If They Endorse It,I Can't Trust It: How Outgroup Leader Endorsements Undercut Public Support for Civil War Peace Settlements

Civil wars are a greater source of violence than any other type of conflict, yet little is known about one of the key determinants of civil war peace settlement success: civilian support. We evaluate how a core component of nearly all peace settlements, leader endorsements, affects public support. We predict that individuals in conflict settings will view settlements endorsed by outgroup leaders as less trustworthy and that they will become less supportive. We conduct an endorsement experiment with nearly 1,000 respondents in South Sudan in 2016, taking advantage of a brief cessation in a devastating civil war. Public support for a tentative settlement drops precipitously when it is endorsed by an outgroup leader but does not increase when it is endorsed by an ingroup leader. We find suggestive evidence that effects are strongest for individuals with the greatest reason to fear outgroup leaders: those whose communities were targeted most violently by that outgroup.     

Circumventing Legislative Committees: The US Senate

Committees have been established to improve legislation and make expert recommendations. However, many bills do not appear in committees, and how they reach the Senate floor varies in style and strategy. We develop and test expectations for when, as well as how, bills bypass Senate committee proceedings. The procedures legislators use to circumvent committees and what makes committee bypassing more probable are explored. The findings clearly demonstrate that bills introduced by ideologically extreme minority-party members are more likely to bypass committees. We also show a clear shift in the procedural choices senators make as the Senate becomes increasingly polarized. This article highlights the procedural choices members make, how these choices produce differing outcomes, and suggests evidence of positive agenda power for individual minority-party senators.     

Democracy, Sea Power and Institutional Change: An Economic Analysis of the Athenian Naval Law

The present essay attempts to test the validity of the theory of institutional change based on the concept of property rights, in the remote historical setting of Classical Athens. The Naval Law introduced by Themistocles in 483-2 BC, established the institution of trierarchy to produce warships to face the Persian invaders. This reform led to the first attempt to define the costs and benefits of public goods in the field of national defense. Thus, institutional change in Ancient Athens, through an efficient arrangement of property rights and duties, had long-term consequences on economic performance, creating a new growth path and ensuring economic prosperity and social justice for more than 150 years.     

Deconstructing the ASEAN security community: a review essay

Once viewed as a bastion of stability and economic growth, theAssociation of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is now besetwith a variety of seemingly intractable problems ranging fromterrorism to internal secessionist conflict and economic stagnation.The central and evolving role of ASEAN in the internationalrelations of Southeast Asia since 1967 raises the question ofhow we should conceptualize the organization. This review articleargues that Amitav Acharya's recent claim that a nascent securitycommunity is emerging in Southeast Asia is flawed for at leastfour reasons. First, a variety of problems surround the independentvariable – norms – that Acharya uses to explainASEAN's emergence as a security community. The author failsto adequately explain why the norms he privileges emerged asASEAN's dominant norms. The lack of a convincing explanationfor the origins of the author's favored ASEAN norms is damagingbecause, prima facie, other kinds of norms – ‘perversenorms’ – appear to give us greater purchase in understandingthe organization. Second, a critical flaw in Acharya's argumentrelates to its tautological nature. Third, from an empiricalperspective, the dependent variable, the nascent ASEAN securitycommunity has arguably never existed. Finally, alternative explanationsfor ASEAN are not fully explored. While Acharya examines neo-liberalinstitutionalism and neo-realism, he overlooks the possibilitythat a form of realist institutionalism may most accuratelyexplain ASEAN's history, and perhaps even predict its future.     

Children's Lie-Telling to Conceal a Parent's Transgression: Legal Implications

Children's lie-telling behavior to conceal the transgression of a parent was examined in 2 experiments. In Experiment 1 (N = 137), parents broke a puppet and told their children (3-11-year-olds) not to tell anyone. Children answered questions about the event. Children's moral understanding of truth- and lie-telling was assessed by a second interviewer and the children then promised to tell the truth (simulating court competence examination procedures). Children were again questioned about what happened to the puppet. Regardless of whether the interview was conducted with their parent absent or present, most children told the truth about their parents' transgression. When the likelihood of the child being blamed for the transgression was reduced, significantly more children lied. There was a significant, yet limited, relation between children's lie-telling behavior and their moral understanding of lie- or truth-telling. Further, after children were questioned about issues concerning truth- and lie-telling and asked to promise to tell the truth, significantly more children told the truth about their parents' transgression. Experiment 2 (N = 64) replicated these findings, with children who were questioned about lies and who then promised to tell the 'truth more likely to tell the truth in a second interview than children who did not participate in this procedure before questioning. Implications for the justice system are discussed.     

The sexual distribution of benefits and burdens in the household: Adolescent experiences and expectations

An examination of self-reported contributions to housework and use of resources in the home by 1296 Scottish 16- and 18-year-olds revealed sharp differences between the sexes in both areas. In only one area of housework sampled, household repairs, did boys contribute more often, and in only one area of resources, use of space for friends, did girls benefit more often. Moreover, with respect to housework, sexual inequality was inversely related to social class. Beliefs about sex roles were broadly egalitarian, but weakly related to housework done; among both male and female, contributing to more areas of housework was associated with more egalitarian beliefs. Neither access to resources nor contributions to housework were related to financial contributions made to the household. Generally, the results indicate that sex was the most powerful determinant of both housework and use of resources. It seems that young people are already extensively prepared for inequality in adult sex roles within the family by their own direct experience, if not their sex-role beliefs.     

A comparison study of hair examination methodologies

A study was conducted to investigate the accuracy between two methods of hair analysis: PCR-STR DNA analysis and microscopic comparison analysis. Standard sets of pubic hairs were collected from volunteers, and unknown sets were generated from these samples. Three out of five (60%) of the hairs analyzed produced full DNA profiles that were correctly matched to the standard sets. DNA analysis was inconclusive (partial or no DNA profile) for two out of five (40%) of the samples. In contrast, the microscopic comparison analysis correctly matched four out of five (80%) of the samples to the standard sets but mis-identified one out of five (20%) of the samples. These results reinforce the practice of preliminary microscopic hair examination in narrowing down a set of hairs for DNA analysis. Microscopic comparison analysis is sufficiently reliable to remain a rapid and inexpensive method for forensic hair analysis.