Electoral Politics, Ideology and American Social Policy

This article addresses the politics of social policy in the context of the 2004 American presidential election. It examines the divisions in American society and their distinctive agendas. It also explores the record of the Bush administration on key social policy issues and shows how it relates to the broader conservative tradition as well as to the Clinton administration's reform of welfare. Finally, it examines the election results. The article argues that the Bush administration has a distinctive agenda on social policy issues and that its approach is likely to reduce further the role of the social government in the provision of social policy, by emphasizing market forces and philanthropy as well as cutting taxes. It also notes, however, that the Bush administration has taken a strong stance on traditional moral values and that its opposition to abortion and homosexuality is an important part of its political strategy.     

How to Design a "Liberal" Welfare State: A Comparison of Canada and the United States

My aim in this paper is to show how differences in the programmatic design of two otherwise "liberal" welfare regimes have generated substantially different patterns of welfare state retrenchment and distributive outcomes since the 1970s. Welfare regimes are distinguished by the principles and rules that regulate transactions between the three institutional nuclei from which individuals derive their "welfare" in modern capitalist societies—the state, the market, and the family. Liberal regimes are characterized by a preference for market solutions to welfare problems. While Canada and the United States both represent paradigmatic instances of the liberal regime type, there are long-standing differences in methods both of financing and distributing benefits. Differences in programme design led to substantially different retrenchment strategies from the end of the 1970s, which in turn produced dramatically different distributive outcomes: rising inequality and poverty rates in the United States compared to relative stability in the distribution of income among Canadian families.     

美国族群问题及其破解对策

美国是一个多族群的国家,族群之间的矛盾和斗争充斥着整个美国历史发展过程。"二战"之后,特别是20世纪80年代以来,由于白人至上主义和极右思潮的抬头,美国族群关系更趋于紧张。然而,在前苏联、南斯拉夫这些多族群国家解体的后冷战时代,美国却能够保持相对稳定的族群关系。这主要得益于其不断完善的法律制度、多元与一体的相对平衡,以及不断改进的社会保障制度等因素。由于美国族群政策是建立在资本主义私有制基础之上的,具有不可避免的局限性,因而对美国的族群政策应重于研究、分析,慎于借鉴。     

American Roulette: The Effect of Reminders of Death on Support for George W. Bush in the 2004 Presidential Election

An experiment was conducted to assess the effect of a subtle reminder of death on voting intentions for the 2004 U.S. presidential election. On the basis of terror management theory and previous research, we hypothesized that a mortality salience induction would increase support for President George W. Bush and decrease support for Senator John Kerry. In late September 2004, following a mortality salience or control induction, registered voters were asked which candidate they intended to vote for. In accord with predictions, Senator John Kerry received substantially more votes than George Bush in the control condition, but Bush was favored over Kerry following a reminder of death, suggesting that President Bush's re-election may have been facilitated by nonconscious concerns about mortality in the aftermath of September 11, 2001.     

Seeking Safety and Humanity in the Harshest Immigration Climate in a Generation: A Review of the Literature on the Effects of Separation and Detention on Migrant and Asylum-Seeking Children and Families in the United States during the Trump Administration

In recent years, families with children from the Northern Triangle countries of Central America constitute a large and growing proportion of migrants and overall filed asylum claims. In an effort to deter overall immigration through the U.S.–Mexico border, the executive branch under the Trump administration has made substantial changes to federal immigration and asylum policy in recent years. Given the sensitive nature of early development and the hardship and trauma that many migrant children have experienced, immigration policies that do not prioritize child wellbeing, and in fact, neglect or harm it, can have lifelong negative consequences on physical and psychological wellbeing. In light of the scope of children and families affected by these policies and potential magnitude of their effects, the present review aimed to: 1) outline federal immigration policies under the Trump administration that primarily impacted migrant children and families; 2) review the research base regarding the effects of these policies on physical safety and health, development, mental health, family wellbeing, and education; and 3) provide policy recommendations to prevent further harm, mitigate the great harm already done, and prioritize child wellness moving forward. Findings from the review indicate that even short experiences of detention, particularly when children are separated from parents and caregivers, are associated with serious, lasting negative effects across every domain of functioning. The practices of separation, detention, and removal to temporary encampments compound traumatic experiences that migrant families are often fleeing, which in turn may set up already vulnerable children for a trajectory of continued marginalization. Future directions for research and implications for policy and practice are discussed.     

从地缘政治视角看美国的海上崛起及其对当代中国的启示

本文从地缘政治视角分析美国崛起的原因,比照当代中国与19世纪末美国在地缘政治环境上的异同,提出当代中国和平发展应研究借鉴美国的经验,按照统一国家——增强国力——发展海权的步骤,把握中国自身地缘政治环境特点,顺应当代世界发展潮流,统筹好国内国际两个大局,为实现中华民族的伟大复兴奠定坚实基础、创造良好环境。     

The Political Consequences of Outsider Labour Market Status in the United States: A Micro‐level Study

This article contributes to recent research that seeks to understand the political consequences of ‘outsider’ labour market status. There is an emerging consensus that labour market outsiders have systematically different policy preferences and display systematically different political behaviour to securely employed ‘insiders’ in Europe. Yet the political consequences of outsider status in the USA are less clear. They may be expected to differ from those that have been documented in the European context, because: (1) the USA is characterized by low employment protection of insiders; and (2) there is evidence that Americans are more reluctant than Europeans to hold governments responsible for personal economic hardship. We therefore use the General Social Survey to examine how outsider labour market status is related to voting behaviour and to social policy preferences in the USA. We find that the concept of ‘labour market outsider’ – as conventionally operationalized – holds little explanatory power in the American context. Disaggregating the outsider category, our results suggest that the political consequences of outsider labour market status may be contingent on individual beliefs about government responsibility.