Sex and the civil partnership act: the future of (non) conjugality?

This article considers the transgressive and transformative possibilities in the sexual silences of the U.K.’s Civil Partnership Act 2004. The absence of a consummation requirement and adultery as a specific ground of dissolution do open up some possibilities but are not unproblematic. These issues are explored in the context of the England and Wales Law Commission’s apparent ‘return’ to a conjugal model in its forthcoming consultation on cohabitation. It is concluded that though the Act may open up possibilities for expanding the legal recognition of relationships beyond those that are sexual, this raises concerns about the further privatisation of care as well as increased state intervention in relationships. Instead, I argue that the purpose and function of relationship recognition should be deconstructed and separated from ideology and romantic mythology about what families and relationships are and should be. If it does wed itself so closely to the conjugal marriage model in the consultation document, the Law Commission will miss a valuable opportunity to ask important questions about the purpose and function of relationship recognition.     

Political Responsibility for UK Prison Security – Ministers Escape Again

Two very serious prison escapes in 1994–5 prompted the Home Secretary, Michael Howard, to dismiss the Prison Service head, Derek Lewis (a contracted businessman) who successfully sued for full compensation and costs. This sacking and law suit were unprecedented events which highlighted familiar tensions about the 'policy' and 'administrative' ('operational') distinction and what passes for the theory of individual ministerial responsibility to Parliament. This article reviews four serious prison security failures in England and Northern Ireland since 1983 and the standard ministerial posture blaming operational error rather than their own policy framework. Drawing on interviews with relevant senior figures, the exceptionally politically sensitive case of executive agency status for the Prison Service of England and Wales is considered. The 'Lewis vs. Howard' affair is placed in its context of the increasingly managerial ambitions of both 'incomer' and career civil servants which conflict with traditionally comprehensive, but symbolic, ministerial responsibility.     

The Politics of Pain: A Political Institutionalist Analysis of Crime Victims' Moral Protests

Like the new social movements, crime victim movements were part of broad cultural struggles to redefine the character of social order in the late twentieth century. Motivated by pain and outrage over criminal victimization, they were engaged in highly charged moral protests over the rights and duties of state government and the relative value of human life. This article argues that the degree to which crime victims were part of a retributive movement—the restriction of criminal offenders' rights and liberties—or part of a restorative movement to repair victims' well-being depended on the political context in which they were operating, specifically the structure of the democratic process. The case studies suggest that a context with a high degree of democratization but intensive social polarization was more likely to deepen crime victims' demands for vengeance as well as provide their legal and political expression, while a context with intensive civic engagement but well-developed social trust and norms of reciprocity was more likely to bring about pragmatic measures, intermixing restorative and restrictive approaches to criminal victimization. This article seeks to extend the literature on political institutionalism by integrating the structural constraints of institutions with the power of human agency.     

The Impact of Psychological Consequences of Rape on Rape Case Attrition: The Police Perspective

This paper examines whether the psychological sequelae of rape relate to rape case attrition by leading police to see the victim as less reliable. A mixed methods approach with two linked studies, one qualitative and one quantitative, was used. In Study 1, the qualitative study, interviews with 12 specialist police officers were analysed using Framework Analysis. In Study 2, the quantitative study, 76 specialist officers completed an online questionnaire to assess the generalisability of Study 1’s findings. In Study 1, officers’ perceptions of victims clustered into three stereotypes, which we label “the real victim”, “the mad discloser”, and “the bad discloser”. Victims who exhibited signs of shame, self-blame, and post-traumatic stress reactions which impeded their ability to give a coherent account of the rape were perceived as less reliable “mad” or “bad” victims. The findings of Study 2 supported these results. Although police interview strategies have improved in recent years, there is evidence that signs of trauma and shame in the victim are sometimes misinterpreted as signs of lying. This may affect attrition by impacting on victim-officer relationships. Further training on recognising trauma and understanding its consequences is recommended both for specialist officers and front-line staff.     

On-line public relations: towards an integrated theoretical model

Abstract

Much has been said about the so-called information superhighway. Organisations are realising that a whole new world can be created on-line: more and more organisations, and individuals, are entering this superhighway at an incredible rate. Ironically, most people do not have a clue what the information superhighway really is, which is, for example, evident in the 1993 advertisement of the telecommunication giant, Pacific Bell, which claimed that: ‘While others talk about the information superhighway, we're actually building it’, but only launched their consumer Internet access service in 1996. In spite of widespread ignorance, the exponential growth of the Internet provides public relations practitioners with constantly expanding on-line public relations resources and the opportunity to use these online systems to create or enhance the images of organisations in the market place.

Without theory, the field of on-line public relations has no framework for understanding, organising and integrating the many activities and purposes of online public relations. Therefore online public relations needs a body of knowledge grounded in theory. It is clear that the shift is away from mass communication towards dialogical or interactional communication. In order to understand the theory of on-line public relations, it is important to systemise it in terms of a theoretical aporoach. This leads to the main aim of this article, which is to propose a theoretical model, the Or,-line Public Relations (OPR) model, to provide a suitable framework for explaining the on-line public relations process, and if applied in the development of on-line public relations plans or strategies, it can maintain its utility as a framework for the analysis thereof.

Based on a qualitative approach, this article attempts to theoretically explore, describe, interpret and conceptualise the concept on-line public relations, with specific reference to the development of on-line public relations in South Africa, the shift from traditional paradigms to new on-line trends and the integration of on-line public relations with other communication processes. Particular reference is made to the theoretical foundations of on-line public relations, and it is argued that at the root of on-line public relations, as a framework for explaining it, lies the need for an integrated theoretical approach. In the last section, a new OPR model is proposed, and a brief discussion of the elements of the model, the conceptual foundation of on-line information and information overload is presented.