Informants, Police, and Unconscionability

Essay exploring the extent to which certain agreements between the police and informants are an affront (both procedurally and substantively) to basic tenets of the liberal tradition in legal and political philosophy

Ice Cube and the philosophical foundations of community policing

Essay on police legitimacy through public reason and community policing

What Grounds Special Treatment Between Siblings?

Siblings ought to treat one another specially – in other words, siblings qua siblings ought to treat one another in ways that they need not treat others. This paper offers a theory of why this is the case. The paper begins with some intuitive judgments about how siblings ought to treat one another and some other normative features of siblinghood. I then review three potential theories of why siblings ought to treat one another specially, adapted from the literature on filial piety: the gratitude theory, the friendship theory, and the special goods theory. In each case, these theories fail to explain some of the intuitive judgments about how siblings ought to treat one another. The paper then proposes a familial belonging theory. The institution of the family has certain goals, which impose normative demands on family members. I suggest that one such family goal is that every member feel familial belonging towards every other member, a goal which grounds the ways in which siblings ought to treat one another specially

Liberalism and Policing: The State We're In

Short online essay on the state of policing in liberal societies, discussing how executive discretionary power has grown to such a degree that it has trended toward illiberal practices and policies

The Retrieval of Liberalism in Policing

There is a growing sense that many liberal states are in the midst of a shift in legal and political norms—a shift that is happening slowly and for a variety of reasons relating to security. The internet and tech booms—paving the way for new forms of electronic surveillance—predated the 9/11 attacks by several years, while the police’s vast use of secret informants and deceptive operations began well before that. On the other hand, the recent uptick in reactionary movements—movements in which the rule of law seems expendable—began many years after 9/11 and continues to this day. One way to describe this book is an examination of the moral limits on modern police practices that flow from the basic legal and political tenets of the liberal tradition. The central argument is that policing in liberal states is constrained by a liberal conception of persons coupled with particular rule of law principles. Part I consists of three chapters that constitute the book’s theoretical foundation, including an overview of the police’s law enforcement role in the liberal polity and a methodology for evaluating that role. Part II consists of three chapters that address applications of the theory, including the police’s use of informants, deceptive operations, and surveillance. The upshot is that policing in liberal societies has become illiberal in light of its response to both internal and external threats to security. The book provides an account of what it might mean to retrieve policing that is consistent with the basic tenets of liberalism and the limits imposed by those tenets. [This is an uncorrected draft of the book's preface and introduction, forthcoming from Oxford University Press.

A Historical Survey of Water Utilization in the Cook Inlet - Susitna Basin, Alaska

Completion Report OWRT Agreement No. 14-34-0001-6002 Project No. A-056-ALASThe objectives of the study encompassed a scholarly investigation of the appropriate archival and published literature on the Cook-Inlet-Susitna Basin, and the publication of the articles and a book-length history of the utilization of water resources. There are many aspects of Alaskan history to which historians have not given serious attention. Certainly there has been no historical consideration of the importance of water resources in Alaska. Issues that have involved water use have either been treated journalistically or have been the subject of scientific monographs. The understanding of the public can sometimes be confused by the journalistic treatment of events while scientific reports are seldom read. There is a definite need for a well-researched, lively survey of an important spect of Alaska's history. Many years passed before systematic scientific work was carried out in the Cook Inlet-Susitna region but the uses of its water resources for sanitation, transport, food, and power were intensified as time passed. The region has had significance for well over 200 years to the western peoples who settled there and, of course, for much longer to its aboriginal inhabitants. There has never been a substantial history written of the region, although some aspects of its past have been surveyed in a few pub1ished works, and there has never been a historical survey of water utilization for any region of Alaska. Increasingly, the development of the region will involve political decision. The public scrutiny of the environmental impact of new dam and other construction is not likely to decline. Further petroleum leasing in the outer continental shelf areas will raise questions of the best uses which can be made of the water and other resources. The wisdom of these decisions depends upon our knowledge of all of the factors involved. An understanding of what has happened in the past as people have made use of the water resources could contribute to the effectiveness of judgments made in the future.The work upon which this completion report is based was supported by funds provided by the U. S. Department of the Interior, Office of Water Research and Technology as authorized under the Water Resources Research Act of 1964, Public Law 88-379, as amended

Florida Bay Science Program: a synthesis of research on Florida Bay

This report documents the progress made toward the objectives established in the Strategic Plan revised in 1997 for the agencies cooperating in the program. These objectives are expressed as five questions that organized the research on the Florida Bay ecosystem: Ecosystem History What was the Florida Bay ecosystem like 50, 100, and 150 years ago? Question 1—Physical Processes How and at what rates do storms, changing freshwater flows, sea level rise, and local evaporation and precipitation influence circulation and salinity patterns within Florida Bay and exchange between the bay and adjacent waters? Question 2—Nutrient Dynamics What is the relative importance of the influx of external nutrients and of internal nutrient cycling in determining the nutrient budget for Florida Bay? What mechanisms control the sources and sinks of the bay’s nutrients? Question 3—Plankton Blooms What regulates the onset, persistence, and fate of planktonic algal blooms in Florida Bay? Question 4—Seagrass Ecology What are the causes and mechanisms for the observed changes in the seagrass community of Florida Bay? What is the effect of changing salinity, light, and nutrient regimes on these communities? Question 5—Higher Trophic Levels What is the relationship between environmental and habitat change and the recruitment, growth, and survivorship of animals in Florida Bay? Each question examines different characteristics of the Florida Bay ecosystem and the relation of these to the geomorphological setting of the bay and to processes linking the bay with adjacent systems and driving change.This report also examines the additional question of what changes have occurred in Florida Bay over the past 150 years

The Politics of Hydroelectric Power in Alaska: Rampart and Devil Canyon -- A Case Study

Originally published January 1978, revised October 1978. OWRT Agreement No. 14-34-0001-7003 Project No. A-060-ALAS. Completion Report.Hydroelectric power in Alaska has had a curious history--and an instructive one. This study focuses on three separate projects: Eklutna, Rampart, and Devil Canyon. The Eklutna project functions today; Rampart was not constructed; and the Devil Canyon project is still in the planning stage. Yet for all their differences in location, goals, and fate, the projects were related; and, taken together, their histories highlight all the essential political elements involved in hydroelectric power construction. There is still a fourth project which is functioning today--the Snettisham installation near Juneau which is not considered in this paper. A complex decision-making process determines the progress of such large projects. In following these three Alaskan projects, we can gain a better perspective on the roles of the several government agencies and the public; thus we can assess some of the inherent complexities. Such an assessment fully substantiates the conclusion that it takes more than moving dirt to build a dam.The work upon which this completion report is based was supported by funds provided by the U. S. Department of the Interior, Office of Water Research and Technology as authorized under the Water Resources Research Act of 1964, Public Law 88-379, as amended