Drug use and pretrial misconduct in New York city

Is recent drug use significantly associated with pretrial misconduct? Does consideration of recent drug use enhance risk classification among a sample of persons who have time free pending the disposition of their cases? Using data on arrestees in Manhattan, this paper examines these issues and some related questions. To measure recent drug use, urine samples were collected from persons shortly after their arrest and tested for four drugs: heroin, cocaine, PCP, and methadone. Two measures of pretrial misconduct are considered: whether a defendant fails to appear for a scheduled court date (FTA) and whether a defendant is rearrested prior to case disposition. Censored probit models are used to estimate the statistical association between drug test results and pretrial misconduct. Results show that drug test results are significantly associated with pretrial misconduct over and above the information typically available to judges at the time release decisions are made. Some implications of these findings for pretrial decision making are discussed.     

Evidence for the role of the justice motive in status generalization processes

Status generalization refers to the capacity of status characteristics, such as race, gender, or occupation, to become the basis of social inequality even when such characteristics are not directly relevant to the immediate social interaction. For instance, individuals with positively valued status characteristics are more likely to assume positions of power and prestige than those of lower standing. To date, status generalization has been assumed to arise from stereotyped beliefs that associate positive standing on a status characteristic with positively valued personal attributes. Findings from two studies indicate that the capacity for status characteristics to produce power and prestige orders may also depend on people's need to believe in a just world. In the first study, participants were fortuitously granted a position of either superior or equal power and prestige to another person. Consistent with just world predictions, participants portrayed themselves more positively relative to the other on assessments of personal attributes when they occupied a superior position than when they occupied a position of equal power and prestige. Results from a second study showed that the tendency to link personal attributes with power and prestige standing was strongest for participants who scored high on the Just World Scale. Thus, just world beliefs appear to play a role in status generalization processes.     

The Canadian charter and the protection of international human rights

B.A., University of Alberta 1960; LL.B., University of Alberta 1961; LL.M., University of California at Berkeley 1963.     

ACCESS TO SERVICES: ETHNICITY IN AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENT ADMINISTRATION

Abstract: This paper starts from an argument, developed by Jean Martin in 1978, which links recent ethnic differentiation of the activities and structures of our major institutions with an underlying social redefinition of migrants. It then extends Martin's analysis in the particular context of the service activities of one of the major line departments of Australian government — the Department of Social Security. It is argued that the accommodation of ethnic considerations within the daily activities of administration has occurred largely through the concept of "access to services". Using this concept, administrators have been able acceptably to define the problem of ethnic disadvantage and to develop programs which approach its solution. The formula has been applied to Aboriginal as well as migrant disadvantage and reasons for the similarity of approach are considered briefly. A range of recent initiatives which make reference to the migrant and Aboriginal clienteles of government are considered — in particular, DSS services, namely language services, migrant and Aboriginal public contact staffing, information services and advocacy/agency programs. All of these are seen within administration, as approaches to the "access" problem. The final section comments on the general characteristics of this "access" formula and on its success in both accommodating ethnic claims of disadvantage and reinforcing administrative commitments to universalism.