Do administrators have the same priorities for risk reductions as the general public?

A stated preference survey was used to investigate the potential discrepancy between the priorities of public administrators and the general public regarding risk reductions. Both groups of respondents were asked to assume the role of a public policy-maker and choose between different public safety projects. We investigate differences in three areas: (i) large vs. small accidents, (ii) actual vs. subjective risk, and (iii) the trade-off between avoiding fatalities and serious injuries for different age groups and accidents. We find only minor differences between the responses of administrators and the general public, the most important of which is the difference in priorities between reducing the risk of many small or one large accident. In this area the most common response from the general public is that they prefer avoiding many small accidents rather than one large accident while among the administrators there is almost an equal split between the two options.     

Accounting for Genocide: How Many Were Killed in Srebrenica?

The takeover of the UN safearea of Srebrenica by Bosnian Serb forces inJuly 1995 was followed by the killing of alarge number of male Bosnian Muslim civilians,in what has been characterized as the worstmassacre in Europe since World War II. Thisarticle is based on a report submitted asevidence to the UN International CriminalTribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) inthe case against General Radislav Krsti,who became the first person to be convicted ofgenocide at this Tribunal. This case also formspart of the genocide charges against SlobodanMiloevi, Radovan Karadi and RatkoMladi. To our knowledge, this report isunique among genocide studies in its approach,using individual-level data to identify everyvictim in order to arrive at a highly reliableminimum estimate of the number of peoplekilled. This was possible because of efforts byhumanitarian organizations to register peoplewho disappeared during the war as well as theavailability of both pre- and post-conflictdata on individuals. We conclude that at least7,475 persons were killed after the fall ofSrebrenica. We also present estimates of theprobability of being a victim: more than 33%for Muslim men who were enumerated inSrebrenica in 1991.     

Selves and a Changing Social Form: Notes on Three Types of Hospitality

Taking hospitality as a social form, analysis of three altering types (domestic, airline, the hospice) shows reflections of social and economic forces that change the form and interactions within it and, hence, the selves of the interactants. It is suggested that symbolic interactionists pay particular attention to the dynamics of social forms as a way to link situated activity and larger social and economic forces.     

Book notes

The Social Mind: Language, Ideology and Social Practice By James Paul Gee. New York: Bergin & Garvey, 1992. 175 pages. $14.95 (paper).

The Afterlife of the Life History. A special issue of the Journal of Narrative and Life History, 2(1). M. Blackman (Ed.), Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1992. 79 pages, $17.50.

Teaching Thinking: An Agenda for the 21st Century. C. Collins & J. N. Mangieri (Eds.). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1992. 362 pages, $69.95; $34.50 (paper).     

The Institutionalization of Solidarity and Globalization: The Case of Darfur1

This article uses the suffering in Darfur and the world's responses to it to discuss how contemporary solidarity and globalization is characterized by an institutionalization that contains elements of both extension and limitation. The extension thesis is supported by the involvement of international institutions such as the UN, the EU, and the AU. It also draws support from the involvement of civil society organizations. The limitation thesis is supported by observations of state activities, which do not always adhere to cosmopolitan norms. The limitation thesis is also strengthened by the fact that civil society organizations played a relatively marginal role in the debate and that those who did take part were a small group of large professional organizations. This leads to the conclusion that solidarity and globalization risk becoming de-popularized and de-democratized. On the other hand, it is also remarked that this institutionalization of civil society responses is an advance because it allows a routine professional response to distant suffering.