Web 2.0: a new chapter in development in practice?

This brief paper describes a range of facilities and new developments in Web-based and Internet services. While many of the applications are being used for publishing, dialogue, research, and feedback in development, the question still remains: how profoundly is the development of communications, and in particular the Internet, changing the international development community and the way in which it works?     

Christianity and punitive mentalities: A qualitative study

According to David Garland (1990) scholars should be concerned about the cultural foundations of punishment in modern western society, such as religion. To this end, Garland conceptualizes punitive mentalities and sensibilities that provide the cultural support for structural systems ofpunishment. Punitive mentalities are ways of thinking about punishment, whereas punitive sensibilities are ways of feeling about punishment. Garlandsuggests that religious traditions are an important source of punitive mentalities and sensibilities. This research is an empirical analysis ofpunitive mentalities and their cultural roots, using qualitative research.Research questions focus on the following: Are there distinctively punitivementalities? How do punitive mentalities influence the desire for officialpunishment? Data from a previous study (Cook, 1998a) are analyzed here to explore terrains of punitive mentalities within the contexts of Christianity.Findings identify four distinct categories: anti-punitive, non-punitive,retributive and vengeful mentalities where Christian (non)belief systemsare important cornerstones. Respondents in each group have specific desires regarding the state's use of punishments, especially the ``death penalty''.     

Proficiency testing (external quality assessment) of drug detection in oral fluid

Eighteen external quality assessment (proficiency testing) samples were prepared from client specimens collected with the Intercept^® oral fluid collection device and by spiking drug-free oral fluid. Samples were circulated in pairs at quarterly intervals to 13 UK and USA based laboratories for analysis by a panel of OraSure micro-plate Intercept^® enzyme immunoassay kits and hyphenated mass spectrophotometric techniques. During the survey, there was a single case of non-specificity in a false report for methadone. The major errors were of lack of sensitivity relative to the concentration thresholds specified for the immunoassays. The sensitivity for overall ‘present’/‘not found’ reports calculated as true positives/(true positives + false negatives) were for the amfetamine specific assay 50%, methyl-amfetamines 93%, barbiturates 64%, cannabinoids 73%, cocaine and metabolites 100%, benzodiazepines 69%, methadone 95%, opiates 79% (opiates excluding oxycodone 93%), phencyclidine 93% and human gamma-globulin 97%. A small number of the sensitivity errors were attributable to errors in chromatographic confirmation techniques.     

Schools and the prevention of petty crime: Search for a missing link

Earlier research on the relation between school features and petty crime suggests that schools can intentionally influence the crime rate of the pupils. These findings were the starting point for a Dutch study at secondary schools of the same type in Dutch towns. The study focused on effects on the delinquency of third-year low-stream pupils (aged 15–17). For the study a control theory was formulated, a conditional control theory, which, in contrast to Hirschi's social control theory, recognizes possible delinquent influences of the pupils' network. In the study a strong statistical relation between integration of pupils in school and petty crime was found. However, I found almost no influence of the studied school features on integration and petty crime. These results led to the question whether the real important feature of schools had been neglected in the study. This seems not to be the case. A multilevel analysis shows that it is unlikely that there is major impact of schools on the integration of pupils, on delinquency, or on the relationship between integration and delinquency. This can be the result of special aspects of the Dutch school system and of the neglect of theory in earlier research.     

Defining risk

Risk is the focal topic in the management of many activities and technologies. For that management to be successful, an explicit and accepted definition of the term risk is essential. Creation of that definition is a political act, expressing the definers' values regarding the relative importance of different possible adverse consequences for a particular decision. Those values, and with them the definition of risk, can change with changes in the decisionmaker, the technologies considered, or the decision problem. After a review of the sources of controversy in defining risk, a general framework is developed, showing how these value issues can be systematically addressed. As an example, the approach is applied to characterizing the risks of six competing energy technologies, the relative riskeness of which depends upon the particular definition used.     

Reviews

Susan Gross Solomon (ed.), Beyond Sovietology: Essays in Politics and History. New York and London: M.E. Sharpe, 1993, 254 pp., £38.00.

Alice H. Amsden, Jacek Kochanowicz & Lance Taylor, The Market Meets Its Match. Restructuring the Economics of Eastern Europe. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994, 250 pp.

Robert E. Ebel, Energy Choices in Russia. Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies, 1994, xii + 152 pp., $16.95.

Michael Waller, The End of the Communist Power Monopoly. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1993, viii + 287 pp., £35.00 h/b., £9.99 p/b.

Minxin Pei, From Reform to Revolution: The Demise of Communism in China and the Soviet Union. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994, 253 pp., £29.95.

William G. Rosenberg & Lewis H. Siegelbaum (eds), Social Dimensions of Soviet Industrialisation. Bloomington and Indianapolis, IN: Indiana University Press, 1993, xix + 296 pp., £12.99 p/b.

Taras Kuzio & Andrew Wilson, Ukraine: Perestroika to Independence. Basingstoke: Macmil‐lan Press, 1994, xiv + 260 pp., £40.00.

Russell F. Farnen (ed.), Nationalism, Ethnicity, and Identity. Cross National and Comparative Perspectives. New Brunswick, NJ, and London: Transaction, 1994, xiv + 538 pp., £49.95.

Edwin Thomas Bacon, The Gulag at War: Stalin's Forced Labour System in the Light of Archives. Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1994, xii + 190 pp.

Robert S. Ross, China, the United States and the Soviet Union: Tripolarity and Policy Making in the Cold War. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1993, x + 204 pp., £42.00.     

Reviews

Barbara Caine and Rosemary Pringle (eds), Transitions: New Australian Feminisms (Allen & Unwin) 1995.

Peta Tait, Converging Realities: Feminism in Australian Theatre (Currency Press) Sydney, 1994.

Pauline Johnson, Feminism as Radical Humanism (Allen & Unwin) St Leonards, 1994.

Denise Russell, Women, Madness and Medicine (Polity Press) Cambridge, 1995.

R.W‐ Connell, Masculinities (Allen & Unwin) St Leonards, 1995.

Margaret Maynard, Fashioned from Penury: Dress as Cultural Practice in Colonial Australia (Cambridge University Press) Melbourne, 1994.

Joy Damousi, Women Come Rally: Socialism, Communism and Gender in Australia, 1890–1955 (Oxford University Press) Melbourne, 1995.

Susan Sheridan, Along the Faultlines: Sex, Race and Nation in Australian Women's Writing, 1880s—1930s (Allen & Unwin) Sydney, 1995.