The Impact of Model Court Reform in Arizona on the Processing of Child Abuse and Neglect Cases

Arizona juvenile courts have taken a series of steps over the past five years to improve the quality and timeliness of court proceedings in child abuse and neglect matters. These efforts encompass both procedural reforms to front‐load the early hearing process as well as reforms that require a clearly demarcated permanency hearing and permanency determination process. A comparative analysis of the impact of these changes in four selected counties reveals that child abuse and neglect cases are handled in a more timely manner; that children are spending considerably less time in out‐of‐home placements; that courts are becoming more specific in the orders generated at dependency hearings (particularly initial hearings); and that the State and federal governments have realized sizeable savings in placement costs.     

THE SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES OF SELF-CONTROL: TESTING THE GENERAL THEORY OF CRIME*

Gottfredson and Hirschi's recently introduced general theory of crime has received considerable empirical support. Researchers have found that low self-control, the general theory's core concept, is related to lawbreaking and to deviant behaviors considered by Gottfredson and Hirschi to be “analogous” to crime. In this article, we extend this research by assessing the effects of low self-control on crime and analogous behaviors and by using two distinct measures of self-control, an attitudinal measure and the analogous/behavior scale. Thus, following Gottfredson and Hirschi, we use analogous imprudent behaviors as outcomes of low self-control and as indicators of low self-control's effects on crime. We also examine an important but thus far neglected part of the theory: the claim that low self-control has effects not only on crime but also on life chances, life quality, and other social consequences. Consistent with the general theory, we found that both measures of self-control, attitudinal and behavioral, have effects on crime, even when controlling for a range of social factors. Further, the analysis revealed general support for the theory's prediction of negative relationships between low self-control and social consequences other than crime—life outcomes and quality of life.     

INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS, THE LAW AND GOVERNMENT STRATEGY

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NEIGHBORHOOD CONTEXT AND NONLINEAR PEER EFFECTS ON ADOLESCENT VIOLENT CRIME*

Although evidence of the strong correlation between deviant behavior and exposure to deviant peers is overwhelming, researchers have yet to investigate whether a nonlinear functional form better captures this relationship than does a linear form. Researchers also have yet to examine the extent to which peer effects vary as a function of the neighborhood context. To address these issues, we use data from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods (PHDCN) to examine 1) the functional form of the relationship between peer violence exposure and self‐reported violent crime and 2) the extent to which the effect of exposure to violent peers on violence is ecologically structured. Estimates from logistic hierarchical models indicate that the effect of peer violence exposure on violent crime decreases at higher values of peer violence, as reflected in a nonlinear relationship (expressed in terms of log‐odds). Furthermore, exposure to violent peers increases along with neighborhood disadvantage, and the effect of peer violence exposure on violent crime is attenuated as neighborhood disadvantage increases, which is reflected in a cross‐level peer violence/disadvantage interaction.     

Explaining Australian Economic Success: Good Policy or Good Luck?

Australia and some European countries experienced economic “miracles” in the 1990s that reversed prior poor export, employment, and fiscal performance. The miracles might provide transferable lessons about economic governance if it were true that economic governance institutions are malleable, and that actors deliberately changed those institutions in ways that contributed to the miracles. This paper analyzes Australian policy responses to see whether remediation should be attributed to pluck (intentional, strategic remediation of dysfunctional institutions to make them conform with the external environment), luck (environmental change that makes formerly dysfunctional institutions suddenly functional), or just being stuck (endogenous or path‐dependent change that brings institutions into conformity with the environment). These distinctions help establish whether actors can consciously engineer institutional change that is “off‐path.” While pluck appears to explain more than either stuck or luck in the Australian case, the analysis suggests that both off‐path behavior and policy transfer are probably rare.     

Capitalism, socialism, and democracy: An empirical inquiry

Abstract. Some prominent economists have argued that the structure of a nation's economic life – capitalist or socialist - helps to shape its political institutions. Though its importance seems self-evident, scholars have not yet integrated this idea into the literature of empirical democratic theory. Drawing on previous work, we formulate four propositions about the relationship between economic structure and political democracy. Economic structure does in fact mould political forms, but not in a simple, linear fashion. Rather, it does so in a more complex, non-linear manner, a relationship we label the 'mixed-economy' model. This relationship survives and flourishes in the face of extensive challenges. Its implication is simple: democratic political practice reaches a maximum under moderate amounts of public direction of economic affairs, but suffers at the extremes of both unfettered capitalism and socialism.