Prediction of institutional aggression among personality disordered forensic patients using actuarial and structured clinical risk assessment tools: prospective evaluation of the HCR-20, VRS,Static-99, and Risk Matrix 2000

A minority of men and women with intellectual disabilities at times engage in, and are suspected, or convicted, of illegal activity. Recent policy developments in England and Wales emphasise the need to respond appropriately to putative offending risk through the provision of safe and effective community management, treatment, and support services. In line with these concerns, research has focused increasingly on testing the utility of an evolving variety of risk assessment procedures. Here, the authors set out to challenge the repertoire of a number of prominent and/or recently developed risk assessment procedures and the scope of an associated research literature, on the basis that contextual risk factors are receiving insufficient attention in relation to offending among people with intellectual disabilities. Drawing on the wider criminological literature, a novel study is reported that compares key contemporary proximal social and environmental circumstances in the lives of offenders and non-offenders with intellectual disabilities. A contextual risk score is derived, providing statistical support for increased consideration of the impact of relevant social and environmental circumstances. Increased emphasis on key contextual risk factors is recommended to strengthen community service responses to offenders with intellectual disabilities.     

Looking Good on Whose Terms? Ambiguity in Two Kellogg's Special K ® Print Advertisements

The present paper examines the current trend by advertisers who construct ambiguity within advertisements to gain a double profit with consumers. As advertisers pre-empt their critics by acknowledging and even foregrounding the political incorrectness of their own industries, they also subversively promote the same damaging messages that were always present within the advertisements. This strategy is becoming more and more prevalent with several industry sectors that need to fight backlash by cultural critics. In the present paper, I focus intensely on the way one popular advertising campaign by Kellogg Canada fosters an ethos of liberation for women from gender stereotyping, manipulation of perceived body image and ageism. I argue that this style of advertising lifts feelings of guilt and bolsters a mock cultural capital for consumers who believe they are helping to free society from gender shackles, while they are in fact unknowingly contributing to this situation by not challenging these advertisements. I use the visual semiotic framework of Gunther Kress and Theo van Leeuwen to reveal this act of manipulation.     

For richer or for poorer: Marriage as an antipoverty strategy

This study examines the effects of changes in family structure on children's economic well‐being. An initial shift‐share analysis indicates that, had the proportion of children living in female‐headed families remained constant since 1970, the 1998 child poverty rate would have been 4.4 percentage points lower than its actual 1998 level of 18.3 percent. The March 1999 Current Population Survey is then used to conduct a second analysis in which marriages are simulated between single mothers and demographically similar, unrelated males. The microsimulation analysis addresses some of the shortcomings of the shift‐share approach by making it possible to account for the possibility of a shortage of marriageable men, to control for unobservable differences between married men and women and their unmarried counterparts, and to measure directly the effects of increases in marriage on the economic well‐being of children. Results from the microsimulation analysis suggest that, had the proportion of children living in female‐headed families remained constant since 1970, the child poverty rate would have been 3.4 percentage points lower than its actual 1998 level. Among children whose mother participated in a simulated marriage, the poverty rate would have fallen by almost two‐thirds. © 2002 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.     

The 2012 Elections in Mexico: The Birth of a Consolidated Federal Democracy?

In 2012, the simultaneous elections at the federal, state and municipal levels in Mexico reopened the debate about the path of democratic consolidation in the country. With the return of the Revolutionary Institutional Party to the presidency in 2013, there are renewed signs that Mexican democratic consolidation is underway. Particularly important in this process is that the 2012 gubernatorial and mayoral elections have been more competitive, resulting in higher political alternation in power between political parties. Under a changing subnational political context, there are indications that subnational politicians are no longer under the shadow of a dominant party system. As a more consolidated federal democracy, the political landscape in Mexico has become more complex.     

Choosing second citizenship in troubled times: the Jewish minority in Turkey

ABSTRACT

This article explores the motivations behind the applications for Portuguese citizenship by Turkish Jews since 2015. Based on a qualitative research, the findings highlight that obtaining a second passport does not yet equate emigration. Rather, it constitutes an insurance policy aimed at alleviating growing ontological insecurity, stemming partly from their secular and westernized lifestyle and from their Jewish identity, which are endangered by perceived de-secularisation, growing anti-Semitism and authoritarian trends in Turkey.     

Cross-border Mergers and Acquisitions in different legal environments

The aim of this paper is to analyze the influence of the legal and institutional environment on bidder firm returns around the announcement date of cross-border Mergers and Acquisitions (M&As). The database includes 469 M&As of European (221 cross-border and 248 domestic) listed firms, with target firms being worldwide public or private firms (40 countries), over the 2002–2006 period.Shareholders of acquiring firms place greater value on cross-border M&A announcements than on domestic ones. The stronger (weaker) the legal and institutional environment of the acquirer firm country in comparison with that of the target firm country, the more positive (negative) the effect on acquiring-firm shareholders’ valuation of M&As.