Third Way Social Governance: Where is the State?

The ‘Third Way’ politics of Blair's New Labour government of the United Kingdom has popularised a number of policy reforms centred on a supposedly new discourse of ‘devolution’, ‘inclusion’, ‘partnerships’ and ‘community’. These notions reflect a re‐emergence of the ideas and values of civil society, participation and localism. Key drivers of this discourse are: new conceptions of citizenship; a retreat from the social state to a politics of community; and a questioning of both ‘big‐state’ interventionist and competitive market approaches to public policy. These trends have resonance in the Australian context. The welfare reform agenda of the Australian Commonwealth government together with community building and engagement initiatives of State governments have been sites for these policy directions. Much of the debate surrounding these policies excludes or minimises the fundamental role of an active state by focusing on an uncritical conception of community. Drawing on the notion of network governance, an alternative framework for re‐conceptualising state‐community relations and delivering improved community outcomes is posited. The paper concludes by suggesting possible social governance methodologies for actioning this framework.     

统计数据的使用与误用

不要依赖统计分析,除非你了解其中的陷阱缺陷比率正在下降吗?顾客满意度在提高吗?你查看数字,却并不确定是否该相信它们。你并不担心存在欺骗或操控,而是不知道在多大程度上信任统计数据。谨慎从事,是有道理的。哈佛商业院     

The minimum regularized covariance determinant estimator

Statistics and Computing - The minimum covariance determinant (MCD) approach estimates the location and scatter matrix using the subset of given size with lowest sample covariance determinant. Its...     

The Contours and Correlates of Informal Work in Rural Pennsylvania*

Abstract Social scientists have increasingly come to recognize the informal economy as a prominent and permanent structural feature of modern society. Rural sociologists have made a considerable contribution to this literature, demonstrating informal work to factor prominently in the livelihood strategies of rural Americans. Despite this scholarly attention significant gaps persist in our understanding of the informal economy. Drawing on data from a survey of family households in nonmetropolitan Pennsylvania, this paper examines the contours and correlates of informal work. The results make a strong case that participation in informal work is widespread and most often combined with formal work as a household livelihood strategy. While income is not found to be a significant correlate of informal work, it is found to influence the reasons cited for participation. Important correlates of informal work are identified and differences in the factors associated with informal work done to generate income (cash or in‐kind) versus savings are revealed.     

Extended voting measures

This paper extends a number of voting measures used to quantify voting power. The extension is based on the recognition that individuals sometimes vote in coalitions. This observation gives rise to a statistical model which considers past voting patterns of subsets of eligible voters. The model is then used to obtain estimates of the probabilities of all voting combinations from which empirical measures are calculated. The calculation of the estimated probabilities may involve high-dimensional integrations. An example is given based on past decisions arising from the Supreme Court of Canada.     

Psychometric Evaluation of the Affect Regulation Checklist: Clinical and Community Samples,Parent-Reports and Youth Self-Reports

The Affect Regulation Checklist (ARC) was designed to capture affect dysregulation, suppression, and reflection. Importantly, affect dysregulation has been established as a transdiagnostic mechanism underpinning many forms of psychopathology. We tested the ARC psychometric properties across clinical and community samples and through both parent-report and youth self-report information. Clinical sample: Participants included parents (n = 814; M_age = 43.86) and their child (n = 608; M_age = 13.98). Community sample: Participants included independent samples of parents (n = 578; M_age = 45.12) and youth (n = 809; M_age = 15.67). Exploratory structural equation modeling supported a three-factor structure across samples and informants. Dysregulation was positively associated with all forms of psychopathology. In general, suppression was positively associated with many forms of psychopathology, and reflection was negatively associated with externalizing problems and positively associated with internalizing problems.     

Truly embodied sociology: marrying the social and the biological?

This paper explores the relation between sociology and biology through an examination of issues relating to the sociology of the body, emotion and health. Arguments for a ‘biological’, and yet social, body are considered before developing a critique of work on the sociology of the biological body. It is argued that there are a number of difficulties with this latter project. Writers working in this area can be seen to have used rather emotional ploys to advance their promotion of a more ‘biologised’, or ‘material‐corporeal’, account of the body, emotion and health. In addition though these writers eschew reductionist, naturalist, and dualist arguments, they nevertheless draw on studies that have some or all of these characteristics. Finally a variety of epistemological and methodological difficulties inherent in physiological analysis and in ‘interviewing’ the body are explored. It is concluded that we still remain near the ‘starting point’ of a sociology of the body that interrelates biology and sociology.