Revolutionary Discourse in Mao's China,by David E. Apter and Tony Saich

Abstract

As early as Edgar Snow's pioneering Red Star over China (1937), Yan'an was seen as the “defining moment” of the Chinese Communists' rise to power. Beginning in 1935, Mao Zedong set his personal imprint on the party as he successfully guided it from the disaster of the Long March to the “Congress of Victors” in 1945. This set the stage for the final showdown with Chiang Kai-shek and the hapless Nationalists in the civil war of 1946-49. With the victory of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in 1949, the experiences of Yan'an became the blueprint for the reconstruction of China along the lines first laid out in that remote and impoverished town in the northeast.     

Missing Data Problems in Criminological Research: Two Case Studies

This paper considers the problem of missing data in two circumstances commonly confronted by criminologists. In the first circumstance, there is missing data due to subject attrition—some cases drop out of a study. In this context, analysts are frequently interested in examining the association between an independent variable measured at time t(x _t ) and an outcome variable that is measured at time t + 1(y _t + 1); the problem is that the outcome variable is only observed for those cases which do not drop out of the study. In the second circumstance there is missing data on an independent variable of interest for typical reasons (i.e., the respondent did not wish to answer a question or could not be located). In this case, researchers are interested in estimating the association between the independent variable with missing data and an outcome variable that is fully observed. Criminologists often handle these two missing data problems by conducting analyses on the subsample of observations with complete data. In this paper, we explore this problem with two case studies and we then illustrate the use of methods that directly address the uncertainty produced by missing data.     

DAYLIGHT SAVING IN NEW SOUTH WALES: A CASE OF EMOTIVE SYMBOLIC POLITICS?

Abstract: This is a case study of the campaign over daylight saving in New South Wales from the mid-1960s. The period leading to the legislation making daylight saving a permanent feature in 1972 was marked by the involvement of various groups, media campaigns and inter-governmental negotiations. After the legislation was passed, the character of the campaign changed. Conflict was confined mainly to the rural sector, where large-scale citizen involvement occurred. Many anti-daylight saving bodies were created and a petition of over 40,000 names protesting about daylight saving was presented to the Premier. The Country Party was pressured sufficiently to promise during 1973, 1974 and 1975 that a referendum would be held, and this was achieved in May 1976. The results of the poll showed majority approval lay with continuing daylight saving. Until 1972 the policy area appeared to correspond to Theodore Lowi's "regulative" category, but from 1972 the policy arena altered to one which may be viewed in terms of T. Alexander Smith's "emotive symbolic" policy. The article assesses the Smith concept and its usefulness in explaining the issue of daylight saving as an example of intense community debate.     

The historical roots and development of criminological statistics

The history of the development of criminological statistics must examine the emergence of social statistics in general. The theoretical concerns and technical questions raised by early criminologists cannot be isolated from the wider concerns of sociologists and statisticians at work in other fields. This article traces the history and problems of crime and justice statistics through the distinct periods: a “preparatory” phase (1650–1800),and a “conceptualization” phase (1800–1914). In addition, while specifically noting a dependent relationship with the fields of demography and statistics, the separation of criminological statistics as an automous area is considered. The use of criminal justice statistics for comparative and other purposes has come under considerable review and criticism during recent years, and an examination of historical sources and problems serves to increase the understanding and usefulness of these statistics today.