“Purpose versus practice in the use of electronically monitored home confinement”

This paper explores differences between the stated purpose and actual practice of electronically monitored home confinement as a prison-diversion strategy. Methods and data are triangulated to examine the difference between the stated purposes of electronic monitoring and its actual usage in two contexts: 1) the decision to imprison/probate; and 2) the actual use of electronically monitored home confinement. Sentencing information, along with data on employment, family, substance abuse, prior convictions, and type of offense, were collected on 391 felony offenders sentenced to probation in 1987–89 from three counties located in two large Metropolitan Statistical Areas in Texas. Information gathered from interviews with probation officials is also employed. This paper presents an analysis of this data and discusses its implications for future use and evaluation of electronically monitored home confinement.     

Modern dependency: A “crucial case” study of Brazilian government policy in the minicomputer industry

Conclusion Brazil’s minicomputer industry has become dependent on government import policy, government financing and domestic private business. The growth in the domestic component of this industry between 1974 and 1981 suggests that incremental government policies (short of a transformation to socialism) can alter Brazil’s level of dependency on MNCs, concerning at least one industry–the minicomputer industry. Therefore, the Brazilian minicomputer model advances the dependency question from “what is dependency and why does it exist?” to “how can one improve its position in a dependency situation?” Relative success in the minicomputer industry cannot be construed as victory over Brazil’s dependency on MNCs, which may alter its economic and political relationship with other countries. Instead, it illustrates a viable model for improving a developing country’s dependency situation. This infant industry strategy is given more credence due to the rekindling of protectionism by all nations. A definitive evaluation of Brazil’s minicomputer policies cannot be rendered until this industry has progressed in its growth cycle. As indicated earlier, signs of both success and failure are evident. In addition, several events may restrict growth in Brazilian minicomputer firms: (1) restriction of funds due to the enormous foreign debt, (2) corrupt or inappropriate management, (3) unsuccessful transfer of technology, or (4) intrusion of smaller and less expensive microcomputers into uses now served by minicomputers. Thus, how effectively Brazil can get out of its overall dependency trap will depend not only on how well it can apply the minicomputer industry model to other industries, of course, given that the model does succeed in the long–run. But it will also depend on how well Brazil can deal with the problems listed above. 0259 0255 V 2     

Advance Australia fair? Anatomy and pathology of an 84‐year trade dispute

• This paper examines the very long‐running trade dispute between Australia and New Zealand concerning a ban on the importation of apples on the basis of fire blight disease present in New Zealand. This particular example illustrates the more general case of the frequent conflict between science and politics in regard to technical trade barriers. This same issue of fire blight disease in apples became the subject of a protracted World Trade Organization dispute between the USA and Japan, with New Zealand a third party to the USA, and Australia a third party to Japan. The World Trade Organization Dispute Settlement Body, and subsequently the World Trade Organization Appellate Body, ruled in favour of the USA (and thus New Zealand) on this issue. Despite this ruling, Australia has continued its ban on New Zealand apples and the issue has become highly politicized in Australia.
• This case highlights the need for World Trade Organization rules to be changed to ensure that its rulings become binding on third parties and other World Trade Organization members. This would ensure that once an issue is decided through the full World Trade Organization conflict resolution process, the principles established should become generally applicable to other instances of the same scientific issue.

Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

More than one bite of the cherry: a study of UK grocery retailers' attempts to influence the retail planning policy‐making process

• Despite a tightening of planning policy guidance in recent years, the major multiple grocery retailers have been able to maintain and expand their market shares. In this paper, the processes by which retailers have involved themselves in planning policy‐making formulation between 1988 and 1998 are evaluated. Both individual and collective representations have been made to the process by retail organizations. It is shown that there is evidence of a small but powerful retail planning policy network that has the hallmarks of a ‘policy community’. In conclusion, some future research directions are set out that, inter alia, suggest further work into the role organizations play in Select Committee and lobbying processes. Examination of how specialist and technical advisers feature in these important policy‐making decisions is also suggested.

Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Hostage-Taking in the Context of Domestic Violence: Some Case Examples

Initial reports of domestic violence are generally made to law enforcement officers who must respond and intervene. A subset of these episodes involves cases in which the victim, and, in many instances her child(ren), have been taken hostage by her husband or partner. Moreover, there are indications that the number of such incidents is growing. The purpose of this project was twofold: (1) to provide one of the first reports on the prevalence and characteristics of these events, and (2) to more closely analyze domestic crisis (hostage) situations using actual case examples. All information was obtained from the Hostage Barricade Database System (HOBAS) of the FBIs Crisis Negotiation Unit. HOBAS is a postincident information collection tool which stores historical data from law enforcement agencies across the nation on hostage/barricade incidents. An examination of this database yielded different types of domestic hostage-taking acts and outcomes (e.g., tactical vs. negotiated resolutions, survival vs. death/injury of perpetrator and/or victim[s]). Implications of the findings, for future crisis negotiation efforts directed toward nonviolent resolution of these high-risk critical incidents, are discussed.