RAISING THE BAR: WHY SUPERVISED VISITATION PROVIDERS SHOULD BE REQUIRED TO MEET STANDARDS FOR SERVICE PROVISION

The New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NYSPCC) has provided a supervised visitation program (SVP) for high‐risk families for almost two decades. Parents needing supervised visitation often have histories of domestic violence, child abuse and neglect, mental illness or substance abuse, therefore providers delivering services must be adequately trained and supervised in order to protect the child from further harm during the visitation process. This article describes the need for SVP's, parental issues warranting consideration, the special needs of children in these circumstances, policy recommendations for provider standards, and a certification process to be developed and adopted in New York State.     

The Polish–Lithuanian borderlands,past and present: multicultural versus decolonial responses to local and state violence

This article presents the case of the Suwa?ki Triangle region on the current Polish–Lithuanian border to demonstrate how local activists developed a “multicultural” interpretation of social relations to counter previously dominant nationalist narratives. It then contrasts this interpretation with a “decoloniality” framework to illustrate the limits of the multicultural approach. Decoloniality, developed by Walter Mignolo to theorize about Latin American historical experiences, finds continued hierarchies in the apparently plural social landscape, situates identity as a fluid response to these hierarchies, and privileges voices that are “delinked” from them. Decoloniality may explain the complex borderland identifications of the Suwa?ki Triangle – and potentially other territorialized communities – better than multiculturalism.     

The Promises and Pitfalls of Prime Provider Models in Service Delivery: The Next Phase of Reform in Australia?

At a time of fiscal restraint and reductions in the size of the public sector, governments in Australia are exploring new approaches to delivering public services. One model receiving attention is the prime provider approach. This is an approach where government contracts a lead or prime provider who in turn organizes and manages a group of sub‐contractors. In prime provider approaches, non‐government organizations take on a quasi‐government role and this brings a new complexity into the relationships between the various actors involved in developing and delivering public services. This article provides an overview of prime provider approaches and, drawing on the limited research to date, poses questions that we view as being critical to the current debate. The aim is to provoke further discussion on the potential impact of prime provider approaches.     

Adolescent Health Risk Profiles: The Co-Occurrence of Health Risks among Females and Males

This analysis examines the complexity of adolescent health risk behaviors using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health), a nationally representative study of students. The current sample includes 12,955 students (6,626 females and 6,329 males) in grades 9 through 12. Cluster analysis was conducted separately by gender to examine the interrelationships among eight health risk behaviors: sexual activity, general alcohol use, binge drinking, cigarette use, marijuana use, other illicit drug use, fighting, and suicide. Four distinct clusters for females and males were identified based on their profiles of risk-taking behavior. Females and males both report low- and high-risk profiles, and a risk profile with high alcohol use and sexual activity. Females have two distinct risk profiles, one that is highest on every measure of risk compared to others and one that has high levels of fighting and suicide with little participation in substance use or sexual activity. Males have a distinct risk profile with particularly high rates of marijuana use and suicidal behaviors. Few distinctions exist between profiles based on sociodemographic characteristics.     

Administrative Reform and Regional Development Discourses in Hungary. Europeanisation Going NUTS?

Starting from the empirical observation of high levels of absorption of EU cohesion funds but strikingly low levels of substantive change in regional cohesion, this essay offers a contextual analysis of regional development policies in Hungary. Based on theoretical frameworks dealing with Europeanisation, new regionalism and participative development, it explores the reasons for this observation by analysing the role of administrative and planning structures and of development discourses. The essay shows that the Europeanisation of regional development policy triggered several changes in the planning process and led to the partial inclusion of new actors. However, the main effect of this was a growing centralisation of development policy making. The essay explains this by pointing to the domestic political context and the historical foundations of regional development discourses of the conservative and leftist liberal parties. While there are overlaps between the discourses on both sides of the ideological divide, they are perceived as incompatible by political actors. Thus, it is argued that considerations of political power, rather than ideological nature, shape Hungarian regional and development policy and explain the incremental reform process.     

National Minorities and the Milošević Regime

Tone Bringa, Being Muslim the Bosnian Way: Identity and Community in a Central Bosnian Village. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995, xxi, 281 pp. + illustrations, bibliography, index.

Robert J. Donia and John V. A. Fine, Jr., Bosnia and Hercegovina: A Tradition Betrayed. New York: Columbia University Press, 1994, xi, 318 pp. + maps, illustrations, chronology, glossary, bibliography, index.

Noel Malcolm, Bosnia: A Short History. New York: New York University Press, 1994, xxiv, 340 pp. + maps, glossary, bibliography, index.     

The invisible/visible claims to justice: sexual violence and the university camp(us)

If the relationship between international tribunals and reconciliation remains empirically under‐researched within the transitional justice literature, this is even truer in respect of hybrid and local courts. Seeking to address this gap, the purpose of this article is to explore whether the State Court of Bosnia and Hercegovina (BiH) – and more particularly its War Crimes Chamber (WCC) – can contribute to reconciliation in BiH. Unlike the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY), the State Court is located in the country itself. Hence, in theory at least, it has greater potential to involve local people and thus to facilitate the reconciliation process. In practice, however, the Court faces many of the same problems as the ICTY, including perceptions of bias and the difficulty of satisfying victims. What this ultimately demonstrates is that criminal trials are not a panacea or “magic bullet” and that reconciliation – both in BiH and in post‐conflict societies more generally – requires a comprehensive and holistic approach to transitional justice that does not over‐rely upon the administration of retributive justice. The State Court, therefore, is merely one potential path to reconciliation.