Conflict Assessment in Energy Infrastructure Siting: Prospects for Consensus Building in the Northern Pass Transmission Line Project

As energy demand grows rapidly worldwide, power line infrastructure will continue to be a major development planning challenge. This study considers the environmental conflict that has arisen over a transnational transmission line project between Canada and the United States. A qualitative conflict assessment is presented to define the parameters for consensus that could prevent protracted litigation between stakeholders. Proactively designing a process to encourage consensus building during the early development phase remains the most critical determinant of compromise. In this article, we argue that in this case a consensus‐building effort could be feasible if certain design requirements were met, including gaining the participation of key stakeholders, paying attention to trust, and focusing on the issues specific to this transmission line rather than to a larger energy discussion. The research shows that despite potential pitfalls, reaching more widely accepted and ecologically sensitive solutions to environmental conflicts through participatory and collaborative approaches is possible and worth the effort.     

NEIGHBORHOOD RACIAL CONTEXT AND PERCEPTIONS OF POLICE‐BASED RACIAL DISCRIMINATION AMONG BLACK YOUTH*

Renewed interest has occurred in the United States around racially biased policing. Unfortunately, little is known about the effects of neighborhood social context on black adolescents' experiences with racially biased policing. In the current study, we examined whether perceptions of racially biased policing against black adolescents are a function of neighborhood racial composition, net of other neighborhood‐ and individual‐level factors. Using two waves of data from 763 black adolescents, we found that black adolescents most frequently are discriminated against by the police in predominantly white neighborhoods. This effect especially is pronounced in white neighborhoods that experienced recent growth in the size of the black population. Our results lend support to the “defended” white neighborhood thesis.     

新世纪公安高校课程建设的现状与对策

在我国高校由扩张式外延发展向着以内涵发展为主之际,课程建设被放到了前所未有的地位;公安高校课程建设在观念认识、学科研究、课程体系、建设主体等方面存在的问题,如不尽快解决,将拉大与普通高校的差距;明确课程建设在教学工作中的核心地位,加强对课程生成和实施的管理,创建有效的课程管理机制,培育发展公安高校课程建设特色,不失为当前公安高校加强对教学工作的领导与管理的有力举措。     

论公安民警的身体健康及自我保健

一个时期以来,公安民警积劳成疾、英年早逝的事例时有发生,令人痛心。各地调查发现,公安民警身体健康状况不容乐观,已给我们敲响警钟。造成公安民警身体健康出现问题特别是出现积劳成疾的原因很复杂,其中不健康的生活方式和观念是“头号杀手”。健康是生命的基础,健康水平决定生命的质量。作为公安民警自身来说,要改善健康状况,提高生命质量,提升战斗力,必须构建健康的生活方式。     

Bad cops

Research Summary Police scholars and public policymakers throughout generations have sought to identify reliable correlates of police misconduct. Despite these efforts, general statements as to the etiology and epidemiology of police misconduct remain inconclusive, in part because of the inconsistent definitions of misconduct and the difficulty of obtaining the data required to make such statements. This research attempts to fill these gaps through a comparison of the personal and career histories of all 1,543 officers who were involuntarily separated from the New York City Police Department (NYPD) for cause during 1975–1996 with a randomly selected sample of their police academy classmates who served honorably. The study uses confidential NYPD files as its major data sources, which include extensive biographical and career information. The study finds that career‐ending misconduct rarely occurs in the NYPD and that the types of misconduct do not match well with existing definitions. Several factors emerge as significant predictors of misconduct, including officer race, minimal education, records of prior criminality and prior poor employment, failure to advance in the NYPD, and histories of citizen complaints. Policy Implications This study shows that existing definitions of police misconduct are difficult to apply to actual cases of police malpractice, which leads the authors to create a new eight‐category classification scheme. The rarity of misconduct, especially on‐duty abuse, confirms prior research indicating that most police officers do their jobs without engaging in serious malpractice. These findings suggest that the NYPD has become better behaved as it has become more diverse along race and gender dimensions and that the link between black officers and misconduct might be explained by persistent “tokenism.” The findings related to race have important implications for continued efforts to build racially representative police departments. Personal history findings highlight the importance of conducting background investigations that disqualify candidates with arrest records and employment disciplinary histories, whereas the inverse relationship between college education and misconduct provides strong support for continued emphasis on pre‐ and post‐employment educational requirements.     

Examining fatal and nonfatal incidents involving the TASER

Research Summary According to TASER International, nearly 10,000 police departments in the United States have deployed the TASER as a less lethal force alternative in some capacity. Despite the TASER's increasing popularity, serious questions have been raised about the device's physiological side effects; in particular, Amnesty International has reported that more than 300 people have died after being subjected to the TASER. Although a growing body of research has examined the physiological effects of the TASER on animals and healthy human volunteers in laboratory settings, there has been virtually no empirical analysis of “real‐world” fatal and nonfatal TASER cases simultaneously. This article examines all media reports of TASER incidents from 2002 to 2006 through a comprehensive review of LexisNexis and New York Times archives. We compare TASER incidents in which a fatality occurred to TASER incidents in which a fatality did not occur and then employ multivariate analyses to identify the incident and suspect characteristics that are predictive of articles describing TASER‐proximate deaths. Policy Implications Several suspect factors were significantly associated with the reporting of a fatal TASER incident, including drug use (but not alcohol), mental illness, and continued resistance. Multiple deployments of the TASER against a suspect was also associated with the likelihood of the article describing a fatality—especially if the suspect was emotionally disturbed—which raises the possibility that the risk of multiple shocks might not be uniform for all suspects. More research is needed to explore the relationship between mental illness, drug use (illicit or therapeutic), continued resistance, and increased risk of death. In the meantime, police departments should develop specific policies and training governing the use of multiple TASER shocks against individuals who could be in these vulnerable physiological and psychological states.     

袭警原因十论

由社会转型而引发的社会矛盾使民警成为民众不满情绪的发泄对象;利益冲突使民警成为直面危机的群体;警务工作的强制性和镇压性决定了民警与违法犯罪嫌疑人及其家人存在对立;民警素养不足成为诱发袭警的导火索;装备不足及枪械管理不善人为地增加了民警受袭的风险性;认识上的错误相对纵容了袭警行为;被严管的民警与个体权利意识日益膨胀的公民之间的法治失衡制约了警察权的有效发挥;权力袭警使民警受到深度伤害;恶意投诉则扩大了袭警后果。     

袭警的类型、特点及危害

袭警是行为人对正在执法或从事其他警务工作的公安民警实施的人身攻击和精神刺激行为的简称。虽然根据不同的划分依据和划分标准,袭警有不同的表现类型及相应的特点,但都给社会、公众以及警察的正常执法活动带来很大危害。     

实行通识教育 培养全人警官——台湾“中央”警察大学通识教育及其启示

台湾“中央”警察大学是实施与警察有关的专业教育的单科性大学,为了避免专业教育所导致学生片面发展的弊端,推行通识教育,不仅能拓宽学生知识视野,培养思维能力,更为重要的是通过通识教育,提升学生人文素养,增进他们对社会的爱心与关怀。使学生在警察专业教育外,还能拥有广博的知识、深切的人文社会关怀和宏观的视野,成为具有健全人格的现代优秀警官。     

福清市行政、边防派出所“联合警务”的实践与思考

福清市行政、边防派出所“联合警务”打破了行政派出所与边防派出所辖区和警种的界限,施行“警务联勤、巡查联动、信息联通”,构建行政、边防派出所“同调度、同办案、同巡查、同分析、同培训、同考评、同保障”的警务机制。“联合警务”构筑了行政、边防派出所警务协同的有机平台,建立了务实高效的警务运行机制,达到了“警力互补、业务互学、信息互通、工作互助”的实际效果。“联合警务”对优化当前派出所警力的配置、推进边防派出所警务体制的改革、推广“联合警务”的经验起到了至关重要的作用。