Ministerial Resignations 1945–97

This article reports on data collected on ministerial resignations and non-resignations 1945–1997. It analyses the reasons why ministers resign and patterns that emerge in terms of the types of issues that are more likely to lead to resignation, and variances between different Prime Ministers, parties and over time. It provides the first fully quantified analysis of ministerial resignations in Britain in the post-war period to enhance the impressionistic analyses which have been offered before.     

Mediation Practice in the South African Construction Industry: The Influence of Culture, the Legislative Environment, and the Professional Institutions

We studied mediation practice in the South African construction industry by surveying sixty-three mediators. We found that mediators are more intent on resolving disputes for the parties than on assisting the parties to find their own settlements. In addition, we found that greater emphasis by parties to the dispute is placed on technical expertise, authority, and a clear understanding of the matter in dispute than on moving the parties toward an in-depth understanding of each other's perspectives. We conclude that mediation practice in the South African construction industry is not consistent with generally accepted principles of mediation. We also argue that the fragmented and potentially adversarial traditional procurement system predominantly used in South Africa, together with the inadequate institutional response in promoting mediation as a preferred dispute resolution method, is encouraging mediation to develop in this way. This is cause for concern, not only because this practice represents a departure from the underlying philosophy of mediation — dialogue aimed at amicable and long-lasting solutions that are in everyone's best interests — but because it is incompatible with the Southern African worldview concept of ubuntu .     

SEX EDUCATION LEFT AT THE THRESHOLD OF THE SCHOOL DOOR: STRICTER REQUIREMENTS FOR PARENTAL OPT‐OUT PROVISIONS

Current state law creates the risk that, if sex education is not provided to a child in public school, no similar instruction will be given to the child. Legislatively enacted opt‐out provisions give parents broad control over their child's education by granting them the option to have their child excused from any sex education requirements within a public school's curriculum. Through public school sex education, professionals provide youth information aimed at protecting them from the dangers of pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). A stricter statutory opt‐out provision should be enacted by state legislatures that only allows parents to excuse their child from sex education after a parent attends a 90‐minute STD prevention course and receives the instructional material used in the school's sex education curriculum. Parents should be provided up‐to‐date information and a structural framework designed by the school to encourage them to discuss with their child the many sexual issues addressed within a school's sex education curriculum.     

Positive attributes of state direct order mandates: A case study of planning mandates in California

States closely regulate the policies of their local units of government through the imposition of direct order mandates. The general literature on state as well as federal mandate activities suggests that such regulations seriously constrain local autonomy and add to local financial burdens. A case study of the application of California's planning mandates in a sample of small nonmetropolitan cities suggests that major programmatic mandates are not always restrictive; mandates can be beneficial by empowering local officials.     

Terrorist (E)motives: The Existential Attractions of Terrorism

This article describes a number of possible existential motivations for engaging in terrorism. Three in particular are identified: (1) the desire for excitement, (2) the desire for ultimate meaning, and (3) the desire for glory. Terrorism, according to the argument set out here, is as much a site of individual self-drama and self-reinvention as a tactical instrument for pursuing the political goals of small groups. The conclusion explores the concept of “existential frustration,” and suggests that terrorist activity may provide an outlet for basic existential desires that cannot find expression through legitimate channels.     

Extravagance and mediocrity of virtue: Their divergence and the possibility of demagoguery

In the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle refers to Socrates five times: four references are to the contentious Socratic doctrine that “virtue is knowledge” the fifth is in the discussion of irony, “such as that of which Socrates was accused.” These issues are not conjoined accidentally. “Manifest appearances” attest that we can do worse than we know or know better than we do. Yet, the “problem of incontinence'’ is only half of the problem of the divergence of character and intellect, the mediocre and the extravagant in virtue. The other half of the problem is the capacity of some to do or act better than they know, vice's ability to imitate virtue, the disloyal talent's employment of demagoguery, the clever vice of irony.