A majorization comparison of apportionment methods in proportional representation

From the inception of the proportional representation movement it has been an issue whether larger parties are favored at the expense of smaller parties in one apportionment of seats as compared to another apportionment. A number of methods have been proposed and are used in countries with a proportional representation system. These apportionment methods exhibit a regularity of order, as discussed in the present paper, that captures the preferential treatment of larger versus smaller parties. This order, namely majorization, permits the comparison of seat allocations in two apportionments. For divisor methods, we show that one method is majorized by another method if and only if their signpost ratios are increasing. This criterion is satisfied for the divisor methods with power-mean rounding, and for the divisor methods with stationary rounding. Majorization places the five traditional apportionment methods in the order as they are known to favor larger parties over smaller parties: Adams, Dean, Hill, Webster, and Jefferson. Received: 5 August 2000/Accepted: 24 October 2001     

Philippine NGOs and Multistakeholder Partnerships: Three Case Studies

This paper discusses an emerging role for Philippine NGOs—building and maintaining intersectoral cooperation among various sectors of society to tackle key issues like agricultural development, HIV/AIDS, and agrarian reform. The three case studies elaborated in the paper show that Philippine NGOs play important intermediary and bridging functions crucial for the success of multistakeholder partnerships. NGOs are well equipped for this because of their middle-class and professional nature and because of various characteristics like autonomy, flexibility, and the ability to mobilize resources.     

Measures of Multigroup Segregation

In this paper we derive and evaluate measures of multigroup segregation. After describing four ways to conceptualize the measurement of multigroup segregation—as the disproportionality in group (e.g., race) proportions across organizational units (e.g., schools or census tracts), as the strength of association between nominal variables indexing group and organizational unit membership, as the ratio of between–unit diversity to total diversity, and as the weighted average of two–group segregation indices—we derive six multigroup segregation indices: a dissimilarity index (D), a Gini index (G), an information theory index (H), a squared coefficient of variation index (C), a relative diversity index (R), and a normalized exposure index (P). We evaluate these six indices against a set of seven desirable properties of segregation indices. We conclude that the information theory index H is the most conceptually and mathematically satisfactory index, since it alone obeys the principle of transfers in the multigroup case. Moreover, H is the only multigroup index that can be decomposed into a sum of between– and within–group components.     

Territorial Modernity and Public Space: Lessons from the Politics of Water Conflict Along the US/Canadian Border

Conflict over water resources is a major problem throughout the world. This essay describes the long-standing and often successful effort to insulate decisions on how to allot water among contending users, and how to reduce water pollution along a 5000-mile international border. The effort has been fraught with political and scientific complexity. Yet, after more than 90 years of experience, it provides a model that other nations are beginning to examine as relevant to their own efforts to find solutions.     

Binding the Generations: Household Formation Patterns among Vietnamese Refugees1

Much of the analysis of refugee and immigrant adaptation has stressed the interaction of prior experience with the requirements of life in a new country. For refugees, that interaction has often been jarring because of the after‐effects of their flight and their relative inability to prepare for a new life in a new country. Yet refugees have often done rather well in economic terms in that new country. The reasons for that relative success have been phrased in cultural terms (e.g., the predisposition toward education) and in general socioeconomic terms (e.g., refugees as educated and skilled). This article examines a set of factors that lie between these customary cultural and socioeconomic categories. Specifically, the paper examines key features of household formation among Vietnamese refugees. An examination of historical data from southern Vietnam indicates patterns in household formation that appear durable over time yet are not shared across the breadth of Vietnam and cannot thus be viewed as “cultural” in the usual sense. A comparison of the historical data with recent national survey data on refugees in the United States indicates that these patterns continue among Vietnamese refugees and are ‐ as compared to other refugees ‐ distinctive to them. These patterns of household formation provide Vietnamese refugees with important options in adaptation to a new country.     

Career Self‐Efficacy and Perceptions of Parent Support in Adolescent Career Development

The authors examined the relative contributions of both proximal and distal supports to the career interests and vocational self‐efficacy in a multiethnic sample (N = 139) of middle school adolescents. Consistent with Social Cognitive Career Theory, it was found that (a) vocational self‐efficacy and career planning/exploration efficacy consistently predicted young adolescents' career interests across Holland (J. L. Holland, D. R. Whitney, N. S. Cole, & J. M. Richards, 1969) themes; (b) gender and career gender‐typing predicted interests in Realistic, Investigative, and Social careers; and (c) perceived parent support accounted for 29% to 43% of the total unique variance in vocational self‐efficacy for all Holland theme careers.     

Fire and restoration of the largest urban forest of the world in Rio de Janeiro City,Brazil

National Park of Tijuca in Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) is about 3,300 ha and considered the largest urban forest in the world. Its floristic composition is typical of Atlantic Rain Forest. The reserve is being altered because of fire occurrences and urban expansion. This study identified locations and causes of forest fires, and makes management recommendations to restore damaged areas. From 1991 to 2000, forest firefighters recorded an average of 75-fire occurrences/year. Identified causes included hot air balloons (24%), intentional (24%), rubbish burning (21%) and religious practices (17%). Primary fuels included invasive grasses and ferns. Although hot air balloons destroyed larger areas of forest in each occurrence, a greater number of fires started in the invasive vegetation along roads that bisect the forest. In response to recurrent forests, invasive vegetation has spread gradually into the forest increasing forest degradation. To decrease fire damage, sites with high fire frequencies and density of invasive vegetation were planted with less flammable species. Results indicate that fire frequency decreased and density of invasive vegetation declined. This approach appears to prevent fire incidence, reduce the need for fire fighting, and preserve existing biodiversity.