Ideas,Economics and 'the Sociology of Supply': Explanations for Fertility Decline in Bangladesh

The persistence of high rates of fertility in Bangladesh, despite the poverty of its population, has been given alternative, and apparently competing, explanations, including the absence of effective forms of family planning, the resilience of pro-natalist values and norms and the existence of material constraints which led to the reliance on children as economic assets. The recent and dramatic declines in fertility rates, in the absence of any apparent major economic changes in the decades prior to the onset of fertility decline, appears to contradict materialist explanations for fertility behaviour and to support explanations which stressed ideas about the acceptability of birth control and the availability of the means for doing so. This article argues that such an interpretation is based on an historical analysis of events in Bangladesh. It offers an alternative explanation which stresses socio-economic change as the primary motor for change in family size preferences, but which recognises the role of modern forms of family planning in facilitating the pace of the resulting fertility decline.     

菲律宾精英家族政治的历史演进分析

菲律宾政治带有浓厚的精英家族特色,精英家族政治的起源可追溯到前殖民时期,历经西班牙殖民时期、民族独立革命时期、美国殖民时期、两党民主时期和马科斯独裁时期。在历史演进过程中,一方面,精英家族政治权力由地方向中央延伸并最终垄断国家政治权力;另一方面,精英家族政治所依赖的经济基础从较单一的农业向多样化的工商业发展。可以判断,长期存在的精英家族政治是菲律宾依然相当落后的一个重要原因。     

Long-term monarchical survival in the Middle East: a configurational comparison, 1945–2012

The survival of eight monarchies during the “Arab Uprisings” has put centre stage the fundamental question about the durability of this subtype of authoritarian regime. Seen from a broader historical perspective, however, the idea that monarchies have an inherent advantage in retaining power is less evident: a number of authoritarian monarchies broke down and subsequently became republics (Egypt 1952, Iraq 1958, North Yemen 1962, Libya 1969, Iran 1979), while others survived (Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates). To account for these divergent long-term pathways we systematically compare the 13 current and former Middle East monarchies. Using a fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA), we concentrate on five central explanatory factors derived from previous research – namely, external support, rent revenues, family participation, the monarch's claim to legitimate rule, and hard repression. Our findings highlight the existence of three broad pathways to monarchical survival – linchpin monarchies, like Jordan and Morocco, versus the dynastic Gulf monarchies – and also reveal a possible hybrid third pathway, one which shares linchpin characteristics, but relates to cases on the Arabian Peninsula (Oman and the historical Imamate in North Yemen).     

Who are the targets of familial electoral coercion? Evidence from Turkey

The unfettered expression of electoral choice is an important democratic right; however, in many contexts voters are pressured by others to cast their votes in certain ways. Electoral coercion is a topic that has received increased attention from researchers in recent years as part of the wave of research on electoral violence, yet there is little consensus in the literature as to who the targets of coercion are most likely to be. This article uses a list experiment embedded in a survey fielded following the Turkish general election of 2018 to identify the targets of coercive electoral practices within families and among close friends. The analysis reveals familial electoral coercion to be strongly conditioned by partisanship and disadvantaged demographic characteristics, but finds no evidence that women are more likely than men to be coerced.     

Service v. Security Focus in Training Assessments

ABSTRACT

As jails have moved to professionalize their staffs the role of the correctional officer has become broader in scope and now encompasses both service and security functions. However, some research suggests that female correctional staff may have more of a “service” orientation than males. In our analysis of one dataset from exclusively women's jail facilities we investigate correctional officer preferences for training (service v. security) to see if they differ by gender. We find that both male and female correctional officers generally rank service type training over security and that they differ little in their overall assessment of initial training provided and usefulness of in-service training. We also find that minority officers may be more likely to value service training than their nonminority counterparts.     

论“失独者”权利的国家保护

"失独者"已然成了新的"特殊群体",其养老、返贫、疾病和心理是他们面临的主要问题,这些问题亟待政府从制度层面予以解决。但无论是国家层面还是地方层面,该问题的立法状况都不容乐观。"失独者"是因为国家义务而致,所以,作为一个人权主体,政府必须有相应的法律政策来保护他们。政府亦可将社会抚养费作为履行了计划生育义务的失独者养老费用。     

Arbitration in financial dispute resolution: the final step to reconstructing the default(s) and exception(s)?

In this article, I argue for caution in embracing family arbitration as a new form of private ordering for resolving parties' financial disputes. I explain that family arbitration may be more successful than other forms of private ordering and final court hearings in enabling certain types of parties to resolve certain types of disputes. I consider why family arbitration may not become numerically significant despite its potential benefits, but may be much more important in normative terms. Lawyer-led negotiations remain the most common form of out-of-court resolution and constitute the de facto default form of bargaining in the shadow of the normative regime framed by ss 23–25 Matrimonial Causes Act 1973. Together with the transformation in approach to nuptial agreements, family arbitration may mark a normative shift towards autonomy and private ordering. I question whether this is a desirable step for family law, at least before we have resolved the underlying policy debate.     

A fatal interaction: The role of the victim and function of aggression in intrafamilial homicide

Abstract

This study examines the interaction between the victim and offender during intrafamilial homicide. It is hypothesised that in order to understand the fatal consequences of the interaction, a psychological model must take into account both the role of the victim, as either a significant person or non-significant object, and the function of the aggression, as either instrumental or expressive. The combination of these two proposed facets gives rise to four hypothesised styles of intrafamilial homicide. This hypothesis was tested by analysing 191 intrafamilial homicide cases from the Chicago HITS database. Fifty two crime-scene actions were analysed using Smallest Space Analysis which revealed four distinct thematic clusters of variables. These themes corresponded to the hypothesised facets of victim role and function of aggression. Two related to expressive acts, (a) those murders where the offender kills multiple members of his family and subsequently takes his own life, and (b) cases where the victim is not treated as a significant person in the interaction but is simply used as a target for the offender's rage. The other two relate to instrumental acts, (c) those murders that are a culmination of years of abuse in which the offender sees the killing as the only means of escape, and (d) homicides where the victim is seen as an obstacle to the offender achieving a goal and is removed.

A further test of the validity of these four themes in describing distinct forms of interaction within intrafamilial homicide was to examine the proportion of cases which could be classified according to the framework. The hypothesis that each relationship would map onto just one of the interactional styles was tested by χ² which confirmed that such exclusive relationships existed at the p < .001 level of significance. This has theoretical as well as practical implications in that in using this method of classification it may be possible to infer which family member is responsible for killing their relative.     

Retribution or restoration? Anglo–Australian's views towards domestic violence involving Muslim and Anglo–Australian victims and offenders

Abstract

The current study explored how gender, group membership and different emotional reactions to the crime of domestic violence predict attitudes and endorsement of restorative or retributive justice practices. The experiment consisted of a 2 (victim group membership: Muslim- or Anglo–Australian)×2 (offender group membership: Muslim- or Anglo–Australian)×2 (Sex of participant) between-participants factorial design. Anglo–Australian participants (43 men; 50 women) were randomly assigned to one of the four manipulated conditions, and completed an online questionnaire that involved viewing a short video clip of a woman describing her experience as a domestic violence victim. Results revealed strong preferences for restorative justice in dealing with domestic violence, with women supporting this practice more than men. The crime was perceived as most severe and retribution was endorsed most strongly when the victim was Anglo–Australian (i.e. an in-group member). Intra-group violence was also perceived to be a greater breach of shared Australian values than inter-group (i.e. cross-cultural) domestic violence. Emotional reactions further predicted participants' responses, with hatred predicting stronger support of retributive ideals and sympathy for the victim predicting greater endorsement of restoration.     

Family systems in central Russia in the 1830s and 1890s

Czap, Moon, and Mironov have suggested that two regional models for the rural family existed side by side in 19th-century Russia. This article approaches the question by examining the rural family as a statistically describable system occurring in a given economic and institutional context. The material applies to 8 local communities representing central Russia in the 1830s and 11 in the 1890s, the majority being the same communities in both cases. The aim is to determine from the household arrangements, economies, and institutional frameworks of these communities the kind of context in which a certain family system occurred. By relating these conclusions to data on the economic circumstances and social structures of the different parts of central Russia, two regional family systems are identified. Czap's “Eastern European family type” predominated in this area in the 1830s. Because the reforms and reorientation of economic activities in the 1860s brought about changes in household arrangements, however, a pattern characteristic of communities with a substantial degree of social stratification became the norm for most of the area.