Ownership or Competition? An Evaluation of the Effects of Privatization on Industrial Relations Institutions,Processes and Outcomes

This paper examines whether privatization and exposure to product market competition leads to changes in labour management and industrial relations. Three sets of propositions are examined: privatization will lead to lower changes in industrial relations institutions and processes; privatization will lead to lower average levels of remuneration relative to public sector firms; and privatization will lead to relatively higher levels of efficiency. In each instance it is hypothesized that competition will add to ownership effects. These propositions are examined drawing on data derived from the UK bus industry.     

Paradoxical bedfellows: Nihilism and human rights

This article identifies and considers the existence of a manifest, though often overlooked, paradox contained within the doctrine of human rights. The principal justifications for human rights are based upon the identification of variously conceived human characteristics, or attributes of human agency. Nevertheless, human rights have all too often been required to protect some human beings from being seriously harmed by other human beings. The justification for human rights envisages a single, universal community of human beings, whereas the actual application of human rights typically testifies to the existence of two, very distinct communities: victims and perpetrators. The single greatest impetus for the drafting of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was the desire to prevent the re-occurrence of genocide. The modern human rights regime emerged out of mountains of human corpses. One would like to claim that the impetus for human rights became less urgent after the horrors of the Holocaust. Unfortunately, genocide has persisted and gross violations of human rights remain a feature of the geo-political landscape. Our need for protective human rights remains as urgent today as it did fifty years ago. This article accounts for this paradox and answers the question: Why is it that the ultimate justification and application of the doctrine of human rights is frustrated by members of the very species upon which the doctrine is based?     

Mass Administrative Reorganization,Media Attention,and the Paradox of Information

How does media attention influence government decisions about whether to terminate independent administrative agencies? The authors argue that an agency's salience with partisan audiences has a direct effect, but a high media profile can disrupt normal government monitoring processes and obfuscate termination decisions. This argument is evaluated in the context of a recent mass administrative reorganization by the British coalition government using probit and heteroscedastic probit regression models. The evidence suggests that termination is less likely for agencies salient in newspapers popular with the government's core supporters but not those read by its minority coalition partner. We also find that agencies with greater overall newspaper salience as well as younger agencies have a higher error variance.     

Trends in the management of registered sexual offenders across England and Wales: a geographical approach to the study of sexual offending

Abstract

Social scientists, and geographers in particular, have long been interested in examining spatial patterns of offending in order to generate a “geography” of crime and criminality. This paper examines what value, if any, a geographical approach to the study of sexual offending might offer. Utilising published official data from England and Wales it presents for the first time geographical analyses of the registration, risk assessment and management of Registered Sexual Offenders (RSOs) across 42 Multi-Agency Public Protection Arrangement (MAPPA) areas. In doing so it considers and evaluates the methodological issues pertaining to the use of such data and such a geographical approach. We conclude that geographical interpretations of both the incidence of RSOs and the rates of risk allocations between MAPPA areas provide valuable insights and raise new questions about the way in which RSOs are managed nationally and are thus worthy of further exploration.     

Sexually violent predators and civil commitment: is selection evidence based?

Sexual offenses represent an alarming proportion of crimes committed yearly. To address these concerns, several states, including South Carolina (SC), have enacted laws requiring sexually violent predators (SVPs) to be civilly committed to treatment. To date, no published study has examined sexual offenders recommended for treatment in SC. This study used a specially designed statewide database (SC-SVP research database) to determine which offender and offense characteristics were associated with increased likelihood of being recommended for civil commitment. Factors correlated with being more likely to be recommended included: being of a younger age at time of evaluation, prior sex convictions, having related and unrelated victims, a higher number of victims, frequent substance use, and a history of suicide attempts. Prior sex convictions, having both related and non-related victims, and a higher total number of victims align with characteristics associated with sexual recidivism. Frequent substance abuse and a history of suicide attempts do not mirror previous findings regarding sexual recidivism. These findings present new information regarding the civil commitment process of offenders being committed to the SC-SVP treatment program, characterize types of offenders committed to SC-SVP treatment program, and provide a foundation for using a computerized database in conducting sex offender research.     

Food distribution's socio-economic relationships and public policy: Mexico City's municipal public markets

Traditional food supply systems, like municipal public markets (MPM), are in crisis. Nevertheless, MPMs continue to demonstrate importance in the lives of the cities. In this article we discuss the case of Mexico City and the importance of the public markets for its neighbourhoods. We present the results of two research projects, completed in Mexico City at two different historical times and interpreted longitudinally. The results demonstrate the importance of socio-economic relationships for MPM's survival and potential. The article concludes with public policy recommendations to permit conservation, given the MPM's importance for the city's social cohesion.     

Zambia: The First Fifty Years

As Zambia completes 50 years of independence from British rule, an assessment of the present state of the country is topical. This article argues that, for all the setbacks that Zambia has suffered over the past half century, substantial progress has been made in a number of areas and that the Zambian people have maximised the opportunities that this progress has generated.     

What Really Happens: Department Secretary Appointments,Contracts and Performance Pay in the Australian Public Service

This account of the practice in the Australian Public Service (APS) for appointing department secretaries, using contracts and rewarding for performance, is based on my own experience in being appointed, reappointed and not reappointed, and in receiving and not receiving performance pay. It also draws on my experience as Public Service Commissioner in assisting with appointments and performance pay of secretaries. I also discuss weaknesses in the current system, and the drift to ‘politicisation’. I was first appointed as a department secretary at the end of 1993 after 25 years in the APS including 15 years in the Senior Executive Service (SES) in three different portfolios (Social Security, Finance and Defence). I was secretary of three different departments (Administrative Services, Housing, and Health, some of which went through changes in name and responsibilities during my tenure) before being appointed as Public Service Commissioner from the beginning of 2002. I retired from the APS in June 2005.