Three ‘Rs’ of Econometrics: Repetition,Reproduction and Replication

Development economics has become increasingly quantified in recent years, reflecting the aspirations of economists to practise hard science. We argue that standard applied econometric methodology lacks one key feature of the claim of science to be scientific, namely replication as part of independent confirmation of findings. Replication plays a large role in understanding the confidence we can place in the quantitative studies on which much policy advice rests, which is particularly salient in a UK context given the emphasis placed on evidence-based policy-making by the UK Department for International Development.     

Ethnicity and the politics of heritage in Uzbekistan

The UNESCO office in Uzbekistan has been relatively successful in nominating cultural practices to The Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. Selection for the List conveys prestige and draws international attention to local culture that is deemed of universal value. What is striking about the first successful nominations from Uzbekistan is that they point to the inseparability of Tajik and Uzbek culture, a touchy subject for both Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. In this article the author looks at how the politics of ethnic cultural heritage play out through these projects, highlighting the tensions between a rhetoric of diversity promoted both by UNESCO and by the official national ideology, and practices that demonstrate a more mundane, ethnically exclusive sense of national culture. Although ostensibly celebrating the rich diversity of Uzbekistan's national culture and eschewing the strict delineation of Tajik culture from Uzbek culture, the effect of UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage programmes is to perpetuate the occlusion of Tajik culture in Uzbekistan.     

The genetic and environmental overlap between aggressive and non-aggressive antisocial behavior in children and adolescents using the self-report delinquency interview (SR-DI)

Purpose

This study investigated genetic and environmental commonalities and differences between aggressive and non-aggressive antisocial behavior (ASB) in male and female child and adolescent twins, based on a newly developed self-report questionnaire with good reliability and external validity -- the Self-Report Delinquency Interview (SR-DI).

Methods

Subjects were 780 pairs of twins assessed through laboratory interviews at three time points in a longitudinal study, during which the twins were: (1) ages 9-10 years; (2) age 11-13 years, and (3) age 16-18 years.

Results

Sex differences were repeatedly observed for mean levels of ASB. In addition, diverse change patterns of genetic and environmental emerged, as a function of sex and form of ASB, during the development from childhood to adolescence. Although there was some overlap in etiologies of aggressive and non-aggressive ASB, predominantly in shared environmental factors, their genetic overlap was moderate and the non-shared environmental overlap was low.

Conclusions

Taken together, these results reinforced the importance of differentiating forms of ASB and further investigating sex differences in future research. These results should be considered in future comparisons between youth self-report and parental or teacher report of child and adolescent behavior, and may help elucidate commonalities and differences among informants.     

Justice,Charity, and Disaster Relief: What,If Anything,Is Owed to Haiti,Japan, and New Zealand?

Whenever fellow humans suffer due to natural catastrophes, we have a duty to help them. This duty is not only acknowledged in moral theory but also expressed in ordinary people's reactions to phenomena such as tsunamis, hurricanes, and earthquakes. Despite being widely acknowledged, this duty is also widely disputed: some believe it is a matter of justice, others a matter of charity. Although central to debates in international political theory, the distinction between justice and charity is hardly ever systematically drawn. To fill this gap in the literature, I consider three accounts of this distinction— the “agent‐based,” the “recipient‐based,” and the “mixed” view—and argue that they are all unsatisfactory. I then offer a fourth alternative, the “autonomy” view, which successfully overcomes the difficulties affecting its rivals. I conclude by considering the implications of this view for the moral grounds of disaster relief in earthquake‐stricken Haiti, New Zealand, and Japan.     

Double Punishment for Regional and National Incumbents: The March 2012 Regional Election in Andalusia

Confounding predictions, the 2012 Andalusian regional election resulted in a renewal of left-wing government as the conservative Popular Party failed to obtain an absolute majority of seats. The socialists, who had ruled the region for 30 years, came second but continued in power in coalition with the United Left, which increased its seat share. The article argues that the Andalusian election results should be understood in a multi-level governance perspective. For those who voted for the socialists, the hard austerity policies implemented by the Popular Party central government became more salient than the current performance of the regional government. The behaviour of unemployed voters is also key to understanding the election outcome.     

Decision rules and service delivery in small cities

The research presented here describes the spatial distribution of parks and recreation services in four suburbs of the City of Detroit, Michigan. This comparative perspective suggests that the “decision–rule hypothesis” explains service distribution in some suburbs, as has been the case in central cities. In suburbs which are less highly bureaucratized, standardized decision procedures are not used to allocate service, however. Additionally, patterns of service benefits seem to vary among suburbs depending upon the extent of the reliance on such bureaucratic procedures.     

USAID,Population Control,and NGO-Led Democratization in Egypt: The Fate of the ICPD Programme of Action

Critics of US democracy-promotion strategies of the last 20 years ask: what kind of democracy is promoted by US public agencies and associated nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), how is it promoted, and for what purpose(s)? This paper draws on interviews with NGO, USAID, and UN representatives, gathered in Egypt in 2001, to describe the fate of Egyptian women's advocacy NGOs seeking to implement the pro-democracy platform of action of the 1994 UN International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD). It offers some support for critics' contentions both that external (here USAID) pro-democracy interventions may actually obstruct democratization, and that the instrumental nature of US democracy promotion may mean that such activities are quickly eliminated or downgraded when they conflict with more primary US policy goals.