Environmental Mock Claims Analysis

Environmental risks have earned a reputation for undermining a wide range of business activities. Given the tremendous potential for unanticipated environmental losses, multitiered claims and high-priced litigation, environmental risks have prompted organizations to seek protection through a variety of risk transfer methods. The insurance community has in turn responded with the creation of a progressive menu of project-specific and entity-specific environmental insurance products that can help provide financial security to those organizations exposed to real or perceived environmental risks. What are these products and how do they work? The following mock claim analysis (MCA) highlights some of the risk issues and the insurance solutions.     

Potential through paradox: indigenous rights as human rights

This paper takes the ratification of the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as its departure point. Reactions to the Declaration have thus far been mixed. According to advocates, these events signal ‘a new consensus’ that brings ‘to an end the nation states’ history of oppression of indigenous peoples’. According to critics, however, we have uncritically assumed an alliance between human rights and Aboriginal rights initiatives. This paper draws on these conflicting accounts, the theories of Rancière, and a discussion of a current Canadian court case to offer an assessment of the political possibilities of the UN declaration. Overall we argue that the value of the Declaration rests on our interpretation of the political process by which these rights are enacted. The possibilities of rights-based politics are always contextually dependent. In some instances a human rights frame can represent radical repositionings and rearticulations while at the same time always risking the possibility of co-optation. The acts of politics, in particular acts of dissensus, are the key factors that will impact whether the Rights of Indigenous Peoples lead to transformation or to the reinforcement of the status quo.     

A blessing in disguise? Scottish independence and the end of the UK nuclear posture

This article examines the implications of Scottish independence for the UK's nuclear posture. It is argued here that a vote for independence will critically undermine this posture. Since the UK nuclear force operates entirely out of Scotland, and since the Scottish government continues to assert its intention to see nuclear weapons removed from an independent Scotland, it is overwhelmingly likely that a ‘Yes’ vote will prompt a demand for the drawdown of the UK nuclear force in Scotland. If it wished to maintain its nuclear capability, the UK government would then have to make alternative basing arrangements. It is argued here that a host of legal, financial and political difficulties may preclude any such relocation and that Downing Street may ultimately be left with little option but to surrender the UK's nuclear capability. This article concludes that far from weakening the UK, a surrendering of its nuclear posture would result in a stronger and more functional UK military footprint and would bolster the UK's standing in the international arena.     

Reviews

National Unification and Economic Development in Vietnam, by Melanie Beresford. Macmillan, Basingstoke and London, 1989. xv + 296 pp. £45 hardback, £16.99 paperback. ISBN 0–333–48447–9 and 0–333–49729–5.

The Origins of the Vietnam War, by Anthony Short. Longman, London and New York, 1989. xvi+347pp. £8.95 paperback. ISBN0–582–49081–2.

Vietnam at War: The History: 1946–1975, by Phillip B. Davidson. Sidgwick & Jackson, London, 1989. x + 838 pp. £13.99. ISBN 0–283–99935–7.

Vietnam Images: War and Representations, edited by Jeffrey Walsh and James Aulich. Macmillan, Basingstoke and London, 1989. xv + 224 pp. £9.99 paperback. ISBN 0–333–45801‐X.

Cambodge: Histoire et Enjeux 1945–1985, by Camille Scalabrino, Serge Thion, Marie‐Claire Orieux et al. L'Harmattan, Paris, 1986. 237 pp. ISBN 2–85802–671–8.

Affaires Cambodgiennes 1979–1989, by Camille Scalabrino, Serge Thio, Marie‐Claire Orieux et al. L'Harmattan, Paris, 1989. 256 pp. ISBN 2–7384–0317–4.

Visions and Heat: The Making of the Indonesian Revolution, by William H. Frederick. Ohio University Press, Athens, 1989. xxvi+339 pp., maps. $36.95 hardback, $17.95 paperback. ISBN 0–8214–0905–0 and 0–8214–0906–9.

Born in Fire: The Indonesian Struggle for Independence, edited by Colin Wild and Peter Carey. Ohio University Press (by arrangement with BBC Publications), Athens, 1988. xxvii+215 pp., notes, illus. $26.95 hardback, $12.95 paperback. ISBN 0–8214–0881‐X and 0–8214–0882–8.

The Army and Politics in Indonesia (revised edition), by Harold Crouch. Cornell University Press, Ithaca. NY and London, 1988. 384 pp. $10.95 paperback. ISBN 0–8014–9506–7.     

The Effect of the 2014 Federal Housing Administration Loan Limit Reductions on Homeownership Decisions

ABSTRACT

Using data from the American Community Survey, this article assesses the effects of the 2014 Federal Housing Administration (FHA) loan limit reductions on homeownership decisions. Employing a difference-in-differences identification strategy, we find little evidence that the loan limit reductions caused an overall decline in homeownership rates. However, we do find that overall homeownership rates (as well as African American homeownership rates more specifically) increased in low-price parts of metropolitan statistical areas that experienced a loan limit reduction relative to high-price areas, suggesting that the lack of an overall effect may be because of changing decisions on where to own a home, not whether to own a home. This thesis is further supported by evidence of an increase in commuting times for residents in areas that experienced a limit reduction. Our findings contribute to the debate over how individuals respond and adapt their homeownership decisions to policy changes and credit constraints.     

A Dynamic Equalisation Model for Economic and Social Capital Grants with a South African Example

A capital grant model has been developed which can be used in developing economies to allocate grants to sub-national governments for economic or social capital. The model allows these allocations to happen in a way that increases the value of the capital stock whilst at the same time addresses any inter regional inequities, or economic inefficiencies. The model is also applied to South Africa as an illustrative example and the results of three model simulations for that country are presented. There is a discussion of the data requirements for the model and how it might be replicated by researchers for other economies.     

Witness Interview Training: a Field Evaluation

The effect of a witness interviewing training program on interviewing performance in actual investigations was examined. Eighty interviews, conducted by police officers in one Canadian organization, were coded for the presence of 38 desirable practices. Results showed that, in general, trained interviewers outperformed their untrained counterparts. Specifically, there was a large improvement in engage and explain behaviors (d = 1.65), a moderate improvement in account behaviors (d = 0.54), and a large improvement in closure behaviors (d = 0.90). Trained interviewers also used more open-ended questions and fewer leading questions. The implications of the findings for transferring interviewing skills from the classroom to the field are discussed.     

A Developmental Approach for Measuring the Severity of Crimes

There is widespread agreement in criminology that some crimes are more severe than others, but precise definitions of crime severity and straightforward methods for measuring it have been elusive. Public perceptions of crime severity and economic estimates of crime costs to society or willingness to pay offer a variety of metrics for the public’s perceptions of severity, but they may not accurately describe severity as reflected in offender preferences. The behavior of offenders is critical for understanding developmental progressions in criminal careers, as one may assume that typically more severe offenses are not undertaken until less severe crimes have been committed. In the present paper we propose an alternative metric of crime severity, drawing on findings from developmental criminology that indicate that more severe crimes occur after less severe crimes in the criminal life course, and a method for estimating crime severity that uses the generalized Bradley–Terry model of multiple paired comparisons. We demonstrate this approach on two samples of youthful offenders: the National Youth Survey and the RAND Adolescent Outcomes Project. The results suggest that sample-specific estimates of crime severity can be derived, that these estimates provide insight into the developmental progression of crime, and that they correspond well to crime severity rankings produced by the public.