Smallholder Household Maize Production and Marketing Behavior in Zambia: Implications for Policy

CSO/MACO nationally-representative rural surveys provide important insights on smallholder crop marketing behavior from the 2001 and 2004 harvests. Only about 25 percent of smallholder farmers in Zambia sold maize in both seasons, and about 15-20 percent of smallholders sold fresh horticulture as well as groundnuts, with 11-13 percent selling cassava. From 6-10 percent of farmers produced and sold cotton. Overall, Zambian smallholder agriculture has become more diversified over the past decade, with maize, cassava, groundnuts, cotton, horticultural crops, and animal products all becoming important sources of cash revenue as well as production for home consumption (except, of course, cotton). Importantly in both seasons studied, horticulture crop sales are roughly equivalent to the value of maize sales nationwide There is substantial variation in farm income and off-farm income across small farm households, owing to disparities in landholding size, other productive assets, and variables affecting access to markets. Two percent of all smallholder farms nationwide accounted for over 40% of all the maize sold by smallholder households in Zambia in 2000/01 and 2003/04. This same two percent of smallholder households also accounted for about 17% and 20% of the total value of all crop sales of the smallholder sector. Poverty reduction policy options are severely constrained by these production and marketing patterns especially if operating though programs that raise market prices for sellers and buyers.food security, food policy, Zambia, maize, production, marketing, Crop Production/Industries, Q20,

Constraining the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure through the Federalism Canons of Statutory Interpretation

The doctrine for deciding when to apply the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure to state claims heard in federal court has become a quagmire of exceptions and ephemeral distinctions, in large measure due to the persistent difficulty courts have in separating substantive rules from procedural ones in an era where special procedural rules are often used as an essential regulatory tool in state governance. This article examines the power of Federal Rules of Civil Procedure to displace contrary state law in diversity cases by focusing on the limited functional competence of the Supreme Court and its Advisory Committee to displace state policymaking decisions through the federal rulemaking process. It demonstrates that applying canons of statutory construction to the Rules Enabling Act that focus upon congressional intent and the political safeguards of federalism reveals the narrowness of the federal rulemaking power in the Enabling Act. It argues that reading the Enabling Act through a presumption against preemption and “clear statement” rules resonates with the core principles underlying the modern understanding of Erie Railroad Co. v. Tompkins. This article concludes that the Court has no power under the Enabling Act to undermine state policymaking in areas left by Congress to the states that fall within the states’ historic police powers, regardless whether the Rules themselves only purport to regulate procedural matters within the federal courts. In areas within the states’ police power to regulate the general welfare, where Congress has left regulation to the states and the states have chosen to use the litigation process itself to shape social, economic, or political goals, the states’ policies should prevail over the Federal Rules in diversity cases heard in federal court, even though the manner the states have used to effect such governance might conflict with the Federal Rules

\u27Rogue States\u27 Within American Borders: Remedying State Noncompliance with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights

Nearly a decade after the United States ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the treaty\u27s implementation is incomplete. A complex maze of reservations, understandings, and declarations has hindered domestic implementation, as has Congress \u27s failure to pass national implementing legislation. Almost every state in the Union has laws that violate the Covenant. For example, the treaty requires that in criminal matters, juveniles must be tried in a manner that takes account of their age. Nevertheless, California and many other states frequently treat minors as adults in such matters. Because the Senate declared the treaty to be non-self-executing, the question arises whether there is any legal remedy for state breaches of this U.S. treaty obligation. The Supremacy Clause exclusively regulates the relationship between treaties and states. Nothing in the Supremacy Clause requires congressional implementation of a treaty in order for that treaty to supersede state law. Congress\u27s failure to implement the treaty merely displaces the primary burden of enforcement to the states. The Senate\u27s declaration that the Covenant shall not be self-executing in no way diminishes state courts\u27 duty to enforce the treaty. Though the declaration may limit the federal courts\u27 ability to recognize private rights of action based on the treaty, federal courts have demonstrated an increasing willingness to entertain claims to treaty rights asserted against the government. Both state and federal courts have the power to bring wayward state laws into compliance with the Covenant\u27s obligation

Morphing Case Boundaries in Multidistrict Litigation Settlements

The boundaries of federal multidistrict litigation (MDL) are blurring, as district courts seek innovative ways to facilitate global settlements to resolve multzjurisdictional, multidimensional, national mass torts. The techniques emerging from the district courts have mostly evaded appellate review and received little scholarly attention, but they raise important challenges to traditional understandings of the nature of MDL and complex litigation. This Article argues that factually similar cases proceeding in multiple court systems in mass tort disputes create a \u27\u27federalism problem for global settlements: global settlements typically benefit from oversight by a single judge, but often there is no single judge who can exercise control over all the parties who might participate in such a settlement. This Article identifies a trend emerging in MDL settlements that attempts to solve the federalism problem by extending the MDL court\u27s authority. Jn the settlement phase, some MDL judges have begun experimenting with the exercise of power over state litigants (and even individuals who made private claims but never filed suit in any court), in order to facilitate global settlements. In this situation, the case appears to encompass the national mass tort settlement itself. This Article concludes that the aggregative trend toward transjurisdictional settlement authority in MDL has no basis in the MDL statute. The emerging practice submerges the federalism problem into the settlement agreement without regard to the inherent limitations on the federal court\u27s structural power, but the federalism problem remains unsolved

Parens Patriae and the States\u27 Historic Police Power

Class actions have long been contracting as procedural vehicles in mass tort litigation. At the same time, parens patriae actions brought by state attorneys general for injuries to their state’s citizenry have been expanding. This form of public dispute has emerged as a full-fledged alternative form of aggregate litigation in mass torts. The use of this public alternative is already widespread in consumer, antitrust, environmental, and health law cases. Despite the widespread use of parens patriae litigation by states, the source of the power to sue in this way is vague and ill-defined. Courts have struggled to articulate and explain the source and scope of the state’s power to bring mass tort suits for injuries to the state’s populace, sometimes reaching seemingly contradictory results. Although the use of parens patriae power in mass tort litigation has been both praised and criticized by complex litigation scholars, commentators have largely overlooked the historical and constitutional functional role of parens patriae litigation. This Article fills that gap by examining the states’ parens patriae power from the Framing to the modern era excavate the doctrine’s historical roots and purpose in our constitutional structure. It debunks the false history used by modern courts to justify the doctrine’s existence, suggesting courts have relied on a faulty foundation to expand the doctrine. In so doing, this Article makes space for a new foundation for parens patriae litigation rooted in the historic police powers of the states. The Article argues that the historic police powers of the states are inextricable from parens patriae power. Modern mass tort litigation brought by states is thus deeply connected to federalism in a way that traditional class actions are not

Restoration-oriented stressors of bereavement

Background and objectives: The Dual Process Model of Coping with Bereavement holds that bereaved people who respond flexibly to loss-oriented stressors (i.e., relating to the loss; to the deceased person) and restoration-oriented stressors (i.e., secondary to loss; daily-life changes, taking on new roles) adapt better to bereavement. Despite growing interest in the Dual Process Model, systematic analyses of the prevalence, characteristics, and correlates of restoration-oriented stressors are lacking. Therefore, we aimed to chart restoration-oriented stressors and their relationship with post-loss adaptation. Design and methods: A community sample of 181 bereaved adults (63% women) completed the 20-item expert-construed Restoration-Oriented Stressors Inventory (ROSI) and questionnaires assessing background characteristics, worry, and prolonged grief and depression symptoms. Results: Main findings were that younger people, and those who lost a parent, partner, or child (vs. other relationship) experienced more restoration-oriented stressors and appraised these as more stressful. Stressors’ perceived stressfulness, but not their quantity, related positively to worry. Perceived stressfulness predicted prolonged grief and depression symptoms beyond background characteristics, worry, and the number of stressors. Conclusion: Restoration-oriented stressors and their appraisal vary and relate to coping and post-loss mental health. Future research should clarify temporal interrelations between stressors, coping mechanisms, and outcomes

Paper Session I-C - Robotics for Interstellar Missions

This paper discusses the requirements for robotics in future interstellar missions and describes the various robotic development activities at NASA KSC that are laying the basis for the robotics of the future. The first longduration interstellar missions, which might occur at the end of the 21 st century, would probably be preceded by trips to outer planets in the Solar System and by near-Solar interstellar probe missions. The time span, dangers, and uncertainties involved would almost certainly decree that the first missions be unmanned. If an interstellar mission involved a surface landing, all initial exploration would be performed by robots or other autonomous devices. These robots of the next century must possess true autonomy: onboard intelligence; sensor systems to provide information on the visual scene, temperature, radiation, task forces, and torques; stable locomotion; self-maintenance and repair capabilities; and so on. The varied sensor data must be integrated into an intelligent understanding of the environment to support decisions concerning that environment—for example, avoiding collisions or other dangers, or selecting areas of interest for exploration. The capability to store and transmit data, and to modify behavior based on experience, would also be required. Many of these capabilities are in their infancy today. However, NASA is expanding the state-of-the-art of robotics in directions which, while supporting near-term endeavors, will eventually lay the necessary foundation for the interstellar missions of the next century. For instance, the NASA KSC robotics program is making very meaningful contributions in areas of robot mobility, collision avoidance, vision systems, and special endeffectors. One example of this activity concerns the KSC Thermal Protection System robot, which provides an autonomous mobile platform and special end-effectors and vision systems for navigation, inspection, and positioning tasks. The robot can also store task data for downloading at a later date. Other developments at KSC include special mechanisms and controls for robotic space vehicle cleaning and component inspection, and the development of self-diagnostics for automated systems. In summary, while we are presently a long way from achieving the robotics capabilities to support interstellar missions, present-day robotics development activities at KSC and at other NASA centers are laying the groundwork for these exciting future endeavors

The Sensitivity and Specificity of Markers for Event Times

The statistical literature on assessing the accuracy of risk factors or disease markers as diagnostic tests deals almost exclusively with settings where the test, Y, is measured concurrently with disease status D. In practice, however, disease status may vary over time and there is often a time lag between when the marker is measured and the occurrence of disease. One example concerns the Framingham Risk Score as a marker for the future risk of cardiovascular events, events that occur after the score is ascertained. To evaluate such a marker, one needs to take the time lag into account since the accuracy may be higher when the marker is measured closer to the time of disease occurrence. We therefore consider inference for sensitivity and specificity functions that are defined as functions of time. Semi-parametric regression models are proposed. Data from a cohort study are used to estimate model parameters. One issue that arises in practice is that event times may be censored. In this research, we extend the work by Leisenring, Pepe and Longton (1997) that dealt only with binary tests, parametric models to continuous tests, semi-parametric models and censored data. Asymptotic distribution theory for parameter estimates is produced and procedures for making statistical inference are evaluated with simulation studies. We illustrate our methods with a dataset from the Cardiovascular Health Study, relating the Framingham risk score measured at enrollment to subsequent risk of cardiovascular events

Some Implicit Presuppositions of Typical Writings in the Field of American Intellectual History

This paper reports a study made of some of the implicit presuppositions contained in the following materials: The Federalist, papers 10 and 51 by Madison, selections from de Tocqueville's Democracy in America; Emerson's "The American Scholar"; Melville's "Bartleby the Scrivener"; "Washington as Commander in Chief” in Bancroft's History of the United States; and "A Small Group of Men Hold in their hands the Business of this Country," a Senate speech by Robert M. LaFollette, Fifteen students at the Claremont Graduate School, who had taken a course in which these materials were studied, rated them on seven scales, or "dimensions, " each of which represents one of a contrasting pair of implicit presuppositions which we have identified and defined. At 19 of the 42 choice points at which decisions had to be made (six selections on seven dimensions) the ratings proved to be significant at p < .05 level. These results thus expand the "scope" of our set of implicit presuppositions to include new materials not previously investigated. In short, it has been shown that readers who are guided by our definitions are able to agree on some of the implicit assumptions contained in a representative sample of writings in the field of American intellectual history