Multiple Trajectories and “Good Governance” in Asia: An Introduction

Conventional wisdom in the international aid community has been that governance systems and practices in developing countries require reform in order for aid catering to economic development or poverty alleviation to be successful. Despite criticisms, the good governance agenda has remained unscathed in international development policy until the recent economic crisis in the advanced economies. This feature section of this issue provides in-depth analysis of the nuances at the critical linkage between institutional reforms and development, based on empirical case studies of the logic of governance reforms in the Asian context. This introductory essay surveys the intellectual background of discussion over the concepts of governance, good governance and development, and the linkage between governance reforms as process and development as outcome. It highlights the significance of discussing Asian reform experiences for the ongoing reflection over the global institutional agenda. The message is not that we do not need governance reforms, or that international learning is impossible or counterproductive. Reform efforts in developing and advanced economies will benefit, however, from a better understanding of the linkage between reforms and the diverse historical conditions they are embedded in.     

Letters in exile: An introductory reader on the history of Filipinos in America,by J. Quinsaat et al.

Abstract

Letters in Exile is a real breakthrough in the history of Filipinos in the United States. General Editor Jesse Quinsaat and a number of his colleagues at the UCLA Asian' American Studies Center deserve congratulations for completing an excellent introductory anthology of previously printed materials. There has been a tremendous need for literature on this topic and this first effort is remarkably well done.     

To be committed or not: examining effects of personal and workplace variables on the organizational commitment of Southern prison staff

This study examined how personal and workplace variables were related to organizational commitment among staff working at a large Southern prison. The personal variables were gender, age, position, tenure, educational level, and supervisory status. The workplace variables were assessment of training, job variety, role clarity, input into decision-making, and instrumental communication. The results indicate workplace variables play a greater role in shaping affective commitment of surveyed Southern prison staff than do personal variables. The personal variables explained only 10% of the variance in the commitment index, while workplace factors accounted for approximately 59% of the variance and were significant determinants of organizational commitment among the respondents. In the multivariate regression analysis, age, assessment of training, job variety, role clarity, input into decision-making, and instrumental communication all had positive associations with commitment. Educational level had a negative relationship with commitment. Implications of these findings for policy and future research are also discussed.     

An estimate of the proportion of drug-facilitation of sexual assault in four U.S. localities

In recent years, drugs including flunitrazepam, gamma-hydroxybutyrate, ketamine, and ethanol, have become popularly associated with drug-facilitated sexual assault. Other drugs are also candidates as factors in "drug facilitated sexual assault" (DFSA). The true extent of DFSA is not known, and is difficult to estimate. We recruited sexual assault complainants at four clinics in different parts of the U.S. to anonymously provide urine and hair specimens, and to answer questions about suspected drugging, drug use, and the sexual assault incident. Urine and hair specimens were tested for 45 drugs, including ethanol, and those pharmacologically capable of inducing sedation, amnesia, or impairment of judgment. Analytical test results were used to estimate the proportion of subjects, and the proportion of all complainants to the clinic in the same time period, who were victims of DFSA. Overall, cases of 43% of 144 subjects, and 7% of 859 complainants, were characterized as DFSA. Subjects underreported their use of drugs. The role of toxicological results and history in characterizing DFSA cases is discussed.     

Guidelines for postmortem protocol for ocular investigation of sudden unexplained infant death and suspected physical child abuse

Postmortem examination is a cornerstone in identifying the cause of unexplained sudden death in children. Even in cases of suspected or known abuse, an autopsy may help characterize the nature of the abuse, which is particularly important in the forensic autopsy of children in the first 3 to 4 years of life when inflicted neurotrauma is most common. Forensic examinations are vital in cases that might otherwise be diagnosed as sudden infant death syndrome. The ocular autopsy in particular may demonstrate findings that were not appreciated on antemortem clinical examination. This protocol for postmortem examination of the eyes and orbits was developed to promote more consistent documentation of findings, improved clinical and forensic decision making, and more replicable and coherent research outcomes.     

Sudden cardiac death due to giant cell inflammatory processes

Granulomatous inflammation of the myocardium may occur in a number of systemic disease processes including those with infectious etiologies such as fungal, mycobacterial and parasitic infections, as well as hypersensitivity reactions, and rarely autoimmune disorders. In many of these disorders, giant cells are components of the inflammatory infiltrate. Systemic granulomatous processes of unknown pathogenesis, most notably sarcoidosis, may also be associated with involvement of the myocardium. Occasionally, these disorders are associated with sudden death due to pathologic involvement of the heart. In contrast, giant cell myocarditis, also known as idiopathic myocarditis, a rare, frequently fulminant and fatal disorder of unknown etiology, is isolated to the heart and lacks systemic involvement. This disorder is most commonly diagnosed at autopsy. We present two cases in which sudden death resulted from a giant cell inflammatory process affecting the myocardium. Both individuals lacked antemortem diagnoses and collapsed at their respective places of employment. These cases compare and contrast the clinical and pathologic issues involved in the differential diagnoses of the subgroup of sudden cardiac deaths resulting from giant cell inflammatory processes that affect the myocardium, as well as the value of histologic examination and immunohistochemical studies.     

Langauge and Violence: Analysis of Four Discursive Operations

The Interactional and Discursive View of Violence and Resistance is a framework for critical analysis and research, prevention and intervention that takes into account the conditions that enable personalized violence, the actions of perpetrators and victims, and the language used in representing those actions. Using this analytic framework, we analyzed five accounts of personalized violence, one each from a perpetrator, a psychiatrist, a judge, a government minister, and a therapist. Our results demonstrate the scope and the ubiquity with which diverse accounts locally accomplish four-discursive-operations; namely, the concealing of violence, obfuscating of perpetrators’ responsibility, concealing of victims’ resistance, and blaming and pathologizing of victims. We examine the specific linguistic devices that combine to accomplish the four-discursive-operations in each case. These data suggest that the problem of violence is inextricably linked to the problem of representation.

Typologies of abuse among Afro-Trinidadian women

This study examines typologies of abusive behaviors among Afro-Trinidadian women. A total of 17 women participated in a 2-hour, face-to-face interview. The findings suggest that women experience multiple types of abuse including physical, sexual, and emotional abuse and controlling behaviors. This article discusses the implications of the findings for interventions with abused women.     

Statistical Inference After Model Selection

Conventional statistical inference requires that a model of how the data were generated be known before the data are analyzed. Yet in criminology, and in the social sciences more broadly, a variety of model selection procedures are routinely undertaken followed by statistical tests and confidence intervals computed for a “final” model. In this paper, we examine such practices and show how they are typically misguided. The parameters being estimated are no longer well defined, and post-model-selection sampling distributions are mixtures with properties that are very different from what is conventionally assumed. Confidence intervals and statistical tests do not perform as they should. We examine in some detail the specific mechanisms responsible. We also offer some suggestions for better practice and show though a criminal justice example using real data how proper statistical inference in principle may be obtained.