Cases

Fortaleza: Keeping an Electoral Promise

Publication Date: March 4, 2021

During his re-election campaign in 2016, Mayor Roberto Cláudio faced recurring complaints from voters concerning the availability of essential medicines at their health clinics. Limited access to medicine frustrated patients and health...

A Task Force with Teeth?: Driving City Performance in Lawrence, MA Practitioner Guide

Publication Date: February 23, 2021

This practitioner guide accompanies HKS Case No. 2209.0. After taking office, Mayor Daniel Rivera created a new task force to combat blight in Lawrence, Massachusetts. Although blight and distressed properties were not on Rivera's campaign...

A Task Force with Teeth?: Driving City Performance in Lawrence, MA

Publication Date: February 23, 2021

After taking office, Mayor Daniel Rivera created a new task force to combat blight in Lawrence, Massachusetts. Although blight and distressed properties were not on Rivera's campaign agenda, he soon realized the matter required his attention...

Nobody's Core Business: Confronting Cross-Cutting Problems in the Public Sector Practitioner Guide

Publication Date: February 9, 2021

This practitioner guide accompanies HKS Case 2200.0. A city librarian grappled with the question of what to do about opioid use and overdoses in her library. Changes over the past two decades had dramatically expanded the mission of the public...

Creating Public Value: Concept Note

Publication Date: February 9, 2021

For those looking to understand public value creation in greater depth, this “concept note” offers a 9-page overview of the processes, conceptual frameworks, and vocabulary that have helped hundreds of practitioners surmount common...

Nobody's Core Business: Confronting Cross-Cutting Problems in the Public Sector

Publication Date: February 9, 2021

A city librarian grappled with the question of what to do about opioid use and overdoses in her library. Changes over the past two decades had dramatically expanded the mission of the public library. What began as a repository of human...

Greenland and the Paris Agreement

Publication Date: January 27, 2021

This case explores the tradeoffs between climate change action and economic development from the perspective of Greenland, a self-governing territory of Denmark. Greenland lacks autonomous decision-making authority in several key international...

Shanties in the Skyline: Addressing Unauthorized Building Works in Hong Kong Practitioner Guide

Publication Date: December 16, 2020

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, high atop a great many of the older, concrete-block buildings in lower-income areas of central Hong Kong and the neighborhoods of the Kowloon peninsula, informal metal-framed wooden structures housed...

Shanties in the Skyline: Addressing Unauthorized Building Works in Hong Kong Epilogue

Publication Date: December 16, 2020

This epilogue accompanies HKS Case 2194.0. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, high atop a great many of the older, concrete-block buildings in lower-income areas of central Hong Kong and the neighborhoods of the Kowloon peninsula,...

Shanties in the Skyline: Addressing Unauthorized Building Works in Hong Kong

Publication Date: December 16, 2020

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, high atop a great many of the older, concrete-block buildings in lower-income areas of central Hong Kong and the neighborhoods of the Kowloon peninsula, informal metal-framed wooden structures housed...

American Broadcasting during the Hungarian Revolution of 1956: Incitement or Observation?

Publication Date: December 14, 2020

In the fall of 1956, under the shadow of the Soviet Union, Hungarian students revolted against the Communist Party in Budapest. But their calls for reform and a moderate government were silenced by Soviet troops. America’s broadcaster to...

Hearts and Minds: Admiral Jim Stavridis on the Art of Wrangling NATO

Publication Date: November 19, 2020

This leadership case package, a written case with a podcast supplement, describes the biggest challenges to confront four-star Admiral James G. Stavridis during two of his tours of duty-one as commander of U.S. Southern Command, or...