Pork-Barrel Politics in Postwar Italy, 1953–94

This article analyzes the political determinants of the distribution of infrastructure expenditures by the Italian government to the country's 92 provinces between 1953 and 1994. Extending implications of theories of legislative behavior to the context of open-list proportional representation, we examine whether individually powerful legislators and ruling parties direct spending to core or marginal electoral districts and whether opposition parties share resources via a norm of universalism. We show that when districts elect politically more powerful deputies from the governing parties, they receive more investments. We interpret this as indicating that legislators with political resources reward their core voters by investing in public works in their districts. The governing parties, by contrast, are not able to discipline their own members of parliament sufficiently to target the parties' areas of core electoral strength. Finally, we find no evidence that a norm of universalism operates to steer resources to areas when the main opposition party gains more votes.     

Editors' Note

Capital market or capital markets? We say the latter in thetitle of this Journal. The articles in this issue, however,deal with attempts to harmonise, codify and direct a more commonapproach, albeit regional in some cases, for capital marketactivities, which we know are sometimes slow to respect eithernational jurisdictional     

Desquamative interstitial pneumonia in an infant. Mimicry of sudden infant death syndrome

A 15-week-old infant girl, without a prior history of overt illness, was found dead while sleeping between her two parents. The gross examination at autopsy showed only congested lungs, and the initial diagnosis was sudden infant death (SID). On microscopic examination, a desquamative interstitial pneumonia (DIP) was observed. The widespread, patchy intraalveolar histiocytic desquamation was associated with lymphocytic infiltration of bronchiolar and aveolar walls, which together provided convincing evidence that an interstitial pneumonitis was the cause of death. A viral etiology seems most likely in view of the accompanying chronic inflammation of bronchial submucosal glands.     

Incumbency Effects under Proportional Representation: Leaders and Backbenchers in the Postwar Italian Chamber of Deputies

We study incumbency effects for individual legislators from two political parties (Christian Democracy and the Italian Socialist Party) in Italy's lower house of representatives over 10 legislatures (1948–92) elected using open‐list proportional representation. Our analysis finds no reelection advantage for the average incumbent legislator. Only a tiny elite in each party successfully creates an incumbency advantage. We find incumbents advantaged for reselection by their political party. We interpret reselection advantage as a party loyalty premium. Our study depicts a political environment monopolized by party leaders who reward party loyalty but hamper legislators in appealing directly to voters.     

Women in criminal justice: Occupational interests

This study explores the extent to which women interested in careers in criminal justice tend to express interest in the female-role—compatible specialties within the field as compared to men and as compared to more traditionally male specialties. A sample of 288 criminal justice students was surveyed and the data revealed that females did express higher interest in female-role—compatible specialties both as compared to the males surveyed and as compared to their interest in most of the traditionally male positions. The results are especially noteworthy in that occupational areas recently opened to women (most especially police patrol officer) were of relatively low interest to those women as compared to traditionally female areas.