The Misplaced Trust in the DOJ\u27s Expertise on Criminal Justice Policy

As should be clear, this is less a book review and more an in-depth exploration of a key point Professor Barkow makes in Prisoners of Politics as applied to the federal criminal justice system. Sure, we need expertise in order to make data-driven criminal justice policy decisions--as Barkow puts it, “[t]he key is to create and foster an institutional framework that prioritizes data” and “expertise” so as to “create incentives for key decisionmakers to be accountable for real results” (pp. 14-15). But in creating reforms, the kindof expertise is also important. Many federal policymakers currently view the DOJ and NAAUSA as possessing the most salient expertise on all criminal justice matters. This Review, I hope, calls that premise into serious doubt. In Part I of this Review, I explain how the DOJ and NAAUSA have had a vise-like grip on federal policymakers when deciding criminal justice issues. In Part II, I detail their lobbying efforts in favor of longer sentences and against any reforms that would reduce sentences, and I explain why their claims against reform are flawed. Part III addresses the DOJ\u27s and the NAAUSA\u27s active opposition to criminal justice policies set by the presidents whom they serve because federal prosecutors seek to retain power to the exclusion of all other policy goals. If we want a federal criminal justice system that reflects the goals of public safety, fairness, and equal enforcement, then federal policymakers should give less deference to the views of federal prosecutors because they do not possess the requisite expertise or will to move our policies toward those ends

Heat and light from renewable energy for village houses in England

This paper reports on an investigation into supplying from renewable sources the entire domestic energy needs, both heating and electricity, for three remote communities in the English Pennines. The study took a whole system approach converging the pattern of energy demand, appropriate technologies, the possible sources of energy and opportunities for energy efficiency. The results indicate that the energy needs could be readily met through the use of solar power for some electricity and heat by using photovoltaic roofs and solar collectors; wind for electricity; and biomass for heat and electricity. There was strong local support for the proposals and the future challenge is to develop renewable energy communities to demonstrate the possibilities

From evangelistic bureaucrat to visionary developer: the changing character of the master plan in Britain

Masterplanning is having a major effect on development, especially in Britain, Europe and the USA, though the theoretical base is ill-defined and process has received little research attention. Of greater concern is that masterplanning is the antithesis of sustainable development. The paper explores the evolution of the masterplanner, critiques the way this product-driven device has changed and suggests sustainable alternatives. Giddings was the lead author

A Comparison of Household Food Security in Canada and the United States

Food security—consistent access to enough food for an active, healthy life—is essential for health and good nutrition. The extent to which a nation’s population achieves food security is an indication of its material and social well-being. Differences in the prevalence of household level food insecurity between Canada and the United States are described at the national level and for selected economic and demographic subpopulations. Associations of food security with economic and demographic characteristics are examined in multivariate analyses that hold other characteristics constant. Comparable measures of household food security were calculated from the nationally representative Canadian Community Health Survey Cycle 2.2 (2004) and the U.S. Current Population Survey Food Security Supplement (2003-05). Based on the standard U.S. methodology, the percentage of the population living in households classified as food insecure was lower in Canada (7.0 percent) than in the United States (12.6 percent). The difference was greater for the percentage of children living in food-insecure households (8.3 percent vs. 17.9 percent) than for adults (6.6 percent vs. 10.8 percent). These differences primarily refl ected different prevalence rates of food insecurity for Canadian and U.S. households with similar demographic and economic characteristics. Differences in population composition on measured economic and demographic characteristics account for only about 15 to 30 percent of the overall Canada-U.S. difference.Agricultural and Food Policy, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, Food Security and Poverty, Health Economics and Policy, Institutional and Behavioral Economics, International Development,

CAST – City analysis simulation tool: an integrated model of land use, population, transport and economics

The paper reports on research into city modelling based on principles of Science of Complexity. It focuses on integration of major processes in cities, such as economics, land use, transport and population movement. This is achieved using an extended Cellular Automata model, which allows cells to form networks, and operate on individual financial budgets. There are 22 cell types with individual processes in them. The formation of networks is based on supply and demand mechanisms for products, skills, accommodation, and services. Demand for transport is obtained as an emergent property of the system resulting from the network connectivity and relevant economic mechanisms. Population movement is a consequence of mechanisms in the housing and skill markets. Income and expenditure of cells are self-regulated through market mechanisms and changing patterns of land use are a consequence of collective interaction of all mechanisms in the model, which are integrated through emergence

Doctoral student experience in Education:Activities and difficulties influencing identity development

This paper explores variation in the events or activities Education doctoral students describe as contributing to their feeling of being an academic or belonging to an academic community as well as difficulties they experience. The results (drawing principally on students in a Canadian research-intensive university though with some in a UK university) demonstrate a rich variation in multiple formative activities that are experienced as contributing to a developing identity as an academic, with many lying outside formal and semi-formal aspects of the doctorate. Yet, at the same time students report tensions in the very sorts of activities they often find significant and positive in the development of their identity. We see this analysis as offering much-needed insights into the formative role of cumulative day-to-day activities in the development of academic identity

Spitzer Imaging of Herschel-ATLAS Gravitationally Lensed Submillimeter Sources

We present physical properties of two submillimeter selected gravitationally lensed sources, identified in the Herschel Astrophysical Terahertz Large Area Survey. These submillimeter galaxies (SMGs) have flux densities >100 mJy at 500 μm, but are not visible in existing optical imaging. We fit light profiles to each component of the lensing systems in Spitzer IRAC 3.6 and 4.5 μm data and successfully disentangle the foreground lens from the background source in each case, providing important constraints on the spectral energy distributions (SEDs) of the background SMG at rest-frame optical–near-infrared wavelengths. The SED fits show that these two SMGs have high dust obscuration with A_V ~ 4–5 and star formation rates of ~100M_⊙ yr^(−1). They have low gas fractions and low dynamical masses compared with 850 μm selected galaxies