Death by a Thousand Grants? The Challenge of Grant Funding Reliance for Local Government Councils in the Northern Territory of Australia

In July 2008, the local government sector in the Northern Territory of Australia underwent wide-sweeping reforms whereby 53 councils, most of which were located in remote Indigenous communities, were amalgamated into eight regional shires. The dominant justifications for these reforms focused on internal ‘deficit’ views about the community council sector, including lack of competent and ethical staff, managerial workforce instability, inefficient use of resources, and poor oversight as the primary causes of chronic underperformance and dysfunction. This paper identifies and discusses the under-scrutinised role of grants revenue dependency and volatility in the demise of remote small councils in the Northern Territory. We analyse financial data to demonstrate the extreme volatility in year-on-year grants funding. With their high dependency on grants revenue, such volatility and unpredictability resulted in councils being hamstrung in their ability to strategically plan and ensure stability in service delivery, infrastructure management and employment provision. We argue that these fiscal dynamics, fuelled by hierarchical intergovernmental relations, contributed significantly to dysfunction in the sector, as well as mutually reinforcing pre-existing structural and endogenous weaknesses. This argument runs against the common conceptualisation of the sector as requiring of externally imposed structural reform. We conclude by suggesting that there are factors additional to scale that need to be incorporated into analysis of the effects of amalgamation policies on remote councils.     

Towards understanding the contextual role of traditional leadership in the establishment of cyber communities amongst rural people in South Africa: The case of Dr J.S. Moroka Municipality

Abstract

ICT policies instituted over a number of years by the South African government have failed manifestly in establishing cyber communities amongst rural people in South Africa. The authors of this article argue that for rural South African communities to reap the benefits of ‘cyber citizenship’ and Information and Communication Technologies for Development (ICT4D) initiatives, it will be necessary for communities to enable themselves and to take ownership of initiatives to participate in the anticipated South African information society. The authors argue that the success of ICT4D initiatives depends very strongly on an understanding of the interaction of such initiatives with the social context at the local community level. One of the significant aspects of the social context at community level is the role of traditional leaders in these communities. This article examines the role of traditional leadership, with specific reference to the literature on traditional leadership in South Africa and the literature on the role of traditional leadership in ICT4D initiatives, as well as empirical findings from a case study that serves as an example of a ‘typical’ rural community in Mpumalanga, South Africa.     

Living and learning in Tacna,Peru

I spent the summer after my first year of college in Tacna, Peru. I lived in community with five Peruvian nuns and worked in the school where they were the administrators. I was completely immersed in the culture and language as no one spoke English. It was an experience that allowed me to connect with new ideas about community and social justice, ideas that have contributed to the way I have come to understand my position and my responsibilities in my global community. When I returned home from Peru, I wrote this reflection about my experience adapting and living in this wonderful and vibrant community.     

我国刑法中应当设立“暴行罪”——以虐待儿童的刑法规制为中心

在我国许多虐待儿童的行为,由于没有造成轻伤以上的后果无法以故意伤害罪评价,由于加害被害双方不是家庭成员不能定为虐待罪,也无法以其他罪名有效规制,至多由公安机关处以15日的行政拘留,这样未充分体现对暴力行为的打击以及对人身的特别保护.为了惩罚和预防虐待儿童一类的暴行,为了严厉打击暴力犯罪,全面严密保护公民的人身权利,我们应借鉴日本、英美刑法的立法理念及法律规定,将暴行罪引入我国刑法,将以殴打或其他暴行侵犯他人身体的行为纳入刑法的评价视野,从而更有效地保护包括儿童在内的公民的人身安全.     

Coping with the Cuts? The Management of the Worst Financial Settlement in Living Memory

The scale of the cuts to local government finance, coupled with increasing demand for services, has led to unprecedented ‘budget gaps’ in council budgets. Arguably, two competing narratives of the trajectory of local government have emerged in which contrasting futures are imagined for the sector – a positive story of adaptation and survival and more negative one of residualisation and marginalisation. Drawing on case study evidence from three English local authorities, the paper distinguishes and provides examples of three strategic approaches to managing austerity – efficiency, retrenchment and investment. It demonstrates how and why the balance of these strategies has shifted between the early and later phases of austerity and considers the extent to which the evidence of the case studies provide support for either the survival or marginalisation narrative. The paper concludes by arguing that a third narrative – responsibilisation – captures more fully the trajectory of local government in England.     

Measuring knowledge management in a virtual chat room: A case study

Abstract

Many organisations deem the virtual workplace to be a solution to challenges such as global competition, accelerated product development, improved quality and customer service, to mention but a few. In spite of the success of virtual communities on the Internet and although a significant amount of research has been conducted on virtual organisations, very few studies have focused on the evaluation of the combined effects of the theoretical variables of knowledge management in virtual communities. Advanced web analytics have been used in some instances to test the content of virtual communities, like discussion forums, hat rooms and the like. Because a plethora of chat rooms are devoted to special interest topics that may implicitly contain information and insights on consumers, knowledge creation and sharing, it creates the ideal opportunity to measure the management of knowledge therein. The aim of this article is, therefore, to measure knowledge management in a virtual community (an online chat room of an academic institution). Firstly, the article propounds a brief overview of the theoretical underpinning of the study by proposing a conceptual framework for the measurement of knowledge management in virtual communities. Secondly, the methodology to measure the knowledge management in a chat room of an educational institution is outlined. Finally, the research results are presented and recommendations are made for future research.     

Support for Terrorism: The Role of Beliefs in Jihad and Institutional Responses to Terrorism

ABSTRACT

Passive support for terrorism refers to expressions of sympathy for acts of terrorism and/or the justifications (ideology) used by terrorist groups to legitimise their beliefs and actions. One form of passive support is whether Muslims feel terrorists have valid grievances. Appealing to a sense of grievance is a key way that violent Islamists attempt to recruit fellow Muslims to their cause. Using survey data collected from 800 Muslims living in Australia, this paper examines factors that lead Muslims to believe that terrorists have valid grievances. Factors examined include beliefs in jihad and attitudes towards counterterrorism policing and laws. Other variables included in the analysis are social identity, age, gender, income, religious denomination (Sunni vs. Shia), religious commitment, i.e., Mosque attendance, and recent contact with police. The most significant predictor of passive support for terrorism was found to be particular beliefs in jihad. The perceived legitimacy of counterterrorism laws and trust in police were also important. Implications for countering extremist ideology and generating community cooperation in counterterrorism will be considered.     

Comfortably inhabiting reality: justifying and denouncing arguments in a development dispute in the post-industrial gentrified inner-city

This article seeks to understand the ‘critical capacities’ of actors involved in public disputes by focussing on one such case in Melbourne, Australia. The dispute centred on a non-government school's proposal to develop classrooms in a heritage listed building on public land sublet from a charitable foundation. Following local council's rejection of the original proposal, the school successfully appealed to the Victorian Planning Minister. After introducing a critical pragmatic analytic framework, five accounts of the dispute given by key actors are examined, uncovering similarities in the arguments used by each. Then, in the same accounts, analysis identifies differences in how the pro- and anti-development groups justified their own and denounced their opponents' positions. Both groups recognised formal rules as the best means for preserving equal citizens' access to public space, yet the pro-development group justified their argument by reference to local community benefit, in contrast with the anti-development group, who adopted an abstract argument concerning the privatisation of public space. Understood as mobilising different ‘models of justice’, the groups are regarded as appealing to a ‘real’ order, an implicit politicised hierarchy that situates winners in relation to losers. In effect, the pro-development group justified its position by representing it as congruent with, rather than disrupting, the real order encompassing the situation. In conclusion, the paper discusses the usefulness of the critical pragmatic analytic framework for understanding governmental power relations and assemblages, as actors demonstrate their critical capacities in contexts where erstwhile formal equality obscures the presence of hierarchical order.     

被害人有过错的故意杀人罪的死刑裁量研究——从被害与加害的关系切入

故意杀人罪是最典型的有被害人的犯罪。被害人加害在先引起他人加害 ,或被害人激化矛盾引起他人加害属于被害人有过错的故意杀人罪。在故意杀人罪死刑裁量中 ,被害人的过错是酌定从轻处罚情节。司法解释确立了“被害人一方有明显过错或对矛盾激化负有直接责任的故意杀人罪 ,一般不应判处死刑立即执行”的规则 ,但在司法实践中对被告人量刑时往往不予考虑。为了减少和限制故意杀人罪的死刑适用 ,在立法上有必要将被害人的过错这一酌定情节法定化。     

INTEGRATING RACE,PLACE AND MOTIVE IN SOCIAL DISORGANIZATION THEORY: LESSONS FROM A COMPARISON OF BLACK AND LATINO HOMICIDE TYPES IN TWO IMMIGRANT DESTINATION CITIES*

In this paper, we examine and compare the impact of social disorganization, including recent immigration, and other predictors on community counts of black and Latino motive‐specific homicides in Miami and San Diego. Homicides for 1985 to 1995 are disaggregated into escalation, intimate, robbery and drug‐related motives. Negative binomial regression models with corrections for spatial autocorrelation demonstrate that there are similarities and differences in effects of social disorganization and other predictors by motive‐specific outcomes, as well as for outcomes across ethnic groups within cities and within ethnic groups across cities. Recent immigration is negatively or not associated with most outcomes. Overall, the study shows the importance of disaggregating homicide data by race/ethnicity and motive and demonstrates that predictions based on existing theories are qualified on local conditions.