Diana Gittins. The Child in Question. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1997. 231 Pages

Abstract

Does occupation-level information reflect what people actually do at work and thus influence individuals? I examine whether there is an effect of occupation-level complexity on individuals' sense of personal control, and if there is, whether the effect is a proxy for the actual work people do on their jobs. I analyze a national probability sample of 1,450 employed persons interviewed by telephone in 1995. Without adjustment for worker's reports of autonomy, creativity, authority, and social interaction in their daily work, an index of DOT occupational complexity of work with data and people correlates with the sense of personal control. Adjustment for job-level autonomy, creativity, authority, and social interaction renders the occupation-level measure insignificant and shows significant effects of autonomous work, creative work, and social interaction at work on the sense of personal control.     

Women,Computers, and Social Change

Summary

Belenky, Clinchy, Goldberger, and Tamlc's research and data on gender differences in learning arc used to introduce some experiences of autonomous women's group use of computers. Database applications and telecommunications uses are reviewed from a wide variety of different projects. Follow-up information is provided.     

Curriculum Alternatives

Based on the author's conviction that professional social work practice requires assertive self-expression skills of a high order, this study undertook to examine the assertiveness of MSW students at a school of social work in the Western United States. Focusing on this dimension of assertiveness, the study compared males with females, members of minority ethnic groups with nonminority students, casework students with students concentrating in other methods, and beginning students with graduating students.     

Travelling theory in China: contextualization,compromise and combination

In this article we explore the dissemination of human rights ideas in China through an ethnographic study of three women's organizations: the government's ‘letters and complaints’ department, the governmental NGO affiliated with it, and a legal aid centre; all are located in Beijing. We argue that there are two paths in China for the transmission of international human rights ideas – a government one and a non‐government one. The government path, featured as contextual and compromising, is rooted in socialist and collective values, and the governmental organizations we studied function squarely within the domestic legal framework and the concept of ‘women's rights and interests’. The non‐governmental path, by contrast, characterized by vernacularization, namely a combination of international ideas with local practice to promote legal reform in China, is the result of economic development and interactions with the international community. Both paths interact within their different spheres to further the development of women's rights.     

Mujeres '94

ABSTRACT

Periods of democratic transition may provide space for increased political participation by women. Often, however, women's participation inexplicably falls off after the transition period to former low levels. This article argues that the form women's participation takes in transitions is crucial to both the shape of the resulting new democracy, and the subsequent impact of the new democratic institutions on building or sustaining a women's movement. A case study of the 1992-1994 transition period in El Salvador suggests that women must be present and contribute to the transition; form autonomous organizations but remain engaged with the state; and transform their political behavior from opposition to interaction with the new state.     

Juvenile court pathways to legal permanence for children in substitute care

Using administrative data describing the contemporaneous substitute care and juvenile court histories of 8116 children entering substitute care in Cook county Illinois, this study examines children's pathways to legal permanence. Specifically, by parsing children's exit to permanence by its constituent legal milestones, and examining the extent to which variability in the rates of these milestones are attributable to the court calendar (i.e., judge) and child levels, respectively, this study attempts to pinpoint the primary sources of variability in children's pathways to legal permanence. Results suggest that the transitions between certain legal milestones (e.g., disposition to reunification, disposition to TPR) account for a majority of the variability in children's exit to permanence. Results also suggest that a moderate amount of variability in permanency rates is attributable to court calendars, but that the magnitude of calendar-level influence varies considerably across legal milestone transitions; for some transitions (e.g., TPR to adoption finalization), calendar-level influence is effectively zero, whereas for other transitions (e.g., entry to dispositional order), calendar-level influence seems to eclipse the influence of observed child-level characteristics. Implications for child welfare and juvenile court scholarship, policy, and practice are discussed.     

Alternative Dispute Resolution in Child Protection Matters: The Victorian Experience

Abstract

Pre-hearing conferences were introduced in 1992 into the Family Division of the Children's Court, Victoria. Pre-hearing conferences take place when there is a dispute between the Child Protection Service and the child's family about the need for statutory intervention in their family's life. The conference is held prior to any formal hearing so that the family, their legal representatives and the welfare authority can see whether they can negotiate an agreement about a child protection order. The present paper sets out the findings of a study of 208 pre-hearing conferences held in the Melbourne Children's Court from February to July 2002. The study found that the quality of legal advice provided to parents significantly affected the outcome of pre-hearing conferences. Legal representatives varied in their willingness to step aside from the adversarial approach and give priority to discussion about child welfare concerns. It was apparent that professionals coming to the pre-hearings, both legal and welfare, had different expectations of these forums. It is imperative that if pre-hearings are to succeed, then their role and place in the child protection legal process is clearly explicated and professionals receive training in alternative dispute resolution.     

COMMUNITY,COMMUNICATION, AND MEANING: THEORIES OF BUCHLER AND HABERMAS

The scope of Jürgen Habermas's “universal pragmatics” and communicative interaction theory are critically assessed in this article. Habermas's pragmatics are seen to reveal different assumptions than those of Peirce or Mead. This difference yields different assumptions about the research program embodied in Habermas's work. The ideas of Justis Buchler are presented in order to develop a comprehensive theory of meaning and community. This article provides the basis for an assessment of linguistic rationality, meaning, and human interests in daily life.     

Reciprocal Pathways Between Autonomous Motivation and Affect: A Longitudinal Investigation of American and Chinese Early Adolescents

The current research examined the reciprocal pathways between children's autonomous motivation in school and affect over early adolescence in the United States and China. Beginning in the fall of 7th grade, 825 American and Chinese children (mean age = 12.73 years) reported on their autonomous (vs. controlled) motivation as well as unpleasant and pleasant affect every 6 months until the end of eighth grade. In both the United States and China, there were negative reciprocal pathways between children's autonomous motivation and unpleasant affect. Over time, heightened autonomous motivation predicted dampened unpleasant affect, which in turn predicted heightened autonomous motivation. Positive reciprocal pathways between children's autonomous motivation and pleasant affect were evident over time only in China.     

Child neglect and the law: catapults,thresholds and Delay

This paper discusses the dilemmas and challenges that arise when child neglect cases reach such a level of severity that court proceedings become necessary. It identifies the complexities of determining the appropriate social work and legal responses to child neglect, and of squaring these with wider organisational priorities and social policy imperatives. The paper draws on data from a series of interviews with local authority social work and legal staff. It highlights the ‘threshold criteria’ for the court's intervention, barriers to crossing them in neglect cases and the frequent need for a decisive event (a ‘catapult’) to do so. It shows the conflicts and tensions of reconciling social work and legal approaches, but also the overlaps and inter‐dependency between them. Despite the difficulties, the way forward lies in the interaction of different professional perspectives and skills, in ways that are both critical and supportive. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Goffman's Interaction Order at the Margins: Stigma,Role, and Normalization in the Outreach Encounter

This article considers Goffman's conceptualization of interaction order at the margins of society in encounters between urban welfare workers and their clients. Observations from these encounters demonstrate practices relating to the situated management of stigma and identity, and the accomplishment of role within these service encounters. A reading of Goffman's theoretical contribution lies in revealing how social actors and social structures are realized in situ within the constraints of the interaction order sui generis. The article discusses three aspects of the outreach encounter, namely, (1) the accomplishment of role and motive, (2) the sequential phases of the outreach encounter, and (3) “the normalization ritual,” and introduces the concept of willful disattention.     

Unobtrusively Stretching Law: Legal Education,Activism, and Reclaiming Title IX

We often understate the work that activists put into crafting movement tools. This article examines the space between legal texts and movement resources in a study of early activism surrounding Title IX. Though often hailed as a feminist law, the Title IX statute and regulations lay out a narrow set of individual rights and incorporate several conservative principles. In an analysis of early social movement mobilization surrounding Title IX by the Connecticut Women's Educational and Legal Fund (CWEALF), we identify a distinctive legal framing technique tied to the often overlooked practice of lay legal education. In a legal education campaign that targeted schools, CWEALF placed Title IX's actual requirements alongside broader feminist ideas about gender socialization and civic responsibility to imply that the law mandated substantially greater reforms, a tactic we call unobtrusively stretching law. This article contributes to research on social movements and legal mobilization by illustrating how legal education can serve as part of the tool-making kit for social movements as they struggle to transform legislative compromises into movement resources.     

A legal realist view on citizen actions in Hong Kong's umbrella movement

This article considers the legal validity of citizens' actions in civil disobedience as it pertains to the umbrella movement in Hong Kong. It introduces the critical approach of “legal realism” in order to reconsider normative law, such as police enforcement and court interventions, in relation to political struggle. It has been argued that the legal precepts of rights, responsibility, and the rule of law are capable of contingent and contextually appropriate interpretations by different legal actors, including citizens who participate in civil disobedience. In politics, justice, and most importantly law, civil disobedience offers an alternative legal normativity to consider the citizen's right, and even duty, to express dissent. Furthermore, this right or duty is legally persuasive and conducive to guarding democratic principles.     

Martha Stewart behaving Badly: Parody and the symbolic meaning of style1

This study addresses the issue of how to correlate social meaning with linguistic style through an investigation of the parodic speech genre. The analysis examines two parodies of lifestyle entrepreneur Martha Stewart and compares linguistic strategies used in parodies of Stewart to her own linguistic performance on her talk show. Features considered include phonological characteristics, lexical items, politeness strategies, and voice quality. A comparative quantitative analysis of aspirated and released /t/ as employed by Stewart and her parodist reveals that a variable feature of Stewart's style is rendered categorical in the parody. It is demonstrated that both parodies exploit elements associated with Stewart's ‘Good Woman’ image in order to expose Stewart as a ‘Bad Woman’, a reputation she earned for her 2003 insider trading conviction. This study suggests that parodic performance may serve to strengthen and even iconize indexical connections between stylistic variants and their social meaning in particular contexts.     

Parents,Friends, and Familial Sex Role Attitudes*

The present study treats parental and friendship interaction as predictors of familial sex role attitudes for each sex, taking into account mother's socioeconomic status and work experience. The data are based on a random sample of college students. The findings show that parental interaction is more important than peer associations in influencing familial sex role attitudes, particularly among men. Mother's socioeconomic status and work experience condition the effects of reference group interaction on a daughter's and son's familial sex role attitudes differently and contrary to expectations. The findings are discussed in the context of reference group theory and attitude formation with a focus on the mother as a role model.     

Credibility,Agency, and the Interaction Order

There are two ways of reading Goffman—as a theorist of trust and ritual accommodation, that is, as a theorist of the interaction order, or as a theorist of deception. I suggest a way of making these two readings compatible, by arguing that Goffman was interested in what I call the “production of credibility.” Credibility is the quality of being believable, and this quality is integral to both trust and deception. Viewed in this way, Goffman explored the ways in which people make their actions convincing to other people. Although Goffman's analysis of the interaction order did not need a theory of the self, his work actually contains two quite different theories of the self: one linked to role analysis, one to his analysis of mental illness. I argue for the latter at the expense of the former. I conclude that Goffman both initiated substantive work about the interaction order and contributed to a synthesis of a theory of the interaction order and a theory of the self.     

With/Out a State,Kurds Rising: The Un/Stated Foreign Policy and the Rise of the Kurdish Regional Government in Iraq

Abstract

Located in northern Iraq, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) rules over an autonomous province in Iraq. Constitutionally, ‘Kurdistan Region’ is not independent, but empirically the KRG behaves as if it is a sovereign entity. With an elected parliament, a president, a prime minister, a cabinet, a flag, a national anthem, schools taught in Kurdish, and a booming economy, the ‘Kurdistan’ embodied by the KRG clearly exists empirically while unrecognized internationally. In this paper, I examine the rise of the KRG as an agent in international relations since the first Gulf War in 1991. I argue that foreign policy as a field of conduct and discourse has been central to the KRG's effective agency. In my analysis, I employ and interrelate Robert Jackson's work on ‘quasi-states’, Doug McAdam's argument on ‘political opportunity structures', and Giorgio Agamben's discussion on ‘indistinct zones of politics’ as in Iraq and the Middle East. Ultimately, I contend that while less than a full state in constitutional legal form, the KRG is more than a quasi-state in substance.¹1 See the official site of KRG at: http://cabinet.gov.krd/?l=12     

With Strength and Struggle: A Teacher's Process of Transforming Science into Multicultural Science. Where is Multicultural Science in Science Education Reform?

This interpretive case study focuses on one middle school science teacher in the United States as she transforms her classroom based on her personal definition of science education that is multicultural. The teacher‐participated in a multicultural science institute over the course of four years which provided a framework for her change process. Critical to the change process was an acceptance of the responsibility to teach science to all students in her diverse classroom. Elements of her change process included incorporating a model of science known as the 3P's, as well as, a focus on multicultural perspectives and cooperative learning. Classroom practices were changed as a result of a complex interaction between her increasing conviction in the academic ability of her students and an evolving perception of science as a social construction.     

Utopia,Realism and the Search for Politics

If politics is action oriented towards some supposedly desirable future state, how can it survive the apparently radical unpredictability of what is to come? The contemporary challenge is a severe one for all modes of political thinking with a utopian thrust, of which the various strands of the French Left are exemplary. Yet the most natural response-to relate utopia solely to dreams, sharply split from practical politics-is also a deeply problematic one. A comparison of contemporary French thinking with the theories of the 'Third Way' developed by, among others, Tony Blair and Anthony Giddens shows how the problem applies well beyond the traditional limits of the Left. No doubt globalization, technology, individualization, and other trends, are powerful policy challenges, but what is ultimately at stake is the very nature of politics. To build something new on the ruins of Max Weber's famous contrast between the ethics of conviction and of responsibility-such, perhaps, is the question for our times.