Protection, Parity, or Promotion: Public Attitudes to Cohabitation and the Purposes of Legal Reform

Cohabitation law reform may be informed by different purposes. Three are considered in this paper: protection of parties at risk when relationships break down, parity of treatment between different forms of partnership, and the promotion of particular family forms. These are considered in relation to the Family Law (Scotland) Act 2006 in the context of recent evidence about public attitudes towards cohabitation. Public attitudes and the approach adopted in the 2006 Act are juxtaposed, raising questions about the alignment of public attitudes and the direction of law reform on cohabitation.     

THE OLDER PRISONER

The value of defensible space (access by strangers and opportunity for residents to observe public areas) in a variety of household types was examined. Comparison of matched samples of households (one sample consisting of people who had been victims of a crime and one where they had not), using both observation and interview data produced mixed results. Defensible space was eflective in deterring crime in indoor public areas, but not in outdoor areas. Defensible space was found to have a slight impact on people's feeling of responsibility for public areas .     

Is the EU held accountable for economic performances? Assessing vote and popularity functions before and after membership

The EU has become increasingly responsible for the state of national economies over the last decades. Meanwhile, many observers have claimed that this increased responsibility has not translated into more accountability. In this article, we revisit this literature and analyse vote-popularity functions before and after accession because it provides a situation when the EU is an incumbent and when it is not. Using Eurobarometer surveys from 2001 to 2011, which were carried out in the countries that joined the EU in 2004 and 2007, we first show that individuals do not hold the EU accountable for macroeconomic performances before accession, but that they do after accession. Using European Election Studies surveys, we also indicate that the incumbent European Peoples’ Party is held accountable for the state of the economy in countries that are ruled by the EU, but not in countries that have just become EU members.