Determinants of presidential position taking in Congress, 1949–1995

In this paper we seek to explain the activity presidential position taking on roll call votes in the House. Position taking may help presidents pursue their policy agendas, but time and available resources constrain their ability to take positions. Even though position taking is a discretionary presidential action, it occurs in the legislative arena and, thus, presidents must consider elements in both institutions as well as outside conditions when making this decision. Accordingly, we posit a multiple perspectives approach to explain the number of presidential positions on votes in the House. Our multivariate two-stage least squares regression reveals that variables from all three environments (executive, legislative and exogenous) within our multiple perspectives approach are necessary to adequately explain presidential position taking overall and when divided according to domestic and foreign policy positions.     

Family functioning and emotion socialization in Chinese two-parent households: A person-centered approach

The current study adopted cluster analysis as a person-centered approach to identify patterns of Chinese families’ functioning and parents’ emotion socialization responses and investigate their associations with children's emotion regulation and behavioral outcomes. Both parents residing in the same family were included to explore joint contributions of mothers and fathers within the family system. Participants were 204 Chinese two-parent (mother and father) households of 5- to 10-year-old children (M_age = 7.43 years, SD = .81; 98 girls). Both parents filled out online questionnaires about their perceptions of family functioning (cohesion, adaptability) and endorsement of responses to children's negative emotions (supportive, nonsupportive). Mothers also reported children's lability/negativity, emotion regulation, problematic behaviors (internalizing, externalizing) and prosocial behaviors. Five clusters were identified: poor-functioning/dismissing, well-functioning/coaching, engaged fathers, engaged mothers, and balanced/diffuse. Overall, poor-functioning/dismissing families had children with the lowest functioning and well-functioning/coaching families had children with the most optimal outcomes. The other three clusters were moderate in terms of child functioning with children of engaged fathers having less optimal outcomes than the other two. The nuanced variations among clusters and meaning of results are discussed in relation to Chinese cultural contexts. Findings support the utility of a person-centered approach for illuminating how parents’ socialization practices interconnect holistically within dynamic family systems.     

Putting the ‘public’ into public service delivery for social welfare in South Africa

Mubangizi BC, Gray M. Putting the ‘public’ into public service delivery for social welfare in South Africa Int J Soc Welfare 2011: 20: 212–219 © 2010 The Author(s), International Journal of Social Welfare © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the International Journal of SocialWelfare. The privatisation of some essential services in South Africa has raised severe difficulties for those for whom the idea of fees for services is quite foreign and who, in any case, cannot afford to pay for services. The government has developed several initiatives to educate people about the need to pay for services provided by local government, the largest of which was the Masakhane fees‐for‐services campaign. This article describes two recent initiatives that seek to engage local citizen participation, namely, Integrated Development Plans and izimbizo (or traditional forums). These are examined along with the challenges faced by local government in promoting citizenship participation in service delivery within a decentralised system of governance. The article concludes with some recommendations on how citizen participation can be enhanced so as to make the ‘public’ visible in public service delivery and thus improve social welfare services.     

Rent Control: its Costly Repercussions

This article examines the theory and practice of rent control in the UK and elsewhere in order to contribute to the important debate on the future of the private rental sector in the UK. Our opposition to rent and eviction controls is unequivocal. We shall show that wherever rent control has been imposed the effects have been, at best, adverse and at worst, appalling. The effects on the quantity and quality of a housing stock can be so devastating that one Swedish socialist economist, Assar Lindbeck (1967) concluded: “In many cases rent control appears to be the most efficient technique presently known to destroy a city — except for bombing.” Controls which lead to an excess demand for housing foster unfortunate practices such a discrimination on various grounds other than willingness and ability to pay rent, and the creation of a black market. Rent and eviction controls also have a major impact on the mobility of labour. The encouragement to immobility can lead to the perpetuation of structural imbalances in an economy prompting rigidities which can have considerable economic and social costs.     

Does Privatization Protect Natural Resources? Property Rights and Forests in Guatemala

Objectives . Property rights are central to debates about natural resource policy. Governments traditionally have been seen as the appropriate custodians of natural resources for their citizens. More recently, many argue the privatization of property rights will ensure that users have incentives to manage their resources well. Common property, to the extent it is discussed at all, is seen as leading to the tragedy of the commons. We evaluate these claims by assessing property rights and forest conditions in two private and three communal forests in Guatemala. Methods . Data on biological and social phenomena from five forests (151 plots) and their associated communities were collected using the International Forestry Resources and Institutions Research Program protocols. Ordinary least squares regression was used to analyze four models. We examined t -scores for differences in coefficients for the different models. Results . The models demonstrate that de jure property rights are not a powerful predictor of variations among the sampled forests. Conclusions . We argue that de facto institutions and their enforcement are much more important than de jure property rights to forest management. Communities holding a forest in common can, under certain circumstances, create institutions to manage their resources as successfully as—or more successfully than—private owners.     

Hearing the voices of abused older women

This paper focuses on a qualitative research process that gathered responses from 64 older women aged fifty and older on their experience of violence and abuse. What older women said about abuse in their lives supports the use of a feminist framework as well as the age based analysis of the elder abuse field. Some respondents spoke of abuse from childhood into their later years. Some spoke of partners witnessing or experiencing abuse as children. Some women express concern about possible abuse by their adult children of their own children. Abused older women like younger women need a safe environment, emotional support, advocacy, information, and peer support. While it is important to consider the perspectives and knowledge of service providers when developing policy and practice on abuse of older women, it is critical to ask the women survivors of abuse or neglect what they believe would benefit them, and others in similar situations.     

Commodity price stabilization models: A review and appraisal

This paper is designed to bring into focus the numerous modeling attempts to analyze commodity price stabilization that have recently appeared. The studies examined begin with the Waugh-Oi-Massell framework and advance to econometric commodity modeling. Such a critique is considered necessary: None of the studies examined has overcome the myriad of problems that analysts have pointed out as essential for assessing the welfare outcomes of price stabilization schemes. As a consequence, stabilization analyses for similar commodities have produced conflicting results regarding predicted welfare outcome. The present appraisal attempts to provide a unity of direction to this work by (1) comparing recieved studies of a theoretical, empirical, and econometric modeling nature, and (2) suggesting possibilities for improving modeling analyses.