Obligation-based bribes in Vietnam: A view from the norm of reciprocity

Crime, Law and Social Change - Studies of bribery have been heavily influenced by the cost/benefit calculation, leaving social relationship of the involved parties under-explored. We propose the...     

The Ocean of Yoga: An Unpublished Compendium Called the Yogārṇava

Journal of Indian Philosophy - The Yogār?ava (‘the ocean of yoga’) is a Sanskrit compendium on yoga that has not been published, translated or even mentioned in secondary...     

Predicting How Well Adolescents Get Along with Peers and Teachers: A Machine Learning Approach

Journal of Youth and Adolescence - How well adolescents get along with others such as peers and teachers is an important aspect of adolescent development. Current research on adolescent...     

Does counter-mobilization contain right-wing populist movements? Evidence from Germany

Right-wing populist (RWP) movements have been on the rise in Western democracies. Outside of party politics, such movements regularly organize demonstrations against political elites and minority groups. At the same time, civil society coalitions have mobilized against these movements. Yet we know little about the effect of counter-demonstrations on RWP protest activities. We derive competing theoretical expectations from previous work. On the one hand, counter-mobilization reduces mobilization because the original movement is less likely to achieve its goals (expected utility/costs). On the other hand, clashes and standoffs between opposing movements facilitate mobilization through polarization and anger (identity/emotions). We empirically analyze movement–countermovement dynamics using a new city-level event dataset on street protests by the German Pegida movement and its opponents. In our quantitative analysis, we investigate how counter-mobilization is associated with the onset of Pegida protests, their intensity in terms of participant numbers, and their demobilization. Counter-mobilization does not prevent protest onset, but large counter-demonstrations are associated with larger subsequent Pegida protests, and violence against Pegida supporters reduces the likelihood that they will stop protesting.     

The COVID Cash Transfer Study: The Impacts of a One-Time Unconditional Cash Transfer on the Well-Being of Families Receiving SNAP in Twelve States

There is growing interest in the use of unconditional cash transfers as a means to alleviate poverty, yet little is known about the effects of such transfers in the U.S. This paper reports on the results of a randomized controlled study of a one-time $1,000 unconditional cash transfer in May 2020 to families with low incomes in 12 U.S. states. The families were receiving, or had recently received, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits. We examine the impact of the cash transfer on five pre-registered outcomes (material hardship, mental health, parenting, child behavior, partner relationships) and several secondary outcomes (hardship avoidance, consumption, employment, benefit use). We find no statistically significant effects (powered to detect effects of 0.09 standard deviations) of the cash transfer on any outcomes for the full sample. In pre-specified exploratory analyses, we find significant reductions in material hardship (-0.17 standard deviations) among families with less than $500 of earnings in the previous month, roughly the bottom 50 percent of monthly earnings for the study sample.     

Government and Corruption: Scylla and Charybdis

Using public sector employment and corruption perception data for 72 countries across the world, this article demonstrates that despite common notion countries with “smaller” governments do not tend to have lower corruption. Under general assumptions, one can demonstrate that there is an optimal size of public sector employment corresponding to the highest capital intensity. The model has several implications: lower optimal sizes of governments for labor intensive countries and higher sizes for capital intensive ones, possibility to reduce corruption paying a cost of suboptimal output, and a higher “price” of an oversized government for labor intensive countries.     

Operational oceanography in Indonesia

In 2005 Indonesian and European institutes joined to start the first step for the implementation of an Ocean Operational System in the Indonesian archipelago. The system will support the decision making process for the sustainable use of marine resources, providing useful information and added value products as well as a service for an improved management of the sea with high business impact to targeted groups as public authorities and commercial operators (coastal managers, fishermen, shipping companies). In this paper the System is shortly described with its potential benefits and economic and social impacts.

---

Neighborhoods,Schools, and Adolescent Violence: Ecological Relative Deprivation,Disadvantage Saturation,or Cumulative Disadvantage?

Journal of Youth and Adolescence - Neighborhood and school socioeconomic “disadvantage” are consequential for youth violence perpetration. This study considers alternative ecological...     

Rechtliche Einordnung von Grünbrücken bei Aus- und Neubauten sowie bestehenden Bundesfernstraßen

Natur und Recht - Angesichts der enormen Zerschneidungswirkung von Bundesfernstraßen werden Grünbrücken in der Bundesrepublik vermehrt errichtet, sodass sich die Frage der...