The estimated cost impact of privatizing student transportation in Minnesota school districts

Student transportation makes up a substantial portion of a typical school district??s operating budget, and sub-contracting bus service to private firms has been advanced by some as a way to reduce transportation costs. Previous studies have found conflicting evidence regarding the cost impact of privatization. This paper seeks to improve on previous studies by estimating cost equations using data that spans six school-years. The primary result is that privatization acts to substantially increase transportation costs. Estimates using a pooled cross section predicted that going from fully outsourced to fully in house reduced costs by approximately 15.8%, while the analogous estimate using a first-differenced equation was a savings of 20.7%.     

"Chartering" the limits of involuntary psychiatric treatment in Victoria: interpreting the Mental Health Act 1986 (Vic) in the age of the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities Act 2006 (Vic)

The Mental Health Act 1986 (Vic) allows for individuals with a serious mental illness to be treated on an involuntary basis either in a psychiatric hospital (on an involuntary treatment order) or in the community (on a community treatment order). The Act also establishes the Mental Health Review Board with the authority to review these orders within eight weeks of those orders being made and at least once every 12 months thereafter. This article analyses a recent decision of the board, Re Appeal of 09-085 [2009] VMHRB 1, in which the appellant challenged a decision of a psychiatrist to extend his community treatment order for a further 12 months. The appellant argued that aspects of his involuntary treatment under the Act amounted to "cruel, inhuman or degrading" treatment and therefore breached his right to freedom from "cruel, inhuman or degrading" treatment under s 10(b) of Victoria's recently enacted Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities Act 2006 (Vic). Thus, the board was asked to consider whether the definition of "treatment" under the Act was compatible with the rights and freedoms enacted by the Charter. This was the first time that a Victorian court or tribunal had considered the impact of the Charter on involuntary psychiatric treatment. The decision was also a prelude to the Victorian Government's announcement that it would comprehensively review its mental health legislation, now the oldest in Australia. As this case highlights, in determining the future direction of mental health legislation and policy in Victoria, the Charter has been crucial.     

Perceptions of the Police by LGBT Communities

The purpose of this study is to explore how lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) communities perceive the police. Historically, relationships between LGBT communities and the police have been strained due to a legacy of discriminatory actions, although some police agencies have more recently taken steps to build relationships with LGBT communities. A survey was administered to a sample of LGBT and heterosexual respondents (n = 787) to measure perceptions regarding police fairness, policing qualities, policing outcomes, and police interactions with LGBT communities. Across a number of measures and scales, the perceptions of LGBT participants were significantly more negative than those of other participants, including when the variables of race, income, location type (e.g., rural, small town, suburban, urban), prior service as a police officer, and quality of prior interactions with the police, are controlled in multivariate modeling. Implications for police training and policy are discussed, as well as theoretical contexts that frame the results.     

A neo-Downsian model of group-oriented voting and racial backlash

We extend the standard Downsian framework to suppose that voters consider the identity of each candidate's supporters when deciding whom to support, rather than considering only the announced policy positions of the candidates. In particular we posit the existence of a class of voters whose support for a candidate reduces support by some other voters for that candidate. Our most important result concerns the conditions under which the addition to the electorate of new voters on one side of the policy spectrum shifts the equilibrium toward the opposite direction. The model can explain why enfranchisement of blacks did not immediately help the election of liberal candidates.     

B. Reviews: general

DISCOVERING ISLAM: MAKING SENSE OF MUSLIM HISTORY AND SOCIETY. By AKBAR S. AHMED. London and New York, Routledge and Kegan Paul, Ltd., 1988. 251pp.

THE CRUSADES THROUGH ARAB EYES. By AMIN MAALOUF. Translated by JON ROTHSCHILD. London, Al‐Saqi Books, 1984 (first published as Les Croisades vues par les Arabes, Paris, 1983). 295 pp., 2 maps.

THE SOCIAL ORIGINS OF THE MODERN MIDDLE EAST. By HAIM GERBER. Boulder, Lynne Rienner/London, Mansell, 1987. 300pp. £26.50 (U.K.)

PAN‐ARABISM AND ARAB NATIONALISM: THE CONTINUING DEBATE. Edited by TAWFIC E. FARAH. London/Boulder, Colorado, Westview Press, 1987. 208pp., notes, tables.

POLITICAL SOCIALIZATION IN THE ARAB STATES. Edited by TAWFIC E. FARAH and YASUMASA KURODA. Boulder, Lynne Rienner, 1987. vii‐xiv, 215pp.

ZIONISM AND THE ARABS, 1882–1948: A STUDY OF IDEOLOGY. By YOUSEF GORNY. Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1987. 342pp. £32.50.

SHI'ISM, RESISTANCE, AND REVOLUTION. Edited by MARTIN KRAMER. Boulder, Co., Westview/London, Mansell, 1987. 324pp.

EGYPT: INTERNAL CHALLENGES AND REGIONAL STABILITY. Edited by LILLIAN CRAIG HARRIS. (Chatham House Papers, 39.) London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1988. 116pp. £5.95.

PALESTINIAN HIGHER EDUCATION IN THE WEST BANK AND GAZA: A CRITICAL ASSESSMENT. By SAMIR N. ANABTAWI. London, KPI, 1986. 84pp. 1 map, tables.

POLITICS AND THE ECONOMY IN SYRIA. Edited by J.A. ALLAN. London, Centre for Near and Middle Eastern Studies, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 1987. 142pp., maps, figs., tables.

IRAQ SINCE 1958: FROM REVOLUTION TO DICTATORSHIP. By MARION FAROUK‐SLUGLETT AND PETER SLUGLETT. London, KPI, 1987. 332pp. £12.95.

LAW AND JUSTICE IN CONTEMPORARY YEMEN: THE PEOPLE'S DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF YEMEN AND THE YEMEN ARAB REPUBLIC. By S.H. AMIN. Glasgow, Royston Ltd., 1987. vi, 159pp. £18.75

TRANSLATIONS OF EASTERN POETRY AND PROSE. By REYNOLD ALLEYNE NICHOLSON, with a new Introduction by C.E. Bosworth. London, Curzon Press/New Jersey, Humanities Press, 1987 (first published 1922). xvi, 200pp, 5 plates. £5.50.

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SOCIAL AND HISTORICAL CHANGE: AN ISLAMIC PERSPECTIVE. By AYATULLAH MURTAZA MUTAHHARI. Translated by R. CAMPBELL. Berkeley, Mizan Press. 1986. 164pp.

DEVELOPMENT PLANNING IN IRAN: FROM MONARCHY TO ISLAMIC REPUBLIC. By KAMRAN MOFID. Cambridgeshire, MENAS Press, 1987. 320pp., tables and figures, notes, bibliography.

THE ELEMENTARY STRUCTURES OF POLITICAL LIFE: RURAL DEVELOPMENT IN PAHLAVI IRAN. By GRACE GOODELL. Oxford, O.U.P., 1986. 326pp.

BANKING AND EMPIRE IN IRAN (THE HISTORY OF THE BRITISH BANK OF THE MIDDLE EAST, VOLUME I). By GEOFFREY JONES. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, xxiv, 418pp. £40.00.

PAKISTAN SOCIETY: ISLAM, ETHNICITY AND LEADERSHIP IN SOUTH ASIA. By AKBAR S. AHMED. Karachi, Oxford University Press, 1986. 279pp.

TOWARD ISLAMIC ANTHROPOLOGY: DEFINITION, DOGMA AND DIRECTIONS. By AKBAR S. AHMED. Ann Arbor, Michigan, New Era Publications/London, al‐Quds Publications, 1986.79pp. $6.00.

HÉRITER EN PAYS MUSULMAN: HABUS, LAIT VIVANT, MANYAHULI. Edited by MARCEAU GAST. Paris, Editions du C.N.R.S., 1987. 302pp. (French and English abstracts to p. 296; Index of vernacular terms to p. 302). FF. 130.

OPEC: THE RISE AND FALL OF AN EXCLUSIVE CLUB. By SHUKRI M. GHANEM. London, Kegan Paul International, 1986. 233pp. £30.00.

OPEC AID AND THE CHALLENGE OF DEVELOPMENT. Edited by ABDELKADER BENAMARA and SAM IFEAGWU. London, Croom Helm, 1987. 130pp. £25.00.

SYRIA AND IRAN: THREE STUDIES IN MEDIEVAL CERAMICS. Edited by JAMES ALLAN and CAROLINE ROBERTS. Oxford, O.U.P., 1987. 248pp. £25.00.