Gender and land rights in Murang'a district,Kenya

Conceptualising rights to land in a framework of legal pluralism, this article explores the historical nature of struggles over land by women and men in a situation of increasing land scarcity. It is argued that the manipulation of customary law and state law is instrumental in increasing gender and, more generally, social differentiation.     

Legitimacy in corrections

Research Summary
To extend research on legitimacy to the correctional system, we study a sample of 202 adult inmates randomly assigned to serve their 6-month sentence at one of two institutions—a traditional prison or a military-style correctional boot camp. Findings show that perceptions of justice system legitimacy changed during the course of incarceration, that the prison (but not the boot camp) proved delegitimizing, and that certain regime characteristics explained why.
Policy Implications
Across academic disciplines, studies continue to link compliance with perceived legitimacy. Compliance with the law, for instance, is related closely to the legitimacy of the justice system and its actors. These findings suggest implementing legitimacy-building policies such as procedurally fair treatment and decision making by police officers and judges. This article, by finding legitimacy to be malleable even at the final stage of the justice process, proposes the efficacy of similar policies in the correctional system. As research from England and Wales has shown, legitimizing strategies in this context could increase compliance both during and after incarceration.     

Intimate Partner Violence and Risk for Child Neglect during Early Childhood in a Community Sample of Fragile Families

The current study explores the relationship between child neglect and intimate partner violence (IPV) in a longitudinal community sample of 1,740 families with young children, with a special focus on the association between specific typologies of both neglect behaviors and IPV. We focused on families followed across early childhood, because infants and toddlers are at the greatest risk of exposure to neglect (the most prevalent type of child maltreatment), and this period spanning the transition to parenthood presents heightened risk for IPV. We found evidence that coercive IPV is an important driver of the connections between IPV and subsequent neglect through affecting the mother’s well-being and ability to provide basic care and nurturance. Implications for intervention and future work addressing definitions and pathways to neglect are discussed.