Thinking about change for development practice: a case study from Oxfam GB

Development practice is informed by theories of change, but individuals and organisations may not make them explicit. Practitioners may be unaware of the extent to which strategic choices and debates are informed by disparate thinking about how history happens and the role of purposeful intervention for progressive social change. In the past few years, some Oxfam GB staff have been creating processes to debate their theories of change as part of an effort to improve practice. In this context, the authors introduce four sets of ideas about change, with a discussion of how they have been explored in two instances, and some of the challenges emerging from this process. Through explicitly debating theories of change, organisational decision-making processes can be better informed and strategic choices made more transparent.     

The European Union and gender mainstreaming: Constitutionally embedded or comprehensively marginalised?

This paper examines the extent to which gender mainstreaming is constitutionally embedded in the legal framework of the European Union. Within the framework of that broad question it examines three sub-questions concerning the robustness and constitutionalised nature of the E.U.'s `equality regime', the extent of adaptation to mainstreaming methodologies by supranational institutions such as the Court of Justice, and the extent of the gender dimension in the debates which are shaping the future of the European Union, especially the 2002–3Convention on the Future of the Union and the Commission's Governance White Paper of 2001.The E.U. is analysed in this article as an emergent, non-state, postnational constitutionalised polity. The first section presents this perspective, and the succeeding three sections engage with the three` sub-questions' outlined above. The conclusion suggests that as yet, while gender concerns maybe constitutionally embedded in the Treatyframe work, they are less prominent in the constitutional politics of the Convention and the Governance White Paper. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Shift patterns and hardiness: Police use of lethal force during simulated incidents

In the present experiment, utilizing the Film Fire' shooting simulation system, the effects of shift patterns and hardiness on police officers' judgments (decisions to (i) shoot at a suspect and (ii) taking cover during the confrontation) were examined. Sixty-one Authorised Firearms Officers were briefed on two “incidents” they would be asked to attend. The experiment took place at three different times, each time one hour before completion of the shift: at 1 p.m. (early day shift), 9 p.m. (late day shift), or 5 a.m. (night shift). In one incident the officer would be justified in shooting the suspect, whereas in the other incident it would be difficult for the officer to justify having shot the suspect. Because in both incidents the suspects were threatening the police officer, taking cover during both incidents would be desirable. Results revealed that most erroneous decisions occurred during the early shift, and that officers low in hardiness made more incorrect judgments than officers high in hardiness. Implications of the findings are discussed. Authors' Note: This study has been sponsored by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), studentship award given to the first author.     

Youth organizations as a Battlefield in the Cold War

In the late 1960s it was revealed that ever since 1952 the CIA had financed and was still financing, by way of a whole series of ‘screen’ foundations, the overwhelming majority of youth and student organizations, not only in the United States, but throughout the free world. Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) as respectable as the International Union of Socialist Youth (IUSY), Pax Romana and the World Assembly of Youth (WAY) had benefited, at various times in their history, from the generosity and ‘liberalism’ of the CIA. The key to understanding this paradoxical American involvement in leftist organizations lies in the Soviet Union's policy of systematically infiltrating Western civil society and international organizations. Its constant aim, relentlessly pursued and never openly avowed, was to control Western opinion and further the goals of Soviet foreign policy. By 1950 the communists had succeeded in effectively controlling all the international mass organizations. This study deals with the crucial Berlin Youth Festival of 1951 and the East-West struggle for dominance in the World Federation of Democratic Youth (WFDY) and the International Union of Students (IUS).     

Strategic Spending: Does Politics Influence Election Administration Expenditure?

Recently, election administration has been an important part of the national and global conversation about the results of elections. The important issue of election administration spending has not been examined extensively, and the influence of politics on election administration spending levels has not been examined in the United States. While theories of voter turnout and policy preference suggest that politics should influence election administration spending levels in the counties that administer elections, to our knowledge, there has been no evidence produced to support a partisan election administration expenditure effect. This research finds that Republican county commissions in North Carolina spend significantly less on election administration once the county electorate is a sufficient Republican majority. The article presents a novel model and method for estimating election administration spending and calls for additional research to examine the outcomes of these significant differences in spending on election administration.     

The Stability of Self-Control: A Group-Based Approach

In A General Theory of Crime (1990), Gottfredson and Hirschi argue that self-control, fully developed in the early stage of life (around age 8 to 10), is a primary explanatory factor of deviance. Research consistently supports the relationship between self-control and deviance, while only limited studies have examined whether self-control is stable after age 10. Using a longitudinal national sample of South Korean youths from age 10 to 14, this study provides a rigorous test of three assumptions of the self-control stability thesis: first, if the development of self-control follows a homogenous process among individuals; second, if within-individual level of self-control stay unchanged over time (absolute stability); and third, if the age and self-control relationships parallel across individuals (relative stability). Both attitudinal and behavioral measures of self-control were used to investigate whether different measures yielded different results in the stability thesis. The results indicated that among individuals multiple developmental paths of self-control existed instead of a homogeneous path. The findings also showed different measures yielded divergent results in the stability thesis. While the analysis of the attitudinal measure revealed strong absolute stability for 50% of the sample, and strong relative stability for 99.7%, the analysis of the behavioral measure showed strong absolute and relative stabilities for 88.6% of the sample.     

CHILDREN RESISTING POSTSEPARATION CONTACT WITH A PARENT: CONCEPTS, CONTROVERSIES, AND CONUNDRUMS

This article provides an overview of the key concepts, themes, issues, and possible mental health and legal interventions related to children's postseparation resistance to having contact with one parent. We maintain that the too often strongly gendered polemic on alienation and abuse is polarizing and needs to be replaced with a more nuanced and balanced discussion that recognizes the complexity of the issues so that the needs of children and families can be better met. This article reviews the historical development of the concept of alienation; discusses the causes, dynamics, and differentiation of various types of parent child contact problems; and summarizes the literature on the impact of alienation on children. These are complex cases. A significant portion of the cases in which alienation is alleged are not in fact alienation cases; for those where alienation is present, interventions will vary depending on the degree of the alienation. More severe alienation cases are unlikely to be responsive to therapeutic or psycho-educational interventions in the absence of either a temporary interruption of contact between the child and the alienating parent or a more permanent custody reversal. We conclude with a summary of recommendations for practice and policy, including the need for early identification and intervention to prevent the development of severe cases, interdisciplinary collaboration and further development and research of interventions.