Sweet-Talking the Fourth Branch: The Influence of Interest Group Comments on Federal Agency Rulemaking

Students of politics have identified a variety of actors whoappear to influence the federal bureaucracy's implementationof public policy, including Congress, the president, and interestgroups. These lines of research, however, have often portrayedinterest groups as actors with indirect influence (who, forexample, work through or with Congress), rather than assessingthe direct influence of interest groups on bureaucratic policyoutputs. I conduct a test of direct interest group influenceby analyzing an original data set composed of 1,444 interestgroup comments in reaction to forty federal agency rules. Ifind, contrary to the expectations of the extant literature,that the formal participation of interest groups during rulemakingcan, and often does, alter the content of policy within the"fourth branch" of government. I conclude that those who voicetheir preferences during the notice and comment period rulemakingare often able to change government policy outputs to bettermatch their preferences.     

Body Image and Body Change Strategies Within Friendship Dyads and Groups: Implications for Adolescent Appearance‐based Rejection Sensitivity

Appearance‐based rejection sensitivity (appearance‐RS) consists of concerns about, and expectations of, rejection because of one's appearance (Park). This study examined dyadic‐ and group‐level friendship characteristics as correlates of early adolescents' appearance‐RS. Using subgroups of an initial sample of 380 participants, appearance‐RS was examined within best friend relationships (N = 132, M_age = 13.84) and friendship groups (N = 186, M_age = 13.83). Overall, best friends were similar in their appearance‐RS, body dissatisfaction, restrictive dieting, appearance‐conditional self‐worth, appearance values, and self‐rated attractiveness. Similarities between individuals and their friendship groups were consistent with the findings for dyads, except for self‐rated attractiveness and dieting. Appearance‐RS was higher in adolescents whose best friends and friendship groups reported greater restrictive dieting and appearance‐conditional self‐worth. In general, associations did not differ for boys and girls, but having a higher proportion of boys in the friendship group was associated with lowered appearance concerns.     

Conversation takes two: understanding interactions with people with dementia

The term ‘person-centred’ underpins dementia policy and approaches to support people with dementia. However, ‘person-centredness’ remains hazy, and words and definitions matter greatly when they are at the heart of defining what happens in people’s lives. Drawing on data from an ongoing project, this article suggests that conversations which include a person with dementia can elucidate how ‘relational’ support is enacted in practice and the implications this can have on our understanding of ‘person-centredness’. Identities are shaped in part through how we speak to people, and how they speak to us. This is particularly pertinent to the aims of ‘person-centredness’. A conversation analytic approach to dementia support may therefore move us towards seeing ‘personhood’ as jointly constructed and reconstructed through interactions with others.     

In Two Minds? — Parental Attitudes toward Physical Punishment in the UK

Since the Millennium, the use of physical punishment in the home has been a widely debated topic across the UK. Reliance on public opinion has been an important feature of this debate with a variety of UK surveys showing that many find physical punishment acceptable and do not support a complete ban on smacking. Drawing on the results from a comprehensive review of the literature, this article highlights that public/parental opinion is less than straightforward. Parents are often ambivalent about physical discipline, do not view it as an optimal method of behaviour management and are more prone to smack when stressed or angry. Likewise, a survey of the disciplinary practices and attitudes of 1000 parents in Northern Ireland shows that majority of parents have negative attitudes towards physical discipline. Nonetheless, many parents continue to smack despite the fact they do not believe it to be effective. Lack of parental support for legislative reform should be reconsidered in the light of this ambivalence. Most important, the UK Government needs to reframe the smacking debate in terms of children’s rights rather than relying on public opinion if it is to fulfil its commitment to protect children from harm as set out in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.     

Power and Policy Making

POLICY MAKING IN BRITISH GOVERNMENT: AN ANALYSIS OF POWER AND RATIONALITY BY Brian Smith.
COMPARATIVE PUBLIC POLICY: THE POLITICS OF SOCIAL CHOICE IN EUROPE AND AMERICA by Arnold Heidenheimer     

The comfort of strangers: social work,modernity and late Victorian England—Part I

In these two related articles the history of social work in late Victorian England is understood by aligning it not with self-consciously held ideologies of, say, bourgeois capitalism, patriarchy, evangelical Protestantism, or liberal humanism, but with the complex cultural system of modernity. It is hoped to problematize both the genealogy and the substance of early social work that now so decisively shapes our interpretations of the influences of late Victorian philanthropy. The history of social work has to be treated seriously if we are to properly understand the present day situation in terms of modernity and investigate its orientation more thoroughly. This first paper offers a history of social work which draws attention to the imbrications of a secular modernity and how its governing ideas, texts and discourses of the time influence philanthropy. It examines dominant modernist themes that had a significant impact on the emergence of social work and the important role of the Charity Organization Society. It is suggested that these themes form part of a shared European heritage. Whilst the influences of modernity on social work are likely to have been uneven, there were common conditions faced by people in Europe and shared developments that gave way to the rise of social work in the nineteenth century.     

A Basis Function Approach to Position Estimation Using Microwave Arrays

We consider the problem of estimating the bearing of a remote object given measurements on a particular type of non-scanning radar, namely a focal-plane array. Such a system focuses incoming radiation through a lens onto an array of detectors. The problem is to estimate the angular position of the radiation source given measurements on the array of detectors and knowledge of the properties of the lens. The training data are essentially noiseless, and an estimator is derived for noisy test conditions. An approach based on kernel basis functions is developed. The estimate of the basis function weights is achieved through a regularization or roughness penalty approach. Choosing the regularization parameter to be proportional to the inverse of the input signal-to-noise ratio leads to a minimum prediction error. Experimental results for a 12-element detector array support the theoretical predictions.     

Is Business Discourse Colonizing Philanthropy? A Critical Discourse Analysis of (PRODUCT) RED

Increasingly, traditional notions of philanthropy are colonized by a market discourse that promotes consumption as an effective way to solve social ills, resulting in what scholars have termed “marketized philanthropy.” This paper examines the implications of marketized philanthropy through a discourse analysis of the (PRODUCT) RED campaign benefiting the Global Fund to fight HIV/AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis in Africa through consumption of (RED)-branded products. This paper explores the implications of a business-oriented model of philanthropy for bringing about social change, the repercussions of campaigns like (RED) that explicitly shed the label of philanthropy; and how they impact political engagement.     

The sex offender in Minnesota

J. Dudley Chapman, D.O.: The Feminine Mind and Body. Philosophical Library, New York, 1967. 325 pages. Price $6.95.

Eric W. Johnson: Love if Sex In Plain Language. J. B. Lippincott Company, Philadelphia and New York, 1965. 68 pages. Price $2.95.

Sophia J. Kleegman and Sherwin A. Kaufman: Infertility in Women. F. A. Davis Company, Philadelphia, 1966.

Richard H. Klemer, Ph.D. (ed.): Counseling in Marital and Sexual Problems. A Physician's Handbook. Williams &; Wilkins Co., Baltimore, 1965. 309 pages. Price $9.75.

Hans Lehfeldt, M.D. and Henry Guze, Ph.D.: Psychologic Factors in Contraceptive Failure. Fertility and Sterility, 17: 1, January 1966, 110–115.

Alexander Lowen: The Betrayal of the Body. The Macmillan Co., New York, 1967, 307 pages. Price $6.95.

Douglas Murphy, M.D., and Editha F. Torrano, M.D.: Donor Insemination. Fertility and Sterility, 17: 2, March‐April 1966, pp. 273–277.

Sam Blum. What Every Nice Boy Knew About Sex. B. Geis Associates‐Random House, New York, 1967.

Frank H. Netter, M.D.: Endocrine System and Selected Metabolical Diseases. Vol. IV, The Ciba Collection of Medical Illustrations. Guest Editor: Peter H. Forsham, M.D. Ciba Pharmaceutical Company, Summit, N.J., 1965. 287 pages. Price $ 22.00

Hyman Spotnitz and Lucy Freeman: The Wandering Husband. Prentice‐Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, N. J., 1964. 224 pages. Price $4.95.

Russel Trainer: The Lolita Complex. Citadel Press, New York, 1966. 315 pages. Price $6.95.