AGE,PERIOD, AND COHORT EFFECTS ON DEATH PENALTY ATTITUDES IN THE UNITED STATES, 1974–2014

In this article, we further the understanding of both changes in public opinion on capital punishment in the United States and changes in the factors associated with public opinion on the death penalty. Support for the death penalty may be motivated by events happening during specific time periods, and it can vary across birth cohorts as a result of cohort‐specific socialization processes, demographic changes, and formative events that are specific to each generation. An explication of the sources of and variation in death penalty attitudes over time would benefit from the accounting for the age of the respondent, the year of the survey response, and the birth cohort of the respondent. We improve on previous research by using multiple approaches including hierarchical age–period–cohort models and data from the General Social Survey (N = 41,474) to examine changes in death penalty attitudes over time and across birth cohorts. The results showed curvilinear age effects, strong period effects, and weak cohort effects on death penalty support. The violent crime rate explained much of the variation in support for the death penalty across periods. The examination of subgroup differences suggests that support for the death penalty is becoming concentrated among Whites, Protestants, and Republicans.     

SHORT‐TERM CHANGES IN ADULT ARREST RATES INFLUENCE LATER SHORT‐TERM CHANGES IN SERIOUS MALE DELINQUENCY PREVALENCE: A TIME‐DEPENDENT RELATIONSHIP*

The impacts of quarterly adult arrest rates on later male serious delinquency prevalence rates were investigated in Philadelphia police districts (N = 23) over several years using all male delinquents aged 10–15 years who were mandated to more than “straight” probation. An ecological deterrence model expects more arrests to lead to less delinquency later. A community justice or mass incarceration model, the ecological version of general strain theory, and an ecologized version of the procedural justice model, each anticipates more arrests lead to more delinquency later. Investigating quarterly lags from 3 to 24 months between adult arrests and later delinquency, the results showed a time‐dependent relationship. Models with short lags showed the negative relationship expected by ecological deterrence theory. Models with lags of about a year and a half showed the positive relationship expected by the other three theories. Indicators needed so future works can gauge the relative merits of each theoretical perspective more accurately are described. The spatial distributions of current and 1920s delinquency rates were compared.     

INTRODUCTION: GREENING THE COUNTRYSIDE? CHANGING FRAMEWORKS OF EU AGRICULTURAL POLICY

In response to wide‐ranging criticism of agricultural policy, especially within Western industrialized countries, new frameworks of justification are emerging and new hybrid policy fields have been established to tackle some of the ‘externalities’ of agricultural support. However, institutional frameworks are proving slower to change, partly because this would require coordinated action across different levels of governance. Nevertheless, previously marginalized environmental concerns have successfully gained entrance to agricultural policy networks, while the intersection of trade liberalization and rural diversification have undermined the dominance of the productivist mindset in government. This gives rise to a plurality of policy actors and actions which defy the conventional categories of analysis of agricultural policy, calling for changing frameworks on the polity of agriculture too.     

The Future of Conservatism*

British Conservatism embodies certain basic, though not always compatible, tenets of belief. They have underpinned the Conservative Party, which has been the most successful political party in the history of western Europe. The party was the ‘in’ party in British politics in the 20th Century; the reasons for that success shifted in the 21st century to it principal opponent party. Attempts by Conservative leaders in the first two parliaments of opposition constituted quick‐fix and ultimately doomed approaches to restoring electoral dominance. The party under David Cameron has shifted to a long‐term, grounded approach, learning the lessons of earlier periods of opposition. Though the process remains incomplete, the Conservative Party is placed for the first time in the 21st century to return to being a party of governance.     

Electoral reform and the political modernization of England, 1832–1841

SUMMARY

Philip Salmon re-examines the place of the Reform Act of 1832 in English parliamentary history as a supposed turning point which averted revolution. Recent scholarship has shown that already before 1832 English radical traditions favoured popular constitutional reform over republicanism, and that changes to the electoral system were in practice not extensive after 1832. The analysis of pollbooks reveals, however, that the incidence of party-based voting was higher after the reform. The author explains how changes in the electoral laws, including those for local elections in the Municipal Corporations Act of 1835, altered the nature of electioneering. The new, more bureaucratic electoral laws on voter registration and qualification, on the manner of taking the poll, and on permitted election costs, all placed a premium on party organization for both local and national elections. The legal complexities led to the formation of local party associations to tackle them, as especially the registration of party supporters as voters required constant vigilance between elections. The adversarial system of registration was a key element in the rise of party-based voting in the 1830s. Confrontational electoral practices politicized the electorate for local as well as national contests, and so contributed to the advance of more persistent party allegiances at both levels. This constitutional realignment underpinned the growth of a more modern English representative democracy.