How Will We Fight?

In considering the question “How will we fight?”, this article begins by examining the threats we face from conventional, insurgent, and hybrid enemies as well as terrorists and super-empowered individuals. It then outlines how America can fight effectively against each threat—as well as identifying the deficiencies in our current force structure that will hinder that response. The analysis argues that America needs a well-balanced, medium-weight joint force. It then provides recommendations for each of the services, as well as special operations forces, to achieve that goal. It concludes by describing what is needed to insure our force is capable of the rapid innovation in wartime required of successful nations.     

Mapping the road to development: a methodology for scaling up participation in policy processes

Understanding local variability in context and mobilising local participation to define development agendas are widely accepted development strategies. There remain, however, significant challenges to the systematic and effective inclusion of local communities and households. Projeto MAPLAN, a pilot project in Ceará, Brazil, is a joint effort of the public sector and civil society designed to create a process of participatory development planning which integrates local-level contextual variations. In this effort, the use of a Participatory Geographic Information System (PGIS) stimulates the participation of community members in analysing their needs, goals, and priorities. The visualisation of these factors through easily understood maps facilitates communication and contributes to a democratic and transparent planning process, thus permitting the articulation of local priorities with the state-level planning apparatus. MAPLAN represents part of a shifting paradigm for rural development planning in the state and provides the tools for the effective inclusion of citizen voice in development policy.     

Considering the council’s counsel: Advisor influence and political change

Comment on paper by Brian Goff regarding the influence of political advisors on observable measures of political outcomes.     

Taking Threat Seriously: Prejudice,Principle, and Attitudes Toward Racial Policies

Drawing from group theories of race-related attitudes and electoral politics, we develop and test how anxiety influences the relative weight of prejudice as a determinant of individuals’ support for racial policies. We hypothesize that prejudice will more strongly influence the racial policy preferences of people who are feeling anxious than it will for people who are not. Using an experimental design we manipulate subjects’ levels of threat and find significant treatment effects, as hypothesized. We find that individuals’ racial policy attitudes are partially conditional on their affective states: individuals who feel anxious report less support for racial policies than those individuals who do not feel anxious, even when this threat is stimulated by non-racial content. More broadly, we conclude that affect is central to a better understanding of individuals’ political attitudes and behaviors.     

Two Cheers for Capitalism?

According to a popular view that I call “two cheers for capitalism,” capitalism’s effect on development is ambiguous and mixed. This paper empirically investigates that view. I find that it’s wrong. Citizens in countries that became more capitalist over the last quarter century became wealthier, healthier, more educated, and politically freer. Citizens in countries that became significantly less capitalist over this period endured stagnating income, shortening life spans, smaller gains in education, and increasingly oppressive political regimes. The data unequivocally evidence capitalism’s superiority for development. Full-force cheerleading for capitalism is well deserved and three cheers are in order instead of two.     

Global scientific production,international cooperation,and knowledge evolution of public administration

Public administration is a discipline with considerable history, and is also a diverse, interdisciplinary field in social science. To analyze its evolution, discover the present research foci, and predict future development trends, this study applied scientometrics visualization technology to evaluate over 72,000 scientific articles from the 1920s to 2020s. This research referred to the SSCI and JCR databases to gather scientific data of the discipline and the journals' impact factor. Consequently, paper citations, cited journals, journal co-citations, author co-citations, authoritative papers, top countries, productive institutes, average references, and research collaboration trends were analyzed on the bases of the published literature. This study found top productive journals in the discipline, discovered productive countries and institutes, present the research foci, and predicted future development trends. Through this study, scientific production, international cooperation, and knowledge evolution mode of public administration research offers a clear knowledge map of the public administration discipline.     

Capital appreciation bonds and the cost of borrowing

A Capital Appreciation Bond (CAB) is a financial instrument that is most attractive as a resource-flow management instrument. It bridges multiple fiscal years for jurisdictions experiencing rapid growth, potentially stretching for decades, but may also be used by localities experiencing fiscal distress. Using debt issuance data by independent school districts in Texas, who utilized almost all such bonds in the state, we present empirical evidence that CABs are associated with both the service and fiscal pressure factors. We further observe that, though the threat from CABs in terms of borrowing costs may have been exaggerated, enacting limits on debt repayment ratios (ratio of payment size at maturity to premium size) was likely the right legislative intervention.     

The failure of a liberal peace: Sri Lanka's counter-insurgency in global perspective

The victory by the Sri Lankan government over the LTTE in 2009 apparently ended over 25 years of civil war. However, the ramifications of the government's counter-insurgency go far beyond Sri Lanka's domestic politics. The military campaign against the LTTE poses a significant challenge to many of the liberal norms that inform contemporary models of international peace-building—the so-called ‘liberal peace’. This article suggests that Sri Lanka's attempts to justify a shift from peaceful conflict resolution to counter-insurgency relied on three main factors: the flawed nature of the peace process, which highlighted wider concerns about the mechanisms and principles of international peace processes; the increased influence of ‘Rising Powers’, particularly China, in global governance mechanisms, and their impact on international norms related to conflict management; and the use by the government of a discourse of counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency to limit international censure. The article concludes that the Sri Lankan case may suggest a growing contestation of international peace-building norms, and the emergence of a legitimated ‘illiberal peace’.     

Forensic Performance Analysis of Load‐Limiting Devices in Automotive Seat Belt Retractors

The introduction of frontal airbags and seatbelt pretensioners for front seat occupants provided an opportunity to address injuries caused by seatbelt loading by introducing load‐limiters, which were intended to reduce belt loading while maintaining proper restraint. Investigation and forensic analysis of real‐world crashes identified that the implementation of these devices, in some circumstances, increased the potential of injury. This paper focuses on the trade‐offs of load‐limiters, that is, the reduction loading to the occupant versus the corresponding increase in seatbelt webbing and occupant movement. If the additional webbing introduced is not controlled, the risk of injury to the occupant is increased and could result in more frequent and severe injuries rather than a reduction. This paper quantifies the webbing introduced by load‐limiter activation through forensic analysis of the seatbelt involved in real‐world crashes and testing and assesses its effect on the injuries sustained by the occupant.