Victims' Rights in Criminal Trials: Prospects for Participation

Victims in common law jurisdictions have traditionally been unable to participate in criminal trials for a number of structural and normative reasons. They are widely perceived as 'private parties' whose role should be confined to that of witnesses, and participatory rights for such third parties are rejected as a threat to the objective and public nature of the criminal justice system. However, recent years have witnessed both a major shift in attitude in relation to the role of victims within the criminal justice system and a breakdown in the public/ private divide in criminal justice discourse. This article considers the standing of the victim within the criminal trial against the backdrop of such changes, and examines the arguments for a more radical course of reform that would allow victims to participate actively in criminal hearings as they are able to do in many European jurisdictions.     

The Politics of Local Government Stabilization Funds

The adoption, maintenance, and prudent use of budgetary stabilization funds are fundamental financial management precepts, yet the variables that influence the size of these funds are poorly understood. This article contributes to the stabilization fund literature by examining the extent to which variation in stabilization fund balances across municipalities and over time can be explained by a community's political culture and financial management capacity. The balanced panel research design includes archival data for 239 Massachusetts municipalities for each of 18 fiscal years. Stabilization fund balances are lower in communities with either an anti‐tax or a pro‐spending political culture. Stabilization fund balances are higher in communities that have the financial management capacity to accumulate budget surpluses that can be made available for appropriation to stabilization funds. Communities with the open town meeting form of government also have higher stabilization fund balances.     

Incrementalism: Dead yet Flourishing

Charles Lindblom's 1959 essay “The Science of ‘Muddling Through’” is best known for the strategy of decision making—disjointed incrementalism—that it recommended. That famous paper and Lindblom's related work also provided two theories: a critique of the conventional method (the synoptic approach) and an argument for using incrementalism instead. Both are applied theories: they are designed to help solve complex policy problems. Lindblom's negative applied theory has stood the test of time well: the empirical foundations of its main micro‐component (cognitive constraints of individuals) and its central macro‐component (the impact of preference conflict on policy making) have grown stronger since 1959. The picture regarding the positive applied theory is more mixed. As a coherent decision‐making strategy, disjointed incrementalism has almost disappeared. Yet its key elements, the major heuristics identified in “Muddling Through,” are thriving in many applied fields. Intriguingly, they are often accompanied by subroutines—especially optimization as a choice rule—typically associated with the synoptic approach.     

Evaluating Transformational Leaders: The Challenging Case of Eric Shinseki and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs

Evaluating less than fully successful transformational leaders is difficult. One common method of assessing leadership is to focus on a single temporal narrative. A second approach uses a particular theory, such as transformational leadership, to frame the analysis. The latter, less common strategy is used with the example of Eric Shinseki, who served as both chief of staff of the U.S. Army and as secretary of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). The analytic framework used here has six major elements that are specified by 22 factors. Using those factors to evaluate Shinseki's tenure at the VA, he is found to be very poor in only 2 factors but poor in 11, adequate in 6, good in 1, and excellent in only 2. While using a list of factors does not eliminate subjectivity or the challenges of reaching a single assessment, it does clarify the elements of judgment and weighting.     

Women Don't Run? Election Aversion and Candidate Entry

To study gender differences in candidate emergence, we conduct a laboratory experiment in which we control the incentives potential candidates face, manipulate features of the electoral environment, and measure beliefs and preferences. We find that men and women are equally likely to volunteer when the representative is chosen randomly, but that women are less likely to become candidates when the representative is chosen by an election. This difference does not arise from disparities in abilities, risk aversion, or beliefs, but rather from the specific competitive and strategic context of campaigns and elections. Thus, we find evidence that women are election averse, whereas men are not. Election aversion persists with variations in the electoral environment, disappearing only when campaigns are both costless and completely truthful.     

The Consequences of Gentrification for Racial Change in Washington,DC

This article looks at the effects of gentrification on the racial composition and transformation of urban neighborhoods. The investigation examines Washington, DC, a city that has undergone significant and contentious racial transformation in the past few decades. To provide for a more robust analysis of how gentrification is associated with measures of racial displacement and diversity, I employ two separate quantitative measures. Using U.S. Census Bureau long form, American Community Survey, and decennial census data, I compare tract-level changes in racial evenness and displacement between gentrifying and nongentrifying areas from 1990 to 2010. The findings suggest that gentrification is associated with the displacement of blacks, but this racial turnover is not consistently associated with greater levels of racial and ethnic diversity compared with nongentrifying neighborhoods.