Rule of law v. rule of man: The search for the golden zigzag between conflicting fundamental values

Although most theorists from Aristotle to K. Culp Davis have recognized the need for law and discretion in any government, there has been very little analysis of the values protected by rule of law or the values preserved by rule of man (discretion). Nor has there been a systematic analysis of the relationship between these values. This article suggests that the law/discretion conflict is an essential and potentially productive conflict because both law and discretion protect fundamental, but limited, values which are essential for achievement of justice. Therefore, it is of the essence to understand the values underlying both law and discretion.     

Sea Grant — A technology transfer model for the marine field

A network of 29 Sea Grant Programs now operate in almost all of the 34 eligible coastal and Great Lake states, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Island Territories. Operating in response to current needs and opportunities by applying faculty, research staff and student expertise, Sea Grant Programs have developed many new systems, processes, policy and legal studies, and technologies. These have been effectively transferred to user groups, including major industries, businesses, government agencies, citizen groups and individuals. Many examples of successful technology development and transfer are discussed. Some examples are the hydrodynamic modeling of transport and dispersion of pollutants in large definable water bodies, the demonstration of a prototype machine for skinning the Spiny Dogfish Shark and application of vibration studies to reduce wave response of offshore structures. The examples demonstrate the viability and effectiveness of the Sea Grant concept.     

Community reponse to crime: Two middle-class anti-crime patrols

This paper examines two middle-class citizen patrols in the light of previous studies of patrols in lower- and working-class communities situated in very large urban areas. Consistent with previous research, our data show that patrol participation is related to the belief that citizens should play a role in crime prevention, to a slightly lower fear of crime, and to general social involvement. Contrary to previous findings, length of residence, age, and victimization were not found to be related to patrol participation. Patrol participants were more likely to believe that citizens have some responsibility for crime prevention and to have engaged in more anti-crime activities than nonparticipants. Residents strongly rejected the vigilante analogy and appeared, instead, to define patrol participation as a manifestation of good citizenship.     

Appropriately Upset? Emotion Norms and Perceptions of Crime Victims

Victims who express less emotion in response to a crime are perceived as less deserving, less sympathetic, and they have less punishment assigned to the offender who committed the crime. This study considers the extent to which emotion norms underlie perceptions of victims who testify. Two studies investigate the circumstances in which emotional reactions to a crime are seen as "unusual" and whether a more general emotion norm underlies responses to victim testimony. We test a "victim-role" norm against a "proportionality" norm by crossing the severity of victim's emotional response (severe or mild) with the seriousness of a crime (serious or less serious). Results across two studies lend greater support to the notion that people expect victims to match the intensity of their emotional response to the seriousness of the event (i.e., a proportionality rule), although we also find instances in which expectations of the victim are not strong. Gender of the victim exhibited small and contingent effects. We discuss the relevance of emotion norms to legal settings.     

Gender disparity in criminal offenses among persons of high IQ

Criminologists have largely neglected deviance among those with high IQs. This work uses Towers's (1988) concept of conventional genius to analyze how deviant behavior varies by gender among genius offenders. Like Bisi (2002), the authors expect female patterns of deviance to be lower than that for males even within this genius sample. Their work finds that male geniuses are significantly more likely to self-report ever having committed violent felonies. Among the authors' conventional genius sample of university students, gender differences in nonviolent felonies, misdemeanor offenses, and unethical behaviors are not significantly different between the female and male respondents.