Rail Safety: Targeting Oversight and Assessing Results

Rail safety has emerged as a significant issue in the past two years as a result of two major factors: a statistical lack of improvement in rail safety in the past decade, and a catalytic event in the form of a major derailment involving loss of life at Graniteville, South Carolina, in January 2005. The convergence of long-term leveling of rail safety indicators and the shock of a major rail accident prompted the Senate Appropriations Committee to ask the Government Accountability Office to assess the oversight role of the Federal Railroad Administration, the modal agency of the U.S. Department of Transportation charged with overseeing rail safety. The report is a reminder of the continuing importance of regulatory activities and the general movement in federal management toward greater use of data and performance measures since the Government Performance and Results Act of 1993.     

The Importance of Trust in Government for Public Administration: The Case of Zoning

Many scholars argue that citizens with higher levels of political trust are more likely to grant bureaucratic discretion to public administrators than citizens with lower levels of trust. Trust, therefore, can relieve the tension between managerial flexibility and political accountability in the modern administrative state. Unfortunately, there is little empirical evidence showing that trust is actually associated with citizens' willingness to cede policy-making power to government. This article tests theories about political trust and citizen competence using the case of zoning. Trust in local government is found to be an important predictor of support for zoning, but trust in state government and trust in national government have no effect. These findings suggest that trust affects policy choice and helps determine how much power citizens grant to local administrators.     

Reparations for the Herero Genocide: Defining the limits of international litigation

The Herero were the first ethnic group to be subjected to genocidein the twentieth century. In 2001, the Herero became the firstethnic group to seek reparations for colonial policies thatfit the definition of genocide. The Herero are the latest plaintiffto use the procedures of the Alien Torts Claim Act of 1789 toseek reparations in a US federal court for war crimes committedoverseas. This article analyzes the legal arguments by Hererosagainst Germany within the context of current understandingsof international law and identifies the challenges that lieahead for this claim. The article also explores the implicationsof the Herero claim for other ethnic groups victimized by colonization.     

‘Get Brexit Done’: The New Political Divides of England and Wales at the 2019 Election

This article analyses the successful Conservative election campaign of 2019 and how it took advantage of a fractured political and economic landscape. It reviews the unique circumstances around the 2019 election and the ‘surprising death’ of a no-deal Brexit. We then analyse the divergent political communication strategies in the 2017 and 2019 Conservative campaigns showing how the latter was much more coherent and politically unorthodox. Drawing on socioeconomic, demographic and British Election Study data, we argue that Boris Johnson’s messaging was carefully tailored towards the demands of voters in the ‘red wall’ seats. Conservative success was built around an appeal to voters in these economically depressed ‘geographies of discontent’. But while tremendously successful, the coalition this created is potentially fragile. An unconventional, ‘leftish’ Conservative campaign built a new, diverse bloc of voters. It includes a number of left-wingers expecting change alongside traditional Conservative supporters, and will be hard to keep together given the economic turbulence ahead.     

Influences of Neighborhood Context,Individual History and Parenting Behavior on Recidivism Among Juvenile Offenders

This study examined the effects of neighborhood context on juvenile recidivism to determine if neighborhoods influence the likelihood of reoffending. Although a large body of literature exists regarding the impact of environmental factors on delinquency, very little is known about the effects of these factors on juvenile recidivism. The sample analyzed includes 7,061 delinquent male juveniles committed to community-based programs in Philadelphia, of which 74% are Black, 13% Hispanic, and 11% White. Since sample youths were nested in neighborhoods, a hierarchical generalized linear model was employed to predict recidivism across three general categories of recidivism offenses: drug, violent, and property. Results indicate that predictors vary across the types of offenses and that drug offending differs from property and violent offending. Neighborhood-level factors were found to influence drug offense recidivism, but were not significant predictors of violent offenses, property offenses, or an aggregated recidivism measure, despite contrary expectations. Implications stemming from the finding that neighborhood context influences only juvenile drug recidivism are discussed.     

Does Wal-Mart reduce social capital?

Social capital has attracted increasing attention in recent years. We use county-level and individual survey data to study how Wal-Mart affects social capital. Estimates using several proxies for social capital—such as club membership, religious activity, time with friends, and other measures—do not support the thesis that “Wal-Mart destroys communities” by reducing social capital. We measure exposure to Wal-Mart two ways: Wal-Marts per 10,000 residents and Wal-Marts per 10,000 residents aggregated over the years since 1979 to capture a more cumulative “Wal-Mart Effect.” We find that the coefficients on Wal-Mart’s presence are statistically insignificant in most specifications.     

Interests, Institutions, and the Reliability of International Commitments

One feature associated with democratic governance is frequent leadership turnover. While the ease of replacing leaders improves accountability, it may impede the ability of democracies to make credible long-term international commitments. Using newly collected data that identify cases in which leaders who derive their support from different domestic interests come to power, we evaluate the effects of changes in domestic political leadership on one important aspect of foreign policy—decisions to maintain military alliances. An analysis covering bilateral alliances between 1919 and 2001 reveals that changes in societal supporting coalitions in nondemocratic states are associated with decisions to abrogate alliances prior to their scheduled end dates, but changes in societal supporting coalitions in democracies have no effect on the probability of premature alliance termination. We conclude that international cooperation is sensitive to changes in core supporting coalitions, but that this effect is moderated by democratic political institutions.