Fear of Crime in the Swedish Daily Press—Descriptions of an Increasingly Unsafe Society

Fear of crime is a subject that is described increasingly often in the daily press. In spite of this, very few studies have examined how the press describes fear of crime. This article focuses on how fear of crime is presented, in what context, and who is labelled as fearful in the Swedish daily press. The theoretical frameworks are theories about the risk society and how fear of crime can be understood in a society characterized by risk, uncertainty, and worry. The current study analyses articles from four national daily newspapers employing a qualitative, thematic content analysis. In the analysis, four principal themes were distinguished: fear of crime defined, fear of crime personified, fear of crime situationalized, and fear of crime contextualized. The articles examined describe an increasingly unsafe society characterized by rising crime, particularly in the suburbs, which is producing fear among women and children. Male police officers are also described as being afraid and as no longer being able to protect the public. The daily press establishes clearly who should be afraid of crime, which crimes produce fear, and where and why people are afraid. The articles formulate special ways of describing fear of crime, in which fear appears as a natural and expected reaction to life in an increasingly unsafe and violent society.     

What do students really know about criminal justice?

This survey of three hundred and twenty undergraduate students attempted to determine their knowledge of crime and punishment in North Carolina. Respondents answered a series of open- and closed-ended questions regarding various legal topics, such as statutory rape and the legal ages for tobacco and alcohol use. The participants were also asked to list punishments for various offenses, such as possession of marijuana, driving while intoxicated, and rape. They were then asked to define certain legal terms such as larceny. The results indicated that most students were unable to provide correct corresponding punishments for many offenses. They were also unable to accurately define various legal terms, such as robbery or rape. The implications for stronger education in the area of criminal justice are discussed.     

Political Theory,Critical Theory,and the Place of the Frankfurt School

Abstract

This paper explores the paradox of the Frankfurt School's Critical Theory where the notion of "critical theory" became identified with aesthetics and asks whether the disappearance of the political dimension of critical theory was necessary. This disappearance of the political also presents some uncomfortable affinities between it and postmodernism. But in the more sober world after 1989, post-communism poses more relevant questions than post-modernism for an assessment of the history of the Frankfurt School. The political project of the old Frankfurt School has to be revivified - or at least given a decent burial.     

基于职业生命周期的驾驶员多维安全教育策略探讨

驾驶作为一种准职业技能,具备生命周期的属性。处于不同职业阶段的驾驶员具备不同的特点,其安全培训教育的需求是不一样的。按照驾龄与驾驶技术的成熟度,驾驶员的生命周期可分为学习期、实习期、熟练期、熟悉期以及衰退期。在这样划分的基础上,我们可以分析出不同阶段的职业特点与安全培训需求,从而设计出基于职业生命周期的驾驶员安全教育培训内容、学习形式与教学方法,以及相应的实施策略。     

理论与实践的融合:当代警察教育的要义

在目前的政法院校招录培养体制改革中,随着学历教育与职业培训之间的“剑拔弩张”,理论与实践的关系问题再次凸显.综观世界警察教育发展潮流,理论与实践的融合是当代警察教育的要义.在警察教育训练体系方面,它体现为横向上的警察教育训练的分类分级,以及纵向上教育与训练的前后衔接、同步并行.在警察教育训练内容方面,它体现为理论维的强调通识教育、素质提升、全面发展,以及实践维的强调面向实战、贴近实战、服务实战.     

The Effects of Political Talk Radio On Political Attitude Formation: Exposure Versus Knowledge

The effects of political news on the mass audience are usually difficult to establish empirically. Recent models of mass communication effects have held that political knowledge is a better indicator of media reception than traditional measures of exposure. This claim is tested in two studies of attitudes toward Democratic and Republican leaders during the 1996 U.S. presidential primary campaigns. The impact of messages from three types of political talk radio (PTR) is examined: Rush Limbaugh, other conservative hosts, and liberal/moderate hosts. Political knowledge and exposure to talk radio are found to be equally good predictors of attitudes toward political leaders when studied separately. However, when tested against one another, exposure is the more effective measure. Agreement between Rush Limbaugh's messages and his audience's attitudes toward political figures is consistent and strong. Biased processing of PTR content by audience members with partisan predispositions contrary to those of the host is also examined.     

Steven Chaffee and the Future of Political Communication Research

This article discusses four basic characteristics of Steven Chaffee's research: going beyond the "common research wisdom," careful explication of concepts, avoiding unsubstantiated charges against the media, and investigation of the social aspects of communication. The evolution of political socialization research is used as an example of how these characteristics have strengthened Chaffee's contribution to that area and to the larger field of political communication. It is argued that the future of this field would benefit from emulation of these characteristics. Continuing problems of political communication research are noted, and various emerging problems are discussed.     

The Method is the Message: The Current State of Political Communication Research

Formal journalism ethics, as laid out in codes of ethics by journalism associations and the like, is part of a wider debate on media ethics that has been triggered in the Middle East due to the advent of global media in the region. This study compares journalism codes from Europe and the Islamic world in order to revisit the widespread academic assumption of a deep divide between Western and Oriental philosophies of journalism that has played a role in many debates on political communication in the area. The analysis shows that there is a broad intercultural consensus that standards of truth and objectivity should be central values of journalism. Norms protecting the private sphere are, in fact, more pronounced in countries of the Near and Middle East, North Africa, and in the majority of Muslim states in Asia than is generally the case in Europe, although the weighing of privacy protection against the public's right to information is today a component of most journalistic codes of behavior in Islamic countries. Obvious differences between the West and many Islamic countries are to be found in the status accorded to freedom of expression. Although ideas of freedom have entered formal media ethics in the Middle East and the Islamic world, only a minority of documents limit the interference into freedom to cases where other fundamental rights (e.g., privacy) are touched, whereas the majority would have journalists accept political, national, religious, or cultural boundaries to their work. Despite existing differences between Western and Middle Eastern/Islamic journalism ethics and in contrast to the overall neoconservative (Islamist) trends in societal norms, formal journalism ethics has been a sphere of growing universalization throughout the last decades.     

Attention to Counter-Attitudinal Messages in a State Election Campaign

Research following the "selective exposure" model has focused on avoidance of political messages with which a person might disagree. But positive attention to such "counter-attitudinal" messages is worthy of study, in part because normative theories of democracy value exposure to information that might disturb citizens' political predispositions. Surveys of youth (N = 417) and parents (N = 430) examine attention to newspaper, television, and Web messages about candidates. While there is somewhat more attention to messages about and for a person's favored political candidate or party, forms of political involvement (knowledge, curiosity, and discussion) that predict this "attitude-consistent" attention also predict counter-attitudinal attention at least as strongly. Parents' education and students' exposure to civics lessons also predict both kinds of attention. These results suggest that attention to counterattitudinal political messages is worthy of further study as an important goal of political socialization and a criterion of citizen performance in democracy.     

Framing,Value Words,and Citizens' Explanations of Their Issue Opinions

This study examines the effects of framing on how citizens use value language to explain their views on political issues. An experiment simulated exposure to framing in media coverage of gay rights. The results show that participants who received an "equality" frame were particularly likely to explain their views on gay rights in terms of equality and that participants who received a "morality" frame were particularly likely to cast their opinions in the language of morality. A closer examination, however, showed that exposure to the frames encouraged participants to use value language not only in ways suggested by the frames but also in ways that challenged the frames. Moreover, the results indicated that exposure to the "morality" frame interfered with the impact of the "equality" frame, suggesting that the presence of alternative frames can dampen framing effects.