Establishing Laws and Policies on Parent to Child Violence in Finland 1965–1983

This study explores perceptions of parent to child violence, the arguments for imposing legal regulation, and the intended objectives of the legislative process that led to a ban in Finland in 1983. This qualitative policy analysis examines policy documents alongside expert interviews with professional on the legislative process. The example of Finland shows that a significant change in attitudes and decreased levels of violence towards children can be achieved without the threat of legal punishment, even without specific intervention policies. However, the study emphasises the importance of establishing clear practices alongside altering legislation which has been inadequate in Finland.     

A Semiparametric Regression Model for Longitudinal Data with Non‐stationary Errors

Motivated by the need to analyze the National Longitudinal Surveys data, we propose a new semiparametric longitudinal mean‐covariance model in which the effects on dependent variable of some explanatory variables are linear and others are non‐linear, while the within‐subject correlations are modelled by a non‐stationary autoregressive error structure. We develop an estimation machinery based on least squares technique by approximating non‐parametric functions via B‐spline expansions and establish the asymptotic normality of parametric estimators as well as the rate of convergence for the non‐parametric estimators. We further advocate a new model selection strategy in the varying‐coefficient model framework, for distinguishing whether a component is significant and subsequently whether it is linear or non‐linear. Besides, the proposed method can also be employed for identifying the true order of lagged terms consistently. Monte Carlo studies are conducted to examine the finite sample performance of our approach, and an application of real data is also illustrated.     

Impact of Gender Binarism on Hijras’ Life Course and Their Access to Fundamental Human Rights in Pakistan

This study adds to the growing body of knowledge on gender nonconformity aspects of heteronormativity by examining its impact on the life course of hijras and their access to fundamental human rights in Pakistan. Drawing on 50 semistructured interviews conducted in two sites, the findings suggest that the participants’ lived experiences associated with gender nonconformity significantly influenced the direction of their life course and their ability to have access to human rights. These experiences spanned from childhood to elderhood across a wide range of settings, such as family, school, guru dera (residence headed by a hijra guru), workplace, and interactions with authorities. The participants’ human rights were not recognized, resulting in abuse, social stigma, discrimination against them, and their exclusion from mainstream society. Finally, implications are drawn for public policy and future research on third gender concerns in Pakistan and elsewhere.     

A longitudinal comparative study of the impact of the experience of social work education on interpersonal and critical thinking capabilities

Head (the intellectual/critical thinking) and Heart (the emotional-interpersonal) are long established twin-pillars of social work. Their importance is not just reflected in literature devoted to each but in the professional proficiencies and capabilities expected for practice. While clearly intertwined—both operate together in practice—and central to practice proficiencies/capabilities, implying implicit measurement of standards, there is a curious lack of research focusing on measurement of the two together. This novel study is the first to carry out a longitudinal comparative study examining the extent to which interpersonal and critical thinking capabilities are developed during the lifetime of qualifying social work training as measured through programme performance and development. It focuses on four cohorts (n = 170) at two Universities (Undergraduate and Masters). While findings show the interpersonal significantly underpinned performance and outcome, critical thinking—though embedded in Masters programme performance—was less significant, particularly in the undergraduate programmes. The study concludes that we cannot assume interpersonal and critical thinking capabilities are always incorporated into the learning process and attention should be paid to the overt measurement of interpersonal and critical thinking capabilities together with the processes and mechanisms by which they are focused on in programmes.     

家电下乡政策的消费效应评估——基于全国221个村庄的4年跟踪调查

以全国221个村庄所获得的4年调查数据作为研究基础,对"家电下乡"政策的消费效应予以评估和分析。调查表明,家电下乡政策消费效应的最大特征是农民消费需求的释放,其中包括全国消费总额的上升,户均消费额增幅达到8成,全国各地消费总量和户均消费数量的增加。但家电下乡政策的消费效应在实践中也遇到了持续性疲软的难题,如农民收入的限制作用,农民购买下乡产品比重偏低,政府补贴额和补贴程序不足,政策宣传和解说不到位。为了使家电下乡政策的消费效应持续起效,必须不断完善政策,使家电下乡政策的实惠真正落实到农民身上。     

Lawrence R. Klein 1920–2013: Notes on the early years

Klein can well be said to have created the field of macroeconometric modeling almost singlehandedly. His international influence started at an early stage. The article offers scattered archive observations on Klein's early years from undergraduate study to the University of Pennsylvania in 1958. Klein was in 1944 recruited by the Cowles Commission in Chicago to construct the first macroeconomic model in the USA, drawing on the experiences of the interwar modeling work of Jan Tinbergen and the new path-breaking econometric methods developed by Trygve Haavelmo. The first Klein model was taken into use at the end of 1945 to shed light on the prospects for the US economy in the transition from war to peace. After two-three years in Chicago Chicago, Klein traveled for a year in Europe and initiated macroeconometric modeling work in Canada, at the University of Michigan, and at Oxford University. This was only the beginning of the lifelong influence exerted on modelers around the globe. The article pays attention to Klein's relation to Paul Samuelson, Jacob Marschak, Trygve Haavelmo, Ragnar Frisch, and others.     

重庆市农民工市民化的教育培训资源统筹对策

城乡统筹的实质是资源的统筹.在重庆市“千万农民变市民”的社会大试验中,教育与培训将发挥重要作用.目前,重庆市农民工的教育与培训存在较多问题,直接影响了农民工市民化的进程,根源在于资源统筹乏力.应当根据科学发展观的要求,加强重庆市农民工的教育培训资源统筹.文章对重庆市实施制度、机构、经费、师资、信息资源这“五大统筹”和统筹模式变革提出了对策建议.     

Pre‐procreative ages in population stability and cyclicity

Age‐specific models of population renewal (with and without feedback) which imply convergence to a stable state for some levels of fertility or feedback may imply the presence of long‐term cycling around a constant or exponentially changing equilibrium for other levels of fertility or feedback. The switch from one regime to the other is a “bifurcation.”; The conditions for bifurcation involve the roots of an analogue of Lotka's Equation.

Typically bifurcation is induced by raising the strength of feedback or the level of fertility. It has been known since the early 1980s, however, that this is sometimes impossible. It is sometimes impossible even with the linear renewal equation itself and with the most basic of non‐linear models, Lee's cohort feedback model.

Here it is proved that this typical route to bifurcation does not fail for these basic models in the presence of a condition which always holds for realistic applications with higher organisms: the existence of a span of ages before the onset of fertility.

Specifically, a strictly positive lower bound on ages of procreation is proved to be sufficient to guarantee the existence of a rescaling of Lotka's Equation for which the real part of some complex root vanishes. This result holds for absolutely Lebesgue‐integrable (signed) net maternity functions on the positive real line and for absolutely summable (signed) net maternities on the positive integers.

It follows that Coale's rescaling device for the analysis of approach to stability in stable population theory can be implemented for all realistic human net maternity schedules. It also follows that the many special cases of the cohort feedback model throughout population biology will all generate persistent cycling instead of stability if feedback is sufficiently strong.     

From Destruction to Reconciliation

SUMMARY

Daniel Johnson discusses how the application of “restorative justice” in his own life and in the life of the victim of his criminal offense contributed to his personal regeneration and healing for his victim. Mr. Johnson challenges criminal justice policy-makers to create conditions where “restorative justice” can be employed in the broadest sense in order to do what contemporary, punitive, retributive criminal justice systems are largely incapable of doing, that is, facilitate lasting offender rehabilitation and healing for crime victims and communities, and to offer opportunities for victim-offender reconciliations.     

Poverty Research in a Development Policy Context

This article provides an evaluation of the extent to which science is addressing worldwide poverty and hunger. It is based on the literature contained in the Thomson Reuters' Web of Science Citation Index (1980 to 2008) and focuses on the WOTRO Strategy Plan 2007–2010 of the Netherlands Foundation for the Advancement of Tropical Research, although similar policies from other countries might also be assessed. The data show that poverty/hunger research has grown steadily over time in many disciplines, most significantly in Environmental Sciences and Technology. Much of this research is hidden; hence the construction of an internationally recognised open‐access database is recommended so that scientists can easily identify critical gaps related to scientific capacity‐building.