Socialization and generational political trajectories: an age,period and cohort analysis of political participation in Britain

The role of political socialization in explaining disengagement from specific modes of activism beyond voting remains largely unexplored, limited to date by available data and methods. While most previous studies have tended to propose explanations for disengagement linked to specific repertoires of political action, we propose a unified theory based on the different socialization experiences of subsequent generations. We test this theory using a new dataset of collated waves of the British Social Attitudes Survey and by applying age–period–cohort models for repeated cross-sectional data and generalized additive models to identify generational effects. We show that generational effects underlie the participatory decline across repertoires. Consistent with our expectations, the results reveal that the generation of “Thatcher’s Children” are much less likely to engage in a range of repertoires of political action than “Wilson/Callaghan’s Children”, who came of age in the more politicized 1960s and 1970s. Significantly, and in line with our theoretical expectations, the “Blair’s Babies” generation is the least politically engaged of all. We reflect on these findings and highlight the concerning implications of falling levels of activism for advanced democracies.     

Employment versus empowerment: A case study of the nature of women's work in Ecuador

This research re‐evaluates the female marginalisation thesis through an examination of the changing nature of work in Latin America and of women's incorporation into paid employment. We combine labour market segementation theory, which explains the emergence of low level occupations in terms of capitalist restructuring, with feminist theory, which explains why women become concentrated in inferior positions. We operationalise this reconceptualisation through an empirical analysis of women's and men's relative occupational position across economic sectors and through time in Ecuador. A key finding is that women's and men's occupations are differentiated in terms of control over economic resources and control over the labour process and that this worsens over time.     

Ingredients of institutional reputations and citizen engagement with regulators

The purpose of this study is to examine the link between the reputational components of efficacy and moral reliability of institutions, and citizens' compliance with institutional recommendations. Research on bureaucratic reputations highlights the significance of positive political reputations based on credibility and legitimacy, but the impact of these components is not systematically isolated and studied. We draw insights from political psychology to move beyond a positive‐negative valence‐based approach of reputation, and highlight the different effect of efficacy and moral reliability components of reputation on citizens' cooperation, engagement in water saving activities, and levels of complaints. We use the Cypriot Water Authority as a case study and inquire how its institutional reputation influences Cypriot citizens' behavior regarding water use. Our data was collected via a representative national survey administered to a random sample of 800 Cypriots in the spring of 2009 and show that favorable perceptions of particular components of institutional reputation shape the levels of satisfaction with specific organizational outputs.     

Explaining Split-Ticket Voting at the 1979 and 1997 General and Local Elections in England

Only in 1979, 1997 and 2001 have British general elections coincided with the annual local government elections. Uniquely, this study uses both survey and aggregate data to examine aspects of split-ticket voting at the simultaneous elections in 1979 and 1997. Through the use of bi- and multi-variate analysis, it suggests that ticket-splitting is a product of both voter attitudes and party strategies: although it is almost wholly confined to the less partisan, the electoral context in which those votes are being cast can play an additional and significant role in stimulating such behaviour.     

Corporate violence against canadian women: Assessing left-realist research and policy

Canadian researchers, especially feminists, have shown, that male violence against women in both intimate relationships and public places is a significant social problem. Compared to the amount of rigorous work done on this important issue, an equally if not more serious problem for women—corporateviolence—has been given little empirical, theoretical, and political attention The primary purpose of this paper is to articulate how, some left realist survey techniques and policy proposals can contribute to the study, prevention, and control of corporate violence against Canadian women in the industrial workplace. The authors conclude this article by pointing to a few pitfalls of realism which must be add ressed before it can be effectively applied in the Canadian context.     

Beijing’s Rich Legacy in Sound

Last year I embarked on a new project for which I still don’t have a satisfactory title.It started out being the Beijing Hutong Sound Project,then the Beijing Sound History Project,and now the Beijing Sonic Reenactment Project.The lineage of titles reflects the project’s conceptualization from last summer,when it first began,up until the moment earlier this year when I started realizing its potential to     

Fiji’s Foreign Relations: Retrospect and Prospect

Abstract

Of all the island states of the Southwest Pacific, Fiji’s foreign relations have been the most fraught since the advent of independence in the region, due largely to a succession of coups d'état. These have invariably precipitated adverse responses from major partners and aid donors, notably Australia, New Zealand, the United States and the European Union. The last coup in 2006 also unsettled relations in Fiji’s more immediate region, especially among some of its smaller Polynesian neighbours, contributing to Fiji’s unprecedented suspension from the Pacific Islands Forum. This article reviews Fiji’s foreign relations from the time of independence in 1970 through the period of successive coups to the 2014 elections. It also examines Bainimarama’s strategies in extending foreign relations in the broader international sphere as well as issues surrounding the ‘normalisation’ of relations with its traditional partners.     

Decomposition Rate and Pattern in Hanging Pigs

Accurate prediction of the postmortem interval requires an understanding of the decomposition process and the factors acting upon it. A controlled experiment, over 60 days at an outdoor site in the northwest of England, used 20 freshly killed pigs (Sus scrofa) as human analogues to study decomposition rate and pattern. Ten pigs were hung off the ground and ten placed on the surface. Observed differences in the decomposition pattern required a new decomposition scoring scale to be produced for the hanging pigs to enable comparisons with the surface pigs. The difference in the rate of decomposition between hanging and surface pigs was statistically significant (p = 0.001). Hanging pigs reached advanced decomposition stages sooner, but lagged behind during the early stages. This delay is believed to result from lower variety and quantity of insects, due to restricted beetle access to the aerial carcass, and/or writhing maggots falling from the carcass.