Predicting Community Satisfaction among Rural Residents: an Integrative Model*

Abstract Community satisfaction has often been linked to the level of satisfaction with a community's infrastructure, job opportunities, and social support networks. Yet most empirical analyses of community satisfaction have focused on only one aspect of the available theory to predict community satisfaction. In this paper we integrate multiple models to analyze community satisfaction of almost 4,000 rural Nebraskans. The integrated model indicates that social ties may have a greater role in predicting community satisfaction than had been thought previously.     

Toward A Sociology of Nuclear Weapons*

This article serves as an introduction to the issue's special feature on “The Nuclear Threat.” The early sociological literature on nuclear war related issues is reviewed and the dearth of sociological work in this area since the early 1960s is documented. A new call for sociological theory and research on the nuclear threat is issued and possible topics are outlined. The paper concludes with a brief review of the papers that make up the special feature.     

A control engineering framework for planning

Control Engineering provides a convenient framework for analyzing and understanding the essential features of business planning and control processes. This is because the basic idea of a control hierarchy is fundamental both to Control Engineering and to the control of a business. Control hierarchies in both business and in engineering are information-processing devices. As a business grows in size and complexity, its control hierarchies grow correspondingly more complex (‘The Principle of Hierarchization’); this is in order to manage the increased information-processing load.The authors describe how the basic control diagram can provide valuable insight into the planning and control hierarchies of business systems. The authors emphasize that the ‘Control Engineering’ method of analyzing the management process complements exisiting theories of management planning and control.     

Building the San Francisco Beacons

San Francisco's Beacon Initiative is designed to foster youth development on a large scale. Its intermediary, Community Network for Youth Development, used a theory of change process to forge consensus and create a road map to guide this large collaborative toward its long-term goals.     

Creating pathways to participation: a community-based developmental prevention project in Australia

Pathways to Prevention is a developmental prevention project focused on the transition to school in a disadvantaged multicultural urban area in Queensland. The project incorporates two elements: The Preschool Intervention Program (PIP) promotes communication and social skills related to school success; and the Family Independence Program (FIP) (parent training, facilitated playgroups, support groups, etc) promotes family capacity to foster child development. Using a quasi-experimental design (N= 597), improvements in boys' but not girls' behaviours over the preschool year were found. FIP reached more than a quarter of the target population, including many difficult-to-reach families experiencing high stress. Case studies and other qualitative data suggest positive outcomes.     

Correlation of Quantitative Risk Results for High Hazard Processes

A quantitative risk analysis was conducted to evaluate the design of the VX neutralization subsystem and related support facilities of the U.S. Army Newport Chemical Agent Disposal Facility. Three major incidents including agent release, personnel injury, and system loss were studied using fault tree analysis methodology. Each incident was assigned a risk assessment code based on the severity level and probability of occurrence of the incident. Safety mitigations or design changes were recommended to bring the "undesired" risk level (typical agent release events) to be "acceptable with controls" or "acceptable."     

Pension Reforms in Hong Kong: Using Residual and Collaborative Strategies to Deal With the Government's Financial Responsibility in Providing Retirement Protection

In 2000, the Hong Kong government introduced the first compulsory retirement saving scheme intended to protect the entire workforce, the Mandatory Provident Fund (MPF). Prior to the introduction of this scheme, the government's main measure for giving financial protection to retirees was the Comprehensive Social Security Assistance (CSSA) scheme, which is a noncontributory, means-tested financial assistance scheme. This paper studies the government's attempt to introduce the MPF on top of the CSSA scheme as a means to illustrate how governments might address their financial responsibilities in providing pension schemes by adopting both the residual strategy-centered reform approach and the collaborative strategy-centered reform approach. The former approach is concerned with developing noncontributory schemes using residual strategies, and the latter is concerned with developing contributory schemes using collaborative strategies. The paper shows the difficulties involved in carrying out these two reform approaches simultaneously.