Furthermore, university students fall within the age group that has the highest record of drinking and driving accidents (Ibid). However, despite these interventions, there are still many young people who practice drinking and driving behaviour.
Policy context
This quote describes the vision of the National Department of Transportation and the role it plays in our society. Drink and drive policies, programs and campaigns can be placed within road safety projects, which fall under the regulatory and safety branch of the Ministry of Transport structure.
Theoretical framework
Sociological framework
Third, social bond theory refers to the bond that exists between the individual and society. According to social bond theory, individuals with strong bonds are less likely to engage in deviant behavior.
Policy framework
- Public Policy
- The Policy Cycle
Redistributive policies involve "deliberate efforts by government to shift the allocation of wealth, income, property or rights among broad classes or groups of the population such as the haves and the have nots, the proletariat and the bourgeoisie" (Anderson, 1997:18). The stages of the political cycle will be briefly explained to illustrate how they interact with each other in the political process. Many authors organize the political process into a series of sequential phases, the combination of which is referred to as the political cycle.
A policy cycle is the most common approach to policy analysis in which clear stages are defined through which a particular policy will move.
PROBLEM/ISSUE AGENDA
AMENDMENT/
TERMINATION
ALTERNATIVES
POLICY EVALUATION
POLICY FORMULATION
POLICY
IMPLEMENTATION
Policy implementation
- Top down approach
- The bottom-up approach
The top-down approach assumes that policy is contained in a single statute or other authoritative statement (Birkland, 2001:181). They further state that the main advantage of the "bottom-up" approach is that it directs attention to the formal and informal relationships that make up the policy networks1 involved in policy making and implementation (1995:157). This campaign would not have been successful without the commitment and involvement of SLBs (for example, traffic officers who ensure the enforcement of rules) in the enforcement process.
A bottom-up approach is more flexible than a top-down approach because lower-level workers (implementers/policy makers) have more input and decision-making discretion.
Who implements policy?
Community Organizations - According to Anderson, community organizations and other organizations have occasionally been used in the administration of national policies. Anderson sees both pressure groups and community organizations as some of the most influential actors in the implementation process. Since street-level bureaucrats are one of the instruments of policy implementation, a brief description is appropriate to understand the role they play in the implementation process.
They are lower-level workers in government who interact directly with the public.
Data collection
- In-depth interviews
- Literature review
Fortunately for the researcher, most of the respondents did not have a problem being interviewed. Some of the information reviewed was pulled from different university websites to examine the presence of the drinking and driving policies. A literature review was relevant to this study because it provided the study with background information on the previous research on drinking and driving approaches and their implementation.
Sociological theories were used to analyze implementation approaches in South African universities, to see if some of the preventive measures suggested in these theories were predicted in the findings of the study.
Sampling
The University of Pretoria has over 55 000 contact and distance students (
From the ten universities selected, i.e. three from the Western Cape, three from the Gauteng Province and four from the KwaZulu-Natal Province, thirteen interviews were conducted in each institution (i.e. 10 general students and 3 management members, i.e. 1 Dean of Students, 1 SRC member and 1 RAG member) with the exception of the University of Zululand and UKZN's Westville campus where only twelve interviews were conducted because they did not have a RAG association.
Ethical considerations
Their inclusion will also provide information to help determine the types of programs they, as students, use to deal with student drinking and driving. Indeed, the distance that had to be traveled to collect data from different universities was significant and thus only a few interviews could be conducted in a day. Because of these time constraints, the interviewer had to purposefully select a few information-rich cases to get the relevant data.
When all interviews conducted at the selected universities were added together, a total of one hundred and twenty-eight (128) was obtained.
Data analysis
None of the research institutions had a formally codified drink-driving policy, i.e. a formal policy implemented by university management and written in university regulations. Nevertheless, ninety-eight percent of the general students surveyed felt that it was very important to have such programs at the university. Ninety-eight percent of general students at WITS felt they should be involved in the implementation process.
The findings of the study will be discussed below according to the themes identified during the examination of the data.
Existence of Drinking and driving programmes Western Cape Province (Cluster 1)
WITS also has drug abuse awareness programs on campus, but it is not specifically focused on drinking and driving. According to the Dean of Students of the University of KwaZulu-Natal campus (Howard College), the institution does not have a dedicated institutional policy on students who drink and drive. The University of Zululand (UZ) does not have a formal, codified drinking and driving policy, but does have alcohol and drug awareness programs during Orientation Week.
Most of the anti-drinking and driving programs used across universities are similar to e.g. The "Buddy Bus" campaign, music concerts.
Implementation approaches for drinking and driving programmes Western Cape Province (Cluster 1)
The Department of Transport also runs programs once or twice a year on campus in conjunction with the SRC on road safety and the dangers of drinking and driving (UKZN SRC: Interview conducted 30 May 2005). UCT University used a mangled car as an exhibition on campus to warn students about the dangers of drinking and driving. However, the SRC is encouraging the adoption of a "bottom-up" approach to implementing drinking and driving policies (UP SRC: Interview conducted on 24 May 2005).
At UKZN's Howard College campus a 'bottom-up' approach is used to implement drinking and driving awareness programmes.
At UKZN's Westville campus a "top down" approach is used as awareness programs are managed by the Student Advice Center and they make all decisions on how the programs should be delivered (Dean of Students of Westville: Interview conducted on 1 June 2005 ). Those implementing drink driving programs on the Pietermaritzburg campus include RAG members, SRC members and student guidance staff. At the Westville Campus, the programs are implemented and administered by the student guidance staff.
The University of Zululand programs are also implemented by staff, specifically the Student Services Protection Services who decide on the programs to be implemented on campus.
Perceived value of drinking and driving policy Western Cape Province (Cluster 1)
The SRC also agreed that it was important to have a drink and driving policy in place. The students and the SRC at UJ thought it was important to have a drinking and driving policy and the reasons they gave were included. The UP SRC also agrees that it is important to implement drink and driving policies.
The Dean of Students at UKZN-PMB stated that it is important to have such policies to make students aware of the dangers of drink driving.
Awareness of programmes
According to the Dean of Students at UKZN campuses, students are aware of the alcohol and driving awareness programmes, but it is difficult to evaluate the effect the campaigns are having on them as they currently have no formal feedback mechanism to show effectiveness. of the campaigns. At Howard College, about sixty percent of the students interviewed had no knowledge of any drunk driving policies or programs. At the UKZN PMB campus, ninety percent of the general students interviewed were unaware of any alcohol and driving programs on campus.
At UKZN's Westville campus and the University of Zululand, none of the students interviewed were aware of any drinking and driving policies.
Marketing strategies used for drinking and driving programmes Western Cape Province (Cluster 1)
RAG also has competitions on campus where students are challenged to come up with marketing strategies that will be effective in getting their message across, with prizes for the best strategies. At Howard College, they use posters, t-shirts with slogans like "responsible drinking, responsible decisions lead a friend home," websites, and e-mails. The UKZN campus PMB also uses posters, RAG events and presentations during Orientation Week.
They also use the student newspaper (UKZN-PMB Dean of Students: Interview conducted 30 May 2005).
Suggestions for better implementation approaches
They also include “bringing people in to talk to students from their own experiences about drunk driving.” 34; printing messages on the pay slip when paying school fees using campus radio to relay messages, especially during lunch when most students are sitting." They also suggested "vandalized cars" with messages about drinking and driving hanging around campus where everyone can see them, and also “getting student volunteers who will present the messages, by talking to students (UJ students: interview conducted on May 23, 2005).
Howard College's suggestions included "displaying anti-drinking and car posters and t-shirts all year round, not just during RAG events and orientation" (UKZN-DBN student: interview conducted May 31, 2005) .
Analysis
- Sociological frameworks 1. Social learning theory
- Anomie theory
- Social bond theory
- Availability theory
- Policy framework
- Implementation approaches
- The street-level bureaucrats
This theory is reflected in the findings of this study, as some universities appear to be taking preventative measures to address student driving. This is evident in the findings of universities using a “bottom-up” approach to implementing drunk driving programs. Of the ten institutions surveyed, seven took a bottom-up approach to implementing drunk driving programs.
They were the ones who chose the course of action for the drink driving programs.
Conclusion
It emerged from the results of the survey that there was very little knowledge of the alcohol and driving programmes. As mentioned before, despite all these efforts by universities, students still drink. Studies using any of the sociological theories of deviant behavior to understand students who drink and drive are absent.
The universities and the DoT should work together in the development and implementation of drinking and driving strategies/programmes.
Bibliography
Books
Towards an integration of South African sociological research on alcoholism into a general corpus of sociological theory.
Journals
Reports
Websites
Geneva: World Health Organization,
Interview Questionnaire Section A
Dean of students (or relevant member of university executive), RAG &
SRC members questions
- Do you have any drinking and driving policies, strategies, approaches or programmes on your campus?
- If yes, what are they?
- If no, why not?
- Do you think it is important for universities to have such a policy?
- If yes, why?
- If no, why not?
- Describe how these policies are implemented/ How did you implement such policies?
- What kind of techniques or approaches did you use to implement such a policy (ies)? Did you use a top down approach or a bottom up
- Do you feel your drinking and driving policy is successful?
12. How involved are students in the implementation of such policies and their related strategies/programs. 13. Do you think their involvement contributes to the success/failure of the strategy and if so why?
Section B
Students Questions
Do you know of any drinking and driving policies, programmes or strategies on your campus?
How did you find out about it?
Do you think it is important to have such programmes in universities?
Do you think students should be involved in implementing such programmes?
If yes, why? If no, why not?
Do you make use of these programmes?
If yes, why? If no, why not?
How do these programmes/strategies work? Describe them?
What other techniques or approaches can be used to implement such policies in order for students to use them?
THANK YOU FOR YOUR TIME
