"Braxton Hick's" or the birth of a new era? Tracing the development of Ireland's abortion laws in respect of European Court of Human Rights Jurisprudence

In Ireland, Article 40.3.3 degrees of Bunreacht na hEireann (the Irish Constitution) guarantees the right to life of the unborn child and the equal right to life of the mother. Abortion in Ireland is permissible only where there is a real and substantial risk to the mother's own life. Since Ireland became a signatory to the European Convention on Human Rights in 1950,2 there have been concerns that it could result in Ireland being compelled to introduce a right to abortion. This article commences with a review of the extant law on abortion in Ireland, tracing the Constitutional protection afforded to the unborn child. The article will discuss the impact of the European Court of Human Rights' jurisprudence in regard to access to abortion and to information on abortion services in Ireland in an effort to ascertain if it really has resulted in a radical change to Irish abortion laws. As such, it will also be necessary to examine the more recent decisions of the ECtHR such as Tysiac v. Poland, and A, B, and C v. Ireland, to determine both the approach of the ECtHR to access to abortion in general and also to consider if it has resulted in a liberalisation of abortion law in Ireland.     

Principle,Discretion, and Symbolic Power in Rousseau's Account of Judicial Virtue

Rousseau's understanding of legislation as the expression of the general will implies a constitutional principle of legislative supremacy. In turn, this should translate to a narrow, mechanical account of adjudication, lest creative judicial interpretation subvert the primacy of legislative power. Yet in his constitutional writings, Rousseau recommends open‐textured and vague legislative codes, which he openly admits will require judicial development. Thus he apparently trusts a great deal in judicial discretion. Ostensibly, then, he overlooks the problem of how legislative indeterminacy—and correspondingly, judicial discretion—may undermine the authority of the general will. However, I argue that Rousseau aims to check judicial subversion of legislative supremacy simply by extending his broader social politics—and specifically, his peculiar concept of republican virtue—to the domain of law. His main concern is that the law should not develop as a mystifying expert practice; therefore, he necessarily rejects any understanding of judicial virtue as lying in principled discourse. Instead, he envisages that judicial power will be checked by a more generic sense of republican virtue. In turn this echoes his apprehension of social differentiation and social complexity as sources of domination and hierarchy.     

A Cognitive Perspective on Policy Implementation: Reform Beliefs,Sensemaking, and Social Networks

Utilizing a cognitive perspective, this article examines the social processes through which teachers come to understand the Common Core State Standards. The authors begin by identifying three beliefs that have important implications for policy implementation: self‐efficacy, resource adequacy, and value for clients. They measure those beliefs and the Common Core discussion networks that emerge among teachers at three points in time. Through the use of SIENA models, the authors explore how networks and beliefs coevolve within schools. Unlike prior research on social networks, which consistently finds strong homophilous tendencies, this research finds no evidence that teachers seek out coworkers who hold similar beliefs. Rather, teachers relied on preexisting formal and informal relationships to guide interactions. Those interactions were characterized by social influence, whereby a teacher's own beliefs adapted toward the beliefs held by the members of their social network. The findings offer a novel perspective on the complex dynamic that occurs within organizations as new policies are unveiled and employees interact with one another to understand the changes those policies entail.     

School Engagement Among Urban Adolescents of Color: Does Perception of Social Support and Neighborhood Safety Really Matter?

In this study we examined the effects of risk factors (perceived neighborhood crime/delinquency problems, neighborhood incivilities) and protective factors (teacher support, family support, peer support) on the school engagement of 123 urban adolescents of color. Age and gender were also examined to determine if different ages (younger or older) or genders (male or female) significantly modified the relationship between the risk factors and school engagement. Results indicated that perceived neighborhood incivilities was uniquely predictive of school engagement. Contrary to hypotheses, different levels of the perceived social support variables did not modify the effects of risky neighborhood conditions on adolescent’s perceived school engagement. Age, but not gender, significantly modified the relationship between perceived family social support and perceived neighborhood crime on adolescents’ reported levels of school engagement. The implications of the results for prevention and intervention programs that address school engagement among early adolescents of color are considered.

How binding are binding guidelines? An analytical framework

Guidelines are a type of “soft law” that play an important role in contemporary public administration. Despite the propagation of guidelines in recent decades, their legal effects are often difficult to classify. Clearly, guidelines are neither legislation nor delegated or subordinate legislation, but they are nonetheless designed to influence people's behaviour. Distinguishing binding from non-binding guidelines is an important issue because the permissible scope of their use often depends on bindingness. Yet there is no analytical framework available to determine bindingness. To fill this gap in the literature, I develop an analytical framework consisting of three indicia which help to distinguish binding guidelines from non-binding guidelines: the presence or absence of imperative language, the level of detail and precision and the extent of effects on third parties. With the help of numerous examples drawn from the Canadian legal system, I explain how to distinguish binding from non-binding guidelines, bringing analytical clarity to an important area of contemporary public administration.