State Capacity in Contemporary China: ‘closing the pits and reducing coal production’

This paper analyses the capacity of China's central state to control society and implement its policies at the local level, using as a case study the implementation from 1998 of a major policy initiative—‘closing the pits and reducing coal production’. The aims of this policy were to close down many of the TVE (township and village enterprise) mines, thereby ameliorating China's coal safety record, and to reduce output in order to balance supply and demand, thereby improving the situation of the SOE (state-owned enterprise) coal mines. The paper concludes that, despite some success, the state found it difficult to overcome resistance from a powerful coalition of local cadres, mine bosses, workers and farmers who depended directly or indirectly on the mines for their living. It therefore highlights continuing shortfalls in China's state capacity, particularly in situations where the state is trying to control or influence the distribution of economic rents as between different groups in society.     

The Voting Rights Act and Louisiana: Twenty Years of Enforcement

This article examines the interaction of structural change (lawsaffecting voting rights) and cultural continuities (differencesbetween the Protestant and black Catholic political cultures)on the level and quality of black political participation inLouisiana. Blacks who at mid-century resided in the French-Catholicparishes were more likely to register and vote than blacks wholived outside these parishes. The advent of the Voting RightsAct has radically changed this pattern. Northern parishes havingthe highest proportion of black population, the highest landtenancy rates, and a tradition of a plantation economy are nowamong the parishes exhibiting the highest rates of black voterregistration.     

Postmortem interval estimation from body temperature data only

One of the most consistently used methods of postmortem interval estimation (PMIE) is by means of body temperature measurements. Several variations of this method exist, from simple 'rules of the thumb' to quite complex equations requiring a knowledge of body mass and height. All of these methods employ a certain degree of approximation and perhaps the use of standard values and tables, and all of them are susceptible to some degree of error. The present study, at the Department of Forensic Medicine, Leeds, was initiated by the Home Office to investigate the extent of the errors which might be encountered in the use of these methods, and to devise a more simple and accurate method. The method devised is called the time-dependent-z equation, for purely theoretical reasons. It will be referred to as the TDZE method. The TDZE method requires the measurement of two rectal temperatures, about 1 h apart, a little mental arithmetic and reference to a single standard curve. The method is valid for all bodies, obese or emaciated, clothed or naked, in all environmental conditions, without modification. Results of the use of the method on data collected from 67 coroner's cases compare favourably with the results obtained by the use of other methods on the same data.     

Scholar Networks and the Manuscript Economy in Nyāya-śāstra in Early Colonial Bengal

Journal of Indian Philosophy - This essay engages with two large themes in order to address the social and intellectual practices of nyāya scholars in early colonial Bengal. First, I examine...     

Unanswered Questions about Public Service Motivation: Designing Research to Address Key Issues of Emergence and Effects

As public service motivation research gains momentum, important questions emerge regarding its origins and consequences that are not addressed by existing research. The authors identify some fundamental public service motivation assumptions, including critical gaps in our current understanding of its basic tenets. The authors then discuss specific research studies that, by virtue of their findings and designs, may fill in and inform such apparent gaps. Their aim is to chart new concrete directions for scholarship that complements and advances existing public service motivation research.     

Predictors of child molestation: adult attachment, cognitive distortions, and empathy

A conceptual model derived from attachment theory was tested by examining adult attachment style, cognitive distortions, and both general and victim empathy in a sample of 61 paroled child molesters and 51 community controls. Results of logistic multiple regression showed that attachment anxiety, cognitive distortions, high general empathy but low victim empathy significantly increased the odds of child molester status. Findings supported theoretically based hypotheses, suggesting that attachment theory may be useful in the conceptualization and treatment of child molesters.     

Rhythms of Law: Aboriginal Jurisprudence and the Anthropocene

On 1 December 2019, over one hundred Aboriginal nations performed ancestral and creation dances in synchrony across the Australian continent. One of the communities that danced was the Anaiwan nation from the north-eastern region of New South Wales, Australia. Since 2014 I have been working with Anaiwan people in a collaborative activist research project, creating and maintaining an Aboriginal community garden on the fringes of my hometown of Armidale as a site for land reclamation and decolonising, multispecies research. The community garden is adjacent to the site of the old East Armidale Aboriginal Reserve, where over one hundred dispossessed Aboriginal people were forced to live on the municipal town garbage depot in the mid-twentieth century. This paper positions both the Nation Dance 2019 movement, and the Armidale Aboriginal Community Garden, as rhythmic events that activate Aboriginal Law and sovereignty that is held enduring in the land but that has been buried alive by the settler-colonial state. Focusing on the tensions between deep Indigenous ancestral temporality and colonial territoriality, I argue that the emergence of the Anthropocene reveals a dangerous dissonance between the rhythms of Aboriginal Law patterned through present-day Australian environments and the grid-based structures of colonial governance imposed upon them.

     

Patterns of Spiritual Connectedness during Adolescence: Links to Coping and Adjustment in Low-Income Urban Youth

Religiosity and spirituality are influential experiences that buffer adverse effects of stressors. Spirituality typically declines during adolescence, although not universally. Using Latent Class Growth Analysis, we examined changes in spiritual connectedness among 188 early (52% female; M age?=?10.77, SD?=?0.65 years) and 167 middle (56% female; M age?=?13.68, SD?=?0.82 years) predominantly African American adolescents participating in a 4-year longitudinal study. Three distinct profiles of spiritual connectedness emerged: low and steady, moderate with declines over the study period, and high and steady. Profile distributions varied across developmental level: there were more early adolescents in the high and steady profile and more middle adolescents in the decliner profile. Youth in the high and steady profile evidenced more goal-directedness and life satisfaction and more effective emotion management and coping strategies than youth in other profiles. Contributions to the positive development literature are discussed.