The state,public policy,and AIDS discourse

The paper probes the deep structure of perceptions of AIDS and the ensuing public policy trends. AIDS has become the latest symbol indexing 20th century conflicts over the family and sexuality and recapitulates some features of early debates over contraception and the control of sexually transmitted diseases. From 1981 to 1983, public talk about AIDS was virtually taboo. Since 1983, the massive proliferation of AIDS discourse has led to the development of an official story common in the press and clear in the presumptions underlying recent state policies in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. These policies have favored state control of sexual speech and education, as well as control of people blamed for HIV infection, while community-based groups have sought to empower people to affirm their sexuality while avoiding viral transmission.     

The Popeye principle: selling child health in the first nutrition crisis

The cartoon character Popeye the Sailor was capable of superhuman feats of strength after eating a can of spinach. Popeye ate spinach because the association of spinach with strength was a product of the first national nutrition crisis in the United States: the 1920s fight against child malnutrition. Spanning the first three decades of the twentieth century, the malnutrition crisis arose from the confluence of many different events including the invention of nutrition science and new standards for height and weight; international food crises created by world war; the rise of consumerism, advertising, and new forms of mass media; and Progressive reformers' conviction that education was a key component of any solution. The history of the malnutrition crisis presented in this essay synthesizes disparate histories concerning advertising, public health, education, consumerism, philanthropy, and Progressive Era reform with original analysis of a major nutrition education program sponsored by the Commonwealth Fund in the 1920s. Because the character of Popeye came to embody one of the nutritional norms advocated in the 1920s, I refer to the influence of culturally constructed social norms on children's beliefs about health and nutrition as the Popeye Principle. The history of the malnutrition crisis demonstrates the importance of understanding the cultural and economic conditions surrounding childhood nutrition, the use and influence of numerical norms, and the mutually reinforcing influences on children's nutritional norms from their parents, peers, teachers, and culture.     

Sexual psychopathy, public policy, and the liberal state

This article addresses several interrelated issues. It strives to situate a class of offenders within the liberal state. The disposition of this class allows an analysis of the tensions in liberal theory. It highlights the ways liberalism attributes individual responsibility for criminal behavior and captures the limits of those attributions. It also reveals liberalism's shift away from models of responsibility toward the social control of deviancy. The disposition of this class points toward the therapeutic mask involved in the social control model. Further, the disposition of this class may well serve as a model for isolating and demonizing other disfavored classes, including political dissenters.     

Monitoring the uninsured: a state policy perspective

Because states have primary responsibility for the implementation of public health insurance programs, states need timely, good quality data to evaluate programs, monitor trends in the number and characteristics of the uninsured, and better understand the dynamics of health insurance coverage. This article provides a synthesis of the data sources available to states for monitoring rates of health insurance coverage. Information was collected through a comprehensive review of state and national health surveys and in-depth interviews with state analysts in all fifty states. Our findings suggest that national surveys do not meet states' needs for data, and in response, states have initiated their own household surveys. We provide information on thirty-six household surveys that are used to estimate state levels of health insurance coverage. We recommend that national and state efforts be better coordinated to facilitate efficient use of resources to achieve good state-level date.     

房产新政下的情势变更原则及其适用(上)

情势变更原则应当适用于异常商业风险,在房产新政已经导致合同实际履行困难或者不能履行的情况下,该房产新政具备异常因素而应当归属于情势变更事由。但即便如此,由于商事合同维系着社会经济交易稳定,而情势变更原则是保护合同的最后一道堡垒,房产新政下能否依当事人的请求而适用情势变更原则解除合同,仲裁员必须慎重对待,在双方未预见新政的情况下,应当先通过积极磋商的途径解决纠纷;在双方已预见新政且已作出相关风险防范的情况下,遵循有约定从约定原则,最大限度保护买卖双方合法权益。     

沦"儿童最大利益优先原则"在中国的确立——兼论《婚姻法》等相关法律的不足及其完善

International documents like the Declaration of the Rights of the Child (1959) and the Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989) propose that in mediating on children issues, the best interests of the child should be the primary consideration. In China, the Constitution and the Law on the Protection of Minors have already set out the terms in principle for the protection of minors, however, it has not been defined in the Marriage Law (2001). In order to enforce the commitment of respecting and safeguarding human rights, the child’s best interest principle should be established in marriage and family law, along with amending related provisions. Chen Wei is a professor of law, and director of the Research Center for Foreign Family Law and Women Theories in the China Southwest University of Political Science and Law. She is in the teachings of civil law, family law, law of succession, the history of civil law and comparative family law for years. During 2003–2004, Prof. Chen, being a visiting scholar, studied foreign family laws in the Faculty of Law, Sydney University. In academic field, she has published over 50 research articles in China and abroad; and her monograph is Research on the Legislations of Marriage and Family Law of China (2000). Further, she has taken charge of editing over 10 books, for instance, A Comparative Study of Family Laws between the Mainland and Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan of China (2002), A Comparative Study of Foreign Marriage and Family Law (2006) and A Comparative Study of Succession Laws among the Mainland, Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan of China (2007).     

Changing policy and practice in the child welfare system through collaborative efforts to identify and respond effectively to family violence

The Greenbook provides a roadmap for child welfare agencies to collaborate and provide effective responses to families who are experiencing co-occurring child maltreatment and domestic violence. A multisite developmental evaluation was conducted of six demonstration sites that received federal funding to implement Greenbook recommendations for child welfare agencies. Surveys of child welfare caseworkers show significant changes in several areas of agency policy and practice, including regular domestic violence training, written guidelines for reporting domestic violence, and working closely and sharing resources with local domestic violence service providers. Case file reviews show significant increases in the level of active screening for domestic violence, although this increase peaks at the midpoint of the initiative. These findings, coupled with on-site interview data, point to the importance of coordinating system change activities in child welfare agencies with a number of other collaborative activities.     

Implementing the principle of policy integration: institutional interplay and the role of international organizations

The implementation of the sustainable development principle of integration implies that economic laws should not be designed solely for the purpose of maximizing financial profits, but also with the object of improving human well-being, and addressing social and environmental concerns. International organizations, in which international treaties are being negotiated and created, will have to support this type of cross-disciplinary approach. International institutions, however, were not originally designed to cope with such a cross-disciplinary effort. Rather, most international institutions have emerged in line with the premise of ‘functionalism’, according to which their role is limited to supplying specialized services, usually as a solution for emerging needs and as a result of historical events. These specialized institutions have thus emerged with little coordination or common planning and have resulted in a global structure that has been referred to as an ‘accident of history’. The role that international organizations should and do fulfil with respect to the implementation of the principle of integration is reviewed in this paper. This paper concentrates on trade and investment organizations (the World Trade Organization and the Energy Charter Treaty); it reviews the channels through which non-trade/investment considerations may, or may not, penetrate the decision-making processes of these organizations; the ways these International organizations engage with interdisciplinary issues and how the objectives of other institutions are reflected in their work.