Social capital or group style? Rescuing Tocqueville’s insights on civic engagement

Social capital has become the preeminent concept for studying civic relationships, yet it will not help us assess their meanings, institution-like qualities, or potential for social capacity. Alexis de Tocqueville’s insights on these three features of civic relationships continue to be highly influential, and the popular social capital concept claims a strongly Tocquevillian heritage while systematically missing what a Tocquevillian imagination illuminates. Scenes from volunteer group settings in a midwestern US city show how a concept of group style apprehends the varying meanings, routines, and social capacities of civic ties. Group style also illuminates the process by which civic groups create “bridging” ties beyond the group. Without rejecting the social capital concept entirely, I highlight research questions and findings that social capital would ignore or misapprehend. A concluding discussion draws out implications for democratic theory, and sketches an agenda for future research on civic group style that makes good on Tocquevillian insights while moving beyond Tocqueville’s own limits.     

Methods for Uncertainty Analysis: A Comparative Survey

This paper presents a survey and comparative evaluation of methods which have been developed for the determination of uncertainties in accident consequences and probabilities, for use in probabilistic risk assessment. The methods considered are: analytic techniques, Monte Carlo simulation, response surface approaches, differential sensitivity techniques, and evaluation of classical statistical confidence bounds. It is concluded that only the response surface and differential sensitivity approaches are sufficiently general and flexible for use as overall methods of uncertainty analysis in probabilistic risk assessment. The other methods considered, however, are very useful in particular problems.     

The impact of labor unions on the passage of economic legislation

This paper examines the political power of labor unions. A model of the decision of an interest group to contribute to a political campaign is developed and tested. The empirical evidence indicates that interest groups, and unions in particular, use political contributions in a systematic and coordinated manner. Unions give money to candidates with relatively little seniority (who might otherwise not be elected) and to candidates from districts with about the average number of union members. Such candidates might otherwise not vote as the union would desire. The influence of campaign contributions and of union membership on the voting of congressmen on issues of interest to unions is also investigated. Union membership is sometimes significant and campaign contributions are always significant in explaining voting on minimum wages, wageprice controls, benefits for strikers, and OSHA and CETA appropriations. The indirect economic effects of labor unions — those effects which occur because unions influence legislation — may be as important as the direct effects which occur through collective bargaining.     

Optimal loan periods for undergraduate recommended reading

A model is developed for the total expected utility to borrowers of an undergraduate text book recommended by a lecturer. It takes account of the peaked demand for a book following a recommendation, measures of borrower satisfaction which involve both waiting time and reading time (loan period), and the persistence of would-be borrowers in requesting books not found on the shelves. Some parameters of the model were estimated by a method which elicited preferences of students in various choice situations; other parameters were estimated by librarians. Some specific conclusions are drawn regarding the optimal loan period of books in terms of their type and the number of copies held.     

Planning with multiple objectives

Planning any task that is characterised by the presence of multiple objectives presents the decision maker with a set of special considerations which are not present in the case of decision making with one unique objective. The paper outlines the stages in the formulation of a dynamic multiple-objective objective function and introduces the criterion complex as a decision making construct particularly suited to formulating and solving problems with multiple objectives. The paper then considers some of the mathematical properties of the alternative formulations of criterion complex.