Reeling in Disengaged Students: An Assessment of a Countywide Juvenile Court Attendance Program

On any given day, thousands of youths are absent from school; many are absent without a legitimate excuse and thus deemed truant. Truancy has been linked to various problem behaviors including academic failure, delinquency, and school dropout. Thus, the prevention of truancy is assumed to have beneficial effects far into the future. This study provides an overview of an innovative truancy abatement program operating in southwestern Idaho known as the Ada County Attendance Court. Qualitative and quantitative data are presented to show how the program operates, its effects, and how it differs from other truancy prevention programs nationwide.     

GENDER,SOCIAL NETWORKS,AND RESIDENTIAL BURGLARY*

Criminological researchers have devoted substantial attention to the nature and dynamics of residential burglary, but the role played by gender in shaping this offense remains largely unexplored. Feminist ethnographers have documented the fact that streetlife is highly gendered, and that this typically serves to marginalize women's participation in criminal networks and activities. Therefore, it appears likely that residential burglary—a prototypically social offense that requires good network connections—will be strongly influenced by gender dynamics. In this study, we analyze in‐depth, semi‐structured interviews with 18 female and 36 male active residential burglars to examine the ways in which gender structures access to, participation in, and potential desistance from, residential burglary. In doing so, we aim to provide an insider's view of how gender stereotypes are expressed, reinforced, and exploited within streetlife social networks, and how these networks shape the lived experience of men and women engaged in residential burglary.     

THE EFFECT OF IMPRISONMENT ON RECIDIVISM RATES OF FELONY OFFENDERS: A FOCUS ON DRUG OFFENDERS*

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the deterrent effect of imprisonment. Using data on offenders convicted of felonies in 1993 in Jackson County (Kansas City), Missouri, we compare recidivism rates for offenders sentenced to prison with those for offenders placed on probation. We find no evidence that imprisonment reduces the likelihood of recidivism. Instead, we find compelling evidence that offenders who are sentenced to prison have higher rates of recidivism and recidivate more quickly than do offenders placed on probation. We also find persuasive evidence that imprisonment has a more pronounced criminogenic effect on drug offenders than on other types of offenders.     

SUPPORT FOR THE SUPREME COURT AS A NATIONAL POLICYMAKER

The most frequent explanations for the endurance of the Supreme Court's policies and of its power as a national policymaker assume public reverence for the Court, widespread support for it as an institution, or broad-based agreement with its policies. Public opinion studies refute most of these assumptions. Our research confirms those studies and shows, in addition, that the Court cannot claim strong support among occasional political activists. It does, however, have a strong constituency among liberal activists and liberal position-holders. We hypothesize, therefore, that the Court's endurance as a national policymaker is explained by special support from one wing of the dominant party coalition that, because of its strategic location in the complex national policy process, is able to obstruct broadly-based attacks on the Court's authority and policy. Such attacks gain force, however, when critical elections alter the dominant party coalition and therefore weaken the hold of the Court's ideological allies. Yet even then—or at least so far—the Court and its policies have prevailed against various court curbing efforts.     

THE 1976 ELECTION AND THE AMERICAN POLITICAL SYSTEM

Abstract The elections, remembered as the first in which an incumbent President was defeated since 1932, show other characteristics inconsistent with usual interpretations. The Democratic Party's selection procedure managed to produce a moderate around whom the party could unite for the first time since 1964 while the Republicans experienced a damaging fight which the more extreme candidate almost won. Analysis of the results refutes many common conclusions. The popular vote was not as close as in other postwar elections; regional variations less pronounced and party more important in the campaign than had been supposed. The Republicans showed surprisingly strongly in the Presidential election, but did disastrously again in others. No satisfactory theory explains the discrepancy. Republicans still challenge strongly for the Presidency but consistently fail elsewhere.