Making civic engagement go viral: Applying social epidemiology principles to civic education

This paper explores the connections between education for youth civic engagement and theories and strategies from public health (specifically, epidemiology). We illustrate this with four applications of epidemiologic theory to youth civic engagement: social determinants and fundamental causes, vulnerable populations and cumulative disadvantage, positive spillover, and herd immunity and critical mass. Formalizing concepts of current civics, in schools and the public, as a civic epidemic, we present a case for individual‐ and group‐level interventions based around targeted, school‐based, effective civic education initiatives. Grounded in epidemiological theory, such approaches call attention to the simultaneous need to improve broad civics education and ensure that particular populations receive necessary attentions.     

An Assessment of the Impact that Participation in Local Climate Networks Has on Cities’ Implementation of Climate,Energy, and Transportation Policies

Much of the attention surrounding local climate protection in the United States is associated with two networks: ICLEI Local Governments for Sustainability's Cities for Climate Protection and the U.S. Conference of Mayors’ Climate Protection Agreement (MCPA). However, the impact of these networks on member‐city actions has not been clearly established. This paper examines whether, and to what extent, participation in climate networks leads to the implementation of greenhouse gas (GHG)‐reducing policies, above and beyond what would have been done in their absence. To account for the possibility that cities which join climate networks are systematically different from those that do not and control for self‐selection induced bias, three statistical techniques—propensity score matching, Heckman full information maximum likelihood, and instrumental variables—are employed to estimate the “treatment effect” of participation. Results suggest that impact is network specific: ICLEI membership causes small to moderate increases in cities’ GHG‐relevant activity, whereas the MCPA has no such effect. The characteristics of each network are evaluated in light of these findings.     

POSTDECREE LITIGATION Is Joint Custody to Blame?

The Joint Custody Symposium Project examined almost 600 court files in five judicial districts to investigate the common perception that joint custody contributes significantly to relitigation rates. Data indicated that joint custody as a factor accounted for only 10.8% of court returns. Financial concerns accounted for the majority of actions. Disputes over child custody appeared to be related to finances as well. Unfortunately, returns to court do not necessarily resolve the financial needs of divorced parents. The findings suggest that children may be used as pawns in court battles over money that are disguised as parenting concerns, as evidenced by the close relationship found between visitation or custody disputes and child support modification filings.     

Patents and Appropriation: Concerns and Evidence1

For over the past twenty years, the United States has witnessed a pro-patent movement. In response, numerous concerns have been raised, including possible impediments to innovation in cumulative technologies, emergence of anti-commons, barriers to entry and an elevation of costs of innovation associated with defensive patenting, growth in patent litigation and poor quality patents. Although there is little systematic evidence that these concerns have materialized in any substantial way, vigilance is nonetheless warranted.     

Negotiating Integrative Medicine: A Framework for Provider–Patient Conversations

Efforts to integrate complementary and alternative medical (CAM) therapies into conventional medical settings are creating a variety of negotiation challenges between various stakeholders. Focusing on the two-party encounter between physician and patient offers a way to understand the application of principled negotiation to perhaps the most fundamental and emotionally charged place within the health care system in which the introduction of CAM therapies is likely to disrupt relationships and produce conflict. This article suggest ways in which the theory and analysis of principled negotiation can add to current liability and ethical frameworks, and might thereby contribute to optimal future health care by helping to wisely integrate CAM therapies into conventional medical care.     

Foreign advisors and capacity building: The case of Kenya

Approximately 100,000 foreign advisors work in the public sectors of Sub-Saharan African countries at an annual cost of more than $4 billion. The numbers, range of services, and costs of such advisors increased during the 1980s while at the same time donors launched new efforts to build professional capacity in the African civil service. Based on a study of advisors and their counterpart economists in Kenya's Ministry of Planning and National Development, this article addresses three important questions: what are the functions carried out by advisors in the development ministries?; why is it so difficult to retain skilled professionals in the civil service?; and how does the provision of advisors affect the retention of skilled government officers?     

Relationship Between Two Types of Help Seeking Behavior in Domestic Violence Victims

A coordinated community response system to the help-seeking behaviors of domestic violence victims is critical to minimize the impact of violent events and to educate the public, so that safe and effective conflict management skills may replace violent responses. The focus for the present study is to identify and analyze victims’ choices of law enforcement assistance in stopping the violence and/or aid through the services of the regional family violence center. Some victims select legal channels of support; others rely exclusively on social service support, and others seek assistance from both sources. Characteristics of victims whose cases followed two types of help-seeking behavior patterns—legal support or social support–were determined through archived data from both the records of a regional family violence center (FVC) (n=258) and domestic violence incident reports of a police department serving a city of approximately 200,000 citizens (n=127). Findings indicate that African American victims more frequently sought protection through law enforcement sources than they did through family violence center services, and the reverse was true for Euro-Americans.