The logical reconstruction of pure exchange economics: Another alternative

Theory and Decision -     

Counterintuitive behavior of social systems

This paper addresses several issues of broad concern in the United States: population trends; the quality of urban life; national policy for urban growth; and the unexpected, ineffective, or detrimental results often generated by government programs in these areas.The author does attempt to indicate how multiloop feed-back systems (to which our social systems belong) mislead us because our intuition and judgement have been formed to expect behavior different from that actually possessed by such systems. At times programs cause exactly the reverse of desired results.It is now possible to explain how such contrary results can happen. There are fundamental reasons why people misjudge the behavior of social systems. There are orderly processes at work that frequently lead people to wrong decisions when faced with complex and highly interacting systems. Until we come to a much better understanding of social systems, we should expect that attempts to develop corrective programs will continue to disappoint us.     

Public Opinion and Dynamic Representation in the American States: The Case of Environmental Attitudes*

Objective. We investigate causal processes linking environmental conditions, attitudes, and policies in the American states: Is public opinion about ecology shaped by environmental conditions? Are state policymakers responsive to environmental opinions? Does public opinion respond to policy adoption? Methods. Using public opinion data from the DDB Worldwide Life Style Survey to measure aggregate state attitudes about the environment, as well as measures of water quality and policy intervention, we capture the dynamics of representation in the American states on the environment during the late 1980s and early 1990s. Results. Our findings support a thermostatic model of representation—state environmental opinions are influenced by environmental conditions and are responsive to policy outputs alongside improved environmental conditions. Conclusions. This model of the opinion‐policy linkage refines our understanding of representation and focuses us not just on the passage of public policy to address public desires, but the effectiveness of that policy as well.     

Restorative justice for juvenile offenders in China: Current practices and challenges

ABSTRACT

In recent decades, restorative justice has gained considerable recognition worldwide and has become a prominent option for diverting juveniles away from the traditional criminal justice system as well as delivering fair and just outcomes in the justice process. This paper provides an overview of how the criminal justice system operates for juvenile offenders in the People’s Republic of China (hereafter, China). Based on a sophisticated literature review of recent Chinese academic journal articles on restorative justice for juveniles, the paper presents an analysis of the characteristics and operational procedures of current practices. Deficits and potential future developments pertaining to Chinese restorative practices for delinquents are also discussed.     

Dilemmas of Environmental Planning in Post‐Urban New Jersey*

Objective. New Jersey's state land‐use plan, designed to preserve open space by directing growth to urban centers, rests on the assumption that nature (the “environment”) and the urban constitute separate objective spheres, such that nature can be preserved as an end in itself. Through a spatial transformation that de‐populated the cities and suburbanized the countryside, however, the urban and the environmental have become overlapping discursive categories, each expressing the absence of the other, and raising serious dilemmas for environmental planning. Methods. This article uses Census data to document the extent of New Jersey's urban and racial transformation over more than half a century, and examines county and municipal reviews of the state's proposed land‐use plan to document the resulting contradictory interpretations of nature articulated in political debate over state‐plan implementation. Results. The attempt to forge a statewide consensus on environmental and open‐space preservation has been stymied by the contradictory perspectives of urban and suburban constituencies, whose responses focus on the urban rather than the environmental implications of proposed land‐use controls. State planners seeking political support for environmental protection find themselves embroiled in often vitriolic debates about urban and suburban lifestyles, with implicit racial subtexts, and about the legitimacy of state intervention perceived as supporting antithetical values. Conclusions. Contrary to the state's attempt to separate the urban and the environmental, the route to environmental protection in New Jersey may lie through urban revitalization.