Comment on Dowell Myers and Elizabeth Gearin's “current preferences and future demand for denser residential environments”: In praise…or at least acceptance…of ambiguity

Abstract

It is clear that attempts to discern consumer attitudes toward neighborhood form yield only ambiguity. Denser, more walkable residential environments are impossible to define in a universally applicable manner because of the unique characteristics of an individual neighborhood and its relationship to a region's climate, tradition, and heritage. Consumer preferences are likewise ambiguous and contradictory; this is simply due to many Americans’ lack of personal familiarity with compact, walkable neighborhoods.     

Institutional Change and Conflict Regulation: The Anglo-Irish Agreement (1985) and the Mechanisms of Change in Northern Ireland

This article uses historical institutionalist theory to assess the impact of the Anglo-Irish Agreement of 1985 – often seen as the first step towards gradualist change in the role of the state in Northern Ireland. It uses new data to show how the elites who initiated the process conceived of it and to identify the mechanisms producing change. The study shows that the mechanisms of institutional change identified in comparative studies of industrial policy and welfare state development are also to be found in processes of intergovernmental ethnic conflict regulation. In turn, it highlights a mechanism of institutional change – ‘wedging’ – not discussed in the literature.     

Predicting School Sense of Community: Students’ Perceptions at Two Catholic Universities

Understanding the factors that predict sense of community (SOC) among college students has important implications for higher education policy and practice. The present study determined whether perceptions of inclusion and religious pluralism across 2,199 university students' (1,442 women, 757 men; M age = 23.42, SD =7.84) at two Catholic universities predicted levels of school sense of community (SSOC). As expected, results indicated that perceptions of both inclusion and religious pluralism significantly predicted SSOC. However, mixed results were found regarding the interaction of university setting with inclusion and religious pluralism. Limitations and future directions for research are discussed.     

Proportionality in the Liability to Compensate

Law and Philosophy - There is widely thought to be a proportionality constraint on harming others in self-defense, such that an act of defensive force can be impermissible because the harm...     

Structural validity of the posttraumatic stress disorder checklist among college students with a trauma history

The authors conducted confirmatory factor analyses to test three-factor and four-factor models of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) using the PTSD Checklist with college students reporting a traumatic event history. The authors found support for the three-factor DSM-IV-based PTSD diagnostic model including reexperiencing, avoidance/numbing, and hyperarousal symptom factors, with slightly better support for a four-factor model separating the avoidance and numbing factors. Results further attest to the PTSD Checklist's construct validity, and to research finding that PTSD avoidance and numbing constructs are distinct.     

Measuring the Impact of New Public Management and European Integration on Recruitment and Training int he UK Civil Service

This article investigates the impact which the institutional development of the European Union (EU) and the new public management (NPM) have had on the process of recruitment and training of senior public officials in the United Kingdom between 1970 and 1995. Information provided by directors of personnel and training has enabled the extent of change observed in three government departments – Agriculture, Transport and Health – to be measured on a numerical scale. This is combined with a historical analysis rooted in practitioner experience. The evidence from both sources suggests that whereas NPM pressures have had a relatively similar impact on recruitment and training practices in all three departments, the response to EU pressure is much stronger in the Ministry of Agriculture than in the Departments of Transport and Health. The EU impact in Agriculture is particularly strong in respect of recruitment and career progression, the only area and the only department in which our index suggests that policy has been more heavily influenced by European pressures than by NPM. These findings reflect the strength of the political commitment to NPM and the power of the central departments in imposing it across Whitehall; and in the case of Agriculture the development of a cadre of senior officials who have almost all had experience of working in or with the EU institutions.     

Collective versus unilateral responses to terrorism

Global terrorism presents collective action issues for targeted nations. Proactive measures (e.g., preemptive strikes) against terrorists create external benefits for all at-risk nations. In contrast, defensive actions deflect attacks to softer targets, thereby giving rise to external benefits to protected foreign residents and external costs to venues abroad. Coordinated antiterrorism measures are particularly difficult to achieve when many nations must participate and nonparticipants can undo the efforts of others. Thus, freezing terrorists’ assets or abiding by a no-negotiation pledge pose difficult collective action problems. These same concerns do not plague decisive action against domestic terrorism.     

Recovery of Missing Persons in Cyprus: Heavy Equipment Methods and Techniques for Complex Well Excavations

This technical note presents the methods and techniques developed by the Bi-communal Forensic Team (BCFT) of the Committee on Missing Persons in Cyprus (CMP) used to excavate and exhume the remains of missing persons, many of whom were buried in deep wells at sites across the island of Cyprus during the conflict period of the 1960s and 1970s. A total of 493 Turkish Cypriots and 1508 Greek Cypriots were officially reported missing by the two communities as a result of the conflict. Since the team's formation, in 2005, the BCFT has excavated 114 wells, resulting in the recovery of 195 missing individuals from 35 of these well excavations. The standard excavation approach used by the BCFT, especially for deep well recovery, consists of “ramp,” “pocket,” and “pool” components. These excavation features enable CMP archaeologists to excavate deep wells safely and efficiently while simultaneously permitting time for thorough documentation and unimpeded recovery of human remains. The team uses three variants of this approach to cope with the variety of geological, physical, and hydrological contexts faced in Cyprus’ wells, including hard and soft landforms, the presence or absence of water, and limitations imposed by surrounding infrastructure. The “terracing”, “double-ramp”, and “single-ramp” variations are detailed with respect to the environmental contexts which prescribe their use. The BCFT's general procedures for human remains recovery and standard well safety protocols conclude the article.