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The European Union: debate or referendum?

ChloeF — Fri, 14 Jun 2013 07:30:21 +0000

By Simon Usherwood

To the casual observer of British politics, we would appear to be heading towards a referendum on the UK’s membership of the European Union (EU). The Prime Minister has spoken for it, the clamour in the press and in the lobbies of Westminster continues to grow stronger and there is no good reason to speak against it, or so it would seem.

As with much casual observation, this is not really the case when we look more closely. David Cameron’s speech in January offered only a very minor advance, either of his previous position or even of government policy. Since the passing of the European Union Act in 2011, there has been a requirement for a referendum for any new transfer of power to the Union. The noises off by backbenchers and media commentators are as much driven by frustration as by success. With neither Labour nor the Liberal Democrats willing to match Cameron’s offer to press for a renegotiation and then a referendum, we remain where we have been for some considerable period of time.

Moreover, the entire referendum argument risks obscuring something much more consequential, namely the paucity of public debate about European integration.

To be clear, there is much more of a debate in the UK about ‘Europe’ than in most other member states. The connection elsewhere to a bigger project of political or economic modernisation, or a ‘return to Europe’, tends to take the edge off questions of the value of participating in integration, which is essentially seen as self-evident. The historical British experience of the EU — as something to be caught up with, for lack of a credible alternative — has been rather different, and so has opened a space for questioning that has long raised eyebrows in other capitals.

However, even in this relatively well-developed public debate (consider the number of times one sees an EU-related headline in the news), there is very little substance. For many in the UK, ‘Europe’ means bendy bananas, votes for prisoners (which isn’t even the EU), and not much else. By giving a byword for technocrats in Brussels making thoughtless decisions which they impose on us, we actually lose sight of what really happens. What debate there is all too often rests on little more than some half-formed ideas of what is happening, with some teasing of foreigners thrown in for good measure.

For something that both pro- and anti- sides of the debate would claim is an important part of our lives, this seems rather incredible. Instead of getting a real sense of the context and process by which decisions are made, or an understanding of the issues at hand, there is general hand-waving and appeals to higher values. Thus, any referendum is not about the Union and Britain’s part in it, but about giving the people a voice. It seems odd then that those same advocates do not press for referenda about the reform of the NHS or changes to schooling.

In the (still unlikely) event that there is a referendum, I would doubt that there will be much informed discussion. Instead we will have some headline facts and figures, together with some celebrity endorsements and a couple of half-hearted TV debates, watched by few and cared about by fewer still. Whatever the result, it would not solve any of the long-term questions about Britain’s relationship with the rest of the Continent, nor offer a constructive agenda for the future.

As both a political scientist and as a citizen, that pains me. If democracy is about anything, then it is about participation by the people. Part of that is voting, but that voting should be only one element in a bigger process of engagement, reflection, and discussion. For the EU, just as for any political issue that faces us, we should be at the front of debate, challenging those who offer to lead us to show the true value of their judgments and their abilities. If we do not, then we risk continuing the drift in policy that we served so inadequately of late, and that’s true whatever you think of the European Union.

Simon Usherwood is Senior Lecturer in the School of Politics at the University of Surrey. He is the co-author of The European Union: A Very Short Introduction. He blogs here and tweets from @Usherwood

The Very Short Introductions (VSI) series combines a small format with authoritative analysis and big ideas for hundreds of topic areas. Written by our expert authors, these books can change the way you think about the things that interest you and are the perfect introduction to subjects you previously knew nothing about. Grow your knowledge with OUPblog and the VSI series every Friday and like Very Short Introductions on Facebook.

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Image credits: David Cameron, photo by by Remy Steinegger [Creative Commons licence] via Wikimedia Commons; European Union flag, © Johan Ramberg via istockphoto.

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Violence, now and then

Nicola — Wed, 05 Jun 2013 09:30:20 +0000

By Hannah Skoda

We are used to finding a stream of extreme violence reported in the media: from the brutal familial holocaust engineered by Mick Philpott to the terror of the Boston bombings. Maybe it is because such cases seem close to home and elicit reactions both voyeuristic and frightened, that they gain so much more emotive coverage than quotidian violence in Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan. As a historian of violence, it is tempting to join in this discussion. And yet it is perhaps more revealing to comment upon the commentary. Indeed, the meta-commentary surrounding these cases has been particularly striking: from outrage over the demonization of the welfare state by the Daily Mail, to criticism of the hypocrisy of political and media focus on the Boston bombings, to the exclusion of the higher mortality rates from daily American gun-crime. Such acts are self-evidently out of the ordinary, abnormal. And yet they can tell us a lot about the ordinary, about what is considered normal, in the reactions they elicit. Then we can expose the fissures and hypocrisies of our own responses to violence.

This also presents a fruitful approach for historians and anthropologists of violence. In many ways, this is a question of sources; we are reliant upon representations of acts of brutality and all the distortions that this entails. So it makes sense to think more carefully about how violence was, and is, represented and reacted to. In my own work on the fourteenth century, a picture of a society with a somewhat schizophrenic attitude towards physical violence emerges. Levels of violence and bloodshed were probably very high compared to nowadays. Yet the very profusion of evidence, legal, literary and moral, indicates that this was an era when people were bothered and frightened by extreme violence, but couldn’t quite make up their minds about it. They weren’t sure what distinguished violence from discipline, familial or judicial; whether violence was the prerogative of the state, or whether it was a useful way of negotiating social relations within the community; sometimes they weren’t even sure whether things were funny or appalling. But they certainly discussed violence in ways at least as complex as commentary today.

On the one hand, we find old men traumatised by memories of violence from half a century previously. An inquiry into judicial rights in the northern French village of Ham-en-Artois in 1303 reported witnesses in their sixties recalling their distress at seeing a murdered corpse when they were just ten years old. They remembered the name of the victim, the location of the body, the time when the crime was supposed to have been committed. The source reveals not just distressed individuals unable to shake off the vision of violence many years later, but a community which had discussed the case over the intervening years, debating, corroborating, and clarifying the details. Here we have a picture of a society shocked and upset by brutality.

But consider reactions to the following incident. Records from 1288 in the northern French town of Merck describe an accusation by the wife and child of a man who had apparently committed suicide; they claimed that the local legal official had engineered the man’s death by drowning in order to make it look like suicide. The official was apparently motivated by personal enmity, as well as sheer greed (a suicide’s possessions were forfeited to the relevant authorities). We cannot know the truth of the case. But we do know that this complaint only gained attention several years later and that the official was barely held accountable, perhaps out of unwillingness to undermine the legal system, perhaps because it was sensed that this was really about personal vendetta. He even gained re-employment in another town in a similar capacity. Thirteenth-century contemporaries were not overly bothered by the emotional and physical cruelty of the incident.

What can we learn nowadays from these widely contrasting responses to violence in the fourteenth century? There may have been a statistical decline in levels of physical violence over the centuries, and we may have become more sensitized to the sight of blood, but this doesn’t mean that our reactions have become any less problematic and ambivalent. If we step back and think about the range of modern reactions to violence — from horror at cases like that of Mick Philpott or the Boston bombings, to a willingness to turn aside from confronting the impact of gun-crime, to the chronic brutality in much modern entertainment — we will find a similarly complex and troubling set of attitudes. Whilst so-called acts of terror seem to linger in the collective memory, we quickly forget or turn aside from much violence which challenges our collective responsibility in ways too challenging fully to acknowledge.

Hannah Skoda is Fellow and Tutor in History at St John’s College, Oxford. Her recent published work includes Medieval Violence: Physical Brutality in Northern France, 1270-1330 and Legalism: Anthropology and History, co-edited with Paul Dresch. She is currently embarking on research into the misbehaviour of students in fifteenth-century Oxford, Paris, and Heidelberg. She writes about the perspectives afforded by the study of medieval history on her blog, Ideas Now and Then.

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Image credit: Vie de saint Denis – cropped [public domain] via Wikimedia Commons.

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Important announcement from the OUPblog

Alice — Tue, 28 May 2013 12:55:40 +0000

Dear readers,

We’re planning to make several changes to the OUPblog this year to improve the site and your reading experience. Some of the first changes will be taking place over the next couple weeks.

We will change some of our navigation and categorization on the blog based on reader behavior: deleting, adding, shifting, and renaming several categories. For example, our current ‘dictionaries’ category will be renamed ‘language’ and sub-categories will better reflect the full range of our language publishing from lexicography to linguistics.

We will also migrate away from Feedburner, which currently delivers our RSS and email, to a new service. Feedburner has been unreliable and we believe Google is getting ready to shut down this service after they shut down Google Reader on 1 July 2013. If all goes well, your email and RSS notifications will not change. If not, please check back here and re-subscribe.

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We know a few of the problems the site is experiencing and have great plans for improving it over the coming months. We of course welcome your feedback too and appreciate any comments that can be left in the box below.

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The classification of mental illness

Alice — Wed, 15 May 2013 10:30:41 +0000

By Daniel Freeman and Jason Freeman

According to the UK Centre for Economic Performance, mental illness accounts for nearly half of all ill health in the under 65s. But this begs the question: what is mental illness? How can we judge whether our thoughts and feelings are healthy or harmful? What criteria should we use?

This month sees the publication of the latest version of the psychiatrist’s bible: the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). The DSM is arguably the definitive reference work on mental illness, used by health services worldwide (though the World Health Organisation’s International Classification of Diseases and Health Related Problems is widely used in the UK). Sales of the previous edition, DSM-IV, are estimated at about a million copies — not bad for a book that runs to almost 1000 densely packed pages and retails for around £80.

What’s changed in DSM-5 — apart from the move from Roman to Arabic numerals in the title? Well, terms have been revised (“mental retardation” has become “intellectual disability”, for example). New disorders have been introduced. For instance, “premenstrual dysphoric disorder” has been added to the list of depressive disorders. And, perhaps most controversially, some professionals have worried that the threshold for diagnosis of certain disorders appears to have been lowered — meaning that more people may be classified as mentally ill. Indeed there is organised opposition to the new edition, exemplified by the International DSM-5 Response Committee.

The DSM’s basic approach, on the other hand, has remained consistent for more than 30 years: a painstaking enumeration of symptoms, designed to make the clinician’s task of diagnosis easier and more consistent. This is an objective that it has undoubtedly achieved. But are those diagnoses scientifically valid?

Take clinical depression, for example. Nine possible symptoms are listed in DSM-IV, and you’d need to report at least five of them to warrant a diagnosis. These symptoms must be sufficiently intense to really interfere with a person’s life and they must have lasted for a while.

One effect of this approach is to emphasize the severe end of a spectrum that also includes relatively mild psychological problems. So the DSM criteria won’t capture everyday fluctuations in mental health. And they won’t pick up people with, say, four symptoms rather than five.

Implicit here is a debate about the nature of mental illness. The DSM uses a medical model of psychiatric illness. It thinks in terms of separate, discrete disorders, just like physical medicine. The approach is binary: either you meet the criteria for a particular condition, or you don’t.

Many would argue that this kind of all-or-nothing attitude, with hundreds of separate conditions, doesn’t fit well with people’s real-life experience of psychological problems. Better instead to think of psychological experience as being dimensional — that is, encompassing a wide variety of experiences, from the unproblematic to the severely distressing. The further along that dimension, the more symptoms a person is likely to have and the more upsetting and disruptive those symptoms will be.

This is the psychological model of mental illness. It argues that there’s no binary opposition between disorder and ‘normality’. Psychological disorders are simply the extreme manifestation of traits that we all possess to varying degrees. For example, almost everyone experiences occasional feelings of anxiety. People who develop what the DSM classes as an anxiety disorder aren’t experiencing something qualitatively different. They’re simply undergoing a more intense version of the same thing.

There is a third approach to understanding mental illness: the sociological model. Proponents argue that psychological disorders aren’t illnesses at all. They’re a label used to stigmatize and control behaviour society deems objectionable — such as homosexuality, which featured in the DSM until 1980.

Our view is that psychological problems aren’t illusory. They are real expressions of distress, for which most people — understandably — want help. However there is variability in the validity of individual diagnoses. Therefore it is often wisest not to focus on particular diagnoses. Better instead to adopt a dimensional approach, and to concentrate on the key problems and day-to-day symptoms that lead people to seek assistance. To help us understand these problems, we can look at epidemiological information to see which experiences occur together, and therefore may share common causes. Psychologists call this a data-driven approach.

We can also be guided by our knowledge of how the brain works. For example, basic emotions such as fear or unhappiness are powered by relatively distinct circuits in the brain. So we can understand certain psychological problems as what follow when these emotional circuits don’t function properly. We can match up the emotion and the problem: sadness and depression, fear and anxiety disorders, for example. This is what we might call a theory-driven approach, though given the complexity of brain activity it may – at least at present — be a little optimistic.

Importantly, even such a psychological, evidence-based approach doesn’t get around the need to classify problems. Mental health professionals must still make decisions about how to label the problems people describe to them. Without some kind of classificatory system, we can’t communicate, research, and evaluate treatments.

But the problems inherent in the current systems arguably constitute the greatest obstacle to that work. Given the extent of the burden on society and individuals alike, improving the scientific understanding of psychological disorders remains a priority. And that means DSM-5 certainly won’t be the last word on the classification of mental illness.

Daniel Freeman is a Professor of Clinical Psychology in the Psychiatry Department at the University of Oxford. Jason Freeman is a writer and editor. Their latest book is The Stressed Sex: Uncovering the Truth about Men, Women, and Mental Health (Oxford University Press).

The OUPblog is running a series of articles on the DSM-5 in anticipation of its launch on 18 May 2013. Stay tuned for views from Donald W. Black, Michael A. Taylor, and Joel Paris. Read yesterday’s post “DSM-5 will be the last” by Edward Shorter.

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Image credit: Thinker, created by Auguste Rodin at the end of the 18 century. San Francisco Legion of Honor. © Rafael Ramirez Lee via iStockphoto.

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Give weight-loss diets a rest

JonathanK — Mon, 06 May 2013 17:30:35 +0000

By Abigail C. Saguy and Tamara B. Horwich

A respected cardiologist of our acquaintance recently confessed that he often tells his patients to lose weight. This may sound like good advice, but he knows better. Scores of clinical studies show that heavier patients with heart disease are, on average, less likely to die than thinner ones. Furthermore, weight loss efforts are typically counterproductive. Our cardiologist friend knows the studies but can’t quite bring himself to let go of the association between weight and health. He is not alone. In fact, the pervasive clinical and cultural bias against fat and fat people distorts medical practice, despite mounting evidence that human metabolic function is far more complex than previously understood.

Weight Loss Advertisement from Woman Beautiful Magazine, November 1908 via Library of Congress

It is true that heavier individuals are more likely to develop heart disease on average than are thinner patients, although it is not clear that being heavier causes heart disease. It may be that some related factor or factors — such as diet, exercise, stress, socio-economic status or a combination of these — causes both increased weight and makes one susceptible to heart disease.

That said, a growing body of evidence has shown that, among people who already have heart disease, heavier patients are less likely to die. This is so counter-intuitive that medical researchers refer to this burgeoning body of research as “reverse epidemiology” or the “obesity paradox.”

A recent study has shown that this “obesity paradox” holds for Type II Diabetes as well. Granted, people in the general population are more likely to develop Type II Diabetes in the first place if they are heavier, although the causal pathways remain unknown. However, among those who develop Type II Diabetes, many are in the “normal weight” category. Furthermore, among Type II Diabetes patients, the heavier ones are less likely to die than their thinner counterparts.

In the general population, heavier body mass is indeed associated with cardiometabolic abnormalities (i.e., high blood pressure, triglycerides, cholesterol, glucose, insulin resistance and inflammation). However, even here, the association is far from perfect. Specifically, almost one quarter of “normal weight” people — or 16 million Americans — have metabolic abnormalities, whereas more than half of “overweight” and almost one third of “obese” people — or 56 million Americans — have normal profiles, according to a 2008 study. We are beginning to understand that it is not the quantity but rather the quality of fat in our bodies that predicts cardiovascular risk; the unseen fat deeply embedded in our internal organs, known as visceral adipose tissue, is the type of fat most likely to lead to cardiometabolic abnormalities while visible fat beneath our skin may be more metabolically benign.

These studies belie the idea that heavier or bigger bodies are automatically diseased bodies and that weight loss is a panacea. When we further consider that 90-95% of dieters end up regaining what they lose, and that use of diet drugs or supplements may be particularly dangerous in patients with heart disease, the insistence on weight loss is more puzzling.

Rubber Reducing Garment advertising, Woman Beautiful Magazine, November 1908. via Library of Congress

“It took a lot of self-discipline, but I finally gave up dieting,” quips a popular Facebook posting. This post is funny because it inverts the common assumption that dieting requires discipline and is a virtuous endeavor. Indeed, being fat is still widely regarded as evidence of the sins of sloth and gluttony, despite — or perhaps because — of growing talk of “obesity” as a medical problem and public health crisis. It is this conviction that being fat is morally wrong that makes it hard for doctors, as well as ordinary people, to give up dieting and dieting advice. This is all the more true in times and places, like the contemporary United States, where the socially and economically privileged tend to be thin and the disadvantaged are more likely to be heavy.

Especially distressing are studies showing that many medical professionals regard their heavy patients as lazy and non-compliant. A recent study showed that doctors treat their heavy patients with less empathy and compassion than their thinner peers. In extreme cases, convinced that excess weight is responsible for ill health and that weight loss is the solution, doctors may not conduct necessary diagnostic exams that would have pointed to the underlying cause of illness.

It is time that medical professionals give up the focus on fat. This won’t be easy; the belief that if overweight and obese patients lost weight they would be healthier is deeply embedded in both our popular and our medical culture. Yet, there is a better way. Rather than focusing on outward appearance, it would be infinitely more productive and accurate to talk about cardiometabolic risk and to recognize that there are both metabolically-healthy and metabolically-unhealthy individuals in all categories of weight. Instead of promoting weight loss, doctors should emphasize that patients of all sizes incorporate physical activity and a balanced diet into their lives. Several studies have shown that physically fit “obese” individuals have lower incidence of heart disease and mortality from all causes than do sedentary people of “normal” weight. Similarly, a recent clinical trial published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that adopting a Mediterranean diet reduced cardiovascular risk without inducing weight loss. The sixth of May is International No-Diet Day and a good time for doctors and patients alike to give up their unhealthy focus on weight loss.

Abigail C. Saguy, PhD is Associate Professor and Vice Chair of Sociology at UCLA and author of What’s Wrong with Fat? (Oxford, 2013).Tamara B. Horwich, MD, MS is a UCLA cardiologist who has published research on the link between body mass and mortality among heart disease patients.

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eIncarnations

AlyssaB — Fri, 12 Apr 2013 10:30:10 +0000

By William Sims Bainbridge

Cleora Emily Bainbridge was born 8 November 1868, and passed away on 14 April 1870. Her father was a clergyman, and her mother, Lucy Seaman Bainbridge, was director of the Woman’s Branch of the New York City Mission Society. In 1883, her father, William Folwell Bainbridge, imagined what her life might have been like by casting her as the heroine of his novel Self-Giving, where she became a Christian missionary and died a martyr.

Cleora’s brother, William Seaman Bainbridge, born 17 February 1870, became an internationally prominent surgeon and medical scientist, living a full life until 22 September 1947. Had Cleora lived, she would have accompanied her brother and parents as they toured American Baptist missions around the world, 1879-1880, which prepared her brother for many more such voyages. He co-founded the International Committee of Military Medicine in Belgium in 1921, and two years later, he had the equivalent of an email address, Bridgebain, receiving telegrams sent to it from anywhere in the world.

Long dead, a sister and brother have now returned to life inside virtual worlds, as avatars: Cleora in fantasy role-playing game EverQuest II, and William in two science fiction virtual worlds where medical science advanced to frightening levels, Fallen Earth and Tabula Rasa.

Cleora Emily Bainbridge (1868-1870)

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The only surviving photograph
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Cleora's Avatar, a Half-Elf Conjuror Mage in EverQuest II

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William Seaman Bainbridge (1870-1947)

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At his most idealistic and ambitious, playing the role of Columbus at festivities marking the 400th anniversary of his discovery of the New World in 1892 at the Chautauqua Institution in western New York, a remarkable educational resort founded in 1874.
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Bridgebain in His Crude Chemtown Laboratory in Fallen Earth

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Bridgebain and the Clone He Made of Himself, after a Battle in Tabula Rasa

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Long ago, the gods abandoned Norrath, the world of EverQuest II. The game imagines the gods as creeping back to regain their lost status as lords of all the lands; it presents a cynical view of religion. Given Cleora’s history, I cast her avatar as ambivalent about deities. Her perspective made her an excellent vantage point for research.

The post-apocalyptic gameworld of Fallen Earth depicts conflict between numerous small gangs and cults in a chaotic corner of the United States, some years after the fall of civilization caused by a plague that may have resulted from unconstrained genetic engineering. Set in and around the Grand Canyon in Arizona, including simplified versions of many real locations, the game requires avatars to scavenge materials from the environment so they can craft weapons and medicines in order to survive the new Dark Ages. Bridgebain joined the Tech faction—scientists and engineers who believe only technology can restore civilization—and set up his headquarters in an advanced Tech base named Chemtown.

Tabula Rasa imagined that the Earth was invaded by a vicious extraterrestrial army called the Bane, but a few humans were able to escape to the planets Foreas and Arieki, where they formed alliances with the indigenous civilizations against the invaders. In addition to exploring these alien worlds and battling the Bane, Bridgebain collected Logos symbols from widely dispersed and often hidden shrines, where they were left by an ancient civilization named called the Eloh. Assembled into sentences, these Logos elements are like scientific theories or engineering designs that give the user advanced powers. Bridgebain collected all the Logos symbols, learned new medical skills like cloning himself, and eventually battled back from the stars to a point in New York City only a few blocks from Gramercy Park where the real doctor had lived.

Cleora and the two Bridgebains are Ancestor Veneration Avatars (AVAs), a new way of memorializing, enjoying, and learning from deceased family members, especially for a secular society in which traditional ways of dealing emotionally with death have lost plausibility. When operating an AVA inside a virtual world, the user can draw upon personal knowledge of the dearly departed (many written records as in the case of Bridgebain), and a hopeful sense of what a life might have been like in a particular social context (as in the case of Cleora). The goal is as much to enrich the life of the user as to fulfill a duty to the deceased. Indeed, the user gains a richer sense of human life by experiencing a challenging virtual world from the perspective of another person.

William Sims Bainbridge is a prolific and influential sociologist of religion, science, and popular culture. He serves as co-director of Human-Centered Computing at the National Science Foundation. His books include eGods: Faith versus Fantasy in Computer Gaming, Leadership in Science and Technology, The Warcraft Civilization, Online Multiplayer Games, Across the Secular Abyss, and The Virtual Future. He is the grandnephew of Cleora Bainbridge and grandson of William Seaman Bainbridge.

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Happy National Tartan Day: Celebrating Scottish American data

ErinF — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 07:30:33 +0000

By Sydney Beveridge

First observed nationally in 1997, Tartan Day celebrates the legacy and contributions of Scottish Americans. The annual festivities are held on April 6th, the anniversary of the Declaration of Arbroath, the 1320 Scottish Declaration of Independence.

As George Bush’s 2008 presidential proclamation stated, Tartan Day seeks to “celebrate the spirit and character of Scottish Americans and recognize their many contributions to our culture and our way of life.”

Though Census data does not go back as far as the 14th century Declaration of Arbroath, Social Explorer’s data resources offer a glimpse into the birth and development of the Scottish community in America. Back in 1790, the very first Census tracked the nationality of the foreign born population.

While the English and Welsh made up over four fifths of the population (81.4 percent), followed by the Germans (6.5 percent), the Scottish were the next most populous group (5.9 percent), followed by the Dutch (3.0 percent). (Calculations based on all available county data from the 1790 Census.)

Though small in number compared to other groups, they settled in particular communities of the early colonies, which you can explore in the following map.

Scottish Americans: Census 1790

Click the map to explore.

This detailed map of American Community Survey data shows where Americans with Scottish ancestry live today.

Scottish Ancestry: American Community Survey 2006-10

Click the map to explore.

The Scottish continue to immigrate to the US, and this detailed map data shows where residents originally born in Scotland live today.

Foreign-Born Scottish Residents: American Community Survey 2006-10

Click the map to explore.

Check out Social Explorer’s map and report tools for more Tartan Day data.

Sydney Beveridge is the Media and Content Editor for Social Explorer, where she works on the blog, curriculum materials, how-to-videos, social media outreach, presentations and strategic planning. She is a graduate of Swarthmore College and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

Social Explorer is an online research tool designed to provide quick and easy access to current and historical census data and demographic information. The easy-to-use web interface lets users create maps and reports to better illustrate, analyze and understand demography and social change. From research libraries to classrooms to the front page of the New York Times, Social Explorer is helping people engage with society and science.

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Humane, cost-effective systems for formerly incarcerated people

Alice — Tue, 26 Mar 2013 19:30:09 +0000

By Leonard A. Jason and Ron Harvey

A recent New York Times article, reports on a study that found private, corporate-run transitional halfway houses were less effective in preventing recidivism than releasing inmates directly into communities. For those interested in understanding and improving outcomes among ex-offenders, these results are discouraging.

However, the size and scale of the halfway houses could have contributed to these disappointing results. The study included 38 facilities across the state housing up to 4,500 individuals; one private company had four facilities that could together house almost 800 individuals. Successful outcomes rarely occur when individuals are taken out of one dehumanizing large-scale system and put in another. Human warehousing is no replacement for real community reintegration.

Re-integration programs need to offer useful, scalable features with specific goals and consequences for program administrators as well as program recipients. As reported, inspections of these facilities revealed residents had too much unstructured time. Residents need support to use their time looking for employment or training opportunities for jobs. However, one individual mentioned that the private companies running these facilities seemed more concerned with filling up beds than providing effective services.

These recovery systems exist within the larger economic and social system. The current economic climate continues to provide few job opportunities, particularly for ex-offenders. As such, those with the most needs at the bottom of the social ladder have even fewer opportunities to positively change their life.

We need more naturalistic, humane, and cost-effective systems to address the more than 600,000 individuals released from jail and prison each year. In contrast to large facilities, we have seen much lower recidivism rates in Oxford Houses, which are small-scale (7-12 person), democratic, self-run, self-financed recovery communities. When ex-offenders in these small scale recovery houses have experienced mentors and hope, they are less likely to relapse and go back to prison. Today, there are over 10,000 former addicts who live in over 1,500 of these Oxford houses across the country, many of whom are ex-offenders.

What makes systems like Oxford House an attractive and economic alternative to other large systems is their adherence to specific goals (providing sober housing) modeled after a general program of mutual help and support groups. In these democratic settings, there are specific requirements (abstinence, employment, resident participation) and sanctions for violating these principles (immediate eviction). We need to explore alternatives to large, de-humanizing institutions that often perpetuate the problem of recidivism.

Leonard A. Jason, professor of clinical and community psychology at DePaul University and director of the Center for Community Research, is the author of Principles of Social Change published by Oxford University Press. He has investigated the self-help recovery movement for the last 20 years. Ron Harvey is a graduate student in Community Psychology at DePaul University.

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Image credit: Two hands clutching prison bars. Photo by jgroup, iStockphoto.

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How we can use the Internet to resolve intergroup conflict

KimberlyH — Wed, 13 Mar 2013 10:30:36 +0000

By Yair Amichai-Hamburger

Conflicts across the world between communities cause high levels of social and physical devastation as well as a large drain in resources, but how can relations be improved?

Psychologist Gordon Allport realized that a casual contact between rival group members will not change the stereotype that each holds on the other, particularly if there are status differences between the groups. In fact, he showed that such meetings actually serve to strengthen the existing stereotypes. Allport believed if certain conditions were met, meetings between rival groups could successfully lead to change. Under these terms both groups would send representatives of equal importance; the two groups would cooperate on a goal that is perceived as important for both of them; and representatives of both groups would be endorsed by their own official authorities. These conditions have become collectively known as the contact hypothesis.

Although meetings underpinned by the contact hypothesis have been fairly successful, I believe that it has several severe limitations. First, the practical stipulations are hard to achieve. For example, it is often hard to find participants of equal status. A series of contact meetings between warring factions may be complicated and expensive to arrange, particularly when a third mutually acceptable location has to be used. Second, face-to-face meetings with “the enemy” are almost certain to provoke anxiety among participants. These anxious feelings are likely to cause participants to “close-up” and make them unable to see the other side in a new way, thus unwittingly existing stereotypes on the both sides are reinforced. The third problem is what psychologists refer to as generalization. In other words, the contact meeting may be successful but participants may not generalize from their positive feelings towards the participants from the other side to their whole group, or they believe that other side’s participants, nice as they may be, are not representative of the group as a whole.

I believe that the Internet can provide answers to the three challenges mentioned above. First, practicality: when the contact takes place online rather than face to face, it is much easier and significantly cheaper to organize. The Internet also goes a long way to solving another practical problem, that of equal status among participants. Since the Internet does not contain visual cues, it is impossible to know whether your opposite number is wearing a Rolex watch or is 20 years younger than you and much better looking.

Second, anxiety: the apprehension that people feel when they sit together with “the other” is significantly reduced when the contact takes place over the web. Moreover, the Internet allows people to meet from a place that they feel comfortable, this may be even their own living room, thus further reducing the anxiety. Third, the Internet also assists with the lack of generalization from the individual to the group, since it allows people to emphasize their group identity. For example, members may tag the group identity to the participant every time he or she makes a contribution to the meeting. Such tools in online contact will enhance the chances of a positive contact, which will effect the whole perception of the “other group.”

It seems that the Internet, with its almost ubiquitous accessibility, may have significant advantages over the traditional forms of contact. It is also important to stress that such digital contact should not take place in a wholly unstructured setting. I believe that the supervision of a social psychologist that has expertise in group dynamics is imperative. This will help to avoid flaming, that is people using the web, not as tool to improve intergroup relations, but rather to launch vicious attacks on the other side. The skills of the supervisor are important to ensure the involvement and commitment of participants.

I believe that this type of contact will have a tremendous impact on reducing many of the major disputes between communities throughout the world. For example, initial contact meetings have taken place between Israelis and Palestinians, and between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland. These are first steps. I believe that in the future we will see more and more online platforms aimed at reducing intergroup conflict and improving intergroup relations throughout the world.

Yair Amichai-Hamburger is the director of the Research Center for Internet Psychology and the editor of The Social Net: Understanding our online behavior.

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Can women fight?

Alice — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 10:30:21 +0000

By Anthony King

On 24 January 2013, Leon Panetta, the US Secretary of State for Defence, made an historic announcement: from 2016, combat roles would be open to female service personnel. For the first time, women would be allowed to serve in the infantry. Applauded in liberal quarters, the decision was widely seen as unproblematic since it merely ratified a de facto reality; women had been fighting on the front line since 2001 and especially after the Iraq invasion of 2003. A predictable conservative backlash has now begun however.

David Frum, a contributing editor of the Newsweek recently posted a long article on The Daily Beast which rejected Panetta’s ruling reaffirming women’s unsuitability for combat roles. Citing Kingsley Browne 2007, Co-ed Combat: The New Evidence That Women Shouldn’t Fight the Nation’s Wars, Frum identifies four reasons why women cannot and should not fight: the physical and psychological differences between men and women, the inability of the military to enforce gender-neutral standards, heterosexual attraction, and the unique duty of the armed forces (to fight wars). Most women are too physically weak to perform as combat soldiers and they undermine the cohesiveness of all male groups. Even those women who are strong enough to serve in combat present a problem because the armed forces, focused on war-winning (not internal equality), are unable to apply gender-blind standards to women; they cannot treat them equally and tend to be too soft on them.

There is little question that Frum’s claim that most women are too physically weak to fight is true. Despite advances in female athletic performance, about one percent of the female population could serve as infantry soldiers. Yet, all his other claims are highly dubious and indeed self-referential.

It is simply not true that women’s presence inevitably undermines cohesion. In the highly professional armies which the western powers deploy today, cohesion no longer depends primarily on appeals to masculinity or to ethnicity which was typical in the citizen army of the twentieth century. In Iraq and Afghanistan, military units have unified their personnel not by the fact that they are all (typically white) men together as the US Army did in the Second World War but by reference to their professional competences. They are united by their common training and doctrine, which inculcates a set of collective drills which are performed more or less independently of personal relations. Indeed, in the context of Iraq and Afghanistan, due to availability, casualties and the requirements for specialists, patrols have often consisted of individuals who barely know each other. However, they have been able to operate together effectively by reference to common professional procedures learnt in training.

US Army (USA) Major (MAJ) Mary V. Krueger, 321st Civil Affair Battalion, assigned to the Surgeon Cell, for the Combined Joint Civil Military Task Force (CJCMOTF), applies an ointment to a rash on the face of a little boy from a local Kuchi Tribe, located in the city of Gardez, Afghanistan. Source: SFC Larry Johns, USA: US Department of Defence.

In this context, soldiers fighting on the front line have recorded the successful integration of women, often as specialists, into combat units. Something quite surprising happens when a competent women joins one of these male groups. The predicted collapse of cohesion has not happened. On the contrary, the female soldier has been accepted as a professional equal, respected like her peers for the expertise she brings. Moreover, in the close proximity of the patrol base, the question of sexual attraction often becomes irrelevant; female soldiers assume the status of a sister — or indeed honorary brother. In the United Kingdom, members of the Parachute Regiment and the Royal Marines, two elite infantry regiments, who might be expected to be most opposed to women, have in fact recorded their successful integration. Undoubtedly some women have failed on the frontline, just as some men have, but as long as women can do their job, they have been accepted by male soldiers. Moreover, against Frum’s presumptions that men will not be led by women, there are a number of cases in the Canadian Army where women have served as infantry officers or NCOs sometimes more successfully than their male peers.

It is empirically false to claim that women cannot serve on the frontline or that they necessarily undermine cohesion, then. It is also conveniently circular to suggest that the armed forces cannot and should not be asked to enforce gender-blind standards. This simply legitimates unthinking patriarchal presumptions assuming that what men have done and thought in the past is necessarily correct. Crucially, such a masculinist position misunderstands the nature of military effectiveness. It equates combat performance with masculinity. Yet, combat performance is not primarily determined by raw masculine courage, strength and bonding. Rather, on the mechanised battlefield, successful militaries require refined tactics developed through careful training and preparation, and they need to coordinate their units by means of established procedures and clear command relations.

U.S. Marine Cpl. Mary E. Walls (right), an ammunition technician, and linguist Sahar (left), both with a female engagement team, patrol with 1st Battalion, 2nd Marine Regiment in Musa Qa’leh, Afghanistan, 2010. Walls and other female engagement team members patrolled local compounds around the district center to establish relationships with local people and talk with the women of the area in support of the International Security Assistance Force. Source: Cpl. Lindsay L. Sayres, U.S. Marine Corps: US Department of Defense.

Masculinity has its place here certainly at the small group level — and most combat solders will perforce be men — but the organizational and tactical requirements of contemporary warfare far exceed the gender essentialism which Frum proposes. Indeed, as the armed forces reduce in size once again with the current round of defence cuts, their continued effectiveness will rely even more exclusively not on appeals to masculine solidarity, but on the contrary on intensified forms of professionalism. Collective performance will depend on competence and skill. The future success of the armed forces will rely on professionalism. Professionalism is not synonymous with masculinity.

Anthony King is Professor of Sociology at the University of Exeter, and author of The Combat Soldier: Infantry Tactics and Cohesion in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries. He has written extensively on social theory, football, and the armed forces.

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Even small government incentives can help tackle entrenched social problems

AlyssaB — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 11:30:56 +0000

By Leonard A. Jason

As the federal bureaucracy continues to struggle with philosophical issues of the appropriate role of government, many Americans feel that our political parties are incapable of providing credible solutions to the nation’s burgeoning societal and economic problems.

Those who advocate for expanding or at least maintaining government programs to address entrenched social problems and inequities must contend with an escalating national debt and a resultant conservative backlash over out-of-control government spending. At the same time, many are increasingly dissatisfied with underwriting government programs either because they increase taxes, are perceived as creating dependence rather than autonomy, or both. Clearly there is a need for a new middle ground that can help reconcile the polarities that threaten to cripple our nation.

In the near future, the overwhelming budgetary crisis will constrain our ability to address intransigent national problems. The roots of this disaster began when presidential and legislative decisions led to an expansion in defense spending, while at the same time reducing taxes. In addition, the recent banking and housing crisis reduced revenues and caused a sharp rise in spending on safety-net programs. A further challenge stems from Medicare and Medicaid expenditures, which have long been rising dramatically and are expected to continue to do so over the next few decades as millions of baby boomers retire, creating unprecedented federal budget problems.

Yet there are ways for society to address critical social and health care concerns without massive government outlays, and precedent exists for government leveraging small investments to motivate significant social change. For example, a significant and pervasive health and economic challenge facing America is alcohol and substance abuse. Approximately 22 million Americans meet diagnostic criteria for drug and alcohol dependence, including 18 million just for alcohol abuse disorders. Annual costs of alcohol abuse alone are estimated at $235 billion dollars in direct treatment and lost productivity.

For many substance abusers, treatment begins in a detoxification program, with a time-limited therapeutic program typically following. However, these programs are becoming shorter and less effective as funding has decreased. For many addicted persons, basic detoxification does not lead to sustained recovery. Instead, these individuals repeatedly cycle through social service delivery and criminal justice programs, driving up costs without any sustainable benefit. The missing element for many patients is a supportive, cohesive setting following treatment for substance abuse. A society that returns its most vulnerable members back into socially high-risk settings upon discharge from treatment can expect to be plagued by an ever-expanding array of social problems.

How then can the average person address these types of social problems when the government and other large institutions have failed?

Oxford House is the largest successful communal-living, self-help alcohol and drug abuse recovery program in the nation, with a network of recovery homes in almost every state. These houses are governed, operated, and paid for by the people who live in them. There is no external, professional staff. With over 10,000 residents across the country, Oxford House exemplifies a grass roots effort to transform our society’s way of dealing with addiction. It expands upon the Alcoholics Anonymous approach by providing former addicts a place to live and a 24/7 support network. In some states, Oxford House residents can borrow $4,000 in government loans to cover the first month’s rent and security deposit, which has to be paid back over two years. One study showed that Oxford House residents had less substance abuse, were less likely to commit crimes, and found better jobs than those in traditional aftercare.

The productivity and incarceration-reduction benefits yielded an estimated $613,000 in savings in a recent study. These findings suggest that there are significant societal benefits for these types of lower cost, non-medical, community-based care options for those battling addiction.

The Oxford House movement has continually evolved through experimentation and trial and error for more than three decades. This is compatible with evidence-based practices that focus on incrementally improving outcomes. Similarly, successful companies use this process to create great products: not with one brilliant idea, but a core product with a succession of improvements.

This broadening self-help movement demonstrates what is possible when people are given the power and responsibility to make their own decisions. Yet, these benefits are not readily available to the homeless, those with chronic health conditions, or those who are released from addiction treatment facilities, prisons, or mental institutions. These individuals often have no voice and are excluded from the basic rights that would empower them to affect their own recovery.

They need supportive, recovery-based environments where they can participate in society and, most importantly, retain some dignity. Those involved in the Oxford House movement and others such as Alcoholics Anonymous are providing democratic environments to the disenfranchised in neighborhoods and communities throughout our country. History has shown that it often takes a grassroots initiative to radically challenge the system or status quo, and this approach can greatly ease the financial burden of addressing major problems facing our nation.

Leonard A. Jason, professor of clinical and community psychology at DePaul University and director of the Center for Community Research, is the author of Principles of Social Change published by Oxford University Press. He has investigated the self-help recovery movement for the last 20 years.

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The KKK in North Carolina

AlanaP — Sun, 03 Mar 2013 08:30:49 +0000

How can mainstream institutions and ideals subsume organized racism and political extremism? Why did the United Klans of America (UKA) once flourish in the Tar Heel state? From lax policing to a lack of mainstream outlets for segregationist resistance, a variety of factors led to the creation of one of the strongest and most complex Ku Klux Klan (KKK) groups in America — and a dramatic conservative shift in North Carolina. We sat down with David Cunningham, author of Klansville, U.S.A., to discuss the rise and fall of the Civil Rights-Era Ku Klux Klan.

Why was the KKK so popular in North Carolina?

Two factors were important. First, the state’s klan leadership — and in particular its top officer, “Grand Dragon” Bob Jones — had the ingenuity and capacity to mount massive rallies every night in the state. Hundreds — and sometimes thousands — of spectators would come out, buy refreshments and souvenirs, listen to live music from the KKK’s house band Skeeter Bob and the Country Pals, hear a full slate of klan orators, and watch the climactic burning of a 60 or 70 foot high cross. This skewed county fair atmosphere was compelling theater, and a highly effective recruiting tool.

The United Klans of America printed 2000 of these flyers for each rally. Image courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration.

The second factor related to the flipside of North Carolina’s pronounced moderation with civil rights. In places like Mississippi or Alabama, committed segregationists could count on militant support from a full spectrum of state and local officials — from governors on down to school boards — and the KKK therefore had a narrow appeal, primarily among those who believed that violence was the only answer to civil rights challenges. In North Carolina, where political officials were clear that they didn’t agree with civil rights reforms but would abide by federal law, the klan became the primary conduit for those who sought to defiantly maintain segregation. This meant that, while the group certainly attracted its share of violent members, it also appealed to those who sought out a civic outlet that insulated them from changes to the racial order.

What led to the KKK’s abrupt and rapid decline in the late 1960s?

While the declining fortunes of Jim Crow-style segregation made the klan’s efforts seem increasingly futile and anachronistic, the fall of the civil rights-era KKK was predominantly a policing story. In North Carolina, state officials had always spoken out against the klan but hadn’t ever engaged in actions that would proactively hinder the group’s efforts to organize and terrorize its enemies. When a congressional committee held hearings on the KKK in late 1965, the state’s status as “Klansville U.S.A.” was splashed across the national headlines. This led to an about-face in North Carolina’s policing efforts. The Governor appointed an “anti-klan” committee to strategize about how to solve its KKK problem, and soon after state police began arresting klansmen on violations large and small, court injunctions prevented the klan from holding rallies in many communities, judges began sentencing klansmen for infractions that would have been ignored earlier in the decade, and both the state police and FBI began more aggressively deploying informants to create infighting within klan units that sapped the group of its resource base. While the press emphasized how disgruntled KKK members were abandoning a laughably crude and irrelevant organization, in truth the Carolina Klan was a sophisticated outfit whose momentum was halted only by an equally dedicated and coordinated anti-klan policing campaign.

What does the KKK’s history tell us about the civil rights movement?

Fifty years ago, while Dr. King was delivering his famous “I Have a Dream” speech on the Mall in Washington, DC, the KKK was barnstorming around North Carolina, holding its first rallies and attracting two or three thousand spectators each night to protest the rising civil rights tide. When King came to Raleigh, the state’s capital, three years later, a thousand robed klansmen gathered to protest his speech. Talking to reporters afterward, he asked how the state that prided itself as the most liberal in the South could also have the largest KKK. We know that the Civil Rights Movement story remains important, and this is a key component of it — part of the mosaic that continues to shape race relations in the United States today.

What was it like talking to these former KKK members as you researched your book?

These conversations ran the gamut, from unreconstructed defenses of the klan’s mission, to strong rejections of the KKK’s principles, to nostalgic reminiscences about the camaraderie and “good fun” that members enjoyed. Two interviews in particular stand out. The first was with Robert Shelton, who as the United Klans of America’s “Imperial Wizard” was the most influential KKK leader of the era. Shelton had been put out of the KKK business by a landmark Southern Poverty Law Center lawsuit in the 1980s, and by the early 2000’s had adopted a Burger King near his Alabama home as a sort of ad hoc headquarters for him and “his boys.” He agreed to meet me there, and arrived in a big powder-blue Lincoln Town Car with a defiant “Never” license plate displayed in front. He bragged about working out a deal with the manager for cheap coffee in return for keeping the restaurant full. The disjuncture between his persona and the setting, I think, says a lot about the klan’s declining fortunes since the 1960s.

Another interesting interview was with George Dorsett, the Carolina Klan’s most popular and fiery speaker in the 1960s. Late in his life, both his charisma and his stridency remained evident as he regaled me with Biblical justifications for racial separation. He also told me about his work as an FBI informant throughout much of his klan tenure. I had previously seen documentation of his recruitment by the Bureau, and also had learned about his partnership-of-sorts with his local handling agent. But what struck me was his retrospective view that the FBI was working for him, which isn’t entirely inaccurate if you consider how he was able to protect his role as the KKK’s most successful fundraiser while on the Bureau’s payroll.

What is the KKK’s legacy today?

In my view, the KKK continues to embody two opposing realities. The first relates to the tragic continuities associated with klan activity in the South. My colleague Rory McVeigh and I have found that communities where the KKK was active fifty years ago continue to this day to have significantly higher rates of violent crime than places where the klan never established a foothold. That sustained culture of violence is one aspect of the legacy of organized and sanctioned vigilantism. But the KKK’s trajectory also epitomizes the great changes that have occurred in the South and our nation since the 1960s. In the 2008 election, Barack Obama became the first Democratic presidential candidate in more than three decades to win North Carolina. From Klansville, U.S.A. to the state that cemented the election of our first African-American president, all in less than fifty years — a remarkable transformation indeed!

David Cunningham is Associate Professor and Chair of Sociology and the Social Justice & Social Policy Program at Brandeis University. Over the past decade, he has worked with the Greensboro (N.C.) Truth and Reconciliation Commission as well as the Mississippi Truth Project, and served as a consulting expert in several court cases. The author of Klansville, U.S.A.: The Rise and Fall of the Civil Rights-Era Ku Klux Klan, his current research focuses on the causes, consequences, and legacy of racial violence.

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Two parents after divorce

Kirsty — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 08:30:10 +0000

By Simone Frizell Reiter

According to Statistics Norway, around 10,000 children under the age of 18 in Norway experience divorce every year. These numbers do not take into account non-married couples that split up. Therefore, in reality far more children experience parental separation.

Status of knowledge

Focus has been on the adversity of parental divorce, emphasising the support and safety an intact family gives. The child may experience conflict, neglect or parental alienation, and insecurity about who belongs to the family. Not only the separation itself but also the period preceding and following the divorce may disturb the child’s well-being. Several studies show that parental conflict, that may be harmful to the child, is perpetuated even after the divorce. However, other studies show that when the parents are able to reduce the level of conflict after the divorce, the divorce is not exclusively negative if the child is moved from a family situation with conflicts to a more harmonious one. Society’s attitude toward divorce has changed as divorce has become more common. Prejudice and stigma are less pronounced. A natural assumption is therefore that mental problems related to divorce are also reduced. However, more recent studies conclude that adults, who experienced divorce in childhood, have more mental health problems than adults from intact families.

Divorce and reduced parental contact are closely linked. Children with loss of parental contact after divorce report more mental health complaints compared to children with preserved contact. Lack of attention, support, and economic insecurity may explain some of the negative effects of a parent’s absence. However, even when provided with at step-parent after divorce, these children report a lower level of well-being than children with preserved parental contact. Biological parents therefore seem to be of particular importance. Regular and frequent contact with both parents after divorce may also reduce the potential harmful effects of parental absence as seen in sole-custody households. Parental support is an important, independent risk factor to children’s sense of achievement and well-being. It is shown that as children’s relationship with their fathers weakens after divorce, they also lose contact with paternal grandparents and stepfamily.

Studies show that when divorce is followed by strong conflict, children may be used as a weapon between the parents. In such conflicts contact with one of the parents may be limited or brought to an end. The child is forced to ally with one of the parents, and suffers from the psychological stress this causes.

What is the concern?

Family law in Western societies generally aims at preserving dual parental contact for the child after divorce. This is also the aim of the Norwegian legislation. The Norwegian Child Act states that the parents may come to an agreement on where the child should primarily reside. However, if the parents cannot agree on this, the court has to decide which one of the parents the child should stay with. In practical life this has, in most cases, been the mother, while the father has been reduced to a weekend parent. Due to this, the experience in Norway is that when it comes to loss of parental contact, children of divorce primarily lose contact with the father. This effect is in some cases strengthened by the primary caregiver intentionally sabotaging the other parent’s visitation rights. To prevent this, the Norwegian legislation has sanctions, but these are very rarely used. A suggestion has been to introduce shared residence as a preferred solution after parental divorce, and that parents who sabotage this agreement may get restrictions on their contact with the child.

Most parents choose to take an active role in their child’s upbringing, and only a small group is absent, either by choice or circumstances. Therefore, social benefit systems have built in mechanisms to compensate the lacking of the absent parent by high financial contributions to sole providers left alone in charge. The downside of these benefits is that one of the parents can gain financially on monopolising the contact with the child and in some cases the sole provider actively sabotages or reduces the other parent’s contact, only to gain financially. This mechanism is strengthened by the Norwegian child maintenance system, where the level of economic support is linked to the amount of time spent with the child. Parents who share the custody in equal parts do not pay any child maintenance to each other. The combination of the systems has turned many fathers in to “child maintenance machines” because the mother would lose so much financially, sharing the custody of the child with the father. The benefits therefore undermine the aim to gain shared custody, and deprive the father of the possibility to have a close relationship with his child.

The concept of “parental alienation syndrome” is used to describe the condition where the child is alienated against one of the parents. If the government wants the children’s voice to be heard in custody conflicts, they must take into account that the child is already involved in a process of demonization and slander of one of the parents. From the literature, we know the term folie à deux. The government should be careful not to act in a game that can be characterized as folie à troi (madness shared by three).

In practice, it is difficult to have an equal amount of contact with both parents unless the child lives in two places equally. What is important to consider is whether advantages of maintaining a close relationship with both parents outweigh the disadvantages of having to change residence, for instance every week or every second week. Equally shared legal custody is not the same as having the child living in two residences fifty-fifty.

The experience is that the Child Act’s intention of parental agreement on a solution of custody between equal parties does not work. This is because the court, when presented the case, is legally bound to choose a single residence and almost exclusively chooses the mother.

On the basis of this knowledge it is important that the government puts effort in protecting the child’s right to have contact with both parents. This work must be as unprejudiced as possible. It is not acceptable that we continue with a practice in which the legislation allows the systematic favoring of one part in conflicted divorces.

Simone Frizell Reiter is a PhD candidate in the Department of Clinical Medicine at the University of Bergen, Norway, and the author of the paper ‘Impact of divorce and loss of parental contact on health complaints among adolescents’, which appears in The Journal of Public Health.

The Journal of Public Health aims to promote the highest standards of public health practice internationally through the timely communication of current, best scientific evidence.

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Image credit: Divorce and child custody. By Brian Jackson, iStockphoto.

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Burrowing into Punxsutawney Phil’s hometown data

ErinF — Sat, 02 Feb 2013 11:30:43 +0000

In the United States, a German belief about the badger (applied in Switzerland to the wolf) has been transferred to the woodchuck, better known as the groundhog: on Candlemas he breaks his hibernation in order to observe the weather; if he can see his shadow he returns to his slumbers for six weeks, but if it rains he stays up and about, since winter will soon be over. This has earned Candlemas the name of ‘Groundhog Day’. In Quarryville, Lancaster County, Pa., a Slumbering Groundhog Lodge was formed, whose members, wearing silk hats and carrying canes, went out in search of a groundhog burrow; on finding one they watched its inhabitant’s conduct and reported back. Of twenty observations recorded, eight prognostications proved true, seven false, and five were indeterminate. The ritual is now carried on at Punxsutawney, Pa., where the weather prophet has been named Punxsutawney Phil. (The Oxford Companion to the Year)

By Sydney Beveridge

Every February Second, people across Pennsylvania and the world look to a famous rodent to answer the question—when will spring come?

For over 120 years, Punxsutawney Phil Soweby (Punxsutawney Phil for short) has offered his predictions, based on whether he sees his shadow (more winter) or not (an early spring).

The first official Groundhog Day celebration took place in 1887 and Phil has gone on to star in a blockbuster film, dominate the early February news cycle, and even appear on Oprah. (He also has his own Beanie Baby and his own flower.)

In addition to weather predictions, Phil also loves data, and while people think he is hibernating, he is actually conducting demographic analysis. As a Social Explorer subscriber, he used the site’s mapping and reporting tools to look at the composition of his hometown.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Punxsutawney, PA, located outside of Pittsburgh, is part of Jefferson County. Examining Census data from 1890, Phil learned that the population was 44,405 around the time of his first predictions. While the rest of the nation was becoming more urban, Jefferson County remained more rural with only one eighth of the population living in places with 2,500 people or more (compared to nearly half statewide and more than a third in the US).

Many Jefferson residents worked in the farming industry. Back then, there were 3.2 families for every farm in Jefferson County — higher than the rest of the state with 5.0 families per farm.

Less than three decades after the Civil War, the county (located in a northern state) was 99.9 percent white, which was a little higher than statewide (97.9 percent) and also higher than nationwide 87.8 percent. (The Census also noted that there was one Chinese resident of Jefferson County in 1890.)

Groundhog Day was originally called Candlemas, a day that Germans said the hibernating groundhog took a break from slumbering to check the weather. (According to the Oxford Companion to the Year.) If the creature sees its shadow, and is frightened, winter will hold on and hibernating will continue, but if not, the groundhog will stay awake and spring will come early. Back in 1890, there were 703 Germans living in Jefferson County (representing 1.6 percent of the county population and 11.3 percent of the foreign born), making Germany the fourth most common foreign born place of birth behind England, Scotland, and Austria. Groundhog Day is also said to be Celtic in its roots, so perhaps the 623 Irish residents (representing 1.4 percent of the county population and 10.1 percent of the foreign born) helped to establish the tradition in Pennsylvania.

Looking to today’s numbers, Phil was astonished to learn from the 2010 Census that Jefferson County has just 795 more people than it did 120 years ago. While Jefferson grew by 1.8 percent, the state grew by 141.6 percent and the nation grew by 393.0 percent.

2010 Census Jefferson County, PA, Population Density (click to explore)

Phil dug deeper. The 2008-10 American Community Survey data reveal that the once-prominent farming industry had shrunk considerably. (Because it is a small group, “agriculture” is now grouped with other industries including forestry, fishing and hunting, and mining.) While Jefferson residents are more likely to work in the industry than other Pennsylvanians, that share represents just 4.4 percent of the employed civilian workforce.

According to the Census, Jefferson is still predominately white (98.3 percent), while the rest of the state and nation have become somewhat more diverse (81.9 percent white in Pennsylvania and 72.4 percent nationwide). Today there are 24 Chinese residents (out of a total of 92 Asian residents).

As Phil rises from his burrow this February second, he will survey the shadows with new insight into his community and audience. To learn more about Punxsutawney Phil’s hometown burrow (and your own borough), please visit our mapping and reporting tools.

Sydney Beveridge is the Media and Content Editor for Social Explorer, where she works on the blog, curriculum materials, how-to-videos, social media outreach, presentations and strategic planning. She is a graduate of Swarthmore College and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. A version of this article originally appeared on the Social Explorer blog. You can use Social Explorer’s mapping and reporting tools to investigate dreams, freedoms, and equality further.

Social Explorer is an online research tool designed to provide quick and easy access to current and historical census data and demographic information. The easy-to-use web interface lets users create maps and reports to better illustrate, analyze and understand demography and social change. From research libraries to classrooms to the front page of the New York Times, Social Explorer is helping people engage with society and science.

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Why are married men working so much?

Kirsty — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 08:30:35 +0000

By John Knowles

If you become wealthier tomorrow, say through winning the lottery, would you spend more or less time working than you do now? Standard economic models predict you would work less. In fact a substantial segment of American society has indeed become wealthier over the last 40 years — married men. The reason is that wives’ earnings now make a much larger contribution to household income than in the past. However married men do not work less now on average than they did in the 1970s. This is intriguing because it suggests there is something important missing in economic explanations of the rise in labor supply of married women over the same period.

One possibility is that what we are seeing here are the aggregate effects of bargaining between spouses. This is plausible because there was a substantial narrowing of the male-female wage gap over the period. The ratio of women’s to men’s average wages; starting from about 0.57 in the 1964-1974 period, rose rapidly to 0.78 in the early 1990s. Even if we smooth out the fluctuations, the graph shows an average ratio of 0.75 in the 1990s, compared to 0.57 in the early 1970s.

The closing of the male-female wage gap suggests a relative improvement in the economic status of non-married women compared to non-married men. According to bargaining models of the household, we should expect to see a better deal for wives—control over a larger share of household resources – because they don’t need marriage as much as they used to. We should see that the share of household wealth spent on the wife increases relative to that spent on the husband.

Bargaining models of household behavior are rare in macroeconomics. Instead, the standard assumption is that households behave as if they were maximizing a fixed utility function. Known as the “unitary” model of the household, a basic implication is that when a good A becomes more expensive relative to another good B, the ratio of A to B that the household consumes should decline. When women’s wages rose relative to men’s, that increased the cost of wives’ leisure relative to that of husbands. The ratio of husbands’ leisure time to that of wives should therefore have increased.

In the bargaining model there is an additional potential effect on leisure: as the share of wealth the household spends on the wife increases, it should spend more on the wife’s leisure. Therefore the ratio of husband’s to wife’s leisure could increase or decrease, depending on the responsiveness of the bargaining solution to changes in the relative status of the spouses as singles.

To measure the change in relative leisure requires data on unpaid work, such as time spent on grocery shopping and chores around the house. The American Time-Use Survey is an important source for 2003 and later, and there also exist precursor surveys that can be used for some earlier years. The main limitation of these surveys is that they sample individuals, not couples, so one cannot measure the leisure ratio of individual households. Instead measurement consists of the average leisure of wives compared to that of husbands. The paper also shows the results of controlling for age and education. Overall, the message is clear; the relative leisure of married couples was essentially the same in 2003 as in 1975, about 1.05.

One can explain the stability of the leisure ratio through bargaining; the wife gets a higher share of the marriage’s resources when her wage increases, and this offsets the rise in the price of her leisure. This raises a set of essentially quantitative questions: Suppose that marital bargaining really did determine labor supply how big are the mistakes one would make in predicting labor supply by using a model without bargaining? To provide answers, I design a mathematical model of marriage and bargaining to resemble as closely as possible the ‘representative agent’ of canonical macro models. I use the model to measure the impact on labor supply of the closing of the gender wage gap, as well as other shocks, such as improvements to home -production technology.

People in the model use their share of household’s resources to buy themselves leisure and private consumption. They also allocate time to unpaid labor at home to produce a public consumption good that both spouses can enjoy together. We can therefore calibrate the model to exactly match the average time-allocation patterns observed in American time-use data. The calibrated model can then be used to compare the effects of the economic shocks in the bargaining and unitary models.

The results show that the rising of women’s wages can generate simultaneously the observed increase in married women’s paid work and the relative stability of that of the husbands. Bargaining is critical however; the unitary model, if calibrated to match the 1970s generates far too much of an increase in the wife’s paid labor, and far too large a decline in that of the men; in both cases, the prediction error is on the order of 2-3 weekly hours, about 10% of per-capita labor supply. In terms of aggregate labor, the error is much smaller because these sex-specific errors largely offset each other.

The bottom line therefore is that if, as is often the case, the research question does not require us to distinguish between the labor of different household or spouse types, then it may be reasonable to ignore bargaining between spouses. However if we need to understand the allocation of time across men and women, then models with bargaining have a lot to contribute.

John Knowles is a professor of economics at the University of Southampton. He was born in the UK and schooled in Canada, Spain and the Bahamas. After completing his PhD at the University of Rochester (NY, USA) in 1998, he taught at the University of Pennsylvania, and returned to the UK in 2008. His current research focuses on using mathematical models to analyze trends in marriage and unmarried birth rates in the US and Europe. He is the author of the paper ‘Why are Married Men Working So Much? An Aggregate Analysis of Intra-Household Bargaining and Labour Supply’, published in The Review of Economics Studies.

The Review of Economic Studies aims to encourage research in theoretical and applied economics, especially by young economists. It is widely recognised as one of the core top-five economics journals, with a reputation for publishing path-breaking papers, and is essential reading for economists.

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Image credit: Illustration by Mike Ertl. Do not reproduce without permission.

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Checking in on Martin Luther King, Jr.’s dream, with data

ErinF — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 12:30:25 +0000

By Sydney Beveridge

Martin Luther King, Jr. was the legendary civil rights leader whose strong calls to end racial segregation and discrimination were central to many of the victories of the Civil Rights movement. Every January, the United States celebrates Martin Luther King, Jr. Day to honor the activist who made so many strides towards equality.

Let’s take a look at the demographics of the legendary man’s hometown then and now to see how it has (and has not) changed. King was born in 1929, so we’ll examine Census data from 1930, 1940, and the latest Census and American Community Survey data.

His boyhood home is now a historic site, situated at 450 Auburn Avenue Northeast, in Fulton County (part of Atlanta). In 1930, Fulton County had a population of 318,587 residents. A little over two thirds of the population was white (68.1 percent) and almost one third of the population was African American (31.9 percent). Today, the 920,581-member population split is nearly even at 44.5 percent white and 44.1 percent African American, according to 2010 Census data. Fulton’s population is more African American than the United States as a whole (12.6 percent), but not as as much as Atlanta (54.0 percent).

A closer look at 1940s Census data of the Atlanta area offers more detail about where the black and white populations lived. The following map shows the distribution of the black population in the Atlanta of King’s youth. Plainly, African Americans lived together, largely apart from whites.

African American Population in Fulton County, GA, and Surroundings, 1940 (click map to explore)

For comparison, the following map shows where the black population lives today. Now the black population has expanded in the metro area, but still seems to be quite segregated.

African American Population in Fulton County, GA, and Surroundings, 2010 (click map to explore)

Reflecting on a century after the end of slavery, King said in his famous “I Have a Dream” speech of 1963:

But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. And so we’ve come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.

The quest for equal rights and freedoms made up part of a larger vision. In 1967, he spoke of aspiring for full equality at a speech at the Victory Baptist Church in Los Angeles:

Our struggle in the first phase was a struggle for decency. Now we are in the phase where there is a struggle for genuine equality. This is much more difficult. We aren’t merely struggling to integrate the lunch counter now. We’re struggling to get some money to be able to buy a hamburger or a steak when we get to the counter…

He went on to say that this would require a commitment of not only political initiative but also money: “It didn’t cost the nation one penny to integrate lunch counters. It didn’t cost the nation one penny to guarantee the right to vote. The problems that we are facing today will cost the nation billions of dollars.”

In 1968, King and other activists launched the Poor People’s Campaign, advocating for economic justice to address these imbalances in opportunity and resources. A few months later, he was assassinated.

We can look at different socioeconomic indicators to measure the country’s progress towards equality. According to 1940 Census data, more than a third (36.5 percent) of housing units in Fulton County where whites lived were owner occupied, compared to less than a seventh (14.0 percent) of the housing units where African Americans lived.

Today, home ownership increased for both groups, but the gap remains. Two thirds (66.6 percent) of white households are owner-occupied, compared to two fifths (41.7 percent) of all black households.

Home Ownership Comparison in Fulton, GA, by Race

Let’s examine other measures of equality to see examples of additional gaps.

The unemployment rate is nearly twice as high among African Americans (17.9 percent) compared to among whites nationwide (9.5 percent). That gap is even more pronounced in Fulton County, where the unemployment rate for whites is 7.7 percent, while the unemployment rate for African Americans is 20.4 percent.

The percent of those living below poverty is also higher in the black community (27.2 percent) than in the white community (12.5 percent). While both groups are better off in Fulton County than the rest of the US, the poverty rate gap is even larger (8.2 percent among whites and 26.6 percent among African Americans in Fulton).

Similarly, while both groups are better educated in Fulton County compared to the rest of the US, nearly two thirds (62.4 percent) of white adults in the county have BA degrees or more, while just one quarter (25.3 percent) of the black population have the same level of education. The college attainment gap is 11.6 percentage points nationwide, but 37.1 percentage points in Fulton County.

While much progress towards freedom and equality has been made since King’s time, chronic gaps persist, even in his own backyard. The data show that 50 years after the “I Have a Dream Speech,” equal opportunity and socioeconomic status continue to lag behind equal rights.

Sydney Beveridge is the Media and Content Editor for Social Explorer, where she works on the blog, curriculum materials, how-to-videos, social media outreach, presentations and strategic planning. She is a graduate of Swarthmore College and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. A version of this article originally appeared on the Social Explorer blog. You can use Social Explorer’s mapping and reporting tools to investigate dreams, freedoms, and equality further.

Social Explorer is an online research tool designed to provide quick and easy access to current and historical census data and demographic information. The easy-to-use web interface lets users create maps and reports to better illustrate, analyze and understand demography and social change. From research libraries to classrooms to the front page of the New York Times, Social Explorer is helping people engage with society and science.

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Thought Control

ChloeF — Fri, 18 Jan 2013 08:30:09 +0000

Tim Bayne

As a teacher I have sometimes offered a million pounds to any student who can form any one of the following beliefs: that they can fly; that they were born on the moon; or that sheep are carnivorous. Needless to say, I have never had to pay up. The Queen in Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass might have been able to believe six impossible things before breakfast, but that is a feat few of us can match. In fact, it is doubtful whether the formation of belief is under voluntary control at all. Adopting a belief seems to be more like digesting or metabolizing and rather unlike looking or speaking—it seems to be something that happens to one rather than something that one does.

But unlike digestion or metabolizing, the upshot of belief-formation has a direct impact on how we behave. Although we don’t always act in accordance with our beliefs, it goes without saying that what we believe plays a huge role in governing what we do. More importantly, a rational person ought to act on the basis of their beliefs; indeed, failing to act in light of one’s beliefs is a form of irrationality.

In and of themselves the two claims that we have just examined—that belief-formation is involuntary and that a person’s beliefs justify their actions—are unobjectionable. Trouble looms, however, when we put them together. From Francisco Pizarro to Tomás de Torquemada, and from Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to Anders Breivik, history is littered with the carnage wrought by the actions of sincere but misguided individuals—people who have regarded the superiority of their religion, race or ideology as legitimizing actions that we regard as horrific.

How should we regard such individuals? If the formation of belief is involuntary, then, one might think, we cannot justifiably condemn them for holding the beliefs that motivated their actions. Can we condemn them for acting on those beliefs? Arguably not, for how else is a person to act if not on the basis of their beliefs? But if we cannot condemn them either for forming their beliefs or for acting in light of their beliefs, what grounds do we have for condemning them at all?

Some might be tempted to respond that we don’t have any grounds for condemning such individuals, and that those who act on the basis of their sincerely held beliefs shouldn’t be denounced for what they do, no matter how awful their deeds. We could, of course, continue to regard such agents as legally responsible for their crimes, but—according to this line of thought—we have no grounds for holding them morally guilty for the actions that they carry out in light of their convictions.

Although some might be happy to settle for this solution, I suspect that for many of us it is a response of last resort—a position to be adopted only when all other avenues are exhausted. Are there any other avenues available to us?

Perhaps we were too quick to embrace the idea that belief-formation is always involuntary. Although it is clear that we cannot simply decide to adopt any old proposition that is put to us, it doesn’t follow—and it may not be true—that we have no intentional control over what we believe. For example, it is surely plausible to suppose that we have some control over whether or not to subject our beliefs to critical scrutiny. One can deliberate about whether or not to believe those propositions that are open questions for one. And if deliberation lies within one’s voluntary control, then perhaps one can be justifiably blamed for failing to deliberate appropriately.

Perhaps so, but does this solve our puzzle? I suspect not. For one thing, I very much doubt whether the beliefs that motivated Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Anders Breivik were ‘open questions’ from their point of view. Instead, I suspect that they regarded them as self-evident truths, claims no more deserving of critical scrutiny than the belief that 2+2=4 or the belief that there is water at the bottom of the ocean. Moreover, even if they were guilty of failing to subject their beliefs to the kind of scrutiny that they should have, that failing would surely be relatively minor rather than an instance of gross moral turpitude of the kind for which we are inclined to hold them guilty.

So, how should we resolve this puzzle? I don’t have a full solution to offer, but here is one line of thought that I find tempting. Although belief-formation is responsive to evidence, it is also influenced by desire and motivation: how we take the world to be is heavily influenced by how we would like the world to be. And one of the central sources of belief in the superiority of one’s religion, race or ideology is surely the desire to dominate one’s fellow human beings.

And here, perhaps, we can see the hint of a solution to our puzzle. What the Khalid Sheikh Mohammeds and Anders Breiviks of this world are guilty of is not the fact that they have voluntarily adopted unjustified beliefs, for we have seen that it is doubtful whether their beliefs were voluntarily acquired. Rather, their guilt lies in the character traits that their beliefs manifest. Our condemnation of them is justified insofar as the beliefs that motivated their actions were grounded in intolerance, arrogance and self-aggrandizement.

Tim Bayne is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Manchester. He has taught at the University of Canterbury, Macquarie University, and the University of Oxford. His main interests are in the philosophy of psychology, with a particular focus on consciousness. A native of New Zealand, he divides his time between Manchester and Geneva. His is the author of Thought: A Very Short Introduction .

The Very Short Introductions (VSI) series combines a small format with authoritative analysis and big ideas for hundreds of topic areas. Written by our expert authors, these books can change the way you think about the things that interest you and are the perfect introduction to subjects you previously knew nothing about. Grow your knowledge with OUPblog and the VSI series every Friday!

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Image Credit: Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, upon capture. Taken by U.S. forces when KSM was captured [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

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The Tottenham riots, the Big Society, and the recurring neglect of community participation

Kirsty — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 07:30:57 +0000

By Bryan Fanning and Denis Dillon

The Tottenham riots in the London Borough of Haringey took place in August 2011. We examined three responses to them: reports by North London Citizens, an alliance of 40 mostly faith community institutions including schools, the Tottenham Community Panel established by Haringey Council, and the Riots, Communities and Victims Panel established by Parliament.

The riots coincided with the end of an era of British urban policy when various community-centred regeneration programmes introduced by the previous New Labour Government, were being wound down. One of its flagship initiatives was the New Deal for Communities (NDC), a ten year programme which invested £50 million in each of thirty deprived areas including Tottenham. More recently, David Cameron has promoted the idea of the Big Society with an accompanying rhetoric that blames big government for enfeebling the civic sphere.

Two of the three analyses of the Tottenham riots that we examined shared this perspective. North London Citizens emphasised the need to create new community leaders; the Riots Communities and Victims Panel emphasised an on-going failure of services to engage with communities and vaguely endorses an agenda of neighbourhood-level community empowerment. Cameron’s Big Society agenda envisioned communities and neighbourhoods becoming empowered to take local decisions and solve local problems taking over the running of services and facilities where appropriate. None of the three reports make such recommendations for Tottenham. Rather, they restate in minor key the need for greater responsiveness to communities with no clear ideas about how this might be achieved.

All three reports emphasised a deficit in community cohesion. All three identified inadequate engagement by local service providers with residents as part of the problem. But Tottenham has been here before. The aftermath of the 1985 riot saw considerable effort to improve, foster and build community cohesion in Tottenham. Many of the buildings that were looted and burned in 2011 had been the focus of regeneration efforts.

We had just completed research on the efficacy of such policies when the riots occurred. Our 2011 book Lessons for the Big Society: planning, regeneration and the politics of community participation (Ashgate, 2011) examined a long history of failed efforts by the local authority to secure such participation. There were many reasons for this. Labour held a political monopoly in Tottenham. Community activism not sponsored by the party was often ignored. The institutional culture of the local authority councillors and officials was often hostile to community participation in decision-making even if official rhetoric claimed otherwise. Well-to-do parts of the borough had articulate well-organised groups capable of putting pressure on officials and councillors. Community groups in Tottenham lacked the skills and cultural capital that worked to win responsiveness from institutional actors.

The kind of community capacity that regeneration programmes in Tottenham sought to introduce appeared feeble compared to the on-going capacity for unsolicited activism found in well-to-do areas – expressed through single issue campaigns, the establishment of long-standing amenity groups and well-organised networks able to compel responsiveness from Council officials and councillors. The New Labour diagnosis was that areas like Tottenham lacked the necessary social capital. But the regeneration programmes it put in place engendered only a limited form of community capacity, and this depended on the life-support of funding that has since ended.

What then for Cameron’s Big Society? Even after decades of community-focused urban renewal in Tottenham, both community-institutional relationships and community cohesion remain weak. However, this does not justify the withdrawal of state support or bucolic expectations that civil society can fill the resulting void with minimal support. The very localities that need community empowerment also need state support the most.

We argue that what might work for Tottenham is an approach that seriously interrogates why past regeneration efforts were unable to empower local communities but at the same time accepts that such empowerment cannot be realised without significant state funding. It would take seriously the scepticism-bordering-on-hostility of the Big Society to local authority officialdom. But what Tottenham needs for the foreseeable future is big government willing to learn from past mistakes.

Professor Bryan Fanning is the Head of the School of Applied Social Science at University College Dublin. Dr Denis Dillon is employed by Community Services Volunteers (CSV) in North London. They are the co-authors of Lessons for the Big Society: planning, regeneration and the politics of community participation (Ashgate, 2011). Their article, The Tottenham riots: the Big Society and the recurring neglect of community participation, appears in Community Development Journal.

Since 1966 the leading international journal in its field, Community Development Journal covers a wide range of topics, reviewing significant developments and providing a forum for cutting-edge debates about theory and practice. It adopts a broad definition of community development to include policy, planning and action as they impact on the life of communities. It publishes critically focused articles which challenge received wisdom, report and discuss innovative practices, and relate issues of community development to questions of social justice, diversity and environmental sustainability.

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Image credit: After the Riot – View from near Scotland Green. Photo by Alan Stanton, 2011. Creative Commons Licence. (via Wikimedia Commons)

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Autism: a Q&A with Uta Frith

ChloeF — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 08:30:49 +0000

We spoke to Uta Frith, author of Autism: A Very Short Introduction and asked her about diagnosis, the perceived links between autism and genius, and how autism is portrayed in culture.

Autism was not identified before the 1940s. Weren’t there any autistic people before this?

Autism was not a new phenomenon starting in the middle of the 20^th century, but it needed people like Leo Kanner and Hans Asperger to point out the striking constellation of poor social communication and stereotypic behaviours for others to see it too. Clinicians used the terms ‘infantile’ or ‘early childhood autism’ and located it among the neglected population of children who were born ‘mentally deficient’. Gradually clinicians became aware that most of this neglected population showed similar problems in varying degrees, and that specialist services were needed to educate children who could not communicate appropriately. They embraced the idea of the autism spectrum. So, just as there has been an increase in the autism spectrum diagnosis, there has been a corresponding decrease in the diagnosis of mental retardation.

But the spectrum idea had even wider implications. The constellation of social impairments and stereotypic behaviours can also be found in people whose intellectual abilities are average or superior. Previously these people would have been regarded as loners or possibly schizophrenic. It turned out that many families had an eccentric uncle, cousin, or grandfather! From the 1990s the diagnosis of Asperger syndrome became hugely popular and preferred to the diagnosis of autism. This popularity also reflected the gradual recognition of outstanding talents in autism, which is particularly visible in people who are also articulate. The loosening of criteria from early childhood autism, which remains rare, to the whole autism spectrum, which is not at all rare, has helped to make autism one of the most frequently used diagnostic categories today. In the US, 1 in 88 people currently have the diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder.

I have read that some people with Asperger syndrome claim that they do not have a disorder, but that they are just different from ‘neurotypicals’.

Asperger syndrome is a label that is going to disappear from the official diagnostic criteria. This is because clinicians believe that autism spectrum conditions can be diagnosed regardless of severity and regardless of differences in ability. But in its mildest form is autism a disorder? Certainly, the border between autistic and neurotypical is hard to establish. Many of us are a bit geeky and a bit egocentric and a bit obsessive. It could all be just a matter of degree. However, this argument has serious drawbacks. Educational support, psychiatric and other care will only be given to people who have a disorder, and on the whole autistic people do need specialist education and care. My hope is that eventually we might be able to identify clear-cut differences, but not in observable behaviour. The distinctions are likely to be in the underlying mental mechanisms that atypical brain development disturbs in particular ways. But this is still speculation, and arguments about what it means to be autistic will continue.

Are most scientists and artists on the autism spectrum?

A supremely self-assured egocentrism coupled with obsession with a particular idea or technique seems to be the mark of genius. We expect a genius to be oblivious of the trivial aspects of a conventional social life. We should be suspicious of this stereotype, because on the one hand, not all artists and scientists are like this. On the other hand, some people may behave like this to persuade other people that they are artists. However, the idea that autism and genius go together has given new impetus to the stereotype. Now we can label the fact that a famous artist or scientist habitually withdraws from company and shows arrogance and blatant socially inappropriate behaviour: it must be autism! However, the likeness to autism is only superficial. There are many reasons for people to be socially odd and to be single-minded to the point of obsession. In the case of the brilliant physicist Paul Dirac, the case can be made that he had Asperger syndrome and Graham Farmelo’s marvellous biography (“The Strangest Man”, 2009) provides a lot of support for this possibility.

Autism has been portrayed in books, plays, and in films. Which can you recommend?

Rain Man was made in 1988, is one of the first big movies that portrayed autism, and indeed autism in an adult who had many endearing traits. This was hugely important, to make people aware of the fact that autistic children grow up to be autistic adults and that they could be heroes. In making this film the director and actors consulted autistic people and their parents. This made the portrayal by Dustin Hoffman exceptionally perceptive.

The most frequent aspect that films and books portray is savant talent, for example, an encyclopedic memory. In some cases this is mere caricature of what might be found in real life. The film I like best never mentions autism, and was made in 1979. It is called “Being There”. Here Peter Sellers portrays a man who outshines sophisticated socialites by his innocence. Mark Haddon with his 2003 best selling book “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime” succeeded in telling a good story from the point of view of an autistic boy. He made a huge contribution to awareness of autism and a more tolerant attitude to autistic people by reaching a large readership.

Uta Frith is the author of Autism: A Very Short Introduction and Autism and Talent. She is Emeritus Professor of Cognitive Development at University College London and Visiting Professor at the University of Aarhus.

The Very Short Introductions (VSI) series combines a small format with authoritative analysis and big ideas for hundreds of topic areas. Written by our expert authors, these books can change the way you think about the things that interest you and are the perfect introduction to subjects you previously knew nothing about. Grow your knowledge with OUPblog and the VSI series every Friday!

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Image Credits: Book jacket of The Strangest Man from Faber.co.uk used for the purposes of illustration; Book jacket of Autism and Talent, all rights reserved by Oxford University Press; Photo still captured from Youtube clip of Rain Man.

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‘Grooming’ and the sexual abuse of children

Nicola — Thu, 10 Jan 2013 08:30:22 +0000

By Dr Anne-Marie McAlinden

The word ‘grooming’ has become synonymous with child sexual abuse. It is often used to describe situations of extra-familial abuse, where predatory strangers befriend children who were previously unknown to them. Two of the most prominent social connotations of the term are ‘online grooming’ committed via the internet and ‘institutional grooming’ and abuse committed by those in positions of power and trust.

While ‘grooming’ is a useful short-hand to describe the staged process of befriending children in order to prepare them for abuse and prevent disclosure, it is a term that needs to be used with caution. There is a need to acknowledge the complexities of the onset of sexual offending against children and recognise that there will not always be pre-abuse grooming in every case. The unmitigated use of such terminology, however, can serve to mask these complexities. That being said, grooming of the child, significant others, or the environment is a highly significant and multi-layered variable in child sexual abuse. Unpacking and confronting some of these nuances is vital to protective and preventive efforts.

Within intra-familial contexts, there is often no need to groom prior to the first offence, since in many cases the abuser will already be physically proximate to the child. ‘Familial grooming’, however, can operate not only upon the child but also other protective adults and the environment itself. In the case of father-daughter abuse, for example, the would-be offender may groom or manipulate the mother in order to create the opportunity to be alone with the child and abuse undetected. Similarly, the immediate familial surroundings can also be groomed so that inappropriate behaviours are normalised and the victim ultimately does not recognise themselves as such.

Further complexities arise in relation to the potential cross-over between victimhood and an offending identity. This is particularly the case where abuse occurs on an organisational level. A minority of enquiries into institutional child abuse have demonstrated that victims report being abused by their peers as well as adults where abuse has become part of the organisational culture. Similarly, peer-to-peer grooming also has resonance in the context of ‘localised’ or ‘street grooming’. Recent high profile cases such as those in Rochdale and Oldham demonstrate that young girls may recruit other children and young people into exploitative situations, which in its worst form becomes organised abuse or trafficking.

Such complexities which underlie the onset of sexual offending against children also have broader significance in terms of recognising and challenging inappropriate pro-offending behaviour. It is widely assumed that the adult male is the most typical offender. Sexual offences committed by young people and females, however, together comprise a substantial proportion of official statistics on sexual offending against children (approximately one-third and 5% respectively). These groups of offenders may have different motivations and may initiate abuse in different ways to adult male offenders, whether this is more experimental or relational and less overt.

As an extension of the concept of institutional grooming, sex offenders may seek to manipulate professionals who are charged with their assessment, treatment, or management into discounting their risk to children. However in order to protect children it is vital to remember that all sex offenders act and think differently, and their routes into offending don’t fit any particular. Stereotyping predatory offenders in this way can be dangerous, by detracting our attention from other possible sources of harm to children. Similarly, whole communities can be groomed to view offenders as trustworthy individuals. The ongoing investigation concerning abuse by the late Jimmy Savile highlights potential societal grooming in evidence on a large scale. It is arguable that Savile used his influence to groom not just his victims but society as a whole, abusing his position of trust and authority which was amplified by his celebrity status.

Ultimately, at the tertiary level, the prevention of child sexual abuse in the form of legal and policy frameworks only comes into play once risk is known and identified. Some of these complexities concerning grooming point towards the need for additional social policies at the primary and secondary levels of prevention. Specifically, public health approaches aimed at raising awareness of child sexual abuse and promoting identification and intervention should be targeted at children, families, potential offenders, and wider society. This should involve a continuum of services centring on the creation of a ‘safeguarding’ culture within families, communities, and organisations.

Dr Anne-Marie McAlinden is Reader in Law at Queen’s University Belfast. Her book ‘Grooming’ and the Sexual Abuse of Children: Institutional, Internet and Familial Dimensions published in December 2012.

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Image credit: School children walking in corridor (motion blur) photo by Bim via iStockphoto.

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New year’s resolution: don’t sabotage yourself

Nicola — Thu, 27 Dec 2012 08:30:08 +0000

By Susan David

We humans are funny. Often we create beliefs or engage in behaviors that seem to help us in the short term, only to discover they get in the way of the lives we really want to live, or the people we want to become.

Allow me to share the story of my friend, Erin. Over lunch one day, she told both her mentor and me about a division director job she had truly wanted. The role offered good challenges, the chance to develop her skills, fabulous travel, and unparalleled flexibility. It would have been “a dream come true”.

But then Erin began to recite a litany of reasons why she hadn’t gone after the job. She wasn’t good in interviews, having never received the coaching that so many candidates are privy to these days. She was overweight, which would surely make a poor impression. On top of all this, due to the economic downturn, many people more qualified than she would apply. She thought she’d be great at the job if she could have made it beyond the interview, but all things considered, she “knew” she hadn’t stood a chance.

“So I never applied,” she told us. “Instead, I sent the advertisement to a peer and encouraged him to interview.” She paused. “He got the job.”

How was it that this bright, hardworking, lovely young woman also had such an aptitude for self-sabotage?

There are plenty of smart, even gifted, people like Erin. They are bonded by a common behavior psychologists call “self-handicapping,” which involves anticipating a real or imagined obstacle that might get in the way of success, and using that obstacle as an excuse.

Self-handicapping allows us to protect ourselves from the pain of assuming responsibility for our failures, and people do it all the time. In a groundbreaking 1978 study, psychologists Berglas and Jones found that participants who “succeeded” at a test (that was really just luck-based) were more likely to choose to take a performance-inhibiting drug before taking a second test. In other words, they actively set themselves up for failure on the second try. By doing this, they could blame their subsequent poor performance on the drug, and also protect their earlier feeling of success.

In a more recent set of experiments conducted by psychologist Sean McCrea at the University of Konstanz in Germany, participants were asked to take several intelligence tests under a variety of conditions. The research showed that people who were encouraged to make excuses for their poor performance — blaming poor performance on loud noises, for example — maintained high self-esteem, but were also less motivated to improve.

This kind of behavior is often so subtle and habitual that we don’t notice we’re doing it. Think about the manager who has to give a big presentation and fails to practice ahead of the event, or people who procrastinate on work projects and wind up “not having enough time” to do a good job. In a 2010 HBR article, Jeffrey Pfeffer identified self-handicapping as one of three major barriers to building professional power: people avoid the pain of failure by never trying to build power in the first place.

What can you do to overcome self-handicapping? Here are four steps:

Watch for the warning signs. Drawing down your efforts, generating lists of excuses, or distracting yourself (music, alcohol, etc.) are signs that you’re engaging in self-handicapping. Everyone needs to take breaks and manage energy during the work day, but these activities can be clues that you are veering onto the trail of self-sabotage. A mentor or colleague can often help steer you back on course.
Use “what-ifs” and “if-onlys” to help you generate goals instead of excuses. Research shows that the thinking people engage in during self-handicapping can just as easily be flipped to be motivational. When you ponder what could have gone better, or recognize obstacles in your way, you generate valuable information. Identify factors within your control, and see what you can do about them. Erin, for example, could have responded to the thought “I’m not great in interviews” by researching the right skills, practicing them, and requesting support from her mentor.
Recognize and manage your negative emotions. Research shows that when we use our “if-onlys” to motivate rather than excuse ourselves, we will also likely experience negative emotions, such as disappointment and self-directed anger . If you can notice these emotions and be kind to yourself in working through them, you’re more likely to be able to move into positive, empowering behavior.
Go for mastery. Self-handicapping is most likely to kick in when we are trying to perform well in order to avoid negative feedback from external sources, such as criticism from colleagues. When we focus instead on developing mastery in a domain we care about, we tap into our inherent motivation to learn and grow. Recognize what matters to you, and brainstorm ideas to get yourself moving in that direction.

Going for what you really want takes considerable courage. Let’s face it, even when you put forth your best effort, things don’t always turn out as you would like. But by taking a risk you open yourself not only to the possibility of failure, but also the possibility of learning, growth, and real attainment. It’s up to you to decide which is more perilous: the risk of disappointment, or the risk of never reaching your potential.

Reprinted with permission from Harvard Business Reveiw. This blog was originally published here.

Susan David is co-editor of the Oxford Handbook of Happiness (due out in January 2013) with Ilona Boniwell and Amanda Conley Ayers. Susan is is a founder and co-director of the Harvard/McLean Institute of Coaching and a member of the Harvard faculty. She is also the director of Evidence Based Psychology, a leadership development organization and management consultancy.

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Making and mistaking martyrs

ChloeF — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 07:30:01 +0000

By Jolyon Mitchell

A protestor holds a picture of a blood spattered Neda Agha-Soltan and another of a woman, Neda Soltani, who was widely misidentified as Neda Agha-Soltan.

It was agonizing, just a few weeks before publication of Martyrdom: A Very Short Introduction, to discover that there was a minor mistake in one of the captions. Especially frustrating, as it was too late to make the necessary correction to the first print run, though it will be repaired when the book is reprinted. New research had revealed the original mistake. The inaccuracy we had been given had circulated the web and had been published by numerous press agencies and journalists too. What precisely was wrong?

To answer this question it is necessary to go back to Iran. During one of the demonstrations in Tehran following the contested re-election of President Ahmadinejad in 2009, a young woman (Neda Agha-Soltan) stepped out of the car for some fresh air. A few moments later she was shot. As she lay on the ground dying her last moments were captured on film. These graphic pictures were then posted online. Within a few days these images had gone global. Soon demonstrators were using her blood-spattered face on posters protesting against the Iranian regime. Even though she had not intended to be a martyr, her death was turned into a martyrdom in Iran and around the world.

Many reports also placed another photo, purportedly of her looking healthy and flourishing, alongside the one of her bloodied face. It turns out that this was not actually her face but an image taken from the Facebook page of another Iranian with a similar name, Neda Soltani. This woman is still alive, but being incorrectly identified as the martyr has radically changed her life. She later described on BBC World Service (Outlook, 2 October 2012) and on BBC Radio 4 (Woman’s Hour, 22 October 2012) how she received hate mail and pressure from the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence to support the claim that the other Neda was never killed. The visual error made it almost impossible for Soltani to stay in her home country. She fled Iran and was recently granted asylum in Germany. Neda Soltani has even written a book, entitled My Stolen Face, about her experience of being mistaken for a martyr.

The caption should therefore read something like: ‘A protestor holds a picture of a blood spattered Neda Agha-Soltan and another of a woman, Neda Soltani, who was widely misidentified as Neda Agha-Soltan.’ This mistake underlines how significant the role is of those who are left behind after a death. Martyrs are made. They are rarely, if ever, born. Communities remember, preserve, and elaborate upon fatal stories, sometimes turning them into martyrdoms. Neda’s actual death was commonly contested. Some members of the Iranian government described it as the result of a foreign conspiracy, while many others saw her as an innocent martyr. For these protestors she represents the tip of an iceberg of individuals who have recently lost their lives, their freedom, or their relatives in Iran. As such her death became the symbol of a wider protest movement.

This was also the case in several North African countries during the so-called Arab Spring. In Tunisia, in Algeria, and in Egypt the death of an individual was put to use soon after their passing. This is by no means a new phenomenon. Ancient, medieval, and early modern martyrdom stories are still retold, even if they were not captured on film. Tales of martyrdom have been regularly reiterated and amplified through a wide range of media. Woodcuts of martyrdoms from the sixteenth century, gruesome paintings from the seventeenth or eighteenth centuries, photographs of executions from the nineteenth century, and fictional or documentary films from the twentieth century all contribute to the making of martyrs. Inevitably, martyrdom stories are elaborated upon. Like a shipwreck at the bottom of the ocean, they collect barnacles of additional detail. These details may be rooted in history,unintentional mistakes, or simply fictional leaps of the imagination. There is an ongoing debate, for example, around Neda’s life and death. Was she a protestor? How old was she when she died? Who killed her? Was she a martyr?

Martyrdoms commonly attract controversy. One person’s ‘martyr’ is another person’s ‘accidental death’ or ‘suicide bomber’ or ‘terrorist’. One community’s ‘heroic saint’ who died a martyr’s death is another’s ‘pseudo-martyr’ who wasted their life for a false set of beliefs. Martyrs can become the subject of political debate as well as religious devotion. The remains of a well-known martyr can be viewed as holy or in some way sacred. At least one Russian czar, two English kings, and a French monarch have all been described after their death as martyrs.

Neda was neither royalty nor politician. She had a relatively ordinary life, but an extraordinary death. Neda is like so many other individuals who are turned into martyrs: it is by their demise that they are often remembered. In this way even the most ordinary individual can become a martyr to the living after their deaths. Preserving their memory becomes a communal practice, taking place on canvas, in stone, and most recently online. Interpretations, elaborations, and mistakes commonly cluster around martyrdom narratives. These memories can be used both to incite violence and to promote peace. How martyrs are made, remembered, and then used remains the responsibility of the living.

Jolyon Mitchell is Professor of Communications, Arts and Religion, Director of the Centre for Theology and Public Issues (CTPI) and Deputy Director of the Institute for the Advanced Study in the Humanities (IASH) at the University of Edinburgh. He is author and editor of a wide range of books including most recently: Promoting Peace, Inciting Violence: The Role of Religion and Media (2012); and Martyrdom: A Very Short Introduction (2012).

The Very Short Introductions (VSI) series combines a small format with authoritative analysis and big ideas for hundreds of topic areas. Written by our expert authors, these books can change the way you think about the things that interest you and are the perfect introduction to subjects you previously knew nothing about. Grow your knowledge with OUPblog and the VSI series every Friday!

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Image credit: A protestor holds a picture of a blood spattered Neda Agha-Soltan and another of a woman, Neda Soltani, who was widely misidentified as Neda Agha-Soltan, used in full page context of p.49, Martyrdom: A Very Short Introduction, by Jolyon Mitchell. Image courtesy of Getty Images.

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Why day care should be subsidized

Nicola — Mon, 12 Nov 2012 08:30:11 +0000

By David Domeij and Paul Klein

The Nordic countries and France heavily subsidize pre-school child care. In Sweden, parents pay only about ten percent of the actual costs. As a result, about 75 percent of all Swedish children aged one to five are in formal day care. In Germany, where the availability of subsidized day care spots is strictly limited, that number is less than 60 percent, and those German children that are in day care typically spend only a few hours a day there unlike their Swedish counterparts who usually spend all day in a day care center. The consequences for female labour force participation are not surprising. In Germany, 58 percent of women with children up to the age of six were employed in 2004. The corresponding number for Sweden is 78 percent.

What is the case for subsidizing day care? Generally speaking, a market economy works best when the prices people face correspond to actual costs. If I pay in proportion to what I take out of the economy and I am rewarded in proportion to what I contribute, then I have an incentive to do what is best for the economy as a whole. However, the ideal market economy where all prices equal true (marginal) costs and incomes exactly reflect (marginal) contributions is not attainable in practice. Every society needs to fund some goods and services on a collective basis. To do this, the government has to levy taxes. As a practical matter, taxes are levied on income and consumption. So taxes inevitably distort choices by driving a wedge between the social benefit of working and the private reward from working. That’s a given. The question is not how to remove all distortions but how to minimize their damaging effects.

To see why day care subsidies should be part of a damage-minimization tax policy, consider an economy where people have to pay for day care out of their after-tax income. Suppose the pre-tax wage is €10 per hour and that the cost of day care is €2 per hour and suppose the income tax rate is 50 percent. For simplicity, consider a single parent who needs to buy one hour of child care for every hour that he or she works. The social benefit of working, net of real child care costs, is €8. The net reward, after taxes and day care costs, is €3. Thus the effective wedge is 5/8 or 62.5 percent. What is the effective wedge for people without small children? 50 percent of course. So, in this imaginary economy, the choices of parents with small children are more distorted than the choices of others.

There are strong reasons to think that such inequality of wedges is not a feature of the best possible tax system, the one that distorts as little as possible. To verify that properly, we need a mathematical model. But some well-informed intuition will do nicely for now. Presumably it is at least plausible that jelly beans and candy canes should be taxed at the same rate. Why not? So surely parents with young children should be taxed at the same effective rate as everybody else. In our little example, what would it take for the effective tax rate to be 50 percent for everyone? The answer is: a child care subsidy of 50 percent. Then the net reward for working would be €4 per hour or 50 percent of the benefit to society. This is of course not a coincidence. In general, to equalize wedges between people with and without small children, the thing to do is to subsidize it at the same rate as the marginal tax rate. Equivalently, day care expenses can be made tax deductible. Naturally, tax rates for everyone else will have to rise a bit to finance child care subsidies. But even when we take that into account, an equalization of wedges leads to a more efficient allocation of resources.

In the German context, there is another reason (beyond equalizing explicit tax wedges) to subsidize child care, namely that it encourages people to work who otherwise would have lived on social assistance. For single mothers in Germany, the incentives to work are particularly weak, and day care subsidies would strengthen those incentives. Meanwhile, encouraging people to move from living on social assistance into working for a living is good for the government budget, making child care subsidies cheaper for the public purse. We conclude that the best subsidy rate for Germany would be 50 percent.

Is formal day care good for children? The evidence is not entirely clear-cut, and many studies fail to find either positive or negative effects on outcomes later in life for children who went to day care. But a recent study by Havnes and Mogstad provides some very strong evidence that formal day care has been good for Norwegian children, especially for those from disadvantaged backgrounds. Gathmann and Sass find similar results for Germany. Thus there is no strong counterargument based on child development to the efficiency case for child care subsidies.

David Domeij is associate professor of economics at the Stockholm School of Economics in Stockholm, Sweden. He received his PhD in 1998 from Northwestern University. In his research he has mostly focused on public finance and macroeconomics. Paul Klein is associate professor of economics at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada. He received his PhD in 1997 from Stockholm University. In his research he has mostly focused on public finance and macroeconomics. Their recent paper, “Should Daycare be Subsidized,” has been made freely available for a limited time by the Review of Economic Studies journal.

The Review of Economic Studies is widely recognised as one of the core top-five economics journals. The Review is essential reading for economists and has a reputation for publishing path-breaking papers in theoretical and applied economics.

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Image credit: Teacher explaining the world to preschoolers by Dean Mitchell via iStockphoto.

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Russia’s toughest prisons: what can the Pussy Riot band members expect?

Nicola — Sun, 04 Nov 2012 08:30:00 +0000

By Judith Pallot

The onion dome of Russian Orthodox Church dominates the skyline of women’s correctional colony number 14 (IK14) in Part’sa. The Governor of the colony, showing Laura and me around, told us that five prisoners – all tuberculosis sufferers – who volunteered to help build the Church were miraculously cured of their disease. It was a story we were to hear repeated several times on our research trip to women’s penal colonies in S-W Mordoviia. How the community of believers in IK 14 will react to the arrival of members of the controversial rock-band ‘Pussy Riot’, recently convicted of ‘hooliganism motivated by religious hatred’ is a matter of intense concern to their supporters.

Judith Pallot with co-author Laura Piacentini, various correctional officers, and research collaborators outside the entrance to IK14. The Governor of the colony (Kulyagin) is in the centre of the photo.

Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, one of the band members recently convicted, arrived in IK14 last week. The colony is one of seventeen located along a now defunct single-track railway line extending 60 miles north of the Pot’ma station on the mainline connecting Moscow and Siberia in the S-W corner of the Mordoviyan republic. Prisoners have been brought here from the early 1930s, initially to work timber stands to produce wood for the construction of the Moscow metro. Part’sa, the settlement that hosts IK 14, is in the heart of the penal zone; it is a strange place – everyone here is connected in some way with the prison service.

IK14 is more accessible now than it was in the past when permits were needed to enter the penal zone. However, for anyone wanting to visit one of the 14-15,000 men and women incarcerated here the cost in time and money can be prohibitive. Small wonder that the statistics for visitation are so poor; 60-70% per cent of prisoners receive no visit during the course of a year, with the record is worse for women than for men.

Tolokonnikova will be among the more fortunate as she has a good support group around her. However, she will only be entitled to ten visits per year; including four ‘residential’ three-day long visits. The Russian prison service can boast that it is ahead of much of the rest of Europe in the provision of ‘residential’ visits, but it should be noted that the need for these has arisen due to prisoners being sent to such remote regions.

Prison residential visiting suits are rather like student accommodation blocks in the West. They consist of a number of rooms off a corridor each with two/three beds, a kitchen for communal use and, sometimes, a common room with TV. In the Mordoviyan colonies they have vases of plastic flowers and landscape pictures on the walls to ‘make it seem like home’. But there are no outside windows, and both prisoners and their visitors remain inside for the 72 hours of the visit.

Visitors to the correctional colonies have to bring provisions sufficient to last three days. It is not uncommon to see a line of women laden with bags waiting to have their contents checked before entering the colony. Russian prisons allow a surprising range of products and goods into the colony compared with their American counterparts. Further to this, whilst in the visiting dormitory prisoners can dispense with their uniform and headscarf, are exempt from parade ground head counts, and given dispensation from work in the colony’s ‘production zone’.

An issue for Nadezhda Tolokonnikova is whether her daughter Gera will be brought to visit her. Not many children visit their mothers in prison – the journeys are often too long and, many believe that it is wrong to bring children into such a ‘dark place’. Colonies organise Family Open Daysdesigned for children, but those who come are often told that the prison is a hospital, ‘secret factory’, or indeed, a convent.

A prison Church in L'govo colony Riazan.

Half of Mordoviia’s correctional colonies have a church like the one in IK14, and the Mordoviian penal authority is the first to have placed priests on its pay roll. In 2001 the former Head of the Prison Service declared that the priest had become more important than correction officers in re-socialising prisoners. It would smack too much of conspiracy theory to suggest that the strong presence of the Russian Orthodox Church in Mordoviia’s colonies influenced the decision to send Tolokonnikova to IK 14 in Part’sa. But, given the nature of the Pussy Rioter’s last encounter with the Russian Orthodox Church, we might be forgiven for wondering whether it is more than a coincidence.

Judith Pallot is Professor of the Human Geography of Russia at the University of Oxford, and Official Student of Christ Church. Judith Pallot is co-author (with Laura Piacentini) of Gender, Geography, and Punishment: The Experience of Women in Carceral Russia (OUP, 2012).

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