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Inspired by recent controversial instances of excessive force by police across the country, we examine the variation in the use of video cameras worn by patrol officers across large U.S. municipal police departments. We test a conflict theory based perspective centered on the role of economic threat as well as an alternative set of factors that attribute decisions to implement body cameras to public reactions to police killings and police reactions to community violence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The number of wrongful criminal convictions has increased over the past decade. These cases erode public confidence in the criminal justice system and trust in the rule of law. Many states have adopted laws that aim to reduce system errors but no study has examined why some states appear more willing to provide due process protections against wrongful convictions than others. Findings from regression estimates suggest that states with a Republican controlled legislature are less likely to pass these laws while the presence of advocacy organizations that are part of the 'innocence movement' make legislative change more likely. We thus identify important differences in the political and social context between U.S. states that influence the adoption of criminal justice policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the punishment of juvenile offenders has increasingly become an issue of major concern to the public, there are few studies that test the government's coercive response to offending by this particular group. This study addresses this issue by examining the variation in the willingness of courts in U.S. states to adjudicate juvenile offenders in the adult criminal courts and sentence them to adult correctional facilities. I use pooled time-series negative binomial regression to analyze raw counts of juveniles admitted to adult prisons from 1983 to 2001. Results consistently show that states with larger minority populations admit more juvenile offenders to prisons but that states with a very large African American population send fewer of these offenders to prison. The findings also show that differences in the ideological climate of each state are a strong predictor of the variation in adult sanctions for minors. Additional evidence shows that states where judges must run in an election to gain their seats and states where judges have shorter terms proscribe more severe sanctions on juvenile offenders by sentencing more of them to adult prisons. Overall, the results suggest that race and politics play a very strong role in the sentencing of juvenile offenders to adult prisons. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researchers who study police strength in U.S. jurisdictions have found direct relationships between police strength and racial cleavages as well as between economic inequality and the capacity of police forces. Yet empirical evidence about this relationship in more recent years has not been a common topic of study. Research on the relationship between political explanations and police strength has also been scarce. We explore these theoretical issues by looking at the factors that determine the amount of law enforcement personnel in U.S. cities in 1980 and 1990. Findings suggest that both economic inequality and racial threat are important predictors of police strength, but race matters more in 1990. Additional indicators of conflict including unemployment are strong predictors for more police. Finally, violent crime does not produce more police but the disorder produced by high numbers of alcohol vendors has a positive effect on per capita police. These results suggest that multiple explanations are necessary to explain this form of social control at the city level, and that politically-based conflict explanations in particular should be considered. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Existing research on movement policy impact relies on researcher-defined measures of relevant policy. Movements, however, have their own legislative policy agenda, which is central to their own definitions of movement success. We use time-series analysis of the percent of legislative victories in the U.S. House and Senate as gauged by the National Scorecards of the League of Conservation Voters for 1970-2000. Movement appearances at Congressional hearings and organizational founding along with favorable public opinion are critical to victories on this environmental agenda. In the House, the effects of public opinion are magnified by economic security and the Senate responds to air pollution and strong northern Democratic power. Protest has no effect, suggesting that progress on the movement's core legislative agenda is largely driven by organization-building and institutional advocacy. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social movement organizational studies have primarily relied on the analysis of one source. Recently study showed the use of one source was inadequate to study the population of environmental groups at the state level. This raises questions regarding the use of single sources for the study of national and international social movement organizations. A single source that has become a standard for social movement organization research is the Encyclopedia of Associations, however, we know of only one paper assessing the adequacy of the EofA's coverage of movement organizations. Overall, an important component in the analysis of social movements is the adequacy and reliability of the data utilized. We need to know if multiple sources will result in a significant difference from the analyses based on a single source. To accomplish this, we used 155 sources (IRS data, directories, books, reports, proceedings, and web sources) to gather a comprehensive population data set of national and regional U.S. environmental organizations over a 100-year time-series. The purpose of this paper is to describe the methods used in this analysis. Our research and methods revealed that the use of a single source, such as the EofA, is significantly insufficient for studying the U.S. environmental movement population. Multiple sources are needed, including the web and IRS data files, in order to capture a representative population. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Between the 19th century and the mid 20th century, the environmental movement transformed American culture, forcing a rethinking of the "Manifest Destiny" ideology that had dominated political thinking towards an understanding of the need to protect and preserve the natural environment. What drove this growth of the environmental movement? Using the data of the GreenMoney Project, we examine a 100-year time-series of environmental movement organization (EMO) foundings, showing that, in addition to the "legitimation-and-competition" effects of organizational density, EMO founding are facilitated by economic affluence, the discourse-creative activities of critical communities, objective threats in terms of air pollution, and alienation from the political system based on 3rd party Presidential voting and unemployment. Powerful political allies and elite divisions do not play a significant role. Environmental mobilization needs to be understood in terms of the creation of new discursive frames that identify environmental problems, objective environmental threats, the resources that allow political entrepreneurs to launch new EMOs, and the political alienation that energizes environmental activists and creates popular concern about the environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Capital punishment is the most severe criminal penalty, yet little is known about the political factors that produce jurisdictional differences in the imposition of the death sentence. Political accounts emphasize racial politics, conservative values, the strength of relatively conservative parties, and whether trial court judges must stand for election. The findings show that racial threat, conservative religious values, and judicial elections produce greater numbers of death sentences. A period specific interaction term shows that conservative political ideology matters after the Supreme Court increased the political prominence of this penalty. While states with the most African Americans were more likely to use this sentence, the presence of larger Hispanic populations has no effect. The findings confirm recent theoretical perspectives that stress the political nature of punishment as they suggest that racial politics and conservative values explain death sentence frequencies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Does the activity of social movement groups or public sentiment have an impact on legislative outcomes? Do the sentiments of the public influence these outcomes? A longstanding debate has existed in both the Political Science and Sociology literature as to how influential social movement lobbying activities and public opinion are on legislative outcomes. While some theories of democracy state that public sentiment and interest group activity should be significant drivers of legislative behavior few empirical studies have attempted to examine this relationship closely. The present study uses indicators of social movement activity, public opinion, partisanship and other important factors to determine the impact they may have on legislative voting. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]