Child Sexual Abuse Perpetrated by Women: Case Series and Review of the Literature

The literature on child sexual abuse (CSA) perpetrated by female sexual offenders (FSOs) is exiguous, and many studies have focused on judicial databases. The present retrospective study, instead, analyzed clinical and judicial data of a group of both victims and alleged FSOs, to additionally include women who have not been convicted by the criminal justice system, but who hold strong clinical suspicions of being perpetrators of CSA. The medical records and the Court files of 11 children and their eight suspected FSOs have been collected and critically reviewed in light of the literature to date. This approach allowed for a deeper understanding of the relationship between child and FSO. The authors hypothesize that the victims’ severe psychopathological outcomes were a result of a failure to develop appropriate attachments with their prospective caregivers, which could have been damaged by the pathological relationship with FSOs, who were the victims’ caregivers.     

THE HEAVY ENGINEERING ADJUSTMENT AND DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM: ORIGINS, PROCESS AND OUTCOMES

Abstract: An industry-specific plan for the heavy engineering industry was introduced by the federal Labor government in 1986. It is an important subject for several reasons. Heavy engineering is a vital industry but receives little publicity. The manner of the plan's introduction is representative of Labor's priorities in its first period of office. The plan's character was exemplary in its forward-looking emphasis on reconstruction. Finally, the adverse bureaucratic environment in which the plan operated provides salutary lessons for cost-efficient and workable industry policy in the future.     

Trends in explosive contamination

This study sought to assign a rough order of magnitude for the amount of explosive residue likely to be available in real-world searches for clandestine explosives. A variety of explosives (TNT, TATP, HMX, AN, RDX, PETN) in various forms (powder, flake, detonating cord, plastic) were carefully weighed or cut into containers, and the amount of residue inadvertently remaining on the work area, hands, or containers was quantified. This was used to evaluate the spillage potential of each explosive. The adhesion of each explosive to a glass surface was quantified from amount of explosive adhering to the inside of a glass vial into which the explosive had been placed and then removed by vigorous tapping. In powdered form, most of the explosives--TNT, PETN, RDX, HMX, and TATP--exhibited similar spillage and adhesion to glass. However, PETN as sheet explosive and plasticized RDX (C-4), showed very little potential to contaminate surfaces, either by spillage or adhesion to glass.     

The Purse Strings and the Policy Process: Bureaucratic Shaping of Industry Policy Capacity after 1945

Much literature in public administration debates the role of the public servant in the policy-making process. Some literature acknowledges an integral role of the public servant in the process. However, this role often remains obscure, due to being couched in abstract terms. The hierarchical structuring of responsibilities and power within bureaucracies imparts the capacity for differential influence. This paper provides a case study of the role of the Public Service Board (power over staffing) and the Australian federal Treasury (power over the purse) in the shaping of the bureaucratic structure. The case study centres on the industry policy bureaucracy in the volatile decade after World War II. In shaping the bureaucratic capacity, the Board and the Treasury exerted a discretionary influence on the policy process itself.     

Boundary institutions and HIV/AIDS policy in Brazil and South Africa

Why have some national governments acted more aggressively to address the HIV/ AIDS pandemic than others? More specifically, what explains, widely varied responses across Brazil and South Africa—two countries where one might have expected more similarity than difference? We argue thatboundary institutions—those sets of rules and practices that give social and political meaning to group identities—help explain this puzzle. Institutions interact with other pressures to structure the dissemination of information, the construction of risk, and priorities within society. Where institutions divide groups deeply, elites and ordinary citizens are less likely to feel volnerable, and more likely to blame other groups, making aggresive government action far less likely.