Exploring cynicism toward prison administrations as a mediator of the association between quality of treatment and inmate misconduct

This study explores the ability of inmate cynicism to mediate the relationship between perceptions regarding quality of treatment and inmate misconduct in a prison setting. Using a sample of inmates from prisons in South Korea, the generalizability of the process-based model is tested. Also, the indirect effect of quality of treatment on inmate misconduct through cynicism is estimated using a bias-corrected bootstrapped mediation analysis. The findings show that quality of treatment was negatively and significantly associated with inmate misconduct in South Korean prisons. Additionally, results indicate that the quality of treatment and social support are significant predictors of inmate cynicism. Finally, a regression-based path analysis reveals that cynicism mediates the relationship between quality of treatment and inmate misconduct. While quality of treatment was found to predict inmate misconduct significantly, mediation analyses support the hypothesis that inmate cynicism partially mediates this association. The findings suggest that correctional policies should pay more attention to reducing inmates’ cynicism.

     

When Clients Throw Punches and Chairs: How Mediators Respond to Violence

Much is known about screening family law mediation cases for potential violence, but little is known about violence that occurs within or immediately after mediation. In this article, we present the findings of a survey of U.S. mediators who reported their experiences of violence across a variety of mediation case types. These mediators described how and when violence arose and also reported the techniques and interventions that they used to de‐escalate tensions and to respond to violence. Our goal is to better equip mediators to prevent violence when possible, and to respond effectively if violence does arise in mediation.     

Relatively Permanent Pigmented or Vascular Skin Marks for Identification: A Pilot Reliability Study

In child sexual exploitation offenses, the collected evidence images often show the skin of nonfacial body parts of the criminals and victims. For identification in this scenario, “relatively permanent pigmented or vascular skin marks,” abbreviated as RPPVSM, were recently introduced as the basis for a novel biometric trait. This pilot study evaluated the interexaminer variability of RPPVSM identification. Four dermatology physicians were recruited to examine RPPVSM from 75 skin images collected from a total of 51 Caucasian and Asian subjects. The images were separated into 50 reference (“suspect”) images and 25 evaluation (“evidence”) images. The examiners were asked to perform identification by annotating RPPVSM in each of the 25 evaluation images and matching them with the reference images. The rate of misidentification was 0% while the mean rate at which examiners failed to find a match was 6%, indicating the potential of dermatology physicians performing the role of RPPVSM examiners.     

Family Violence and Dating Violence in Korea

The purpose of this study is to examine the antecedents of dating violence. The paper hypothesizes that the relationship between family of origin violence and dating violence will be mediated by neutralizing beliefs. To test this hypothesis, a survey was conducted of 510 college students in Seoul and Kyung-gi provinces in South Korea. Partner violence and child abuse in the family of origin were associated with college students’ perpetration of dating violence. That relationship was mediated by neutralizing beliefs. The same results were found for both male and female students. Based on the findings, this study presents practical suggestions for intervening in dating violence.     

Ethnic-Racial Socialization,Ethnic-Racial Identity,and Depressive Symptoms in Korean Adolescents in the United States and China

Journal of Youth and Adolescence - The United States and China are top two receiving countries of Korean immigrants in modern history. Minority families in ethnically-racially diverse societies,...     

Networked and Polycentric Governance in South Korea: The Case of Dam Politics after Devolution

The South Korean intergovernmental environment has undergone drastic changes after the reintroduction of local autonomy in 1995. This study investigates how and why the governance has changed in terms of its structure and processes after devolution using the case of dam politics in South Korea. It also addresses the accountability implications of the changed governance. This study analyses two cases of dam construction initiative, which are the Youngwol dam project (1990–2000) and the Hantangang dam project (1998–2004). The analysis of these cases reveals that the governance structure concerning water resource supply has changed from a form of policy community, which can be characterized by its closed membership and stability in relationships, to a form of issue network, where the membership is enlarged to include various participants. More specifically, there are three important findings. First, the cancellation of the Youngwol dam project served as the moment to establish and empower a network of opposition against dam building, which had long been advocated and led by the policy community comprising the Ministry of Construction and Transportation, Korea Water Resources Corporation, engineering experts, and some private companies related to dam construction. Second, as the central government plans to build 12 more dams including Hantangang dam, the network of opposition tends to be further vitalized with heated participation from local activists, some water resource management experts, and environmental activists. Third, as the pro-dam policy community and the network of opposition initiate dialogue among themselves, they are forming an issue network which works as a governance mechanism in the area of water resource supply management.     

Co-opting Good Governance Reform: The Rise of a Not-so-Reformist Leader in Kebumen,Central Java

Challenging the existing literature, which tends to downplay the impact of good governance reform in post-Suharto Indonesia, the article suggests that greater intervention by international donors, combined with the process of decentralisation, has influenced the dynamics of political competition at the local level. It suggests that the increasing availability of international aid has provided local elites with an option to engage in a new form of patronage politics that relies less on old instruments, such as money politics and violence. By selectively committing themselves to good governance reform, Indonesian local elites can now seek a new source of power in the form of support from international donors, with which they can raise their profiles as ‘reformists’ and consolidate power, only to engage in familiar, if less blatant, forms of patronage politics. The article highlights such a dimension of local politics with reference to the case of Kebumen's former regent, Rustriningsih.     

‘Joe everyday,people off the street’: a qualitative study on mediators’ roles and skills in victim–offender mediation

This qualitative study examined multiple perspectives of participants who experienced a Victim–Offender Mediation (VOM) program in a Midwestern city in the United States. Of particular interest are the roles and skills of mediators. Data consisted of 34 face‐to‐face interviews with 37 participants including adult crime victims, juvenile offenders and their parents, mediators and representatives from referring agencies. Insider perspectives regarding the roles and skills of the mediators in restorative processes were revealed through personal stories. Although the majority of the participants reported that the roles and skills of mediators were consistent with restorative justice principles, this exploratory study also revealed that some roles and skills exhibited by mediators were inconsistent with restorative justice values, which shows the variance of ‘real world’ restorative justice. Recommendations are made to promote mediators’ roles and skills that are compatible with restorative justice principles.     

Uncertain allies or uncomfortable neighbors? Making sense of China–North Korea Relations, 1949–2010

Abstract

This study is based upon two premises: (1) the available literature, though voluminous, fails to provide systematic understandings of the complex and evolving relations between China and North Korea; and (2) China and North Korea had been short of being trusted allies bound in blood and belief even before the launch of post-Mao reforms and the normalization of Beijing–Seoul relations. This article dissects this curious relationship into four questions: (1) What does history inform us about China's relations with (North) Korea? (2) Has China communicated effectively with North Korea? (3) Have China and North Korea been ‘trusted allies’? (4) How effective has China been in inducing North Korea to comply with its demands over the years? The authors argue that, geo-strategically, China can hardly afford to put North Korea in an adversarial position. Furthermore, residues of the Factional Incident of 1956 and North Korea's deep-rooted suspicion of China still linger on. These have been the sources of Beijing's dilemma in consistently opting for ‘soft’ measures despite that North Korea's provocative acts and nuclear weapons programs have negatively affected China's interests. From the outset, China and North Korea had been more uncertain allies who had to cooperate with each other under the ideological and geopolitical imperatives of the difficult times. The authors also suggest that it would be misleading to put Sino–North Korean dynamics in a usual category of big power–small nation relations where power asymmetry generally works against the latter. North Korea has undoubtedly been an atypical ‘small nation’. It is due to these limitations that China's pressurizing has not been always effective and that Beijing's reactions have been continuously cyclical. This cyclical trend is not likely to be broken since the upcoming drama of Sino–American rivalry is bound to close the window of such opportunities for China, which will nevertheless regard North Korea increasingly as a liability, if not uncomfortable neighbor.