The impact of child support enforcement policy on nonmarital childbearing

The interaction of welfare and child support regulations has created a situation in which child support policy's incentives that discourage unwed fatherhood tend to be stronger than its incentives that encourage unwed motherhood. This suggests that more stringent child support enforcement creates incentives that reduce the likelihood of nonmarital childbearing, particularly among women with a significant chance of needing public assistance in the event of a nonmarital birth and their male partners. We investigate this hypothesis with a sample of women from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, to which we add information on state child support enforcement. We examine childbearing behavior between the ages of 15 and 44 before marriage and during periods of non‐marriage following divorce or widowhood. The estimates indicate that women living in states with more effective child support enforcement are less likely to bear children when unmarried, especially if they are young, never‐married, or black. The findings suggest that improved child support enforcement may be a potent intervention for reducing nonmarital childbearing. © 2006 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.     

Expert Testimony Pertaining to Battered Woman Syndrome: Its Impact on Jurors' Decisions

Participants (N = 200) were presented with a criminal homicide trial involving a battered woman who had killed her abuser. Within the trial, both the response history (passive, active) and presence of expert testimony pertaining to battered woman syndrome (present, absent) were systematically varied. As well, half of the participants in each of these conditions were provided with a nullification instruction informing them that they were free to disregard the law and acquit should a strict application of the law result in an unjust verdict. Results indicated that, compared to the passive response condition, the mock jurors were no less receptive to the expert testimony in the active response condition. The impact of the testimony on participants' verdicts, however, was moderated by the nullification instruction. That is, although the presence of the testimony did result in greater verdict leniency, this only occurred when the mock jurors had been released from a strict application of the law. The implications of these findings are discussed.     

The Asian Rejection?: International Refugee Law in Asia*

The majority of Asian states have not signed onto the major international refugee law instruments which promote refugee recognition and protection. Yet, second to Africa, the Asian region has had the highest number of refugees since the Second World War. Three explanations are usually offered to explain this puzzle —“good neighbourliness”, “economic costs” and “social disruption”. In this article I argue that each is flawed in important ways and then develop an alternative by explaining how limited Asian involvement in the drafting of international refugee law has led Asian states to reject Eurocentric refugee recognition practices.     

Value Choices and American Public Opinion

Individual preferences among core values are widely believed to be an important determinant of political attitudes. However, several theoretical perspectives suggest that people experience difficulties making choices among values. This article uses data from the 1994 Multi-Investigator Study to test for hierarchical structure in citizens' value preferences. The empirical results show that most people make transitive choices among values and that their value preferences have an impact on subsequent issue attitudes. To the extent that citizens exhibit intransitive value choices and/or apparent difficulties in the "translation process" from value preferences to issue attitudes, it is due more to low levels of political sophistication than to the existence of value conflict.     

Prison or Voluntary Cooperation? The Possibility of Withdrawal from the European Union

Can a Member State choose to leave the European Union (EU)? Are there provisions in the Treaties that establish a right to withdraw? What would the political and economic implications be? In this article, these questions are addressed. In a first step, the Treaties of the EU and the provisions of international law are consulted in order to clarify if a legal right to withdraw exists. The conclusion is that there is no guaranteed legal right to withdraw in the current situation, but the entering into force of the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe would create such a right. However, a formal right to withdraw does not necessarily mean that leaving the EU is a real option, and therefore the political and economic sides of the issue are also examined. From the literature on secession and Europeanization, a number of issues that could arise in a case of withdrawal are identified – namely ‘fear of fragmentation’, ‘lost investment’, ‘costs’ and ‘the effects of Europeanization’. The extent to which these issues were of importance is examined in the only existing case of withdrawal: Greenland. Subsequently, an assessment is made of the extent to which these issues could form obstacles for a Member State that wishes to withdraw in the current situation. The main conclusion is that large economic costs and the constitutional changes that follow from EU membership could rule out withdrawal as a realistic option.     

A field diagnostic test for the improvised explosive urea nitrate

A sensitive, specific and simple color test for the improvised explosive urea nitrate is described. It is based on the formation of a red pigment upon the reaction between urea nitrate and p-dimethylaminocinnamaldehyde (p-DMAC) under neutral conditions. Urea itself, which is the starting material for urea nitrate, does not react with p-DMAC under the same conditions. Other potential sources of false positive response e.g., common fertilizers, medications containing the urea moiety and various amines, do not produce the red pigment with p-DMAC. Exhibits collected from 10 terrorist cases have been tested with p-DMAC. The results were in full agreement with those obtained by instrumental techniques including GC/MS, XRD and IR.