Criminology and Human-Animal Violence Research: The Contribution and the Challenge

Using theories concerning human-animal abuse links this paper assesses the role(s) that criminology can play in understanding human-animal relationships. That this is not a one-way process of knowledge transferral is acknowledged with analysis of the contribution that human-animal studies can offer in return. Following a brief outline of human-animal abuse theses the contributions that criminology can play in furthering understandings of, and informing responses to, this phenomenon are discussed. A critique of mainstream approaches towards human-animal abuse links, namely, their conceptualization of animals as tools, is then outlined. The argument that anthropocentric approaches to the study of interhuman violence actually reinforce the forms of oppression which create and maintain such forms of violence in the first place, is then developed. The author concludes that the incorporation of human-animal relationships into criminology offers something in return, i.e. an opportunity to re-think the modernist foundations upon which (traditional) criminology is built.     

Contracting out local road and park services: economic effects and their strategic,contractual and competitive conditions

ABSTRACT

The economic rationale for contracting out local services is increasingly contested by empirical research. This article aims to contribute to this literature, first by scrutinising the economic effects of contracting out in local road and park services and, second, by exploring how characteristics such as markets, contracts, municipal strategies and contracting history influence these outcomes. Drawing on original survey data from Danish municipalities, we find that competitive tendering has on average reduced costs. Further analysis shows that savings are not associated with lower quality, thus indicating that ‘quality shading’ was not taking place. Another finding is that municipalities that repeatedly contract the services experience smaller savings, suggesting that competitive tendering is subject to declining marginal returns. Finally, we find that larger municipalities and those emphasising expenditure cuts realise larger savings, whereas the characteristics of markets and contracts do not seem to explain variations in cost savings.     

Segmentation of Homebuyers by Location Choice Preferences

Edmonton, Alberta, has been experiencing rapid population growth and its associated housing pressures for the past decade. Municipalities like Edmonton are attempting to promote compact, transit-oriented, and infill housing development with policy while accommodating large increases in a population that may demand traditional suburban housing options. This article examined homebuyers’ opinions and preferences regarding their home location choice and found three distinct segments of homebuyers. These segments were established using a Q methodology to group homebuyers by their shared opinions as opposed to traditional sociodemographic or socioeconomic variables. These groups illustrate different perspectives regarding the everyday transportation choices, home attributes, and neighborhood predilections that comprise a home location choice. The identification of these groups of homebuyers provides insights for municipalities attempting to attract and retain citizens in redeveloped housing areas and assists to dissuade greenfield sprawling development.     

The Problem of Nuclear Harm for Andrew Linklater,Lorraine Elliott and Other Contemporary Cosmopolitans

In a paper that helped inaugurate the subfield of Environmental Philosophy in 1973, Richard Routley located the seed of Western anthropocentrism in the liberal harm principle. Yet, beginning in the late 1990s, Andrew Linklater began globalising the harm principle with no reference to Routley, or to the enduring debates about the moral status of the non-human world. In this article, I offer a preliminary sketch—no more than that—as to why Routley was right to reject the idea of a harm principle being contained within a non-anthropocentric environmental ethic, and that Linklater, Lorraine Elliott and their contemporary cosmopolitan colleagues—whatever the extent of their human-centredness—have been wrong to ignore him. I do so by intruding the problem of nuclear harm into Linklater’s cosmopolitan account of harm in world politics. Approaching the concept of harm through the prism of the nuclear age is interesting and important, I argue, since it both takes seriously Linklater’s intuition that the cosmopolitan response to the emergence of nuclear harms is evidence of a global harm narrative, and because it serves to ground Linklater’s otherwise abstract theorising in the harm par excellence of world politics.     

How is Political Influence Redistributed in Times of Fiscal Austerity?

The distribution of political influence changes in times of fiscal austerity. Decision makers generally find themselves with more influence when the economy gets tighter, probably because more tough decisions must be made. In line with expectations based on the asymmetrical distribution of interests between budget guardians and advocates, however, some evidence can be found that the relative political influence shifts in the direction of the guardians when austerity becomes severe. These findings are based on a dataset consisting of a repeated cross‐sectional survey of the perception of political influence among local councillors in Denmark, combined with register data on austerity in the Danish municipalities. By moving the analytical level down to the subnational level, a contribution to the discussion on how austerity affects political influence can be made. Thus, it is not merely a practical saying that crisis opens for new political opportunities; it is now also a research agenda to investigate how this unfolds in different institutional settings.     

The politics of beer: analysis of the congressional votes on the beer bill of 1933

Nine days after he took office in March 1933, Franklin Roosevelt asked Congress to amend existing federal Prohibition policy so as to allow for the sale and consumption of 3.2% alcohol beer. Over the following 8 days, the so-called “beer bill” was proposed, debated, passed and signed into law. This study analyzes the political decision making behind one of FDR’s earliest New Deal policies. Specifically, we consider how voter preferences, representatives’ ideologies, national party affiliations, and the influence of special interests affected legislative decision making. We find that special interests and party affiliations were particularly important drivers of congressional voting behavior.     

Internal Whistle‐Blowing in the Public Service: A Matter of Trust

Although employee reporting of workplace ethical violations is recognized as an important measure for managing the integrity of the public service, not many public employees who have observed ethical violations actually report them. This article examines and compares the links between employee perceptions of trustworthiness of different organizational members and internal whistle‐blowing. It differentiates between trustworthy coworkers, supervisors, and senior managers. It uses cross‐sectional data from 10,850 employees in the Australian Public Service in 2013 and 2016, which are aggregated to construct longitudinal data for 60 organizations. Among the three groups examined, perceptions of trustworthy senior managers are found to be most strongly related to internal whistle‐blowing.