Terrorism,Agenda 2063 and the challenges of development in Africa

The nobility of the objectives and aspiration of the African Union's Agenda 2063 towards the developmental needs of the African people are laudable, as are the attempts being made to ensure collective action, despite the ‘shield of sovereignty behind which too many corrupt leaders have hidden’. However, these noble objectives and aspirations may be undermined and threatened by the upsurge in militant Islamism and the spread of terrorism within and outside Africa, a fact not being addressed by Agenda 2063. Yet while Agenda 2063 does not seek to address the challenges posed by terrorist networks within the continent, which are threatening human security as well as the sovereignty, territoriality, legitimacy and stability of political regimes, these issues are at the core of the agenda. This article argues for Agenda 2063 to step up its efforts to combat both the roots of terrorism and the threat to development that terrorism itself poses.     

The Regionalisation of Judicial Review: Constitutional Authority,Access to Justice and Specialisation of Legal Services in Public Law

Since April 2009 judicial reviews may be dealt with at regional centres and in Cardiff. This change significantly relaxed the hitherto highly centralised system of judicial review in England and Wales. The main aims were to improve access to public law redress by enabling cases to be listed and heard at the most appropriate regional location. Despite recognition of the need to improve regional access, fears exist that this reform will threaten the standing and authority of judicial review in this jurisdiction; that it will contribute to a fragmentation of judicial review and, in the regions, reduce the quality of public law adjudication, legal advice and representation. Drawing on an empirical study on the regional use of judicial review, this paper assesses these matters and considers the early effects of regionalisation on access to judicial review and the development of regional markets for legal services in public law.     

Maintaining programme integrity: the FOR . . . A Change programme and the resettlement of ex-prisoners

This article describes the process and results of monitoring the programme integrity of FOR . . . A Change, a group programme for offenders, as it was being delivered in three prisons in the United Kingdom. In so doing, it briefly describes the aims, structure, and theoretical orientation of the programme; explains what informed the particular approach to checking for integrity and how it was implemented; outlines the results; and finally, postulates the requisite conditions for the successful maintenance of programme integrity.     

Ethnic Diversity and Social Capital in Europe: Tests of Putnam's Thesis in European Countries

This article focuses on the core theory recently proposed by Putnam on the relationship between ethnic diversity and dimensions of social capital. Hypotheses are derived from this theory, but also from other theories that propose competing hypotheses on relationships between national characteristics and dimensions of social capital. Essentially, the authors propose more rigorous empirical tests of Putnam's hypotheses by including these competing hypotheses: tests of these hypotheses provide possibilities to evaluate Putnam's and these other theories in terms of general (i.e. cross‐national) tenability for the European continent. The general question is: To what extent do national‐level characteristics like ethnic diversity, next to other national characteristics, actually affect dimensions of social capital of individual citizens in European countries? The authors set out to answer this question by testing hypotheses on cross‐national data from 28 European countries. These data contain valid measurements of a number of dimensions of social capital. The individual‐level data are enriched with contextual‐ (i.e. national‐) level characteristics to be included in more advanced multilevel analyses. The main finding is that Putnam's hypothesis on ethnic diversity must be refuted in European societies. Instead, it is found that economic inequality and the national history of continuous democracy in European societies turn out to be more important for explaining cross‐national differences in social capital in Europe.     

Red tape and technology transfer in US government laboratories

The purpose of this paper is to gauge the effects of red tape and bureaucratization on the technology-transfer activities and effectiveness of government laboratories in the United States. Two central questions are addressed: Do laboratories involved significantly in technology transfer have more red tape than others? and Does the level of red tape have an effect on technology-transfer success? Objective and perceptual measures of red tape are used. Technologytransfer effectiveness is measured in terms of getting other organizations to adopt technology developed in the laboratory (“out the door” success) and of the commercial impact of transfers. Data are derived from questionnaire responses provided by directors of 276 federal- and state-government laboratories. Results indicate that laboratories involved in technology transfer do not have higher levels of red tape. Out-the-door technology-transfer success relates strongly to low degrees of perceived red tape, whereas high ratings for commercial impact are associated with actual low levels of red tape in acquiring project funding and lowcost equipment.     

Understanding gender differences in distributive and procedural justice

Gender differences in treatment and in judgments of distributive and procedural justice were examined. Three hundred nine litigants who had been involved in arbitrated auto negligence lawsuits responded to exit surveys. Two mechanisms by which gender might influence justice perceptions were explored. First, we examined whether a “chivalry bias” might be operating, in which the procedures systematically favor women over men. If such biases occur, women might feel they had been treated more fairly because of egocentric biases. Results provided only modest support for the chivalry bias. While women received slightly better awards and perceived somewhat more control than men, these differences had no effect on perceptions of distributive or procedural justice. Second, we examined whether men and women differ systematically in the factors they use as indicators of distributive and procedural justice. On the basis of group-value theory we predicted that women might place more emphasis on standing or on outcome favorability. The study revealed that men and women did differ in how they defined distributive justice, with women placing more emphasis on their perceived standing and on their perceptions of the favorability of their outcomes. There were no substantial gender differences in how procedural justice was defined. Results are interpreted in terms of how women might be responding to insecurity about facing a justice system historically dominated by men. An erratum to this article is available at .