Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Prior research has uncovered numerous motivations for the differing daily routes traveled by illegal drug dealers that depend on ethnicity. This evidence includes factors supported by such divergent theories as social disorganization and various psychological theoretical frameworks. These theories will be tested using a dataset from Wilmington, Delaware containing over 6,800 geocoded illegal drug sales sites. Using block-group level census data, Wilmington has been parceled into three zones representing white, black, and mixed areas to understand the spatial characteristics of both white and black drug sellers. A series of 400 foot buffers both inside and outside of the zones have been created to further measure the willingness of drug sellers to operate in areas outside of their own ethnic boundaries. These buffers provide the basis of the analysis of whether illegal drug dealers are likely to sell drugs in their own ethnic communities or outside their communities. Results demonstrate that Black and White illegal drug dealers respond differently to ethnic boundaries.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: The “guest worker” policy in Asia has created a highly exploitative system of labor migration. This paper looks at the case of Taiwan to examine how Asian states intervene in the process of international labor migration, and how their policies impact the recruitment process and conditions of migrant contract workers. Quota controls enforced by the Taiwanese government have aggravated competition among recruitment agencies. Migrant workers are charged excessive placement fees and tied to their non-transferable employers stipulated in the contract. The financial burden, coupled with uncertainties in the renewal of contracts, contributes to the increasing number of “runaway” migrants. The stringent state regulations punish those who abide by the law and induce the formation of irregular migration—undocumented migrants can escape the circumstance of “legal servitude” and enjoy some “free illegality” in the situation of unauthorized employment.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: As illegal immigration emerges again as a core political issue, we note that the effectiveness of campaign appeals on immigration is not well understood. In particular, there is a lack of experimental work on the topic, and the precursors to attitudes on illegal immigration are typically inferred from cross sectional data. In addition to understanding attitudes toward immigration policy, our second goal in this project is to use the issue of illegal immigration to explore the role of anxiety in responses to political appeals. According to the Affective Intelligence theory, anxiety motivates citizens to learn, pay more attention to news coverage, and base voting decisions on contemporary information rather than partisanship. Anxious citizens also seek out additional information relevant to the issue or candidate that provoked the anxiety. While we do not dispute the empirical link between anxiety and information, we question both the measurement of information seeking and the assumptions of the AI theory about how anxious individuals process information. Literature in cognitive psychology demonstrates that high stress and anxiety is associated with biased information processing, that is a tendency to pay closer attention to threatening information. We predict that anxious citizens will seek more information but that they will be attracted by threatening presentations of information and pay closest attention to threatening pieces information. We also predict that participants made anxious about immigration will search out information relevant to immigration policy. Rather than relying on self-reported intentions to gather information, as the AI literature does, a better method is to simulate an information environment in order to monitor actual information consumption. In an experiment we expose subjects to campaign appeals about immigration, either intended to enhance anxiety about illegal immigration or not. Subjects are then given the opportunity to search for additional information in a website that we designed to mimic online news sources. The website will have both immigration and non-immigration stories, and the immigration stories will be balanced between threatening coverage and non-threatening coverage. Experimental subjects see campaign appeals about immigration. They have a chance to search for more information in a website that we designed. We predict that anxious citizens will seek information but will be attracted by threatening presentations.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: The British Government has recently announced that it wishes to change the law so that the English Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) should be able to uphold a conviction obtained through a serious irregularity at or before trial, even that amounting to an abuse of process, if the Court considers the appellant to be factually guilty. This paper argues that this proposal is deeply flawed in two respects: Firstly, it is based on a fundamental misconception of the nature of appeals against conviction in the Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) as the Court cannot properly adjudicate upon guilt or innocence in these appeals; and secondly, it threatens the rule of law by proposing the removal of the Court of Appeal’s power to quash a conviction that was based upon the State’s illegal conduct. This paper argues that these proposals will encourage illegal acts by state officials such as falsifying evidence, procuring unreliable confessions and in extreme cases, torture, and will endanger public confidence in the administration of justice. Furthermore, the three options provided by the Government as mechanisms for bringing about this change are either not necessary or require a radical change to the Court’s powers which it is not currently equipped to perform therefore, this paper argues that these proposals are unworkable in practice and objectionable in nature.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper describes differences and similarities between male and female professed compulsive gamblers in terms of the types of illegal techniques employed to maintain a heavy gambling lifestyle and the prevalence of such illegal activities. The data were obtained from one-on-one interviews with professed compulsive gamblers exploring the process by which gamblers have constructed their compulsive gambler identities (i.e., identity work), and the manner in which they managed their emotions (i.e., emotion work) during their gambling career.