The Prevention of AIDS Among Injecting Drug Users

Correspondence to Dr Beth Crisp, School of Social Inquiry, Deakin University, Geelong, Victoria, Australia 3217 Summary There is great potential for the spread of HIV amongst injectingdrug users (IDUs) if they engage in unsafe injecting and sexualpractices. This paper identifies a range of obstacles to safebehaviour, including availability of sterile injecting equipment,legal/policy factors, social norms and personal factors suchas ignorance, beliefs, intoxication and craving. Two alternativepolicy options—harm reduction and use reduction—arediscussed along with specific strategies for ameliorating risk.Strategies include drug treatment, provision of sterile injectingequipment, bleach, promoting alternate methods of drug administration,HIV testing and counselling and peer endorsement of safe behaviour.The paper concludes by considering the implications of thesepolicy and programme options at the level of service delivery.     

Research Note: The Social Behaviour of Injecting Drug Users

Correspondence to Professor J. G. Barber, School of Social Work, Newnham Drive, Newnham, P.O. Box 1214, Launceston, Tesmania 7250, Australia. Summary As part of a larger interview schedule conducted with 1245 injectingdrug users in Sydney, Australia, respondents were asked aboutthe degree to which their drug use is conducted within a groupcontext. They were also asked about the size of their user groupsand the extent of needle-sharing that occurs in the groups.Results revealed that injecting drug use was a social behaviourapproximately half of the time for the overall sample, but thatthere were statistically significant differences according tothe age, gender, and drug experience of the user. The studyalso found an alarming amount of needle-sharing among the sampleoverall. Females, younger users, and those less experiencedin injecting drug use were more inclined to inject in groups,while needle-sharing was more common among older and more experiencedusers.     

EFFECTS OF OPERATIONAL EMPLOYEE SKILLS ON ADVANCED MANUFACTURING TECHNOLOGY PERFORMANCE

This study employs structured interviews in a field setting to develop an in‐depth understanding of how a specific human resource decision affected manufacturing performance at 30 plants using advanced manufacturing technologies. Initial results suggested that there is no relationship between the skill level of operational employees and the level of performance of the installations. When a measure of “fit” between environmental characteristics and skills was employed, however, there was a significant relationship between the fit measure and performance.     

The Promise and the Pitfalls of Learned Helplessness Theory for Social Work Practice

Summary Because it articulates a psychology of powerlessness and becauseit focuses on the interactions between the individual and thesocial environment, Learned Helplessness Theory deserves tobecome an important new practice theory within social work.However, the theory also suffers from certain unresolved problemswhich currently limit its usefulness. This paper reviews LearnedHelplessness Theory for social workers and directs the attentionof practitioners to some crucial theoretical issues to be bornein mind when applying the theory to practice.     

Inequality and Occupational Prestige: Theory,Research, and Social Policy*

Occupational prestige is one important dimension of social inequality. Building on past theory and especially on excellent recent empirical research in this area, a new theory is presented. This new theory criticizes some assumptions of older theories of occupational prestige with regard to motivation and to the scarcity of human talent. Finally, using the new theory, some small suggestions are given for social policy to reduce inequality based on occupational prestige.     

Culture, Capital and Class Conflicts in the Political Economy of Cape Breton

Abstract This paper examines the unprecedented rapid unionization of fish processing plant workers in the industrial town of Glace Bay, Cape Breton. The explanation for union militancy is tied to historical dynamics in local labour markets and the transposition of working class consciousness from the mining sector to the fish processing sector. Historically forged household and community dynamics and cultural values provide the key to the mobilization of the Cape Breton fish plant workers. While the contradictory and complex nature of local culture allowed for the emergence of resistance, the conditions which inspired such action also nurtured social patterns well accommodated to the region's marginal economic conditions. Thus, the circumstances under which strategies for resistance are forthcoming must hold particular and locally meaningful cultural significance. Paternalistic control of the labour force in local fish plants successfully manipulated local cultural values. Impersonal corporate management strategies violated these codes of conduct and provoked rapid collective response.