Explaining recent increases in calorie intake in rural India: the role of social policy strengthening

ABSTRACT

During the past decade, considerable research efforts have sought to explain India’s “calorie consumption paradox”, namely, the coexistence of a decline in average per capita calorie intake in rural India alongside increased material living standards. Evidence from the most recent (68th) round of the National Sample Survey (NSS), released in 2014, however, indicates increases in calorie intake, notably among poorer income quintiles. This paper argues that the turnaround in these data is linked to the improved performance of pro-poor social protection measures. Analysis of data suggests a close association between states that have made the greatest improvements in social policy delivery systems, and increased calorie intake for the poorest quintile of rural populations. This conclusion supports wider international evidence on the importance of social protection strengthening for nutrition-sensitive economic growth.     

The illusion of state neutrality in a secularising Ireland

It is argued that although the importance of party identification and social cleavages is declining, the bipolarity of the Swedish party system is sustained by voters’ identification with political blocs rather than with parties. Using data from the Swedish election of 2010, the article shows that voters’ bloc identification structures their voting behaviour and stabilises the party system. Four hypotheses are tested and supported. H1: Declining party identification has been replaced by bloc identification. H2: Voters with a strong bloc identification are often detached from a strong party identification, while almost all of the few voters with a strong party identification are also attached to a strong bloc identification. H3: Bloc identification has an effect on voting for parties belonging to one of the political blocs, even when party identification is controlled for. H4: Bloc identification has a small effect on electoral support for anti-establishment parties (such as the Sweden Democrats).     

THE SOCIETY'S TOUR OF BHUTAN, 13–29 OCTOBER 2016

This article provides an account of the 2016 RSAA tour to Bhutan. It includes: a brief history of the country; an account of travel including visits to Paro, Punakha, Bumthang, Trongsa, Gangtey, Punakha, and Thimphu, and reflections on the current state of the country based on the tour.     

In search of criminological tradition: the development of criminology in Taiwan

There has been a growing interest in the historical development of criminology(ies) throughout the world. This paper examines the development of criminology in Taiwan (Republic of China) using both questionnaire and interview data. Textbooks, institutional development, and research activity are taken as proxy measures of a criminological tradition. Beginning with criminology in Republican China (1929–1949), the article explores the key features of change in criminology against the background of Taiwan's own particular adoption of social, political and economic ‘modernisation’. Foreign influence and the contemporary meaning of ‘indigenous’ are considered. The article ends with a research agenda for a grounded historical sociology of criminology on Taiwan; key identified research questions relate to sponsorship, research priorities and the production of criminological knowledge; the reception of research by policy communities and practitioners; the relationship between criminological knowledge and politics; and the processes of selective appropriation.