Book reviews

Tajikistan

Muriel Atkin, The Subtlest Battle: Islam in Soviet Tajikistan. Philadelphia: Foreign Policy Research Institute, 1989, viii + 66 pp., $6.50.

Edward Allworth, Editor, Central Asia: 120 Years of Russian Rule, Durham, N.C. and London: Duke University Press, 1989, xviii + 608 pp., $57.50, HB, $22.95 PB.     

Does founding team composition influence external investment? The role of founding team prior experience and founder CEO

The Journal of Technology Transfer - Entrepreneurship research examines the nature and diversity of founding teams’ prior experience to understand its influence on the new ventures’...     

Presidential address: How to improve poverty measurement in the United States

This paper discusses the reasons why the current official U.S. poverty measure is outdated and nonresponsive to many anti‐poverty initiatives. A variety of efforts to update and improve the statistic have failed, for political, technical, and institutional reasons. Meanwhile, the European Union is taking a very different approach to poverty measurement. The paper ends with four recommended steps that would allow the U.S. to improve its measurement of poverty and economic need.     

Same Bed,Different Dreams: China's ‘peaceful rise’ and Sino–Russian rivalry in Central Asia

China is already outpacing Russia, which is encountering ever more difficulties in trying to arrange a continental bloc of satellite states. While it may not be possible for China to organize its own version of such a bloc given the deep-rooted regional fears and apprehensions about Chinese objectives, in the coming years it will probably be the primary foreign economic presence in Central Asia, able to cash in on the political advantages that accrue to any such power.     

Kashmir: all tactics,no strategy

Despite a recent deescalation of military tensions and the fairest election in more than two decades, Kashmiris do not express much optimism about their future. If this skepticism is justified, perhaps it is due to a near-universal emphasis on short-term tactics at the expense of long-term strategy. Virtually all parties to the conflict in Kashmir – whether based in New Delhi, Islamabad, Srinagar or Muzaffarabad, seem to be thinking tactically rather than strategically. The one notable is the most implacable segment of the jihadist militants: all the more reason to be pessimistic.     

A Pilot Assessment of a School‐Based Youth Court in a Resource‐Poor African‐American Urban School District: Lessons Learned From Youth Court Volunteers

This study assesses the benefits of youth court participation for volunteers (N = 14) serving as jurors in an urban school‐based youth court. Focus group and questionnaire data indicate that volunteers are capable of providing more effective sanctioning decisions than adults. Volunteers reported developing citizenship skills including learning about the law and decision‐making skills. The youth court leaders developed self‐confidence and maturity while learning the conflict resolution skills necessary for rendering dispositions and conducting trials. We interpret our findings within the context of the youth court literature, the issue of the school‐to‐prison pipeline, and Elijah Anderson's analysis of the Code of the Street.