The promise of primary prevention home visiting programs: a review of potential outcomes

Home visitation (HV) is a promising service delivery model, despite a history of mixed documented results. Compiling results on the promising family and child development outcomes in the HV literature has utility for current programs and those under development. We review traditional outcomes (e.g., child maltreatment prevention) from the literature on HV, but we also present nontraditional outcomes (e.g., community connection) that may be relevant for future evaluations. Programs that document their implementation and study their outcomes through a thoughtful, planned process may capture important and much needed information on strengthening families through HV.     

Coordinating individual and organisational responses to fraud

Crimes involving dishonesty, collectively known as fraud, have been estimated to cost developed nations many billions of dollars each year. The last decade has seen the creation of an extensive range of responses to this problem by government and business alike, some of which are beginning to bear fruit. But much remains to be done—particularly concerning the coordination of the many preventive and response strategies being used by public and private sector organisations. This article outlines current avenues of fraud reporting that individuals and organisations use, examines the extent of reporting, and considers the various barriers that exist to reporting fraud. The focus is primarily on Australia, although the issues have relevance to many other countries. It is argued that there are various approaches that could be developed to encourage greater reporting of fraud, and that a nationally coordinated response would assist those who make official reports, and enable information to be gathered which may assist in the development of improved fraud prevention strategies and interventions. The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the Australian Government.     

Who Wins in Settlement Negotiations?

When lawsuits are resolved out of court, what determines thesettlement price? This article uses a laboratory simulationand path analysis to estimate the relative importance of measurablevariables in determining who wins the battle for the cooperativesurplus. In the simulated negotiation conditions, seven variablesexplained more than half of the variation in settlement outcomesachieved by participants, with negotiators’ predictionsof their opponent's reservation prices the most important, followedby negotiator gender and amount of first offer. Although thespecific context of this article is settlement, the insightsgenerated are applicable to any two-party, distributive negotiation.     

Politics and Power in the United Kingdom

PRODUCING an introductory text for any academic discipline isa challenging task; however, the work involved in compilingand writing a comprehensive user-friendly and contemporary workfor British Politics undergraduate students has to be one ofthe most daunting tasks to face the political scientist. With the trend towards receiving ever more information and newson politics and political events from the worldwide web, coupledwith the expansion of transmission time by a range of radioand television outlets, much political coverage tends towardssimplistic explanation, driven largely by personality ratherthan policy concerns. Consequently, the importance of producinga thorough introductory text removing misperception and misinformationhas intensified. However, in Politics and Power in the United Kingdom editedby Heffernan and Thompson, both established and well-respectedfigures in their subject disciplines,     

Carceral Pride: The Fusion of Police Imagery with LGBTI Rights

This paper reflects upon the adoption of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Intersex (LGBTI) rights discourse and imagery in police public relations and problematises the construction of police as protectors and defenders of gay liberties and homonormative life. Building from a foundational conceptualisation of policing as a racial capitalist project, it analyses the phenomenon of police rainbow branding practiced in nominally public spaces, such as Pride parades, and online through news media and social networking sites. Drawing on critiques of queer liberalism and complicities with state violence, the paper explores the contours of carceral homonationalism, arguing that ‘officially anti-homophobic’ police image work attempts to obscure the role of the carceral state in (re)producing sexual and gender oppression. However, this image work has also given rise to new forms of political action. Counter-movements against police and ‘carceral pride’ are actively reworking the distributions of space and visibility within LGBTI movements.     

Interpreting Partisan Dealignment in Germany

Partisan ties in Germany have been weakening over the past three decades, which is changing the landscape of electoral politics. In contrast to a recent article by Dassonneville et al. in this journal, this article argues that a generational decline in partisanship is contributing to this dealignment trend, and virtually all of the new independents are more sophisticated apartisans who are politically engaged even though they lack party ties. These findings are based on the 1972–2009 time series of surveys by the Forschungsgruppe Wahlen. The results point to a more sophisticated German electorate that will inject more fluidity into electoral politics and empower more Germans to make reasonable electoral choices.     

The Anti-Inflation case: the anatomy of a constitutional decision

Abstract. The Supreme Court's decision upholding the Anti-Inflation Act may have been the Court's most important decision since becoming Canada's final Court of Appeal. While the federal government's wage and price control policy escaped a judicial veto, the Court's decision gave that policy only a temporary constitutional mandate. In so doing, the Court laid to rest, for the time being, any possibility that the national peace, order and good government power was to be dramatically expanded, but opened up the possibility of fairly easy access to the emergency use of the power in peacetime. By examining this decision in the context of the political and legal strategies of the parties, we may gain some valuable insights into the nature of judicial review in Canada. Among other things the case demonstrates the limited importance of judicial review in the politics of Canadian federalism. The Court's decision signals that a constitutional revolution is not about to occur, but the decision itself is not the major factor in preventing a centralizing shift in the balance of power. In fact the Supreme Court's decision reflects fairly accurately the balance of political power in the country. But while the case reveals how political the process of judicial review can be in Canada, still the end product of the process—the opinions of the judges—continues to be cast in a relatively legalistic' style. The Court may adjudicate constitutional disputes but it is not about to dispense constitutional wisdom. The case also teaches us something about the relative importance of economic and judicial resources in the political process. The main lesson is clear: bodi politicians and interest groups will risk losses in terms of long-run constitutional doctrine in order to secure important short-run policy objectives.