Reaching the unreached? Good governance and welfare reform politics in Delhi,India

Good governance scholarship has been preoccupied with the donor-driven conditionalities imposed on aid-receiving developing countries. Limited attention has been given to power struggles and resistance from government actors (bureaucrats and politicians) to embrace internally driven good governance programmes. To address this gap, this article ethnographically examines a good governance initiative of the Delhi government (India) to reform its welfare system in partnership with NGOs. The study indicates that the conflict between government and non-governmental actors over the authority to govern the poor eventually maintained the status quo of the welfare system while the poor remain marginalised.     

An experimental trial of adaptive programming in drug court: outcomes at 6, 12 and 18 months

Objectives

To test whether an adaptive program improves outcomes in drug court by adjusting the schedule of court hearings and clinical case-management sessions pursuant to a priori performance criteria.

Methods

Consenting participants in a misdemeanor drug court were randomly assigned to the adaptive program (n?=?62) or to a baseline-matching condition (n?=?63) in which they attended court hearings based on the results of a criminal risk assessment. Outcome measures were re-arrest rates at 18 months post-entry to the drug court, and urine drug test results and structured interview results at 6 and 12 months post-entry.

Results

Although previously published analyses revealed significantly fewer positive drug tests for participants in the adaptive condition during the first 18 weeks of drug court, current analyses indicate the effects converged during the ensuing year. Between-group differences in new arrest rates, urine drug test results and self-reported psychosocial problems were small and non-statistically significant at 6, 12, and 18 months post-entry. A non-significant trend (p?=?.10) suggests there may have been a small residual impact (Cramer’s v?=?.15) on new misdemeanor arrests after 18 months.

Conclusions

Adaptive programming shows promise for enhancing short-term outcomes in drug courts; however, additional efforts are needed to extend the effects beyond the first 4 to 6 months of enrollment.     

Examining the “virtual”; publication as a “newspaper of record”;

Newspapers as a record of the day's events and chronicle for public business have been part of the United States' unofficial governing system for several hundred years. The expression “newspaper of record”; has specific meaning and import for librarians, historians and lawyers. This article compares the statutory characteristics of “newspapers of record”; with the qualities of modern electronic newspapers delivered by on‐line delivery services. The article concludes that the definitions of “newspapers of record”; used by librarians, historians and statutes may not be met yet by electronic editions of newspapers. Thus, on‐line newspapers may not be able to carry legal notices.     

Saghir Ahmad

Abstract

Following Yahya Khan’s invasion of East Pakistan on March 25th of this year, a small number of West Pakistani intellectuals living in North America publicly condemned the brutal massacres. Prominent among them were Saghir and Eqbal Ahmad (brothers), Feroz Ahmed, and Aijaz Ahmed, all university teachers and writers. These men wrote open letters to their government and articles on Bangla Desh, demonstrated, and gave media interviews, braving possible reprisals. Together with friends from East Bengal, they tried to inform North Americans about the conditions of the people and the character of the contending forces in Bangla Desh, and to oppose the U.S. contribution to that slaughter.