The judiciary and post-election conflict resolution and democratic consolidation in Ghana’s Fourth Republic

ABSTRACT

In recent times most elections in Africa have been fraught with post-elections conflicts that have had dire consequences on citizens. Kenya, Ivory Coast and Zimbabwe are few of these cases. This makes post-election conflict resolution a very important aspect of the electoral process deserving enormous attention. However, extant literature has not accorded it the needed attention. It is as a result of this, that this study investigates the nature of post-election conflict resolution in Ghana’s Fourth Republic. The study, based on a qualitative case study approach, found among others that, the Courts have been instrumental in consolidating democracy in Ghana, and stakeholders are devotedly operating within the legal framework governing elections, despite logistical, law enforcement and justice delivery challenges. The study being conscious of the progress made over the years concludes that, where democratic institutions are consolidating, the use of unconventional means to resolve conflicts is usually not an option.     

A multilevel comparison of child abusers with nonabusers

An integrative, ecological model developed by Belsky (1980) implies that to understand child abuse researchers must examine factors at four levels: the individual, the family, the environment, and the culture. This study compared abusive and nonabusive parents at three of these four levels. At the individual level, abusers were found to have lower self-esteem than controls. Also, male abusers were likely to be relatively impulsive and hostile. At the level of the family, abusers described their children as more troublesome than control parents, but they did not perceive them as developmentally delayed. At the level of the environment, abusers identified more intense life stressors than nonabusers. Results of this investigation supported Belsky's argument that child abuse involved multiple factors and levels.     

Criminal justice and ethical ideology: an exploration of a loyalty-truthfulness dilemma

The notion of loyalty is well established in the criminological literature pertaining to ethics, ethical decision making, and ethical and ideological orientations. The present research addresses the topic of ethics and loyalty in an attempt to address three research questions germane to these areas within criminal justice and criminology. Using two samples equivalent in characteristics other than academic major, this research examines: (1) what impact gender, college major, and the ethical perspective of the observer and the nature of the actor’s action have upon the observer’s attitude toward the action (specific act of deception/truth); (2) what impact gender, college major, and the ethical perspective of the observer and the nature of the actor’s action have upon the observer’s perception of the social attractiveness of the deceiver; and (3) what impact gender, college major, the ethical perspective of the observer, and the nature of the actor’s action have upon the observer’s perception of the task attractiveness of the deceiver. Using a vignette design in this exploratory research, attempts are made to shed light on the impact of gender, major (criminal justice v. others), and ethical orientation on perceptions of an actor confronted with an ethical dilemma of loyalty versus disloyalty involving deception.     

Information flow and party influence: Theory,measurement, and policy consequences

In this paper I present a theory of party influence, based on Bayesian decision theory, as a process in which the voting decisions of individual legislators are influenced by information concerning the votes or intended votes of their rank-and-file colleagues. Procedures derived from the theory are then used to estimate the magnitude of party influence relative to the influence of the president and of party leaders, committee cue givers, and constituents on roll call voting in three policy domains in the U.S. House of Representatives. The results imply that party influence has important short-run and long-run consequences for public policy.