Public Beliefs in the Causes of Wealth and Poverty and Legitimization of Inequalities in Russia and Estonia

The article analyzes the attributions of the causes of poverty and wealth in Russia and Estonia in 1991 and 1996 and their determinants. Among the latter are the perceived actual justice of the society, the perceived size of the middle class, and the personal position in the system of inequalities. Despite the economic hardships and a rise in inequalities in both countries, individualistic explanations of wealth and poverty have increased over the 5 years between the surveys. At the same time respondents in both countries demonstrated a growing awareness of the importance of starting positions and connections to achieve wealth. The perceived middle class has a significant effect on attributions of poverty but not on wealth. Russians in Estonia have a particular bias against wealth, whereas non-Russians in Russia are more likely to justify wealth on the basis of individual merit. Explanations of poverty and wealth in Estonia are more rooted in the factors of socialization (age, education, and gender), whereas in Russia they are more rooted in the changes in the family financial circumstances between 1991 and 1996. There was a general increase in support for government intervention in distribution in both countries.     

Does the multi-phased high school entrance program affect the equity of educational opportunity？

The Taiwan Government has proposed many educational reform programs in these years. Since 2000, in addition to the joint high school entrance examination, new ways of entering senior high school have included recommendation, application, register-and-distribution, as well as direct promotion. In 2001, the joint high school entrance examination was further annulled for good. However, contrary to the Taiwan Government＇s anticipation, the multi-phased high school entrance program has been severely criticized due to its controversial operating process. Based on our in-depth interviews and analyses of data collected by the Taiwan Education Panel Survey, the results demonstrate that the multi-phased high school entrance program has divided the selection process into several critical parts. Firstly, students have to face the requisition both on and off campus. Secondly, the selection and recommendation criteria are not uniform among different schools. Thirdly, students with better family backgrounds are still benefiting from the advantages of being recommended to public senior high schools. Finally, the selection process and related criteria can easily be influenced by the parents or relatives of students with higher socio-economic status. We therefore argue that the issues related to the selection and recommendation criteria, timing of assignments, school categorizations, as well as the review process for the multi-phased high school entrance program should all be re-considered.     

贵州“智力扶贫”实证分析

＂智力扶贫＂是贵州新世纪扶贫独创的＂六大模式＂之一。实地调研表明,贵州智力扶贫存在地方政府的重视程度和支持力度不够、贫困人口的参与度不够、内容狭窄等问题,论文据此提出了相应的政策建议。     

Participation in welfare legislation—A poverty-aware paradigm

Public participation, responsive regulation, and other policy formulations are intended to draw governments down from their ivory towers and into engagement with the people. However, they paint at best, a hazy picture of who “the people” are. This superficial representation is felt, among other collectives, by people living in poverty, who not only face hunger, often accompanied by poorer health and lower life expectancy, but whose social exclusion typically goes unrecognized by the authorities. The legal framing of poverty—and, as a result, states' policy approaches to its alleviation—focuses on the material core, representing a very thin conceptualization that fails to address the social dimension. Furthermore, practical avenues for incorporating citizens' views into lawmaking—which might enrich understanding—are lacking when it comes to people in poverty. Combined with a blatantly hegemonic stance, the resulting ignorance around poverty and “the poor” generates welfare laws that are woefully out of touch with reality, and legislative thinking that perpetuates, rather than alleviates, poverty. This paper seeks to make a twofold contribution: (i) to demonstrate this situation with a deep empirical inquiry into the legislative process of one legal provision within the Israeli welfare law regime, juxtaposed against qualitative field-research findings and (ii) to introduce the inventive and groundbreaking “poverty-aware” paradigm, constructed in social-work discourse, to illuminate and explain the empirical findings and point to potential procedural–institutional reform, to pave the way for poverty-aware legislation.     

Drug Recognition Evaluation and Chemical Confirmation of a 25C‐NBOMe‐Impaired Driver

This case report details an individual arrested for drug‐impaired driving after leaving the scene of multiple motor vehicle collisions and evading police. The driver was examined by a drug recognition expert and failed the drug recognition evaluation. The driver admitted to using cocaine, marijuana, an antidepressant medication and “N‐bomb,” a novel psychoactive substance that possesses hallucinogenic properties. Toxicological analyses at the Centre of Forensic Sciences’ Toronto laboratory revealed only the substance 2‐[4‐chloro‐2,5‐dimethoxyphenyl]‐N‐[(2‐methoxyphenyl)methyl]ethanamine (25C‐NBOMe) in the accused's urine. This is the first report in which 25C‐NBOMe was identified through DRE and toxicological analyses in a drug‐impaired driver.     

The ‘Short Addiction Program’: experiences from an intervention by the correctional services in Norway

Do participants in a short term training program in prison find that it helps them to cope with their addiction better than before? This article explores the effects of a pilot project conducted in two Norwegian prisons. The study is based on interviews with 16 participants. The data show that the program increased inmates’ motivation and provided them with better tools to deal with their addiction. The conclusion is therefore that this kind of program could be the first step towards enabling prisoners with addictions to cope better with the challenges involved.     

见怪不怪与其怪自败

中国的基尼系数从20世纪80年代的0 25上升到目前的0 458,并且还有进一步扩大的趋势。进入20世纪90年代中期以后,我国城市贫困的状况持续恶化,农村贫困的缓解也面临着极大的困难。即便是按照我们自己制定的非常之低的贫困线来衡量,目前城乡绝对贫困人口的数量也在1亿人上下,如果按照联合国制定的每人每天1美元来衡量,中国的贫困人口总量将达到2 5亿人的规模。     

The assassination of the Swedish Minister for Foreign Affairs

On September 10, 2003, Anna Lindh, the Swedish Minister for Foreign Affairs, was assassinated. The offender, a 24-year-old man, was a socially isolated, culturally and familially dislocated, yet academically quite competent young man who became enthralled with the habitual criminality of some of his relatives and their associates, and then psychiatrically decompensated in his early twenties. He had a history of serious violence before the crime, including the gross assault with a knife of his alcoholic and abusive father when he was 17, stalking, and extortion. At least a year prior to the assassination, he confided to a friend his desire to attack someone famous in front of many people. A definitive motive for the crime was not possible to establish. This was an act of intended, yet opportunistic violence toward a national political figure. The dynamics of the case are placed in the context of other attacks on Western European and U.S. politicians.     

妇女贫困：从农村到城乡，从收入贫困到多维贫困——2000年以来中国“妇女贫困”研究评述与展望

随着中国社会经济的发展,妇女贫困呈现出新的地域性与内涵特点,相应地对妇女贫困的研究重点也应有所转移。本文在纵观2000年以来研究者对中国妇女贫困的理解与认知、贫困研究方法、贫困原因分析、对贫困的体验等研究成果的基础上,分析了中国妇女贫困研究的未来走势。