‘Whiteness,’ criminality,and the double standards of deviance/social control

White criminality is increasingly defined and controlled via the medical model. This is made possible by the white racial frame, which constructs ‘whiteness’ as normative and white deviance as individual aberration or mental illness. Conversely, the white racial frame constructs Blackness as synonymous with criminality. Media depictions of crime and criminals play a central role in furthering this framing, which provides the underlying legitimation for disparities in social control. The result is double standards of definition and control which medicalize whiteness and criminalize Blackness. This differential framing of whiteness and Blackness provides the foundation for the expansion of both the medical and prison industrial complexes, which are characterized by real racial differences despite comparable patterns of deviance across racial lines.     

National self-image as an obstacle to ensuring children’s rights in the context of domestic violence and family law – the case of Sweden

ABSTRACT

The aim of this paper is to highlight and discuss contradictions and challenges in the current policy and practice regarding fathers’ violence towards mothers and children in the Swedish welfare state. In particular, professional discourses and understandings of domestic violence in disputes about contact, custody, residence and maintenance, following parental separation, are analysed. My research suggests that abusers find ways to manipulate professionals and get them unwittingly to enable their continued control of victimised mothers and children. One conclusion is that oppression is maintained through processes of familialisation and selective repression. These discursive practices reproduce intersectional inequalities and, in doing so, in many cases result in the administration rather than prevention of further violence.     

Effortful control,negative emotionality,and juvenile recidivism: an empirical test of DeLisi and Vaughn’s temperament-based theory of antisocial behavior

Recently, DeLisi and Vaughn articulated a temperament-based theory of antisocial behavior which they expressed as the first within criminology to use temperament explicitly, and as the exclusive explanatory construct of both antisocial behavior and negative interactions with the criminal justice system. We provide an initial empirical test of the theory’s two main constructs of effortful control (EC) and negative emotionality (NE) with respect to juvenile offending using a sample of 27,712 adjudicated youth. Cox regressions reveal youth with lower levels of EC and those with higher NE re-offend faster, controlling for demographics plus many prominent risk factors. Furthermore, the approximately 5% of youth at the extreme ends of both low EC and high NE evidence higher recidivism rates and faster time to failure. The findings show strong initial support for temperament theory, and we discuss relevancy for future research, prevention and intervention.     

Youth crime and family disruption in Canadian municipalities: An adaptation of Shaw and McKay’s social disorganization theory

Using an adaptation of Shaw and McKay’s (1942) theory, the present study examined the effects of social disorganization and family disruption on youth crime. Based on data from 483 Canadian municipalities, the results revealed that low income, mobility and ethnic heterogeneity had the expected positive effects on youth crime, particularly in municipalities with smaller population and lower prevalence of low income. The effect of single parenthood was positive as expected whereas that of divorce was unexpectedly negative. The findings suggest the importance to specify the conditions for the effect of social disorganization and differentiate the effects of divorce and single parenthood. The unexpected negative effect also raises the possibility of divorce as law mobilization, thus underscoring the roles of planning and legal intervention in social disorganization. In terms of policies, the findings suggest early intervention for social disorganization, support for single-parent families, and the incorporation of divorcees in productive activities.     

Can community policing increase residents’ informal social control? Testing the impact of the Chicago Alternative Policing Strategy

This study examines whether community policing can build informal social control. Specifically, this paper assesses the impact of the Chicago Alternative Policing Strategy (CAPS) in Chicago neighborhoods. The data for this research are drawn from both the Community Survey of the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods (PHDCN) and the CAPS Prototype Panel Survey. Bivariate and multivariate methods are used to analyze data gathered from 8782 residents nested within 343 neighborhood clusters. Initially, community policing was found to increase informal social control, but this effect was rendered non-significant after controlling for theoretically and empirically relevant variables. Several social (dis)organization variables, as well as satisfaction with policing services, yielded significant effects in a multilevel regression model. Further analysis found that the community policing effect on informal social control was mediated through satisfaction with the police. These findings indicate indirect support for the ability of community policing to build informal social control and suggest that general satisfaction with the police is important to neighborhood crime control strategies.     

Surveillance and social control: the FBI’s handling of the Black Panther Party in North Carolina

Extant research on state policing of protest tends to focus on overt and physical forms of repression, yet far less work has examined more subtle types of social control. Such mechanisms often take place behind the scenes and are carried out within large government agencies. Drawing upon previously classified documents, we analyze the targeted investigation of the Black Panther Party by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) between 1968 and 1976. Findings indicate that directives from FBI headquarters to regional offices in North Carolina had three specific goals: forewarn law enforcement agencies of planned activities, gather evidence for possible preemptive prosecutions under an anti-sedition statute, and gather evidence for possible prosecution under existing firearm statutes. We highlight how local offices in North Carolina often distorted and embellished Black Panther activities to meet national FBI directives. Findings have important implications for ongoing state investigations of social movement activity.     

Social network analysis and small group ‘dark’ networks: an analysis of the London bombers and the problem of ‘fuzzy’ boundaries

Social network analysis (SNA) is believed to be capable of revealing significant insights into crime and terror groups, including identifying important individuals and unique approaches to disruption. However, SNA has a number of theoretical and practical limitations, particularly when applied to ‘dark’ networks. While most analysts certainly acknowledge at least some of these limitations, we need to know more about their potential impact in a crime intelligence context. This article aims to go some way towards that end by placing greater scrutiny on the problem of ‘fuzzy boundaries’ when applied to small group networks. SNA is applied to the groups responsible for the 7 July 2005 London bombings and the 21 July 2005 attempted London bombings. The article concludes that while SNA is a valuable tool for understanding crime and terror groups, the age-old problem of fuzzy boundaries can have a profound impact on the analysis of small dynamic networks.     

Fighting the obscene, pornographic, and unhealthy—an analysis of the nature, extent, and regulation of China’s online pornography within a global context

China??s Internet development has experienced an explosive growth in the last two decades. As China became the largest Internet user in the world, cyber crimes presented a new challenge. In its efforts to combat cyber crimes, the Chinese government singled out online pornography and labeled it ??online narcotics.?? Using the reports of online pornography found in the People??s Daily, a leading national newspaper, this study examines the extent and nature of online pornography in China??s unique context and how the Chinese government has worked to counter such crimes. The analyses of the official reports indicate that the number of China??s porn users has reached millions and continues to grow. To combat such behavior, the Chinese government has adopted a number of countermeasures such as increased law-making, strengthened law enforcement, and the use of new technology. While these countermeasures parallel those of other nations, China??s regulation also presents a number of unique features, such as its broad and sweeping control of online pornographic and unhealthy material for both adults and juveniles, its campaign-style policing, and its emphasis on building consensus with little dissenting opinion. China??s overreaching and proactive approach indicates substantial differences in national standards, value systems, and legal practices between China and many other nations.     

The internet and the state: Instrument of social control or subversive tecnology?

Conclusion Technological progress always contains within it the ironic dialectic of liberation and domination. The computer-based information highway is no exception. As a consequence, our own view is that the computer revolution contains the potential for both over-control and subversion of control. Science and technology are not neutral. They are social constructs that exist only within a context of choices of development and application. Therefore, it is not the technology that constrains, or oppresses, or liberates. Rather, the emancipatory potential of this new technology lies in the degree to which those who use it can disseminate it and maintain it as a relatively low-cost communication tool. To date, many of those involved in expanding the Internet frontier have generally been suspicious of and resistant to government intrusion into the Net. While it is often easier to simply dismiss such suspicion as the ranting of conspiracy theorists, history has taught us that such a na?ve faith in the benevolence of the government is unwise. Our intention here has not been to provide a definitive conclusion about the past, present, or future state of technological progress; instead we hope that our discussion will spark further critical analysis of technology and related topics.     

Adolescents’ level of knowledge of and supportive attitudes to sexual crime in the Swedish context

ABSTRACT

The aim of the present study was twofold. First, we wanted to quantify the level of knowledge of Swedish young people regarding sexual crime and to evaluate their supportive attitudes, while at the same time we aimed at identifying, through self-report, the sources that most contribute to such knowledge and attitudes. A sample of 245 upper secondary school students was selected from five schools in four Swedish counties. The results indicate that adolescents in Sweden have a high level of knowledge of rape, sexual molestation/harassment, and sexual exploitation of a dependent person. Furthermore, they show non-supportive attitudes to rape, sexual harassment, and sexual crime in general. However, some issues related to these types of crime proved to be confusing to the participants and, therefore, require targeting in education policies, specifically among juvenile males and those born abroad. The results are discussed in the context of the needs for sexual crime prevention.     

Linking the global to the national: an application of the international pathways model to examine the influence of international environmental agreements on Cameroon’s forest policy

Cameroon’s tropical forest cover is one of the largest in the world. It is home to some of the world’s rarest plant and animal species. However, the country has suffered extensive forest loss for many decades as a result of socioeconomic and political factors. The growing global concern for the health of the world’s forests and related global issues has placed pressure on Cameroon to sustainably manage its forests. The intricacies of domestic and international pressures on Cameroon’s forest sector means that policy makers have to take into consideration the dynamics of the domestic-international nexus in developing the country’s forest policies. The increasingly integrated global governance of the world’s forests—international agreements, protocols and treaties, international program, international institutions, international actors, and international norms—together constitute international policy regimes that have influenced the direction of Cameroon’s forest policy. Employing the international pathways framework model, an analytic model which describes how transnational actors and international institutions affect domestic policies and policy making, this paper examines the extent to which international environmental agreements have influenced the direction of Cameroon’s forest policy and policy making. The application of the international pathways model facilitated analytic review and allowed for a better understanding of how Cameroon has utilized the complex global forest governance arrangements to enhance its domestic forest policy.     

Fathers’ patenting behavior and the propensity of offspring to patent: an intergenerational analysis

In this paper we show that the patenting behavior of innovators is correlated with the patenting behavior of their fathers. Our argument for exploring this relationship stems from established theories of entrepreneurial behavior, specifically theories on intergenerational behavior. Our empirical analyses are based on survey data collected from MIT’s Technology Review (TR) winners.     

The threat of ‘woolly-haired grandchildren’: Race,the colonial family and German nationalism

The German colonial world was marked by an ostensibly self-evident boundary between the white ruler and the black ruled that situated Europeans and indigenous peoples as diametrically opposed and socially discrete. This situation, however, was problematised by the gendered and sexualised interactions between European and indigenous society. The result was often a slippage between the administrative attempts to create recognisably ‘German’ families (perceived in racial terms), and the antinomian realities of human relationships that transgressed racial lines. This in turn gave rise to reproductive anxieties in the face of a new liminal population of ‘half-castes’ (Mischlinge) that refused the white–black, master–slave dialectic of the colonial ideal. Many historians have recently attempted to link the troubled history of race relations in German Southwest Africa to the later history of Nazi anti-Semitism and genocide, by focusing on the apparent continuities between the Holocaust and the Herero–Nama wars. However, an alternative genealogy for the Holocaust that refutes this genocidal continuity thesis is possible through an investigation of the origins and contents of the debates about the nature of the German colonial family and its relationship to German citizenship between 1904 and 1914.     

The threat of ‘woolly-haired grandchildren’: Race,the colonial family and German nationalism

The German colonial world was marked by an ostensibly self-evident boundary between the white ruler and the black ruled that situated Europeans and indigenous peoples as diametrically opposed and socially discrete. This situation, however, was problematised by the gendered and sexualised interactions between European and indigenous society. The result was often a slippage between the administrative attempts to create recognisably ‘German’ families (perceived in racial terms), and the antinomian realities of human relationships that transgressed racial lines. This in turn gave rise to reproductive anxieties in the face of a new liminal population of ‘half-castes’ (Mischlinge) that refused the white–black, master–slave dialectic of the colonial ideal. Many historians have recently attempted to link the troubled history of race relations in German Southwest Africa to the later history of Nazi anti-Semitism and genocide, by focusing on the apparent continuities between the Holocaust and the Herero–Nama wars. However, an alternative genealogy for the Holocaust that refutes this genocidal continuity thesis is possible through an investigation of the origins and contents of the debates about the nature of the German colonial family and its relationship to German citizenship between 1904 and 1914.     

A Facebook post is born: exploring the process of generating MPs’ social media presence

Research on political communication between MPs and the public has focused on the role, activities and perceptions of the members of parliament (MPs) themselves. However, the authors’ prior research demonstrated that in fact social media necessitate a new prism through which to study such communication. The contribution of the present study is to look at this relationship through the heretofore under-researched prism of those who in fact are doing much of the actual communication (at least in Israel): the parliamentary assistants (PAs). Whereas other studies tend to focus on the communicative contents, the present research deals mainly with the behind-the-scenes processes that produce such content.

In this study 26 PAs were interviewed in Israel’s Knesset regarding three central questions: What are the goals of the MPs’ activities on Facebook? What are the key obstacles perceived by the assistants while maintaining MPs’ Facebook presence? What are the main professional dilemmas that PAs run into during their Facebook activity on behalf of MPs? By addressing these questions, the paper contributes to generating a more comprehensive picture of the ways political Facebook posts are born, and of the processes through which MPs’ social media presence is generated.     

Agents’ response to inefficient judiciary: social norms and the law in transition

The paper questions the impact of rule-based governance in an environment with poor legal enforcement and general mistrust in the law-setting institutions. We conduct a quasi-experiment and a survey to prove that ??law on books?? can still play a role by triggering the social norm of ??obeying the law??. We furthermore expose and empirically confirm the role of the Corporate Governance Code as a signaling tool, and discuss why in a weak institutional environment the Code??s potential may be even stronger than in the developed market economies.     

Social Rules: Some Problems for Hart’s Account,and an Alternative Proposal

What is a social rule? This paper first notes three important problems for H.L.A. Hart’s famous answer in the Concept of Law. An alternative account that avoids the problems is then sketched. It is less individualistic than Hart’s and related accounts. This alternative account can explain a phenomenon observed but downplayed by Hart: the parties to a social rule feel that they are in some sense ‘bound’ to conform to it.

     

‘Alien family’: The impact of the Aliens Act 1935 and subsequent Orders on the family in Ireland, 1933–1945

This article examines the consequences of Irish ‘aliens’ policy on families fleeing Nazi Germany using case studies of Irish German-speaking families and German-speaking families to ascertain the difficulties they faced. Analysis of the applications process undergone by families in order to secure a safe-haven from the reaches of the Third Reich reveals the main concerns of the Irish establishment and how these matters affected the potential safety of some individuals above others because of how they were officially categorised. Juxtaposing those who were considered an asset to Irish society against those who were not granted refuge this study traces the process both endured. While this article outlines the Irish government policy on refugees it focuses more particularly on how civil servants and government agencies implemented such policies and the subsequent impact on refugee family units affected by the Nazi regime.1 1?My doctoral research forms part of the German-speaking exiles in Ireland Project an initiative led by Dr Gisela Holfter in the Centre for Irish-German Studies at the University of Limerick. The overall project is attempting to fill a previous void in international exile studies, from an Irish perspective see Holfter, Gisela (Ed.). (2006 Holfter, Gisela, ed. 2006. German-speaking Exiles in Ireland 1933-1945, Amsterdam: Rodopi. New York [Google Scholar]). German-speaking Exiles in Ireland 1933-1945 Amsterdam/New York: Rodopi. This article attempts to reconcile internal policy, international relations and the effect these had on the lives of ordinary people both German-speaking and Irish. It will conclude by recognising the importance to the Irish authorities of the former two elements while acknowledging that despite them there were some successes for refugees although they were of least consequence in the priorities of the day.     

Parent–child contact problems and family intensive interventions: The crisis of adolescent suicidality and the role of social media

Although clinicians, educators and parents have been alarmed by the decline in the mental health of children and adolescents commensurate with the Covid-19 pandemic, statistics indicate there has been a downward spiral over the last decade. This has been evident in the overall increase in suicide rates for young people. For legal and mental health professionals working in the Family Court system, this has provided unique challenges. Most vulnerable has been those children and adolescents embroiled in high conflict divorces, especially those exhibiting parent child contact problems. This article focuses upon that population exhibiting parent child contact problems, and their treatment, specifically Family Intensive Intervention. Building Family Resilience is an Intensive family treatment program that has had to address this deterioration in child and adolescent mental health and increase in suicidality. The role of social media in both exacerbating and/or ameliorating mental health issues is explored.