The danger assessment: validation of a lethality risk assessment instrument for intimate partner femicide

The Danger Assessment (DA) is an instrument designed to assess the likelihood of lethality or near lethality occurring in a case of intimate partner violence. This article describes the development, psychometric validation, and suggestions for use of the DA. An 11-city study of intimate partner femicide used multivariate analysis to test the predictive validity of the risk factors on the DA from intimate partner femicide cases (N = 310) compared with 324 abused women in the same cities (controls). The results were used to revise the DA (four items added; one "double-barreled" item divided into two), and the calculated weights (adjusted odds ratios) used to develop a scoring algorithm with levels of risk. These levels of risk were then tested with an independent sample of attempted femicides (N = 194) with a final outcome of .90 of the cases included in the area under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve.     

I Get By with a Little Help from My Friends: Leveraging Campaign Resources to Maximize Congressional Power

Central to the study of Congress is the study of relationships among members. Electoral collaboration is a function of a member's position in the broader congressional power network. It allows members to leverage their campaign resources to achieve the four classic goals of members of Congress: reelection, making good public policy, obtaining power within the institution, and having one's party in the majority. Using nearly 3.2 million FEC records from 2010 to 2016, we explore the dynamics that influence electoral collaboration. We find members are most likely to collaborate electorally with other members from the same state, party, and committee, and the most electorally vulnerable. Further, party leaders share most frequently with the rank and file. These findings build upon our expanding understanding of congressional collaboration, the networks members of Congress form, and the congressional power structure members operate within.     

Review article

THE LAW OF CONTRACT. By H. Collins. [Wiedenfeld & Nicolson. 1986, pp. xi and 236. £7.50 (paperback); £14.95 (cloth).]     

Business economic impacts: The new frontier for corporate accountability

Economic issues associated with poverty are complex and require holistic responses in order to realise the goals of sustainable development. While business alone may have significant economic impacts, the link between business-level behaviour and macro-level development aspirations is unclear. By developing a sound grasp of how companies understand and manage these impacts, we are better placed to understand how corporate responsibility clusters, or partnerships with other companies, civil society organisations, and governments, can harness corporate impacts to bring about more sustainable development at the macro level.     

Death as a result of asthma in Wayne County Medical Examiner cases, 1975-1987

All deaths ascribed to asthma in the 5-to-40-year age group at the Wayne County Medical Examiners' Office were reviewed from 1975 to 1987 inclusive. Fifty-eight deaths were attributed solely to asthma, and the annual number increased fivefold in the 1980s to a rate of approximately 0.5 per 100,000 per year when extrapolated to the Wayne County population. Blacks were overrepresented to double their proportion in the general population. Almost all cases were known asthmatics, and many had received previous emergency care. Most fatalities occurred at night and did not demonstrate any seasonal variation. The onset of the fatal attack was apparently very rapid in most cases, with many engaged in routine activities and few surviving any length of time in hospital or having sought treatment earlier. Our data reveal a significant increase in sudden death in previously well asthmatics in Wayne County in the 1980s. Similar increases in deaths as a result of asthma have been noted previously in other countries for reasons that remain unclear.     

Book reviews

R. Bahro: Die Alternative. Koln‐Frankfurt, 1977, 542 pp. 34.00DM.

R. Bahro: The alternative in Eastern Europe, New Left Books, 1978. 463 pp. £9.50.

Bergson, Abram, Productivity and the Social System—The USSR and the West, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1978. xi+256 pp. £12.25.

Alec Nove; Political Economy and Soviet Socialism, London, Boston, Sydney: George Allen & Unwin, 1979. 249 pp. £10.00.

Gail Warshofsky Lapidus, Women in Soviet Society: Equality, Development and Social Change. Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of California Press, 1978. x + 381 pp. £12.25.

Nationalism in the USSR & Eastern Europe in the Era of Brezhnev and Kosygin. Papers and Proceedings of the Symposium held at University of Detroit on 3–4 October, 1975. Edited by George W. Simmonds. Detroit, Mich.: University of Detroit Press, 1977. 534 pp. $6.95 soft bound, $12.00 hard bound.

Alexander Yanov, The Russian New Right: Right‐ Wing Ideologies in the Contemporary USSR. Berkeley: Institute of International Studies, University of California, 1978. 185 pp. $3.95.

John J. Stephan, The Russian Fascists: Tragedy and Farce in Exile, 1925–1945. New York: Harper and Row, 1978. 450 pp. $15.00.

Michael A. Newcity, Copyright Law in the Soviet Union. New York: Praeger Publishers, 1978. x + 212 pp. Appendix and selected bibliography.

Robin Higham and Jacob W. Kipp, Soviet Aviation and Air Power. A Historical View. London: Brasseys’, 1978; Boulder Co.: Westview Press, 1977. xii + 328 pp. $25.

James Riordan (ed.), Sport Under Communism. London: C. Hurst & Company, 1978. x +177 pp. £6.95.

Vahan D. Barooshian, Brik and Mayakovsky, Slavistic Printings and Reprintings 301. The Hague: Mouton, 1978. 154 pp. + index. Paperback.

Vladimir FiSera (ed.), Workers’ Councils in Czechoslovakia: Documents and Essays 1968–69. London: Motive, 1978. 200 pp. £8.50.

Richard F. Starr (ed.), Yearbook on International Communist Affairs 1978, Stanford, California: Hoover Institution Press, Stanford University, 1978. 497 pp. $35.00.

G. E. Skorov (ed.), Science, Technology and Economic Growth in Developing Countries. Oxford: Pergamon Press, 1978. (tranlated by J. Warren).