Seeking Social Security: An Alternative Motivation for Mexico-US Migration

In this analysis we investigate the degree to which the absence of effective pension systems may generate motivations for international migration as a means of self-financing retirement. Using ethnosurvey data gathered in selected Mexican communities and US destination areas, we estimate models to predict the odds of US migration from indicators of relative wages and whether or not jobs in Mexico were covered by that country's social security system. We find that by holding constant the binational differential in expected wages, the odds of out-migration were much higher for male household heads working in jobs that were not covered by social security compared with those working in jobs that enjoyed such coverage. Subsequent analyses showed that the odds of receiving a pension in old age were systematically higher for former US migrants, and that the likelihood of pension receipt rose steadily as the number of US trips and amount of US experience accumulated.     

Adoption Issues in Perspective: An Introduction to the Special Issue

The process and dynamics of adoption have changed considerably in the last 50 years, assisted by both social change and new knowledge of human development. The current status of 3 important aspects of adoption is reviewed: 1) the general effects of relinquishment and adoption, 2) the effects of secrecy in adoption, and 3) the need to add information on the dynamics of adoption to the training of therapists. The articles contained in this special adoption issue of the Journal of Social Distress and the Homeless are summarized and are placed in context of the 3 aspects reviewed.     

A Comprehensive Model for Managing Credit Risk on Home Mortgage Portfolios*

Managing credit risk in financial institutions requires the ability to forecast aggregate losses on existing loans, predict the length of time that loans will be on the books before prepayment or default, analyze the expected performance of particular segments in the existing portfolio, and project payment patterns of new loans. Described in this paper are tools created for these functions in a large California financial institution. A forecasting model with Markovian structure and nonstationary transition probabilities is used to model the life of a mortgage. Logistic and regression models are used to estimate severity of losses. These models are integrated into a system that allows analysts and managers to depict the expected performance of individual loans and portfolio segments under different economic scenarios. With this information, analysts and managers can establish appropriate loss reserves, suggest pricing differentials to compensate for risk, and make strategic lending decisions.     

Memorial Essay: Harold Garfinkel (1917–2011): A Sociologist for the Ages

Harold Garfinkel, the founder of Ethnomethodology, died at home on April 21, 2011 of congestive heart failure. A major sociologist of the twentieth century, his contribution to many fields will undoubtedly continue to be felt for years to come. In this essay, I will discuss the origins of the term “ethnomethodology,” briefly explore ethnomethodology's relationship with symbolic interactionism, provide a biographical overview of Garfinkel's oeuvre, list some ways in which the work has had a massive influence, and end with a short discussion of Garfinkel's legacy.     

Intervention research in couple and family therapy: a methodological and substantive review and an introduction to the special issue

This article serves as an introduction to this third version of research reviews of couple and family therapy (CFT) that have appeared in this journal beginning in 1995. It also presents a methodological and substantive overview of research in couple and family therapy from about 2001/2002 to 2010/2011 (the period covered in this issue), while also making connections with previous research. The article introduces quantitative research reviews of family-based intervention research that appear in this issue on 10 substantive areas including conduct disorder/delinquency, drug abuse, childhood and adolescent disorders (not including the aforementioned), family psycho-education for major mental illness, alcoholism, couple distress, relationship education, affective disorders, interpersonal violence, and chronic illness. The paper also introduces the first qualitative research paper in this series, as well as a paper that highlights current methodologies in meta-analysis. The first part of this article rates the 10 content areas on 12 dimensions of methodological strength for quantitative research and makes generalizations about the state of quantitative methodology in CFT. The latter part of the papers summarizes and makes comments on the substantive findings in the 12 papers in this issue, as well as on the field as a whole.     

Comparative evaluation of aesthetic, biological, and economic effectiveness of different lawn management programs

We evaluated aesthetic (lawn quality), biological (weeds and insect pests), and economic (management costs) effectiveness of a commercial (managed by a professional company), consumer (managed using consumer lawn care products following labeled instructions), integrated pest management (IPM) (pesticide applications based on monitoring and thresholds), organic (monitoring and need-based organic and natural product applications), and an untreated lawn care program. Percent weed cover was the lowest in the commercial followed by IPM, organic, and consumer programs. The commercial program had lower white grub density than all other programs, and the organic program had lower white grub density than the untreated program. The commercial program had the highest lawn quality while the untreated program had the lowest. The IPM and organic programs did not differ significantly in lawn quality, but both rated significantly higher than the consumer program. Annual costs were highest in the commercial ($382/0.05 ha) followed by the organic ($305/0.05 ha), IPM ($252/0.05 ha), and consumer program ($127/0.05 ha), respectively. We conclude that the commercial program produced the highest lawn quality, and weed and insect control, and was the most expensive. The IPM and organic programs were cheaper than the commercial program and produced slightly lower lawn quality. Although the consumer program was the cheapest, it produced the lowest weed control and lawn quality among treated lawns.     

The feeling of the incommensurable: Lawrence Grossberg on affect and incommensurability

This essay analyzes Lawrence Grossberg's work on the concept of commensuration, and especially his suggestion that we face a generalized crisis in our mechanisms for commensurating values. In making explicit the ways in which Grossberg's reflections on commensuration connect with his recent assessment of the contemporary social landscape in the United States – particularly the affective landscape that he describes in his work on the election of Donald Trump – I suggest that Grossberg's approach is, in part, distinguished by its attentiveness to the affective dimensions of commensuration (and of incommensurability). It can thus be contrasted with many previous approaches to commensuration, which view it exclusively as a problem at the level of practical reason, focusing on how we adjudicate between different bearers of value and how we justify, or give reasons for, our choices among them. Although such questions are also present in Grossberg's work, I argue that his writings contain a subtle treatment of the moods, attitudes, and tacit dispositions that characterize what if feels like to live through significant breakdowns in established logics of measure and comparison. Following Grossberg, I claim that having an adequate account of this affective dimension is crucial if we are to construct political alternatives that can address the felt sense of crisis in American political life.     

The evolution and impacts of Graeme Hugo’s environmental migration research

Drawing on Graeme’s published and unpublished work, as well as his long-term collaborations with two of us, we identify strands of thought that Graeme kept returning to and refining over the course of his career. We trace the evolution of four key points that he often reiterated: (1) The migration-environment relationship is complex and oversimplified; (2) Migration is both a consequence and a cause of environmental change; (3) Migration is just one possible response to environmental change; and (4) Displacement is just one type of migration response. We briefly map his impact on environmental migration scholarship and policy by revealing how key publications have been used in different contexts to shape theory and practice.     

‘A most active,enterprising officer’: Captain John Perkins,the Royal Navy and the boundaries of slavery and liberty in the Caribbean

John Perkins was the most senior black officer in the Royal Navy during the American War of Independence and the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. He rose through the ranks from a carpenter’s enslaved servant in 1759 to post-captain in 1800, and went on to be one of the very first British officials to land in newly independent Haiti in 1804. His career as a spy, gun-runner, naval officer and land owner was one of almost implausible adventure and speaks to the capacity of the maritime service to subvert race and slavery in the Caribbean. His very uniqueness, however, highlights the profound challenges for slaves and ex-slaves in trying to remake themselves as free people.