Are women more likely to throw the rascals out? The mobilizing effect of social service spending on female voters

Public Choice - This study focuses on gender differences in voter reactions to a corruption scandal in one’s preferred party. We analyze, in a framework of ‘exit, voice and...     

The importance of discretion for welfare services to minorities: Examining workload and anti-immigration attitudes

Migration influx in Western countries resulting in increasingly diverse societies results in more complex situations for bureaucrats in their client interactions in welfare organizations. The role of discretion for services to clients has received much attention in the public administration research and therefore this study explores the relation among perceived workload, anti-immigration attitudes, perceived discretion, and perceived difficulty in working with migrants. The paper examines the function of perceived discretion as moderator or mediator variable in this constellation. The relations are examined by using structural equation modelling based on a survey among Swedish welfare bureaucrats (N = 1,319). The results show that heavier perceived workload increased the likelihood of experiencing work with migrants as difficult and that greater perceived discretion decreased the likelihood of experiencing work with migrants as difficult. The results suggest that perceived discretion functions as a mediator for the relation between perceived workload and difficulty in work with migrants: potentially functioning as a ‘buffer’ for organizational pressure. We also found that bureaucrats who hold negative attitudes towards migrants were more likely to express their work with migrants as more difficult. This paper contributes to the public administration literature by increasing our knowledge on how discretion has significance in relation to when bureaucrat's behaviour is determined by specific organizational and personal factors.     

Analyzing decentralized resource regimes from a polycentric perspective

This article seeks to shed new light on the study of decentralized natural resource governance by applying institutional theories of polycentricity—the relationships among multiple authorities with overlapping jurisdictions. The emphasis on multi-level dynamics has not penetrated empirical studies of environmental policy reforms in non-industrial countries. On the contrary, many of today’s decentralization proponents seem to be infatuated with the local sphere, expecting that local actors are always able and willing to govern their natural resources effectively. Existing studies in this area often focus exclusively on characteristics and performance of local institutions. While we certainly do not deny the importance of local institutions, we argue that institutional arrangements operating at other governance scales—such as national government agencies, international organizations, NGOs at multiple scales, and private associations—also often have critical roles to play in natural resource governance regimes, including self-organized regimes.

The influence of hypnotics on the development of morphological and biochemical wound reaction (author's transl)]

The influence of hypnotics (barbital and carbromal) on the development of the early wound reactions in mechanically injured skin of guinea pigs was investigated: 1) The cellular reactions in incised wounds were retarded after moderate intoxication by hypnotics (300 mg/kg barbital; 3 g/kg carbromal). The histomorphological changes in wounds were inhibited by carbromal twice as much as by barbital. The hitherto published investigations had not shown any retardation of the early cellular inflammation by weakening influences such as loss of blood or alcohol without symptoms of shock (Berg et al., 1977) or local disturbances by acids and bases (Kampmann et al., 1978). 2). A moderate delay of the activity of structure bound enzymes was found in barbital intoxication, a stronger restriction under the influence of carbromal. 3) After barbital intoxication significant elevation of histamine or serotonin in wounds was not seen. Under the influence of carbromal there was also no increase of histamine but an increase of serotonin. Thus, although the cellular reactions seem to be the most reliable indicator among the methods for the determinations of wound age under devitalizing influences, their value is reduced in cases of intoxications by hypnotics needing treatment. Possible pathophysiological connections of the alterations of morphological and biochemical wound reaction with shock are discussed.