A NOTE ON AMERICA'S "CLOACAL" JAILS

A large literature points to the abominable condition of American jails. Comparison of national surveys of jail conditions conducted in 1972 and 1978 indicates that what little improvement has occurred is minimal compared to remaining problems. A number of factors have prevented state-set standards from achieving widespread improvement in local jail conditions: high costs, local autonomy and lack of credible threats for forcing compliance. The failure of New York State to implement adequate health standards illustrates the limitations of the standards approach. Other approaches, such as strategies for replacing local jails with regional facilities, deserve the attention of policy researchers.     

THE STATUTORY CORPORATION—A NOTE ON THE THEORY OF AUTONOMY

Readers of this journal, especially those who watch developments affecting the machinery of government in Canberra, will no doubt have noticed the rehabilitation of the concept of statutory independence—a notion that, in some academic circles, had been virtually written off as having little or no relevance in the real world, where the general tendency has been towards an extension of government control and co-ordination of bureaucratic systems. Although it is much too early to evaluate, with suitable scholarly detachment, the significance of the administrative changes initiated since December, 1972, it seems a safe observation that for a small group of government agencies at least, the Labor Government has committed itself to the idea of independence. This much is clear from its declared aim of giving the Australian Broadcasting Commission more autonomy and the decision, recently announced, to reconstitute the Postmaster-General's Department into two separate statutory corporations.