History in the Law of the Constitution

This article addresses the diminution of historical understanding in English constitutional law by reconsidering Dicey's approach to history in his foundational work. It argues that Dicey's approach was inconsistent and unconvincing – separating a historical view of an evolving constitution from a legal view, discounting history's legal significance and nonetheless repeatedly evoking a whig history to enhance the appeal of the constitution's rules and principles. It recalls the features or deficiencies of whig history, famously characterised by Herbert Butterfield from a modern historical perspective. To Butterfield's characterisation it adds an elaboration on their constitutional significance and a neglected comparative dimension. From those features, it develops, in conclusion, methodological suggestions for a history that might yet serve constitutional legal purposes.     

Others in Deeply Divided Societies: A Research Agenda

This article identifies a central problem in the theory and practice of democracy in divided societies: the systematic exclusion of Others. Defining the exclusion-amid-inclusion (EAI) dilemma of consociational power-sharing, whereby in including the main groups to the conflict it works to exclude those beyond these groups, the article offers the first systematic conceptualization of this issue. The article outlines the type of individuals and groups affected by the EAI dilemma, the varying strategies they adopt to navigate power-sharing frameworks and the potential routes out of this normative and empirical puzzle. Finally, it lays out a challenge for scholars to build on this conceptualization and address the EAI dilemma in future research.     

Foreign Aid,Human Rights,and Democracy Promotion: Evidence from a Natural Experiment

Does foreign aid improve human rights and democracy? We help arbitrate the debate over this question by leveraging a novel source of exogeneity: the rotating presidency of the Council of the European Union. We find that when a country's former colonizer holds the presidency of the Council of the European Union during the budget‐making process, the country is allocated considerably more foreign aid than are countries whose former colonizer does not hold the presidency. Using instrumental variables estimation, we demonstrate that this aid has positive effects on human rights and democracy, although the effects are short‐lived after the shock to aid dissipates. We adduce the timing of events, qualitative evidence, and theoretical insights to argue that the conditionality associated with an increased aid commitment is responsible for the positive effects in the domains of human rights and democracy.     

Local democracy in a hybrid state: pluralism and protest in Volzhskiy,Russia

The standard narrative of Russia's “authoritarian backsliding” fails to grapple with the tremendous variation in subnational politics that emerged over the past two decades. This article offers a case study of the industrial city of Volzhskiy, which, although once a stalwart supporter of the Communist Party (KPRF), has evolved into a highly pluralistic system with democratic municipal institutions. Drawing upon analysis of local publications, protest data, and interviews with local politicians, this article traces the interplay of formal institutions and informal political processes in Volzhskiy's local-level transition to democracy. Volzhskiy's pluralism and local democratic outcome can largely be explained by (1) the emergence of a more diverse set of economic and political interests and constituencies, and (2) a KPRF organization that was strong and provided robust competition that created the conditions for cooperation among the competitors to form fair and open local political institutions, which fostered the city's pluralism.     

The Physiological Expression of Living in Disadvantaged Neighborhoods for Youth

Evidence suggests that the consequences of chronic exposure to stressors extend beyond psychological effects, and that adolescents living in socio-economically disadvantaged neighborhoods may experience an accumulation of exposure to stressors that wears down the physical systems in the body, resulting in hyper-activation of the stress response. This research examines the relationship between exposure to neighborhood stressors and salivary cortisol reactivity in a sample of 163 at-risk African American adolescents (average age 21; 50 % female) living in disadvantaged urban neighborhoods. More specifically, the relationship between neighborhood stressors and physiological stress, measured by baseline cortisol and cortisol reactivity is assessed. This research also examines several moderating pathways between exposure to neighborhood disadvantage and cortisol reactivity including substance use, high effort coping, psychological stress and social support. Results indicate that both individual and neighborhood-level factors influence adolescent cortisol. High effort coping and psychological stress were associated with cortisol in the sample, and exposure to neighborhood socio-economic disadvantage resulted in an atypical cortisol response. In addition, neighborhood disadvantage interacted with intra- and interpersonal factors to affect cortisol indirectly. Thus, living in disadvantaged neighborhoods may take a psychological and physiological toll on adolescents, and it also may exert synergistic effects through individual coping and vulnerabilities.     

NATO: The View from the East

Abstract

Relations between Russia, Ukraine and Belarus and NATO have placed more emphasis on cooperation than confrontation since the Cold War, and Ukraine has begun to move towards membership. At the popular level, on the evidence of national surveys in 2004 and 2005, NATO continues to be perceived as a significant threat, but in Russia and Ukraine it comes behind the United States (in Belarus the numbers are similar). There are few socioeconomic predictors of support for NATO membership that are significant across all three countries, but there are wide differences by region, and by attitudinal variables such as support for a market economy and for EU membership. The relationship between popular attitudes and foreign policy is normally a distant one; but in Ukraine NATO membership will require public support in a referendum, and in all three cases public attitudes on foreign policy issues can influence foreign policy in other ways, including the composition of parliamentary committees. In newly independent states whose international allegiances are still evolving, the associations between public opinion and foreign and security policy may often be closer than in the established democracies.     

Adolescent Sleep Barriers: Profiles within a Diverse Sample of Urban Youth

Most adolescents face numerous obstacles to good sleep, which may undermine healthy development. In this study, we used latent class analysis and identified four categories of sleep barriers in a diverse sample of 553 urban youth (57% female). The majority profile, School/Screens Barriers, reported the most homework and extracurricular barriers, along with high screen time. The Home/Screens Barriers class (i.e., high environmental noise, light, screen use) and the High/Social Barriers class (i.e., high barriers across domains, particularly social) reported the poorest sleep quality and highest depressive/anxiety symptoms. The Minimal Barriers class—predominately male, with low depressive/anxiety symptoms—reported more sleep per night. We discuss implications of our findings for targeting interventions to address poor adolescent sleep among specific clusters of students.     

Characteristics and Co-occurrence of Adolescent Non-Suicidal Self-Injury and Suicidal Behaviours in Pediatric Emergency Crisis Services

During the potentially tumultuous adolescent period, non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) and suicide attempts are relatively common, particularly amongst youth who present to mental health services. These phenomena frequently co-occur but their relationship is unclear. This study evaluated clinical data from 468 youth between the ages of 12 and 17 years (63.5% female) to determine the incidence of NSSI 24 h prior to presentation at emergency crisis services, evaluated the overlap between NSSI and suicide attempt, and examined the characteristics of different types of self-harm. Half of the adolescents presenting to emergency crisis services had self-harmed within the previous 24 h, with most of these (91%) classified as NSSI only. The percentage of youth with a suicide attempt was 5% and the co-occurrence of these two behaviours was 4%. Group differences in depressive symptoms, suicidal ideation and impulsivity were identified, with the co-occurring NSSI and suicide attempt group presenting with the highest level of psychopathology. This study underscores the necessity of assessing suicidal ideation and NSSI in all youth presenting to mental health services.     

Sport and Civil Society

Political science lags behind social history and sociological theory in its contributions to the academic understanding of sport. One remedy for this lag might be the analysis of the concept of civil society in relation to sport, since sporting institutions fit many of the definitions and fulfil many of the supposed functions of civil society. An analysis of sporting institutions in Georgia, Thailand and South Africa shows that they do 'reflect' the general condition of civil society in those countries, albeit in a distorted or exaggerated way, and that it is possible, though not necessary, for sport to be a major component of civil society.