What drives democratisation in Asia and Africa?

Abstract.   With many developing countries stuck in an uneasy middle ground between full-fledged democracy and outright dictatorship, the question of favourable and unfavourable conditions for democratisation is dramatically brought back into focus. Yet, systematic comparative analysis that analyses a range of favourable and unfavourable political, economic and cultural factors is rare, particularly as far as African and Asian countries are concerned. This article addresses these shortcomings and at the same time introduces two conceptual innovations. Building on a structural and socio-anthropological conception of the term, we measure and test culture cross-nationally in a way that overcomes the conceptual limitations of the 'political culture' approach. We further develop an index of power sharing for 62 African and Asian countries, allowing us statistically to test Arend Lijphart's 'consociational' model of democratic emergence and consolidation. In our statistical examination of these countries between 1965 and 1995, power sharing and the cultural element of low familism turn out to be the strongest predictors of democratisation, while economic factors – often viewed as the most important variables shaping democratisation – have only limited effects.     

Making an Impact on Juvenile Delinquents: An Approach to Victim Impact Statements that Everyone Can Embrace

The use of victim impact statements occurs in the majority of states' juvenile court proceedings. Many victims' rights advocates celebrate the use of these statements as a valuable means of victim empowerment, as victim impact statements allow victims to convey the personal effects that delinquent acts had on their lives directly to the courts. Yet at the same time, many oppose the use of victim impact statements in juvenile courts because they inhibit judges' ability to focus on delinquent juveniles' rehabilitative needs by infusing the victims' feelings and emotions into the disposition‐crafting process. This article suggests that a balance can be struck between these competing concerns by incorporating victim impact statements into the rehabilitative programs prescribed in the dispositions of delinquent youths, instead of using the statements as an influencing force in crafting the dispositions.     

Evaluating a Police Report

An evaluation system was developed for a police department using the MAUT-Baysian (Multiple Attribute Utility-Baysian Statistics) system of strategy evaluation. This system requires the elected officials, police department, and community to jointly establish the goals for the police department. These goals are then rank ordered from most important to least important. A weighting system is then established using the least important goal as the unit of measure to ensure goal consistency.

Both objective and subjective measures were developed to help assess the success of the Department meeting these goals. Measurements included comparisons between the Department and other similar departments on areas of concern, survey results of citizen and police attitudes, and observational information. After completing the data collection for the evaluation it is placed on a matrix to aid the decision maker get a complete overview of the Department. The array allows the manager to see quickly how the Department is doing on each goal and how the Department is doing as a whole.

The management implications for the system are extensive and powerful, since the manager can see how resource allocation or change can affect overall success. By shifting small resources from lower ranked to higher ranked goals major changes in police effectiveness can be accomplished.     

Saying Goodbye

My experience in China has not been about demystifying this culturally complex place or becom- ing a Sinophile. Old China Hand, China expert-I'm none of those and don't feel any more qualified to write about "the Middle Kingdom" now than I did when I     

Partisan Politics,Globalization, and the Determinants of Privatization Proceeds in Advanced Democracies (1990–2000)

The 1990s have witnessed unprecedented attempts at privatizing state‐owned enterprises in virtually all OECD democracies. This contribution analyzes the extent to which the partisan control of the government can account for the differences in the privatization proceeds raised by EU and OECD countries between 1990 and 2000. It turns out that privatizations are part of a process of economic liberalization in previously highly regulated economies as well as a reaction to the fiscal policy challenges imposed by European integration and the globalization of financial markets. Partisan differences only emerge if economic problems are moderate, while intense economic, particularly fiscal, problems foreclose differing partisan strategies.     

EVALUATION OF INDUSTRIAL INNOVATION POLICY–CONCEPTS, METHODS AND LESSONS

The first part of this article describes the methods most frequently used in evaluations of government technology and innovation policies and discusses the limitations and appropriate applications of each. The second part summarizes important findings from German evaluation research: innovation policies tend to focus on large enterprises; efforts to stimulate private investment in research and development produce relatively little effect; and grants for specific research and development projects and increased research and development personnel are effective in stimulating action that would not have otherwise occurred. The most promising methodological strategy for evaluating innovation policies involves mixing methods to avoid the limitations of individual approaches.     

Victim Compensation and Offender Restitution in the Federal Republic of Germany—a Western-European Comparative Perspective

In the Federal Republic of Germany, as well as in most other Western European countries, the growing emphasis in victimology during the last 15 years has led to several legal schemes for victim compensation. The German Victim Compensation Act of 1976 provides compensation for violent acts within the framework of a social security system with periodic payments, while most of the other West-European countries grant lump sums from a special compensation fund. The German legislation, however, has given the victim a relatively weak position. The problems are aggravated because of the restrictive, and concerning the Federal states—different, application of the law. Victim compensation as a restitutional sanction within the penal law doesn't play an important role. Furthermore, the financial situation of most offenders is so bad, that the civil claims of the victim for damages cannot be compensated. In Germany, however, remarkable efforts are made by the debt relief programs for offenders, which allow victim compensation on the one hand and offender rehabilitation on the other. This balancing of victim-offender interests seems very important for criminal policy in general. An extension of the legal provisions for victim compensation is considered necessary as is the wider application of restitutional sanctions whether instead of or combined with penal sanctions. Furthermore, help for victims should include social and psychological assistance programs, which are not yet developed in Europe to any great extent.     

Shall Housekeeping Tasks Become a Duty for Husbands?

This popular newspaper headline has often be discussed in public. After all, statistics show, that men only spend 19 and a half hours per week to help with the cooking, washing, ironing etc., while the wife spends 35 hours for housekeeping.     

Introduction of Therapy into Tegel Prison: Evaluation of an Experiment

The revision of the Penal Code of the Federal Republic of Germany includes provision for therapeutic units in prisons. This paper reports on the first of a series of research projects designed to test the effectiveness of the largest such unit which is at Tegel Prison in Berlin. The data indicate that residents of the unit have lower reconviction rates than prisoners exposed only to orthodox penal confinement. However, there are no significant differences in outcomes for the three treatment models employed. The methodological problems involved in this kind of evaluative research are discussed.