News of the association for the study of the nationalities (USSR & E.E.)

Alexandre A. Bennigsen and S. Enders Wimbush. Muslim National Communism in the Soviet Union: A Revolutionary Strategy for the Colonial World. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1979, Pp. 267.

Natalia Arsiennieva. Mizh bierhami;vybar paiezzii, 1920–1970 (Between the Shores: Selected Poetry, 1920–1970) New York: Byelorussian Institute of Arts and Sciences, 1979. Pp. 350. $15.00

Osyp, Zinkewych, comp. Ukrains'kyipravozakhysnyi rukh: Dokumenty i materiialy kyivs'koi Ukrains'koi Hromads'koi Hrupy Spryiannia vykonanniu Hel'sinks'kykh Uhod. Baltimore, MD: V. Symonenko Smoloskyp Publishers, 1978. Pp. X + 477 $12.75 hardbound; $9.75 paperbound.

Harvey Fireside. Soviet Psychoprisons. Foreword by Zhores Medvedev. New York: Norton, 1979. Pp. 201. $11.95.

Alain Besançon. The Soviet Syndrome. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc., 1978. Pp. 103.

George M. Enteen. The Soviet Scholar‐Bureaucrat: M.N. Pokrovskii and the Society of Marxist Historians. University Park and London: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1978. Pp. xii, 236. $15.00.

George Dana Cameron III. The Soviet Lawyer and His System: A Historical and Bibliographical Study (Michigan International Business Studies, No. 14) Ann Arbor, Michigan: Division of Research, Graduate School of Business Administration, The University of Michigan, 1978. Pp. xii, 198. $9.00.

Murray Yanowitch. Social and Economic Inequality in the Soviet Union: Six Studies. White Plains, N.Y.: M.E. Sharpe, Inc., 1977. Pp. xv, 196.

Alexander Nekrich. Nakazannye narody. New York: Khronika Press, 1978. Pp. 170. $7.00.

Norman M. Naimark. The History of the “Proletariat”: The Emergence of Marxism in the Kingdom of Poland, 1870–1887. Boulder, Colo.: East European Quarterly, 1979. Pp. xvii, 329. $18.00. Distributed by Columbia University Press.

Jan Tomasz Gross. Polish Society Under German Occupation: The Generalgouvernement, 1939–1944. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1979. Pp. xviii, 343. $20.00.

János Decsy. Prime Minister Gyula Andrássy's Influence on Habsburg Foreign Policy during the Franco‐German War of 1870–1871. Boulder, Col.: East European Quarterly, 1979. Pp. 177. Distributed by Columbia University Press.

Teresa Rakowska‐Harmstone and Andrew Gyorgy, eds., Communism in Eastern Europe. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1979. Pp. viii, 338. Frantisek Silnitsky, Larisa Silnitsky, Karl Reyman, eds. Communism and Eastern Europe: A Collection of Essays. New York: Karz Publishers, 1979. Pp. xiv, 242. $6.95 paper.     

Choice in a World of New School Types

As school choice options have evolved over recent years, it is important to understand what family and school factors are associated with the enrollment decisions families make. Use of restricted‐access data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study allowed us to identify household location from a nationally representative sample of students and to match households to the actual schools attended and other nearby schools. This matching is significant as previous research generally has not been able to link individual households to school enrollment decisions. Using these data, we examined the role that socioeconomic status, race, and ethnicity play in school enrollment decisions. One of our more interesting results suggests that the newest public alternative, charter schools, attracts families with higher socioeconomic status than those that traditional public schools attract. The attraction of charter schools, however, unlike traditional public schools, appears to be racially and ethnically neutral. Families do not choose a charter school because of its racial or ethnic composition, nor do race and ethnicity within a household influence its choice of charter schools. Other socioeconomic factors influencing charter school choice are more similar to factors explaining private school choice than to those factors explaining the choice of traditional public schools. The findings suggest that policies governing the design of charter schools should focus on broader socioeconomic diversity rather than race only.     

Political action committees at the state level: Contributions to education

This paper examines campaign contributions from educational political action committees (PACs). Using a new and unique data set of political activity of the educational PACs across the fifty states and throughout the decade of the nineties, the authors describe the contributions' patterns of these groups. The authors argue that teachers occupy a low cost position for organizing. Approximately 90 percent of educational PAC spending is on behalf of teachers' organizations. Generalized least squares analysis of the state-year variance in contributions indicate that competition between teachers' groups and other education interest groups is a significant factor that influences the educational PACs expenditures.     

Entry barriers and medical board funding autonomy

In this paper we develop and test the hypothesis that institutional funding arrangments affect the extent to which public agencies are influenced by special interests. We test this hypothesis using data on state medical boards. In 1989, medical boards in twenty-one states received budget appropriations from their legislatures. The remaining boards operated independent of legislative control, financing their activities from fees and other revenues. We find that budgetary autonomy does influence agency decisions. The ability of physicians to restrict entry is enhanced where licensing boards are self-financed.     

Variation in state education policies and effects on student performance

There have been few systematic studies of the effects that education policies adopted at the state level have on the quality of schooling within the state. This article, building on a framework developed by Eric Hanushek and Lori Taylor, measures the effects of state policies—in particular, the effects of state teacher certification requirements on SAT performance across states. In an examination of SAT data from 1972 to 1990, the results suggest that students in states with a master's degree requirement for teacher certification had lower SAT scores than students in states without a master's requirement. The empirical model accounts for inputs such as family background and other school factors typically used in education production functions.     

The influence of the rulings of the Constitutional Court on the development of health law in Lithuania

This article highlights some recent developments in the constitutional doctrine of the right to health care in Lithuania, and more in particular the impact of the decisions of the Constitutional Court of Lithuania on the development of health law. The right to health care, enshrined in the Constitution, is both an obligation of the state and an individual right. The Constitutional Court has developed a doctrine of the right to health care, as well a doctrine of certain other constitutional social rights, which is based on the understanding of the close interrelation between the different constitutional rights, the principle of indivisibility and equal importance of these rights, and the presumption of justiciability of social rights. The analysis is based on the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court. Two cases on the disputes of the legal regulation concerning the pharmaceutical activities are presented in more detail.