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.     

Development and evaluation of the abortion attributes questionnaire

This paper describes the development and evaluation of the Abortion Attributes Questionnaire (AAQ), an instrument designed to assess the perceived importance of specific characteristics of abortion methods. Women receiving medical abortions ( n = 186) and women who chose surgical procedures ( n = 118) completed the AAQ. Participants were asked to rate how important each of 21 characteristics would be "when choosing between surgical and medical abortion." Factor analyses revealed that the AAQ consists of four factors and, as subscales, the factors have good internal reliability. The validity of the AAQ was established through discriminant function analysis and results indicated that three of the four factors predicted choice. Taken together, these findings provide empirical support for the constructs measured by the AAQ .     

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.     

Rehabilitation Problems Amongst Aboriginals in North Australia

Physical, social and behavioural disabilities occur at a high rate amongst aboriginals. Probably no other group in Australia has a greater need for rehabilitation services. To date this need has been largely ignored. Token services have been provided in some places, usually in terms of european, middle class values. Greater recognition of the socioeconomic, cultural and related factors that influence rehabilitation activities and outcomes is needed if effective services to aboriginals are to be developed.