Public Service Motivation Research: Achievements,Challenges, and Future Directions

This article takes stock of public service motivation research to identify achievements, challenges, and an agenda for research to build on progress made since 1990. After enumerating achievements and challenges, the authors take stock of progress on extant proposals to strengthen research. In addition, several new proposals are offered, among them conducting more research on the disaggregated construct, developing grounded theory of public service motivation to understand contextual variations across cultures and political institutions, and improving current measures to better capture loyalty to governance regime as an institutional dimension of the public service motivation construct.     

Aberrent group B reactions detected in mixtures of semen and vaginal secretions possibly due to acquired B

Routine ABO grouping tests performed on vaginal swabs from a group O female showed the presence of blood group B activity as well as the expected A and H activity after intercourse with her group A partner. The source of the B activity was readily detectable using the Laboratory's routine elution test, but it was not detectable when a monoclonal anti-B was used and detection by the inhibition technique was possible only with a selected antiserum. A possible explanation of the reactions observed is that the acquired B is capable of reacting with only a portion of the antibodies present in normal polyclonal anti-B sera.     

Democracy in Georgia Since the Rose Revolution

Success for Georgia's nascent democracy would be a major success for the democracy-promotion efforts of the United States, which has hailed the democratization there since the Rose Revolution as a success even as concerns have been voiced by some observers regarding the pace and direction of this effort. The U.S. policy of unconditional support for Georgia's government and its disinterest in drawing attention to the new government's democratization shortcomings call into question how serious the United States is about democracy-promotion, particularly in countries that have a semi-democratic but pro-American government. A U.S. approach to Georgia that recognizes the challenges there and seeks to help it solve these problems will demonstrate that America is sincere in its desire to promote democracy, not just to support friendly governments.     

‘There’s just places ya’ don’t wanna go’: the segregating impact of hate crime against Native Americans

Between 1999 and 2001, I interviewed or surveyed nearly 300 Native Americans in seven states, in an effort to uncover insights into the prevalence, dynamics, and local contexts of hate crime as experienced by Native Americans living in remote, rural reservations. One of the predominant themes that emerged revolved around one of the most damaging effects of the ongoing racial harassment and violence that threatens them on a daily basis. What I have observed is that hate crime has become an institutionalized mechanism for establishing boundaries, both social and physical. It reinforces historical patterns of withdrawal and isolation, in short, segregation. Through violence, the threat of violence, or even through the malevolent gaze, Native Americans are daily reminded that there are places in which they are not welcome. For too many American Indians, the perception, if not the reality of ‘what’s out there’ has its intended effect of keeping people in their place.     

The politics of China's peasant revolution

Abstract

Efforts to explain the success of the Chinese Communist revolution have preoccupied more than a few American historians and political scientists in recent years. Most of these scholars, following the trail blazed by George Taylor's The Struggle for North China, have focused attention on the War of Resistance period (1937–1945) in search of the factors responsible for the phenomenal growth in Communist power. Chalmers Johnson, with his famous thesis of “peasant nationalism,” emphasizes the importance of the Japanese invasion for rural mobilization in China. Mark Selden, by contrast, identifies the Communist Party's positive wartime policies—the “Yenan Way”—as the key to revolutionary victory. Carl Dorris, while agreeing with much of Selden's explanation, locates the source of these successful wartime policies not in the capital of Yenan, but in the guerrilla bases of North China, especially Jin-Cha-Ji.     

Hermeneutical dimensions of a media ethic

Abstract

This article explores the concept of a communication ethic, with specific reference to news practice. Can communication be ethically neutral? I would argue that it cannot and will show that certain hermeneutical elements (or aspects of interpretation theory) not only make communication possible, but morally accountable as well. Guided by the philosophy of Hans-Georg Gadamer, I will draw on a recent presentation by Donald Matheson, who teaches journalism at Canterbury University, in New Zealand. Three obstacles in the path towards a fuller ethical vision of news practice are initially examined: an emphasis on verification of factual presentation at the expense of meaning-making, the inadequacy of ethical discourses of independence and distrust of sources, and the methodological relationship between ethical discourse and practice. An alternative conceptualisation of news practice challenges the bias against understanding implicit in traditional news practice, discovers an intrinsic role for the subjectivity of the journalist and comes to recognise the importance of what Jake Lynch terms an ‘ethic of responsibility’. To the same end of a more accountable media ethic, certain key concepts of Gadamer's hermeneutical philosophy, such as openness, listening, close distance and self-knowledge, are introduced and briefly discussed.     

An Investigation of a Community-based Intervention for Socially Isolated Parents with a History of Child Maltreatment

A randomized field trial was conducted to test the effectiveness of a community-based intervention to enhance the prosocial interaction and psychological well-being of urban, Head Start parents with a history of child maltreatment. One-hundred and sixteen socially isolated parents participated. Forty of these parents had a history of child maltreatment. Maltreatment and non-maltreatment parents were assigned randomly to intervention and control conditions. The intervention involved 10 group-training sessions focusing on the relationship between stress and social support. Analyses revealed a significant main effect for the intervention group with intervention parents reporting lower levels of stress and higher levels of social activity than controls. No main effects for maltreatment status or maltreatment by intervention group interactions were found. Implications for community-based treatment were discussed.