Poverty elimination,North-South research collaboration,and the politics of participatory development

This paper reflects critically on issues of North-South collaboration and participatory research arising from a project on participatory and sustainable local-level environmental management in the peri-urban area surrounding Kumasi, Ghana. Rapid immigration, uncoordinated conversion of farmland to housing, intensified resource exploitation, and declining water quality and availability are particularly pressing problems there. Collaborative research arrangements with local partners as well as sustained participatory relations with selected village communities were central to this project. More generally, the paper reflects on institutional issues relating to the dichotomy between research and development assistance projects, and their implications for project evaluations.     

Evaluating the OEO Legal Services Program

During 1970 and 1971, the complex and politically sensitive OEO Legal Services Program received its first independent national evaluation. This paper describes how evaluators dealt with the policy issues arising during the evaluation. Their decisions involved the interaction of three factors: conceptual problems, access to data, and a sense of what would be relevant to public policy. They found only a small area of intersection between a large set of issues important to policy-makers and an equally large, but usually different, set of issues amenable to systematic research.One finding was that the program's use of full-time poverty lawyers is a less expensive way to provide poor clients with legal services than underwriting the fees of private lawyers would be. Another was that the Legal Services attorneys' strong emphasis on law reform apparently adds very little to the cost of providing more routine services.The writer was the government's technical representative on this contract, but the viewpoints expressed in this paper do not necessarily reflect the official position of the Office of Economic Opportunity.     

Work ethic of gifted black adolescents

The attitudes and opinions of 15 gifted Black male and 152 Black female adolescents toward their future in the world of work were surveyed. Under headings of self-determination on the job, rewards, and work philosophy, significant differences were found between the sexes. Males demanded more freedom and independence, yet would be more willing to unionize. They also believed men to be the main breadwinners and marriage more important to females. Gifted males wanted to surpass the successes of their parents more than did their gifted female peers. The latter would not put up with poor working conditions as often as would the males. Thus, among gifted Black adolescents the world of work is still the domain of the male.Received his B.S. from Temple University, M.A. from University of Pennsylvania, Ed.D. from George Peabody College for Teachers. Major research interests include interests and attitudes of adolescents regarding the current scene.     

Benevolence,malevolence and economic theory

How selfish soever man be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it, except the pleasure of seeing it.—Adam Smith inThe Theory of Moral Sentiments.     

Individualism,etatism, and the ACLU

Fred Siegel teaches at The Cooper Union in New York. Last year he served as Visiting Fellow at The Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. He is working on a book about the decline of American imperialism and is editing a special issue of Dissenton social breakdown.