Does Eligibility for Protection Orders Prevent Repeat Abuse of Domestic Abuse Victims in Caribbean States?

The English-speaking Caribbean state of Barbados enacted protection orders legislation in 1992. The goal was to protect household members from domestic abuse inflicted by those with whom they live. To understand the impact of this policy, the study utilized a survival analysis model to test the hypothesis that eligibility for protection orders on Barbados contributed to a significantly lower hazard of repeat abuse for women, compared to women on St. Kitts where protection orders were not available. Data were drawn from police reports that document incidents of domestic abuse reported on Barbados and St. Kitts where high rates of domestic abuse persist. The study found only a negligible difference between the hazard of repeat abuse of women on St. Kitts and women on Barbados.

Fake Claims of Fake News: Political Misinformation,Warnings, and the Tainted Truth Effect

Political Behavior - Fact-checking and warnings of misinformation are increasingly salient and prevalent components of modern news media and political communications. While many warnings about...     

Ultraviolet illumination as an adjunctive aid in dental inspection

Tooth-colored resin fillings have become increasingly popular as restorative materials. Their presence in the dentition presents a challenge to the clinician and the forensic odontologist, as detection of the fillings can be difficult both visually and radiographically. As they necessarily form part of the unique dentition of an individual, recognition of the resins is important for forensic identification. Alternative light sources have been used with success in various fields of forensic science. In recent years small LED flashlights emitting at specific wavelengths in the ultraviolet light (UV) range have been developed. Their low cost, small size, and ready availability makes their use practical in both forensic dental inspection and clinical settings. UV inspection is of interest because enamel, dentin and dental materials all have differing fluorescent properties when illuminated by UV light. It was one goal of this research to quantitatively assess the fluorescence properties of modern restorative resins in order to predict their behavior during inspection using UV illumination. The second goal was to demonstrate practical use of UV in dental inspection with examples of how different materials fluoresce. Quantitative measurements were obtained for optical emission wavelength and intensity for 15 modern resins using a spectrophotometer. Results indicated that resin brands fluoresce at different wavelengths and with varying intensities. Practical use and comparison of the flashlights revealed that the most useful excitation wavelengths for resin detection were in the UVA range (365 and 380 nm). Porcelain restorations and composite resin fillings exhibited different responses to these two wavelengths and thus use of both is recommended for forensic dental inspection.     

‘Bread and butter’ human rights: NGOs in Fiji

While ‘rights-based’ approaches to development – those in which development and poverty alleviation are viewed through the lens of human rights – have become the language of choice among the international development community, less is known about how human rights are used for development at the local level. Using a case study of Fiji, this research investigates how local NGOs understand and use human rights for development. It demonstrates some of the tensions involved in translating broad and supposedly universal approaches to human rights into local contexts.     

Family Court Enhancement Project: Improving Access to Justice

In 2013, Minnesota's Fourth Judicial District was one of four courts in the country selected by the U.S. Department of Justice, Office on Violence Against Women to receive a Family Court Enhancement Project (FCEP) grant, a multiyear demonstration initiative designed to build the capacity of court systems and partner stakeholders to improve child custody decision making in cases involving domestic violence. The FCEP enabled the project sites to explore, implement, and assess new and innovative court and noncourt procedures and practices. This article is an exploration of the outcomes of this project.     

Parental attitudes following exposure to child abuse prevention campaign materials: a randomized trial

The purpose of this study was to evaluate child abuse prevention campaign materials. Using a randomized posttest design, 600 parents from an online research panel were recruited and surveyed. Multiple regression results indicate that exposure to the campaign materials had a significant relationship with four of the five domains (effects of child maltreatment, the appropriateness of harsh parenting, the physical dangers and needs unique to childhood, and the power to prevent child maltreatment). These results have implications for the child abuse prevention practitioners who seek to design and distribute effective campaign materials.     

A case study in public child welfare: county-level practices that address racial disparity in foster care placement

Racial disproportionality has been a longstanding issue within child welfare. The continued overrepresentation of black children in the foster care system is troubling. The authors of this article conducted a case study of two counties in New York State that have steadily decreased the number of black children in foster care in an effort to identify what aspects of their child welfare practice impacted the decline. The case study employed document analysis, in-depth interviews, and focus groups with child removal decision makers. Utilizing a grounded theory approach to content organization and analysis, several themes emerged as noticeable factors. Some of the most salient themes included preventive services and resources, community collaborations, case practice development, family meetings, workforce diversity, the court system, and, the most unique, blind removal meetings. The themes found in this study present promising practices to assist in decreasing the racial disparity in child welfare removal decisions.     

Conscience in public administration: More than just a chirping cricket?

The policy and practice of public administration are caught between two seemingly incommensurate goals. Public servants are expected to be responsible to the oversight and control of democratically elected governments, yet, as the policy space becomes more complex, are forced to exercise more judgment and discretion in their responsibilities. Individual, collective, and professional conscience is motivated across this spectrum of challenges. This article explores the concepts of discretion and conscience in theory and practice in the Canadian context. It offers insights into how conscience can, and perhaps must, be both accommodated and supported more appropriately in the practice of 21^st‐century public administration and service. At root, we argue that an array of strategies and approaches may help to build relational reciprocity to a broader set of norms that are necessary for efficient and effective governance.     

Making Every Vote Count: The Important Role of Managerial Capacity in Achieving Better Election Administration Outcomes

A public agency's capacity to implement policy and achieve valued public outcomes has been a long-running area of research in public administration. Many articles provide theory and empirics regarding the capacity to implement policy, but relatively few examine multiple types of agency capacity within the same analysis. This article develops a model based on the election administration literature in political science and public administration to examine the effects of managerial capacity, financial capacity, and technology on the election management outcome of the residual vote rate in North Carolina election jurisdictions. The results indicate that higher levels of management capacity and technology significantly reduce problems with voting as measured by the residual vote rate. Financial capacity shows a negative association with the residual vote rate but is not significant. The article concludes by discussing how studying election administration provides an important and uniquely good administrative context for developing administrative theory.