Social Impact Bonds: Implementation,Evaluation, and Monitoring

Traditional approaches to public policy increasingly fail to resolve social challenges, particularly in the field of criminal justice. High rates of juvenile recidivism, for example, are often linked to inequality in education and persistent, long-term unemployment—factors which, while complex, are nonetheless conducive to preventative strategies.

Social impact bonds (SIBs) are “pay-for-success” programs that attract private-sector, upfront funding for social interventions. If the program achieves agreed targets, taxpayer funds repay the investor. If the program fails to meet agreed targets, investors take the loss.

This innovative form of social finance through public–private partnership has helped spur efficiencies and improvements in the provision and outcomes of criminal justice services. However, the success of a SIB depends on careful implementation, evaluation, and monitoring.     

Beyond Nancy Fraser's 'perspectival dualism'

The bifurcation between economically and culturally orientated perspectives has become a central trope in critical thinking on the problems of social justice and injustice. This paper attempts a critical explication and assessment of Nancy Fraser's recent work on this problem. She attempts to transcend the culture-economy divide by proposing a 'perspectival dualism' in which distinctive 'economic-redistributive' and 'cultural-recognitive' logics of justice are analytically distinguished and practically combined so as to furnish a balanced strategy for left-critical praxis. The paper seeks to demonstrate how and why Fraser's dualistic perspective fails, insofar as it is untenable to confine recognitive claims to the realm of culture, since they can be seen to underpin both redistributively and culturally oriented manifestations of social struggle. An alternative, multi-axial and 'metatheoretical' conception of recognition is offered, one which, it is claimed, can encompass both economic and cultural struggles within its theoretical ambit.     

A Time Series Modeling Approach in Risk Appraisal of Violent and Sexual Recidivism

For over half a century, various clinical and actuarial methods have been employed to assess the likelihood of violent recidivism. Yet there is a need for new methods that can improve the accuracy of recidivism predictions. This study proposes a new time series modeling approach that generates high levels of predictive accuracy over short and long periods of time. The proposed approach outperformed two widely used actuarial instruments (i.e., the Violence Risk Appraisal Guide and the Sex Offender Risk Appraisal Guide). Furthermore, analysis of temporal risk variations based on specific time series models can add valuable information into risk assessment and management of violent offenders.     

The pious or the doctrinaire? who supports suicide terrorism in Indonesia?

ABSTRACT

Indonesia is generally viewed as a moderate Muslim nation that episodically struggles with terrorism. Between 1981 and the end of 2016, Indonesia experienced 156 attacks from some 15 Islamist militant groups. However, the lineaments of popular support for Islamist militancy in Indonesia remain understudied. In this paper, we expand upon the existing literature on popular support for Islamist violence in Indonesia by replicating and extending the empirical framework for modeling the relationship between support for various conceptualizations of Shari’a and support for Islamist violence offered by Fair, Littman and Nugent (2018) for Pakistan and extended to Bangladesh by Fair, Hamza and Heller (2017). To do so, we conduct ordered logistical regression analysis of Pew survey data which includes information about respondents’ religious beliefs and practice as well as support for Islamist violence. We find considerable evidence that their framework is useful for understanding support for violence in Indonesia.