A cure for crime: Can mental health treatment diversion reduce crime among youth?

Youth crime is a serious social problem, as is the high proportion of young offenders in the juvenile justice system who have mental disorders. A recent policy innovation applies the theory of therapeutic jurisprudence and diverts youth with mental disorders to treatment in lieu of further court processing. The expansion of mental health diversion programs reflects an increasingly popular view that there is a causal relationship between youth mental disorders and crime. Policymakers who share this view place greater emphasis on rehabilitation and treatment as a way to reduce crime, rather than on stricter punishment. This paper considers the policy issues around youth mental health diversion programs. In addition, it evaluates the effect of a mental health diversion program for youth that was implemented in Texas. The paper finds that mental health diversion can be used effectively to delay or prevent youth recidivism.     

Considering Knowledge Uptake within a Cycle of Transforming Data,Information, and Knowledge

Knowledge uptake, having decision makers assimilate the ideas of experts, is recognized as an important stimulus to bringing about policy change. This is particularly true in the realm of environmental policymaking, which is characterized by knowledge intensity, complexity, and multifaceted concerns. Using examples from an innovative watershed management organization, this article presents a heuristic for understanding how knowledge uptake occurs within a cycle of organizational reasoning. This cycle is driven by activities that transform data, information, and knowledge and that link specialists with decision makers. The heuristic can be used as a diagnostic tool to identify breaks in the transformation process that impede mandate fulfillment and impair capacity building. Lack of appreciation of the dynamic relationship between data, information and knowledge leads to mistimed and ineffective policy interventions that do not result in the hoped for progress in science intended to underpin policy advances.     

The Federal Concessioner System: Linking Policy to Opportunities for Local Service Providers

Every year millions of tourists hit the open road to enjoy America's public recreation lands. Upon arrival at their destinations, visitors enjoy a host of service amenities ranging from hotels and lodges to ski resorts and back country adventures, all compliments of concessioners. These public lands concessioner operations are a multibillion dollar business. This decades‐long analysis finds that local service providers have generally failed to secure concessioner contracts on public lands. A focus among more politically adept participants upon other policy priorities has eclipsed local provider preferences despite periodic opportunities for change and economic need.     

A Preliminary Assessment of Water Institutions in India: An Institutional Design Perspective

Water institutions in India play a crucial role in managing scarce water resources and are central to economic development and poverty alleviation. Designing appropriate institutional mechanisms to allocate scarce water and river flows has been an enormous challenge due to the complex legal, constitutional, and social issues involved. The Indian water sector has been grappling with poor performance and deterioration of public (canal and tank) irrigation systems, high extraction levels of groundwater, and related economic and environmental problems. The objective of this article is to carry out a preliminary assessment of institutional mechanisms available to manage water resources in India. The article surveys various formal and informal institutional arrangements that are used at present and their design features in order to identify those institutions related to superior performance. The analysis indicates that crafting “winning institutions” and the policy frameworks to strengthen them should take into account not only the proven criteria of institutional design but also the changing socioeconomic, political, and cultural factors.     

Presidential Party,Incumbency, and the Effects of Economic Fluctuations on House Elections, 1916–1996

There is little professional consensusregarding the effect of economic conditionson House Elections. We argue that recentwork still uses the paradigm of Party toorganize their data and tests. Given thatrecent developments in the theory ofcongress emphasize the paradigm ofIncumbency, we investigate the empiricalrelevance of that competing paradigm. Weshow that (1) Incumbency matters in a purePresidential Party Model of HouseElections, (2) Presidential Party mattersin a pure Incumbency Model, (3) Once bothParty and Incumbency are accounted for,economic conditions exert a highlysignificant and temporally stable influenceon House elections, (4) Return Rates aremore affected by economic fluctuations thanare Vote Shares, and (5) Not allPresidential Party incumbents face the samedegree of electoral accountability foreconomic fluctuations.     

A Tale of Two Towns: Assessing the Role of Political Resources in a Community Electronic Network

In this study we examine responses to the recent expansion of information technology in two rural Minnesota towns. One of these towns took a cooperative approach to technology access, developing a community electronic network, while the other town relied on a more individualistic, entrepreneurial model. The present study examines citizens' attitudes concerning social, political, and technological issues in these two communities, with the goal of uncovering what kinds of attitudes and resources citizens need to have in order to help support and sustain a community electronic network. Structural equation modeling is used to specify the relationships among individuals' economic, political, and social resources, technology ownership and use, and awareness of and support for the community network. Drawing on a theory of social capital, we consider the relative importance of privately- oriented social engagement versus publicly- oriented political engagement in relation to collective outcomes. Our analysis shows that in the town with the broadly- based community electronic network, individuals' political as well as economic resources are linked to knowledge and use of computer resources, whereas in the comparison community, economic stratification alone drives computer access. The implications of these findings for issues of equity, access to technology, and the development of strong community ties are discussed.     

Gubernatorial Use of the Item Veto for Narrative Deletion

Legislative use of narrative, such as conditions and riders, in appropriations bills has become common and has had negative consequences for the executive budget and veto, as well as for the legislative process. Some governors have used the item veto as a remedy. While they have not necessarily diminished the amount of narrative, they have achieved some protection of the executive budget and veto power. Their success depends greatly on the type of legal authority embodied in this constitutional power.