The Effect of Attachment and Self-Control on Status Offending among Puerto Rican High School Students

This study tests the cross-cultural applicability of Gottfredson and Hirschi’s general theory of crime and self-control theory by examining self-reported status offenses among a sample of Puerto Rican adolescents. Data come from a 2005 sample of 298 youth ages 14–19, representing both the public and private school systems in Puerto Rico. Using a series of multivariate regressions, three hypotheses were tested. First, low attachment to parents, schools, peers, and church will positively and significantly predict status offenses among both public and private students. Second, low self-control will positively and significantly increase status offenses among each group. Finally, the effects of attachment on offending will be mediated by self-control. Results show support for both social control theory (via institutional attachment) and general theory of crime (via self-control). Both the measures of attachment and self-control contribute to explaining status offenses. Self-control partially mediates the effects of attachment on status offenses.     

Designing a tax incentive scheme: The case of a wage tip

Governments are constantly attempting to use their tax systems for purposes other than the collection of revenue. Each such use entails difficult decisions of both design and administration. Consideration of a tax-based policy that might reduce wage inflation—a so-called TIP—serves to reveal the wide range of difficult choices that need to be made. In addition to problems of measuring the behavior of the tax payer who is to be benefited or penalized, the analyst must settle on such questions as whether the program should be permanent or temporary, whether it should emphasize rewards or punishments, and whether it should be administered by existing government agencies or by special agencies. None of these problems is insuperable. But lurking behind all of them is the question whether, is the end, the chosen policy will actually contribute to reducing wage inflation.     

Organization,administration and the environment: will a facelift suffice,or does the patient need radical surgery?

Abstract: The Canadian environmental policy process has changed dramatically in the last decade. In past years, environmental policy typically was determined in behind-the-scene meetings of industry and government officials. But with rising concern over environmental degradation came calls for a more transparent and inclusive policy process. Much interest has been given to round table multi stakeholder policy processes, and governments at all levels have been experimenting with them. This paper argues that while round tables may be an important first step in developing new policy-making mechanisms, they have some major limitations for the integration and articulation of environmental interests. While round tables are “new” with respect to their emphasis on multipartite participation, their underlying organizational logic reflects the traditional structure of the bureaucratic state. The non-traditional organizational structure of environmental organizations reflects an ideology that is diametrically opposed to the underlying philosophy of the bureaucratic state, making synthesis of the two difficult. Sommaire: Le processus de formulation des politiques environnementales au Canada a énormément évolué au cours de la dernière décennie. Dans le passé, «étaient les cadres de l'industrie et du gouvernement qui se réunissaient officieusement pour definir ces politiques. Cependant, face à la dégradation de l'environnement, des voix s'élevèrent en faveur d'un processus plus transparent et plus participatif. Les processus du type »table ronde« faisant participer de nombreux intervenants ont fait l'objet de beaucoup d'intérêt et de mises en oeuvre expérimentales à tous les paliers de gouvernement. Selon cet article, si les tables rondes représentent peut-êre un premier pas important vers la création de nouveaux mécanismes pour la formulation des politiques, elles comportent cependant quelques limites majeures lorsqu'il s'agit d'intégrer et d'articuler les intérêts en matière d'environnement. Les tables rondes apportent un élément nouveau en ce qu'elles font participer plusieurs intervenants, mais leur logique organisationnelle fondamentale reflète la structure traditionnelle de l'État bureaucratique. La structure organisationnelle non traditionnelle des organismes environnementaux reflète une idélogie qui est aux antipodes des principes qui sous-tendent 1'État bureaucratique, ce qui rend leur synthèse difficile à réaliser.