MULTIPLE ECONOMIES AND YOUTH LIVELIHOOD

In this paper we present a model of multiple economic spheres in order to understand and explain the income-generating activities of young people. These spheres include the formal sector, the informal waged sector, the informal non-waged sector, the welfare sector and the criminal sector. We conclude that, due to changes in the labour market that affect them in particular ways, young people are engaged in a diverse range of activities within and across each economic sphere.     

The Restorative Power of Emotions in Child Protection Services

The paper examines the significance of our emotional life for validation, enrichment and guidance in everyday behavior. Child protection services (CPS) workers need to understand how emotions affect family dynamics and, in particular, parental behavior as a basis for their work with families. Moreover, in order for CPS workers to be aware of, and professionally responsive to, the importance of a family's emotions requires that they are comfortable with their own feelings. This means that they need to work in CPS agencies which recognize and support this practice orientation. The paper also addresses how the agency can influence CPS workers to become more knowledgeable and attuned to, not only the families' emotional lives, but also to their own.     

“Site Fights”: Explaining Opposition to Pipeline Projects in the Developing World1

Fifty years ago, the main challenges to large infrastructure projects were technical or scientific. Today, the greatest hurdles faced by such projects are almost always social and/or political. Whether constructing large dams in the developing world or siting liquefied natural gas terminals in the United States, the onset of these projects often triggers intense popular opposition. But not always, and therein lays the animating aim of this project. We undertake a systematic comparative case analysis of mobilization efforts against 11 oil and gas pipeline projects spanning 16 countries in the developing world. Using theories from the social movement and facility siting literatures and the technique of fuzzy set/qualitative comparative analysis (fs/QCA), we examine the “causal conditions” linked to political and legal opposition to these projects. We find that both Western funding of projects and public consultation serve as necessary political opportunities encouraging mobilization. In addition, not compensating the host country for involvement in the project is linked to mobilization. Finally, some risk from the project, in the form of environmental or social impact, is associated with mobilization; however, this impact does not have to be very significant for mobilization to occur.     

Disability Studies as Ethnographic Research and Text: Research strategies and roles for promoting social change?

This paper problematises the notion of research production within disability studies by comparing literature on emancipatory research with concepts of reflexivity, authority and empowerment employed within ethnographic research. It critically examines a number of proposals within disability studies on how researchers can stimulate or contribute to processes which improve their respondents life conditions. A variety of strategies for change are discussed within the context of how ethnographers do fieldwork, and write up and disseminate their findings. This discussion also questions the role of the researcher and respondent as 'expert', suggesting that ethnographers should not privilege their own perspectives over that of respondents. It is concluded that the variety of research strategies and roles outlined in this paper need not be mutually exclusive and therefore, that there are a number of different yet complementary ways in which researchers can contribute to the conditions within which self-emancipation flourishes.     

Helen Keller: rethinking the problematic icon

More than 30 years after her death, Helen Keller is still known internationally as the little deaf blind girl, the 'miracle child' who triumphed over adversity. However, behind the image, hidden from the public gaze, was a flesh-and-blood woman, writer and radical activist, suffragette and Socialist. She was a woman who lived to old age, yet is fixed in the public imagination as an eternal child. This paper charts the creation of Keller's popular image and enduring iconic status, analysing their purpose and the implications they hold for us as disabled people. It then examines the truth of her life, revealing how contemporary are the issues which determined it. Finally, it explores the value of retelling her biography and the relevance it holds in the building of disability culture.     

Where Are the Children's Experiences? Analysing Social and Cultural Exclusion in 'Special' and 'Mainstream' Schools

In this paper we employ ethnographic data to illustrate that disabled children encounter discriminatory notions of 'normality' and 'difference' in both 'special' and 'mainstream' schools, and that these experiences relate to both the structural forces in schools, and the everyday individual and cultural practices of adults and children. In contrast to much of the literature in the field, this paper examines the everyday life experiences of adults and disabled children from their own perspective. We highlight disabled children's own criticisms of 'special' and 'mainstream' schools to illustrate the fluid nature of disabled children's lives within educational settings. We argue that schools will be prevented from becoming fully inclusive until adults who control schools take account of children's views of specific educational processes and until educational policy makers adopt a more nuanced multi-level approach to inclusion. Children should be enabled to challenge the structural, cultural and individual conditions which create disability.     

Geometric programming for optimal allocation of integrated samples in quality control

We apply geometric programming, developed by Duffin, Peterson Zener (1967), to the optimal allocation of stratified samples. As an introduction, we show how geometric programming is used to allocate samples according to Neyman (1934), using the data of Cornell (1947) and following the exposition of Cochran (1953).

Then we use geometric programming to allocate an integrated sample introduced by Schwartz (1978) for more efficient sampling of three U. S. Federal welfare quality control systems, Aid to Families with Dependent Children, Food Stamps and Medicaid.

We develop methods for setting up the allocation problem, interpreting it as a geometric programming primal problem, transforming it to the corresponding dual problem, solving that, and finding the sample sizes required in the allocation problem. We show that the integrated sample saves sampling costs.     

Estimating Transition Probabilities for Ignorable Intermittent Missing Data in a Discrete-Time Markov Chain

This article considers a discrete-time Markov chain for modeling transition probabilities when multiple successive observations are missing at random between two observed outcomes using three methods: a na\"?ve analog of complete-case analysis using the observed one-step transitions alone, a non data-augmentation method (NL) by solving nonlinear equations, and a data-augmentation method, the Expectation-Maximization (EM) algorithm. The explicit form of the conditional log-likelihood given the observed information as required by the E step is provided, and the iterative formula in the M step is expressed in a closed form. An empirical study was performed to examine the accuracy and precision of the estimates obtained in the three methods under ignorable missing mechanisms of missing completely at random and missing at random. A dataset from the mental health arena was used for illustration. It was found that both data-augmentation and nonaugmentation methods provide accurate and precise point estimation, and that the na\"?ve method resulted in estimates of the transition probabilities with similar bias but larger MSE. The NL method and the EM algorithm in general provide similar results whereas the latter provides conditional expected row margins leading to smaller standard errors.     

Improving the performance of the zone control chart

A general model for the zone control chart is presented. Using this model, it is shown that there are score vectors for zone control charts which result in superior average run length performance in comparison to Shewhart charts with common runs rules.

A fast initial response (FIR) feature for the zone control chart is also proposed. Average run lengths of the zone control chart with this feature are calculated. It is shown that the FIR feature improves zone control chart performance by providing significantly earlier signals when the process is out of control.