“The Luggage that isn’t Theirs is Too Heavy…”: Understandings of Orphan Disadvantage in Lesotho

In Southern Africa, high adult HIV prevalence has fueled concern about the welfare of children losing parents to the epidemic. A growing body of evidence indicates that parental, particularly maternal, death is negatively associated with child outcomes. However, a better understanding of the mechanisms is needed. In addition, the way orphan disadvantage and the mechanisms giving rise to it are understood on the ground is essential for the successful translation of research into policies and programs. This study employs data from 89 in-depth interviews with caregivers and key informants in Lesotho, a setting where approximately one-quarter of adults is infected with HIV, to elaborate understandings of orphan disadvantage. Our analysis focuses on two questions: (i) Do local actors perceive orphans to be disadvantaged compared to non-orphans, and if so, in what ways; and (ii) How do they explain orphans’ differential disadvantage? Analyses suggest that orphans were widely perceived to be disadvantaged; respondents described this disadvantage in material as well as affective domains. Thematic analyses reveal five broad categories of explanation: poverty, love and kin connection, caregiver character, perceptions of orphans, and community norms related to orphan care. These results underscore the need for research and policy to address (i) multiple types of disadvantage, including deficits in kindness and attention; and (ii) the social embeddedness of disadvantage, recognizing that poverty, kinship, and community interact with individual attributes to shape caregiving relationships and child experiences. The findings suggest limited success for programs and policies that do not address the emotional needs of children, or that focus on child or caregiver support to the exclusion of community outreach.     

Better know an HRD scholar: a conversation with Monica Lee

This article contains a conversation with Monica Lee, and is part of a series that focuses on different HRD scholars – the aim being to better understand the people behind the names we see in print. Monica is a Life Member of Lancaster University, was a founding member of the University Forum of HRD, and was the founding editor of Human Resource Development International. The conversation explores Monica's background, how she got into HRD, how she overcame dyslexia and recovered from her cerebral hemorrhage, how the University Forum was created, and how HRDI came about. The conversation also considers the consequences of placing boundaries around HRD, about how we are guided by our subconscious, and about the impact on HRD of future changes to organizations and structures.     

Better know a Human Resource Development (HRD) scholar: a conversation with Robert (Bob) G. Hamlin

This article contains a conversation with Robert (Bob) G. Hamlin and is part of aseries that focuses on different human resource development (HRD) scholars. Theaim is to better understand the people behind the names we see in print and at HRD scholarly conferences. Bob is professor emeritus and chair of HRD at the University of Wolverhampton Business School, UK and a management and organization development consultant at Oaken Consultancy. Bob has spoken at many HRD conferences in Europe and the United States and was one of the founding members of the University Forum for HRD. The conversation explores Bob's career in HRD practice, research, teaching and management. Among the topics covered are the significance of practical experience and the influence it can then have on research, the power of evidence-based practice, and the need for HRD research to be seen as relevant and having utility within the world of practice.     

Management and leadership: issues for integration in the emergent economy

Globalization is a complex process of worldwide changes that brings a great deal of good but is not without its dark side. With corporations having a significant role in globalization, HRD professionals face tough choices about whether and how to be involved.     

The place of rational choice in criminology and risk analysis

The danger in both criminology and risk analysis is that rational choice will be embraced uncritically and without examination of its subtleties, boundaries, and limitations; its dependency on context, its relationship to what is seen (and not seen), what is understood and what is not understood, its embeddedness in both personal and organizational life. That is a challenge worthy of all the social and behavioral sciences.     

A Web-based review of sexual and reproductive health services available at colleges and universities in Georgia

Objective: Although two-thirds of graduating high school seniors attend college or university in the U.S., there is a paucity of national or state specific research regarding SRH services available on or near college and university campuses.

Methods: A review of websites for all colleges and universities in Georgia was conducted to evaluate sexual health services available on campuses and evidence of referral to community providers.

Results: Of 96 colleges in Georgia, 44 had campus-located health centers, with only 3 at two-year colleges. Overall SRH service provision was low, with great variation between colleges. Distances between colleges and Title X clinics ranged from 0.33 to 35.45 miles.

Conclusions: Many students lack access to campus health centers, and information on college websites regarding SRH service availability and referrals differs dramatically between campuses. In the absence of robust campus-located services, schools should highlight where students can obtain comprehensive SRH care in the community.     

Blazing new trails or opportunity lost? Evaluating research at the intersection of leadership and entrepreneurship

More than a decade ago, scholars formally conceptualized the potential synergy between leadership and entrepreneurship scholarship. Our work highlights research accomplishments occurring at the interface of these two intellectual areas as well as identifying untapped possibilities for continued research. We highlight how recent efforts have witnessed a mutual exchange of ideas that present opportunities benefiting both fields. Drawing from four key domains of entrepreneurship previously proposed to mutually inform future leadership research efforts, we make suggestions for integrating entrepreneurial opportunities, the roles of individual and entrepreneurial teams, the modes of organizing entrepreneurial ventures, and differing entrepreneurial environments with key trends important to leadership research, such as servant leadership and leader-member exchange theory. Overall, our work provides an assessment of the state of the art surrounding the coalescence of leadership and entrepreneurship research and sets an agenda for the next decade of research at this intersection.     

Youth,Gangs and Society: Micro- and Macrosociological Processes*

The late 1960s saw the emergence of a few “super gangs” whose political and economic activities attracted much attention. More recently, gangs apparently similar to those of the 1950s have become newsworthy again in several major cities. This paper surveys these developments against the background of a variety of macro- and microsociological processes. Research conducted in Chicago and elsewhere during the late 1950s and early 60s suggests that delinquent gangs were rather “innocent” participants in the broad social trends of the times and that most gang members were relatively unaffected by the ideological currents associated with them. The primary effect on gangs was indirect, by changing the perceptions and attitudes of others toward gangs, and their behavior in relation to them. Gang life for most members of most gangs, individually and collectively, appears to have changed little in recent years. The prospects for channeling the energies of gangs into socially constructive programs seem bleak, because of the operation of group processes, and the limited experiences and social abilities of most gang members. Basic structural limitations on opportunities for the poor and the powerless to achieve economic and political power provide the framework within which these processes operate today as in the past.     

Politics and Youth Gangs: a Follow-up Study*

Scholarly interest in the political relationships of youth gangs recently has revived, following mass media reports of the politicization of some gangs and federal and private funding in support of economic and socially constructive programs in which a few large gangs participated. Unlike earlier gang political activities (which supported entrenched political power) recent reports suggest that youth gangs and their young adult counterparts have become radicalized, alienated from traditional political approaches and ideologies. This paper focuses on the political attitudes and activities, especially with respect to civil rights programs of young men. now aged 21 to 35, who were members of black youth gangs studied initially between 1959 and 1962. Assimilationist organizations and approaches receive higher recognition and support than do protest, black nationalist, and other groups, and violent methods. Variations in response reflect gang and community differences. The crientation to politics reflected in the findings appears more pragmatic than ideological. The potential for effective organization is related to recent reports of militant organization within prisons, a common experience for gang members.