The Role of Civil Servants in National Budgeting: An International Comparison

Beginning in October 1988, a budgeteer-exchange program has existed between Her Majesty's Treasury in the United Kingdom and the Office of Management and Budget in the United States. Cultural and constitutional differences make the jobs of the budgeteers in each country analogous but not equal. Differences that exist include organizational structure, work content, and information presentation to legislative bodies.     

Social science and the Courts

Social scientists have increasingly become involved in the submission of amicus curiae or friend of the court briefs in legal cases being decided by state and federal courts. This increase has triggered considerable debate about the use of briefs to communicate relevant social science research. This article evaluates the strengths and weaknesses of various methods of summarizing social science research for the courts. It also reviews the procedures for submitting briefs developed by the American Psychology-Law Society which, in collaboration with the American Psychological Association, has submitted its first brief inMaryland v. Craig, a case recently decided by the U.S. Supreme Court.The authors wish to thank James Ogloff, Kathy Roesch, and Claudia Worrell for their comments on an earlier draft     

Commission Newsletter: Winter 1981

I.A.A. Thompson: Crown and Cortes. Government, Institutions and Representation in Early‐Modern Castile (Variorum, Collected Studies Series CS 427, Ashgate Publishing, Aldershot, 1993, pp. 352; ISBN 0–86078–393–6; £49.50)

Janusz Mallek: Preußen und Polen: Politik, Stände, Kirche und Kultur vom 16. bis zum 18. Jahrhundert (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1992. Schriften der Mainzer Philosophischen Fakultätsgesellschaft Nr. 12, pp. 207; ISBN 3–515–05943–1; DM 58)

Cristiana Senigaglia: Il gioco delle assonanze: a proposito degli influssi hobbesiani sul pensiero filosofico‐politico di Hegel (Florence, La Nuova Italia, 1992, pp. 235)     

Claiming Kapwa: Filipino Immigrants,Community-Based Organizations,and Community Citizenship in San Francisco

Filipino immigrants and Filipino-serving community-based organizations (CBOs) in San Francisco work to meet community members’ immediate needs. At the same time, it activates political participation for Filipinos to make claims on traditional citizenship from the city agencies under an albeit xenophobic climate. Although city-level legislation marks San Francisco as politically progressive, Filipino community members experience the national anti-immigrant climate in the United States through a lack of services for integration. We argue that immigrants and CBOs develop “community citizenship” that link Filipino immigrants to local state services while engaging in community building activities that affirm the transnational identities of Filipinos as part of their (in)ability to participate politically in San Francisco. Through qualitative interviews from Filipino organizers and CBO staff, we argue that CBOs use Filipino core cultural values to facilitate collective responsibility for community members’ needs that is not only local but also always transnational under contradicting currents of liberal progressivism and neoliberal conservatism in the city and nationally.     

A Survey of Perspectives on Intergovernmental Relations: A Comparative Analysis of the Czech and Slovak Republics

The results of a survey of local government officials from the Slovak and Czech Republics taken in December of 2005 are presented and analysed. Attitudes about and perspectives on intergovernmental fiscal relations in the two republics are probed. Differences and similarities in Czech and Slovak views are established regarding some of the perceptions of local autonomy and the sufficiency of available funds; whether or not public services are supplied by the appropriate levels of government; the potential benefits of adopting a serious rather than a nominal property tax; and the flexibility of local budget planning in Czech and Slovak cities and towns.