Legislative responses to wrongful conviction: Do partisan principals and advocacy efforts influence state-level criminal justice policy?

The number of discovered wrongful criminal convictions (and resulting exonerations) has increased over the past decade. These cases erode public confidence in the criminal justice system and trust in the rule of law. Many states have adopted laws that aim to reduce system errors but no study has examined why some states appear more willing to provide due process protections against wrongful convictions than others. Findings from regression estimates suggest that states with a Republican controlled legislature or more Republican voters are less likely to pass these laws while the presence of advocacy organizations that are part of the ‘innocence movement’ make legislative change more likely. We thus identify important differences in the political and social context between U.S. states that influence the adoption of criminal justice policies.     

Psychosocial Well-Being of Young People Who Participated in a Support Group Following the Loss of a Parent to Cancer

Despite the evidence of unmet support needs among young people who have lost a parent to cancer, only a few support group initiatives have been reported. This observational prospective study explored the psychosocial well-being of young people who participated in support groups at a Swedish specialist palliative care setting. On three occasions, 29 participants, aged 16–28 years, answered questionnaires covering characteristics of the participants, circumstances of the losses, psychosocial well-being of the young people, and their own assessment of the support groups. The support groups attracted mostly young women who were often unprepared for the loss. The living arrangements differed between younger and older participants; however, the loss-related variables did not differ. Significant positive changes were found regarding a sense of meaning in their future life and life satisfaction. The helpfulness of the group was assessed as high/very high and the group brought a valuable fellowship with others in a similar situation. Universality and beneficial interactions were reported and strengthened psychosocial well-being developed over time. This change, according to the young people themselves, may be attributed to the group support. The findings are useful for planning interventions to support young people in bereavement in order to enhance their psychosocial well-being.     

Developing a model of disability that focuses on the actions of disabled people

Disabled people, writers on disability and disability activists stress the importance of disabled people being included in all aspects of society. I argue that a major omission from this inclusiveness is that no current model of disability focuses on the impact of the actions of disabled people on disability. Disabled people are not passive bystanders, powerless to reduce the restrictions of disability. On the contrary, we are central to actively limiting its constraints. I develop a model of disability, called ‘active’, which focuses on the effects on disability of the individual and collective actions of disabled people. I describe published findings which indicate that engaging in self-help, using support groups and deploying assistive technology can all reduce the limitations of disability. Recent increases in the number of disability support groups and developments in assistive technology have substantially augmented the potential for disabled people to combat the effects of disability.     

Unacceptable forms of work: A multidimensional model

Unacceptable forms of work (UFW) have been identified as an “area of critical importance” for the ILO as it approaches its centenary. Yet there is currently no comprehensive elaboration of the dimensions, causes or manifestations of UFW. This article reports on a research project that has proposed such a framework. The article first investigates and reconceptualizes key discourses on contemporary work to identify their contribution to an analytically rigorous conception of UFW. It then outlines a novel Multidimensional Model that has been designed for use by local policy actors in identifying and targeting UFW in countries across a range of income levels.     

Sexual Orientation in State Hate Crime Laws: Exploring Social Construction and Criminal Law

Several studies have described and analyzed the development and diffusion of hate crime laws in the United States, but none specifically examined state-level differences in protected categories. Forty-five of the 50 states have a hate crime statute, but only 30 of those include sexual orientation. In this study the social construction framework is applied to the hate crime policy domain in order to determine whether or not variations in the social and political status of gays and lesbians are associated with the inclusion of sexual orientation in state hate crime laws. Content analysis of daily newspapers in six states revealed that a positive social construction is associated with groups seeking hate crime law protections, and that political influence may also be a key factor.     

Lurking Behavior in Online Psychosocial Discussion Forums: Theoretical Perspectives and Implications for Practice

Improving outcomes of telebehavioral psychoeducation requires rethinking program design when delivered wholly or partially for self-directed participation. Discussion forum participation often follows the “90-9-1 Rule” where 90% of participants lurk, rather than contribute content. A theoretical perspective on the behavior can help explain its adaptive functions, as well as the threats that this behavior poses to the lurker. Implications for practice require program redesign that actively links individual skills training and group-based discussion. The proposed linking design can synergize individual and group participation to support the development of mutual aid, as well as greater interaction with psychoeducation content and materials.     

非法人团体的民事主体地位探讨

非法人团体能否成为民事主体的问题,历来是民法学理论界争论的焦点。本文试从民事主体制度历史演变的客观规律以及民事权利能力和民事主体之间的内在联系的角度出发,探讨非法人团体在民事主体制度中的法律地位。     

契约社会中的有限身份化--种弱势群体保护的理论探讨

契约化是现代社会的重要特征,契约在追求平等的同时,会产生一定程度上的社会公平问题。克服社会契约化所带来的负面影响,保护弱势群体的权益,使社会在一种和谐有序的状态下发展,是政府面临的重要问题,也是建设和谐社会的内在要求。从契约与身份二者关系入手,尝试在契约社会的整体构架下,建立“有限身份化”的相应机制,具有重要的理论与现实意义。     

Educational inequality across three generations in Australia

The transfer of advantage and disadvantage across multiple generations is receiving increasing attention in the international literature; however, transfers of resources across multiple generations in Australian families are less well understood. Using a longitudinal dataset of Australian children, we have the opportunity to not only investigate the transfer of educational resources across three generations in Australia, but also investigate the gendered nature of these transfers, which has been a limitation of other studies. We find no evidence of individual grandparent education effects on numeracy and reading scores for grandchildren in Year 3, independent of parent educational attainment and other covariates. However, significant effects on numeracy and reading scores were observed for children in families where both the grandmother and grandfather in maternal and paternal grandparent sets had high educational attainment (a diploma or university qualification), and where either or both the mother and father had a university qualification. These results suggest that the contribution of grandparents to the academic achievement of grandchildren cannot be fully explained by the parent generation and that the concentration of human capital in families contributes to educational inequalities across multiple generations that can be observed by eight years of age.     

抗战时期桂糊社团的演进及其贡献

抗战时期桂林文化城戏剧社团的组织形式及特点,不仅反映了抗战时期戏剧体制和机制的发展特色,而且体现了中国戏剧现代化的历史面貌。桂林文化城的戏剧刊物,在传播戏剧理论、总结戏剧艺术实践经验方面,积极地推动过中国抗战戏剧运动。