Settling down and aging out: toward an interactionist theory of desistance and the transition to adulthood

Conceptions of adulthood have changed dramatically in recent decades. Despite such changes, however, the notion that young people will eventually "settle down" and desist from delinquent behaviors is remarkably persistent. This article unites criminology with classic work on age norms and role behavior to contend that people who persist in delinquency will be less likely to make timely adult transitions. The empirical analysis supports this proposition, with both arrest and self-reported crime blocking the passage to adult status. The authors conclude that desisting from delinquency is an important part of the package of role behaviors that define adulthood.     

Disability discrimination in South Korea: routine and everyday aggressions toward disabled people

In the past, the type of discrimination against persons with disabilities in South Korea was seen mainly as being related to the physical environment and social systems that ignored disability. However, the emergence of social model and anti-discrimination laws established in numerous countries has rapidly expanded the scope of social participation for persons with disabilities as well as their awareness of their rights. This article posits that a type of disability discrimination that could emerge in the future is microaggression, which can appear in diverse forms in newly formed human relationships as the scope of social participation increases.     

Disability and social policy: an international perspective

SUMMARY. The paper presents a broad overview of the major issues facing those responsible for facilities and services for children and young people with disabilities. The author was associated with an OBCD/CERI project on transition from school to adult and working life and the discussion arises from that international experience. The paper draws attention to the need for statutory and voluntary agencies to work towards agreed objectives and for policies on disability to be an integral part of policies for all children and young people     

Disability and mortgage default: an Australian study

Debates on human rights and discrimination regarding housing and disability need to emphasise community care and inclusion as principles for improving policy. A qualitative study of Australian mortgage default reveals special difficulties for households with a member with a disability; that is, illness, impairment or injury limiting everyday activities and enduring for several months. Interviews showed that such households adopted similar strategies to other mortgagors with serious financial difficulties but tended to have fewer and less attractive options. Given the crisis in Australian disability welfare services and the 2010–2011 Productivity Commission inquiry recommending major reforms, these findings can inform policy.     

Creating Disability in the Home: the role of environmental barriers in the United States

One thousand persons with disabilities were sampled to discover the types of barriers they encountered in their home while carrying out their daily activities. A 43 percent response rate was obtained. The open-ended questions were submitted to a process of analytic coding and suggested 27 different categories of barriers existed in the homes of persons who have disabilities. The findings have implications for rehabilitation practice. Performance of daily activities is greatly diminished by the presence of architectural barriers. Environmental supports can greatly improve performance in daily tasks. These findings are discussed in light of disability policy and implications for improving performance of persons who have disability.     

From state-bound subjects to global subjects: notes toward an Althusserian theory of globalized subjectivity

ABSTRACT

This article puts Louis Althusser's conception of subjective production via ideological interpellation in dialogue with contemporary Global theories – especially those of Saskia Sassen and Manfred Steger. It does this to offer a more robust framework for understanding subjective production that captures subjective transformations in the age of globalization. The article looks at how Sassen's work captures transformations of social and institutional structures in globalization and then looks at Steger's account of subjective transformations. It then turns to the ways in which Althusser's understanding of the intertwining of subjectivity with institutions and social practices can help bridge the gap between Sassen and Steger and can also help us understand the rise of what I call ‘global subjects’ and a ‘global subjectivity’ that can be in conflict with more traditional ‘state-bound’ subjects. I use the example of globalized regimes of care work in order to help make sense of these distinctions.     

Disability identity and attitudes toward cure in a sample of disabled activists

This study investigates the assumption that disabled people want improvements in their functional abilities, or complete cures. Contrary to this assumption, many disabled activists are found to have attitudes in which they refuse treatment that promises a cure. In order to explain this attitude, different sources of disability identity are isolated as potential predictor variables. A multivariate model reveals that self-identity related to a personal affirmation of disability is a significant predictor of refusal of treatment, as is the age of onset of disability. Implications for interactions with medical professionals and utility-based modeling of medical treatment seeking are discussed.     

Game theory and global environmental policy

Economists interpret global environmental quality to be a pure public good. Each country should contribute to its provision. However, this is hard to achieve because each government is tempted to take a free ride on the other governments’ efforts. Not only has this dilemma been analysed with game theoretical methods but game theory has also been used to think about how to make amends. This paper reviews the game theoretical discussion on how international policy frameworks may be designed to improve the chances for international cooperation. It is also shown that the evaluation of alternative environmental policy instruments deviates from the standard environmental economics model if applied to the international arena. For the benefit of an interdisciplinary readership, the evolution of the debate on global environmental policy is related to the recent history of economic thought. This history is taken to be materialised in the writings of economics’ Nobel Prize laureates.     

Disability and employment: towards an understanding of discourse and policy

This article explores the nature of disability employment policy drawing on evidence from fifteen countries. In line with earlier sociological approaches to disability it describes two ways of framing policy in the area. These two paradigms are developed and used to critically evaluate employment policy under the headings: legislative measures, open employment-financial employment support services and sheltered/supported provision. The dilemmas that may arise during implementation of policy are discussed and the consequences for the construction of an emancipatory employment policy. Finally, the article suggests some themes or dimensions that a coherent disability policy should have.     

Disability and going green: a comparison of the environmental values and behaviours of persons with and without disability

Some studies have suggested that socially excluded groups exhibit different environmental values and behaviours from mainstream society. To consider this in the context of disability, a survey was implemented to investigate environmental values and ecological behaviour. A high percentage of participants considered themselves to have a disability, long‐standing illness or infirmity. Over half of the sample had restricted physical mobility. The study used the revised New Ecological Paradigm Scale, a widely used measure of pro‐environmental orientation, and the General Ecological Behaviour scale to assess ecological behaviours. No significant differences were found between respondents with/without disability for either their general environmental attitudes or their general ecological behaviour. However, a positive correlation was found between level of physical mobility and general ecological behaviour. The results also show significant differences in the ecological behaviours of those respondents living dependently and those living independently; respondents living in care scored lower on the ecological behaviour scale.     

Comparative studies and sociological theory: Autobiographical notes

The following article presents a brief survey on the development of the author's sociological studies and research, especially on the ways in which he has explored in these studies the relations between comparative studies and major problems and developments in sociological theory. The article analyzes how the central focus of his interest has been the problem of human creativity and its limitations, especially as it related to the social arena, the construction of different social formations—ranging from the so-called microsituations to the more formalized institutional and macroinstitutional formations—the problem of charisma and its routinization.     

Professional Ideology and Learning Disability: an analysis of internal conflict

Normalisation is the guiding principle for professionals who work with people with learning disabilities. However, professionals hold varying degrees of adherence to this prevailing orthodoxy. In addition, some professionals openly dispute its merits and adopt a more paternalistic perspective of people with learning disabilities. Consequently, their views are more similar to the parents of people with learning disabilities than to their professional colleagues. Based on ideological differences, these contradictory views create tension and potential conflict between professionals. This paper explores the ideological differences between professionals who follow the prevailing orthodoxy, identified in the study as 'normalisers', and professionals who adhere to a superseded ideology, identified as 'paternalists'. Similar to the problematic relationship between parents and professionals, a solution to the internal conflict of professionals may also be found in seeking a shared ideology of care.     

Disability in an Eastern Religious Context: historical perspectives

Disability in the past of eastern religions has attracted little formal or comparative scrutiny. A range is sketched here of historical data, viewpoints and attitudes on disability in Hinduism, Buddhism and Islam, which continue to influence the thoughts of half the world's population. Approaches for more detailed studies are suggested, moving towards such global measures for understanding, remediating and accommodating disability as would be more appropriate and acceptable to the non-western majority. Popular notions associated with disabilities in these religions are discussed.     

Doing Disability: Disability Formations in the Search for Work*

Disability theorists have spent much time discussing how disability is defined. The theoretical roots for these debates reside in the medical, structural, and minority models of disability. The medical model views disability as equivalent to a functional impairment; the minority model sees a lack of equal rights as a primary impediment to social equality between able and disabled populations; and the structural model looks to environmental factors as the cause of disability. While debates over how to define disability are informative, there is currently an insufficient amount of empirical research looking at how people come to identify themselves as having a disability. Rather than focus on how disability is (or should be) defined, herein we look at how disability identities are constructed as people search for work. We show that people's interactions with employers and employment agencies have important influences on how disability identities are constructed. We borrow from the “doing gender” and “racial formations” paradigms to introduce an interactive approach to looking at how disability identities are constructed. We introduce the concept of disability formation to highlight how disability identities are continually negotiated through interactions with employment agencies and employers. Our findings are based on focus groups with 58 people who self‐identified as having a disability and were working or searching for work.