Trajectories of Positive and Negative Behaviors from Early- to Middle-Adolescence

Although the positive youth development (PYD) model initially assumed inverse links between indicators of PYD and of risk/problem behaviors, empirical work in adolescence has suggested that more complex associations exist between trajectories of the two domains of functioning. To clarify the PYD model, this study assessed intraindividual change in positive and problematic indicators across Grades 5–10, and the links between these trajectories of development, among 2,516 participants from the 4-H Study of PYD (58.1% females; 64.9% European American, 7.0% African American, 12.3% Latino/a American, 2.6% Asian American or Pacific Islander, 1.8% Native American, 3.0% multiethnic-racial, and 8.4% with inconsistent race/ethnicity across waves). Results from person-centered analyses indicated that most youth clustered in the high trajectories of positive indicators and in the low trajectories of the negative ones. Consistent with past research, overlap between trajectories of positive and negative behaviors was found. These results suggest that theory and application need to accommodate to variation in the links between positive and problematic developmental trajectories.     

Work Values of Public,Nonprofit, and Business Employees: A Cross-Cultural Evidence

Employees’ work values, or beliefs about desirability of certain work attributes and outcomes, are believed to drive their motivation to work and stay in certain settings. This article compares work values of business, government, and nonprofit employees in a sample of nations with different cultural orientations—Germany, India, South Korea, Russia, South Africa, and the US. Results showed significant relationship between a country and work values variables, suggesting that a country's culture may have a potential to influence what individuals value in work. Additionally, employees of government, business, and nonprofit sectors differed in their work values in all six countries.     

Nurturing regulatory compliance: Is procedural justice effective when people question the legitimacy of the law?

Procedural justice generally enhances an authority's legitimacy and encourages people to comply with an authority's decisions and rules. We argue, however, that previous research on procedural justice and legitimacy has examined legitimacy in a limited way by focusing solely on the perceived legitimacy of authorities and ignoring how people may perceive the legitimacy of the laws and rules they enforce. In addition, no research to date has examined how such perceptions of legitimacy may moderate the effect of procedural justice on compliance behavior. Using survey data collected across three different regulatory contexts – taxation (Study 1), social security (Study 2), and law enforcement (Study 3) – the findings suggest that one's perceptions of the legitimacy of the law moderates the effect of procedural justice on compliance behaviors; procedural justice is more important for shaping compliance behaviors when people question the legitimacy of the laws than when they accept them as legitimate. An explanation of these findings using a social distancing framework is offered, along with a discussion of the implications the findings have on enforcement.     

Process and practice: groupness,ethnicity, and habitus in Carpathian Rus’

This article synthesizes Wimmer's and Brubaker's processual approach to analyzing ethnic groups with Jenkins and Bentley's practice-based theories of ethnicity to explain the role played by socio-emotional experiences and practical concerns in Carpatho-Rusyns, both mobilizing as an ethnic group as well as resisting such mobilization. Data were gathered from interviews and participant observation during the eight months of fieldwork in 10 different villages, towns, and cities in the Pre?ov region of Slovakia and the Zakarpattia oblast of Ukraine. Carpatho-Rusyns live in an area where borders have changed frequently and where religions, states, and political movements have encouraged the inhabitants’ assimilation to a new or larger group. Rusyns tend to describe ethnicity as instrumentalist theorists do, that is, something largely produced as a result of struggles over territory, resources, and political power. Nevertheless, they evince a profound emotional connection to their language, land, and spirituality. This emotional connection manifests itself among “ethnopolitical entrepreneurs” as well as among the general population, but only motivates explicit political organization among the former.     

To depend on one's children or to depend on oneself: savings for old-age and children's impact on wealth

How did workers make provisions for old age before the introduction of old age pensions? What was the relative importance of dependence on children and saving for old age respectively? This article concerns the transition from a traditional family-based system for economic support in old age to a more modern system. Regarding the nineteenth century, studies have shown that (a) savings generally were insufficient for full retirement, and that (b) families were dependent on children's incomes when the breadwinner became older. Little attention has been paid to the question of how the relative importance of these two alternatives changed during the century. This question is addressed here in a cross-sectional study of net wealth based on probate inventories for three Swedish towns in the 1820s and the 1900s.

The results show that in general the economic importance of children was larger among the lower socio-economic strata. They also reveal that net costs for having children increased between the investigated periods. This means that dependence on children became more expensive. Consequently, the economic importance of this alternative decreased. This may have been a strong motive for the fertility transition.

On the other hand, net wealth for workers increased at the end of the nineteenth century. Financial assets constituted a great part of the increase. Workers with children had less financial savings than those without children, showing that there was a conflict between the traditional and the modern systems for support in old age. However, still at the turn of the twentieth century funds were generally too small to allow an old worker to retire. These results indicate that neither the old, nor the modern systems, fully satisfied the need for support in old age. This may explain why several Western European countries introduced old age pensions at the beginning of the twentieth century.     

Interest group dynamics in a weak and transitional state: the case of Bolivia

Bolivia's political development has been characterized by elitist control set in an environment of political instability and a weak decentralized state. Since the 1980s and Bolivia's transition to a limited form of democracy, this elitist control has been successfully challenged from the left and, since the early 2000s, particularly by the indigenous population. In fact, Bolivian contemporary politics and interest group activity have been shaped mainly by the rise in political power of the left and indigenous interests. This rise, given a weak state transitioning to limited democracy, has had several consequences for interest group activity that add increasing complexity to the group system. One consequence of Bolivia's course of political development is that, although it exhibits many common elements of interest group activity explained by existing group theories, aspects of its group development are not adequately accounted for by these theories. In addition, there are questions about whether the new configuration of interest groups promotes or undermines democracy. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Regulating More Effectively: The Relationship between Procedural Justice, Legitimacy, and Tax Non-compliance

In recent years, a significant number of middle‐income taxpayers have been making use of aggressive tax planning strategies to reduce tax. In many cases, it is unclear whether these are designed and used by taxpayers to minimize tax legally or to avoid tax illegally. Those that are designed to exploit loopholes in tax law need to be dealt with in a way that restores faith and equity to the system. But how can tax authorities best manage taxpayers who may have inadvertently become involved in such illegal tax planning practices? Using longitudinal survey data, it will be shown that attempts to coerce and threaten taxpayers into compliance can undermine the legitimacy of the Tax Office's authority, which in turn can affect taxpayers' subsequent compliance behaviour. Responsive regulation, which is based on principles of procedural justice, will be discussed as an alternative enforcement strategy.