PUBLIC POLICY NETWORKS AND ‘WICKED PROBLEMS’: A NASCENT SOLUTION?

The last two decades have seen a shift in public services organizations from hierarchies to networks. Network forms are seen as particularly suited to handling ‘wicked problems'. We make an assessment of the nature and impact of this shift. Using recent evidence from the United Kingdom (UK) National Health Service (NHS), we explore the nature and functioning of eight different public policy networks. We are also interested in whether there has been a radical transition – or not – from hierarchical to network forms.     

Dissent in Iberia: The ideal points of justices on the Spanish and Portuguese Constitutional Tribunals

In this article, the non‐unanimous decisions of the Portuguese and Spanish Constitutional Tribunals for the periods 1989–2009 and 2000–2009 are analysed. It is shown that judicial dissent can be predicted moderately well on the basis of judicial ideal points along a single dimension. This dimension is equivalent to the left–right cleavage in both Portugal and Spain. The characteristics of the recovered dimension are demonstrated by analysing both the properties of the cases and the properties of the justices who decided them.     

THE TRANSFORMATION OF TROUBLE: Police Certification and State Compensation of Sexual Assault Claims

This article is concerned with the transformation of private troubles into social and legal problems. It is argued that this transformation process involves a micro-and macro-politics of claims-making. Data are presented on police certification and state compensation of sexual assault claims in a mid western state. The largest urban area in this state is distinguished by the collective claims-making of antirape activists, and by the resulting presence of a sexual assault treatment center, which we expected would reduce the influence of racial characteristics on police certifications of innocence, while correspondingly increasing the influence of police certifications on the success of compensation claims. Our results confirm the above expectations. An implication of our findings is that black victims of intraracial sexual assaults are more likely to see their compensation claims succeed, and to see their troubles recognized as social and legal problems in those settings where macro-level antirape efforts have been institutionalized in treatment and/or advocacy centers. More generally, our findings suggest that the transformation of private troubles into social and legal problems can be contingent on collective claims-making in the context considered.     

Plugging the Prisoner Finance Gap: A Critical Analysis of Financial Support for Newly-Released Prisoners

Abstract: The prison discharge grant is intended to meet prisoners' immediate needs on release and assist with living costs prior to their receiving their first benefit payment. It has been widely criticised for providing inadequate financial support, leaving prisoners with a gap in their finances on release. This article discusses the extent to which recent policy developments have been effective in closing this gap. The analysis is based on data from a longitudinal qualitative study of 40 prisoners who were tracked over a six-month period following their release from prison. This research shows that despite new policy initiatives the prisoner finance gap remains.     

Liberation/Emancipation, Economic Marginalization, or Less Chivalry

The alleged criminogenic nature of female liberation/emancipation has been tested recently by numerous North American researchers. Not only did the results lead them to different conclusions, but they did not test simultaneously for the effects on female conviction rates of increasing economic marginalization or less chivalrous treatment by the public, police, or courts toward female suspects. Data relating to England and Wales for 1951-1980 are used to test these competing explanations for changes in female criminality. The results give little support to the emancipation/liberation causes female crime hypothesis, but do provide limited support for the marginalization thesis. However, changes in social labelling appear to have a significant impact on female conviction rates, suggesting that previous researches omitting this possibility were seriously deficient. The authors suggest further research on actual women's lives and behavioral responses as a means of testing the effects of liberation/emancipation and marginalization on female criminal behavior.     

The rise of post-imperial populism: The case of right-wing Euroscepticism in Britain

Abstract.  Recent approaches to contemporary Euroscepticism have explained it in terms of the politics of opposition and peripherality characteristic of competitive party systems. Euroscepticism becomes a central strategy by which non-mainstream parties or factions within mainstream parties attempt to gain political advantage. In the British case, there has been a focus on the influence Eurosceptic factionalism can have within a first-past-the-post parliamentary system. This article challenges explanations of British Euroscepticism in terms of the politics of opposition and the workings of the party system. Instead, it is proposed that a structural crisis of British party politics has allowed Euroscepticism to enter the political mainstream. The author conceives of Euroscepticism as a distinct and powerful national movement asserting conceptions of Britain's exceptional national identity. This is viewed as part of a post-imperial crisis that shifts parties, and factions within parties, towards populist forms of legitimation that have weakened possibilities for stable and coherent political leadership over European integration. Consequently, mainstream parties have struggled to protect themselves against the ideological influence of this populist Euroscepticism. This is particularly evident during periods of Eurosceptic mobilization, and is demonstrated in this article through the examination of the extensive role played by right-wing Eurosceptic forces during the attempt by the Major Government to ratify the Maastricht Treaty.