The Imperatives of Successful Policy Implementation: A Case Study of the Hollings National Institute of Standards and Technology-Manufacturing Extension Partnership (NIST-MEP) Program’s Implementation in Arkansas

Abstract

The Arkansas Science and Technology Authority established the Arkansas Manufacturing Solutions program to serve as an effective diffusion of innovation delivery system, via interagency cooperation, for the small-to-medium sized manufacturing sector in Arkansas. The policy analysis considers the extent to which imperative elements exist to encourage interagency cooperation in the program environment.

The Janet Weiss (1987) cooperation framework is applied as a single exploratory case study. The results indicate that multiple factors contributed to the participation of state agencies. Those factors include: (1) random external influences; (2) systematic external influences; (3) shared problems/goal congruence; (4) resources; and (5) capacity.