bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Developmental and Life-Course Findings on Women and Girls
Authors: Broidy Lisa M. , Thompson Carleen M.
Published: December 2018

This chapter builds on theoretical insights from the gendered pathways literature to interpret the evidence regarding the influence of gender on life-course offending patterns. It summarizes the key theoretical models explaining female offending and highlights what should be the central theoretical principles that guide research on gender and life-course offending patterns. The chapter then describes the most prominent life-course offending patterns, how females sort into these patterns, what we know about the relevant correlates, and how these vary across gender. In each instance the chapter also applies core theoretical principles to help make sense of evident patterns. This chapter concludes with a call for more research on the theoretical mechanisms that might account for life-course patterns of female offending and the ways in which these patterns diverge from those evidenced by males.
Acceleration, Deceleration, Escalation, and De-escalation
Authors: Jennings Wesley G. , Fox Bryanna Hahn
Published: December 2018

This chapter examines two patterns of change seen in individual offending behaviors at certain times and ages: acceleration or deceleration and escalation or de-escalation. In order to answer the questions regarding the age–crime curve and its applicability to the criminal careers of specific individuals, the prevalence of offending in the population and the frequency of offending within individual criminal careers must be examined through these patterns. Hence, the chapter begins with a brief review of the origin of the criminal career paradigm and a description of its various parameters. It then discusses both static and dynamic developmental and life-course theories of crime before providing a more in-depth discussion of acceleration/deceleration and escalation/de-escalation as it relates to a criminal career, respectively. Finally, this chapter concludes by offering directions for future research on these topics.
The Developmental Taxonomy
Authors: McGee Tara Renae , Moffitt Terrie E.
Published: December 2018

This chapter considers whether the peak in the age–crime curve is a function of active offenders committing more crime during adolescence or a function of more individuals actively offending in the peak years. It discusses the two main and most empirically tested typological groupings: the life-course persistent group and the adolescence limited group. The chapter then reviews the evidence on a theoretically interesting grouping: those who abstain from antisocial and offending behavior. It focuses on the debate regarding whether those who were originally thought to recover from early-onset antisocial behavior have childhood-limited antisocial behavior or exhibit low-level chronic antisocial behavior across the life course. Finally, the chapter discusses how the theory it introduces accounts for adult-onset offending and considers whether there are gender differences that need to be accounted for by the theory.
Studying Networked Communication in the Middle East
Authors: Borge-Holthoefer Javier , Hussain Muzammil M. , Weber Ingmar
Published: December 2018

Digital infrastructure has been rapidly embraced in the Arab Middle East and North Africa in the last decade, opening a unique window for computational social science and network data science scholars. However, there are currently two coexisting social and economic realities in the region, which result in very different usages and dynamics of networked communication: countries with chronic civil unrest in which digital media have largely served as mobilization tools (e.g., Tunisia, Egypt), and relatively stable and wealthy societies that face social change and economic hyper-development (e.g., Qatar, Kuwait). Given such diversity across the region, how and why should social scientists study digital networks in the Middle East? What can digital networks teach us about the social and political aspects of the modern Middle East? In sum, while claims about digital technologies’ impacts across the region have been critiqued for being speculative and overblown, we suggest that digital technologies have instead broadened our ability to understand ongoing transformations among Arab states and societies.
IPO Market Conditions and Timing over the Long Run
Authors: Yung Chris
Published: December 2018

This chapter examines the determinants of IPO volume in four broad categories: (i) demand side, i.e. contemporaneous investment opportunities; (ii) supply side, reflecting time-varying entrepreneurial diversification incentives; (iii) time-varying overall mispricing; and (iv) strategic pooling of low quality issuers with high-quality issuers. Our evidence is inconsistent with the second and third channels. Time-varying risk does not appear to drive the entrepreneurial decision to go public. While IPOs offer low average returns, there is little evidence that they are mispriced relative to similar public firms, either in the full sample or in hot markets. Instead, IPOs tend to cluster when actors in the economy more broadly are behaving as if investment opportunities are robust.
Survey and Synthesis of the IPO Underpricing Literature
Authors: Jones Steven , Yeoman John C.
Published: December 2018

This chapter surveys the vast literature on initial public offering (IPO) underpricing, focusing on the major theories of underpricing, along with the most relevant empirical findings. These theories, or explanations, are classified into those based on asymmetric information, agency conflicts, behavioral issues, share allocation targets, and institutional arrangements. This last classification has received little attention in the previous couple of decades, although the authors argue that the related fixed-offer price constraint, first proposed as an explanation by Ibbotson (1975), can explain a “core” level of underpricing equal to about one-half to two-thirds of that historically observed, while still assuming that issuing firms seek to maximize offering proceeds net of the spread. In addition, it provides a unifying framework for understanding how, and when, the other explanations can contribute to underpricing beyond this core level.
Survival of Initial Public Offerings on Europe’s New Stock Markets
Authors: Jiao Tao , Roosenboom Peter , Giudici Giancarlo
Published: December 2018

Nearly 20 competing new stock markets opened their doors in 12 Western European countries during 1995–2005. These stock markets copied the NASDAQ model, with low barriers to entry and tight disclosure rules, and had one common aim—to attract untested, early stage, innovative, and high-growth small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The main hypothesis of this chapter is that by setting the entry barriers too low, these new markets risked attracting too many low-quality firms, creating a “lemons problem” that negatively impacted the survival prospects of all firms listed on that market. The key finding is that the initial public offering (IPO) firm failure on six of these new stock markets is almost double the IPO firm failure on long-established official stock markets with more stringent listing requirements. The exception is the unregulated Alternative Investments Market, where firms have similar survival prospects compared to companies listing on London’s Official List.
IPOs in a Major Emerging Market Economy—India
Authors: Chakrabarti Rajesh
Published: December 2018

Given India’s growing importance as a major emerging market, understanding the initial public offering (IPO) market in India is important in itself for the global investor. In addition, by providing an institutional context that is largely similar to the US setting but different in a few small yet critical ways, as well as by changing the regulations related to IPO offerings, the Indian IPO market provides a testing ground for broader finance questions. Over the last couple of decades a growing body of empirical research has focused on the Indian IPO market with occasionally interesting findings. This chapter attempts an eclectic survey of this literature, stringing together a set of diverse inquiries relating to IPOs in India.
IPOs in New Zealand
Authors: Dang Huong , Jolly Michael
Published: December 2018

This chapter examines the performance of 96 initial public offerings (IPOs) listed on New Zealand Stock Exchange (NZSX) during the 25-year period from July 1991 to June 2015. The NZX Gross All Index and two portfolios of matched peers based on sector/industry and either sales forecast or book-to-market ratio are constructed as benchmarks. Compared with three benchmark portfolios, IPO firms outperform in the short term (one year) but underperform in the medium- and long-term investment horizons (three to five years). The authors conduct three subsample analyses to examine the association between differences in valuation multiples (E/P, EBITDA/EV, and P/S) and long-term returns. The findings are consistent with the general consensus of superior returns from value investments: IPOs with above-median earnings ratio (E/P and EBITDA/EV) and below-median P/S exhibit higher cumulative average return (CAR) than IPOs with below-median earnings ratio and above-median P/S.
Initial Public Offerings in Hong Kong
Authors: Lai Queenie
Published: December 2018

The Hong Kong Stock Exchange (HKEx) is one of the world’s leading exchanges for international capital raising. This chapter begins with an introduction to the historical trends and regulatory structure of Hong Kong equity capital markets. It discusses how the HKEx provides a platform for Mainland Chinese companies to seek an international listing and for international companies to gain exposure in the Mainland Chinese market. The chapter follows with a practical overview of the initial public offering (IPO) process in Hong Kong: from pre-IPO considerations to a listed company’s post-listing continuing obligations. Topics will be examined from a legal and regulatory perspective and include Main Board and GEM Board listing qualifications, listing methods, application process, role of sponsors, prospectus requirements, offering structure, post-listing continuing obligations, notifiable and connected transactions, corporate governance, and future directions of the HKEx.
Venture Capital and Financial Reporting in Newly Public Firms
Authors: Hass Lars Helge , Tarsalewska Monika
Published: December 2018

Financial intermediaries such as venture capitalists (VCs) not only provide financing, they also play an active role in firm governance and in financial practices before a firm goes public. Venture capitalists are actively engaged in monitoring and advising their portfolio firms. Thus, one also expects them to exert significant influence over the development of financial reporting practices. This chapter reviews recent literature and empirical evidence on VCs and financial reporting quality in newly public firms. It surveys the role of VCs in such activities as earnings management. In particular, it discusses how their monitoring activities and reputation can impact how their portfolio firms establish financial reporting practices. Subsequently, it also reviews the consequences of misreporting, and whether they affect VC behavior ex ante. Finally, the chapter uses recent data to provide empirical evidence on the effect of VCs on accrual and real earnings management.
The Admission and Regulation of Overseas Issuers
Authors: Yeung Horace
Published: December 2018

This chapter examines the potential discrepancies in the regulation applied to overseas issuers, as opposed to domestic issuers, of four leading financial centers. They are New York, London, Hong Kong, and Singapore. It consists of three substantive sections. The first section will reviews existing literature and empirical evidence concerning the motivations and current state of cross-listing. The second section examines the listing route for an overseas issuer and inquires how it might differ from a domestic listing in the host country. This chapter particularly concerns the potential discrepancies of rules between a foreign listing and a domestic listing and asks if those discrepancies would lead to better or inferior investor protection. The third section examines the continuing regulation of foreign-listed companies, reviewing some regulatory concerns involving cross-listed companies and discussing what can be done to curb the problems, for instance, through regulatory cooperation between home and host regulators.
The Dark Side of Venture Capital Syndication and IPO Firm Performance
Authors: Chahine Salim , Filatotchev Igor , Hoskisson Robert E. , Arthurs Jonathan D.
Published: December 2018

This chapter integrates agency research with an institutional perspective and investigates multiple agency conflicts in venture capital (VC) syndicates and their effect on stock-market performance of initial public offerings (IPOs) in the United States and the United Kingdom. Using a matched sample of 402 IPOs, the authors show that the size and diversity of a VC syndicate have a negative impact on performance, but this impact is higher in the United States. Ownership concentration within a syndicate improves performance, but this effect is stronger in the United Kingdom. Results indicate that the extent of multiple agency conflicts and their potential remedies are not universal and depend on formal and informal institutions.
Corporate Governance in European IPOs
Authors: Bertoni Fabio , Meoli Michelle , Vismara Silvio
Published: December 2018

Establishing effective corporate governance is most important at the time of an initial public offering (IPO), because the IPO represents a significant step by a company toward moving to the public arena. This chapter focuses on three characteristics that help describe structure of the board of directors at the time of IPO: board size (i.e., the number of members on a board), board independence (i.e., the proportion of non-executive members on the board), and board leadership (i.e., the choice to overlap the roles of CEO and chairman of the board). The chapter presents empirical evidence from a sample of 969 companies that went public between 1995 and 2011 in France, Germany, and Italy that shows how these companies differ from their US and UK counterparts.
The Underpricing of Initial Public Offerings and Private Placements of Equity in China
Authors: Dong Gang Nathan , Gu Ming
Published: December 2018

While the costs borne by firms in raising external capital through initial public offerings (IPOs) and seasoned equity offerings are well documented, the strategic role of IPO underpricing in the market for raising equity after the IPO remains largely unstudied, particularly in an international setting. In China publicly traded firms often issue post-IPO equity through private placements of equity (PEPs), rather than public offerings. This chapter examines the relationship between the pricing behavior of IPOs and the issuance choice of future PEPs. Do companies use IPO underpricing as a strategic precursor toward raising additional capital in future PEPs? If the success of initial offerings of equity can help improve the capital-raising capacity and reduce the issuance cost in subsequent offerings, high-quality firms will intentionally pursue a multiple-issue strategy by lowering the IPO offer price in order to raise more capital at a higher price in PEPs.
Private Capital Marketplaces and IPOs
Authors: Adhami Saman , Gianfrate Gianfranco , Soda Guiseppe
Published: December 2018

The possibility of issuance and resale of private securities was originally introduced in the United States by the Securities Act of 1933 but the nature of such securities made their trades costly and extremely rare. Over last few years, a series of regulatory changes has progressively made the trade of private securities issued by young companies easier and more efficient. This chapter notes that in this framework, and especially in response to the sharp decline in initial public offerings (IPOs) during the financial crisis, two ventures (namely SecondMarket and SharesPost) were pioneers in launching online exchanges for secondary, private securities. While not all start-ups are able to use such platforms to enhance their liquidity, the more mature ones—those that would have probably gone public otherwise—have generated enough trades to partly solve their financing needs. The emergence of private capital marketplaces raises several theoretical and empirical issues.
Human Rights
Authors: Forman Michael
Published: December 2018

Human rights is a way of articulating appeals for justice and aiming at the juridification of these claims. This chapter reconstructs the political theory of human rights to highlight how solutions to the crises it aims at addressing have been articulated in political theory and practice with the result that rights claims have been expanded from the early assertions of personal integrity, religious freedom, and property of a privileged minority to the demands for social, economic, and cultural rights of the victims of exploitation, imperialism, oppression, and exclusion. This chapter examines the notions of sovereignty that sit at the core of the idea, especially the tension between human rights and popular sovereignty, which can only be temporarily resolved in political practice. It argues that human rights, although incompletely realized, retains its appeal to movements everywhere because it is the best way of realizing justice claims in the context of modernity.
Glocalization
Authors: Khondker Habibul
Published: December 2018

This chapter provides a conceptual overview of glocalization, tracing its origin, and the intellectual milieu in which this concept evolved. It also examines how glocalization helps researchers understand the interpenetration of “global” with “local” in various institutions and everyday life. In explaining the relationship between the processes of globalization with glocalization, this chapter highlights the potential usefulness of this concept in global studies. It also introduces a distinction between a thin theory and a thick theory of globalization, arguing that glocalization is conceptually closer to the latter. The chapter posits that in order to understand the dynamics of the current phase of globalization, a top-down view of globalization may not be adequate, and that one also has to recognize the growing transglocal linkages portending the emergence of transglocalization, a new phase of globalization that may even contest the hegemony of the top-down, neoliberal globalization.
The Matter of Timbre
Authors: Villegas Vélez Daniel
Published: December 2018

This chapter offers a critique of traditional Western accounts of timbre to propose that, instead of a secondary parameter subordinated to pitch and rhythm, timbre is a general category—a condition of possibility for listening—that depends on embodied perception and makes difference audible. The chapter draws from phenomenology as well as psychoacoustic and ethnographic research, focusing on case studies ranging from Fatima Al Qadiri to Julius Eastman, alongside ethnographic analyses of Barundi Whispered Inanga, sonic encounters in nineteenth-century Colombia, and readings of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Eduard Hanslick, and Guido Adler, to provide a broader account of timbre that encompasses the imbrication of acoustic components with memory, affect, and language. In this respect, timbre emerges as an important critical and musicological category that helps us address issues of embodied difference and culturally dependent forms of listening, while reassessing the prominence of Eurocentric conceptions of musical values.
What Works in Participation
Authors: Paffenholz Thania
Published: December 2018

Despite the adoption of the landmark UN Security Council Resolution 1325 over fifteen years ago, women remain significantly underrepresented in peace and transition processes. This chapter analyses how and under which conditions the inclusion of women influences peace processes. It draws upon evidence-based comparative research findings, which show that increasing the number of women included in peace and transition processes does not per se increase the likelihood that more peace agreements are signed and implemented. Making women’s participation in peace and transition processes count is more important than merely counting the number of women included in such processes. This chapter suggests, therefore, that for the discursive shift toward meaningful participation to be seen in practice, peace negotiations need to be designed in a way that facilitates the engagement of women in leadership roles. Moreover, it concludes that substantive participation requires political and financial conditions that enable women to occupy leadership roles in the negotiation process.
WPS and the African Union
Authors: Haastrup Toni
Published: December 2018

This chapter critically explores how the African Union (AU) understands and interprets the global norms around gender and security found in the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) agenda. It shows how the WPS agenda is situated within the AU’s African Peace and Security Architecture (APSA) while taking into account the local/regional gender regime including regional action plans (RAPs). To do so, the chapter maps out ways in which gender intersects with security when global and local norms interact within a regional security institution. Drawing on a selection of case studies, this chapter demonstrates that there is now a well-established network of frameworks that embed WPS on the continent. It concludes that this has been informed by a certain understanding of feminism and a new pan-Africanist push via the AU and women’s movements on the continent. Indeed, the chapter highlights the adoption of National Action Plans (NAPs) in seventeen member states as one of the primary achievements of the AU women’s movement. This chapter thus offers a unique perspective on the regional institutionalization process of the WPS agenda.
WPS and the Organization of American States
Authors: Meyer McAleese Mary K.
Published: December 2018

At first glance, the Organization of American States (OAS) appears to have been slow to recognize and embrace the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) agenda, much less take concrete steps to implement it. The OAS is not clearly mentioned in the Global Study of UN Security Council Resolution 1325, and the resolution appears in very few OAS documents. This chapter demonstrates, however, that a closer look at the inter-American system indicates that important work is under way on the WPS agenda. Specifically, the OAS’s Inter-American Commission of Women has long been an important norm entrepreneur and protagonist in advancing women’s human rights and, more recently, in working to end violence against women in the Americas through the Convention of Belém do Pará. The complicated security challenges that the OAS must confront today (namely human trafficking) are highly gendered. This chapter argues, therefore, that going forward the global WPS agenda must be translated meaningfully and explicitly into national and local policies.
Scholarly Debates and Contested Meanings of WPS
Authors: Ní Aoláin Fionnuala , Valji Nahla
Published: December 2018

This chapter sets out some of the critiques that have emerged over the past decade with respect to the WPS agenda. It examines the theoretical accounts that highlight the conceptual and institutional limitations of WPS, specifically the centrality of the victimhood and protection dialogues in the promotion of the agenda. Moreover, this chapter examines the geographies where WPS has purchase, as well as the locations where it struggles to gain meaningful support. This chapter also explores the contributions of feminist institutionalism to the theory and practice of WPS. In doing so, it reveals a more nuanced understanding of the success and failure of WPS. We point to the importance of a layered understanding of how institutional actors advance this agenda or pose sizeable barriers to its success. Our analysis reveals that the limits of its practical success (or the complexity of the success that has been realized) underscore some of the broader conceptual and historical analysis.
WPS and Arms Trade Treaty
Authors: Acheson Ray , Butler Maria
Published: December 2018

The negotiation and adoption of the 2013 Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) made history by including a legally binding provision connecting the proliferation and use of weapons and the prevention of gender-based violence (GBV). The implementation of this treaty could potentially move forward both the prevention of conflict and GBV, and therefore the implementation of the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) agenda. However, recent efforts to advance this agenda continue to be stymied by political and economic interests, with global arms sales amounting to at least $80 billion. The WPS agenda and the ATT have overlapping aims and the potential to reinforce each other in promoting peace. Yet as this chapter suggests, both become meaningless at best, or counterproductive at worst, when employed to legitimize militarism and undermine peace and security. This chapter argues that the culture and political economy of militarism work against effective implementation of the ATT and WPS agenda. It suggests that successful implementation of the ATT and WPS agenda requires actors to constantly challenge the dominant norm of associating militancy with masculinity.
WPS and Climate Change
Authors: Kronsell Annica
Published: December 2018

Climate change can be violent, expressed through immediate weather events, such as floods and storms, and slower, long term violence, such as droughts that impact women’s everyday lives and livelihoods and are exacerbated by other pressures and conflicts. However, climate change has not been explicitly connected to the UN women, peace, and security agenda. The likely reason is that the gender implications of the climate issue have only recently gained salience on the international climate agenda, through the dominant framing of women’s vulnerability. This chapter evokes the ecofeminism argument that climate change is part of a destructive patriarchal politico-economic structure, which implies there can be no separate solution to concerns for peace, equality, or climate issues; all have to be included in a reassessment of humans’ relation to the earth. It suggests that the human security focus provides a more inclusive way to connect the aspirations for peace with climate concerns. To that end, I argue that employing the human security lens as a starting point can help in taking seriously how individual women experience the bottom-up the effects of climate events.
Networked Advocacy
Authors: Susskind Yifat , Duarte Diana
Published: December 2018

Women’s networked advocacy is a vital strategy for overcoming the exclusion of local civil society from the policymaking process. Networked advocacy provides activists at the global and local level with an opportunity to share knowledge. In doing so, it allows activists to maximize expertise, and it creates space for local civil society to participate in the development of policies and programs. Using the examples of national reconciliation processes in the Middle East and Latin America this chapter explores the strategies employed by activists to advocate for grass-roots participation and leadership. This chapter argues that networked advocacy facilitates a more inclusive reconciliation process, as it recognizes the positive contributions of local peace-builders and enables the participation of grass-roots women’s civil society. Given this, the chapter suggests that influential stakeholders who act as gatekeepers to formal reconciliation processes must recognize the power of these networks and mobilize resources and support to sustain them.
Peace and Security from a Feminist Perspective
Authors: Tickner J. Ann
Published: December 2018

Almost one hundred years ago women from both sides of World War I came together to design a postwar peace plan, the principles of which were remarkably similar to UN Security Council Resolution 1325. Since then, women activists have worked to place gender issues on the United Nations agenda. In the late 1980s, feminist international relations began to address peace and security from a gendered perspective. With this in mind, this chapter traces the history of the intersection between women’s activism and this emergent feminist scholarship. Feminists scholarship defines security as the physical and economic security of individuals as well as states. The scholars question the essentialist association of women and peace and advocate seeing women as agents in all aspects of peacemaking, positions that the international community is finally beginning to recognize. This chapter, as such, explores how feminist scholars have constructed knowledge that contributes to our understanding of the deeper reasons why women suffer particular physical and structural insecurities.
Moore’s Paradox and Assertion
Authors: Littlejohn Clayton
Published: December 2018

If I were to say, “Agnes does not know that it is raining, but it is,” this seems like a perfectly coherent way of describing Agnes’s epistemic position. If I were to add, “And I don’t know if it is, either,” this seems quite strange. In this chapter, we shall look at some statements that seem, in some sense, contradictory, even though it seems that these statements can express propositions that are contingently true or false. Moore thought it was paradoxical that statements that can express true propositions or contingently false propositions should nevertheless seem absurd like this. If we can account for the absurdity, we shall solve Moore’s Paradox. In this chapter, we shall look at Moore’s proposals and more recent discussions of Moorean absurd thought and speech.
School Accountability
Authors: Polikoff Morgan , Korn Shira
Published: December 2018

This chapter summarizes the history and effects of standards-based school accountability in the United States and offers suggestions for accountability policy moving forward. It analyzes standards-based accountability in both the No Child Left Behind Act and the Every Student Succeeds Act, and discusses the effects of accountability systems. The authors argue that school accountability systems can improve student achievement, but that unintended consequences are possible. How accountability systems are designed—the metrics and measures used and the consequences for performance—has both symbolic and practical implications for the efficacy of the system and the individuals affected. Synthesizing what is known about the design of school accountability systems, the authors propose policy choices that can improve the validity, reliability, transparency, and fairness of these systems.
Reproduction and Crisis in Capitalist Economies
Authors: Basu Deepankar
Published: December 2018

An economic crisis in capitalism is a deep and prolonged interruption of the economy-wide circuit of capital. Crises emerge from within the logic of capitalism’s operation, and are manifestations of the inherently contradictory process of capital accumulation. The Marxist tradition conceptualizes two types of crisis tendencies in capitalism: a crisis of deficient surplus value and a crisis of excess surplus value. Two mechanisms that become important in crises of deficient surplus value are the rising organic composition of capital and the profit squeeze: two mechanisms that are salient in crises of excess surplus value are problems of insufficient aggregate demand and increased financial fragility. This chapter offers a synthetic and synoptic account of the Marxist literature on capitalist crisis.
Metabolic Rifts and the Ecological Crisis
Authors: Clark Brett , Foster John Bellamy , Longo Stefano B.
Published: December 2018

In analyzing the relations between human societies and the larger biophysical world, Karl Marx employed a dialectical triadic scheme of “the universal metabolism of nature,” the “social metabolism,” and the metabolic rift. He incorporated this metabolic approach within his critique of political economy, allowing him to assess the historical interchanges and interpenetrations of society and ecological systems. Given its endless pursuit of accumulation, capitalism imposes its demands on nature, increasing pressures on ecological systems and the production of wastes. It generates distinct metabolic rifts (ruptures) in natural cycles and processes. Marx specifically developed this approach in his critique of capitalist agriculture, with regard to how this system created an ecological rift in the soil nutrient cycle. Contemporary scholarship has drawn upon this work to examine a broad array of ecological contradictions, which are culminating in an ecological crisis.
Fashion and Its Gendered Agendas
Authors: Mears Ashley
Published: December 2018

This chapter unpacks the multiple definitions of fashion as social process, status dynamic, practice, and industry. The chapter begins with an overview of the historical emergence and spread of fashion, mapping the changing associations of fashion from frivolity and femininity to major global industry and urban branding mechanism. To understand fashion as simultaneously a concept, behavior, and market, the chapter employs a gendered lens. Gender, as well as class, is central to understanding fashion from both lenses of consumption and production, illustrated with two cases of gendered fashion labor: women fashion models and their paradoxical wage gaps, and women workers in the garment industry.
Linking Environmental Sustainability and Consumption
Authors: Dewey Amanda M. , Fisher Dana R.
Published: December 2018

What is the connection between environmental sustainability and consumption? This chapter focuses on how consumption has been employed as a tactic for social change that is meant to improve the natural environment. Although consumption is a central way that society contributes to and responds to concern about environmental degradation, it has received limited attention in the research on sustainability thus far. This chapter focuses specifically on the ways that consumption has been addressed by researchers focusing on sustainability, paying particular attention to the environmental and environmental justice movements and the recent wave of contention in the Resistance, a political movement in the United States that is challenging the Trump administration and its policies, more specifically.
Sex Discrimination and the Transformation of U.S. Education
Authors: Buzuvis Erin E.
Published: December 2018

This chapter highlights the role of Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972 and the U.S. Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment in transforming the gendered landscape of U.S. education. After first providing an overview of these two sources of law, the chapter examines the role they have played in challenging sex-based designations in admissions and in the classroom, in promoting equal opportunity and access to school-sponsored athletics, in challenging sexual harassment and other sexual misconduct, in reducing barriers to LGBT students, and in promoting equal opportunity for students who are pregnant. Sections addressing each one of these topics will also note limitations and shortcomings of the law’s approach to these issues, as there is still more work to do to fully realize sex equality in education. While the law has not cured all the problems of sex discrimination education, owing to limitations in its scope, as well as enforceability, it has proven to be a powerful source of societal norms and expectations, which themselves operate to motivate compliance and beyond.
Unifying the Midbrain
Authors: Rees Adrian , Orton Llwyd D.
Published: December 2018

Commissural fibres interconnecting the two sides of the brain are found at several points along the auditory pathway, thus suggesting their fundamental importance for the analysis of sound. This chapter presents an overview of what is currently known about the anatomy, physiology, and behavioral influences of the commissure of the inferior colliculus (CoIC)—the most prominent brainstem auditory commissure—that reciprocally interconnects the principal nuclei of the auditory midbrain, the inferior colliculi (IC). The primary contribution to the CoIC originates from neurons projecting from one inferior colliculus to the other, with the dorsal cortex and central nucleus providing the most extensive connections. In addition, many ascending and descending auditory centers send projections to the IC via the CoIC, together with diverse sources located outside the classically defined auditory pathway. The degree of interconnection between the two ICs suggests they function as a single entity. Recent in vivo evidence has established that CoIC projections modulate the neural representation of sound frequency, level, and location in the IC, thus indicating an important role for the CoIC in auditory processing. However, there is limited evidence for the influence of the CoIC on auditory behavior. This, together with the diversity of sources projecting via the CoIC, suggest unknown roles that warrant further exploration.
The Medial Superior Olivary Nucleus
Authors: Grothe Benedikt , Leibold Christian , Pecka Michael
Published: December 2018

It doesn’t get any more precise than this: Neurons in the medial superior olive (MSO) in many mammals, including humans, are sensitive to temporal differences between their synaptic inputs of only a few microseconds. These neurons are the basis for our ability to resolve even a 5-μs disparity in the time of arrival of a sound at each ear. This capacity enables humans to discriminate between temporally overlapping sounds based on spatial segregation, as for instance, at a cocktail party or a poster session at a scientific conference. This chapter aims at providing a comprehensive summary on the current state of research regarding the MSO, ranging from cellular and circuit anatomy to subcellular and channel physiology to spatial coding and perception. Consequently, the chapter is subdivided according to these thematic aspects. Nonetheless, while such subdivisions are helpful for providing structure to the reader, they can also convey the inter-dependencies between these topics: for example, when studying the spatial sensitivity of MSO neurons on the mechanistic level, it is crucial to also consider its anatomical specializations (on the subcellular and circuit level), as well as corresponding perceptional phenomena. Finally, the chapter suggests a complete picture of the MSO only emerges by including evolutionary considerations, that is, the phylogenetic origin of the many fascinating specializations that can be observed within the MSO circuit.
Labor Market Institutions in the Gilded Age of American Economic History
Authors: Naidu Suresh , Yuchtman Noam
Published: December 2018

This chapter argues that although nineteenth-century labor markets were unencumbered by regulatory legislation, there existed frictions and rents in the labor market; moreover, labor market institutions other than legislation played an active role in determining labor market outcomes. The chapter provides evidence of frictions and firm-specific rents in nineteenth-century urban American labor markets: when firms experienced positive output price shocks, their employees earned wage premia relative to other employees with similar skills in the same labor market. The existence of rents in the labor contract suggests a role for bargaining and conflict between employees and employers. Workers in the late nineteenth century went on strike to increase wages. This chapter presents data on the frequency of strikes in the nineteenth century and suggestive evidence of an association between strikes and wages; finally, it documents the rise of judicial labor injunctions aimed at suppressing strikes.
Education and Human Capital in American Economic History
Authors: Parman John M.
Published: December 2018

This chapter reviews the empirical literature on the expansion of educational institutions and the human capital stock of the United States over the past two and a half centuries. Using evidence on literacy, numeracy, and years of education, it details the remarkable growth of the American human capital stock and discusses trends in racial and gender gaps in educational attainment. The chapter then outlines the development of the educational institutions that facilitated the growth of the human capital stock, discussing the political and social forces shaping the expansion of schools. This overview includes an emphasis on the consequences of the uniquely public and decentralized nature of American schools. Finally, the chapter examines the literature on the decision to attend those schools, considering the roles of the private returns to education, health, family characteristics, and compulsory schooling laws.
Services in American Economic History
Authors: Broadberry Stephen , Cain Louis P. , Weiss Thomas
Published: December 2018

This chapter chronicles the transformation of the US economy to one where over 80 percent of the labor force is employed in the service sector. The initial section discusses the difficult task of defining services—the service industries as opposed to the service sector. The growth of services began earlier and increased faster in the United States than in other countries. The discussion of this growth is divided into sections on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The roles of education, the entry of women into the labor force, self-employment, and foreign trade are discussed. The final section concentrates on services’ role in the comparative productivity performance of the US, UK, and German economies.
Agriculture in American Economic History
Authors: Olmstead Alan L. , Rhode Paul W.
Published: December 2018

This chapter examines the crucial roles of biological learning and mechanization in facilitating the long sweep of American agricultural expansion and productivity growth. It also explores the major debates concerning the relationship between agricultural growth and overall economic development, the sources and impacts of the twentieth-century decline of the agricultural sector, the role of government policies, and the directions of current and promising future research. The chapter highlights the roles of biological innovation and mechanization in driving territorial expansion and productivity growth. It also investigates the forces behind the structural change affecting the role of agriculture in the US economy.
Manufacturing Productivity Growth in American Economic History
Authors: Field Alexander J.
Published: December 2018

This chapter provides an overview of labor and total factor productivity growth in the manufacturing sector in the United States from colonial times to the present. An introductory section defines concept and terms. This is followed by an historical survey of improvement in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and sections on the manufacturing revolution of the 1920s and the sector’s contribution during the Great Depression. The remainder of the chapter provides a quantitative perspective on manufacturing productivity growth and its contribution to the overall economy from the end of World War I through the first decade of the twenty-first century.
The Environment in American Economic History
Authors: Clay Karen
Published: December 2018

Environmental externalities, although important, have received relatively little attention from economic historians. Air, water, and soil pollution and conservation issues date from the time humans arrived in North America. In some times and places, these externalities were severe. The chapter reviews the literatures on historical pollution and conservation, which were largely written by environmental historians. Because of research interests and available data, American economic historians have traditionally been focused on growth in industrial and agricultural output. Recent research by economic historians on the historical effects of pollution on mortality and on the adaptation of agriculture to climate suggests that environmental issues are now of greater interest.
Urbanization in American Economic History, 1800–2000
Authors: Boustan Leah , Bunten Devin , Hearey Owen
Published: December 2018

This chapter explores the economic forces that led the United States to become an urban nation. The urban wage premium in the United States was remarkably stable over the past two centuries, ranging between 15 and 40 percent. The wage premium rose through the mid-nineteenth century as new manufacturing technologies enhanced urban productivity, then fell from 1880 to 1940 (especially through 1915) as investments in public health infrastructure improved the urban quality of life, and finally rose sharply after 1980, coinciding with the skill- (and apparently also urban-) biased technological change of the computer revolution. Over the twentieth century, households and employment have relocated from the central city to the suburban ring. Rising incomes and falling commuting costs can explain much of this pattern, while urban crime and racial diversity also played a role.
Banking and Monetary Policy in American Economic History from the Formation of the Federal Reserve
Authors: Richardson Gary
Published: December 2018

The United States Congress created the Federal Reserve System in 1913. The System consists of the Federal Reserve Board in Washington, DC; twelve Federal Reserve Banks; and thousands of member commercial banks. This entry describes the evolution of the system and of monetary policy from its foundation through 2013.
Banking and Monetary Policy in American Economic History up to the Formation of the Federal Reserve
Authors: Rousseau Peter
Published: December 2018

The US economy developed from an agricultural one mired in debt to an engine of growth between 1790 and 1913. The nation’s bourgeoning financial system was at the heart of this transformation. Growing from three banks in 1790 to more than 22,000 in 1913, the United States became the worldwide leader in private banking. This path, however, was not always smooth, and experiments with various forms of money creation and regulation subjected the nation to periodic panics. Despite a number of missteps, the approach led to financial development and monetary stability. We review this history and key research that defines the literature. Topics include early central banking, free banking, the National Banking System, and the founding of the Federal Reserve. We also offer a guide to areas that now generate considerable research interest, including finance and growth, the roles of banks and other intermediaries, crises, and the rise of deposits.
Lying, Implicating, and Presupposing
Authors: Meibauer Jörg
Published: December 2018

The notions of ‘indirect lying’, ‘falsely implicating’, or ‘misleading’ refer to the phenomenon of lying by deliberately suggesting what is false in order to deceive the addressee. Thus, what the speaker asserts may be sincere and true, while what she implicates may be deceptive and false. This chapter reviews theoretical approaches that deal with untruthful implicature and untruthful presupposition, ‘untruthfulness’ meaning a subjective attitude towards truth. In these cases, an additional proposition is introduced into the discourse with the intention to deceive the addressee. Arguably, cases of so-called misleading can be reduced to untruthful implicatures. If so, untruthful additional propositions such as the untruthful implicature and presupposition can be seen as a part of the overall act of lying, i.e., the total signification of an utterance. Moreover, experimental results providing further evidence are sketched.