HELPING PEOPLE WITH LABOR MARKET PROBLEMS: AN OVERVIEW OF KEY POLICIES

Those in need of employment and training programs face a variety of difficulties. Accordingly, the federal response to labor market problems has encompassed a wide range of initiatives. These include preparing people for work (through skills training, the Job Corps, work experience programs); improving the functioning of the labor market (through matching workers with jobs, establishing a minimum wage, and the Targeted Jobs Tax Credit program); and preventing discrimination. Unresolved issues in these areas are examined. They include who should be targeted for federal assistance, which levels of government can best operate programs, how public versus private efforts should be balanced, how limited resources should be distributed, and how the welfare versus work question should be resolved.     

Paternity testing in a kidnapping case

A case of kidnapping involving the concept of paternity testing is described. The couple arrested and charged with kidnapping stated the child in their possession was their biological daughter. Serological tests were performed on liquid blood samples in an effort to determine if the couple could have been the biological parents of the child. Two genetic inconsistencies were discovered in the 15 blood marker systems analyzed.     

'Diacuí Killed Iracema': Indigenism, Nationalism and the Struggle for Brazilianness

If categories of 'race' and nationality are social and historical constructions laden with irrefutable meaning and consequences, then ethnic identities, like any other forms of identity, are means to other ends that may or may not be particular. Twentieth‐century indigenist history in Brazil reveals how the cultural politics of indigenism and nationalism can coalesce in a tautological politics of identity that undermines individual liberty and democratic heterogeneity. The concepts 'post‐indigenism,'post‐nationalism' and 'post‐identity' point to the strategic suspension of the infinite heterogeneity of the political subject as a means to widen the ground of shared experience and common interests beyond the realm of hollow and oppressive essentialisms.     

ASSESSING NEIGHBORHOOD AND SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGICAL INFLUENCES ON CHILDHOOD VIOLENCE IN AN AFRICAN‐AMERICAN SAMPLE*

The present study examines the extent to which neighborhood and social psychological influences predict childhood violence among 867 African‐American youth. The results showed that neighborhood affluence was the only neighborhood‐level variable to exert a significant influence on childhood violence. Furthermore, childhood violence was significantly related to social psychological influences, such as adopting a street code, associating with violent peers, parental use of violence, and quality parenting. Overall, the findings suggested that simply living in a violent neighborhood does not produce violent children, but that family, peer, and individual characteristics play a large role in predicting violence in childhood.     

A Test of Generalizability of the Social Development Model Across Gender and Income Groups with Longitudinal Data from the Elementary School Developmental Period

The social development model (SDM) is a theory of behavior that has proven useful in explaining the etiology of delinquency, violence, and substance use among adolescents as well as early antisocial behavior among pre-adolescents. A further test of the model is its generalizability across population groups. A section of the SDM representing prosocial influences in the etiology of problem behavior was compared for boys and girls and for children from low- and non low-income families using three waves of child, parent and teacher survey data on a sample of 851 elementary school students. Multiple group structural equation modeling was used to assess differences across groups in both measurement of model constructs and hypothesized structural paths between constructs. The results indicate overall similarity in the reliability of measurement models and validity of structural models.     

Mentally disordered offenders in Sweden.

This article reviews the laws in Sweden concerning mentally disordered offenders. It also contains some figures on the relationship between mentally disordered offenders and other offenders sentenced to prison. The rules in Sweden are very different from other countries in that the responsibility concept has been abolished and thus there is no acquittal on a psychiatric basis.