Don’t buy from me Argentina: Politics, economics, and trade liberalization in Argentina, 1992–2001

Recently, while opening their markets to international trade through tariff reduction, developing nations have been quietly adopting nontariff measures that impose new barriers on imports. This study contributes to a literature that assesses reactions to recent widespread economic reform, particularly in the developing world. While analysts have identified many determinants of the reform process, we are only beginning to assess the factors that shape its twists, turns, and even reversals. In particular, we do not yet have a clear understanding of the determinants of governments’ treatment of different groups and actors in this process. This article examines these reactions to trade liberalization in Argentina, an important middle-income nation, by drawing upon the significant body of theoretical and empirical literature on trade policy in developed nations that demonstrates that both economic and political factors condition policy implementation. Utilizing a data set of nontariff trade disputes from 1992 to 2001, the analysis employs probit maximum likelihood techniques to assess the relationship between trade policy outputs and economic and political factors. The findings suggest that economic factors, including import flows, and political factors such as the breadth of representation appear to condition trade policy decisions in Argentina. The results also suggest that overall macroeconomic context affects policy outputs. Jeffrey Drope is an assistant professor in the Department of Political Science, University of Miami. His recent articles and current research examine the political economy of trade policy and, more generally, how interests and institutions interact to generate policy. I thank Wendy Hansen, Ken Roberts, and theSCID reviewers and editors for valuable comments, the Latin American Institute at the University of New Mexico for financial support, and Pablo Sanguinetti for helpful introductions in Argentina.     

The Associations Among Family-of-Origin Violence and Young Adults' Current Depressed, Hopeless, Suicidal, and Life-Threatening Behavior

The purpose of the current study was to determine if college students' retrospective reports of family-of-origin physical abuse were related to their current reports of depressed symptomology, hopelessness, and suicidal and life-threatening behavior. Consistent with hypotheses, abuse by a parent (physical and psychological) and physical perpetration toward a parent were associated with increased rates of suicidal and life-threatening behavior. Gender of the parent was also shown to be important as symptoms of depression were related to mother but not father victimization and perpetration. Contrary to expectation, witnessing parental spouse abuse was not associated with young adults' current symptoms of depression, hopelessness, and suicidal and life-threatening behavior. These findings were interpreted with regard to the intergenerational transmission of violence theory.     

The Role of Western Religious Values in Peacemaking for Divorcing Families

Peace (wholeness and integrity) is to be sought as the highest goal in the divorce process, affecting not only the divorcing couple but their family and community as well. The value of “community” found in the three major Western religious traditions suggests that more than just the immediate family should be involved in crafting divorce settlements and that the involvement of clergy may aid in the divorce process, especially in providing rich religious metaphors and exempla to promote peaceful negotiations. Other religious values such as “humanity in the divine image,” “love,” and “the fullness of time” can be useful in working with the divorcing couple to allow their stories to be told, provide time to sort out their complex emotions, and help reduce the impulse to see the other solely as an enemy to be eliminated in battle. “Sin and atonement” can serve an important role in restorative justice, while “the delayed arrival of the divine kingdom” provides a reasonable way to assess what determines success, both for the divorcing couple and for divorce professionals.

Key Points for the Family Court Community:
• Religious values found in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam can be consciously utilized to help divorcing couples separate more peacefully.
• Providing opportunities for each spouse to be fully heard and seen is a crucial component in helping to bring more peace into the divorce process.

     

Are they really so different? Climate change rule development in the USA and UK

Climate change is an increasingly complex and global environmental issue. As a result, scholars have begun to compare the efforts of specific countries such as the UK and the USA in dealing with climate change. However, missing within this comparative literature is a discussion of the important role that administrative agencies play in implementing climate change policy through rulemaking. More specifically, it is unclear how administrative processes may impact or explain variations in the policy implemented within a given country. In fact, it has been over 25 years since Vogel's work compared the regulatory processes of the USA and UK. As a result, this paper's interviews with agency rule writers in both countries provide an updated comparison of their rulemaking processes, which is essential to understanding why countries may vary in the climate change policy they implement. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Why Theater? Sociological Reflections on Art and Freedom, and the Politics of Small Things

In this paper using reflections on a dramatic moment in the life of the author’s ethnographic study of theater in Poland as a starting point, the relationship between art and politics is analyzed. The relationship between two central propositions is explored, leading to a conclusion: (1) Cultural freedom is a definitive characteristic of modern social life and (2) the freedom constituted by culture as the arts and sciences opens up public space for alternative social and political practices, and thus: cultural freedom is a base for political freedom. Applying these propositions to a study of theater in Poland, it is shown that art constitutes cultural freedom through its relative autonomy, and the politics of small things results. Societies are transformed.