The Housing and Planning Act 2016: Rewarding the Aspiration of Homeownership?

In May 2016 the Housing and Planning Act 2016 became law, the first purely Conservative government intervention on housing in England since the 1990s. This article examines the Act's key provisions pertaining to social housing and the government's stated aim of increasing rates of homeownership. The Act, through the Starter Homes Scheme, extension of the right to buy to housing association tenants and changes to security of tenure in the social sector, has been heralded as a ‘landmark’ piece of legislation. This article scrutinises these policy measures and assesses their effectiveness and likely impact. It is contended that the Act exposes the government's promotion of homeownership above all other housing tenures. The article further explores the deep moralisation at the heart of the homeownership narrative and the intensification in the residualisation of social housing in England which, it is argued, is the inevitable consequence of the reforms.     

The Structure and Dynamics of Group Politics: 1964–1992

In the realm of politics the relevance of groups derives from their centrality to government institutions, the policy process, and election campaigns. In addition, individuals have a predisposition to rely on cues and shortcuts when making choices and forming preferences; groups are ideal for this purpose. Groups help orient individuals to their social world by providing standards, supplying information, and defining friend and foe. If groups are central to politics and political cognition then we should find an underlying political structure within which group attitudes can be organized, and through which other political attitudes, coalitions, and behaviors can be viewed. In our analysis we apply Rabinowitz (1976) Line of Sight method for ordering object pairs consistent with the Euclidean spatial model to the complete series of group thermometer ratings from the NES Presidential Election Studies, 1964 through 1992. The resulting eight group by group matrices are subjected to a series of multidimensional scaling models to determine the underlying structure of the group spatial distances. Our findings suggest that orientations toward groups can be satisfactorily mapped into a two-dimensional space defined by partisan and affective axes. Over this 30-year period we find that attitudes toward groups have become more emotional and less partisan in nature. Interpretation of the group space is further aided by the use of ideal-point regressions that make it possible to place voters, members of the New Deal coalition, and issue publics in the space defined by group attitudes.     

Expenditures on children and child support guidelines

This article examines the literature that estimates parental expenditures on children; describes the types of child support guidelines that are being used by the states; and compares how the child support awards that emerge from each state's guidelines compare to the empirical estimates of expenditure patterns on children. The findings indicate that the states' guidelines appear to be more or less consistent with the estimates of expenditures on children. In a few cases, however, the guidelines require less in support from the noncustodial parent than the parent would have spent on the child(ren) in an average intact family. In many other cases, the guidelines require child support payments that are very close to the lower bound of the estimates of expenditures. This article concludes with a discussion of the difficult value judgments that ultimately must be made in setting child support awards.     

The Effect of Negative Emotion on Licit and Illicit Drug Use Among High School Dropouts: An Empirical Test of General Strain Theory

General Strain Theory (GST) argues that drug use is one way adolescents mitigate negative emotions brought on by aversive environmental stimuli. To date, many of the empirical tests of the strain-drug use relationship have neglected to include measures of negative emotion, despite its prominence in GST's etiology of deviant behavior. The following study tests the mediating effects of despair on the strain-drug use relationship, evaluating the effects of parental reactions to leaving school on post-dropout drug use. The moderating effects of recency of dropout and gender of respondent are also considered. Results show that negative parental reactions to dropout affect drug use for females only, and that despair does not mediate this relationship. This type of negative affect has direct effects on drug use for both genders, rather than the indirect effects predicted by GST. These findings affirm prior research linking depressive negative affective states to drug use, but suggests that the relationship between strain and such emotional states is more complex than the theory suggests, particularly when the moderating effects of gender are considered.

Proximal and Distal Effects of Sensation Seeking and Parenting Environments on Alcohol Use Trajectories from Early Adolescence to Early Adulthood

Adolescent alcohol use is related to disinhibition traits and family environments. However, research is scarce on whether these factors predict alcohol use trajectories distally, from early adolescence into early adulthood. We examined whether sensation seeking and parenting environments in early adolescence predicted adolescents’ alcohol use trajectories proximally (middle-adolescence) and distally (early adulthood). Using four waves of data from 345 adolescents (51.3% female; 80% white) and their primary caregivers, we estimated adolescents’ alcohol use trajectories and examined variability in these by sensation seeking and parental control. The findings revealed distal, positive associations between sensation seeking and alcohol use; and negative, proximal associations between parental control and alcohol use. Also proximally, there was a significant interaction between sensation seeking and parental control. We discuss implications for theory and practice.     

Red Europe versus no Europe? The impact of attitudes towards the EU and the economic crisis on radical-left voting

The 2014 European Parliament election saw a relatively large increase in the size of radical-left parties (RLPs), particularly in Western Europe. This article aims to provide new ways of thinking about the dynamics of radical-left voting by analysing the changing role of attitudes towards the European Union in explaining support for RLPs at European Parliament elections during the Great Recession. It is argued that the Europeanisation of economic issues during the financial crisis, together with the particular kind of Euroscepticism advocated by these parties, have enabled them to successfully attract a heterogeneous pool of voters. Using the 2009 and 2014 European Election Studies, it is shown that the effect of negative opinions about the EU on support for RLPs increased significantly during the crisis. In addition, support for RLPs also increased among voters with positive views of the EU who were nevertheless highly dissatisfied with the economic situation.     

Spouse Abuse by Black and White Offenders in the U.S. Army

Black soldiers are overrepresented in the U.S. Army Central Registry of spouse abuse cases. For each year between 1989 and 1997, the number of black offenders outnumbers white offenders, while the white population outnumbers the black population. When age-specific rates per 1000 were computed, the rates for blacks were greater than those for whites in every age group. The highest rates for both races were in the 18- to 21-year age group. Age-specific rate ratios between blacks and whites for 1997 ranged from 3.4 for the 18- to 21-year-old group to 1.9 for the 42- to 46-year age group. All of the rate ratios except the one for the 42 to 46-year age group were statistically significant. Socioeconomic status (SES) is an unlikely explanation for these findings as SES was reasonably controlled. Culturally specific longitudinal studies are needed to clarify the reasons for differences in black and white spouse abuse incidents.     

Juvenile Offenders’ Alcohol and Marijuana Trajectories: Risk and Protective Factor Effects in the Context of Time in a Supervised Facility

The current study modeled trajectories of substance use from ages 15 to 20 among 1,095 male serious juvenile offenders (M age = 16.54; 42% African-American, 34% Latino, 20% European-American, and 4% other ethnic/racial backgrounds) and prospectively predicted trajectories from risk and protective factors before and after controlling for time spent in a supervised setting. Results indicated that supervised time suppressed age-related growth in substance use. Trajectories of offenders with no supervised time and low levels of supervised time increased in substance use across age, whereas offenders with high levels of supervised time showed no growth. Almost all risk and protective factors had effects on initial substance use but only adolescent history of substance use, impulse control, and psychosocial maturity had an effect on change in substance use over time. Findings highlight the importance of formal sanctions and interventions superimposed on normal developmental processes in understanding trajectories of substance use among serious juvenile offenders.

Wheels within Wheels: Poverty,Power and Patronage in the Cambodian Migration System

Abstract

This article presents evidence for an adjusted and refocused systems theory of labour migration in Cambodia. Specifically, it seeks to highlight first, how migration in Cambodia may be understood as a multi-scalar phenomenon characterised by pragmatism and flexibility; secondly, it emphasises the undergirding role of traditional rural norms in shaping and mediating the systematic process of labour movement; and finally, it presents evidence concerning how these structures constitute a vessel of social change, not only from urban to rural, but also from the rural to urban. In this way, a picture is presented of Cambodian migration as an adaptable, but nevertheless highly patterned process which is rapidly reordering the Kingdom’s cities and villages alike.