SPEA - School of Public and Environmental Affairs

Assistant Professor Beth Gazley recently had her paper “Why Not Partner With Local Government? Nonprofit Managerial Perceptions of Collaborative Disadvantage” published in the February issue of Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly. While service delivery partnerships with local governments offer both opportunities and challenges for nonprofit agencies, Gazley explores the tendencies of collaboration literature to downplay rationales for avoiding partnerships and the influence of managerial characteristics on the decision to collaborate. Gazley surveyed nonprofit executive directors across the state of Georgia about factors that might inhibit them from collaborating with a local government, and discovered that the attitudes about collaboration are not homogenous, but instead reflect underlying political and social dynamics that must be understood as distinct constructs. Her findings suggest that future research in this area should focus on specific collaborative barriers, and should examine the individual backgrounds of those charged with collaborative responsibility while integrating theories of organizational and human behavior.