DESIGNING CONTRACTS FOR COMPLEX SERVICES

In this article, we employ transaction cost economics and the contingency stream of organization theory to answer two related questions. First, when contracting for complex services, do governments design contracts for flexibility? Second, is the contingency perspective relevant to understanding contract design? Examining 130 professional service contracts awarded by state government agencies in the USA, we find that task complexity and task unpredictability, two dimensions of task uncertainty, increase the probability of flexible governance. This research highlights for managers the important fact that the potential for opportunism and task complexity are different sources of uncertainty that pose different challenges and call for different governance solutions. The study enriches our understanding of transaction costs by probing the conditions under which task uncertainty matters most (and least), and further shows the utility of integrating transaction cost economics with contingency theory to better understand contract governance.     

PEACEFUL WARRIORS: CODES FOR VIOLENCE AMONG ADULT MALE BAR FIGHTERS

Considerable theoretical and empirical inquiry has focused on the role codes for violence play in generating crime. A large part of this work has examined the attitudes and codes condoning retaliation and violence as well as the prevalence of these among minorities residing in impoverished neighborhoods. Much about the nature of codes remains unknown, however, and this may in part reflect a narrow interest in beliefs about provocation and uses of violence among the inner‐city poor. In this study, we elaborate on a code of violence as part of a system of order and honor as articulated by a network of White, working‐class males in a southern U.S. city who participate in bar fights. The findings suggest that the code these men use prohibits predatory violence, puts exclusive limitations on situations that warrant violence, and constrains the level of violence in a fight. We detail the contours of this code (e.g., purpose of fighting, the rules of honorable fighting, and justifications for violating these rules) and discuss the code as both a cause and a consequence of behavior.     

How Strong Should Our Party Be? Party Member Preferences Over Party Cohesion

In this article, we seek to explain when and why political parties pressure their members to vote with the party. We model party cohesion as an endogenous choice of preference alignment by party members. Couched in Krehbiel's (1996, 1998) pivotal politics model, the formal theory advanced here shows party cohesion to be related to the initial preference alignment of party members, the divergence in preferences between parties, the cohesion of the opposing party, the party's size, and the party's majority or minority status. We solved the model analytically for generalized‐partial equilibrium results and further analyzed it through computer simulations. We tested the model's predictions in the U.S. Senate using Rice party cohesion scores from the 46th through 104th Congresses. The data analyses show strong support for this theory of endogenous choice of party pressure.     

Juvenile Waiver 2003: Where Are We Now?

Juvenile waiver has received much attention from the public, practitioners, and scholars during the last decade. Prior studies have documented the increased use and effects of waiver. In this study we examine the current state of the law regarding juvenile waiver. We replicate a 1995 study of state waiver statutes and detail the changes in prosecutorial, judicial, and legislative waiver since 1995. While the juvenile crime rate has slowed, legislatures' fascination with waiver has increased. In less than 10 years, the number of states utilizing prosecutorial waiver has increased 25%, 27 states have modified their judicial waiver statutes, and 30 states have modified their legislative waiver statutes.     

Partisan Turnout Bias in Midterm Legislative Elections

Abstract: Lower salience elections present greater opportunities for representational bias at the polls than do elections with higher levels of political interest. We hypothesize that turnout bias is most likely to occur during midterm congressional elections in which there are clear short‐term forces that exploit the low turnout setting. The effects of these forces are more likely to be observable among registered nonvoters than citizens who are not registered to vote because registrants have access to the polls and are likely to have voted in previous presidential contests. Using midterm National Election Study data from 1978 to 1998, we find that registered nonvoters are frequently more Democratic than midterm election voters, particularly in 1994 and 1998. The historic 1994 congressional election seat losses for Democrats may be partially explained by the finding that voters going to the polls were clearly more conservative than registered nonvoters.     

Achieving Timely Permanency in Child Protection Courts: The Importance of Frontloading the Court Process

Timely permanency for foster children has been an unrealized goal in our nation's juvenile courts. The goal of timely permanency is a legal mandate, it serves the needs of families, it is consistent with evolving case management standards, it is required by the Canons of Judicial Ethics, and it serves the best interests of children. Judges must take a leadership role within their courts to reduce delays in child protection courts. Through a series of changes including legislation, court rules, case management techniques, and judicial control, timely permanency for foster children can be achieved.