La Donna e Mobile – or is She? Voter Preferences and Public Support for the Performing Arts

This paper investigates a referendum held in 1994 on the public support of the Zürich Opera House. The estimates demonstrate that well over 85% of the variance in the approval rates across ballot districts can be explained with a few variables characterizing the socio-economic composition of the electorate. Since these variables have been shown to influence the level of public support for the arts in representative democracies as well, our result lends support to the view that in democracies public support for the arts is coupled to the stable preferences of the electorate. This insight may, to some extent, mitigate and qualify existing fears that cultural policy is completely at the mercy of changing government ideologies and interest group influences.     

Reducing child support debt and its consequences: Can forgiveness benefit all?

As child support debt owed nationally persists at enormous levels, both noncustodial parents and the custodial families who are not receiving support suffer significant hardships, and states are forced to expend greater resources on collection and enforcement efforts. This paper presents findings from an evaluation of a demonstration program developed to help noncustodial parents with large child support debts reduce their debt while simultaneously increasing child support paid to families, through gradual forgiveness of arrears conditional on payment of current child support obligations. The evaluation employs a randomized experimental design, nonexperimental analyses using propensity score matching and multilevel modeling techniques, and focus groups and follow‐up interviews. Results show a pattern of effects that suggests individuals responded to the program as intended. State‐ and family‐owed child support debt balances decreased for program participants, and participants paid more toward their child support obligations and arrears and made more frequent child support payments. The study findings suggest promise for the effectiveness of this program model in reducing child support debt burdens and in increasing families' receipt of child support, and they also point to ways in which the implementation of the program might be improved. © 2011 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.     

Teilhaftung bei alternativer Kausalität mit Zufall

Der Beitrag besch?ftigt sich mit der schadenersatzrechtlichen Problematik der alternativen Verursachungskonkurrenz von Haftungsgrund und Zufall und dabei insb mit der Probleml?sung über eine Teilhaftung für blo? m?gliche Kausalit?t. Neben einer Erl?uterung der einer Teilhaftungsl?sung zugrunde liegenden Gedanken und der anerkennenden Stimmen in Lehre und Judikatur erfolgt eine Darstellung und Würdigung der dazu ergangenen kritischen Stellungsnahmen.     

Modeling Hostage-Taking: On Reputation and Strategic Rationality of Terrorists

This article takes a fresh look at hostage-taking from a game theoretic standpoint. A new model is developed that shows why conventional government deterrence strategies may fail.     

Analysis of histomorphometric variables: Proposal and validation of osteon definitions

Histological analysis of bone tissue has been used to explore a variety of questions relating to age-at-death, habitual behaviors, health, and nutritional stress. Identification of intact and fragmentary osteons is of key interest to many researchers in these studies, yet the definitions of these features vary between researchers making cross-study comparisons problematic. Furthermore, histological variable definitions are often ambiguous or require subjective classifications by the observer. As a result, and as indicated by previous studies, observer error and misclassification of certain variables, namely intact and fragmentary osteons, can be significant. This study proposes new definitions for intact and fragmentary osteons that are designed to limit observer subjectivity and also explore efficacy of combining osteon types into one variable. A sample of 30 6th rib cross-sections from a modern forensic population was used to test the validity of the proposed definitions. Observations of intact osteon population density (OPD(I)) and fragmentary osteon population density (OPD(F)) were made by three observers for each cross-section. These observations were used to explore the interobserver error associated with the proposed definitions and determine if combining variables into one variable (OPD) mitigates persisting classification difficulties. Results indicate that the proposed definitions significantly reduce interobserver error and misclassification of intact and fragmentary osteons. However, the interobserver error associated with fragmentary osteons is still high. Evaluation of the variables independently indicates that combining variables has potential to reduce the predictive strength of an age estimation model and the ability to interpret age-related bone remodeling.