To Exit or Not To Exit: That is the Question. To Build or Retreat: That is Another Question

• Author: Phil Harris
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/pa.1618
• Date: 01 August 2016
• Published date: 01 August 2016

■Editorial

To Exit or Not To Exit: That is the

Question. To Build or Retreat: That is

Another Question

It has been a very interesting and tragic period for

Europe over the last month. The UK voted to leave

the EU in its Referendum, Its Prime Minister

resigned and Teresa May has taken over as the

Second female Conservative Prime Minister and

formed a new government. The UK Economy took

an initial battering in world markets but seems to

have settled down now as global players perceive

there are advantages and disadvantages for the

UK in being in the EU, but the main thing is stabil-

ity in global markets. It will also speed-up reform

of the EU and its institutions, so this may be

advantageous.

We have also seen a sharp increase in horrific ter-

ror atrocities in Europe, notably France, Belgium

and Germany which has pointed to the need for

more effective management of our freedoms and se-

curity of our citizens. It has been a difficult Summer

for Europe. We hope and pray that stability and

safety will return as without that society will not

be based on a balanced platform to provide for all

We are also seeing the emergence of the two con-

tenders for the US Presidency,Donald Trump versus

Hilary Clinton. The non-establishment business can-

didate versus the female long serving politician and

social reformer. Cleveland and Philadelphia have all

given us insights into what is coming. In addition we

will soon have elections in Germany and France,

which could see major change, whilst growth in

South East Asia continues steadily which can be seen

in the positive meeting in Ulan Bator at the 11

th

ASEM Summit. World regulation and development

now seems to be very much to the fore as we build

and develop a truly global international economy

accountable governmental and financial system,

accountability, good governance and transparency

will be the core underpinnings of that development

This is a general issue of the Journal of Public

Affairs and the first article is an academic paper by

Jiang, Hua and Joon Soo Lim of Syracuse University,

Syracuse, New York, USA and Cary A. Greenwood

of Middle Tennessee State University, Murfreesboro,

Tennessee, USA and is entitled, “The Situational

Public Engagement Model in a Municipal Water-

shed Protection Program: Information Seeking,

Information Sharing, and the Use of Organizational

and Social Media”Explores attitudes in In an exten-

sion of the situational theory of publics and tests a

situational engagement model to answer how situa-

tional factors affect public engagement via both

communication behaviours and the use of social

media and organizational media. A path analysis

for the proposed situation engagement model re-

vealed that problem recognition was the key to

predicting both information seeking and sharing.

The path analysis also yields a significant associa-

tion between communication behaviours and public

engagement, mediated by the use of organizational

media in seeking information on the issue. The anal-

ysis showed a significant direct effect of involvement

on engagement. The current study provides a pre-

liminary framework that explains individuals’envi-

ronmental behaviours in today’s participatory and

user-generating media environment. Theoretical

and practical implications are explored.

The second article is by Craig S Ross of Fiorente of

Media, Inc., Boston, MA, USA and Alicia Sparks

and David H. Jernigan of the Center on Alcohol

Marketing and Youth, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg

School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD, USA. It is

entitled “Assessing the Impact of Stricter Alcohol

Advertising Standards: The Case of Beam Global

Spirits”

It argues that reducing youth exposure to alco-

hol advertising has become a global health prior-

ity. The authors posit that in most countries

around the world, the alcohol industry is given

the opportunity to regulate itself with respect to

advertising practices. It suggests that generally,

the alcohol industry self-regulations are lax,

Journal of Public Affairs

Volume 16 Number 3 pp 219–221 (2016)

Published online in Wiley Online Library

(www.wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/pa.1618

Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.