Effects of Community on Status Attainment*

The major objective of the research reported here is to investigate the significance and meaning of the contextual effects of communities on individuals’ opportunities for socioeconomic attainment. A model which incorporates both individuals and their communities is proposed and tested. The empirical test was done by using samples of the Israeli labor force population. The findings demonstrate that community has significant effects on individuals’ attainment. Community seems to be an additional factor that affects social mobility and as such an important dimension of the stratification system. Characteristics defining the social context of the community as an opportunity structure are identified and their significance discussed.     

ACADEMIC ADMISSIONS STANDARDS: IMPLICATIONS FOR OUTPUT,DISTRIBUTION, AND MOBILITY

We examine the trade‐offs implicit in academic admissions standards when students are charged cost‐based tuition and offered loans that remove liquidity constraints. Lowering entry requirements while holding graduation requirements fixed increases aggregate output and promotes a more equal distribution of wages, but reduces relative income mobility and diminishes the scope for affirmative action. Lowering admissions standards while raising graduation requirements, so that the number of graduates remains constant, has little direct effect on output, distribution, or mobility, but again reduces the scope for affirmative action. Income‐based affirmative action offers a better trade‐off between output and relative mobility than income‐neutral admissions. (JEL: D31, H42, I23, I28, J24)     

Peace building: a conceptual framework

An interdisciplinary legal and social work framework for peace building is presented. Inequality and its eradication are identified as linking factors transforming conflict into coexistence. Peace building is determined to entail participation in the struggle for social justice. Three conditions are identified as central to the peace building process. The first necessitates the establishment of inclusive, autonomous communities, each free to express religious, cultural and national aspirations and identity. The second requires the recognition of the legitimacy of each community to assert rights and claims without denying those of the other . This premise supports the view of the individual in relation and notes that coexistence can only be advanced through the building of mutual relationships. Finally, peace building requires recognition of human rights as a tool to promote relationships both within and between societies.     

Dimensions of Gender Occupational Differentiation in Segregation and Inequality: A Cross-National Analysis

The present research: (a) distinguishes between measures of gender occupational segregation and measures of gender occupational inequality, and (b) examines whether occupational segregation and occupational inequality are differentially related to structural characteristics of national labor markets. Analysis of data from 56 nations shows that measures of nominal segregation are not equivalent to measures of hierarchical inequality. Nominal segregation seems to increase with industrialization and in the presence of service industries but decreases as female labor force participation increases. By contrast, occupational inequality seems to decrease with industrialization and in the presence of service industries but to increase as both female labor force participation and level of educational inequality rise. The data further demonstrate that nominal segregation and ordinal status inequality are interrelated. Where nominal segregation is high, women's relative representation in high status occupations tends to rise. We argue that occupational segregation should not be equated with occupational inequality, and that theoretical propositions regarding gender-occupational segregation may not be applicable to issues concerning occupational inequality. We obtain a better understanding of, and insight into the nature of gender-occupational differentiation by simultaneously considering these two dimensions of gender-occupational differentiation.     

Voting power: an information theory approach

In recent years, there has been increasing awareness of the importance of formal measures of voting power and of the relevance of such measures to real life political issues. Nevertheless, existing measures have been criticized, especially because of their dependence on the unrealistic assumption that different coalitions have equal probabilities. In this paper we show that the classical problem of measuring voting power can be naturally embedded in information theory. This perspective on voting power allows us to extend measures of voting power to cases in which there are dependencies among voters. In doing so, we distinguish between two different notions of a given voter’s power—‘control’ and ‘informativeness’—corresponding, respectively, to the average uncertainty regarding the outcome of a vote that remains when all others have voted and the average uncertainty that is eliminated when only the given voter has voted. This distinction settles a number of well-known paradoxes and enables the study of voting power on the basis of actual political behavior at all levels.     

Service users’ involvement in social work education: focus on social change projects

ABSTRACT

This article presents and analyzes four projects focusing on diverse forms of service users’ involvement in social work training and research in different countries (Israel, Italy, Slovenia and UK). It highlights the value of service user involvement (SUI) to specific social change objectives and to social work education. The conceptual framework focused on the Standpoint Theory, while methodologically participatory action research was applied, and evaluation measures were developed. Key findings, facilitators and limitations to the involvement, students’ views of it and similarities and differences among the four projects are outlined. The challenges embedded in introducing and sustaining social change objectives in a co-production framework within social work education are identified, alongside the added value of meeting them. The differentiated impact the projects had on students is highlighted as well as their significance for health and social care providers were relevant. It is encouraging that in each project SUI was positively valued. The projects indicate the wide range of SUI in the content and format of social work education, as well as its applicability cross-culturally to a range of key issues pertaining to both training and research in social work.     

To work or not to work: Variables affecting non‐financial employment commitment over time

The most common indicator of non‐financial employment commitment (NFEC) is the “lottery question” – whether a person would continue working if they won a lottery. This cross‐sectional research seeks to identify the demographic variables and the “meaning of work” dimensions that could predict individual NFEC, presenting the main international findings over time, with particular reference to data collected in Israel in 1981, 1994 and 2006. The authors' findings point to a marked decrease in NFEC in the new millennium and a change in its predictors over time. The findings and their implications for work and employment are examined in the light of social and economic changes in Israel.     

Beyond Condorcet: optimal aggregation rules using voting records

In certain judgmental situations where a “correct” decision is presumed to exist, optimal decision making requires evaluation of the decision-makers’ capabilities and the selection of the appropriate aggregation rule. The major and so far unresolved difficulty is the former necessity. This article presents the optimal aggregation rule that simultaneously satisfies these two interdependent necessary requirements. In our setting, some record of the voters’ past decisions is available, but the correct decisions are not known. We observe that any arbitrary evaluation of the decision-makers’ capabilities as probabilities yields some optimal aggregation rule that, in turn, yields a maximum-likelihood estimation of decisional skills. Thus, a skill-evaluation equilibrium can be defined as an evaluation of decisional skills that yields itself as a maximum-likelihood estimation of decisional skills. We show that such equilibrium exists and offer a procedure for finding one. The obtained equilibrium is locally optimal and is shown empirically to generally be globally optimal in terms of the correctness of the resulting collective decisions. Interestingly, under minimally competent (almost symmetric) skill distributions that allow unskilled decision makers, the optimal rule considerably outperforms the common simple majority rule (SMR). Furthermore, a sufficient record of past decisions ensures that the collective probability of making a correct decision converges to 1, as opposed to accuracy of about 0.7 under SMR. Our proposed optimal voting procedure relaxes the fundamental (and sometimes unrealistic) assumptions in Condorcet’s celebrated theorem and its extensions, such as sufficiently high decision-making quality, skill homogeneity or existence of a sufficiently large group of decision makers.     

Evaluating estimators using stochastic dominance rules:the variance of a normal distribution

The paper presents an application of stochastic dominance approach to estimator evaluation. This new approach is general and applicable when a monetary loss function is defined over the deviation of a sample estimate from the appropriate parameter. The paper applies this approach to the evaluation of alternative estimators of the normal distribution variance     

A “Jewish Study Hall” Influenced Approach to Social Work Professional Identity Development: A Qualitative Study

The article presents the findings of a qualitative research study focused on the ancient “Jewish study hall” (Beit Midrash in Hebrew) approach. The research was conducted in the context of the Beit Midrash for Social Work and Judaism established at one school of social work in Israel. Twenty participants were included in the study. Content analysis of transcribed Beit Midrash sessions revealed four central themes: reflection on participant identities; expansion, stabilisation, and acceptance of one’s personal identity; clarification of professional identity; and convergence between Jewish and professional identity. Study results raise questions as to both the place and the space for exploration of religious and spiritual identity in social work education. Findings suggest that alternative learning spaces such as the Beit Midrash can enable social work students and practitioners to reflect honestly and profoundly on their religious and spiritual identity, helping them to integrate their different identities towards becoming “whole persons” better prepared to meet the challenges of the social work profession.