General Versus Specific Predictors of Male Arrest Trajectories: A Test of the Moffitt and Patterson Theories

Developmental taxonomies of crime disagree on whether distinctive offender trajectories are related to common or unique risks. This study examined childhood risks of differing arrest trajectories across childhood through early adulthood (from ages 10–11 to 26–27 years) that were identified in prior work for 203 at-risk, predominantly Caucasian young men. Multivariate analyses revealed that when both distal (childhood risk factors) and proximal risk factors (deviant peer association as a time-varying covariate) were included in the model, relatively few childhood risk factors (assessed at age 9–10 years) discriminated the chronic offender groups from rare offenders (i.e., child antisocial behavior, child attention problems, parents’ antisocial behavior). Rather, deviant peer association was significantly related to levels of offending within each trajectory group (i.e., chronic and rare offender groups). No predictor differentially predicted membership in the two chronic groups, supporting the linear gradation argument. Theoretical and prevention implications are discussed.     

China's aggressive ‘periphery diplomacy’ and South Korean perspectives

In this special section, the present article reviews South Korean perspectives on China's ‘periphery diplomacy’ with a focus on Chinese behaviour with respect to the East China Sea maritime territory and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). By analysing research papers published by various Korean research institutions and academic journals, this article demonstrates that most Korean scholars hold that as long as China's growth goes on, the tensions between the US and China are likely to intensify. The article also shows that one of the primary concerns of South Korean scholars lies in the question of how South Korea should respond to changing regional orders and a rising China. The article argues that South Korea's strategic dilemma is reflected in a regional structure in which competition between two great powers has recently forced the periphery to impose bilateral ties on.     

A Participatory Personality? Examining the Influence of Personality Traits on Political Participation

The aim of this article is to examine whether core personality traits are associated with opinions on and engagement in political participation of either participatory or deliberative nature. The Finish National Election Survey 2015 is used to explore the link between the Big Five personality dimensions and a wide array of political opinions and behaviour. The results suggest that variations in personality to some extent affect what kind of activities one prefers and engages in. Personality traits seem to better predict actual engagement in participatory and deliberative activities rather than having favorable opinions about them. This suggests that there is a difference between being positive about an activity in principle and actually engaging in it. Extraversion and Openness are positively linked to engagement in both participatory and deliberative activities, while Agreeableness and Emotional stability are negatively related. There are stronger effects of personality traits in predicting opinions on and engagement in deliberative activities than for participatory activities. The traits associated with deliberation differ from traits associated with preferring more traditional forms of politics. Thus, the results clearly suggest that the impact of personality on participation should not be neglected.     

Protest and property crime: political use of police resources and the deterrence of crime

This article investigates the claim that the political use of police resources promotes crime. Using a panel of South Korean metropolitan areas, we show that (1) the reallocation of police resources toward the control of political protests reduces arrest rates for crime and (2) the resulting reduction in criminal arrests significantly increases the incidence of crime. Overall, the impact of the reallocation of police resources works mainly through tradeoffs with arrest rates. Our findings imply that it is not the size of the police per se, but the allocation of police resources toward crime control that deters crime.     

Navigating Limited and Uncertain Access to Subsidized Housing After Prison

An emerging literature has documented the challenges that formerly incarcerated individuals face in securing stable housing. Given the increasingly unaffordable rental market, rental subsidies represent an important and understudied source of stable housing for this population. The existing literature has described substantial discretion and a varied policy landscape that determine former prisoners’ access to housing subsidies, or subsidized housing spaces that are leased to members of their social and family networks. Less is known about how former prisoners themselves interpret and navigate this limited and uncertain access to subsidized housing. Drawing on data from repeated qualitative interviews with 44 former prisoners, we describe the creative and often labor-intensive strategies that participants employed to navigate discretion and better position themselves for subsidized housing that was in high demand, but also largely out of reach. Our findings also illustrate the potential costs associated with these strategies for both participants and members of their social and family networks.     

The limits of India’s ethno-linguistic federation: Understanding the demise of Sikh nationalism

From 1984 until 1993, the Indian state of Punjab witnessed a sustained insurgency by Sikh militants campaigning for a separate sovereign state. This insurgency was ultimately defeated by the overwhelming use of security force that officially resulted in the deaths of 30,000 people. By the mid-1990s, a ‘normalcy’ had returned to Punjab politics, but the underlying issues which had fuelled the demand for separatism remain unaddressed. This paper examines critically the argument that India’s ethno-linguistic federation is exceptional in accommodating ethno-nationalist movements. By drawing on the Punjab case study, it argues that special considerations apply to the governance of peripheral regions (security, religion). Regional elites in these states struggle to build legitimacy because such legitimacy poses a threat to India’s nation and state-building. In short, India’s ethno-linguistic federation is only partially successful in managing ethno-linguistic demands in the peripheral Indian states.     

The distribution of conflict and attention across energy infrastructure

Across the world, public administration and policy decisions are related to diverse levels of conflict and attention. However, the degree and variance of conflict and attention remain largely unspecified. This article examines how types of energy infrastructure and characteristics of project location are associated with the distribution of conflict and attention around the energy infrastructure siting process. Our empirical focus is on gas pipelines, electricity transmission lines, solar power projects, and wind power projects across the United States in 2018. Primarily relying on regression analysis and interviews, this article finds differences in the distribution of conflict and attention intensity within and between these energy infrastructure types, with gas pipelines and wind power projects presenting relatively higher conflict and attention intensities. However, conflict and attention are skewed to low intensities across infrastructure types. Characteristics of project locations that are positively associated with high conflict and attention intensity include the proportion of Democratic voters and the level of urbanization in the places where projects are sited. In contrast, the proportion of Black or Hispanic residents is negatively associated with high conflict and attention intensity.     

文在寅政府外交的"模糊性战略":动因、 内涵及影响因素

"模糊性战略"本是文在寅政府为处理中韩因"萨德事件"产生的矛盾而推行的外交政策,但随着中美从"合作"走向"竞争","模糊性战略"逐渐成为韩国处理同中美关系的外交战略.韩国在处理中美战略竞争相关议题时,不追求在所有问题领域追随哪一个国家,而是根据不同问题具体做出应对,在每一个问题领域都体现出韩国对国家利益的追求.文在寅政府的"模糊性战略"受制于中美韩三边关系互动和国内进步势力与保守势力斗争的双重影响.从自身利益出发,中国应尊重韩国的这一外交战略选择,加强中韩外交关系,推动中韩走向合作共赢.     

(Un)principled principals, (un)principled agents: The differential effects of managerial civil service reforms on corruption in developing and OECD countries

Do management practices have similar anticorruption effects in OECD and developing countries? Despite prominent cautions against “New Zealand” reforms which enhance managerial discretion in developing countries, scholars have not assessed this question statistically. Our article addresses this gap through a conjoint experiment with 6,500 public servants in three developing countries and one OECD country. Our experiment assesses Weberian relative to managerial approaches to recruitment, job stability, and pay. We argue that in developing countries with institutionalized corruption and weak rule of law—yet not OECD countries without such features—“unprincipled” principals use managerial discretion over hiring, firing, and pay to favor “unprincipled” bureaucratic agents who engage in corruption. Our results support this argument: managerial practices are associated with greater bureaucratic corruption in our surveyed developing countries, yet have little effect in our OECD country. Alleged “best practices” in public management in OECD countries may thus be “worst practices” in developing countries.     

The 2018 California Wildfires: Integration of Rapid DNA to Dramatically Accelerate Victim Identification

In November 2018, Butte County, California, was decimated by the Camp Fire, the deadliest wildfire in state history. Over 150,000 acres were destroyed, and at its peak, the fire consumed eighty acres per minute. The speed and intensity of the oncoming flames killed scores of people, and weeks before the fire was contained, first responders began searching through the rubble of 18,804 residences and commercial buildings. As with most mass disasters, conventional identification modalities (e.g., fingerprints, odontology, hardware) were utilized to identify victims. The intensity and duration of the fire severely degraded most of the remains, and these approaches were useful in only 22 of 84 cases. In the past, the remaining cases would have been subjected to conventional DNA analysis, which may have required months to years. Instead, Rapid DNA technology was utilized (in a rented recreational vehicle outside the Sacramento morgue) in the victim identification effort. Sixty-nine sets of remains were subjected to Rapid DNA Identification and, of these, 62 (89.9%) generated short tandem repeat profiles that were subjected to familial searching; essentially all these profiles were produced within hours of sample receipt. Samples successfully utilized for DNA identification included blood, bone, liver, muscle, soft tissue of unknown origin, and brain. In tandem with processing of 255 family reference samples, 58 victims were identified. This work represents the first use of Rapid DNA Identification in a mass casualty event, and the results support the use of Rapid DNA as an integrated tool with conventional disaster victim identification modalities.