven and evidence-based policymaking.

Local Government Case Studies

Albuquerque  .

December 20, 2018

Upon entering office on December 1, 2017, Albuquerque Mayor Tim Keller knew he wanted to use the city government’s purchasing power as part of his economic development strategy in an effort to help boost the local economy. An analysis of city procurement indicated that an estimated $150 million to $300 million is spent annually by Albuquerque city government to purchase goods and services. Of that amount, at least 40% of funds were spent on non-local vendor contracts in 2017. As a result, the Keller Administration sought to develop strategies to maximize taxpayer dollars circulating in the local economy by contracting with local vendors.

In the City of Dallas, in recent years, there has been an increasing number of 911 calls from people who require mental health assistance. Traditionally, the response has been to transport these people to local emergency departments or, if medically stable, arrest and book them in the Dallas County Jail, where they can receive psychiatric services. Between 2012 and 2015, the number of 911 mental health calls requiring an ambulance response increased by 59% (from 2,176 to 3,452 calls). The South Central Dallas Patrol District saw the bulk of that increase during 2012 and 2015 – from 382 to 706 calls, the equivalent of an 85% spike.

New York City

In 2014, Mayor Bill de Blasio entered office with inequality as the defining core of his agenda. Across the new administration, New York City agencies organized with this priority in mind. New York City’s Center for Economic Opportunity (CEO), established under Mayor Mike Bloomberg in 2006 as the first municipal innovation lab in the United States, was initially charged with launching and evaluating new anti-poverty pilot programs to identify effective solutions; its mandate also included constructing superior methodologies for accurately measuring poverty. With an entire administration oriented to consider economic disparities, New York City now needed to consider how CEO could evolve.

Salt Lake County

In recent years, Salt Lake County has been seeking strategies to better help residents with criminal records expand their employment opportunities. Persons with criminal records face significant barriers to employment: they are 50% less likely to be called for an interview according to the National Reentry Resource Center. The Salt Lake County Mayor’s Office and the Salt Lake County Criminal Justice Advisory Council (CJAC) set out to help eligible individuals expunge their criminal records.

The Seattle Animal Shelter was experiencing a leveling off in the number of pet licenses and renewals in recent years. Data indicated that roughly 3,000 pet licenses were expiring every month, and even after accounting for the move out rate of residents, only 60% of licenses were being renewed. Pet licensing is required by the Seattle Municipal Code and the money generated from pet licenses accounts for nearly $1.5 million in annual revenue, all of which goes directly to fund the Seattle Animal Shelter. Seattle Animal Shelter staff sought to increase renewals of pet licenses across Seattle to ensure compliance and help fund their critical operations.

Washington, DC

Washington, DC’s Fire and Emergency Medical Services Department (DCFEMS) has one of the highest per capita rate of 911 calls for emergency medical services in the United States. Yet approximately one out of every four 911 calls are for situations that do not require Emergency Medical Services (EMS) care; instead, they require primary care or urgent care services. Historically, DCFEMS has provided all 911 callers who present medical needs with the same response – an EMS team visits the person and, in most cases, transports them to the nearest hospital for admission. However, the high demand for EMS services in the nation’s capital was resulting in an EMS ambulance shortage.

Cook County

December 6, 2018

Between 2015 and 2016, Cook County, Illinois experienced a 70% increase in opioid-related deaths, up from 647 deaths to 1,081 deaths. The County also experienced a growing number of gun homicide-related deaths during that same period, up from 525 deaths in 2015 to 805 deaths in 2016, a 50% increase. Law enforcement agencies and public health advocates had been requesting data more frequently from the Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office (MEO) to analyze cause of death trends and understand the scope of these crises. Although not often considered a traditional partner in public health prevention, the MEO recognized they had an important role to play in informing and curtailing the growing opioid and gun homicide-related deaths occurring in Cook County and across the country by providing real-time access to quality data on cause of death

Los Angeles

Los Angeles residents consider clean streets and alleys to be among the fundamental responsibilities of their city government. However, in recent years, Los Angeles had not met its residents’ expectations for street and alley cleanliness. The City received growing numbers of complaints from residents concerned about excessive litter, illegal dumping, and other trash, especially in neighborhoods with predominantly low income and minority residents.

In the City of Tulsa, Oklahoma the Municipal Court issues approximately 22,000 extensions to unpaid court fines – called Time Pay Orders – per year. The Time Pay Order system was originally designed to give residents an additional one- to six-month extension to submit their payments for court fees at the conclusion of a criminal case. Despite the extension, over 70% – or 16,000 – of the issued Time to Pay Orders result in a failure-to-pay warrant each year. Failure to pay often results in suspended driver’s licenses, accrual of additional fines, and further involvement in the criminal justice system. In addition, unpaid Time Pay Orders also result in more than $500,000 each year in unpaid fines.

Louisville  

September 26, 2018

Louisville residents living at or below 130% of the federal poverty line rely on the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) to help cover costly home energy bills each year. However, the local LIHEAP application process was inefficient and time consuming, requiring residents to make multiple in-person visits and wait in long lines to complete their applications. The application process was inefficient for Louisville government staff as well, leaving them too little time to serve all eligible clients and award all available local LIHEAP funds.

Montgomery County  

Montgomery County, Maryland has experienced a steady increase in 911 calls for emergency medical services (EMS) in recent years. Among the nearly 84,000 calls to 911 for EMS in Montgomery County in 2013, the 100 most frequent callers were responsible for 3% (over 2,500 calls) of the call load. These residents were usually experiencing non-emergency events that often stemmed from behavioral health issues, substance abuse challenges, chronic illnesses, or a combination of these factors. They also often lacked knowledge of the non-emergency resources available to them.

King County

August 22, 2018

King County created the Best Starts for Kids initiative, which, among other things, introduced an entirely new way for the government to structure contracts and do business with human services providers. The County made their contracting process more accessible to community-based organizations that work with underserved residents. New contracting practices also promoted outcomes-focused, preventive, and early intervention services based on rigorous evidence of impact, while simultaneously allowing the County to test and build evidence for innovative and community-based approaches.

January 5, 2018

Former Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed’s Office of Innovation Delivery and Performance reinstituted and reimagined the city’s performance management system in late 2012. The City placed departmental staff at the center of the effort and focused foremost on how data collection and review could help city staff better deliver services and respond to the needs of residents. This unique approach was in stark contrast to traditional performance management systems, which focus on first serving the needs of the Mayor and government agency leaders.

The City of Baltimore developed an advanced outcome budgeting system in 2010 to focus resources on the most effective and promising services and programs to meet the City’s priority needs, based on performance data and evidence of impact.

New Orleans

The New Orleans Mayor’s Office of Performance and Accountability used advanced analytics, open source software, and a partnership with Louisiana State University (LSU) students to integrate the City’s administrative data with the operational expertise of New Orleans EMS staff to decrease overall EMS response times and provide equitable service to all neighborhoods.

Philadelphia

In April 2016, the Philadelphia Mayor’s Office jointly created a collaborative team called the Philadelphia Behavioral Science Initiative with academic researchers. First, Philadelphia city staff identify enrollment and usage challenges within city programs and services. Then, the team connects department staff with suitable academic research partners to identify key service touch points and develop behavioral science-based evaluations. Finally, the evaluation findings help determine how to engage city residents in these programs and services more effectively and efficiently.

Private Transit: Existing Services and Emerging Directions (2018)

Chapter: section 5 - case studies: local approaches to transportation challenges.

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32 This section presents three case studies that provide more in-depth information on specific aspects of private transit operations and regulation: • Case Study I examines the Bay Area “Tech Bus” shuttle census and SFMTA commuter shuttle program, which together provide an example of a proactive and cooperative model for arriving at a regulatory structure, despite public authorities’ lack of statutory power. • Case Study II examines consortium-based shuttles and the variety of public-private part- nerships that have been developed to support commuter access to suburban job centers, areas that would have difficulty supporting fixed-route public transit. • Case Study III addresses jitneys and dollar vans in the New York City area, focusing on the evo- lution of regulatory structures and enforcement around these informal private transit networks. Case Study I: San Francisco’s “Tech Buses”: Piloting a Cooperative Process for Prioritizing Street Use This case study examines the process of building a responsive, largely cooperative regulatory policy for the hundreds of “tech buses” that travel between the City of San Francisco and Silicon Valley, picking up and dropping off thousands of passengers per day on each end. Use of these services has grown rapidly over the last decade, and they fill an important gap in the regional transportation system. The process of policy development, although not seamless, provides a model for jurisdictions grappling with how to prioritize the needs of the numerous public and private actors who take part in a transportation system that helps keep thousands of personal automobiles off the roads. Many of the most world’s best-known technology companies—including Facebook, Google, and Apple—are based in suburban office parks in Silicon Valley, an area of no legal defini- tion that encompasses the southern end of the Bay Area. Many of these campuses are served by employer-sponsored commuter shuttles, popularly known as “tech buses,” which transport employees to Silicon Valley from the San Francisco and other communities in the central and northern Bay Area. (Many companies and institutions outside the technology sector also pro- vide these shuttles, but the “tech” moniker has proved to be persistent.) Most of the major employers are in municipalities that implemented TDM strategies in the years leading up to the SFMTA pilot program, requiring that they work to actively reduce the number of drive-alone commuters to their locations.8 Given the lack of direct public S E C T I O N 5 Case Studies: Local Approaches to Transportation Challenges 8Menlo Park first adopted TDM guidelines in 2001 (Menlo Park 2015), and an example of its application can be found in the TDM plan proposed by Facebook for a new campus in the city in 2011. Palo Alto initiated a TDM requirement and established a TMA in 2013. In 2015, Mountain View implemented a TDM district in the North Bayshore area, which includes office parks for such corporations as Google, Microsoft, Intuit, and LinkedIn.

Case Studies: Local Approaches to Transportation Challenges 33 transportation routes, local TDM requirements gave the companies an additional incentive to provide shuttle buses as an amenity for their employees. By 2012, the growing presence of large motor coaches, especially in gentrifying San Francisco neighborhoods such as the Mission District, along with the buses’ unsanctioned use of Muni bus stops for pick-ups and drop-offs, began attracting negative attention from residents and the media (Carroll 2013, McBride 2013). At that point, the shuttles were largely unregulated beyond state public utility commission requirements for licensing and vehicle operation. Local author- ity over the shuttles was limited to enforcement of traffic and parking regulations, with little say over whether, or how many, shuttles could operate in the city of San Francisco. Shuttle sponsors, transit operators, and the city began to recognize the value of regulations for the shuttles that went beyond writing tickets for parking violations. Since an effective system of curb access for passenger loading would tend to be widely distributed, clear of obstacles, and within walk- ing distance of many people—all characteristics of the existing system of Muni stops—arriving at a way to allow managed use of those stops was of interest to both the city and to private operators. In August 2014, the SFMTA, working directly with a group of shuttle sponsors and operators, launched a cooperative pilot program that rationalized private use of the public right-of-way by 1. Allowing shuttles to use designated Muni bus stops. 2. Providing dedicated shuttle stops. 3. Offering other means of planning support and data sharing. 4. Instituting an administrative fee (charge per shuttle stop) to fund the program and strengthen enforcement of its provisions. With revisions including a requirement to plan for cooperation with organized labor, the pilot was formalized as a 12-month program starting in April 2016, with evaluation of the program beginning in the fall of 2016. In the spring of 2017, the program was extended indefinitely with ongoing mandates for ADA compliance and safety provisions. Pilot Program, 2014 to 2016 The groundwork for the Commuter Shuttle Pilot Program was laid 5 years before implemen- tation. SFMTA collaborated with the SFCTA on the latter’s 2011 report, “The Role of Shuttle Services in San Francisco’s Transportation System” (SFCTA 2011). The researchers used a com- bination of community and passenger surveys and field observations to formulate a benefit- impact matrix, shown in Table 4. After consideration of alternatives, the SFMTA’s Sustainable Streets Division recommended the establishment of a “Muni Partners” program with the shuttle providers to rationalize the use of the public right-of-way, ensure safe operations, and integrate the shuttle service with other transit services. The SFCTA’s 2011 report specifically called out the following measures, which would influence the 2014 to 2016 pilot program (SFCTA 2011, 14): • Create dedicated facilities to accommodate the shuttles. • Develop a system for reporting of infractions and enforcement of relevant regulations. • Give guidance to operators and dedicate staffing resources to the program. • Create a monitoring and reporting regimen. Following SFMTA board approval, an 18-month Commuter Shuttle Pilot Program was implemented in August 2014. The initial pilot program included 16 shuttle providers, who were required to • Apply for permits. • Pay fees to support the administration of the program, initially $3.67 per “stop event” (mean- ing any stop in the city to pick up or drop off passengers). • Provide global positioning system (GPS) data on routes and stop events.

34 Private Transit: Existing Services and Emerging Directions SFMTA did not dictate routes, but the larger shuttles were not permitted to travel down cer- tain streets. The agency, in turn, designated approximately 100 Muni stops (“red zones”) where the shuttles might stop and converted on-street parking spaces to approximately 20 shuttle-only, rush hour “white zone” stops. Mid-Term Findings In October 2015, the SFMTA published a mid-program evaluation that utilized the above- mentioned reporting requirements (SFMTA 2015). The agency collected field observations in the boarding zones in June 2014, before the program started, and collected comparable data in the spring and summer of 2015. The analysis also included GPS and survey data shared by the participating shuttles as part of the terms of their pilot program agreement. Shuttle Data The following data on shuttles were reported: • Number and size of shuttles. The shuttle operators registered 479 vehicles by March 2015. Most were motor coaches (399)—either single- or double-decker buses, with a capacity of more than 40 passengers—with the remainder split between minibuses seating up to 30 pas- sengers (40), Muni-style transit buses (30), and vans (10). • Passengers carried. The shuttles in the program averaged 17,000 boardings per day (or approximately 8,500 riders per day), for 356,998 boardings per month. Of these boardings, 76% were intercity regional shuttle trips, and 24% had origins and destinations within San Francisco. Beneits Category Measure Public Private (Broad in scope, highly regionalized) Congestion Vehicle trips avoided X VMT avoided X Load factor X Environmental Emissions reduced (CO2) X Emissions reduced (ROG, NOx, PM) X Economic Local spending induced X Employee retention X Productive time gained X Accessibility X Quality of Life Car ownership reduced X X Leisure or personal time gained X (More detailed, operations level, localized) Congestion Displacement of other vehicles (cars, bikes) when parked or idling X X Displacement of Muni vehicles when parked or idling X Environmental Emissions produced (due to larger vehicle size or when idling) X Quality of Life Noise/vibrations X X Safety Unsafe sightlines if double-parked or in Muni zone X Unsafe sightlines at certain locations if moving (e.g., turning corners) X X Collisions X X Pavement Condition Wear and tear on pavement X Wear and tear on curb bulbs (e.g., turning corners) X Impacts Table 4. High-level shuttle benefits and Impacts. (Credit: SFCTA 2011)

Case Studies: Local Approaches to Transportation Challenges 35 • Stop events. Participating shuttles made an estimated 2,302 daily stop events in June 2014 in the study area, before the launch of the program. In July 2015, they estimated 2,978 daily stop events in the study area, a 29% increase. • Trip distances and shuttle VMT. The intercity shuttles traveled an average of 47 miles per trip, while the intracity shuttles traveled an average of 2 miles per trip. The study estimated the overall shuttle VMT as follows: – 47,484 per weekday – 997,156 per month – 11,965,877 per year The VMT numbers include “deadhead,” or empty, shuttle trips (SFMTA 2015, 12). Finally, the dwell times per boarding increased over the study time, although the effect was minimal on the system as whole. Rider Data and Personal VMT Reduction Attributable to Commuter Shuttles SFMTA surveyed shuttle riders in June 2015. Of nearly 550 respondents, 72% rode the shuttle daily, and 18% rode a few times a week. The survey’s split of intercity (76%) to intracity (24%) trips was almost identical to boardings data, with 55% of respondents going to Menlo Park. The survey reported that “nearly half (45%) of survey respondents do not own cars, and 45% of those who do not own cars cited shuttles as the ‘main reason’ they did not own a car” (SFMTA 2015, 16) The survey also reported that 47% of the riders would commute via single-occupancy vehicle (SOV) if the shuttles were not available. Using the shuttle and rider data, SFMTA estimated a net monthly reduction of 4,296,837 VMT (SFMTA 2015, 18). Safety and Enforcement The SFMTA pilot addressed some of the behavior of the shuttles during stop events in the shuttle zones, especially those “where shuttle activity has received significant attention” like the Mission District (SFMTA 2015, 19): • Blocking problems. Instances of the shuttles blocking Muni stops decreased by 35% year over year, but the overall increase of stop events and the addition of white zones caused increases in travel- and bike-lane blockages across the system. Stops on the near side of intersections blocked travel or bike lanes 51% of the time during the observation period. Near-side blocking also created potential hazards for pedestrians. • Vehicle idling, noise, and unauthorized street use. Some public responses were con- cerned with shuttle vehicles idling in neighborhoods and vehicle noise and presence. Other problems included shuttles traveling down unauthorized streets or making unau- thorized stops. The latter prompted reforms to the program as it approached formalization into policy. Labor Harmony and New Policy The SFMTA board formalized the pilot as a policy in February 2016, following the recom- mendations of its evaluation report. Additions to the policy stated that • Shuttles over 35 feet in length must travel only on Caltrans-designated arterial streets. • New shuttle vehicles must meet 2012 California emissions standards. • Shuttle operators must provide a Service Disruption Prevention Plan (SFMTA 2017).

36 Private Transit: Existing Services and Emerging Directions The latter provision, which required companies to outline plans for preventing and deal- ing with potential service disruptions, including labor disputes, was drafted in response to the International Brotherhood of Teamsters’ organizing of drivers for the major shuttle provid- ers and to possible disruptions due to resistance by some employers (SF Board of Supervisors Resolution 96-15, 2015). The SFMTA Board of Directors announced its compliance with the labor resolution at the end of the pilot program. The program also permits shuttles that are free and open to the public to use the shuttle zone network without paying the stop event fee (SFMTA 2017). The permit process was codified in Section 914 of the San Francisco Transportation Code. Hub Study, 2016 Faced with shuttles’ persistent issues of conflict with other road users, use of non-arterial streets, and use of nearly all the permitted number of zones, the SFCTA and SFMTA undertook a study to explore the feasibility of concentrating over 100 red zone Muni and white zone shuttle- only stops into a small number of hubs. The study explored multiple scenarios, which ranged from simply consolidating the number of stops to 30 along arterial corridors to creating a single large hub in downtown San Francisco (SFMTA 2016b, 9). The scenarios attempted to address the goals of moving the shuttles out of neighborhoods, making them safer, and more fully integrating them into the public transit system. Mode shift and VMT analyses showed that “shuttle ridership would drop between 24% and 45%, nearly all those prior shuttle riders would switch to driving, and VMT would increase five- to eight-fold” (SFMTA 2016b, 2). A San Francisco Chronicle article published during the writing of the study illustrated a possible correlation between elimination of some stops and a decline in ridership on the shuttles (Lee 2016). 2017 Policy and Possible Changes The policy was set to expire on March 31, 2017, but was extended with modifications, including a requirement that “permitted shuttles placed in service after June 30, 2017 comply with disability access requirements.” Remaining in the resolution is the assertion that “shuttle service provides significant benefits to the community by replacing single occupant trips with more efficient transportation, contributing to a reduction in parking demand, and supporting the City’s goal of increasing trips made by sustainable modes” (SFMTA Board of Directors Res. 170221-023). Conclusion The San Francisco commuter shuttle program is a case of a public agency finding a coopera- tive way to bring unregulated, private transit companies to the table in a voluntary program, which evolved into a working policy, with beneficial outcomes for many of the stakeholders. In framing the 2017 launch of the final policy, SFMTA asserted that the Commuter Shuttle Program has improved shuttle vehicle behavior while minimizing the impacts of shuttle vehicles on the rest of the transportation network, despite a 15 percent increase in shuttle ridership and an increase in the number of shuttle vehicles on the road each day as compared to the Pilot. (2017, 1) Although the process was not seamless, it provides a model for other jurisdictions grappling with how to expand commuting options and prioritize the needs of the numerous public and private actors who take part in a transportation system that helps keep many personal auto- mobiles off the road every day.

Case Studies: Local Approaches to Transportation Challenges 37 Case Study II: Consortium-Sponsored Services: Public-Private Partnerships to Access Low-Density Areas The service model that this report has termed “consortium-sponsored services” is neither wholly sponsored by a single entity like the large employer shuttle networks, nor is it purely commercial. Instead, the consortium-sponsored shuttles examined here are the product of public-private partnerships that usually provide last-mile service in lower density areas. The case study comprises five examples, representing a variety of urban forms and transportation contexts: • San Mateo County Shuttles, coordinated by the San Mateo County (California) TDM agency, provide last-mile private transit from regional high-capacity transit services. • Austin is experimenting with employer-anchored, last-mile microtransit routes open to the public. • The Lake-Cook TMA outside Chicago combines the resources of private employers to sub- sidize public bus routes between commuter rail stops and large suburban office campuses. • Lone Tree, Colorado, provides private transit shuttle service and allows transit-oriented development to take place while waiting for planned transit facilities to be built. • In Atlanta’s northern suburbs, community improvement districts contract for private last- mile and circulator shuttles to extend the reach of MARTA rail service. In each example, the private transit services are open to the public and, with a few exceptions, are free to all users. Public-private partnerships are attractive to the private employment and residential centers because private transit provides an alternative to drive-alone commutes, helps with employee recruitment and retention, and sometimes helps to satisfy local TDM requirements. The arrangement is attractive to public entities that provide funding and/or operating assistance for the shuttles for some of the same reasons, as well as supporting ridership on existing transit lines and fulfilling clean air requirements. The most successful of these programs have documented success in diverting SOV trips, keep- ing cars off congested roads and highways, and helping to bolster regional transit ridership, with modest costs to the public. San Mateo County Shuttles: Giving Employers an Active Stake in Route Planning and Regional TDM The consortium-based service shuttle coordinated by Commute.org in San Mateo County, CA, serves as a last-mile solution from regional high-capacity transit services. San Mateo County, at the south end of the Peninsula, is served by Caltrain commuter rail, BART heavy rail, the county’s SamTrans buses, and ferries along the coast. Some of the companies in the county run the direct commuter shuttles from San Francisco, as discussed elsewhere in this report. Many also choose to participate in the county’s last-mile shuttle program. Commute.org is San Mateo County’s TDM agency, a joint-powers agency that covers 17 municipalities and the county government and receives funding through the City/County Association of Governments of San Mateo County (C/CAG), the San Mateo County Transpor- tation Authority (SMCTA), the Bay Area Air Quality Management District (BAAQMD), and the MTC (Commute.org interview 2017). The Commute.org program features • Public and private funding. Consortium members provide a local match ranging from 25% to 50% of the cost of the service, with the remainder provided by county grant funds from

38 Private Transit: Existing Services and Emerging Directions SMCTA, C/CAG, and Measure A funds. Measure A is a sales county tax measure that was approved by voters in 1988 and renewed for 2009 through 2033. Employers or sites can apply directly for county grants to support their own shuttles, or they can work through Commute.org to build a group of employers and allow the TDM group to manage the planning and operation of the shuttles. • TDM management and coordination. In addition to spreading the risk among more private participants, Commute.org helps fund and build the consortium, plans the routes to not conflict with existing bus routes, procures a transportation vendor, and markets the system using common branding and information. • Services, costs, and ridership levels. Vehicles range in size from 20 to 40 passengers. As of June 2017, there are 21 routes, and the cost to the employer/site per month ranges from $100 to $3,000, on a 6-month billing cycle. The Commute.org program has seen a 47.3% increase in passenger trips from fiscal year 2013 to fiscal year 2016 (Commute.org 2016, Commute.org interview 2017, SMCTA 2017). The transportation vendor, MV Transportation, provides ADA-accessible buses with trained drivers and provides data for the county transit agency to report to the National Transit Data- base (NTD). The shuttles are free and open to the public and run during the weekday peak hours (Commute.org interview 2017). Employer-Anchored Microtransit in Central Austin Austin’s MetroRail light rail transit (LRT) line connects several of the growing region’s sub- urbs to the heart of downtown Austin, but with the city’s relatively low density, many employ- ment centers, even those with central city locations, are “somewhat near transit, but not quite close enough to walk comfortably,” in the words of Alix Scarborough of Movability Austin, the Downtown Austin TMA (2017b). To make the train a more useful option for employees just beyond its reach, the TMA, City of Austin, and Capital Metro partnered with the nonprofit Rocky Mountain Institute and several large employers in the 6th Street Market District, west of downtown, to pilot employer-supported microtransit routes operated by Chariot (Movability Austin 2017a). Under Chariot’s business model, routes are generally either “public” (open to anybody with the application who happens to be going that direction) or “private” (sponsored ser- vices open only to the sponsors’ employees). In Austin, two large Market District companies worked with the public-sector and nonprofit partners to sponsor their employees’ trips on a route that was otherwise open to the public—anchoring a new microtransit service for the district and creating a new fare-based mobility option for other employees in the area. The routes created under the system became Chariot’s first permanent routes in the Austin region (Velazquez 2016). Lake-Cook TMA Shuttle Bug: Private Support for Fully “Public” Routes The Shuttle Bug service in Chicago’s northern suburbs is the most visible public-private col- laboration of the consortium-sponsored shuttles, as the Pace transit agency operates the shuttle lines with buses that operate as public transit (i.e., with standard fareboxes) for the general public. Sponsored riders enjoy a free last-mile trip from Metra commuter rail stations to their work destinations. The program was initiated by the Lake-Cook TMA, which was formed in 1989 in response to drive-alone traffic generated by a proliferation of suburban office parks around the expressways

Case Studies: Local Approaches to Transportation Challenges 39 and Lake-Cook Road in Chicago’s northwestern suburbs. The Shuttle Bug program was initiated in 1996 and is a public-private partnership of the TMA, Metra commuter rail, Pace Suburban Bus, and several corporate partners. Pace owns and operates the buses as numbered routes in their system, with the operating cost supported by the private partners and whatever farebox revenue is also generated on the routes (LaBelle and Frève 2016, 30; Grzesiakowski and Gamba 2013a; TMA of Lake-Cook 2017). Program details include • Public-private financing. On the operations side, the companies contribute half the cost of the program by way of the TMA, and Metra and Pace split the other half (25% overall, each). • Services and ridership. The program currently offers 13 routes that serve 30 compa- nies with 1,000 daily rider trips and 250,000 annual trips. Although this is down from a peak of 1,700 daily trips in 2008, the TMA attributes part of the decrease to the number of employers in the area that have seen the value in providing non-automobile com- mute options to their employees and have chosen to bypass the TMA and finance private shuttles directly (increasing their control over the level of amenity). At least a dozen large employers in the TMA area now provide their own shuttles from Metra stations in the district (LaBelle and Frève 2016, 31; Grzesiakowski and Gamba 2013a and 2013b; TMA interview 2017). Lone Tree Link: Enabling Transit-Oriented Development Before the Transit Arrives The Denver metropolitan area continues to grow both geographically and economically. The south-suburban City of Lone Tree was incorporated in 1995 in response to land-use pressure and has grown rapidly since as both a job center and a residential area. According to Lone Tree’s Director of Economic Development, some 15,000 to 20,000 employees work in a city of around 13,000 residents and just under 10 square miles in area. Lone Tree straddles I-25 and currently sits at the southern terminus of the Regional Transit District’s (RTD) Southeast Corridor LRT line. Construction has begun on a southward exten- sion of the line that will open three more LRT stations in the city by 2019. The city has planned its future growth around the arrival of the additional stations and service, with dense, walkable transit-oriented development as a central part of that vision and of its eco- nomic development portfolio. In the meantime, however, Lone Tree remains a relatively low-density exurban area. Anticipating the arrival of the additional LRT stations in the city, but knowing that they were still several years away, municipal and corporate leaders in Lone Tree collaborated to provide a private local circulator service that would allow the city to start building around transit before the transit arrived (Charles Schwab interview 2017, Lone Tree interview 2017, Svaldi 2014). The financial services firm Charles Schwab & Co. decided to site a large campus in the city due to proximity to housing and transit and in anticipation of the new LRT service. In the interim, Schwab teamed with the Denver South TMA, the City of Lone Tree, and companies from two other corporate campuses—the Sky Ridge Medical Center and Park Ridge Corporate Center— to run the Lone Tree Link Shuttle, a private local circulator. The $500,000 annual cost is split among the consortium members, with Schwab pay- ing slightly more than half. Each private partner contracts separately with the city for their participation. The shuttle is contracted to a private operator that runs Link-branded vans that are free and open to the public, although work-destined users are an estimated 90% of the ridership. Although it is overwhelmingly a commuter service, the Link runs every 10 minutes throughout

40 Private Transit: Existing Services and Emerging Directions its service period (weekdays, 6am to 7pm). The latest annual report shows approximately 350 daily riders and claims an average of 5.9 riders per revenue hour, which outpaces the 3.0 ratio that the RTD sets as its standard for its public call-and-ride option. The shuttles are all ADA-compliant, but are considered a private service and do not report to the NTD. As the shuttle runs on a fixed route, it benefits the larger campuses and was always envisioned as a temporary solution while the city awaits the arrival of the new LRT stations. Charles Schwab will be two blocks from a light rail stop and will not need the shuttle. The city is launching within a year a pilot to explore a possible last-mile solution with a TNC. This would serve the smaller companies that could not afford the Link on their own. Given its popularity, the city is consider- ing a “Link 2.0” that would serve the new stations, as well (Charles Schwab interview 2017, Lone Tree interview 2017, Woullard 2014, Lone Tree 2017). Perimeter Connects: Creating a Shuttle Network at Atlanta’s Suburban Edge The Perimeter Center is an “edge city” in north suburban Atlanta that includes parts of the Dunwoody, Sandy Springs, and Brookhaven municipalities, as well as other unincorpo- rated areas. In many ways, it is an archetypal suburban activity node: it draws its name from the mall at its center that was, in turn, named after the ring road Interstate at the peak of which it is built. The district now contains a major medical center and is a one of the region’s major business districts, with some 120,000 employees working at 5,000 firms in the widely dispersed area (PCID 2012). The four northernmost stations of the MARTA rail system sit within the district, and the Georgia Regional Transportation Authority provides limited express bus service in the area. The Perimeter Community Improvement Districts (CIDs) include both the Central and Fulton Perimeter CIDs, in DeKalb and Fulton Counties, respectively. The Perimeter CIDs are self-taxing entities that have, under the Georgia model, the ability to implement a broad range of programs, including transportation services like the Perimeter Connects commuter program, which coordinates, brands, and publishes schedule information for private shut- tles operating in the district (Kuhn, Larson, and Bourdeaux 2016). While the CIDs support a branded network of about a dozen shuttles, other companies within their jurisdictions contract directly with bus operators to provide last-mile services from MARTA and within the district. The Perimeter Connect shuttles are operated by American Coach Lines. It contracts with several different businesses, who cosign under one contract governed by a memorandum of understanding and a chairperson. The bus drivers work for the company as W-2 employees, and the buses are wheelchair accessible. The contractor does not report to the NTD, but pri- vately reports 15,000 to 16,000 passengers per month. The contractor does not compare rider- ship to capacity; rather, headways and schedules appear to be the biggest concern. While the contractor does not see automation on the horizon, it looks to Chariot and other microtransit companies as a possible model for improving service (PCID 2012, American Coach Lines interview 2017). Conclusion These examples of consortium-sponsored services provide several compelling models for enhancing regional public transit investments in a variety of contexts. All are in areas where current land uses make public bus service a challenge, and walking and biking are not reasonable

Case Studies: Local Approaches to Transportation Challenges 41 options. Consortium-sponsored services are often closely coordinated with public entities, such as municipalities or TDM groups, with public monies helping to underwrite the transportation provided. In all these examples, the services are at their core an extension of regional high- capacity public transit and improve access to employment in noncore parts of their metro areas. The private-sector contribution is provided as an amenity to attract employees and customers who may not want to, or be able to, drive to a suburban location. As largely private services, the shuttles’ routes can be tailored for quick connections and more direct service and can be responsive to changes in the local mix of employers and develop- ment. With the growth of population and commercial activity in low-density land-use contexts showing no sign of abating, finding ways to support suburban trips on transit will only grow in importance. Case Study III: Dollar Vans and Jersey Jitneys: Grassroots Private Transit Evolves at the Regulatory Margins While the commuter shuttles that serve the San Francisco Bay Area serve many users who would otherwise drive alone on trips that are not practical to make via public transit, the dollar vans and jitneys in the New York City area and New Jersey included in this case study tend to serve a population less likely to have vehicles of their own. To give an idea of the scale of this mostly informal network, transportation scholar Eric Goldwyn estimates that the New York City metropolitan commuter van network serves more than 100,000 riders daily, more than many major U.S. cities’ public bus networks (Goldwyn 2017, 20). The regulatory environment that surrounds the vans and jitneys is confusing and often out of step with the services’ basic operational characteristics. Recent policy changes attempt to induce participation in licensing through lowered requirements and higher fines for rogue operators, a sign that regulators and operators are evolving in tandem. At present, however, regulatory structures for this grassroots system are still struggling to balance the transportation and safety needs of passengers, the business needs of operators, and the public policy needs of regulating authorities and public transit agencies. New York City Dollar Vans As discussed in the historical overview in Section 1 of this report, the jitney mode of private transit first arose with popular access to automobiles. The rebirth of the jitney and the mod- ern dollar van in the New York City area was born of municipal fiscal crises of the 1970s and grew especially following the 1980 transit strike. Given cuts in services, New York City and New York State (the latter controls the MTA) took a liberal approach to granting commuter van permits. The vans emerged as popular transportation options in Brooklyn and Queens, especially in immigrant communities from the West Indies and parts of Asia (Goldwyn 2017, 45; Richardson 1999). By 1992, the city was ready to take regulatory control over the vans, which was granted on a limited basis along state guidelines. New York State regulates the safe operation of what it defines as buses—any vehicle used to transport more than 10 people, including a driver (NY State Regs., 720.1). The city licensed “commuter vans,” which it defined as carrying between 9 and 20 passengers, on a route that does not travel or stop along a route traveled by MTA buses, on a prearranged

42 Private Transit: Existing Services and Emerging Directions basis (i.e., without accepting street hails) (Goldwyn 2017, 48; NYC Code §19-502 and §19-529.1). Licensing is handled by the New York City Taxi and Limousine TLC, which also regulates other FHVs under 20 passengers (NYC Code §52-02). The New York City vans often parallel New York City MTA bus routes and stop anywhere along the route, but often deliver riders to destinations at less fare and time cost to the user than a ride on MTA. The effect is magnified when vans make express trips between destinations of inter- est to specific communities. For instance, dollar vans provide express service between Chinatowns in Flushing, Queens, and Sunset Park, Brooklyn, in about 20 minutes—a trip that takes more than an hour on MTA local routes (Margonelli 2011). On their face, the commuter van route and street hail provisions place nearly every van, licensed or “pirate,” in violation of the law. The vans travel and pick up fares on the bor- oughs’ major arterials, almost all of which are MTA bus routes. Likewise, the vans are ad hoc services that do not travel on fixed schedules between stops, so by their nature they rely on street hails. The TLC appears to be heading toward a simplified regulatory environment that does more to recognize the vans’ basic operating characteristics. The latest regulatory revisions eliminated the requirement for the vans to carry a passenger manifest (a vestige of the idea that they provide a prearranged service, but which was widely ignored in practice) and emphasized the display of van license decals to make it easier for passengers to tell licensed vans from unlicensed, encour- aging their use of the former. While the relevant enforcement agencies have attempted to limit the vans to specific pick-up zones, in practice the vans, licensed or unlicensed, do not adhere to the rules (TLC interview 2017, NYCDOT interview 2017). However, as a New York City Department of Transportation (NYCDOT) staffer noted in an interview (2017), calls for better enforcement often come from the licensed vans within the industry, as van owners that pay for inspections and licensing will report the pirate vans if they see them cutting into their business or loading passengers at the few designated commuter van stands. Likewise, the police enforce traffic behavior, not licensing issues. But the contradictions at the core of the dollar van regulatory scheme remain unresolved (King and Goldwyn 2014, Reiss 2014). New Jersey Jitneys The New Jersey–based jitneys arose in the 1990s and spread in the new millennium. Although they have their origins in the immigrant neighborhoods of the city of Paterson and Hudson County, the jitneys are more widely visible and have gained a more general ridership (Hellman interview 2017). Some of the New Jersey jitneys’ greater visibility could be due to many of the routes’ greater regulatory exposure as they cross state lines to access New York City destinations. Some routes have gained a form of sanction in Manhattan by securing their own gates in the Port Authority Bus Terminal in Midtown and the authority’s George Washington Bridge Bus Station in far uptown Fort Washington. In the latter, jitney compa- nies operate out of four gates to NJ Transit’s seven. The Hudson County origins are served by multiple public transit modes, with NJ Transit buses and Hudson-Bergen Light Rail and the Port Authority Trans-Hudson (PATH) Corporation heavy rail serving the county, as well as ferry service. Just as with the New York City dollar vans, the jitney form follows regulatory function. The jit- neys that cross from New Jersey to Manhattan fall under federal jurisdiction, as they are engaging in interstate commerce. At the federal level, the vehicles are classified by passenger capacity, with the relevant breaks at 9- to15-seat vehicles and those with more than 16 seats. Since the jitneys

Case Studies: Local Approaches to Transportation Challenges 43 accept direct compensation from the passenger, they are subject to full Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations. As shown in Table 5, the primary concern of the regulation is vehicle safety, and the chief difference between the two categories is the level of liability insurance required (NJTPA 2011, 53–59). The regulatory considerations devolve to the state level for operations that take place entirely within New Jersey, although the Department of Motor Vehicles assists in both federal regula- tions. Here, the municipalities have the power of consent regarding operations (mainly, stops) within their jurisdiction. Most intrastate jitneys cross at least a few municipal borders. The 2011 Hudson County Jitney Study called for consideration of a Hudson County (where most of the non-Paterson service occurs) medallion/decal system, but no such system or its analogue has been implemented. The major shifts in policy have occurred with a 2013 safety law that includes a requirement that every “omnibus” (i.e., jitney) post a means of contacting the state over safety or other consumer affairs concerns (NJ P.L. 2013 c.224, Brenzel 2015). The state and counties have also launched surprise inspections. The state also distinguishes between types of buses, so that vehicles that are performing commercial services are identi- fied apart from those performing nonprofit services, e.g., transporting residents of assisted liv- ing facilities. Vehicle accessibility in compliance with ADA standards remains elusive, however (NJMVC 2013; NJDMV 2017, Code 54; NJTPA 2011, 46). Table 5. Federal and New Jersey state regulations: jitneys/commuter vans. (Source: NJTPA 2011) (continued on next page)

44 Private Transit: Existing Services and Emerging Directions Regardless of these regulations, representatives of Hudson County are still working to create greater oversight (Mota 2016). On the other hand, while safety and ADA accessibility remain issues, planners and politicians face the projection of latent demand for trans-Hudson River crossings, and the Port Authority Bus Terminal faces capacity issues (Port Authority of New York and New Jersey 2016, A-2). Conclusion In the case of both the New York City dollar vans and New Jersey jitneys, the services fill an accessibility need for transit-dependent populations. Regulation and enforcement has not proved consistent, with the latter more geared toward enforcement of general traffic violations, such as blocking bus stops. While they might face some disruption from electronic hailing tech- nologies and TNCs, the jitney mode has proven robust and persistent in the region. Table 5. (Continued).

TRB's Transit Cooperative Research Program (TCRP) Research Report 196: Private Transit: Existing Services and Emerging Directions provides information about private transit services and ways they are addressing transportation needs in a variety of operating environments. The document contains an overview and taxonomy of private transit services in the United States, a review of their present scope and operating characteristics, and a discussion of ways they may affect the communities in which they operate along with several case studies and other supporting information.

Private transit services—including airport shuttles, shared taxis, private commuter buses, dollar vans and jitneys—have operated for decades in many American cities. Recently, business innovations and technological advances that allow real-time ride-hailing, routing, tracking, and payment have ushered in a new generation of private transit options. These include new types of public-private partnership that are helping to bridge first/last mile gaps in suburban areas.

The report also examines ways that private transit services are interacting with communities and transit agencies, as well as resulting impacts and benefits.

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What Does It Mean for a Case to be ‘Local’?: the Importance of Local Relevance and Resonance for Bioethics Education in the Asia-Pacific Region

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• Published: 30 May 2020
• Volume 12 , pages 173–194, ( 2020 )

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• Sara M. Bergstresser   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-7667-2426 1 , 2 ,
• Kulsoom Ghias 3 ,
• Stuart Lane 4 ,
• Wee-Ming Lau 5 ,
• Isabel S. S. Hwang 6 ,
• Olivia M. Y. Ngan 1 , 7 ,
• Robert L. Klitzman 2 &
• Ho Keung Ng 1  

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Contemporary bioethics education has been developed predominately within Euro-American contexts, and now, other global regions are increasingly joining the field, leading to a richer global understanding. Nevertheless, many standard bioethics curriculum materials retain a narrow geographic focus. The purpose of this article is to use local cases from the Asia-Pacific region as examples for exploring questions such as ‘what makes a case or example truly local, and why?’, ‘what topics have we found to be best explained through local cases or examples?’, and ‘how does one identify a relevant local case?’ Furthermore, we consider the global application of local cases to help extend the possible scope of the discussion, opening new avenues for the development of practical bioethics educational materials. We begin with a background description and discussion of why local cases enhance bioethics education, move to an overview of what is currently available and what is not for the region, and then outline a discussion of what it means to be local using example cases drawn from Hong Kong, Australia, Pakistan, and Malaysia. We are not creating a casebook but rather constructing by example a toolbox for designing active and dynamic learning cases using regional diversity as contextualised cases with generalised principles.

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Acknowledgements

The work on this paper was inspired by conversations at meetings of the Asia Pacific Bioethics Education Network (APBEN) hosted at the Chinese University of Hong Kong in 2018 and 2019. The authors would like to extend their thanks to APBEN members for their valuable input and support.

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Bergstresser, S.M., Ghias, K., Lane, S. et al. What Does It Mean for a Case to be ‘Local’?: the Importance of Local Relevance and Resonance for Bioethics Education in the Asia-Pacific Region. ABR 12 , 173–194 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41649-020-00120-8

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The paradox of externally driven localisation: a case study on how local actors manage the contradictory legitimacy requirements of top-down bottom-up aid

• Femke Mulder   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-8564-4977 1 , 2  

Journal of International Humanitarian Action volume  8 , Article number:  7 ( 2023 ) Cite this article

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There are ongoing calls in the humanitarian and development sectors to localise aid, make it more participatory and involve communities. A common response to these calls by INGOs and national governments is to work with local actors to jointly deliver local, community-based, participatory aid. However, this setup tends to be hierarchical, with external actors taking the lead on project design and local actors on implementation. As a result, key outcomes envisioned for localisation and participation in aid often do not materialise. This paper explores the role legitimacy work plays in maintaining this unhelpful status quo. To this end, it provides a qualitative case study analysis of an aid project in Ethiopia (2016–2020) that was initiated by two INGOs and built on government structures designed to facilitate mass volunteering at community level: the Women’s Development Army. The paper argues that externally driven localisation is often organised around project models that are shaped by two contradictory paradigms: one centring resilience and one centring surveillance . As a result, local aid workers and civil servants are faced with incompatible legitimacy requirements in their work. This paper uses a paradox perspective as a theoretical lens to explore how these local actors navigate these conflicting needs. It finds that they use impression management, especially visuals and performances, to sidestep the contradictions. This imagery conceals the disconnects between project strategy, implementation and the reality on the ground. As a side effect, it renders the problems with the externally driven approach invisible and legitimises the hierarchical status quo.

Introduction: externally driven localisation

There are ongoing calls in both the humanitarian and development sectors to localise aid and make it more participatory and community-based (e.g. Barbelet 2018 , Chambers 1983 ). Whilst there is broad support for this general sentiment, there is no consensus regarding the key questions that are associated with these calls: i.e., who is ‘local’ (Melis & Apthorpe 2020 ), what is a ‘community’ (Titz et al  2018 ) and who determines what counts as ‘locally led’ (Kuipers et al  2019 ). There is also no consensus as to whether ‘localisation’ entails the transfer of resources, the transfer of agency and/or whether it entails centring local ways of being (Baguios et al  2021 ). Whilst some call to ‘shift the power’ and centre local (thought) leadership in aid (e.g. van Wessel et al  2023 ), there is no consensus as to whether localisation should entail such a transformative approach or whether it should simply mean decentralisation (Van Brabant and Patel 2017 ). This paper discusses a common response by global aid actors (and some national governments) to these calls and debates, namely, to try and shift the power without relinquishing control, a contradiction this paper refers to as externally driven localisation .

This approach entails trying to organise bottom-up approaches to aid in a top-down manner. To this end, international non-governmental organisations (INGOs) initiate collaborations with local government bodies, staff their country and ‘field’ offices with nationals and/or partner with local actors who work with—or are part of—the communities that are the intended targets of aid. As this paper will show, some federal/national governments do the same. The goal of these external–local collaborations is to organise local, community-based, participatory aid (LCPA). Although they are often framed as ‘partnerships’, these collaborations tend to be hierarchical in nature with strategic direction, funding and monitoring primarily coming ‘from above’ and implementation, reporting and compliance primarily coming ‘from below’. The projects themselves are embedded in broader global hierarchies that resemble those of the colonial era.

The hierarchical setup that often underpins LCPA affects how project contributors at all levels manage perceptions of legitimacy for such projects. Legitimacy is ‘a generalised perception or assumption that the actions of an entity are desirable, proper, or appropriate’ (Suchman 1995 , p. 574). It is not a possession of a project but ‘represents a relationship with an audience’ (Suchman 1995 , p. 594). The need for legitimacy is a powerful and parsimonious explanation for organisational behaviour (Deegan 2019 ), especially in the aid sector where NGOs heavily depend on donors for resources (Keating & Thrandardottir 2017 ). It is for this reason that this paper analyses LCPA project design and implementation through the lens of legitimacy, as opposed to from a more rationalist perspective. Specifically, it focuses on legitimacy work , which is the purposeful activity to shape audiences’ evaluation of something as legitimate (Lefsrud et al  2020 ). Given the hierarchies that underpin LCPA, the main audiences for legitimacy work tend to be leading aid agencies, policy makers and donors in the Global North. Legitimacy work can be substantive, reflecting genuine commitment and action, and/or symbolic, where the focus lies on managing optics (Hrasky 2012 ). In the management literature, the latter is generally referred to as impression management (Conway et al  2015 ). Legitimacy work for aid projects is not limited to writing and speech; visuals and imagery (such as photos, videos and live performances) also play an important role (Dhanani, & Kennedy 2023 ). The case study presented in this paper focuses on how local aid workers, civil servants and community-based volunteers use project imagery to symbolically influence audience perceptions (Hrasky 2012 ). Imagery is effective for this purpose because it embodies both reality and creation, combining information with impression management (Davison 2014 , p. 22). It allows aid projects to present a particular version of reality. Their photos, videos and live performances are choreographed forms of ‘evidence-displaying’ that are linked to wider impression management strategies (Dhanani & Kennedy 2023 ). As such, imagery gives insights into how a project manages strategic issues, balances different expectations and responds to institutional pressures and complexity (Meyer et al  2013 , p. 490). In the context of LCPA, the main challenges that are addressed through the strategic use of imagery are the internal contradictions that are typical of LCPA project models.

These contradictions spring from the fact that two conflicting paradigms dominate the aid sector. When INGOs and governments conduct legitimacy work for LCPA projects, e.g. during the project design phase and when using the project to inform global/national policy and practice, they draw on examples from practice, policy and research that are underpinned by two conflicting sets of ideas. As this paper will discuss, the first paradigm centres on empowerment, self-reliance, local ownership and sustainability. Following Hilhorst ( 2018 ), this paper refers to this as the resilience paradigm in aid. The paper also identifies a second, conflicting, paradigm, which it refers to as the surveillance paradigm . This paradigm centres on professionalism, accountability, compliance and quality control. INGOs and national governments generally turn to the resilience paradigm when trying to persuade leading aid agencies, policy makers and donors in the Global North of the legitimacy of their LCPA strategy. However, when trying to persuade them of the legitimacy of their implementation tools and processes, they turn instead to the surveillance paradigm.

Due to power inequalities, local actors Footnote 1 are pressured to also accommodate both paradigms in their legitimacy work when they co-design and implement the project. The challenge they face is that the two paradigms present different and conflicting legitimacy requirements. The first set of requirements centres on community emancipation and self-reliance. To meet these requirements, local actors need to (be seen to) empower the project’s target communities to become self-sufficient in aid. This means that target communities must (be seen to) have a high level of autonomy in managing project activities locally. However, the second set of legitimacy requirements does not allow local actors to grant target communities significant autonomy within in the project. These requirements centre on compliance with sectoral and governmental standards, regulations and expectations. Meeting these requirements requires specialist expertise in aid monitoring and compliance that INGOs and larger local NGOs possess, but that the aid project’s target communities generally do not have. Table 1 outlines how the contradictory legitimacy requirements of the two paradigms shape LCPA projects. Footnote 2

The paper explores legitimacy work through the lens of paradox theory from the field of organisation and management science (Poole & van de Ven 1989 ). This lens was chosen because it centres on organisational tensions and contradictions. It sheds light on how actors attend to competing demands simultaneously (Smith & Lewis 2011 , p.381). The paper finds that local and community actors use imagery to sidestep the paradox in their legitimacy work, creating the impression that both sets of incompatible legitimacy criteria have been met. However, this has the side effect of hiding disconnects between project strategy, implementation and the reality on the ground. This, in turn, renders problems with the top-down approach to LCPA invisible, which helps maintain this unhelpful status quo. The findings presented in this paper build on the work of the anthropologist (Mosse 2003 ) who showed almost 20 years ago how the need to ‘make’ and ‘market’ participatory aid leads to the legitimation of project models that are internally contradictory.

This paper explores an externally driven LCPA project that ran in Ethiopia from 2016 until 2020, during a period of prolonged drought and intercommunal tensions in the region. To protect the identity of all project contributors, the project is referred to by the pseudonym EMPOWER. It had originally been planned as a pure development project but was adapted prior to launch in light of unfolding humanitarian needs. The project sought to address both the symptoms and causes of the crisis. As such, it was neither a pure emergency relief project, nor a pure development project. Instead, it was an example of ‘alchemical’ humanitarianism (Barnett 2011 ), spanning the humanitarian-development nexus. The project was developed and rolled out by a consortium that included two international NGOs, the federal government of Ethiopia and local government authorities.

Figure  1 provides an overview of who/what this paper means by external drivers, local actors and community actors. ‘External drivers’ are national or global project partners with headquarters that are geographically and culturally remote from the project target areas. Ethiopia is a large country with over 110 million inhabitants, who live in ethno-linguistically based administrative regions Footnote 3 that are semi-autonomous. Given this context, this paper approaches the federal government of Ethiopia as an external driver of the project. ‘Local actors’, in this paper, refer to people working below the national level, for example, at district or municipality level. They are physically based in the project target areas. They include local civil servants working for local government bodies and local aid workers based at the ‘field’ offices of local or international NGOs. ‘Community actors’, on the other hand, refer to unpaid project volunteers living in the municipalities targeted by the project. In the aid sector, such actors are generally referred to as ‘project participants’ or as ‘aid beneficiaries’. Footnote 4 In an LCPA project, project participants play an active, participatory role and can fairly be described as community volunteers. This paper uses the term ‘project contributors’ to refer to all external, local and community actors that contribute to an aid project.

External drivers, local actors and community actors

This paper contributes to the literature on localisation and participation in humanitarian aid by showing why externally driven top-down approaches to LCPA continue to dominate even though they do not deliver the outcomes envisioned for LCPA. It also contributes to the literatures on legitimacy work and organisational paradoxes by highlighting the role project imagery plays in facilitating effective impression management in the context of contradictory legitimacy requirements.

The remainder of this paper is structured as follows. The next section discusses the two conflicting paradigms that LCPA project contributors draw on in their legitimacy work. It then discusses how these two paradigms lead to contradictory project models, with incompatible legitimacy requirements. Next, it provides the paper’s theoretical framework, discussing paradox theory as a theoretical lens for analysing how local and community actors navigate incompatible demands in legitimacy work. It then goes on to describe the qualitative case study methodology on which this paper is based and introduces the EMPOWER project. This is followed by the paper’s main findings and conclusion.

Background: local empowerment through external control

This section discusses why LCPA project contributors draw on two contradictory paradigms in their legitimacy work.

The resilience paradigm in disaster aid

The resilience paradigm consists of social change theories that focus on local self-reliance, empowerment and sustainability in aid. These theories provide the logic (or causal mechanism) that underpins LCPA, that is to say, the reasons why the approach should deliver the outcomes envisioned for it. Very broadly speaking, the theories about LCPA that fall within this paradigm hold that, unlike centrally organised top-down aid, LCPA has the potential to emancipate marginalised groups and empower local communities to become more self-reliant in the face of poverty, hazards, poor health and disasters. The argument behind this claim is that when local people take a leading role in community-based aid, they have the opportunity to enhance their skillset, improve their (political) position, strengthen local relationships, establish connections with external actors and develop ties with relevant authorities. In other words, it allows them to build their human and social capital (Lin 2001 ), which in turn makes them more resilient. This means they are better equipped to prevent, prepare for, respond to and recover from adversity (Aldrich and Meyer 2015 , and Tierney 2014 ). For instance, by ensuring that their local priorities and perspectives are centred in aid and by taking ownership of disaster preparedness and response activities. The different theories for LCPA each put a different lens on this logic (or causal mechanism), depending on whether they constitute political critiques of the status quo or ‘purely technical’ solutions to delivering social change. Collectively, these theories form the basis for the legitimacy criteria of the resilience paradigm, both in terms of critical and 'purely technical' social change requirements (Thrandardottir, 2015 ). They lend legitimacy to LCPA strategies by providing arguments for why they can credibly facilitate empowerment and improve aid.

A central construct in (all) theories about LCPA that fall within this paradigm is that of ‘the community.’ Its imagery plays a core role in legitimacy work for LCPA, as this paper will discuss. It has connotations of a sense of shared identity and belonging as well common interests (Titz et al  2018 ). Whilst the term is sometimes claimed by a group of people who see themselves as distinct from others in a given context (e.g. Cohen 1985 ) and can be used to mobilise against oppression (Faas & Marino 2020 ), it can also be externally bestowed upon people for ideological, pragmatic or strategic reasons. In aid practice, the term is often used pragmatically as a stand-in for ‘the locality where we work’. In legitimacy work, the term is used strategically to conjure up images of a group of people who harmoniously and communally work together towards their shared interests (Titz et al  2018 ). The term embodies a long history of research, advocacy and practices that aim to emancipate and empower disaster-affected groups in aid (e.g. Maskrey 1984 ). This vast body of work lends credibility (and, hence, legitimacy) to community-based approaches.

The resilience paradigm in aid emerged in late 1970s/early 1980s. By that time, a significant body of evidence had been developed showing that centrally designed and implemented aid often fails to address specific local needs and sometimes even deepens local vulnerabilities (Kafle & Murshed 2006 ). This happened around the same time that neoliberalism gained prominence, which led to an increased focus on the importance of local self-reliance, ownership and personal responsibility in disaster aid, as well as the need for aid interventions to be financially sustainable. By the 1990s, fostering ‘resilience’ had become a core focus of humanitarian aid (Hilhorst 2018 ). Until that point, disasters had generally been treated as exceptional occurrences whereby global or national responders needed to help local ‘victims’. However, from the 1990s onwards, disasters increasingly came to be seen as inevitable and recurring outcomes of systemic problems, such as development failures. These systemic problems came to be understood through the lens of resilience. Local ‘victims’ were recast as local capable agents whose resilience, self-reliance and sense of ownership and personal responsibility for local development and disaster management should be fostered (Anholt 2022 ). Neoliberalism shifted the focus in aid from global and national actors to local people and local institutions as the first responders to crises and lead actors in development and disaster risk reduction. This contributed to growing calls on INGOs and national governments to support local aid that was decentralised, participatory and community-based (i.e., LCPA), leading to the phenomenon described in this paper: externally driven localisation. By 2018, when this case study was conducted, the resilience-focused practices and ideas related to LCPA had been fully institutionalized into standards, policies and guidelines (UNDRR 2015 ; UNISDR 2005 ). These documents formed the basis for the institutional legitimacy of the resilience paradigm (Thrandardottir 2015 ). Thus, it had become essential for legitimacy work to demonstrate compliance with these norms and regulations.

To be clear, resilience-centric LCPA does not just appeal to neoliberal organisations and governments. Over the past two decades, the Ethiopian state deployed a ‘developmental state’ strategy, which linked its legitimacy to its achievement of health and development goals through state-led action (Croke 2021 ). A core part of this strategy was the mass mobilisation of community-based volunteers. In the early 2000s, the state brought about a massive expansion of party and state structures at lower administrative levels that were designed to incorporate mass volunteering (Croke 2021 ). As with the global humanitarians, the Ethiopian government sought to persuade its domestic and international audiences of the legitimacy of LCPA on the basis of global research, policy and practice documents from the resilience paradigm. Ethiopian primary health care strategy documents cite, for example, the 1978 Alma Ata declaration, which advocates the ‘full participation’ of communities in health provision. As an early example of resilience thinking, Alma Ata states that primary health care ‘requires and promotes maximum community and individual self-reliance and participation in the planning, organisation, operation and control of primary health care’ (Maes et al  2015 ). Thus, the government of Ethiopia based its legitimacy work for LCPA on the same arguments as the INGOs, namely that LCPA could ‘empower’ local people, enable them to assume ownership and personal responsibility for their own and their community’s well-being, foster local self-reliance and resilience in the face of adversity Footnote 5 and result in locally-targeted, effective and financially sustainable interventions.

The surveillance paradigm in disaster and development aid

The second set of ideas that LCPA project contributors draw on in their legitimacy work revolve around professionalism, accountability, compliance and quality control. As outlined, this paper refers to this set of ideas as the surveillance paradigm in aid. Like the resilience paradigm, the surveillance paradigm is a product of neoliberalism. It emerged as a result of the commodification of aid. From the 1990s onward, operational actors in the sector increasingly had to ‘market’ and ‘sell’ their work to buyers. These buyers were not the local disaster-affected people themselves, but the donors who had the resources to pay for them (Collinson 2016 ). Over 90% of humanitarian aid is bought by national governments, who channel most of it through United Nations agencies and a few leading NGOs (Development Initiatives 2015 ). These organisations rely heavily on sub-contractors (operational actors) for the actual implementation of aid. The latter compete fiercely with each other for aid contracts. The result of this is that a small core of donors and lead agencies exert a lot of influence over implementing agencies, causing them to become similar to each other (Claeyé & Jackson 2012 ). These buyers of ‘aid products’ want goods and services that meet certain performance standards, such as those related to transparency and accountability. They are able to impose this on aid agencies as contractual requirements. The commodification of aid in the 1990s resulted therefore in a rapid professionalisation of the sector from which LCPA initiatives were not exempt. Legitimacy work for LCPA initiatives now involves the task of convincing donors and leading agencies about the projects' credibility in the market. The market requirements for legitimacy (Thrandardottir 2015 ) are closely linked to institutional legitimacy requirements since meeting market demands requires professional expertise in project management to showcase the sector’s ‘best practices’ in accountability, compliance and quality control.

As discussed below, to convince donors and leading aid agencies of the credibility of LCPA initiatives in these areas, it is necessary to monitor the implementation efforts of community actors for quality control. This surveillance component of externally driven LCPA sometimes extends to monitoring the behaviour and attitudes of community actors at the household level. This is because LCPA project materials often stipulate a set of skills, attitudes and behaviours community actors need to acquire and demonstrate in order for the project to be successful (such as self-reliance, empowerment and resilience). This means that legitimacy work requires the monitoring and controlling of community actors’ conduct. The case study presented in this paper explores how this played out in a project that was run in partnership with an authoritarian government.

Legitimacy work around a paradox

A contradictory project model.

The previous section described the two paradigms LCPA project contributors draw on to convince their audiences (primarily donors and leading aid agencies) of the legitimacy of their initiatives. It has sought to explain why these actors employ these two conflicting sets of ideas. This section will now outline how these competing paradigms inform LCPA project models and the implications this has for the legitimacy work done by local and community actors. A project model is a framework that describes how a project will be carried out. It specifies the project’s intended outcomes and goals, the steps needed to achieve them and how progress is to be assessed and monitored. As such, it encompasses the criteria and metrics for evaluating project success and legitimacy. Indeed, what counts as success and lends legitimacy to an aid project is not an ‘objective fact’ or just any set of constructive outcomes. Instead, it is determined by the project model (Mosse 2003 ). Project models are designed to embody the ideas (or logics) that legitimise them. Their purpose is to render these logics manageable, by translating them into strategic and operational tools. These tools guide how local actors can/should conduct legitimacy work for LCPA as the project unfolds.

As outlined, LCPA project models typically embody ideas from two conflicting paradigms with competing legitimacy requirements. However, the two paradigms each underpin a different part of the project model (see Fig.  2 ). The ideas that fall within the resilience paradigm tend to be articulated in high-level project strategy. Many aid projects (such as the one described in this paper) use a theory of change approach to strategy development. A theory of change explains at a high strategic level, the rationale as to how and why an aid project will achieve its intended goals. In the context of LCPA, this tool will typically outline why the project’s specific end-goals logically/causally depend on local participation and community-based action. The purpose of a theory of change (or other high-level strategy document) in project design is to inform the development of project tools for implementation, such as a logical framework, project implementation plan, and monitoring, evaluation and learning framework. However, in the context of externally driven LCPA, these implementation tools are also (and primarily) shaped by the ideas that fall within the paradigm of surveillance. Unlike the resilience-centric logic, the surveillance-centric logic is generally not articulated in high-level project strategy. Footnote 6 Instead, it informs the design of project implementation tools and processes as an unspoken default.

The LCPA project model: strategy and implementation tools are not well integrated because they are informed by conflicting legitimacy requirements

Whereas a theory of change is a high-level strategy document, a logical framework depicts the theorised causal connections between project inputs, activities, outputs, outcomes and goals at the level of detail needed for management. This is planned against a set timeframe in the project implementation plan, where quantified outputs (e.g. 465 training sessions) and outcomes (e.g. a 30% improvement in nutritional practices against baseline) have to be delivered to certain standards and at specific times (e.g. by the end of Year 3). The project implementation plan generally also includes a performance measurement framework as well as annual work plans and risk assessments. Specific project activities are included to evaluate the project’s performance, such as monitoring and evaluation visits by humanitarian or government partners.

One of the main challenges local and community actors face in the context of externally driven LCPA is that they have to conduct legitimacy work on the basis of a project model that encompasses internally contradictory criteria for legitimacy. On one hand, the legitimacy of the project’s strategy depends on whether the project can successfully bring about social change by empowering community actors and centring their agency in aid. According to the criteria of the resilience paradigm, to be credible in the market, an LCPA project needs to deliver services such as ‘participation’ and ‘fostering local self-reliance’ and goods such as ‘resilient communities’ and ‘empowered women’ (see also Mosse 2003 ). On the other hand, the legitimacy of the project's implementation depends on the project's adherence to sectoral norms and expectations (e.g., ‘best practices’). To be credible in the market according to the criteria of the surveillance paradigm, the project needs to deliver these commodities as professional competitive products that score well against accountability, compliance and quality control metrics. Whereas the first set of criteria logically requires community actors to be able to operate with a high level of autonomy, the second set of criteria requires local actors to facilitate extensive external monitoring and control. This means that genuine commitment and action (i.e. substantive legitimacy work) to deliver against both is marked by a paradox: local actors have to empower community actors through external control (see Table 1 ).

• Paradox theory

This paper explores this legitimacy challenge through the lens of paradox theory from organisation and management science. A paradox is ‘a persistent contradiction between interdependent elements’ (Schad et al  2016 ), and a paradox perspective is a meta-theoretical lens on organisational tensions and contradictions (van Hille 2020 ). It explores ‘how organizations can attend to competing demands simultaneously’ (Smith & Lewis 2011 , p.381). The challenge a paradox poses lies in the fact that the incompatible requirements are all essential to legitimacy. In externally driven LCPA, local actors need to simultaneously grant autonomy to community actors and maintain control. This paradoxical situation is not something that can be ‘solved’ at the level of the project, as the contradictions are integral to the wider system in which it is embedded, i.e. the deeply intertwined paradigms of resilience and surveillance. This paper explores how local and community actors navigate this paradox using impression management. It focuses on the role of imagery (visuals and performances) and the impact this has on the envisioned outcomes of localisation and participation.

Methods: case study research

This section outlines the methods used in the paper. It describes the logics of enquiry, the research setting and how data was created and analysed.

The logics of enquiry: case study research

As outlined, this paper is based on case study research. This entails analysing a real-life phenomenon in-depth and within its real-world context on the basis of one or more cases (e.g. Ridder 2017 ). A case is a loosely bounded system, such as an organisation or a project. Case study research is useful when a phenomenon cannot be extracted from its context or when the boundaries between the phenomenon and its context are blurred (Yin 1981 ). This is true for externally driven LCPA, whereby each manifestation is shaped by a context-specific set of relationships and hierarchies. This paper looks at a single case study, providing a within-case analysis (Eisenhardt 1989 ). The paper looks at how project stakeholders sought to conduct legitimacy work for an LCPA project—i.e. at the social construction of reality and meaning. As such, the case study approach used in this paper is based on social constructivism (e.g. Stake 1995 ). The research methodology used to develop the case study is organisational ethnography, which is ethnographic research that focuses on organisations and their processes of organising (Ybema et al  2009 ).

The case study

As outlined, the case study selected for this research was an externally driven LCPA project in Ethiopia, which this paper refers to by the pseudonym EMPOWER. EMPOWER was in part selected for theoretical reasons (Eisenhardt & Graebner 2007 ), specifically, for its project model and the hierarchical manner in which it was run. Whereas EMPOWER’s strategy was almost exclusively based on ideas from the resilience paradigm, its implementation drew heavily on ideas from the surveillance paradigm. As such, its project model constituted a representative example of the phenomenon this paper aims to analyse. To be clear, it is very easy to find a representative example of this project model because it is the default in external–local LCPA partnerships. In addition to being selected for theoretical reasons, EMPOWER was also chosen due to its intrinsic interest (Stake 1995 ). This interest lies in the fact that it was embedded in two vertical systems—government and NGO—and subject to both neoliberal and statist rationales for LCPA (which turned out to be highly compatible).

The research methods

Fieldwork for this paper was conducted in Ethiopia from September to December 2018. It primarily consisted of participant observation at a district level NGO office of the EMPOWER project. The all-Ethiopian staff not only made a desk available for the author in their office but also invited her to all project events and office celebrations. They also let her accompany them on their visits to project implementation sites. Many district staff were fluent in English and interpreted/explained events to the author. In return for being hosted, the author was able to assist the district office with NGO communications and report writing thanks to her decade-plus of experience in the INGO sector. The author took copious photos, video recordings and field notes during field visits and project events, focusing on how local and community actors conducted legitimacy work for the project. She also helped the communications team write ‘success stories’ about community actors who had turned their lives around thanks to EMPOWER. She followed hereby the lead of the local project staff, copying their story templates and narrative framing. As such, she was an active participant in the process she analyses in this paper.

As is the case with all ethnographic work, the author’s identity greatly shaped the research process as well as the analysis presented in this paper. This paper is written from the perspective of a female, white, practitioner-academic from the Global North. The author’s identity heavily influenced her interactions with community actors, who would sometimes mistake her for a donor representative or senior member of the lead INGO’s northern headquarters. As described in the case study vignettes, she was often ascribed the role of ‘external audience’ for the project’s legitimacy work, which, given the focus of this paper, was helpful.

The insights presented in the case study are based on field notes as well as an analysis of EMPOWER project documents, including the project implementation plan, theory of change, logical framework, and monitoring and evaluation tools. It is further based on a media analysis, focussing on project-related plans, reports, photos, posters and videos, some of which the author helped create. The case study is also informed by 30 in-depth qualitative interviews the author undertook, partially remotely (prior to fieldwork) and partially whilst on the ground. The interviews were later transcribed. All information thus gathered was qualitatively coded and analysed thematically. This was done to identify patterns (themes) within and across sources—and to identify the connections between these themes (Attride-Stirling 2001 ). The background and context of the case study are based on a review of academic and practitioner literature.

To prevent any unintended adverse consequences to anyone working on EMPOWER, the project itself and all project contributors have been anonymized. The only actor that has not be anonymised is the Federal Government of Ethiopia. Anonymizing the federal government would have required anonymising the country, which would have removed too much of the context necessary to adequately describe this single qualitative case study.

Findings: legitimacy work around a paradox

This part of the paper presents the case study’s findings. After providing the background and context to the EMPOWER project, it describes how local and community actors supported the efforts of the project’s external drivers to persuade global and domestic audiences of the legitimacy of EMPOWER. It describes how the project contributors drew on the ideas and criteria of the resilience paradigm to convince these audiences of EMPOWER’s strategy, tailoring their input to fit its logic during co-design and providing written and visual evidence of its success during implementation. It then goes on to describe how the project contributors drew on the practices and metrics of the surveillance paradigm to convince these audiences of the professionalism of EMPOWER’s implementation, providing written and visual evidence of accountability, compliance and quality control. The case study shows how the project and wider hierarchies that shaped EMPOWER led local and community actors to support the legitimacy efforts of the project’s external drivers, resorting to impression management to paper over the internal contradictions of the resulting project model.

Background and context of the EMPOWER project

An external–local partnership around a ‘permanent crisis’.

At the start of the EMPOWER project, 25% of Ethiopia’s districts were officially facing a food crisis. As a result, children and pregnant or lactating women were in urgent need of supplementary feeding and treatment for severe acute malnutrition (FAO 2016 ; UNICEF 2016 ). The project was rolled out in three districts that were amongst the worst affected. These areas all experienced prolonged drought and intercommunal tensions that occasionally escalated into violence. Against this backdrop, EMPOWER set out to improve the nutritional status of women of reproductive age and children under 5. Its strategy for achieving this goal was LCPA.

EMPOWER’s approach to delivering LCPA was typical of consortia led by INGOs and/or national governments. The project was initiated by two INGOs in partnership with the Federal Government of Ethiopia. The lead INGO acted as an intermediary with the project’s global donors and monitored its progress. EMPOWER partnered with local government nutrition coordination committees for project co-design. After launch, the project was supervised by the lead INGO’s Ethiopian country office and managed by its district offices. The latter recruited community mobilisers to coordinate project activities at the ward (kebele) level together with local government health extension workers. All staff working on EMPOWER in Ethiopia, except for the director of the country office, were Ethiopian. Whilst this setup was described as a ‘partnership’, relationships were strictly vertical. On the INGO’s side, community mobilizers reported to INGO district staff, who in turn reported to country headquarters, who reported to Northern headquarters, who reported to the donor and global LCPA stakeholders. Relationships between the different levels of government involved in the project were equally hierarchical. This setup has been depicted in Fig.  3 .

The hierarchical structure of the EMPOWER project

The EMPOWER project focused on gender, livelihoods and the community-based management of acute malnutrition. At village level, related project activities were primarily implemented by female volunteers through the structures of the Women’s Development Army. These ‘Army leaders’ facilitated and/or modelled the community-based activities for other, ‘regular’, project participants (see Fig.  3 ).

The Women’s Development Army

Over the past 15 years, Ethiopia has radically expanded its primary health care services. A core component of this was its Health Extension Programme (Croke 2021 ), which trained and employed health extension workers to deliver basic primary care (Assefa et al  2019 ). However, only 35,000 paid health extension worker jobs were created to serve a population of 90 million (Maes et al  2015 ). To strengthen primary health care systems, in 2011, the government rolled out a new initiative called the Women’s Development Army (Closser et al  2019 ). The Army consisted of networks of rural women who were to act as volunteers for health and development work at community level. This enabled the government to task-shift some community-based activities from paid health extension workers to unpaid female volunteers.

By 2016, the initiative involved some 3 million women, including Army leaders and regular members. Army leaders were responsible for a number of tasks, such as monitoring illnesses and pregnancies, supporting immunisation campaigns, and passing on messages between households and health extension workers. The core focus of their work was prevention. Specifically, they were to act as ‘model women’ and demonstrate good health behaviour to their communities (Teklehaimanot & Teklehaimanot 2013 ). The government envisioned that the Army would ultimately incorporate all adult women living in the countryside (Maes et al  2015 ). Ideally, Army leaders were chosen for their status as a ‘model women’, meaning that they had adopted a lifestyle that the federal government deemed ‘healthy’ and ‘development-minded’ (Maes et al  2015 ). Furthermore, they were to model a sense of ‘responsibility’ and ‘ownership’ for their own health and development. ‘Regular’ Army members were to follow and learn from the Army leaders by participating in their health and development activities.

The EMPOWER project was designed to build on the health extension programme, deploying the Army leaders (see Fig.  4 ). The project tasked these female volunteers with educating their peers on nutrition, gender, and livelihoods. In line with the Army’s focus on ‘model women’, the volunteers and their families were expected to model good nutritional and health practices, as well as progressive attitudes towards gender, so as to encourage and inspire their peers to do the same. Volunteers would gather women over for coffee or at church or in the mosque to promote healthy beliefs, desires and behaviours. They would teach how to prepare nutritious meals and promote drought resistant farming.

The Women’s Development Army was created to expand Ethiopia’s Health Extension Programme. EMPOWER was designed to build on both

The government’s idea behind the Army metaphor was to mobilise volunteers who worked with military discipline (Maes et al  2015 ). Army leaders were expected to be disciplined and (willingly) monitor and discipline other women, keeping track of trouble makers and ensuring that all women displayed desirable beliefs and behaviours. Allegedly, political loyalties were also tested at Army meetings, resulting in the reporting of those with anti-government views (Fick 2019 ). The fact that the Ethiopian government used state structures for the dual purpose of facilitating mass volunteering and surveillance is not unusual. Nation-states have a tendency to grow towards surveillance societies (Boersma et al  2014 ). Furthermore, the institutionalisation of participation is sometimes used to entrench authoritarian practices (Dhungana & Curato 2021 ). Due to this element of surveillance, Army leaders increasingly came to be seen as political agents (Croke 2021 ). Thus, even though the term ‘Women’s Development Army’ is featured centrally in EMPOWER’s project documents, by 2018, the staff no longer seemed comfortable using that label for their female volunteers, referring to them instead as ‘peer facilitators’, ‘mothers’ or ‘model farmers’.

EMPOWER’s project model

This section looks at how local and community actors conducted legitimacy work for EMPOWER’s project model. Its development was led by aid workers from the lead INGO’s Northern and Ethiopian headquarters. To facilitate co-design, they held consultations and workshops with EMPOWER’s local partners (the government nutrition coordination committees) in the project target areas. During these consultations and workshops, the external and local actors jointly designed the project’s strategy and implementation tools.

EMPOWER’s strategy

As outlined, EMPOWER’s end goal was to improve nutritional outcomes for women of reproductive age and children under 5. To achieve this goal, EMPOWER first developed a high-level strategy. As is common in the aid sector, EMPOWER’s strategy was designed using a theory of change approach. EMPOWER’s analysis of the core drivers of malnutrition amongst mothers and children focused on gender inequality at the household and community levels. It highlighted how these inequalities constrained women’s agency in the areas of health, nutrition and household economics. Its envisioned solution was women’s empowerment through participation and leadership in local community-based health, nutrition and livelihood initiatives (i.e. LCPA). EMPOWER sought to persuade its global and domestic audiences of the legitimacy of its analysis of the problem and solution on the basis of a literature review of highly reputable sources on nutrition Footnote 7 as well as the input and feedback from local consortium partners. The ideas that were meant to legitimise EMPOWER’s strategy came from the resilience paradigm: they centred on empowerment, local ownership, self-reliance and (financial) sustainability.

EMPOWER’s strategy was also designed to align with the existing priorities and initiatives of global and national consortium partners, such as the Women’s Development Army.

The project is designed to build on these [Women’s Development Army] community structures through processes that examine and challenge beliefs and assist men and women to work together to find sustainable solutions to change health and nutrition outcomes. The design will create local ownership of solutions to address malnutrition. [EMPOWER Project Implementation Plan, 20.06.2016]

Volunteering in the Army was portrayed as giving women more decision-making power and autonomy within the family. Other promised benefits (highlighted by the government, (Maes et al  2015 ) included intrinsic satisfaction, civic mindedness, self-sufficiency and self-generated development. LCPA was portrayed as a mechanism that encouraged volunteers to ‘own’ their work and think of it as work they did ‘for themselves’. The women were depicted as being driven by a sense of civic duty towards their community, eschewing payment or rent seeking. This envisioned sense of ownership and civic-mindedness amongst community-based volunteers was core to legitimacy work directed at donors: it was portrayed as more cost-effective and sustainable than interventions whereby international donors pay local labourers.

Thus, female volunteers played a central role in EMPOWER’s strategy. Not only were they the main implementers of the project activities but they were also the main ‘project deliverables’. The legitimacy of EMPOWER’s strategy hinged on these women becoming ‘empowered’, ‘self-reliant’ and ‘owners’ of strategies to manage drought and malnutrition. Therefore, once the project had started, they were the primary focus and key performers of EMPOWER’s legitimacy work. An important part of their role consisted of creating visuals and performances of ‘ownership’, ‘empowerment’ and ‘self-reliance’ to support the project’s impression management efforts. This is illustrated in vignettes 1 and 2.

Extract from field notes: enacting legitimacy during a ‘donor visit’

The EMPOWER project manager had invited me and a West-African volunteer to join her on a project ‘field visit’ to the most remote target area in the district. After a three-hour drive, we left the car and continued on foot. We were joined at this point by the local community mobiliser for this remote municipality. After an hour’s hike down a slippery path together, we eventually reached an open area. There, on a tarpaulin on the ground, sat a group of women in a circle. In their midst stood a yellow money box. They had been waiting for us, for hours at that point, I imagined, given how long it had taken us to get there. The community mobiliser addressed them in the local language. After a brief exchange, he spoke at length to the project manager in Amharic. She then turned to me and the volunteer. “That lady is a model farmer”, she explained in English. She then pointed to the plants behind the women, “that is her farm”. I can’t tell an orchid from a cauliflower, but I pretended to be impressed. That seemed to please everyone. The project manager continued. “They are starting a rotating fund. Today is their first meeting”. I nodded a bit, nonplussed. Surely, they hadn’t waited for us to hold their first meeting? At this point, the model farmer produced a notebook and the women began a discussion in the local language. I had no idea what was being said but it all looked very professional. I was attending a business meeting. I later learned that the community mobiliser had mistakenly believed the volunteer and myself to be representatives of the project’s main northern donor and had announced our visit to the women as such. [Field notes 05.11.2018]

This ‘visual evidence’ of empowered self-reliant women owning and managing a rotating fund to support their farming and other livelihood efforts during a prolonged drought appeared to lend credibility to EMPOWER’s strategy. However, as the paper will argue below, the strategy that this imagery appeared to validate was not actually used during implementation. Due to the paradoxical nature of externally driven localisation, EMPOWER’s strategy was disconnected from both the reality of the project and its implementation.

How legitimacy work around a paradox led to a disconnect between strategy and reality

When co-designing the EMPOWER project, local actors clearly understood that their external counterparts aimed to anchor the legitimacy of EMPOWER’s strategy to the idea that greater localisation, participation, and community engagement in aid would foster local self-reliance and community resilience. The lead INGO was a signatory to several international standards and codes of conduct that embodied the ideas and criteria of the resilience paradigm. Footnote 8 Furthermore, the Federal Government turned to this paradigm in its efforts to persuade its audiences of the legitimacy of the Women’s Development Army, on which EMPOWER was intended to build. However, in spite ( or rather because ) of their aims to foster resilience through LCPA, in practice, strategy design was primarily driven from above. This counter-intuitive outcome is the result of the paradoxical legitimacy pressures that characterise externally driven localisation.

Given that EMPOWER’s strategy was to present resilience-centric LCPA as the causal mechanism (or logic) through which the project would achieve its end goal, it was imperative for the project’s legitimacy that the strategy be developed in a participatory manner with local and community actors. However, as is the case with most aid projects, EMPOWER had to complete its strategy design prior to being launched to obtain the required legal permissions and funding. This meant that the female volunteers, community mobilisers and the health extension workers who would play a core role in project implementation could not contribute, as they had not been recruited yet. Instead, EMPOWER’s local consortium partners (the local government nutrition coordination committees) were consulted as members of the local community to provide input on EMPOWER’s strategy design.

Given the hierarchical nature of the project, these local actors were under significant pressure to tailor their analysis of the problem (i.e. malnutrition in mothers and children) to the solution the global and national partners desired (i.e. resilience centric LCPA). Indeed, the fact that the project’s external drivers were to a greater or lesser extent reputationally invested in resilience-centric LCPA created a legitimacy imperative for all project contributors to conduct legitimacy work for this approach throughout EMPOWER’s design and implementation. This pressure was strengthened by the dominance of the resilience paradigm in aid and its attractiveness to global donors.

The input provided by local actors (as summarised in the project materials) centred on community-level problems that were suitable to be addressed through resilience-centric LCPA. Specifically, it focused on local community-based gender inequalities as major barriers to improving nutritional outcomes for mothers and children. It listed, for example, harmful traditional practices and existing community norms that resulted in food allocation discrimination within households. It further mentioned women’s limited access to health information and men’s lack of awareness and engagement with maternal, infant and young child nutrition. The local actors’ focus on community level gender inequalities also aligned with the INGOs’ and the federal government’s shared aim of mainstreaming gender in nutrition strategies. Thus, the input provided by the local actors perfectly fitted the problem and solution that the project’s external drivers had already identified: community-based gender inequalities as the root cause of malnutrition amongst mothers and children to be solved through resilience-centric LCPA. This fact does not imply dishonest intent on the part of any of the actors involved. Nor does it imply that the analysis of the problem and solution was ‘wrong’.

It was, however, incomplete. Key local factors that directly affected EMPOWER’s intended outcome were not included. What was missing from EMPOWER’s strategy were factors that fell outside the project’s predetermined remit, were politically sensitive or that could upset relationships within the consortium. Crucially, local issues that conflicted with some of the key imagery used to persuade audiences of the legitimacy of resilience centric LCPA were also not included. As outlined in the introduction, the imagery of community with its connotations of a sense of shared identity and common interests plays an important role in impression management for resilience centric LCPA. It played a central role in the government’s legitimacy work for the Women’s Development Army. The Army was portrayed as building on, and reinforcing, existing traditional mutual help arrangements within communities (Woldie & Balabanova 2018 ). The idea that was put forward was that the female volunteers, as members of their communities, would be able to tap into existing community cohesion to fulfil their responsibilities through persuasion, leverage, enforcement and the modelling of desirable behaviour (Woldie & Balabanova 2018 ). Given that EMPOWER was designed to build on the Army, the imagery of community also played a core role in its legitimacy work. Like many aid programmes, EMPOWER's strategy was based on the idea that training and resources provided to its ‘primary beneficiaries’ (i.e. the female volunteers and their families) would benefit everyone else within the project area as ‘indirect beneficiaries’. The imagery of community used in the project documents suggested (without spelling this out) that this would happen because everyone in the target areas worked together as one communal cooperative entity with no internal tensions (worth mentioning in the strategy materials) other than those surrounding gender.

Observations and discussions with local people in EMPOWER’s project areas showed however that EMPOWER’s target community was anything but one communal cooperative entity. During this period of severe and prolonged drought, there were intra-communal tensions over access to water. People from some hamlets had control over the scarce water resources, whereas people from other hamlets had to walk an hour (or more) to access free water—or barter for it with neighbouring hamlets. The areas had also seen intercommunal violence within their very recent histories. However, the language and imagery used in EMPOWER’s strategy shows nothing of this local reality. Instead, it gives the impression that only community level gender inequalities stood in the way of good nutritional outcomes for mothers and children. EMPOWER district level project staff spent significant time navigating intra-communal tensions surrounding access to water with local authorities. However, they could not use their achievements in this area for legitimacy work because recognising the need for these efforts in the first place undermined EMPOWER’s solution of resilience-centric LCPA. The pressure to match EMPOWER’s strategy analysis to the predetermined solution of resilience-centric LCPA thus led to a disconnect between project strategy and the reality on the ground.

EMPOWER’s implementation: surveillance

In addition, legitimacy pressures surrounding project implementation led to a disconnect between project strategy and project practices. As described above, due to the professionalisation of the aid sector, convincing donors and lead aid agencies of a project’s credibility had come to depend on demonstrating compliance to donor and government requirements and adherence to sectoral standards and expectations. What this meant for EMPOWER was that its strategy of fostering empowerment, local ownership and self-reliance had to be translated into a series of concrete outputs and outcomes that could be put on a timeline and be monitored and measured for the purpose of external quality control. To enable monitoring and measurement, EMPOWER’s theory of change was translated into a logical framework. This tool linked the project’s overarching goal (i.e. improving the nutritional status of mothers and children) to measurable outcomes (e.g. improved attitudes towards gender issues that influence nutrition) to quantified outputs (e.g. x number of community dialogues conducted). The project implementation plan specified the standards, times and manner in which these quantified outputs had to be delivered. It included a performance measurement framework as well as annual work plans and risk assessments to facilitate project evaluation. In effect, it outlined by what date and to what standard EMPOWER had to deliver ‘empowered self-reliant women’.

EMPOWER’s monitoring and evaluation setup was hierarchical, as is typical of externally driven LCPA. Furthermore, it was based on state-led LCPA structures (the Women’s Development Army) that the government also used for monitoring attitudes and beliefs at village level. This setup greatly influenced legitimacy work by local and community actors. The vignette below illustrates how female volunteers and their families endeavoured to create the required imagery for the project outcome ‘improved attitudes towards gender issues that influence nutrition’. Their efforts were directed at the INGOs for quality control and at the state for surveillance. Community mobilisers and government health extension workers played a central role in managing impressions during project monitoring events, together with the female volunteers.

Extract from field notes: enacting legitimacy during a ‘monitoring visit’

I was told by staff at the district office where I was based that their office had been selected by headquarters for a celebratory knowledge sharing event. Staff from all three district offices and their local government counterparts had been invited, as well as staff from the NGO’s headquarters in Addis Ababa. Staff from ‘rival’ district offices were quick to reframe the event as a ‘monitoring visit’. On the first day of the event, attendees were shown video recordings of project successes. One week before the event, NGO staff asked me to accompany them to three specific sites where the success stories were to be shot. At each site, we were accompanied by the NGO’s local community mobilizer and the government’s local health worker. They identified the women whose success stories were to be filmed. The videos consisted of interviews with project participants and staged performances of project activities, such as a group of women performing a peer discussion about nutrition and model farmers pretending to work on their farms. The video was subtitled in English, even though the entire audience was Ethiopian. On the second day of the event, the attendees visited the same three sites where the success stories had been shot. At each of the three sites, NGO staff and government officials were welcomed by project participants. The women were dressed up in their most beautiful festive outfits and sang elaborate songs when the guests arrived. Apparently, they sang songs of gratitude for the EMPOWER project. They sang that, unlike other aid projects, this project had fulfilled its promises and had not let them down. In each of the three sites, I noticed the local community mobilizer and government local health worker behind the women. The EMPOWER staff and government officials took selfies with the singing project participants in the background. A professional photographer was also present to capture the spectacle. When the singing finally ended, attendees were taken to areas where project participants basically did what they had done when the video footage had been shot: they staged project activities. Model farmers busied themselves on their model farms or displayed the nutritious foods they had grown on sheets on the ground. They also performed peer group discussions for the audience about gender and nutrition. They made a real effort to make their conversation look genuine, even though they were far outnumbered by NGO staff and government officials who stood around them, watching. The peer facilitator wrote down names on an attendance sheet and then led a question and answer session about nutrition. Apparently, the attendees gave perfect answers, demonstrating their understanding of key nutritional issues as described in the EMPOWER syllabus, and they asked intelligent, considered questions. A lady from headquarters noted that only a few women spoke during the peer group performance. She questioned whether all women in the group had equal knowledge on the topic of nutrition and berated everyone present to do more to encourage participation. A senior staff member from one of the other district offices asked a group of men who were performing a peer group discussion how many of them cooked at home. Two tentatively raised their hands, followed by the others. ‘Rival’ NGO staff noted that the other men had done so because they sensed that this was the right answer to give. The staffer pressed the issue and asked one of the men whether he knew how to prepare shiro (an extremely common dish). I don’t know what he answered but whatever he said was met with a lot of laughter. [Field notes 29.11.2018]

The vignette illustrates how the volunteers and their families, guided by community mobiliser and health extension worker, spent hours managing impressions for the EMPOWER project. They created visual evidence of female empowerment, self-reliance and ownership that appeared to validate EMPOWER’s strategy of fostering community resilience through LCPA. However, this strategy did not actually play a central role in the project’s implementation.

How legitimacy work around a paradox led to disconnects between strategy and implementation

The female volunteers leading on EMPOWER’s day-to-day implementation at village level lacked the experience in aid project management required to ensure that the project met all accountability, compliance and quality control requirements. Given that demonstrating compliance with those requirements was essential to persuading donor and wider sectoral audiences of the project’s legitimacy, local actors delegated only limited responsibility to them and subjected them to substantial external monitoring and control. Clearly, this approach was diametrically opposed to EMPOWER’s strategy. EMPOWER’s theory of change presented resilience-centric LCPA as the logic or causal mechanism through which the project would achieve its intended goal. According to this strategy, malnutrition in mothers and children was to be redressed through female empowerment, self-reliance and ownership of sustainable solutions, which would be brought about through their leadership and participation in community-based aid. As such, EMPOWER’s strategy required the consortium to grant significant autonomy to its community actors. However, legitimacy pressures surrounding implementation did not allow for this. Local actors were faced with a paradox. They had to empower community actors to be self-reliant and ‘own’ the solutions to malnutrition. However, they had to do so through hierarchical project structures that demanded (and provided) strict external control and monitoring (see Fig.  5 ). Whereas the former was essential to persuading audiences of the legitimacy of EMPOWER’s strategy, the latter was essential to convincing them of the credibility of EMPOWER’s implementation.

EMPOWER's contradictory project model

Given the hierarchical setup, local actors did the only thing they could do: square the circle by creating the imagery required for symbolic—but not substantive—legitimacy work against both contradictory paradigms. This impression management obscured the disconnects between strategy, reality and implementation and appeared to validate the top-down bottom-up project model in its entirety. The female volunteers actively contributed to this impression management because they benefitted from the project, although not necessarily in the way that the project had intended. Volunteering for EMPOWER bolstered the women’s social network position, enabling them to act as brokers between ‘their communities’, the NGO and local civil servants. Whilst the women were supposed to avoid rent seeking and volunteer out of pure civic-mindedness, many tried to use the opportunity to create patronage ties. Indeed, as shown in vignette 2, project staff and local civil servants were treated as patrons and benefactors. However, contrary to the imagery of empowerment, self-reliance and ownership, the female volunteers had very little autonomy within EMPOWER. They had no influence over project design or management—and even in the field of implementation, they had to take the lead from local community mobilisers and health extension workers. They were ‘empowered’ to follow instructions. They had to become self-reliant through external control. This heavy reliance on external drivers limited the volunteers’ sense of ownership over project activities and, therefore, the project’s sustainability.

This paper has explored why top-down approaches in aid persist in spite of ongoing calls for reform to bring about greater localisation and community participation in aid. It has shown that even aid projects that specifically aim for local, community-based, participatory aid (LCPA) are often implemented in a hierarchical manner that undermines the intended outcomes of such projects, such as community empowerment, self-reliance and local ownership in aid. It looked specifically at LCPA collaborations between external and local actors, an approach it termed ‘externally driven LCPA’.

The paper’s focus has been on the role legitimacy work plays in maintaining unhelpful hierarchies in aid. Legitimacy work, in the context of LCPA projects, refers to efforts to persuade target audiences of the desirability, propriety and appropriateness of the project’s strategy and its implementation. It can be substantive, reflecting genuine commitment and action, and/or symbolic, where the focus lies on managing optics. Due to global aid hierarchies, legitimacy work is mostly directed upwards towards donors, government agencies and leading aid organisations. In order to persuade these actors of the legitimacy of an LCPA project, project contributors Footnote 9 must establish a fit between their project (as an object of legitimacy) and the legitimacy criteria for aid that currently dominate the sector at the global level. However, they face a challenge because the neoliberal era has given rise to two conflicting sets of ideas (or paradigms) about aid: the resilience paradigm and the surveillance paradigm. These two paradigms have legitimacy criteria for aid that are incompatible with each other.

The resilience paradigm in aid is the driving force behind the ongoing calls in the humanitarian and development sectors to localise aid, make it more participatory and involve communities. It centres on responsibilising local communities for managing disasters, health and development and, therefore, logically requires them to operate with a high level of autonomy in aid to enable their empowerment, self-reliance and sense of ownership. The surveillance paradigm, on the other hand, centres on professionalism, accountability and compliance in aid. It underpins the techno-managerial turn in aid. This paradigm requires local actors 1 to facilitate a high level of external project monitoring and control to ensure that the project adheres to donor/government requirements and is delivered on time and to the expected standard. Thus, the two paradigms pull in opposite directions. Local actors 1 are faced with the challenge of implementing the contradictory requirements of the resilience and surveillance paradigms, both of which are essential to convincing global and domestic audiences of the legitimacy of LCPA projects.

This paper is based on an analysis of a LCPA project in Ethiopia. However, its insights have implications for research and practice in the field of localisation and participatory aid beyond this setting. This is because all LCPA projects that require global or national level recognition face systemic pressures to accommodate both conflicting paradigms in their work. This paper has used a paradox perspective as a theoretical lens on legitimacy work to explore how this circle is squared in practice. It showed how in project design, project strategy was tailored to the logics of the resilience paradigm, which means that resilience-related objectives, such as local empowerment, self-reliance and ownership, were presented as necessary preconditions for achieving the project's main goal (in this case, reducing malnutrition). The implementation tools of the project, on the other hand, were designed to align with the logics of the surveillance paradigm, to ensure that the project met the sectoral standards and complied with the requirements of the donors and government. In a well-designed project model, the project implementation tools translate the project's high-level strategy into a series of inputs, activities and outputs that can be practically managed and executed. However, in this case, the strategy and implementation tools were in conflict. Legitimacy pressures and hierarchies came together to create an internally contradictory project model, whereby the ‘bottom-up’ strategy conflicted with the ‘top-down’ implementation of the project. They also created a situation where neither the strategy nor the implementation tools effectively addressed the project reality on the ground. This paradoxical situation is not something local actors 1 can solve at the level of the project because the conflicting legitimacy pressures and hierarchies operate at the level of sector.

This has important implications for LCPA legitimacy work. Substantive legitimacy work for an aid project entails developing a strategy on the basis of a theorised causal mechanism (or logic) tailored to the reality on the ground—and then validating that logic through implementation. However, when implementation is based on a competing set of ideas, the link between logic and practice cannot be made. The case study shows how this paradox was sidestepped. Here, legitimacy work was not substantive but purely symbolic: visual evidence was created that showed strong connections between logic, reality and implementation when, in reality, those connections were flimsy at best. As a result, a strategy was ‘validated’ through legitimacy work that was not actually used and that did not fully address the reality on the ground.

The fact that conflicting legitimacy pressures and hierarchies combine to make substantive legitimacy work impossible has significant implications for reform in the aid sector. This situation leads local 1 and community actors 2  to conduct purely symbolic legitimacy work (impression management), creating LCPA project ‘evidence’ that renders the problems with the current setup invisible. The ‘advantage’ to external drivers Footnote 10 of LCPA is that this evidence appears to show that it is possible to ‘shift the power’ without relinquishing control, obtaining the benefits of localisation and participation, whilst closely managing the aid processes that determine legitimacy. In other words, it appears to show that it is possible to empower communities, foster their self-reliance and create a sense of local ownership over aid, whilst maintaining a high level of external monitoring and control over the project. Because symbolic legitimacy work makes the problems with the current setup invisible, it obscures the fact that achieving the desired outcomes for LCPA requires a radical restructuring of the power dynamics that exist within the aid sector. The implications for research and practice are that LCPA project data and information (including visuals) need to be analysed through a critical lens that accounts for the structural power dynamics that shape the creation of this ‘project evidence’. A data justice lens is a useful tool for analysing how knowledge management in aid projects interlinks with existing inequalities, highlighting where project data and information may perpetuate a harmful status quo (Mulder 2023 , 2020 ). With the current hierarchical setup, there is a risk that legitimacy work for LCPA will validate aid structures and processes that undermine the desired the outcomes envisioned for it. Processes of legitimation can be circular, resulting in the status quo being affirmed and recreated.

Availability of data and materials

Due to the nature of this research, participants of this study did not agree for their data to be shared publicly, so supporting data is not available.

‘Local actors’ include both local aid workers and local civil servants (see Fig.  1 ).

‘Community actors’ refers to members of the aid project’s target community (see Fig. 1 ).

The federation also includes two chartered cities that are not based on ethnicity and/or linguistics.

The aid lexicon (e.g. ‘beneficiaries’ and ‘field’) is highly problematic, as explained by Aloudat ( 2021 ).

It is beyond the scope of this paper to explore whether these goals are desirable.

with the exception of ideas surrounding accountability.

e.g. The Lancet series on ‘Maternal and Child Nutrition’ ( 2013 ) and ‘Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN): A framework for action’ ( 2011 ).

For example, the Core Humanitarian Standard https://corehumanitarianstandard.org

‘Project contributors’ includes all external, local and community actors who contribute (see Fig.  1 ).

‘External drivers’ refers to INGOs and national/federal government bodies (see Fig.  1 ).

Abbreviations

International non-governmental organisation

Local, community-based, participatory aid

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Acknowledgements

The author wishes to thank all research participants who generously shared their time with her towards realising this study. She further wishes to extend her gratitude to Prof. Kees Boersma and Prof. Issy Drori for their insights and comments. The author is also very grateful to the anonymous reviewers for their incredibly detailed and helpful feedback. Thank you.

This project was sponsored by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO), Division of Social Sciences, Smart Disaster Governance (Project 409–14-003).

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Mulder, F. The paradox of externally driven localisation: a case study on how local actors manage the contradictory legitimacy requirements of top-down bottom-up aid. Int J Humanitarian Action 8 , 7 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1186/s41018-023-00139-0

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Local Marketing: 3 strategies that worked for small businesses with physical locations

This article was published in the MarketingSherpa email newsletter .

“Best is better than better, but better is still better than bad,” Flint McGlaughlin taught in Above-the-Fold Strategy: 4 ways to write powerful sub-headlines .

This lesson applies to far more than sub-headlines. It is true for all of marketing and business.

But when I hear that quote, I especially think of the small business. Especially a local business with a shop or other physical location looking to promote its product or service

An effective strategy in this case requires more than just getting a click, you must attract a customer to your brick-and-mortar location. Without the massive budgets of a B2C or B2B brand, these small businesses often must settle for “better” and overlook the shiny “best” technology and platform investments of their big-budget marketing peers.

But when you’re just trying to attract customers from your town, better can be good enough.

In this article, we bring you fairly simple tactics that can be easily replicated without a massive budget. First, a medical spa that improves social media performance by using real photos in its Facebook advertising. Then, a gym that recaptures its search engine ranking after overlooking SEO. And finally, a chiropractor that turns to event marketing (on a small scale) to attract new customers.

Quick Case Study #1: Real photos reduce advertising cost per lead from $50 to $5 for medical spa

“When we first began to advertise on Facebook, we used stock images for ads. These ads performed poorly. The cost per conversion was exorbitantly high, around $50 per lead,” said Marina Victoria, Co-Founder and CEO, CADMEN group of brands (CADMEN Barbershop, CADMEN Clinic, and CADMEN Academy).

Creative Sample #1: Facebook ads with stock images

The team decided to change the images from stock photos to real clients’ successful results from Cadmen Clinic .

Creative Sample #2: Facebook ads with real photos of customers

After only three days, cost per conversion improved from $50 per lead to five dollars per lead.

“From this experience we learned a lesson; viewers engage more with authentic imagery. They want to see the real results, what it might look like on them, and what they can expect from the treatment. It wasn’t necessary to invest in things like graphic design, just a simple picture change made all the difference,” Victoria said.

Quick Case Study #2: After letting SEO slip, gym improves search ranking from 81.7 to 4

Intent91 is a personal training gym in Worthing, West Sussex, United Kingdom. As a small local business, search ranking is crucial for its success.

“We've always heavily focused on social media (mainly Instagram), Facebook Ads and then referrals. We also often do local outreach e.g., leaflet drops,” said Miles Branford, Marketing Executive, Intent91 . “We let our website slip.”

The team stopped blogging, stopped updating keywords on its pages, and got comfortable with its SEO (search engine optimization) and position in search engine rankings.

“So comfortable I stopped analyzing our Google Search Console – terrible I know! When I did check, I was in for a BIG shock,” Branford said.

On February 17 th , 2022, the gym was ranked number 81.7 for “personal trainer Worthing.” It was also ranked pretty low for similar keywords such as “gym in Worthing,” “Worthing gym,” and “personal training Worthing.”

“I had to do something, and fast,” Branford said. “I started by getting Google Reviews, 85 to be exact. Optimized and updated all our blogs, making sure they were fresh, had ‘good’ readability and ‘good’ SEO (I use Yoast). Added keywords to photo alt text, YouTube videos, and saved the photo files as a keyword (making sure I didn't keyword stuff).”

The team wrote four new blog posts and released them over a two-week period, posting on social media as well.

“I then reached out to any website that had mentioned us over the past 12 months and asked them to link to our website. This included articles in Sussex World, BLK BOX and Robert Luff,” he said.

By March 11 th , 2022, the gym reached a position four for “personal trainer Worthing.” They also saw a big jump in the other keywords mentioned earlier.

“This has been a big wake up call for our SEO and Google ranking,” Branford said. “Saying this, we're happy with the recovery and now it's time to try and get that number one spot!”

Quick Case Study #3: Chiropractor gets 11 new clients by hosting local presentations

If you search for local marketing ideas, you’ll likely find an emphasis on tactics like local SEO and local listings on third-party websites and directories.

Important tactics, for sure, as described above.

But here’s an advantage of being in the same city as potential customers – you can actually go talk to them.

“The marketing strategy that has helped my co-founder and I generate the most revenue for our business has been hosting presentations in front of small- to mid-sized groups of people interested in improving their health,” said Dr. Kira Capozzolo DC, Chiropractor, Twin Waves Wellness Center .

The wellness center offers chiropractic services, which puts it in the health and fitness industries.

To increase their client base in 2022, the team sent out a 550-email campaign to relevant local businesses – places like yoga studios and fitness centers.

In the email, the team included a personalized video tailored to the industry of the recipient that explained why it could benefit the recipient’s clients to learn about Twin Waves’ services through a free presentation.

Out of 550 emails, the response rate was 3%. From there, the team scheduled four total presentations at local businesses and successfully signed 11 new clients from the campaign.

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How one polish retailer turned its lowest selling products into success with ai, wise move: tapping into travel money with google search insights, the consumer as product creator. this cee retailer sells globally thanks to online video, the road to success: how one car rental company used ai to predict 99% of its cancellations, how this eu grocery chain built a privacy-first ad solution that pays dividends, more local case studies.

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Population and environment case studies: local approaches to a global challenge.

Chih-Hsien (Michelle) Lin, Detbra Rosales, Melanie Jackson

It is apparent that we now live in a new epoch, the Anthropocene (IGBP, 2001), in which Earth’s environment and climate is mainly controlled by human activity. Environmental damage is accelerating on a global scale. As the world’s population increases, improving standards of living without destroying or degrading the natural environment becomes a challenge. Water shortages, sea-level rise, air pollution and degradation of coastline afflict many areas all over the world.

The larger the population, the more complex the environmental problems become (Fig. 1). The challenge is to build synergies between members of separate disciplines and between scientists, policymakers and the public within and between nations that can accomplish collaboratively what none are capable of doing alone for global climate change. A number of case studies in the coastal zone, based on population density gradients, from Palau , Maryland Coastal Bays, Moreton Bay in Australia and Chesapeake Bay to Pearl River in China will be reviewed to understand the population dynamics, environment issues, and management services. Importantly, through this case study discussion, we can learn from different perspectives between nations and the mistakes in terms of the environment and quality of living.

Palau is not letting the overwhelming climate change impacts slow them down. The Pacific country of Palau (with a population of only 21,000) has made significant environmental inroads to a pristine ecosystem protection and a sustainable tourism-based economy. They are looking for ways to increase the resilience of their diverse mangroves, seagrasses and coral reefs to promote high-end ecotourism and manage development to protect its unique ecosystem. However, managing conflicts between conservation, tourism and traditional practices are inevitable in Palau. For example, how do we push to develop education awareness of ecological processes and sustainable development to the public? How do we overcome the knowledge gap, culture differences and language barriers before educating local people about global climate change? How do we spread awareness of the environmental problems when it brings people into closer contact with nature via ecotourism? It is obvious that Palau needs international support and lessons from different experiences and perspectives for management, monitoring and research. A comparison between regions (such as tropical versus temperate environments) is necessary, but it should be careful not to extrapolate too much. Culture bias on nutrient pollution and marine impacts on different systems must be taken into account when making environmental decisions.

The Maryland coastal bay, Chincoteague Bay lagoon system is a wave-dominated environment. The changes impacting water quality, land use and the ecosystem have been associated with intensification of anthropogenic stressors (Fertig et al. 2013) Non-linear ecosystem level changes are due to the complexity of the phenomena occurring in this system. Therefore, management of coastal ecosystems requires a strong interaction between managers and researchers (Dennison 2008). Problem-oriented research is an effective way to examine the sustainable use of coastal zones, and targeting proper species that can affect human health directly is also important for implementing research. The aim of research is to translate it into meaningful information for the decision-making process or its evaluation.

The Moreton Bay system in Australia is known for seagrasses, mangroves and coral diversity. The bay is special in that wildlife is close to city skyline. The health of the bay had worsened over the past year due to the growing population along the coastlines. A significant component of nitrogen pollution from sewage discharge leads to marine eutrophication (Costanzo et al. 2001). Scientists researching water quality issues have developed an ecosystem health index for assessing the health of Moreton Bay. Functional zones based on habitats are also well defined to process effectiveness assessment. On the other hand, the scientists working in Moreton Bay have had good support from politicians, which has enhanced the communication with the public. The Queensland government and mayor are big advocates of the idea that the more people hear the problems, the more they get behind the actions. Currently, they yield good result: the receiving sewage discharge used to be seven times higher than the water quality standards in Queensland; however, it is currently only about two times the standard.

The drivers-pressures-state-impacts-responses (DPSIR; Fig. 2) framework provides a standard framework for site assessment and evaluation on the effect of human activity on environment. The framework has been applied to study the complex interactions in Chesapeake Bay and China’s megacity around Pearl River. The rapid rate of population growth around Chesapeake Bay watershed has changed the land use and expanded urban areas. Harmful algal blooms, declines in oyster population, land erosion and invasive species have become major environmental issues here. Although the Chesapeake Bay is extremely well studied; effective communication between science and management is required to bridge the barriers to integration (Boesch 2006). While the Chesapeake Bay is extensively managed with multiply branches; the community involvement and partnership are commonly separated. People do not feel a sense of ownership for the bay.

Population growth in China is formidable. The economic imbalances within the country itself result in a huge and constant influx of migrants to the coastal megacity (defined as a city with more than 10 million people in search of better jobs and quality of living). China’s Pearl River Delta region has overtaken Tokyo as world’s largest megacity. Large population pressures on resources cause devastating effects on natural environments and human health. As megacities grow, the boundaries expand. It is difficult to manage efficiently when cities reach unprecedented scales and complexity beyond population models. Although the urbanization rate of this coastal megacity has been slowing down, there are a number of uncertainties in terms of nutrient contaminants and future climate change.

Governments around the world are moving to integrate their efforts to address complex environmental issues, such as the Kyoto Protocol . However, there are many challenges we must face in order to make this possible, and to working together across-boundaries can range from technological applications, such as data to culture bias in science and organization. Science may have good networking through peer review, but integrative management is not easy to conduct.

References :

• IGBP (2001) Global Change and the Earth System: a Planet Under Pressure . In: IGBP Science, No. 4. International GeosphereeBiosphere Programme, Stockholm, Sweden, p. 32.
• Boesch DF (2006) Scientific requirements for ecosystem-based management in the restoration of Chesapeake Bay and Coastal Louisiana . Ecological Engineering 26:6-26 [ pdf ]
• Costanzo SD, O’donohue MJ, Dennison WC, Loneragan NR, Thomas M (2001) A new approach for detecting and mapping sewage impacts. Marine Pollution Bulletin 42:149-156
• Dennison WC (2008) Environmental problem solving in coastal ecosystems: A paradigm shift to sustainability . Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science 77:185-196 [ pdf ]
• Fertig B, O'Neil JM, Beckert KA, Cain CJ, Needham DM, Carruthers TJB, Dennison WC (2013) Elucidating terrestrial nutrient sources to a coastal lagoon, Chincoteague Bay, Maryland, USA . Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science 116:1-10
• Sekovski I, Newton A, Dennison W (2011) Megacities in the coastal zone: Using a driver-pressure-state-impact-response framework to address complex environmental problems. Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science xxx (2011) 1-12

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Stephanie Siemek 9 years ago

I agree with the statement, “The larger the population, the more complex the environmental problems become…”, as this idea can be supported within our own personal experiences on how difficult it is to accommodate a large group of people. For instance, how difficult is it for a large group of friends to all agree on what to do on Friday night? Each person has different ideas, needs, and opinions. Therefore, how can it be possible for multiple leaders, states, countries etc. to form an agreement that will restore and sustain the Earth’s ecosystems?

Worldwide collaboration and understanding is necessary for conservation and recovery of ecosystems, as nature has no boundaries. Therefore, it will be up to our leaders to enforce policies that will not lead us into total destruction as human population continues to grow. This may mean that they will eventually have to take measures that will not make every big corporation “happy” and cause burden on the economy and society, but it will keep us from completely destroying our resources, planet, and ourselves.

Whitney Hoot 9 years ago

I think you bring up some really excellent points. You've made me start thinking a lot about the relationships among human population size, growth, and density and how these factors influence conservation and management of marine resources. For instance, Palau actually has a higher population growth rate than China (0.8 percent per year vs. 0.5 percent per year), but we are talking about population sizes that are almost incomparable (21,000 vs. 1.36 billion) and hugely different land masses (458 sq km vs. 9.6 million sq km). Even though China is a huge country, it is much more densely populated than Palau; the density in Palau is about 45 people per sq km vs. 142 per sq km in China. (That being said, I imagine that population density is a more useful figure when managing marine resources in Palau than in China, because the density will inevitably be less variable in a small island country.)

We think a lot about population growth in large countries such as China and India - but what about tiny nations like Palau and the Federated States of Micronesia? Obviously, the global implications of population growth in these small countries are much less significant, but locally, population growth can place serious pressure on resources. Should global concerns always outweigh local concerns? China's per capita fish consumption is over 26 kg per year (http://www.greenfacts.org/en/fisheries/l-2/06-fish-consumption.htm) - not a small amount if you multiply it by more than a billion. So, we have to think a lot about Chinese fisheries. But what if there's an endemic species in Palau that could be wiped out by adding just a few more people to the island who are eating reef fish every day? As always, in conservation, we have to prioritize. And there are two ways to look at it - we could spend a lot of money and a lot of time addressing a massive issue (e.g. China's impact on fish abundance) or a lot less time and a lot less money (and we might even be successful) addressing a smaller, locally-scaled conservation issue in Palau. Just fish for thought.

Atika 8 months ago

Worldwide collaboration and understanding is necessary for conservation and recovery of ecosystems, as nature has no boundaries. Therefore, it will be up to our leaders to enforce policies that will not lead us into total destruction as human population continues to grow.

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How to write a case study — examples, templates, and tools

It’s a marketer’s job to communicate the effectiveness of a product or service to potential and current customers to convince them to buy and keep business moving. One of the best methods for doing this is to share success stories that are relatable to prospects and customers based on their pain points, experiences, and overall needs.

That’s where case studies come in. Case studies are an essential part of a content marketing plan. These in-depth stories of customer experiences are some of the most effective at demonstrating the value of a product or service. Yet many marketers don’t use them, whether because of their regimented formats or the process of customer involvement and approval.

A case study is a powerful tool for showcasing your hard work and the success your customer achieved. But writing a great case study can be difficult if you’ve never done it before or if it’s been a while. This guide will show you how to write an effective case study and provide real-world examples and templates that will keep readers engaged and support your business.

In this article, you’ll learn:

What is a case study?

How to write a case study, case study templates, case study examples, case study tools.

A case study is the detailed story of a customer’s experience with a product or service that demonstrates their success and often includes measurable outcomes. Case studies are used in a range of fields and for various reasons, from business to academic research. They’re especially impactful in marketing as brands work to convince and convert consumers with relatable, real-world stories of actual customer experiences.

The best case studies tell the story of a customer’s success, including the steps they took, the results they achieved, and the support they received from a brand along the way. To write a great case study, you need to:

• Celebrate the customer and make them — not a product or service — the star of the story.
• Craft the story with specific audiences or target segments in mind so that the story of one customer will be viewed as relatable and actionable for another customer.
• Write copy that is easy to read and engaging so that readers will gain the insights and messages intended.
• Follow a standardized format that includes all of the essentials a potential customer would find interesting and useful.
• Support all of the claims for success made in the story with data in the forms of hard numbers and customer statements.

Case studies are a type of review but more in depth, aiming to show — rather than just tell — the positive experiences that customers have with a brand. Notably, 89% of consumers read reviews before deciding to buy, and 79% view case study content as part of their purchasing process. When it comes to B2B sales, 52% of buyers rank case studies as an important part of their evaluation process.

Telling a brand story through the experience of a tried-and-true customer matters. The story is relatable to potential new customers as they imagine themselves in the shoes of the company or individual featured in the case study. Showcasing previous customers can help new ones see themselves engaging with your brand in the ways that are most meaningful to them.

Besides sharing the perspective of another customer, case studies stand out from other content marketing forms because they are based on evidence. Whether pulling from client testimonials or data-driven results, case studies tend to have more impact on new business because the story contains information that is both objective (data) and subjective (customer experience) — and the brand doesn’t sound too self-promotional.

Case studies are unique in that there’s a fairly standardized format for telling a customer’s story. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t room for creativity. It’s all about making sure that teams are clear on the goals for the case study — along with strategies for supporting content and channels — and understanding how the story fits within the framework of the company’s overall marketing goals.

Here are the basic steps to writing a good case study.

1. Identify your goal

Start by defining exactly who your case study will be designed to help. Case studies are about specific instances where a company works with a customer to achieve a goal. Identify which customers are likely to have these goals, as well as other needs the story should cover to appeal to them.

The answer is often found in one of the buyer personas that have been constructed as part of your larger marketing strategy. This can include anything from new leads generated by the marketing team to long-term customers that are being pressed for cross-sell opportunities. In all of these cases, demonstrating value through a relatable customer success story can be part of the solution to conversion.

2. Choose your client or subject

Who you highlight matters. Case studies tie brands together that might otherwise not cross paths. A writer will want to ensure that the highlighted customer aligns with their own company’s brand identity and offerings. Look for a customer with positive name recognition who has had great success with a product or service and is willing to be an advocate.

The client should also match up with the identified target audience. Whichever company or individual is selected should be a reflection of other potential customers who can see themselves in similar circumstances, having the same problems and possible solutions.

Some of the most compelling case studies feature customers who:

• Switch from one product or service to another while naming competitors that missed the mark.
• Experience measurable results that are relatable to others in a specific industry.
• Represent well-known brands and recognizable names that are likely to compel action.
• Advocate for a product or service as a champion and are well-versed in its advantages.

Whoever or whatever customer is selected, marketers must ensure they have the permission of the company involved before getting started. Some brands have strict review and approval procedures for any official marketing or promotional materials that include their name. Acquiring those approvals in advance will prevent any miscommunication or wasted effort if there is an issue with their legal or compliance teams.

3. Conduct research and compile data

Substantiating the claims made in a case study — either by the marketing team or customers themselves — adds validity to the story. To do this, include data and feedback from the client that defines what success looks like. This can be anything from demonstrating return on investment (ROI) to a specific metric the customer was striving to improve. Case studies should prove how an outcome was achieved and show tangible results that indicate to the customer that your solution is the right one.

This step could also include customer interviews. Make sure that the people being interviewed are key stakeholders in the purchase decision or deployment and use of the product or service that is being highlighted. Content writers should work off a set list of questions prepared in advance. It can be helpful to share these with the interviewees beforehand so they have time to consider and craft their responses. One of the best interview tactics to keep in mind is to ask questions where yes and no are not natural answers. This way, your subject will provide more open-ended responses that produce more meaningful content.

4. Choose the right format

There are a number of different ways to format a case study. Depending on what you hope to achieve, one style will be better than another. However, there are some common elements to include, such as:

• An engaging headline
• A subject and customer introduction
• The unique challenge or challenges the customer faced
• The solution the customer used to solve the problem
• The results achieved
• Data and statistics to back up claims of success
• A strong call to action (CTA) to engage with the vendor

It’s also important to note that while case studies are traditionally written as stories, they don’t have to be in a written format. Some companies choose to get more creative with their case studies and produce multimedia content, depending on their audience and objectives. Case study formats can include traditional print stories, interactive web or social content, data-heavy infographics, professionally shot videos, podcasts, and more.

5. Write your case study

We’ll go into more detail later about how exactly to write a case study, including templates and examples. Generally speaking, though, there are a few things to keep in mind when writing your case study.

• Be clear and concise. Readers want to get to the point of the story quickly and easily, and they’ll be looking to see themselves reflected in the story right from the start.
• Provide a big picture. Always make sure to explain who the client is, their goals, and how they achieved success in a short introduction to engage the reader.
• Construct a clear narrative. Stick to the story from the perspective of the customer and what they needed to solve instead of just listing product features or benefits.
• Leverage graphics. Incorporating infographics, charts, and sidebars can be a more engaging and eye-catching way to share key statistics and data in readable ways.
• Offer the right amount of detail. Most case studies are one or two pages with clear sections that a reader can skim to find the information most important to them.
• Include data to support claims. Show real results — both facts and figures and customer quotes — to demonstrate credibility and prove the solution works.

6. Promote your story

Marketers have a number of options for distribution of a freshly minted case study. Many brands choose to publish case studies on their website and post them on social media. This can help support SEO and organic content strategies while also boosting company credibility and trust as visitors see that other businesses have used the product or service.

Marketers are always looking for quality content they can use for lead generation. Consider offering a case study as gated content behind a form on a landing page or as an offer in an email message. One great way to do this is to summarize the content and tease the full story available for download after the user takes an action.

Sales teams can also leverage case studies, so be sure they are aware that the assets exist once they’re published. Especially when it comes to larger B2B sales, companies often ask for examples of similar customer challenges that have been solved.

Now that you’ve learned a bit about case studies and what they should include, you may be wondering how to start creating great customer story content. Here are a couple of templates you can use to structure your case study.

Template 1 — Challenge-solution-result format

• Start with an engaging title. This should be fewer than 70 characters long for SEO best practices. One of the best ways to approach the title is to include the customer’s name and a hint at the challenge they overcame in the end.
• Create an introduction. Lead with an explanation as to who the customer is, the need they had, and the opportunity they found with a specific product or solution. Writers can also suggest the success the customer experienced with the solution they chose.
• Present the challenge. This should be several paragraphs long and explain the problem the customer faced and the issues they were trying to solve. Details should tie into the company’s products and services naturally. This section needs to be the most relatable to the reader so they can picture themselves in a similar situation.
• Share the solution. Explain which product or service offered was the ideal fit for the customer and why. Feel free to delve into their experience setting up, purchasing, and onboarding the solution.
• Explain the results. Demonstrate the impact of the solution they chose by backing up their positive experience with data. Fill in with customer quotes and tangible, measurable results that show the effect of their choice.
• Ask for action. Include a CTA at the end of the case study that invites readers to reach out for more information, try a demo, or learn more — to nurture them further in the marketing pipeline. What you ask of the reader should tie directly into the goals that were established for the case study in the first place.

Template 2 — Data-driven format

• Start with an engaging title. Be sure to include a statistic or data point in the first 70 characters. Again, it’s best to include the customer’s name as part of the title.
• Create an overview. Share the customer’s background and a short version of the challenge they faced. Present the reason a particular product or service was chosen, and feel free to include quotes from the customer about their selection process.
• Present data point 1. Isolate the first metric that the customer used to define success and explain how the product or solution helped to achieve this goal. Provide data points and quotes to substantiate the claim that success was achieved.
• Present data point 2. Isolate the second metric that the customer used to define success and explain what the product or solution did to achieve this goal. Provide data points and quotes to substantiate the claim that success was achieved.
• Present data point 3. Isolate the final metric that the customer used to define success and explain what the product or solution did to achieve this goal. Provide data points and quotes to substantiate the claim that success was achieved.
• Summarize the results. Reiterate the fact that the customer was able to achieve success thanks to a specific product or service. Include quotes and statements that reflect customer satisfaction and suggest they plan to continue using the solution.
• Ask for action. Include a CTA at the end of the case study that asks readers to reach out for more information, try a demo, or learn more — to further nurture them in the marketing pipeline. Again, remember that this is where marketers can look to convert their content into action with the customer.

While templates are helpful, seeing a case study in action can also be a great way to learn. Here are some examples of how Adobe customers have experienced success.

Juniper Networks

One example is the Adobe and Juniper Networks case study , which puts the reader in the customer’s shoes. The beginning of the story quickly orients the reader so that they know exactly who the article is about and what they were trying to achieve. Solutions are outlined in a way that shows Adobe Experience Manager is the best choice and a natural fit for the customer. Along the way, quotes from the client are incorporated to help add validity to the statements. The results in the case study are conveyed with clear evidence of scale and volume using tangible data.

The story of Lenovo’s journey with Adobe is one that spans years of planning, implementation, and rollout. The Lenovo case study does a great job of consolidating all of this into a relatable journey that other enterprise organizations can see themselves taking, despite the project size. This case study also features descriptive headers and compelling visual elements that engage the reader and strengthen the content.

Tata Consulting

When it comes to using data to show customer results, this case study does an excellent job of conveying details and numbers in an easy-to-digest manner. Bullet points at the start break up the content while also helping the reader understand exactly what the case study will be about. Tata Consulting used Adobe to deliver elevated, engaging content experiences for a large telecommunications client of its own — an objective that’s relatable for a lot of companies.

Case studies are a vital tool for any marketing team as they enable you to demonstrate the value of your company’s products and services to others. They help marketers do their job and add credibility to a brand trying to promote its solutions by using the experiences and stories of real customers.

When you’re ready to get started with a case study:

• Think about a few goals you’d like to accomplish with your content.
• Make a list of successful clients that would be strong candidates for a case study.
• Reach out to the client to get their approval and conduct an interview.
• Gather the data to present an engaging and effective customer story.

Adobe can help

There are several Adobe products that can help you craft compelling case studies. Adobe Experience Platform helps you collect data and deliver great customer experiences across every channel. Once you’ve created your case studies, Experience Platform will help you deliver the right information to the right customer at the right time for maximum impact.

To learn more, watch the Adobe Experience Platform story .

Keep in mind that the best case studies are backed by data. That’s where Adobe Real-Time Customer Data Platform and Adobe Analytics come into play. With Real-Time CDP, you can gather the data you need to build a great case study and target specific customers to deliver the content to the right audience at the perfect moment.

Watch the Real-Time CDP overview video to learn more.

Finally, Adobe Analytics turns real-time data into real-time insights. It helps your business collect and synthesize data from multiple platforms to make more informed decisions and create the best case study possible.

Request a demo to learn more about Adobe Analytics.

https://business.adobe.com/blog/perspectives/b2b-ecommerce-10-case-studies-inspire-you

https://business.adobe.com/blog/basics/business-case

https://business.adobe.com/blog/basics/what-is-real-time-analytics

MSI Integrity

Good Practice Case Study: Local Community Engagement in the Philippines

The following case study provides examples of good practices that were observed and detailed in, Protecting the Cornerstone: Assessing the Governance of Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative Multi-Stakeholder Groups , published in February 2015.

This case study describes good practices and shows the benefits of engaging with communities and local actors, as observed in the Compostela Valley, Philippines. This case is in the report in Box 9, on page 61.

Good Practices for Engaging Communities and Local Actors in EITI (from “Box 9: The Philippines – The immense benefits of engaging communities and local actors in EITI”)

Compostela Valley is one of the 81 provinces in the Philippines. Although less than 1% of the country’s population live in the province, it accounts for a significant amount of the country’s extraction of gold.

According to national law, mining that occurs on areas determined to be “ancestral lands” first requires the free, prior, and informed consent of indigenous Filipinos in the area, and royalties of a minimum of 1% must be paid to the relevant indigenous council [FN 110]. Local communities became concerned in recent years about mismanagement of these royalties and government misuse of revenue, and began to demand greater transparency about extractive revenue related to proposed and existing large-scale mining operations, as well as the hundreds of existing small-scale operations.

Bantay Kita, the PWYP-affiliated CSO network that conducted regional consultations on EITI (see Box III in the Civil Society Guidance Note ), had invited attendees from Compostela Valley to CSO consultations when EITI was introduced in the Philippines in Through these and other exposures, local government and indigenous leaders in Compostela decided to advance their own transparency initiative modeled on the reporting requirements of EITI, but extending far beyond the minimum requirements of the EITI Standard.

Under Executive Orders issued in 2012 and 2013, the provincial government established a “provincial multi-stakeholder council for extractive industry transparency and accountability” [FN 111].  The council is made up of small-scale and large-scale companies, local government officials, national government agencies, as well as four representatives from the provincial tribal council and five locally operating NGOs. The Governor of the province chairs the council, and the vice-chairperson is a provincial government representative of the indigenous people. The council is funded by revenue collected by the provincial government from mining operations. It meets at least once every quarter and makes decisions by consensus.

The council has been involved in drafting an ordinance that includes a reporting template to cover these issues. According to the executive order, the reporting template must address issues that extend well beyond EITI. These include disclosure of:

• The level of public consultations or “free and prior consent process” undertaken, and an assessment of its sufficiency;
• Results of monitoring of the environmental, health, and cultural impact of the mining operations;
• Revenue collected by various local actors from extractive industries; and,
• How collected revenues were allocated and utilized at the local level.

As of October 1, 2014, the ordinance had not yet been finalized or released for public review. However, if it is approved, the reporting system will operate completely independently of EITI and will have considerably greater value at the local level.

Leadership for Change: Case Studies in American Local Government

This report profiles three outstanding local government executives – Robert O’Neill, Jan Perkins, and Phil Penland -- who have served in various local governments over the years. The study profiles the change activities of these city/county managers as they have sought to transfer a set of values and a methodology for leading change into a new setting. Case studies are developed on the change activities of each of these managers, drawing out lessons from their experiences that might suggest a model of leading change in American local governments. Leadership

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• Americans’ Changing Relationship With Local News

As news consumption habits become more digital, U.S. adults continue to see value in local outlets

Table of contents.

• 1. Attention to local news
• 2. Local news topics
• Americans’ changing local news providers
• How people feel about their local news media’s performance
• Most Americans think local journalists are in touch with their communities
• Interactions with local journalists
• 5. Americans’ views on the financial health of local news
• Acknowledgments
• The American Trends Panel survey methodology

The Pew-Knight Initiative supports new research on how Americans absorb civic information, form beliefs and identities, and engage in their communities.

Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping the world. Knight Foundation is a social investor committed to supporting informed and engaged communities. Learn more >

Pew Research Center conducted this study to better understand the local news habits and attitudes of U.S. adults. It is a follow-up to a similar study conducted in 2018 .

The survey of 5,146 U.S. adults was conducted from Jan. 22 to 28, 2024. Everyone who completed the survey is a member of the Center’s American Trends Panel (ATP), an online survey panel that is recruited through national, random sampling of residential addresses. This way nearly all U.S. adults have a chance of selection. The survey is weighted to be representative of the U.S. adult population by gender, race, ethnicity, partisan affiliation, education and other categories.  Read more about the ATP’s methodology .

Refer to the topline for the questions used for this survey , along with responses, and to the methodology for more details.

This is a Pew Research Center report from the Pew-Knight Initiative, a research program funded jointly by The Pew Charitable Trusts and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. Find related reports online at https://www.pewresearch.org/pew-knight/ .

The local news landscape in America is going through profound changes as both news consumers and producers continue to adapt to a more digital news environment. We recently asked U.S. adults about the ways they access local news, as well as their attitudes toward local journalism, finding that:

• A growing share of Americans prefer to get local news online, while fewer are getting news on TV or in print. And newspapers are no longer primarily consumed as a print product – the majority of readers of local daily newspapers now access them digitally.
• The share of U.S. adults who say they are paying close attention to local news has dropped since our last major survey of attitudes toward local news in 2018, mirroring declining attention to national news.
• Americans still see value in local news and local journalists. A large majority say local news outlets are at least somewhat important to the well-being of their local community. Most people also say local journalists are in touch with their communities and that their local news media perform well at several aspects of their jobs, such as reporting the news accurately.
• At the same time, a relatively small share of Americans (15%) say they have paid for local news in the last year. And many seem unaware of the major financial challenges facing local news: A 63% majority (albeit a smaller majority than in 2018) say they think their local news outlets are doing very or somewhat well financially.
• Majorities of both major parties say local media in their area are doing their jobs well. While Republicans and GOP-leaning independents are slightly less positive than Democrats and Democratic leaners in their opinions of local media, views of local news don’t have the same stark political divides that exist within Americans’ opinions about national media .
• Most Americans say local journalists should remain neutral on issues in their community, but a substantial minority say local journalists should take a more active role. About three-in-ten say local journalists should advocate for change in their communities, a view that’s especially common among Democrats and younger adults.

These are some of the key findings from a new Pew Research Center survey of about 5,000 U.S. adults conducted in January 2024. This is the first in a series of Pew Research Center reports on local news from the Pew-Knight Initiative, a research program funded jointly by The Pew Charitable Trusts and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

Americans largely hold positive views of local news organizations

At a time when many local news outlets are struggling and Americans’ trust in the news media has waned, the vast majority of U.S. adults (85%) say local news outlets are at least somewhat important to the well-being of their local community. This includes 44% who say local journalism is extremely or very important to their community

About seven-in-ten U.S. adults (69%) say that local journalists in their area are mostly in touch with their community, up from 63% who said this in 2018. And most Americans also say their local news organizations are doing well at four key roles:

• Reporting news accurately (71%)
• Covering the most important stories (68%)
• Being transparent (63%)
• Keeping an eye on local political leaders (61%).

These are relatively positive views compared with how Americans see news organizations more broadly. For instance, a 2022 Pew Research Center survey found that fewer than half of U.S. adults say that news organizations in general do a very or somewhat good job of covering the most important stories, reporting the news accurately and serving as a watchdog over elected leaders.

What’s more, views toward local news are not as politically polarized as Americans’ opinions about the news media overall. While Republicans and GOP-leaning independents are not quite as positive as Democrats and Democratic leaners in some of their assessments of local journalists, most Republicans still say the local media in their area are doing their jobs well.

For example, roughly three-quarters of Democrats (78%) say their local media do well at reporting news accurately, compared with about two-thirds of Republicans (66%).

By comparison, the 2022 survey found that 51% of Democrats and just 17% of Republicans say that news organizations in general do a very or somewhat good job of reporting the news accurately.

Jump to more information on views toward local news organizations.

Fewer Americans are closely following local news – and other types of news

Despite these positive views toward local news organizations, there are signs that Americans are engaging less with local journalism than they used to.

The share of Americans who say they follow local news very closely has fallen by 15 percentage points since 2016 (from 37% to 22%). Most U.S. adults still say they follow local news at least somewhat closely (66%), but this figure also has dropped in recent years.

This trend is not unique to local news – Americans’ attention to national and international news also has declined.

The local news landscape is becoming more digital

The ways in which Americans access local news are changing, reflecting an increasingly digital landscape – and matching patterns in overall news consumption habits .

Preferred pathways to local news

• Fewer people now say they prefer to get local news through a television set (32%, down from 41% who said the same in 2018).
• Americans are now more likely to say they prefer to get local news online, either through news websites (26%) or social media (23%). Both of these numbers have increased in recent years.
• Smaller shares prefer getting their local news from a print newspaper or on the radio (9% each).

Specific sources for local news

The types of sources (e.g., outlets or organizations) Americans are turning to are changing as well:

• While local television stations are still the most common source of local news beyond friends, family and neighbors, the share who often or sometimes get news there has declined from 70% to 64% in recent years.
• Online forums, such as Facebook groups or the Nextdoor app, have become a more common destination for local news: 52% of U.S. adults say they at least sometimes get local news from these types of forums, up 14 percentage points from 2018. This is on par with the percentage who get local news at least sometimes from local radio stations.
• Meanwhile, a third of Americans say they at least sometimes get local news from a daily newspaper, regardless of whether it is accessed via print, online or through a social media website – down 10 points from 2018. The share of Americans who get local news from newspapers is now roughly on par with the share who get local news from local government agencies (35%) or local newsletters or Listservs (31%).

Not only are fewer Americans getting local news from newspapers, but local daily newspapers are now more likely to be accessed online than in print.

• 31% of those who get news from daily newspapers do so via print, while far more (66%) do so digitally, whether through websites, apps, emails or social media posts that include content from the paper.
• In 2018, just over half of those who got news from local daily newspapers (54%) did so from print, and 43% did so via a website, app, email or social media site.

There is a similar move toward digital access for local TV stations, though local TV news is still mostly consumed through a TV set.

• In 2024, 62% of those getting news from local TV stations do so through a television, compared with 37% who do so through one of the digital pathways.
• An even bigger majority of local TV news consumers (76%) got that news through a TV set in 2018.

Jump to more information on how people access local news.

The financial state of local news

The turmoil for the local news industry in recent years has come with major financial challenges. Circulation and advertising revenue for newspapers have seen sharp declines in the last decade, according to our analysis of industry data , and other researchers have documented that thousands of newspapers have stopped publishing in the last two decades. There also is evidence of audience decline for local TV news stations, although advertising revenue on local TV has been more stable.

When asked about the financial state of the news outlets in their community, a majority of Americans (63%) say they think their local news outlets are doing very or somewhat well, with a third saying that they’re not doing too well or not doing well at all. This is a slightly more pessimistic view than in 2018, when 71% said their local outlets were doing well, though it is still a relatively positive assessment of the financial state of the industry.

Just 15% of Americans say they have paid or given money to any local news source in the past year – a number that has not changed much since 2018. The survey also asked Americans who did not pay for news in the past year the main reason why not. The most common explanation is that people don’t pay because they can find plenty of free local news, although young adults are more inclined to say they just aren’t interested enough in local news to pay for it.

Jump to more information on how people view the financial state of local news.

Other key findings in this report

Americans get local news about a wide variety of topics. Two-thirds or more of U.S. adults at least sometimes get news about local weather, crime, government and politics, and traffic and transportation, while smaller shares (but still at least half) say they get local news about arts and culture, the economy, schools, and sports.

Relatively few Americans are highly satisfied with the coverage they see of many topics. The survey also asked respondents who at least sometimes get each type of local news how satisfied they are with the news they get. With the exception of weather, fewer than half say they are extremely or very satisfied with the quality of the news they get about each topic. For example, about a quarter of those who consume news about their local economy (26%) say they are extremely or very satisfied with this news. Read more about different local news topics in Chapter 2.

When asked whether local journalists should remain neutral on community issues or advocate for change in the community, a majority of Americans (69%) say journalists should remain neutral, reflecting more traditional journalistic norms. However, 29% say that local journalists should be advocating for change in their communities. Younger adults are the most likely to favor advocacy by journalists: 39% of those ages 18 to 29 say that local journalists should push for change, as do 34% of those 30 to 49. Read more about Americans’ views of the role of local journalists in Chapter 4.

Americans who feel a strong sense of connection to their community are more likely to engage with local news, say that local news outlets are important to the community, and rate local media more highly overall. For example, 66% of those who say they are very attached to their community say local news outlets are extremely or very important to the well-being of their local community, compared with 46% of those who are somewhat attached and 31% of those who are not very or not at all attached to their community.

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Organizing Your Social Sciences Research Assignments

• Annotated Bibliography
• Analyzing a Scholarly Journal Article
• Group Presentations
• Dealing with Nervousness
• Using Visual Aids
• Grading Someone Else's Paper
• Types of Structured Group Activities
• Group Project Survival Skills
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• Multiple Book Review Essay
• Reviewing Collected Works
• Writing a Case Analysis Paper
• Writing a Case Study
• About Informed Consent
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• Generative AI and Writing
• Acknowledgments

A case study research paper examines a person, place, event, condition, phenomenon, or other type of subject of analysis in order to extrapolate  key themes and results that help predict future trends, illuminate previously hidden issues that can be applied to practice, and/or provide a means for understanding an important research problem with greater clarity. A case study research paper usually examines a single subject of analysis, but case study papers can also be designed as a comparative investigation that shows relationships between two or more subjects. The methods used to study a case can rest within a quantitative, qualitative, or mixed-method investigative paradigm.

Case Studies. Writing@CSU. Colorado State University; Mills, Albert J. , Gabrielle Durepos, and Eiden Wiebe, editors. Encyclopedia of Case Study Research . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 2010 ; “What is a Case Study?” In Swanborn, Peter G. Case Study Research: What, Why and How? London: SAGE, 2010.

How to Approach Writing a Case Study Research Paper

General information about how to choose a topic to investigate can be found under the " Choosing a Research Problem " tab in the Organizing Your Social Sciences Research Paper writing guide. Review this page because it may help you identify a subject of analysis that can be investigated using a case study design.

However, identifying a case to investigate involves more than choosing the research problem . A case study encompasses a problem contextualized around the application of in-depth analysis, interpretation, and discussion, often resulting in specific recommendations for action or for improving existing conditions. As Seawright and Gerring note, practical considerations such as time and access to information can influence case selection, but these issues should not be the sole factors used in describing the methodological justification for identifying a particular case to study. Given this, selecting a case includes considering the following:

• The case represents an unusual or atypical example of a research problem that requires more in-depth analysis? Cases often represent a topic that rests on the fringes of prior investigations because the case may provide new ways of understanding the research problem. For example, if the research problem is to identify strategies to improve policies that support girl's access to secondary education in predominantly Muslim nations, you could consider using Azerbaijan as a case study rather than selecting a more obvious nation in the Middle East. Doing so may reveal important new insights into recommending how governments in other predominantly Muslim nations can formulate policies that support improved access to education for girls.
• The case provides important insight or illuminate a previously hidden problem? In-depth analysis of a case can be based on the hypothesis that the case study will reveal trends or issues that have not been exposed in prior research or will reveal new and important implications for practice. For example, anecdotal evidence may suggest drug use among homeless veterans is related to their patterns of travel throughout the day. Assuming prior studies have not looked at individual travel choices as a way to study access to illicit drug use, a case study that observes a homeless veteran could reveal how issues of personal mobility choices facilitate regular access to illicit drugs. Note that it is important to conduct a thorough literature review to ensure that your assumption about the need to reveal new insights or previously hidden problems is valid and evidence-based.
• The case challenges and offers a counter-point to prevailing assumptions? Over time, research on any given topic can fall into a trap of developing assumptions based on outdated studies that are still applied to new or changing conditions or the idea that something should simply be accepted as "common sense," even though the issue has not been thoroughly tested in current practice. A case study analysis may offer an opportunity to gather evidence that challenges prevailing assumptions about a research problem and provide a new set of recommendations applied to practice that have not been tested previously. For example, perhaps there has been a long practice among scholars to apply a particular theory in explaining the relationship between two subjects of analysis. Your case could challenge this assumption by applying an innovative theoretical framework [perhaps borrowed from another discipline] to explore whether this approach offers new ways of understanding the research problem. Taking a contrarian stance is one of the most important ways that new knowledge and understanding develops from existing literature.
• The case provides an opportunity to pursue action leading to the resolution of a problem? Another way to think about choosing a case to study is to consider how the results from investigating a particular case may result in findings that reveal ways in which to resolve an existing or emerging problem. For example, studying the case of an unforeseen incident, such as a fatal accident at a railroad crossing, can reveal hidden issues that could be applied to preventative measures that contribute to reducing the chance of accidents in the future. In this example, a case study investigating the accident could lead to a better understanding of where to strategically locate additional signals at other railroad crossings so as to better warn drivers of an approaching train, particularly when visibility is hindered by heavy rain, fog, or at night.
• The case offers a new direction in future research? A case study can be used as a tool for an exploratory investigation that highlights the need for further research about the problem. A case can be used when there are few studies that help predict an outcome or that establish a clear understanding about how best to proceed in addressing a problem. For example, after conducting a thorough literature review [very important!], you discover that little research exists showing the ways in which women contribute to promoting water conservation in rural communities of east central Africa. A case study of how women contribute to saving water in a rural village of Uganda can lay the foundation for understanding the need for more thorough research that documents how women in their roles as cooks and family caregivers think about water as a valuable resource within their community. This example of a case study could also point to the need for scholars to build new theoretical frameworks around the topic [e.g., applying feminist theories of work and family to the issue of water conservation].

Eisenhardt, Kathleen M. “Building Theories from Case Study Research.” Academy of Management Review 14 (October 1989): 532-550; Emmel, Nick. Sampling and Choosing Cases in Qualitative Research: A Realist Approach . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 2013; Gerring, John. “What Is a Case Study and What Is It Good for?” American Political Science Review 98 (May 2004): 341-354; Mills, Albert J. , Gabrielle Durepos, and Eiden Wiebe, editors. Encyclopedia of Case Study Research . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 2010; Seawright, Jason and John Gerring. "Case Selection Techniques in Case Study Research." Political Research Quarterly 61 (June 2008): 294-308.

Structure and Writing Style

The purpose of a paper in the social sciences designed around a case study is to thoroughly investigate a subject of analysis in order to reveal a new understanding about the research problem and, in so doing, contributing new knowledge to what is already known from previous studies. In applied social sciences disciplines [e.g., education, social work, public administration, etc.], case studies may also be used to reveal best practices, highlight key programs, or investigate interesting aspects of professional work.

In general, the structure of a case study research paper is not all that different from a standard college-level research paper. However, there are subtle differences you should be aware of. Here are the key elements to organizing and writing a case study research paper.

I.  Introduction

As with any research paper, your introduction should serve as a roadmap for your readers to ascertain the scope and purpose of your study . The introduction to a case study research paper, however, should not only describe the research problem and its significance, but you should also succinctly describe why the case is being used and how it relates to addressing the problem. The two elements should be linked. With this in mind, a good introduction answers these four questions:

• What is being studied? Describe the research problem and describe the subject of analysis [the case] you have chosen to address the problem. Explain how they are linked and what elements of the case will help to expand knowledge and understanding about the problem.
• Why is this topic important to investigate? Describe the significance of the research problem and state why a case study design and the subject of analysis that the paper is designed around is appropriate in addressing the problem.
• What did we know about this topic before I did this study? Provide background that helps lead the reader into the more in-depth literature review to follow. If applicable, summarize prior case study research applied to the research problem and why it fails to adequately address the problem. Describe why your case will be useful. If no prior case studies have been used to address the research problem, explain why you have selected this subject of analysis.
• How will this study advance new knowledge or new ways of understanding? Explain why your case study will be suitable in helping to expand knowledge and understanding about the research problem.

Each of these questions should be addressed in no more than a few paragraphs. Exceptions to this can be when you are addressing a complex research problem or subject of analysis that requires more in-depth background information.

II.  Literature Review

The literature review for a case study research paper is generally structured the same as it is for any college-level research paper. The difference, however, is that the literature review is focused on providing background information and  enabling historical interpretation of the subject of analysis in relation to the research problem the case is intended to address . This includes synthesizing studies that help to:

• Place relevant works in the context of their contribution to understanding the case study being investigated . This would involve summarizing studies that have used a similar subject of analysis to investigate the research problem. If there is literature using the same or a very similar case to study, you need to explain why duplicating past research is important [e.g., conditions have changed; prior studies were conducted long ago, etc.].
• Describe the relationship each work has to the others under consideration that informs the reader why this case is applicable . Your literature review should include a description of any works that support using the case to investigate the research problem and the underlying research questions.
• Identify new ways to interpret prior research using the case study . If applicable, review any research that has examined the research problem using a different research design. Explain how your use of a case study design may reveal new knowledge or a new perspective or that can redirect research in an important new direction.
• Resolve conflicts amongst seemingly contradictory previous studies . This refers to synthesizing any literature that points to unresolved issues of concern about the research problem and describing how the subject of analysis that forms the case study can help resolve these existing contradictions.
• Point the way in fulfilling a need for additional research . Your review should examine any literature that lays a foundation for understanding why your case study design and the subject of analysis around which you have designed your study may reveal a new way of approaching the research problem or offer a perspective that points to the need for additional research.
• Expose any gaps that exist in the literature that the case study could help to fill . Summarize any literature that not only shows how your subject of analysis contributes to understanding the research problem, but how your case contributes to a new way of understanding the problem that prior research has failed to do.
• Locate your own research within the context of existing literature [very important!] . Collectively, your literature review should always place your case study within the larger domain of prior research about the problem. The overarching purpose of reviewing pertinent literature in a case study paper is to demonstrate that you have thoroughly identified and synthesized prior studies in relation to explaining the relevance of the case in addressing the research problem.

III.  Method

In this section, you explain why you selected a particular case [i.e., subject of analysis] and the strategy you used to identify and ultimately decide that your case was appropriate in addressing the research problem. The way you describe the methods used varies depending on the type of subject of analysis that constitutes your case study.

If your subject of analysis is an incident or event . In the social and behavioral sciences, the event or incident that represents the case to be studied is usually bounded by time and place, with a clear beginning and end and with an identifiable location or position relative to its surroundings. The subject of analysis can be a rare or critical event or it can focus on a typical or regular event. The purpose of studying a rare event is to illuminate new ways of thinking about the broader research problem or to test a hypothesis. Critical incident case studies must describe the method by which you identified the event and explain the process by which you determined the validity of this case to inform broader perspectives about the research problem or to reveal new findings. However, the event does not have to be a rare or uniquely significant to support new thinking about the research problem or to challenge an existing hypothesis. For example, Walo, Bull, and Breen conducted a case study to identify and evaluate the direct and indirect economic benefits and costs of a local sports event in the City of Lismore, New South Wales, Australia. The purpose of their study was to provide new insights from measuring the impact of a typical local sports event that prior studies could not measure well because they focused on large "mega-events." Whether the event is rare or not, the methods section should include an explanation of the following characteristics of the event: a) when did it take place; b) what were the underlying circumstances leading to the event; and, c) what were the consequences of the event in relation to the research problem.

If your subject of analysis is a person. Explain why you selected this particular individual to be studied and describe what experiences they have had that provide an opportunity to advance new understandings about the research problem. Mention any background about this person which might help the reader understand the significance of their experiences that make them worthy of study. This includes describing the relationships this person has had with other people, institutions, and/or events that support using them as the subject for a case study research paper. It is particularly important to differentiate the person as the subject of analysis from others and to succinctly explain how the person relates to examining the research problem [e.g., why is one politician in a particular local election used to show an increase in voter turnout from any other candidate running in the election]. Note that these issues apply to a specific group of people used as a case study unit of analysis [e.g., a classroom of students].

If your subject of analysis is a place. In general, a case study that investigates a place suggests a subject of analysis that is unique or special in some way and that this uniqueness can be used to build new understanding or knowledge about the research problem. A case study of a place must not only describe its various attributes relevant to the research problem [e.g., physical, social, historical, cultural, economic, political], but you must state the method by which you determined that this place will illuminate new understandings about the research problem. It is also important to articulate why a particular place as the case for study is being used if similar places also exist [i.e., if you are studying patterns of homeless encampments of veterans in open spaces, explain why you are studying Echo Park in Los Angeles rather than Griffith Park?]. If applicable, describe what type of human activity involving this place makes it a good choice to study [e.g., prior research suggests Echo Park has more homeless veterans].

If your subject of analysis is a phenomenon. A phenomenon refers to a fact, occurrence, or circumstance that can be studied or observed but with the cause or explanation to be in question. In this sense, a phenomenon that forms your subject of analysis can encompass anything that can be observed or presumed to exist but is not fully understood. In the social and behavioral sciences, the case usually focuses on human interaction within a complex physical, social, economic, cultural, or political system. For example, the phenomenon could be the observation that many vehicles used by ISIS fighters are small trucks with English language advertisements on them. The research problem could be that ISIS fighters are difficult to combat because they are highly mobile. The research questions could be how and by what means are these vehicles used by ISIS being supplied to the militants and how might supply lines to these vehicles be cut off? How might knowing the suppliers of these trucks reveal larger networks of collaborators and financial support? A case study of a phenomenon most often encompasses an in-depth analysis of a cause and effect that is grounded in an interactive relationship between people and their environment in some way.

NOTE:   The choice of the case or set of cases to study cannot appear random. Evidence that supports the method by which you identified and chose your subject of analysis should clearly support investigation of the research problem and linked to key findings from your literature review. Be sure to cite any studies that helped you determine that the case you chose was appropriate for examining the problem.

IV.  Discussion

The main elements of your discussion section are generally the same as any research paper, but centered around interpreting and drawing conclusions about the key findings from your analysis of the case study. Note that a general social sciences research paper may contain a separate section to report findings. However, in a paper designed around a case study, it is common to combine a description of the results with the discussion about their implications. The objectives of your discussion section should include the following:

Reiterate the Research Problem/State the Major Findings Briefly reiterate the research problem you are investigating and explain why the subject of analysis around which you designed the case study were used. You should then describe the findings revealed from your study of the case using direct, declarative, and succinct proclamation of the study results. Highlight any findings that were unexpected or especially profound.

Explain the Meaning of the Findings and Why They are Important Systematically explain the meaning of your case study findings and why you believe they are important. Begin this part of the section by repeating what you consider to be your most important or surprising finding first, then systematically review each finding. Be sure to thoroughly extrapolate what your analysis of the case can tell the reader about situations or conditions beyond the actual case that was studied while, at the same time, being careful not to misconstrue or conflate a finding that undermines the external validity of your conclusions.

Relate the Findings to Similar Studies No study in the social sciences is so novel or possesses such a restricted focus that it has absolutely no relation to previously published research. The discussion section should relate your case study results to those found in other studies, particularly if questions raised from prior studies served as the motivation for choosing your subject of analysis. This is important because comparing and contrasting the findings of other studies helps support the overall importance of your results and it highlights how and in what ways your case study design and the subject of analysis differs from prior research about the topic.

Consider Alternative Explanations of the Findings Remember that the purpose of social science research is to discover and not to prove. When writing the discussion section, you should carefully consider all possible explanations revealed by the case study results, rather than just those that fit your hypothesis or prior assumptions and biases. Be alert to what the in-depth analysis of the case may reveal about the research problem, including offering a contrarian perspective to what scholars have stated in prior research if that is how the findings can be interpreted from your case.

Acknowledge the Study's Limitations You can state the study's limitations in the conclusion section of your paper but describing the limitations of your subject of analysis in the discussion section provides an opportunity to identify the limitations and explain why they are not significant. This part of the discussion section should also note any unanswered questions or issues your case study could not address. More detailed information about how to document any limitations to your research can be found here .

Suggest Areas for Further Research Although your case study may offer important insights about the research problem, there are likely additional questions related to the problem that remain unanswered or findings that unexpectedly revealed themselves as a result of your in-depth analysis of the case. Be sure that the recommendations for further research are linked to the research problem and that you explain why your recommendations are valid in other contexts and based on the original assumptions of your study.

V.  Conclusion

As with any research paper, you should summarize your conclusion in clear, simple language; emphasize how the findings from your case study differs from or supports prior research and why. Do not simply reiterate the discussion section. Provide a synthesis of key findings presented in the paper to show how these converge to address the research problem. If you haven't already done so in the discussion section, be sure to document the limitations of your case study and any need for further research.

The function of your paper's conclusion is to: 1) reiterate the main argument supported by the findings from your case study; 2) state clearly the context, background, and necessity of pursuing the research problem using a case study design in relation to an issue, controversy, or a gap found from reviewing the literature; and, 3) provide a place to persuasively and succinctly restate the significance of your research problem, given that the reader has now been presented with in-depth information about the topic.

Consider the following points to help ensure your conclusion is appropriate:

• If the argument or purpose of your paper is complex, you may need to summarize these points for your reader.
• If prior to your conclusion, you have not yet explained the significance of your findings or if you are proceeding inductively, use the conclusion of your paper to describe your main points and explain their significance.
• Move from a detailed to a general level of consideration of the case study's findings that returns the topic to the context provided by the introduction or within a new context that emerges from your case study findings.

Note that, depending on the discipline you are writing in or the preferences of your professor, the concluding paragraph may contain your final reflections on the evidence presented as it applies to practice or on the essay's central research problem. However, the nature of being introspective about the subject of analysis you have investigated will depend on whether you are explicitly asked to express your observations in this way.

Problems to Avoid

Overgeneralization One of the goals of a case study is to lay a foundation for understanding broader trends and issues applied to similar circumstances. However, be careful when drawing conclusions from your case study. They must be evidence-based and grounded in the results of the study; otherwise, it is merely speculation. Looking at a prior example, it would be incorrect to state that a factor in improving girls access to education in Azerbaijan and the policy implications this may have for improving access in other Muslim nations is due to girls access to social media if there is no documentary evidence from your case study to indicate this. There may be anecdotal evidence that retention rates were better for girls who were engaged with social media, but this observation would only point to the need for further research and would not be a definitive finding if this was not a part of your original research agenda.

Failure to Document Limitations No case is going to reveal all that needs to be understood about a research problem. Therefore, just as you have to clearly state the limitations of a general research study , you must describe the specific limitations inherent in the subject of analysis. For example, the case of studying how women conceptualize the need for water conservation in a village in Uganda could have limited application in other cultural contexts or in areas where fresh water from rivers or lakes is plentiful and, therefore, conservation is understood more in terms of managing access rather than preserving access to a scarce resource.

Failure to Extrapolate All Possible Implications Just as you don't want to over-generalize from your case study findings, you also have to be thorough in the consideration of all possible outcomes or recommendations derived from your findings. If you do not, your reader may question the validity of your analysis, particularly if you failed to document an obvious outcome from your case study research. For example, in the case of studying the accident at the railroad crossing to evaluate where and what types of warning signals should be located, you failed to take into consideration speed limit signage as well as warning signals. When designing your case study, be sure you have thoroughly addressed all aspects of the problem and do not leave gaps in your analysis that leave the reader questioning the results.

Case Studies. Writing@CSU. Colorado State University; Gerring, John. Case Study Research: Principles and Practices . New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007; Merriam, Sharan B. Qualitative Research and Case Study Applications in Education . Rev. ed. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 1998; Miller, Lisa L. “The Use of Case Studies in Law and Social Science Research.” Annual Review of Law and Social Science 14 (2018): TBD; Mills, Albert J., Gabrielle Durepos, and Eiden Wiebe, editors. Encyclopedia of Case Study Research . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 2010; Putney, LeAnn Grogan. "Case Study." In Encyclopedia of Research Design , Neil J. Salkind, editor. (Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 2010), pp. 116-120; Simons, Helen. Case Study Research in Practice . London: SAGE Publications, 2009;  Kratochwill,  Thomas R. and Joel R. Levin, editors. Single-Case Research Design and Analysis: New Development for Psychology and Education .  Hilldsale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1992; Swanborn, Peter G. Case Study Research: What, Why and How? London : SAGE, 2010; Yin, Robert K. Case Study Research: Design and Methods . 6th edition. Los Angeles, CA, SAGE Publications, 2014; Walo, Maree, Adrian Bull, and Helen Breen. “Achieving Economic Benefits at Local Events: A Case Study of a Local Sports Event.” Festival Management and Event Tourism 4 (1996): 95-106.

Writing Tip

At Least Five Misconceptions about Case Study Research

Social science case studies are often perceived as limited in their ability to create new knowledge because they are not randomly selected and findings cannot be generalized to larger populations. Flyvbjerg examines five misunderstandings about case study research and systematically "corrects" each one. To quote, these are:

Misunderstanding 1 :  General, theoretical [context-independent] knowledge is more valuable than concrete, practical [context-dependent] knowledge. Misunderstanding 2 :  One cannot generalize on the basis of an individual case; therefore, the case study cannot contribute to scientific development. Misunderstanding 3 :  The case study is most useful for generating hypotheses; that is, in the first stage of a total research process, whereas other methods are more suitable for hypotheses testing and theory building. Misunderstanding 4 :  The case study contains a bias toward verification, that is, a tendency to confirm the researcher’s preconceived notions. Misunderstanding 5 :  It is often difficult to summarize and develop general propositions and theories on the basis of specific case studies [p. 221].

While writing your paper, think introspectively about how you addressed these misconceptions because to do so can help you strengthen the validity and reliability of your research by clarifying issues of case selection, the testing and challenging of existing assumptions, the interpretation of key findings, and the summation of case outcomes. Think of a case study research paper as a complete, in-depth narrative about the specific properties and key characteristics of your subject of analysis applied to the research problem.

Flyvbjerg, Bent. “Five Misunderstandings About Case-Study Research.” Qualitative Inquiry 12 (April 2006): 219-245.

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Case Studies , Local Advertising

Case Study: Winning With Local Service Ads

April 8, 2021

When someone conducts a local search on Google, the ads that appear at the very top of the page — before the search ads, map listings and organic results — are called Local Service Ads (LSA) .

These pay-per-lead ads tend to outperform traditional text ads in local searches, ensure that your business shows up at the very top of the page and can be a powerful driver of direct leads in your area.

Some stats you should know:

• “Near me” searches on mobile have grown by more than 200% over the last couple of years ( Chatmeter )
• 80% of local searches convert ( WebFX)
• 88% of local queries on a mobile device end up in either a call or visit to the business within 24 hours ( HubSpot )
• 75% of users never scroll past the first page of search results ( HubSpot )

Driving leads with Google’s Local Service Ads

The right LSA strategy can be a game-changer for local service providers. One contractor, with the help of their Marketing Success Manager , has recently learned just how powerful having an effective LSA campaign can be.

In their first month as a Google Guaranteed Business, they saw 76 leads (57 phone calls and 19 messages) at an average cost per lead of just $38.09 and had 44 appointments booked with the LSA program.

How did they do it?

Not all LSA strategies are made equal. To drive results, this contractor’s Marketing Success Manager started by optimizing their Google My Business profile for success, including adding high-quality photos.

They also set up their LSA bidding mode to “Maximize Leads,” which lets Google set the bid and ensures the maximum number of leads for the budget.

They adjusted their hours, indicating to Google that they are willing to take leads 24/7 and will manage them in the dashboard consistently.

They enabled the “Message leads” option.

Pro tip : This should only be enabled if you’re willing to respond to messages right away.

To ensure they got the best leads, they indicated which jobs they are willing to accept.

Last but not least, they kept their foot on the gas pedal when it came to getting more Google reviews.

Their Marketing Success Manager also emphasized the importance of booking active leads (which shows Google that you’re taking care of its users) and moving leads through the dashboard daily the way Google instructs.

When consumers need local services, more often than not, they’re going to start their search on Google. Google’s LSA program ensures you show up at the top of the page and, with the right strategy, can be a powerful source of low-cost, high-quality leads for local businesses.

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Case Study: Plumber Wins With Social Media Management

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What Exactly are Local Service Ads and How Can They Help Your Plumbing Business?

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Farmer-led climate adaptation: call for local case studies

• Flagship Programme 1

The Eastern Africa Farmers Federation (EAFF) and AICCRA are calling for submissions on farmer-led best practice case studies that demonstrate innovative local activities and methods to enhance agricultural adaptation and ultimately promote resilience. Deadline for submission: 19 May 2024

The Eastern Africa Farmers Federation (EAFF) in collaboration with Accelerating Impacts of CGIAR Climate Research for Africa (AICCRA), is implementing a project to showcase best practice examples of farmer-led adaptation in managing the negative impacts of climate change on agriculture. These studies will be selected from diverse regions across Africa. The final project output will be a compendium of farmer-led best practice case studies that demonstrate innovative local activities and methods to enhance agricultural adaptation and ultimately promote resilience.

At the project launch, EAFF and AICCRA announced the call for farmer-led best practice case studies that demonstrate innovative local activities and methods to enhance agricultural adaptation and ultimately promote resilience. You can submit your case study by 19 May.

Call for local case studies

EAFF and AICCRA are working towards developing a compendium of farmer-led best practice case studies that demonstrate innovative local activities and methods to enhance agricultural adaptation and ultimately promote resilience across the continent.

Case studies selection

Case studies will be selected from:

• All the geographical regions across Africa
• Will vary in their scale, focus and level of amition

Innovations will be identified and selected in collaboration with local partners, including regional farmer organisations, local communities, NGOs and other appropriate partnners.

Once identified, EAFF and AICCRA will collaborate directly with the grassroots level innovators to document their specific activities and best practices of each project in each unique locality. This includes information that:

• Captures the details of each innovation and describe how it effectively responds to a changing climate;
• Describes the lived reality of each context;
• Defines key challenges and enabling factors for the project's successes and difficulties;
• Gives valuable insights and "key takeaways";
• Provides recommendations on their suitability and potential application in other areas, with the hope to replicate and scale best practices in different regional areas across the continent.

What is required from our partner organisations:

• Assistance to identify farmers, farmer organisations, local agro-businesses in your particular region that are currently demonstrating leadership and good practices in agricultural adaptation to climate change;
• A motivation as to why this particular project demonstrates leadership and innovation;
• A brief introduction of the project to EAFF and AICCRA staff and the sharing of innovator or project contact details;
• Additional information and images that can help describe the innovation or practice.

Further information

If you'd like to know more about the submissions or the project itself, please contact:

Norbert Tuyishime - EAFF Project Officer - [email protected]

Romy Chevallier - AICCRA Policy and Engagement Consultant - [email protected]

About the launch workshop

Objectives:

• Introduce the project, its key objectives and timelines;
• Describe locally led farmer adaptation and provide examples of innovative practices;
• Launch a collaborative call for regional African farmer-led adaptation case studies; and
• Describe the case study selection process and request your support to identify farmers, farmer organisations and local agro-businesses that are demonstrating leadership and good practices in agricultural climate adaptation.

Presentations

• Apercu-du-projet.pdf (2.23 MB)

Union Station redevelopment progressing with completion of new design study

by Tom Roussey

WASHINGTON (7News) — The organization behind efforts to expand, renovate, and modernize Union Station announced a significant step forward in the process Wednesday.

The Union Station Redevelopment Corporation said a study has been completed that helps chart a path forward for it to oversee major changes at the 117-year-old train station.

READ | Art gallery opens new location inside Union Station in Northeast DC

Renderings by the Federal Railroad Administration that show what Union Station could look like portray a much more modern look, with more natural light in the area where riders catch trains — as well as major changes further north where the parking garage is located. They also show some historic parts of Union Station, such as the main hall staying largely the same.

“[It’s about] finding that balance between the classic elements of the building and the more contemporary experience,” said Doug Carr, CEO of the Union Station Redevelopment Corporation. “This is a tremendous opportunity for us not only to make the transportation center bigger and address future growth and capacity but also an economic opportunity for development for the station and also the region more broadly.”

READ | 33 arrests made after DC police clear out pro-Palestine encampment at GWU's campus

Carr said although the process is moving forward, there is still a lot of work to be done and future changes are likely to be done in phases. There is no timeline yet for when the phases may be done.

He said security will play a big role in the design process, as it moves forward.