Editor's Note, Padraig O’Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

Such is the unpredictability of Trump’s streaming executive orders that much of what I write may be irrelevant by the time this issue of the New England Journal of Public Policy goes to press. But the articles in this issue will not lose their pertinence, no matter what the administration does. Indeed, given its predilection for “alternative facts,” they assume a greater relevance and consequential significance.

This issue of the journal has three parts. The first part had its origins in a conference on extremism held at the Center for Study of Intractable Conflicts (CRIC), Harris Manchester College Oxford in …

A Policy-Oriented Framework For Understanding Violent Extremism, Wael Haddara

New England Journal of Public Policy

Violent extremism represents a serious challenge to open and democratic societies. This article presents a framework for understanding violent extremism in the context of “lone-wolf” attacks in Western societies. The framework combines social, political, and psychological factors and highlights the importance of integrating the available evidence from multiple disciplines to develop cogent, effective policy. Specifically, in addition to a broad survey of motivational factors, the article draws on terror management theory to provide insight into the interaction between religiosity and violence.

Counterextremism programs are most successful at mitigating the risk of violence when they are focused on behavior, rather than …

What Is The Colombian Peace Process Teaching The World?, Andrés Ucrós Maldonado

New England Journal of Public Policy

For more than five decades Colombia has suffered a relentless and devastating war that has taken a greater toll than that of many major wars around the world. For the past four years the Colombian government and the left-wing guerrilla Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia–People’s Army (FARC-EP) have been engaged in peace talks with the aim of putting an end to the armed struggle. During the negotiation, the two parties have developed innovative strategies and techniques that are informing debates on security, human rights, peace making, peace building, and international law at the regional and global levels. The aim of …

Israel And Palestine: The Demise Of The Two-State Solution, Padraig O’Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

A two-state solution to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, with a Palestinian state along the lines of the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital, the “mandated” settlement for decades, is no longer either a viable outcome or one that can be implemented. In the past fifty years, the “facts on the ground” have changed, but, perhaps more important, so too have “facts in the mind.” The geopolitical landscape in the Middle East bears little resemblance to “facts” back to 1967. The context of negotiations has changed at least four times: first, after Gaza’s spin-off in 2006; second, after the Gaza …

Geographies Of Absence: Radicalization And The Shaping Of The New Syrian Territoriality, Omar Abdulaziz Hallaj

New England Journal of Public Policy

In November 2015, the United States and the Russian Federation convened the main international stakeholders engaged in the Syrian conflict to broker the Vienna Accords. The unfolding political process culminated in the issuing of UN Security Council Resolution 2254. Since then the situation has evolved rapidly, ushering in a new outlook for the resolution of the six-year-old civil war. The conflicting parties in Syria have not yet fathomed the momentum of this deal. Some progress has been made as part of successive attempts to establish a “cessation of hostilities,” but there have not yet been any major breakthroughs because the …

The Search For Meaning: Survivors’ Children And Their Choice Of A Life In The Law, Rose Zoltek-Jick

New England Journal of Public Policy

Rose Zoltek-Jick is an associate teaching professor and the associate director of the Civil Rights and Restorative Justice Project at Northeastern University School of Law, Boston. She delivered the following talk in Boston on January 23, 2017, during Northeastern’s annual Holocaust Awareness Week.

Inclusiveness, Foresight, And Decisiveness: The Practical Wisdom Of Barrier-Crossing Leaders, Michael A. Cowan

New England Journal of Public Policy

This article previews a study under way to compare and contrast the attitudes, thinking, and action of leaders around the world who manage to bridge social divisions in their respective locales with those who work within their own groups. After briefly describing the planned assessment of their forms of social cohesion and empathy, the article examines the practical wisdom of effective actors in the social world and how it contrasts with academic knowledge for insight into how wise practitioners think about what they are doing. It also looks at the history of the conception of practical wisdom. Finally, examples of …

Cpaf Updates Vol. 18 No. 2, Ruth Anne T. Ruelos, Stella Concepcion R. Britanico

CPAf Updates

In this issue:

• CRDES 2 project conducts CFS graduation in Camarines Sur, 1
• 86 farmers graduate in the CFS in Masbate, 2
• CPAf staff present papers in an international conference on food and agriculture, 3
• KMO conducts series of learning events, 4

How & Why The Arkansas Parental Empowerment For Education Choice Act Of 2017 (Hb 1222) Saves The State Money, Patrick J. Wolf, Julie R. Trivitt, Corey A. Deangelis

School Choice Demonstration Project

The Education Savings Account (ESA) Program created by HB 1222 would save the state money because officials at the Department of Finance & Administration have to follow state law.

How Hb 1222 Would Save Arkansas Money, Patrick J. Wolf, Julie R. Trivitt, Corey A. Deangelis

School Choice Demonstration Project

Private school choice programs have a positive fiscal impact on states because the amount of state money spent on a child in the program, or the amount of state revenue foregone in the case of tax-credit funding, is less than the state would pay if the student attended a public school.

Alice Paul Awards For Women Who Have Worked To Confront Men's Violence Against Women, Robert Brannon

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

No abstract provided.

Access To Taxicabs For Unbanked Households: An Exploratory Analysis In New York City, David A. King, Juan Francisco Saldarriaga

Journal of Public Transportation

Taxicabs are critical complements to public transit systems. In New York City, ubiquitous yellow cabs are as iconic as the city’s subway system, and the city recently added green taxicabs to improve taxi service in areas outside of the Central Business Districts and airports. In this paper, we used multiple datasets to explore taxicab fare payments by neighborhood and examine how paid taxicab fares are associated with use of conventional banking services. There are clear spatial dimensions of the propensity of riders to pay cash, and we found that both immigrant status and being “unbanked” are strong predictors of cash …

Identifying Key Factors Of Rail Transit Service Quality: An Empirical Analysis For Istanbul, Erkan Isikli, Nezir Aydin, Erkan Celik, Alev Taskin Gumus

Journal of Public Transportation

Providing a high quality of service in public transportation is essential to reduce dissatisfactions stemming from traffic congestion and noise. Public transport providers need to find ways to dilute the effects of immoderate use of private cars in big cities while maintaining a sufficient level of customer satisfaction. This study aimed to identify the key service quality (SQ) factors that drive passenger satisfaction in Istanbul’s rail transit (RT) system using data obtained from an extensive survey conducted by the Istanbul Public Transportation Co. A total of 11,116 passengers who used rail transport from May 15–June 3, 2012, and June 17–July …

State Fiscal Impact Of The Succeed Scholarship Program 2016-2017, Julie R. Trivitt, Corey A. Deangelis

School Choice Demonstration Project

This report will address the fiscal impact of the SSP for the 2016-17 school year, the first year the program is available for students. As of February 2017 there were 22 students from 13 districts using the program to attend one of the 17 accredited private schools currently participating in the program. For 20 of the students we know which public school district he/she attended in 2015-16. All students must be attending a public school, relocating from out of state, or be members of an active duty military family in order to participate in the program. To estimate the fiscal …

2016 Elder Economic Security Standard Index™ For Boston, Yang Li, Ping Xu, Jan Mutchler, Center For Social And Demographic Research On Aging, University Of Massachusetts Boston

Center for Social and Demographic Research on Aging Publications

The Elder Economic Security Standard^TM Index (Elder Index) is a measure of the cost of living for older adults age 65 or older living independently in today's economy. The Elder Index defines economic security as the income level at which elders are able to cover basic and necessary living expenses and age in their homes, without relying on benefit programs, loans or gifts. The Elder Index defines an “economic security gap” as having incomes between the Federal Poverty Line and the Elder Index. Older adults living “in the gap” have incomes too high to qualify for many means-tested public …

The East China Sea In Dod China Military Power Reports, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Scholarship and Research

The National Defense Authorization Act of 2000 saw Congress require the Department of Defense (DOD) to prepare an annual report on Chinese military power. This report contains classified and unclassified editions. Documenting Chinese military developments, strategy, and trends are critical parts of these reports. Beijing’s military activities in the East China Sea (ECS) are important report components. This work explains the importance of these and other DOD reports for those studying ECS developments, examines how DOD has documented Beijing’s military activities within these publicly accessible reports, and describes how members of Congress have reacted to ECS developments during the Obama …

The Torch (February 2017), Brandon Baldwin

Torch: The Civil Rights Team Project Newsletter

Civic and Community Engagement | Civil Rights and Discrimination | Education | Gender and Sexuality | Inequality and Stratification | Politics and Social Change | Public Policy | Race and Ethnicity

Recommended Citation

Baldwin, Brandon and Civil Rights Team Project, "Torch (August 2013)" (2013). Torch: The Civil Rights Team Project Newsletter. 58. http://digitalcommons.usm.maine.edu/torch/58

Oregon’S Looming “Tecc” Challenge: The Imminent Rise Of “Total Employer Costs Of Compensation” For Oregon Local Government, Portland State University. Hatfield School Of Government. Center For Public Service, Phil Keisling

Center for Public Service Publications and Reports

Driven largely by dramatic increases in Oregon Public Employee Retirement System (PERS) costs, Oregon’s local governments face historically unprecedented increases in their “Total Employer Costs of Compensation,” or “TECC costs.” Even with 3% annual growth in general fund revenues under Oregon’s strict, voter‐passed property tax limits, the resulting budget squeeze could force reductions of 10% or more in the number of public employees who provide key public services – from police and fire/emergency medical protection to education, health care, and infrastructure maintenance.

The Impact Of Parents Having Health Insurance On Their Children’S Health Care, Andrea Bennett

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Capstones

Abstract of the Dissertation

This study examines the impact of parents having health insurance on their children’s health care in Kentucky. Child health insurance status and child a usual source of medical care are the two health care measures analyzed. The author builds on prior research that indicated more children would become insured if parents had access to affordable health insurance options. Through the implementation of the ACA in 2014, Kentucky expanded Medicaid eligibility to low-income adults up to 138% of the federal poverty level (FPL) and offered discounts on private health insurance plans for families in certain income thresholds …

An Initial Study Into Mine Action And Improvised Explosive Devices, Gichd

Global CWD Repository

Improvised explosive devices (IEDs) present significant risks to mine action (MA) operators and the programmes within which they work. Such risks can be managed through well-informed risk identification and assessment, the avoidance of some activities, and the procurement/development of the necessary skills, equipment and procedures to address others.

This study focuses primarily on improvised devices of the types that are currently encountered by MA organisations during humanitarian operations. The use of IEDs for terrorist purposes or as part of active conflict is not addressed in this study. While it is recognised that MA organisations may be present in places where …