tag:theconversation.com,2011:/institutions/suffolk-university-1711/articlesSuffolk University2023-06-15T17:06:47Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2068292023-06-15T17:06:47Z2023-06-15T17:06:47ZJuneteenth and Emancipation Day: How the ‘Buy Black’ movement is addressing economic inequality<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531482/original/file-20230612-260763-y3p673.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=7%2C7%2C5172%2C3440&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The 'Buy Black' movement encourages people to support Black-owned businesses.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/stories/historical-legacy-juneteenth">Juneteenth</a> being declared a federal holiday in the United States and <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/campaigns/emancipation-day.html">Emancipation Day</a> being officially recognized on Aug. 1 in Canada demonstrate significant progress towards creating more equitable societies in North America.</p>
<p>Juneteenth — a portmanteau of June and nineteenth — celebrates the emancipation of enslaved African Americans. On June 19, 1865, <a href="https://time.com/6188864/general-order-3-juneteenth/">General Order No. 3 was released</a>. It officially enforced the Emancipation Proclamation in Texas and granted freedom to all remaining enslaved people in the U.S.</p>
<p>Emancipation Day holds similarly significant meaning in Canada and other former British colonies. It recognizes the <a href="https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/slavery-abolition-act-1833">Slavery Abolition Act of 1833</a> that paved the way for liberation, impacting more than 800,000 enslaved Africans, Indigenous Peoples and their families across the British Commonwealth.</p>
<p>Both Juneteenth and Emancipation Day are powerful celebrations that honour the vibrancy and resilience of Black communities. They ignite important conversations and inspire individuals and groups to move toward greater equity and inclusion in society.</p>
<p>But despite the symbolic progress represented by these commemorative days, inequalities still persist for many African Americans and Canadians, including <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/diversity-and-inclusion/a-300-billion-dollar-opportunity-serving-the-emerging-black-american-consumer">exclusion within consumer markets</a>.</p>
<h2>Buying Black and showing it</h2>
<p>In response to ongoing challenges about market exclusion, the <a href="https://www.myblackreceipt.com/">My Black Receipt</a> initiative emerged as a dynamic social movement. </p>
<p>By harnessing the power of markets — which have <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-11711-5_1">historically been racialized</a> — this movement aims to combat systemic disparities and promote economic empowerment. It does so by supporting Black-owned businesses and amplifying their impact.</p>
<p>My Black Receipt is a digital collective that encourages consumers to support Black-owned businesses. It was founded by <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/24/business/my-black-receipt-businesses-yelp-trnd/index.html">American entrepreneur and activist Kezia Williams</a> in June 2020 to coincide with that year’s Juneteenth celebration.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A group of people march while holding signs in support of Black Lives Matter and racial equality." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531472/original/file-20230612-25-clgj9z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531472/original/file-20230612-25-clgj9z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531472/original/file-20230612-25-clgj9z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531472/original/file-20230612-25-clgj9z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531472/original/file-20230612-25-clgj9z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531472/original/file-20230612-25-clgj9z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531472/original/file-20230612-25-clgj9z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">People participate in an Emancipation Day March, in Vancouver, on August 1, 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The movement uses social media, media appearances and a website to educate consumers about the benefits of buying from Black-owned businesses, including <a href="https://www.myblackreceipt.com/about-us/">supporting Black employment, causes and wealth generation</a>. </p>
<p>My Black Receipt helps consumers identify and locate Black-owned businesses and then invites participants to upload their receipts to the movement’s website to show the collective impact of their actions. As of June 2023, consumers had uploaded nearly US$10 million in receipts.</p>
<h2>New type of online market</h2>
<p>The digital collective has galvanized change from the business community as well. For example, it <a href="https://blog.yelp.com/news/yelp-teams-up-with-my-black-receipt-to-support-black-owned-businesses/">partnered with online review site Yelp</a> to help businesses self-identify as Black-owned, allowing consumers to search for and support Black businesses. </p>
<p>It’s also <a href="https://www.myblackreceipt.com/pepsi/">partnered with Pepsi for its Dig In initiative</a>, which aims to generate US$100 million in sales for Black-owned restaurants over a five-year period.</p>
<p>These outcomes are a testament to the success of the My Black Receipt collective. My Black Receipt represents a new type of online enclave that brings together Black consumers, their allies and business owners and transcends geographic boundaries.</p>
<p>This makes it unique from more traditional racial and ethnic enclaves, like <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/05/24/us/tulsa-race-massacre.html">Black Wall Street</a> in Tulsa, Okla., or the numerous Chinatowns that exist worldwide. My Black Receipt appears to offer some capacity to address material inequities.</p>
<p>As researchers, we asked ourselves: How do digital enclaves like My Black Receipt function? And what makes them thrive?</p>
<h2>Helping My Black Receipt thrive</h2>
<p>We conducted an <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/07439156221130960">online ethnography study</a> with <a href="https://www.scrutinizers.org/home/our-research">our colleagues</a> to examine the My Black Receipt movement. Our research used data sourced from digital news platforms, social media channels and affiliated websites.</p>
<p>Through this study, we explored the role digital enclaves play in promoting market inclusion and equity for Black consumers and business owners.</p>
<p>The #MyBlackReceipt hashtag serves as a unifying force online, connecting networking sites and posts to form a dynamic digital enclave. This enclave propels collective action in support of the Black community. Participants actively engage in various practices within this enclave to fuel its growth and impact.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Two Black women walk past a brick wall with a mural painted on it that says 'Black Wall St." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531452/original/file-20230612-220077-5r3fj7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531452/original/file-20230612-220077-5r3fj7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531452/original/file-20230612-220077-5r3fj7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531452/original/file-20230612-220077-5r3fj7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531452/original/file-20230612-220077-5r3fj7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531452/original/file-20230612-220077-5r3fj7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531452/original/file-20230612-220077-5r3fj7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">People walk past the Black Wall Street mural in April 2021, in Tulsa, Okla. The original Black Wall Street was destroyed about 100 years ago when a white mob laid waste to the nation’s most prosperous Black-owned business district and residential neighbourhood.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Enclave organizers, led by influential figures like Williams, play a crucial role in creating the enclave’s purpose and garnering support from shoppers and business owners. </p>
<p>They contextualize the movement within broader conversations about Black inequality, freedom and well-being, highlighting its significance in addressing systemic issues.</p>
<p>The organizers amplify their message by forging partnerships with prominent news media outlets <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/24/business/my-black-receipt-businesses-yelp-trnd/index.html">such as CNN</a> and collaborating with major corporations like Yelp and Pepsi. By doing this, they generate widespread awareness and interest in their cause.</p>
<p>To facilitate co-ordination and showcase the collective impact of their efforts, organizers established a dedicated platform on the My Black Receipt website. This platform allows individuals to upload their shopping receipts and create a spending scoreboard that visually represents the impact of their actions.</p>
<p>Through these practices and initiatives, the My Black Receipt enclave thrives, fostering a sense of community and empowerment while driving tangible change in support of Black-owned businesses and economic equity.</p>
<h2>Closing the racial wealth gap</h2>
<p>Digital enclaves like My Black Receipt are working towards establishing secure and prosperous market spaces for Black individuals.</p>
<p>Within these enclaves, Black consumers can access products that cater to their needs, support Black communities and avoid the need to justify their worthiness as customers in predominantly white markets. At the same time, Black business owners benefit from connecting with consumers who support Black-owned businesses. </p>
<p>These arrangements work together to bring and retain more wealth within the Black community, aiming to address the significant wealth gap between Black and white Americans. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.minneapolisfed.org/article/2022/how-the-racial-wealth-gap-has-evolved-and-why-it-persists">Black Americans possess as little as US$4 in wealth for every US$100 accumulated by white Americans</a>, and <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/featured-reports/article-five-charts-that-show-the-impact-of-anti-black-racism-in-canada/">Black Canadians earn, on average, $12,000 less than their non-racialized counterparts</a>. </p>
<p>Juneteenth and Emancipation Day are powerful catalysts for communication and action against discrimination and inequity in society. These commemorative days, along with initiatives like My Black Receipt, seek to address market exclusion and generate tangible change for Black individuals. </p>
<p>By fighting against discrimination through market intervention, these movements create wealth within the Black communities. Together, they embody the ongoing struggle for justice and equality in our economic systems.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/206829/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>By harnessing the power of markets, digital movements like My Black Receipt aim to combat systemic disparities and promote economic empowerment by supporting Black-owned businesses.Myriam Brouard, Assistant Professor, Telfer School of Management, L’Université d’Ottawa/University of OttawaAndrew N. Smith, Associate Professor of Marketing, Suffolk UniversityKatja H. Brunk, Professor of Marketing, European University ViadrinaMarcia Christina Ferreira, Senior Lecturer, Essex Business School, University of EssexLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1670912021-10-05T12:26:14Z2021-10-05T12:26:14ZCentury-old racist US Supreme Court cases still rule over millions of Americans<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/423392/original/file-20210927-21-1u678wd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C30%2C5068%2C3338&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In Old San Juan, Puerto Rico, the flags of the U.S. and its territory fly side by side.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/people-walk-through-the-el-morro-national-monument-in-old-news-photo/1308296260">Spencer Platt/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The 4 million inhabitants of five U.S. territories – Puerto Rico, American Samoa, Northern Marianas Islands, Guam and the U.S. Virgin Islands – <a href="https://today.law.harvard.edu/insular-cases-constitutional-experts-assess-status-territories-acquired-spanish-american-war-video/">do not have the full protection of the Constitution</a>, because of a series of Supreme Court cases dating back to 1901 that are based on archaic, often racist language and reasoning. </p>
<p>A call from Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/02/us/politics/gorsuch-supreme-court-insular-cases.html">overturn more than a century of precedent</a> has been <a href="https://assets.nationbuilder.com/wethepeopleproject/pages/210/attachments/original/1651087779/Fitisemanu_v._United_States_-_Cert_Petition_-_AS_FILED.pdf?1651087779">joined by advocates for equal citizenship</a> for everyone born in those U.S. territories. If the court decides to take up the question, it would review a long-standing status quo.</p>
<p>Now, no U.S. citizen living in any of those places can vote for president. They don’t have a voting representative in Congress, either. </p>
<p>But this inferiority is inconsistent. Puerto Ricans are American citizens and can vote in federal elections if they reside in a U.S. state, but <a href="https://noticiasmicrojuris.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/fea-gelpi_0311.pdf">not if they live in Puerto Rico</a> or one of the other territories.</p>
<p>However, <a href="https://www.axios.com/american-samoa-birthright-citizenship-ruling-4a438f31-5e68-4169-bddc-211128e97f26.html">American Samoans are not U.S. citizens</a>, so they can’t vote for president even if they live in the 50 states. That is <a href="https://theconversation.com/who-is-born-a-us-citizen-127403">being challenged in federal courts</a>.</p>
<p>It’s all a result of a political and legal mindset that is more than 100 years old, but is still in force.</p>
<h2>Superiority complex</h2>
<p>Up until the end of the 19th century, everyone assumed that all U.S. territories would, eventually, become full-fledged states, whose residents would become U.S. citizens with rights fully protected by the Constitution. The <a href="https://history.house.gov/Historical-Highlights/1700s/Northwest-Ordinance-1787/">Northwest Ordinance of 1787 outlined the process</a>: As new lands opened to Americans, Congress would initially appoint a governor and judges for the territory and establish a rule of law. When the territorial population exceeded 5,000 adult men, voters would elect a legislature and send a nonvoting delegate to Congress. When the territory reached a population of 60,000, the territory would petition for statehood and be admitted to the union.</p>
<p>That process assumed the territories would be in North America and that most of the territorial population would be people of European descent. Those assumptions changed when the United States claimed Puerto Rico, the Philippines and Guam in 1898 as spoils of war at the end of the Spanish-American War. Puerto Rico and Guam are still U.S. territories. </p>
<p>That expansion gave Americans a clear sense of the nation’s purpose and power in the world, summarized effectively by U.S. Sen. Albert Beveridge of Indiana in a <a href="https://china.usc.edu/us-senator-albert-j-beveridge-speaks-philippine-question-us-senate-washington-dc-january-9-1900">congressional speech on Jan. 9, 1900</a>: “[God] has made us the master organizers of the world to establish system where chaos reigns. He has made us adept in government that we may administer government <a href="https://noticiasmicrojuris.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/fea-gelpi_0311.pdf">among the savage and servile peoples</a>.” </p>
<h2>A new type of territory</h2>
<p>Starting in 1901, a set of court cases, collectively called the “Insular Cases,” created new constitutional law regarding the United States’ relation with its territories. They began when import companies challenged tariffs imposed on goods transported from the newly acquired territories into the U.S. The companies claimed there should not be tariffs, because the goods were moving from one part of the U.S. to another.</p>
<p>The Supreme Court ultimately ruled that the companies were correct, that transport within the U.S. was not subject to tariffs, but created an exception in which the new lands were neither foreign countries nor part of the U.S.</p>
<p>Those territories, the Supreme Court would rule in the first of the Insular Cases, <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/182/244/">Downes v. Bidwell</a> in 1901, were “<a href="https://www.loc.gov/item/usrep182244/">foreign in a domestic sense</a>,” “<a href="https://www.loc.gov/item/usrep182244/">inhabited by alien races</a>,” and therefore governing them “<a href="https://www.loc.gov/item/usrep182244/">according to Anglo-Saxon principles may for a time be impossible</a>.” </p>
<p>The ruling included other prejudice-revealing statements, too, such as, “<a href="https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/182/244.html">It is obvious that in the annexation of outlying and distant possessions</a> grave questions will arise from differences of race, habits, laws, and customs of the people, and from differences of soil, climate, and production, which may require action on the part of Congress that would be quite unnecessary in the annexation of contiguous territory inhabited only by people of the same race, or by scattered bodies of native Indians.”</p>
<p>As a result, the court created a new distinction: “Incorporated” territories of the U.S. were expected to one day become states. “Unincorporated” territories, by contrast, were not – and, therefore, their inhabitants were, and still are, denied some of their constitutional rights. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Puerto_Rico_Statehood_Referendum_(2020)">2020 referendum</a> vote in Puerto Rico favored statehood; <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/04/30/statehood-dc-puerto-rico-and-guam-what-do-their-residents-want/7413044002/">Guam officials</a> have called for statehood; and Stacey Plaskett, who represents the people of the U.S. Virgin Islands in Congress, says her constituents deserve the <a href="https://plaskett.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=129">full rights of citizenship</a>, including the right to vote.</p>
<p><iframe id="8n5jb" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/8n5jb/1/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<h2>The cases and context</h2>
<p>Both at the time and since, the Downes decision has been described as meaning “<a href="https://cdnc.ucr.edu/?a=d&d=LIB19010601.2.3&e=-------en--20--1--txt-txIN--------1">the Constitution does not follow the flag</a>.” The territories might be ruled by Congress, but not necessarily by the Constitution.</p>
<p>What that meant for the people of those territories was unclear. And despite <a href="https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/upjiel29&div=14&id=&page=">five other cases in 1901</a>, and others in the subsequent 20 years, the Supreme Court has never truly clarified which constitutional protections were available to whom and which weren’t. It left open questions about whether key elements of the Constitution, like trial by jury, or even the Bill of Rights, were available in the unincorporated territories.</p>
<p>Hawaii was also acquired in 1898, but was treated differently and ultimately became a state. The differences were <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/08/21/902334807/simmering-disputes-over-statehood-are-about-politics-and-race-they-always-have-b">probably for reasons to do with partisan politics</a> and a Republican-Democratic balance in Congress.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/423395/original/file-20210927-19-rv7zt8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Two people stand next to a flag" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/423395/original/file-20210927-19-rv7zt8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/423395/original/file-20210927-19-rv7zt8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423395/original/file-20210927-19-rv7zt8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423395/original/file-20210927-19-rv7zt8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423395/original/file-20210927-19-rv7zt8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423395/original/file-20210927-19-rv7zt8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423395/original/file-20210927-19-rv7zt8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Two people from American Samoa who work for the territory’s government made different choices about U.S. citizenship. Filipo Ilaoa, at left, became a citizen; Bonnelley Pa'uulu remains a U.S. national without full citizenship rights and privileges.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/AmericanSamoaCitizenship/864cd2c018fb450f9baeb6c461995f0b/photo">AP Photo/Jennifer Sinco Kelleher</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Supreme Court interpretation over the years</h2>
<p>Since the mid-20th century, the court has <a href="https://www.yalelawjournal.org/forum/after-aurelius-what-future-for-the-insular-cases">made incremental changes</a> to the Insular Cases’ effects, tweaking technical definitions concerning taxes, trade and governmental benefits such as Social Security, Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. But the court has not addressed the overall inferior constitutional status of the territories and the people who live there.</p>
<p>It wasn’t until 1957, for instance, in <a href="https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/354/1.html">Reid v. Covert</a>, that the Supreme Court ruled that defendants in the territories had a right to trial by jury – a right that citizens have because of <a href="https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/article-3/#article-3-section-2-clause-3">Article III of the Constitution</a>. Several justices made clear that “<a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/354/1/">neither the cases nor their reasoning should be given any further expansion</a>.” That statement was widely viewed as a signal that <a href="https://www.yalelawjournal.org/forum/after-aurelius-what-future-for-the-insular-cases">the influence of the Insular Cases was declining</a>.</p>
<p>In <a href="https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/442/465.html">Torres v. Puerto Rico</a> (1979), the court further weakened the Insular Cases. Although narrowly applied to the territory at hand, the Supreme Court made clear that the Bill of Rights actually did apply in a U.S. territory.</p>
<p>In its 2008 ruling in <a href="https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/06-1195-nr1.html">Boumediene v. Bush</a>, the court held that detainees at the U.S. naval base in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, had the constitutional right of habeas corpus to challenge the validity of their detention. Justice Anthony Kennedy’s opinion said, “It may well be that over time the ties between the United States and any of its territories <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/553/723/">strengthen in ways that are of constitutional significance</a>,” and said the federal government did not “have the power to switch the Constitution on or off at will.”</p>
<p>But in its 2020 ruling in <a href="https://casetext.com/case/fin-oversight-mgmt-bd-for-puerto-rico-v-aurelius-inv-llc">Financial Oversight and Management Board for Puerto Rico v. Aurelius Investment</a>, the court pulled back from its trend of extending constitutional protections to the unincorporated territories. It ruled that President Barack Obama’s appointments to the board, a government body focused on helping Puerto Rico return to financial stability, were local officials, not “<a href="https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/article-2/#article-2-section-2-clause-2">officers of the United States</a>,” and therefore did not require Senate confirmation.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/423396/original/file-20210927-25-z9pirs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Four people march carrying a flag." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/423396/original/file-20210927-25-z9pirs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/423396/original/file-20210927-25-z9pirs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423396/original/file-20210927-25-z9pirs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423396/original/file-20210927-25-z9pirs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423396/original/file-20210927-25-z9pirs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423396/original/file-20210927-25-z9pirs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423396/original/file-20210927-25-z9pirs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Athletes from the U.S. Virgin Islands arrive at the Paralympics in Tokyo in August 2021.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/Tokyo2020ParalympicsOpeningCeremony/253ad414684d4a49bfecda6a1404d24b/photo">AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Into the future</h2>
<p>Many <a href="https://noticiasmicrojuris.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/fea-gelpi_0311.pdf">legal scholars view</a> the court’s mention of U.S. territorial connections strengthening “over time” as a possible key to overturning the Insular Cases. The original distinctions assumed that the U.S. would “<a href="https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/354/1.html">govern temporarily territories with wholly dissimilar traditions and institutions</a>.” Most acknowledge those perceived distinctions clearly no longer exist.</p>
<p>These territories have established institutions and principles grounded in American traditions. The internal governments of these territories have established laws, governmental institutions and legal traditions that are indistinguishable from any state in the union. They hold elections, <a href="https://harvardcrcl.org/ongoing-denial-of-voting-rights-in-u-s-territories-incompatible-with-our-founding-values/">have residents serving in the U.S. military</a>, and play a role in building the nation.</p>
<p>But without equal voting rights and congressional representation, the Americans living in these territories <a href="https://hnrdems.medium.com/the-insular-cases-c52a8294b370">cannot remedy their status at the ballot box</a>.</p>
<p>[<em>The Conversation’s Politics + Society editors pick need-to-know stories.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/politics-weekly-74/?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=politics-need-to-know">Sign up for Politics Weekly</a>.]</p>
<p><em>Editor’s note: This is an updated version of an article originally published Oct. 5, 2021.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/167091/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Eric Bellone does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A series of Supreme Court cases based on racist language and reasoning still govern the lives of 4 million Americans.Eric Bellone, Associate Professor of Political Science and Legal Studies, Suffolk UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1006442018-07-26T21:00:34Z2018-07-26T21:00:34ZWhat is a ‘poison pill’?<p>Papa John’s recently forced founder and former Chairman John Schnatter to resign over allegations he made a racial slur. Now the pizza chain <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/23/business/papa-johns-john-schnatter-poison-pill.html">is battling</a> to keep him from clawing his way back into the company. </p>
<p>To do so, Papa John’s says it’s taking advantage of a corporate strategy often used to fend off hostile takeover attempts: the “poison pill.” Schnatter, who <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-07-26/papa-john-s-founder-sues-pizza-company-for-documents-over-ouster">is suing</a> to access internal documents, still owns about 30 percent of the company, making him the largest single shareholder.</p>
<p>What is a poison pill, why would a company use it and does it actually work? </p>
<h2>Raising the cost of a takeover</h2>
<p>The modern publicly traded corporation is <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/241754973_Stockholders_and_Stakeholders_The_Battle_for_Control_of_the_Corporation">often the theater</a> of fierce battles for control. </p>
<p>It’s therefore no surprise that hostile takeovers – in which an outside entity tries to take over a company by convincing shareholders to sell their stakes – <a href="http://doi.org/10.2307/2393275">have become increasingly popular</a> in the U.S. One way companies handle such a threat is by passing protective measures like the poison pill, which was conceived in the 1980s during the <a href="http://www.crainsnewyork.com/article/20171218/OPINION/171219941/reliving-new-yorks-glory-days-of-junk-bonds-and-hostile-takeovers">heyday of junk bonds and hostile takeovers</a>. </p>
<p>In short, the <a href="https://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/poisonpill.asp">poison pill</a> is designed to make the company’s purchase by a “hostile” suitor dramatically more expensive. </p>
<p>Two types exist. The so-called “flip-in” allows shareholders other than the acquirer to buy additional shares at a highly discounted rate if the board of directors does not approve the takeover. The other is called a “flip-over,” which permits stockholders to buy the shares of the acquirer at a discount if the takeover is successful.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229519/original/file-20180726-106521-136w843.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229519/original/file-20180726-106521-136w843.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=677&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229519/original/file-20180726-106521-136w843.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=677&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229519/original/file-20180726-106521-136w843.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=677&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229519/original/file-20180726-106521-136w843.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=851&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229519/original/file-20180726-106521-136w843.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=851&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229519/original/file-20180726-106521-136w843.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=851&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Schnatter had literally become the face of Papa John’s.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Papa-John-s-Founder/c3640a12fb884ab395e0b17fca4b4c22/2/0">AP Photo/Charles Krupa</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Both strategies dilute shares held by the acquirer, making the takeover attempt more costly and difficult. A poison pill also puts pressure on the suitor to negotiate directly with the board. </p>
<h2>Do they work?</h2>
<p>While many corporations have adopted poison pills during the past decades, their use has been equivocal and vividly debated among practitioners and academic researchers. More recently, companies have been <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0149206312441209">increasingly repealing</a> poison pills or allowing them to expire.</p>
<p>As a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=MSg9454AAAAJ&hl=en">scholar of corporate strategy</a>, I’ve found that studies of their effectiveness show mixed results.</p>
<p>For example, <a href="http://doi.org/10.1086/503648">some empirical research</a> has shown no relationship between the adoption of a poison pill and the probability of whether a company is ultimately acquired. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0149206316635250">Some scholars</a> have also argued that poison pills can signal that the company has entrenched “ineffective” managers and is trying to protect them from market oversight. </p>
<p>Other scholars have found value in the use of poison pills, for example by enabling top management to focus on <a href="https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2015/12/18/the-long-term-value-of-the-poison-pill/">long-term performance</a> – rather than worrying about hostile takeovers – and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1086/503648">resulting</a> in more profit for investors after a sale. And researchers have found evidence that poison pills do in fact <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0149206312441209">lower the likelihood</a> of acquisition.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/100644/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Yannick Thams does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Papa John’s is hoping to use the corporate strategy to prevent founder John Schnatter from taking back control over the pizza chain.Yannick Thams, Assistant Professor of Strategy and International Business, Suffolk UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/959952018-05-15T10:27:30Z2018-05-15T10:27:30ZHow understanding pain could curb opioid addiction<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218868/original/file-20180514-100693-18g212o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Helping people with pain, whether it be physical or emotional, could limit the need for opioids. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/woman-sad-face-crying-expressionsad-emotiondespairsadnesswoman-529171864?src=3wBkopW8qPfwMK8g0pjXTQ-1-9">eldar nurkovic/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee unanimously approved a bill in April 2018 designed to address the opioid crisis. The bill called the <a href="https://www.help.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/S.2680%20Summary.pdf">Opioid Crisis Response Act of 2018</a> covers much of the same territory as the 138-page report released in November 2017 by a commission appointed by <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/whitehouse.gov/files/images/Final_Report_Draft_11-1-2017.pdf">President Donald Trump</a>.</p>
<p>Both the Senate bill and the commission document, unlike the president’s own March 2018 <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2018/03/21/trumps-proposal-to-execute-drug-dealers-has-some-fearing-people-of-color-will-be-harmed-most/">call for executing drug dealers</a>, recognize addiction as a health problem and focus on treatment rather than punishment.</p>
<p>All of this is important, but as a medical sociologist, I am particularly interested in developing better understandings of the root causes of the current crisis. Why are so many Americans willing to ingest substances that, they most likely know, can lead to grievous harm? In other words, I am interested in the demand side of opioid overuse.</p>
<h2>A little prevention, but how much cure?</h2>
<p>For prevention, the Senate bill calls for expanding prescription monitoring programs, amping up the ability to seize illegal drugs at U.S. borders, training health care providers in proper prescribing practices, and improving drug disposal systems. All of these measures are what we sociologists consider “secondary prevention”; that is, they are directed toward supply reduction.</p>
<p>Primary prevention – which deals with the reasons that people turn to opioids in the first place - is mentioned in the Senate bill in only a few places but is not developed either in terms of a research plan nor in terms of public health strategies. The president’s commission report briefly deals with prevention in terms of school and media programs designed to inform children and parents about the dangers of opioid use. </p>
<p>In my experience, this does not address many of the issues that lead people to opioids. The <a href="http://susan.sered.name/blog/category/cant-catch-a-break/">Massachusetts women</a> with whom I have been conducting research for the past decade began their substance abuse careers in pain, either mental or physical. In some cases, the pain was a consequence of childhood or intimate partner abuse. In other cases, the pain set in because underlying health problems were not attended to properly or in a timely manner. </p>
<p>Often, the pain wasn’t taken seriously by employers, who insisted that minimum wage workers show up even when they are unwell, family members or health care providers. While substantive help often wasn’t available, psychotropic and pain medication was easy to get hold of, whether from doctors or drug dealers or both.</p>
<p>Following these women in and out of drug treatment for years, I have come to think that America must deal with our pain epidemic if we have any hope of dealing with the painkiller epidemic.</p>
<p>Though it is only a brief reference, it is heartening that the Senate bill calls upon the NIH “to improve scientific understanding of pain, including how to prevent, treat, and manage pain.”</p>
<p>Medical science primarily focuses on the physiological and neurological pathways associated with pain in the individual body. Social science pays more attention to pain in the “social body” – in the environmental, economic, political and cultural conditions that give rise to collective experiences of suffering, hopelessness or exclusion. The social science approach is particularly appropriate in the case of a crisis that, at least to some observers, has reached “epidemic” proportions.</p>
<h2>Gender, race and class</h2>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218887/original/file-20180514-100713-wbd012.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218887/original/file-20180514-100713-wbd012.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218887/original/file-20180514-100713-wbd012.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218887/original/file-20180514-100713-wbd012.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=395&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218887/original/file-20180514-100713-wbd012.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218887/original/file-20180514-100713-wbd012.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218887/original/file-20180514-100713-wbd012.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Kyle Graves, who struggles with opioid addiction, at home in Franklin, Tenn., June 7, 2017.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Overcoming-Opioids-Struggles-for-Recovery/75c45c3d7993452aacd4aa58a2f5fa6e/1/0">AP Photo/David Goldman</a></span>
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<p>The Senate bill acknowledges that not all states have been equally affected by the opioid crisis, but it does not explicitly call for research into why particular communities and demographic groups are harder hit than others.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.samhsa.gov/data/population-data-nsduh/reports?tab=33">Data</a> indicate that opioid abuse is primarily a male problem, concentrated in working class and low-income white communities, and rapidly expanding to Hispanic communities. That does not mean that women or professional class Americans are not affected by opioid overuse. It does mean that particular groups seem to have developed particularly fertile ground for opioid misuse to take root.</p>
<p>According to a Massachusetts <a href="http://www.mass.gov/anf/budget-taxes-and-procurement/oversight-agencies/health-policy-commission/publications/hpc-datapoint-4-opioid.html">report on opiate-related hospital discharges by ZIP code</a>, low-income and working-class neighborhoods have substantially higher rates of opioid problems than upper-middle-class neighborhoods. <a href="https://www.mass.gov/files/documents/2018/02/14/opioid-demographic-february-2018.pdf">Department of Public Health data</a> for the state also show a pronounced gender difference in death rates from opioid-related causes: Men are four times more likely than women to die from opioids. And while the current opioid crisis tends to be described a problem of white communities, in Massachusetts the opioid-related overdose <a href="https://www.mass.gov/news/opioid-related-overdose-deaths-in-2017-fell-by-more-than-8-percent">death rate for Hispanics</a> tripled from 2014 to 2016.</p>
<p>Information of this sort lays the groundwork for primary prevention. What is it about being male in a white low-income community that causes pain and makes opioid use attractive as a means of dealing with pain? Are there occupational or educational policies that encourage or discourage substance abuse? And can those policies be adjusted in ways that reduce pain as well as substance abuse?</p>
<p>Recent preliminary research points to a number of directions that may be useful in terms of getting at root causes. I am particularly interested in several <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28182980">quantitative</a> and <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26868674">qualitative</a> studies that link low social capital, social isolation, weak community ties and economic <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/bpea-articles/mortality-and-morbidity-in-the-21st-century/">despair</a> to higher opioid abuse rates. Overall, however, considering the extent of the opioid crisis, there is surprisingly little written addressing root causes. It will be interesting to track the outcomes of projects such as the San Francisco initiative to train low-income and formerly incarcerated women as <a href="https://www.emeraldinsight.com/doi/abs/10.1108/IJPH-07-2016-0026">birth doulas</a> or the Boston area <a href="http://haleyhouse.org">Haley House</a> that includes formerly incarcerated men in community kitchen and garden enterprises.</p>
<p>Regardless of what proposals become official policy, I believe that better understanding why people turn to opioids in the first place can be an important part of our national response.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/95995/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Susan Sered does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A bill to deal with the opioid crisis recently came out of a Senate committee. While some of its recommendations are good, some key points are missing.Susan Sered, Professor of Sociology, Suffolk UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/913022018-03-08T11:40:32Z2018-03-08T11:40:32ZVery few women oversee US companies. Here’s how to change that<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/209402/original/file-20180307-146697-1ggogv3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Men's dominance in the boardroom has barely changed over the years. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Everett Collection/Shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Women’s participation in the labor force <a href="https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS11300002">has soared</a> over the past 50 years, rising from 32 percent in 1948 to 56.7 percent as of January. </p>
<p>Yet those gains have not translated into the U.S. corporate boardroom, where women <a href="http://publications.credit-suisse.com/tasks/render/file/index.cfm?fileid=5A7755E1-EFDD-1973-A0B5C54AFF3FB0AE">held just 16.6 percent</a> of seats in 2015, according to a Credit Suisse analysis of the world’s largest 3,400 or so companies. That’s up a little from the 12.7 percent five years earlier but still disappointingly low.</p>
<p>As <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=loPMxzAAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">scholars</a> of corporate governance, we felt the answer to this puzzle might require a bit of digging beyond this simple percentage. So we crunched the numbers on individual states over an 11-year period to see where women fared better in the boardroom and why. </p>
<p>Our findings were startling but also suggest a solution.</p>
<h2>The case for parity</h2>
<p>The ethical case for a government promoting or even mandating gender equality, whether in the classroom, office or boardroom, seems fairly straightforward.</p>
<p>Beyond that, research suggests that companies with more female directors achieve better <a href="http://amj.aom.org/content/58/5/1546.short">financial results</a>, <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/corg.12165/full">are more socially responsible</a> and are less likely to engage in wrongdoing such as <a href="http://amj.aom.org/content/58/5/1572.short">fraud</a>. </p>
<p>While many countries in Europe have used quotas to get more women on corporate boards, in the U.S. there is <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/07/world/europe/german-law-requires-more-women-on-corporate-boards.html">resistance</a> to doing so. Instead, federal government agencies have focused on disclosure, which <a href="https://web.northeastern.edu/ruthaguilera/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/36.-Terjesen-Aguilera-Lorenz-2014-JBE.pdf">has had little impact</a>.</p>
<p>Under the U.S. Constitution, states have significant power in setting their own policies. And while none have instituted a gender quota for corporate boards, some states have gone further than the federal government on a variety of policies that affect women’s career advancement, such as workplace discrimination and family planning. We theorized that these differences might help explain the prevalence of women on boards in some states and not others.</p>
<h2>A wide range of representation</h2>
<p>To find out, <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0148296318300444">we examined</a> the boardroom diversity of the 1,500 companies in the Standard & Poor’s 1500 index, which represents about 90 percent of total U.S. market capitalization. </p>
<p>We focused on the period 2003 to 2014 using data provided by <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=3419764">Governance Metrics International</a>, which compiles governance information annually from companies’ proxy statements and public filings. </p>
<p>Nationally, our data showed that just 15.2 percent of S&P 1500 board seats were occupied by women in 2014, up modestly from 9.7 percent in 2003. One explanation for why our figures show less representation than the Credit Suisse data cited earlier is that the largest corporations have done a better job promoting women, while the S&P 1500 includes medium-sized companies as well. This is a correlation also supported by our data.</p>
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<p>Our sample included companies headquartered in 49 states (none were in Wyoming). As some states only had a few companies listed in the index during the period and others had many, we controlled for the economic size of each state as well as several other factors, such as a company’s size and state demographics. This allowed us to more fairly compare each state’s figures and isolate potential explanations. </p>
<p>Overall, the national trend of increasing representation persisted in the vast majority of states from 2003 to 2014, while four experienced slight declines. Not a single woman served on the board of the sole Alaskan company in the index during the period. Beyond that, the data showed wide variation from state to state. </p>
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<p>In 2014, the worst states for women on boards were Louisiana, Nebraska, New Hampshire and Alaska, all of which had less than 10 percent. New Mexico boasted the most women on boards at 44 percent, followed by Vermont, Delaware, Iowa and Maine. </p>
<p>Another way of looking at the data is to focus not just on basic representation but at what percentage of companies have three or more women in the boardroom. Research shows that this <a href="https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s10551-011-0815-z.pdf">can constitute a critical mass</a> that enables them to make a real difference by affecting a board’s working style and dynamic and creating a more favorable environment for women’s perspectives to be heard. </p>
<p>By that measure, the data are a lot more discouraging. Only 11 states, such as Minnesota, Connecticut and Washington, had even a third of their companies meet this threshold. In 18 other states, including Louisiana, Tennessee and Virginia, less than 10 percent had at least three women on their boards. </p>
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<h2>Women’s rights</h2>
<p>What explains the differences? </p>
<p>Our initial hypothesis was that state policies had something to do with it because <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0007650315613980">existing research</a> has found a link between national governmental policies and participation of women in leadership positions. </p>
<p>So we examined whether states had gender-related policies in three general areas: reproductive rights, anti-discrimination and work-family balance. We then analyzed several databases to find out which states had these policies. </p>
<p>We found that that companies headquartered in states with policies that provided more protections for women than the federal government requires in terms of reproductive rights, such as public funding for abortion and laws against gender discrimination, tended to have a greater share of female directors on their boards. Interestingly, we didn’t find a link with work-life balance policies such as better access to maternity leave. </p>
<p>For example, states like Minnesota, Connecticut and Washington – all of which have a greater level of female board representation than the national average over the 11-year period – also had most of the policies we identified. All three provide funding for abortions through Medicaid and have passed <a href="http://www.ncsl.org/research/labor-and-employment/discrimination-employment.aspx">gender discrimination protections</a> that are stronger than exist at the federal level. </p>
<p>In contrast, states where relatively few women sat on corporate boards, such as Alabama, Colorado, Louisiana, Georgia, Nebraska and Virginia, tended to have weaker policies protecting women and their rights. </p>
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<p>Overall, we found a strong statistical link between these types of policies and female representation in the boardroom, which held even after controlling for alternative explanations, such as the political orientation of the state and cultural attitudes toward women based on surveys. To us, the point isn’t that these policies in particular lead to more women on boards, but that they broadly represent a favorable cultural environment for women in the workplace. </p>
<p>There were a few notable exceptions to our findings. California, for example, which has progressive policies in these areas, boasts few women on its boards, or about 14 percent in 2014. One possible explanation could be that <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/20159898.pdf?refreqid=excelsior%3Acccc9b1c2022ca9e0a0f530fa8775900">older companies are more likely to have more women on their boards</a>. A significant number of California companies in the index were relatively young. </p>
<h2>Equity without quotas</h2>
<p>Making it into the highest echelons of a corporation is very difficult and typically requires opportunity for training and access to social networks, both of which are jeopardized when, for example, women suffer harassment on the job or incur a “motherhood penalty.” It is not surprising, for example, that female directors are significantly more likely to be <a href="http://www.heidrick.com/Knowledge-Center/Publication/2012-Board-Of-Directors-Survey">single and childless</a>, compared with their male peers.</p>
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<p>European countries such as <a href="https://web.northeastern.edu/ruthaguilera/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/36.-Terjesen-Aguilera-Lorenz-2014-JBE.pdf">Iceland, Norway</a> and <a href="https://www.la-croix.com/Economie/Social/Les-femmes-restent-tres-minoritaires-dans-conseils-dadministration-2017-01-03-1200814337">France</a> have become <a href="http://publications.credit-suisse.com/tasks/render/file/index.cfm?fileid=5A7755E1-EFDD-1973-A0B5C54AFF3FB0AE">world leaders</a> in female representation by instituting quotas. In 2017, <a href="http://eige.europa.eu/gender-statistics/dgs/indicator/ta_pwr_bus_bus__wmid_comp_compbm">women held more than 40 percent</a> of the seats on the largest listed companies in all three countries, a significant increase from a decade earlier. </p>
<p>The good news is that our findings suggest that states – as well as the federal government – have policy options at their disposal short of establishing gender quotas to increase female representation in the boardroom.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/91302/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The share of board seats held by women varies dramatically across the country, from none in Alaska to close to half in New Mexico. A few key policies may make all the difference.Yannick Thams, Assistant Professor of Strategy and International Business, Suffolk UniversityBari Bendell, Assistant Professor of Management and Entrepreneurship, Suffolk UniversitySiri Terjesen, Dean's Faculty Fellow in Entrepreneurship, American University Kogod School of BusinessLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/673742016-11-02T01:44:22Z2016-11-02T01:44:22ZHow hard is it to rig an election?<p>How do you rig an election? </p>
<p>Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump claims our system of elections are rigged. He has asserted <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-voter-fraud-rigged-tweet-2016-10?r=UK&IR=T">widespread voter impersonation</a> exists. He has <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2016/10/19/fact-checking-two-false-claims-by-trump-alleging-widespread-voter-fraud/">claimed that large numbers of dead people vote</a>. And, he maintains that <a href="http://www.concordmonitor.com/Trump-wrong-that-14-percent-of-noncitizens-are-registered-to-vote-5661513">many noncitizens have successfully registered to vote</a> and regularly do so.</p>
<p>Don’t believe it.</p>
<p>Our democratic system of government counts on voters rejecting these claims that our electoral outcomes are at risk. Citizen trust in election outcomes and the accurate tabulation of votes is fundamental to the legitimacy of representative government. </p>
<h2>How American elections are administered</h2>
<p>As a political scientist who studies election administration and works with election officials to make the voting process successful, I know from firsthand experience that rigging a presidential election would not involve just undermining one system — it involves undermining thousands. </p>
<p>A key feature of the American system of election administration is hyper-localism. More than <a href="http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/elj.2012.0174">5,000 municipal and county election officials</a> administer elections across more than 8,000 local jurisdictions across the United States. </p>
<p>A 2009 survey of local election officials found that about half of local election officials are nonpartisan, meaning they are not Democrats or Republicans. The other half is <a href="http://scholarship.law.uci.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1090&context=ucilr">about evenly split</a> between Democrats and Republicans. In other words, only 25 percent of election officials support either party, significantly limiting the number of potential coconspirators who may back any given outcome.</p>
<p>Moreover, the United States Constitution grants broad power to state legislative bodies regarding the regulation of elections. States regulate ballot design, vote tabulation technology, absentee ballots and early voting. This means that someone attempting to rig an election would need to master 50 states’ methods of administering elections, including polling place management. </p>
<p>Another roadblock is the sheer number of votes involved. Presidential elections generally prompt higher turnout than any other election. In the 2012 presidential election, <a href="https://www.archives.gov/federal-register/electoral-college/2012/popular-vote.html">130 million people cast their ballots.</a> President Obama received nearly five million more votes in the popular vote compared to Republican nominee Mitt Romney. The sheer size of the electorate suggests that attempting to “rig” the system would require a level of coordination even greater than the coordination needed to “get out the vote” on Election Day itself. </p>
<p>Voters who know their history may be under the impression that influencing the popular vote isn’t really necessary. In 2000, Palm Beach County Florida played an outsized role in the outcome of the presidential election. That year, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2001/07/15/us/examining-the-vote-how-bush-took-florida-mining-the-overseas-absentee-vote.html">as few as 537 votes</a> divided Vice President Al Gore from then Texas Gov. George W. Bush. Those few votes had the power to decide into whose column Florida would fall, and which candidate would win the Electoral College. </p>
<p>This recent history may tempt voters to think that would-be riggers need to tamper with the outcome in only one county to change the vote. Yet, nobody could have reliably predicted that Palm Beach County would be the lynch pin in 2000. The odds of a state result within half a percentage point – close enough to trigger a recount – are only <a href="http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/?ex_cid=rrpromo#scenarios">about 7 percent</a>, according to the website fivethirtyeight.com. </p>
<p>Let us examine each type of rigging method Trump identifies as a problem.</p>
<h2>Rigging by voter impersonation</h2>
<p>Voter impersonation involves casting a fraudulent ballot. </p>
<p>One could do that by getting a group of people to register to vote multiple times under false names. In this way, a single person could pretend to be more than one person and go to several polling locations to cast several ballots. </p>
<p>Alternatively, one could get a group of people to go to multiple polling locations, pretend to be someone else and hope that someone else had not yet voted and would not vote later in the day. </p>
<p>In either case, the costs of voter impersonation are high not only because of the risk of arrest for illegal activity, but also because actually engaging in such activity requires extensive planning, time and travel cost.</p>
<p>Although many Americans believe that voter fraud is “<a href="http://harvardlawreview.org/2008/05/vote-fraud-in-the-eye-of-the-beholder-the-role-of-public-opinion-in-the-challenge-to-voter-identification-requirements/">very common</a>,” it is, in fact, rare. </p>
<p>The famed urban machines at the turn of the century like New York City’s <a href="http://www.history.com/topics/tammany-hall">Tammany Hall</a> were often accused of controlling electoral outcomes through fraud and manipulation at the polls, but much of the evidence for stolen elections is <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Analyzing-Electoral-History-American-Behavior/dp/0803916744">largely anecdotal in nature</a>. </p>
<p>When fraud is attempted now, as <a href="http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/crime-and-courts/2016/10/28/voter-fraud-suspect-arrested-des-moines/92892042/">it apparently was</a> during Iowa’s early voting period, the system worked to stop the attempt. </p>
<p>Election law scholars, including University of California Irvine School of Law’s <a href="http://yalebooks.com/book/9780300198249/voting-wars">Richard Hasen</a>, <a href="http://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/?GCOI=80140100774960">Rutgers’ Lorraine Minnite</a> and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/08/06/a-comprehensive-investigation-of-voter-impersonation-finds-31-credible-incidents-out-of-one-billion-ballots-cast/">Loyola Law School’s Justin Levitt</a>, have searched to find evidence of large-scale fraud and come up empty-handed.</p>
<p>“There is … no evidence in at least a generation that [voter impersonation fraud] has been used in an effort to steal an election,” Hasen has written. “The reason voter impersonation fraud is never prosecuted is that it almost never happens.” </p>
<h2>Rigging by impersonating deceased voters</h2>
<p>Trump also claims that dead people vote.</p>
<p>Here, the concern is that deceased people remain on voter registration lists after their deaths, permitting living people to impersonate them and vote in their place. </p>
<p>It’s certainly true that inaccuracies exist on the voter rolls. According to a Pew Center on the States <a href="http://www.pewtrusts.org/%7E/media/legacy/uploadedfiles/pcs_assets/2012/pewupgradingvoterregistrationpdf.pdf">issue brief</a>, voter registration lists across the 50 states suffer from inaccuracies largely because of they have “not kept pace with advancing technology and a mobile society.” </p>
<p>In many states, for example, registration information is entered into computers manually. When people move, even within a state, their voter registration does not move with them. When a citizen changes his or her address with one government agency, that information is not communicated to the election department. Citizens need to reregister to vote every time they move. The report states that “1.8 million deceased individuals are listed as voters.” To put that number in context, <a href="https://www.nationalacademies.org/hmd/%7E/media/Files/Report%20Files/2003/Describing-Death-in-America-What-We-Need-to-Know/DescribingDeathFINAL.pdf">2.4 million U.S. residents die each year</a>.</p>
<p>The question then turns to how an organization, person or political campaign interested in perpetuating fraud could turn these 1.8 million deceased voters into votes.</p>
<p>Bad actors would have to proactively locate the deceased voters – focusing on key states or even counties – and then impersonate them to successfully turn an election. </p>
<p>Does it happen? The evidence is scant. According to a report from <a href="https://www.brennancenter.org/sites/default/files/legacy/The%20Truth%20About%20Voter%20Fraud.pdf">New York University’s Brennan Center investigating voter fraud</a>, the vast majority of cases in which allegations of fraud by dead voters are asserted end up being clerical errors when voter lists are matched against death lists.</p>
<h1>Rigging by having noncitizens vote</h1>
<p>Trump has also asserted that noncitizens have successfully registered to vote and will be able to successfully cast ballots during the 2016 election. </p>
<p>Here we need to look at motives. The costs associated with attempting to register and vote as a noncitizen are high, including criminal prosecution and deportation. The reward of committing such fraud for the individual noncitizen is simply the addition of one vote. A campaign would need to convince hundreds or thousands of noncitizens to take this substantial risk to influence the outcome in even one county – and then keep quiet about it.</p>
<p>According to the <a href="https://www.brennancenter.org/sites/default/files/legacy/The%20Truth%20About%20Voter%20Fraud.pdf">Brennan Center</a>, no documented cases exist in which individual noncitizens have “either intentionally registered to vote or voted while knowing they were ineligible.” </p>
<p>All of this adds up to a system of election administration that is virtually impossible to penetrate in the name of massive fraud that would shift the results of an election. So don’t believe it when someone tries to tell you the vote is rigged.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/67374/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rachael V. Cobb received funding from the US Election Assistance Commission in 2006, 2008, and 2010 to recruit students to be poll workers.
She is a member of the Democratic party in Cambridge and on the Ward Committee. She is on the board of MassVOTE (non-partisan), and iVote (partisan).</span></em></p>Very hard, writes a political scientist who studies election administration.Rachael V. Cobb, Associate Professor of Government and Chair of the Government Department, Suffolk UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/626662016-07-19T10:07:04Z2016-07-19T10:07:04ZAmerica’s police culture has a masculinity problem<p><a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/news/baton-rouge-police-officers-shot-wounded-airline-highway/">Three police officers</a> were killed and three wounded in a shooting early on Sunday, July 17 in Baton Rouge. Ten days earlier – on July 7 – a <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/09/us/dallas-police-shooting.html">sniper gunned down</a> five police officers in Dallas. </p>
<p>I know many strong critics of the police. Many of them are affiliated with the
<a href="http://blacklivesmatter.com/">Black Lives Matter movement</a>. None of them stand for ambushing police officers. I also know a few police officers and many prosecutors. Most of them are against racial profiling.</p>
<p>Now, it would be a false equivalence to say that Black Lives Matter activists and defenders of the police are in the same position. </p>
<p>Black Lives Matter activists are seeking changes in an institution – the criminal justice system – that has <a href="http://www.civilrights.org/publications/justice-on-trial/race.html">disproportionately targeted</a> and killed people of color. These activists are disproportionately drawn from communities that <a href="http://www.dailydot.com/layer8/black-lives-matter-queer-trans-issues/">have been marginalized</a> based on their race, gender identity, sexual orientation and related issues. </p>
<p>In contrast, police officers are sworn to protect the public, even when they are the subject of criticism and protest. Police officers are also disproportionately drawn from <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/09/03/us/the-race-gap-in-americas-police-departments.html?_r=0">relatively privileged</a> segments of society: men and whites. </p>
<p>The recent controversy over policing has often been traced to racial bias, but it may stem in equal part from gender. I have spent a decade researching ways that race and gender intersect in policing and found that hidden police officer machismo is exacerbating the more commonly noticed problem of racial profiling. </p>
<h2>Issues around masculinity</h2>
<p>To bring about peace, we must first acknowledge that we have a problem. </p>
<p>The evidence that police officers target racial minority men for stops on suspicion of crime is overwhelming. This has been statistically proven in New York City <a href="http://ccrjustice.org/sites/default/files/assets/files/Floyd-Liability-Opinion-8-12-13.pdf">racial profiling litigation</a>. In a recent study, <a href="http://scholar.harvard.edu/fryer/home">Harvard professor Roland G. Fryer Jr.</a> also found <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/12/upshot/surprising-new-evidence-shows-bias-in-police-use-of-force-but-not-in-shootings.html">racial bias</a> in police uses of force. Additionally, in New York, as elsewhere, <a href="http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/students/groups/osjcl/files/2015/01/11-Richardson-and-Goff.pdf">racial profiling</a> of these types mostly happens to men. </p>
<p>Having seen such gender patterns before, my colleague <a href="https://law.unlv.edu/faculty/ann-mcginley">Ann C. McGinley</a>, a professor of law at University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and I have <a href="https://law.unlv.edu/event/monday-law-talk-whats-masculinity-got-do-it-gender-pop-culture-and-law">often asked</a>,</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“What’s masculinity got to do with it?” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>By masculinity, I simply mean popular assumptions about what is manly behavior. For instance, men do not wear dresses, do not ask for directions and do not dance. Or so we are told. </p>
<p>If one is a man, or just wants to perform masculinity, one will be drawn toward the behaviors that are popularly understood to be manly. An important tendency of masculine behavior in the United States is to <a href="http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1257183">confront disrespect</a> with violence. </p>
<p>In policing, this has meant punishing the “noncrime” of “contempt of cop” (offending a police officer) with trumped up charges of law-breaking or physical violence. </p>
<p>The killing of Philando Castile serves as one example of the way racial bias and police officer machismo work together. </p>
<p>Racial profiling was evident in the fact that police officers had stopped Castile at the borders between black and white neighborhoods in and around St. Paul, Minnesota. Castile was stopped <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/stopped-52-times-by-police-was-it-racial-profiling/2016/07/09/81fe882a-4595-11e6-a76d-3550dba926ac_story.html">at least 52 times</a> over the course of a few years. Yet at least half of his citations were dismissed. That is an extraordinary number of stops, and an even more surprising number of dismissals.</p>
<p>Implicit in these excessive race-based stops is a macho stance that is <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2016/06/19/us/oakland-police-scandals/">especially prevalent</a> amongst those who go into policing. First, perhaps because police forces <a href="http://www.militarytimes.com/story/veterans/2014/12/08/enlisted-police-officer/20102901/">often give preference</a> to former members of the military, police officers are prone to <a href="http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1257183">bullying the suspects.</a> It should be no surprise that more masculine men thrown into police forces patterned on the military are more prone to aggressive behavior.</p>
<h2>Here are the consequences of this culture</h2>
<p>To maintain face in the culture that prevails in many police departments, officers must meet any physical threat or even disobedience with violence. As the “<a href="http://www.aapf.org/sayhername/">Say Her Name” movement</a> has pointed out, when police officers get macho, women of color may also become victims of their violence. </p>
<p>Police bullying of women can come in the forms of false charges, physical violence, or sexual assaults. For instance, former Oklahoma City police officer <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2015/12/10/us/oklahoma-daniel-holtzclaw-trial/">Daniel Holtzclaw</a> was convicted of 18 counts of sexual offenses against African-American women.</p>
<p>Second, masculinity exacerbates racial profiling because young men of color are the boogeyman. They are the personification of danger in the eyes of much of the public and the police. That status stems from the U.S.’ long history of white supremacy and apartheid. Police officers may be both seeking to maintain their place in the male pecking order and genuinely afraid of men of color.</p>
<p>That is why the mention of a gun by a black man can lead a police officer to shoot first and question later. In the case of Castile, as an audio recording of the events later revealed, Castile’s <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/philando-castile-police-scanner-audio_us_5783a3a2e4b0c590f7ea0d4d">“wide-set nose”</a> got him pulled over. And being the subject of heightened fear – a black man with a gun – got him killed.</p>
<p>Of course, police officers are not a monolithic group. White police officers are not all explicitly, or even implicitly, biased against men of color. Many police officers are racial minorities themselves. Moreover, <a href="http://womenandpolicing.com/PDF/2002_Excessive_Force.pdf">increasing percentages</a> of police officers are women, whose presence has been connected to lessened police brutality. </p>
<p>Nonetheless, acknowledging that racial profiling and police officer machismo travel together is important, as it will require a different approach to fixing policing. </p>
<h2>Way forward: deescalate</h2>
<p>We cannot just observe the police through body cameras, for that will not stop police officers from feeling more threatened by men of color in the first place. Instead, we need to train police officers to acknowledge both that many of them have implicit biases against racial minorities and that they may feel more fearful of men of color than any other group.</p>
<p>As I think about how this proposal might become reality, I have the same advice for each side of the policing divide: deescalate.</p>
<p>To protesters against the police I say this: After Baton Rouge, rightly or wrongly, you will have to go first. Do not stop criticizing racial profiling and police officer machismo, but do unequivocally disavow shooting police officers. </p>
<p>To police officers I say this: You rightfully feel vulnerable, but do not ratchet up this conflict. Do not condone the idea <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/author/heather-mac-donald">advanced in some conservative quarters</a> that the slaying of police officers means you must allow crime to rise. Honor your fallen comrades by doing your job even better. </p>
<p>In the day-to-day job, that means using deescalation techniques to turn potential conflicts into peaceful resolutions. Deescalating the overall conflict between police officers and protesters will not be easy, but it will be worth the effort.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/62666/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Frank Rudy Cooper does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A macho culture prevails in police departments in America. The recent killing of Philando Castile serves as one example of the way racial bias and police officer machismo work together.Frank Rudy Cooper, Professor of Law, Suffolk UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/574512016-04-20T10:04:59Z2016-04-20T10:04:59ZThe cavity in health insurance coverage: oral health<p>When we talk about the successes and shortcomings of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) – and health care in the U.S. in general – little attention is given to dental care. </p>
<p>While the ACA defines dental coverage as an essential benefit for those under 18, insurers <a href="https://www.healthcare.gov/coverage/dental-coverage/">aren’t required to offer dental coverage</a> for adults. Medicare, the nation’s largest insurer, doesn’t cover routine dental work. And coverage for adults through Medicaid varies from state to state. </p>
<p>It is estimated that <a href="http://www.hrsa.gov/publichealth/clinical/oralhealth/">108 million Americans</a> have no dental insurance, and that <a href="https://kaiserfamilyfoundation.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/8324.pdf">one in four nonelderly Americans</a> has untreated tooth decay. </p>
<p>Oral health isn’t just about nice teeth. As the surgeon general noted in a <a href="http://www.nidcr.nih.gov/DataStatistics/SurgeonGeneral/sgr/chap1.htm">2000 report</a>, oral health is intimately connected to general health and can be implicated in or exacerbate diabetes, heart disease and stroke, and complications during pregnancy. </p>
<p>The absence of comprehensive dental care exacts a toll on millions of Americans in terms of poor health, pain and the social stigma associated with bad teeth. </p>
<h2>People desperately need dental care</h2>
<p>In 2003 and 2004 (pre-Obamacare), I conducted <a href="http://www.ucpress.edu/book.php?isbn=9780520250062">a national study</a> of uninsured Americans in southcentral Illinois, northern Idaho, the Mississippi delta, the Rio Grande Valley of Texas and in eastern Massachusetts. </p>
<p>I asked nearly 150 interviewees: “If President Bush were to declare universal health care for everyone starting tomorrow, what is the first problem you would take care of?” The most common answer by a landslide echoed this respondent’s: “I’ll be waiting outside the dentist’s office at 5:00 in the morning waiting for it to open.” </p>
<p>Many of the people I interviewed lived with untreated diabetes, asthma or even cancer, yet their oral health problems presented the greatest challenges to their quality of life. </p>
<p>Recently I returned to these communities to <a href="http://susan.sered.name/blog/the-states-of-the-affordable-care-act/">reinterview</a> the people I’d met over a decade earlier. Very little has changed. While the majority of the people I interviewed now had health care coverage of some sort (for nearly 20 percent of them, it was as a consequence of becoming sufficiently disabled to be eligible for Social Security), very few had managed to secure dental coverage.</p>
<p>Then and now, people told me about visiting emergency rooms in hopes of alleviating pain or using addictive pain medications to make it through the day. People even told me that they had resorted to pulling out their own teeth.</p>
<p>Take Misty, for instance. When I met her 12 years ago in Mississippi, she was a “dirt poor” (her words) married mother of five, and she was living with diabetes, domestic violence and excruciating headaches. Despite all of these quite serious problems, she told me that she was more troubled by her bad teeth than by anything else. In fact, Misty told me that she’d had such bad toothaches that she pulled her own teeth. When I asked her how she can face the pain of pulling out her own teeth, she said: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>[the infected tooth] hurts so bad… it’s a relief just to get it out of there.… I’ve gone two weeks with just being able to eat soup, because they are just so bad.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>By 2016 Misty had left her abusive husband, moved to Arkansas and was accepted onto disability (SSI), which allowed her to get health care coverage through Medicaid. Still, however, she suffered because of her teeth. </p>
<p>It can be very hard to find dentists who accept Medicaid, and when Misty finally did, she had the rest of her teeth – 25 in all – pulled in one day. </p>
<p>Misty’s situation isn’t uncommon. I have met women and men of various ages who, like Misty, have pulled their own teeth. I’ve also met people who were able to get part of their dental needs taken care of during brief periods of Medicaid coverage but then were left with unfinished treatment when the coverage ended.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/118782/original/image-20160414-2629-17nftkj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/118782/original/image-20160414-2629-17nftkj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118782/original/image-20160414-2629-17nftkj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118782/original/image-20160414-2629-17nftkj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118782/original/image-20160414-2629-17nftkj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118782/original/image-20160414-2629-17nftkj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118782/original/image-20160414-2629-17nftkj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Teeth aren’t included in health insurance policies.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?lang=en&language=en&ref_site=photo&search_source=search_form&version=llv1&anyorall=all&safesearch=1&use_local_boost=1&autocomplete_id=&searchterm=dental%20x%20ray&show_color_wheel=1&orient=&commercial_ok=&media_type=images&search_cat=&searchtermx=&photographer_name=&people_gender=&people_age=&people_ethnicity=&people_number=&color=&page=1&inline=93324646">Dental x-ray image via www.shutterstock.com.</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Insurance stops at the teeth</h2>
<p>Even though the link between dental health and overall health is clear, insurance plans tend to ignore teeth.</p>
<p>As health insurance began to appear to appear in the U.S. – initially in the 1920s and then more widely during World War II and in the postwar era – dentistry wasn’t part of the standard package of covered services. </p>
<p>As the nation’s largest insurer, Medicare plays an important role in shaping health care coverage norms. Medicare does not cover <a href="https://www.medicare.gov/coverage/dental-services.html">dental care</a>. Today, according to government estimates, <a href="http://now.tufts.edu/articles/dental-woes-aging-population">70 percent of seniors</a> lack dental coverage. </p>
<p>Since Medicare doesn’t cover dental, Dr. David Kroll, senior program officer at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, argues that this “<a href="http://www.marketwatch.com/story/obamacare-isnt-good-for-your-teeth-2014-01-23">inertia spilled over into the ACA</a>.” </p>
<p>Americans who purchase dental plans typically find that the plans aren’t cheap, and often don’t cover much beyond routine preventative care. Plans often require hefty copays for procedures beyond preventative care and no or very limited coverage for dentures, bridges or periodontic work. </p>
<p>And, in recent years, the <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/wendell-potter/why-a-trip-to-the-dentist_b_4992826.html?utm_hp_ref=politics&ir=Politics">cost of dental care</a> has increased faster than the <a href="http://kff.org/report-section/health-care-costs-a-primer-2012-report/">cost of other medical care</a>. For those without dental insurance, there are few <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/wendell-potter/americas-hidden-epidemic_b_3964228.html">low-cost services</a> available.</p>
<p>The ACA provided for an expansion of Medicaid eligibility, though not all states accepted the offer of federal funding to expand Medicaid coverage. Even in the states that expanded Medicaid under the ACA, strict limits on oral health care remain for most low- and moderate-income Americans. </p>
<p>There is one bright spot: children’s dental coverage is a required benefit included on all ACA compliant plans, and Medicaid as well. According to national calculations of the Health Policy Institute and the American Dental Association, dental care utilization among Medicaid-enrolled children <a href="http://www.ada.org/en/publications/ada-news/2015-archive/october/more-medicaid-and-privately-insured-children-going-to-the-dentist?nav=news">increased</a> from 35.3 percent in 2005 to 48.3 percent in 2013.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/118032/original/image-20160408-23668-1ctwit0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/118032/original/image-20160408-23668-1ctwit0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118032/original/image-20160408-23668-1ctwit0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118032/original/image-20160408-23668-1ctwit0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118032/original/image-20160408-23668-1ctwit0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118032/original/image-20160408-23668-1ctwit0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118032/original/image-20160408-23668-1ctwit0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Not just about nice teeth.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shannon Stapleton/Reuters</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Oral health isn’t just about nice teeth</h2>
<p>In the absence of coherent oral health services, too many Americans end up like Gina, a young Idaho woman who holds her hand in front of her mouth while she talks so that no one will see her rotted teeth. She can’t even get a job as a telemarketer because she cannot speak distinctly enough to be hired.</p>
<p>Many Americans incorrectly assume that rotten teeth are the product of bad decision-making; if someone had just brushed and flossed then they’d have nice teeth. But routine dental care – think of the twice-yearly checkups that are routine for people with dental insurance – keeps teeth healthy and can catch problems when they are easy to treat. </p>
<p>The reality is that tooth decay signifies poverty in pernicious ways. Without expanding insurance to cover oral health, millions of Americans will continue to live with pain, stigma and the risks of systemic diseases that could be averted through an accessible and integrated system of dental care.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/57451/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Susan Sered does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The absence of comprehensive dental care exacts a toll on millions of Americans in terms of poor health, pain and the social stigma associated with bad teeth.Susan Sered, Professor of Sociology, Suffolk UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/524802016-01-26T10:43:24Z2016-01-26T10:43:24ZPoor and homeless face discrimination under America’s flawed housing voucher system<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109181/original/image-20160125-19649-15o8q4c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Boston has some of the highest rents – and lowest vacancy rates – in the country.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-138401321/stock-photo-rows-of-houses-in-back-bay-boston-high-view-from-prudential-tower-boston-usa.html?src=QcEWQqqVxsGT-NpPPClEdw-1-65">'Boston' via www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>From the time she left foster care at age 18 until her late 20’s, <a href="http://susan.sered.name/cant-catch-a-break/">Carly</a> was homeless, staying at shelters or couch-surfing with acquaintances in the Boston area. </p>
<p>In August 2014 she finally got an apartment with the help of a housing voucher from an agency called <a href="http://homestart.org/">Home Start</a>. The one-bedroom apartment, located in Boston’s Dorchester neighborhood, rented at US$1,150 per month. The location wasn’t ideal – the area is where she’d spent time, over a decade earlier, in a gang and dealing drugs. But it was the only apartment she could find with a landlord who was willing to rent to her. </p>
<p>From the outside, the building appears to be quite nice. Inside, it’s a different story: the stairwell is collapsing, and even daily sweeping doesn’t eradicate the fresh mice droppings that dot the floor. Disparate piles of sawdust (likely leftover from some sort of wood-munching insect) appear near the floorboards. The walls are soaked with mold.</p>
<p>“The landlord – he’s a slumlord,” Carly explains. “He will not fix anything.” </p>
<p>Now pregnant, she’s received a $1,500 voucher for a two-bedroom apartment. But after weeks and weeks of searching, she hasn’t been able to find one. </p>
<p>We’ve spent months researching how poor and homeless people struggle to find permanent housing. It’s become clear that Carly – and thousands of others like her – are trapped in a system that fails to acknowledge the realities of the housing market, requires navigating a maze of bureaucratic hurdles and allows landlords to easily discriminate against voucher holders. </p>
<h2>New strategy doesn’t negate systemic flaws</h2>
<p>Throughout the United States, communities have come a long way from the <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1448313/">“housing ready” approach</a>. According to this policy, homeless people needed to complete treatment programs before they were deemed “ready” to receive stable housing. Without housing, however, many found it immensely difficult to undergo successful treatment and become eligible.</p>
<p>Today, most public housing agencies use the <a href="https://pathwaystohousing.org/">“Housing First”</a> approach, which has been shown to be more <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/casp.723/abstract">successful at achieving stable housing</a> for people who have psychiatric disabilities, substance abuse problems or are underemployed. Even if chronically homeless clients have <a href="http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10597-009-9283-7">addictions</a>, they’ll be offered supportive housing and <a href="http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10464-005-8617-z">the opportunity to choose where they live</a>. </p>
<p>But as Carly’s experiences demonstrate, the actual available choices may be limited – or altogether nonexistent.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://portal.hud.gov/hudportal/HUD?src=/topics/housing_choice_voucher_program_section_8">U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development</a> (HUD) allocates funding to states through the <a href="http://www.cbpp.org/research/housing/policy-basics-the-housing-choice-voucher-program">Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher Program</a>, which provides government and social service agencies with funds to help pay the monthly rents of low-income people.</p>
<p>The agencies that distribute housing choice vouchers pay the housing subsidy directly to the landlord, but most of the housing search is left to voucher holders, many of whom lack the skills and perseverance of savvy apartment hunters. </p>
<p>For example, in Massachusetts in 2014, <a href="http://www.cbpp.org/research/housing/national-and-state-housing-data-fact-sheets?fa=view&id=3586#map">4,000 people who received vouchers</a> didn’t end up using them, typically because they couldn’t locate an affordable, acceptable apartment.</p>
<h2>Booming housing costs render vouchers useless</h2>
<p>With cities across the nation becoming gentrified and more desirable to high-income tenants, poorer populations have been priced out. </p>
<p>America’s 2007 <a href="http://www.propublica.org/article/the-great-american-foreclosure-story-the-struggle-for-justice-and-a-place-t/single">foreclosure crisis</a> pushed large numbers of people into the rental market, increasing the competition for available rental housing. </p>
<p>Gentrification is not just an American problem. The British government is having difficulty <a href="http://theconversation.com/labours-rent-control-plans-may-have-unintended-consequences-40877">controlling rental costs</a>, and there’s an <a href="http://theconversation.com/renting-for-life-housing-shift-requires-rethink-of-renters-rights-20538">affordable rental housing</a> crisis in Australia.</p>
<p>Challenges to the U.S. housing voucher program extend across the nation. <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/cico.12087/abstract;jsessionid=5E72E010DEEAECF65B678E642C917F7A.f01t03?userIsAuthenticated=false&deniedAccessCustomisedMessage=">A Baltimore study</a> found that landlords can manipulate the rules to their favor by selecting tenants they prefer and segregating voucher holders to undesirable neighborhoods. <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/06/section-8-is-failing/396650/">In New York</a>, voucher holders can afford rental housing only in the most dangerous neighborhoods.</p>
<p>And in Boston, high housing costs mean stable housing is hard to find. Paula Saba, chief of leased housing programs at the <a href="http://www.bostonhousing.org/en/Home.aspx">Boston Housing Authority</a>, notes that Massachusetts has the highest rent prices in the U.S., with a vacancy rate of less than one percent.</p>
<p>In the Boston metro area, the permitted monthly rent for voucher holders ranges from $1,056 for an efficiency apartment to $1,567 for a two-bedroom apartment. Compare that to the <a href="https://www.rentjungle.com/average-rent-in-boston-rent-trends/">average apartment rent</a> within 10 miles of downtown Boston: $2,283 a month and $2,758 a month for a one-bedroom and two-bedroom apartment, respectively. </p>
<p>As Joe Finn, president and executive director of the <a href="http://www.mhsa.net/">Massachusetts Housing and Shelter Alliance</a>, explains, “Cost is the single biggest factor in people not being able to find apartments when paying with vouchers… The voucher values are behind market value.”</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gosection8.com">GoSection8</a>, an online rental resource for voucher holders, listed only <em>nine</em> apartments in Boston within the “fair market” rent ranges.</p>
<h2>The barrier of brokers</h2>
<p>Carla’s been desperate to move. The adverse living conditions of her apartment set off her asthma, and over the past year, she’s had half a dozen stints in the hospital in order to get her breathing under control. </p>
<p>Asked to estimate how many phone calls she’s made since October (when she began her most concerted effort to move), she looked over her papers and replied, “About a hundred.”</p>
<p>The problem, she explained, is that even apartments listed on <a href="https://boston.craigslist.org/">Craigslist</a> are handled by real estate agents and brokers. </p>
<p>These people “screen you. They ask where you work and other questions and then when you say you have a voucher they say that the landlord will only take cash.” </p>
<p>After scouring the Boston area, she expanded her search to other parts of the region – and still hasn’t gotten to the step of viewing an apartment. </p>
<p>Even though Massachusetts, like a number of other states, has <a href="http://www.mass.gov/ago/consumer-resources/your-rights/civil-rights/housing/housing-discrimination.html">broadened Fair Housing Act protections</a> to cover housing voucher discrimination, landlords and realtors can find ways to skirt the law. </p>
<p>For example, some landlords require letters from previous landlords and proof of employment – documentation that people who have been living in shelters or unemployed for years cannot provide. </p>
<p>Real estate brokers admit the existence of rampant discrimination. One broker in the Boston area (who asked to remain anonymous) told us, “When the market is tight [landlords] discriminate against vouchers, and vouchers don’t keep pace with market values.” </p>
<p>In these transactions, there’s an element of race involved. Some have argued that “Section 8” has become <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/06/15/how-section-8-became-a-racial-slur/">a racial slur</a>. The broker we interviewed uses an application form that asks if an applicant is a “convicted felon,” which is often used as a subtle indicator for race (<a href="https://www.libertariannews.org/2014/06/05/what-percentage-of-us-adult-population-that-has-a-felony-conviction/">25 percent</a> of the adult black population in the U.S. has a felony conviction, compared to 6.5 percent of nonblacks). </p>
<p>In the end, this broker highlighted the primary way landlords weed out undesirable tenants without breaking anti-discrimination laws: real estate agents. Most rentals in the Boston area are handled by agents who are typically paid by tenants, not by landlords. </p>
<p>“The biggest issue is that Section 8 people can’t afford realtors,” he said. “In this market, that’s a problem. It’s an owner’s market.” </p>
<p>The realtor fee is usually one month’s rent, which the homeless often can’t afford. </p>
<p>According to Gabrielle Vacheresse, housing search program manager for <a href="http://homestart.org/">HomeStart, Inc.</a>, most agencies – including her own – “typically do not have the funding to pay for broker’s fees. Some landlords have caught onto this and are able to weed out folks with vouchers by charging a fee, knowing that most will not be able to pay.” </p>
<h2>Simple fixes</h2>
<p>When people receive vouchers, they have only a certain window of time to find an apartment. “People typically need all of that time,” one housing search coordinator told us. </p>
<p>Depending on the agency, that window could be 60 days or 120 days. Afterwards, clients will need to ask for extensions. Some housing authorities provide these; some don’t. </p>
<p>Carly, like other voucher holders, is expected to navigate all of these challenges. While she’s in the somewhat enviable position of doing so from her own (albeit dilapidated) apartment, other homeless people are forced to carry out their searches from park benches. They need to hold onto phone numbers and forms, shuttling them to and from the streets and the shelters. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109180/original/image-20160125-19669-1g1bt9y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109180/original/image-20160125-19669-1g1bt9y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/109180/original/image-20160125-19669-1g1bt9y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109180/original/image-20160125-19669-1g1bt9y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109180/original/image-20160125-19669-1g1bt9y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109180/original/image-20160125-19669-1g1bt9y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109180/original/image-20160125-19669-1g1bt9y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/109180/original/image-20160125-19669-1g1bt9y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">With no permanent home base, the homeless are forced to constantly keep track of all their paperwork.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-208150729/stock-photo-man-reading.html?src=XfZzG_DG8rV_r1ADfdLxrg-3-54">'Bench' via www.shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Complicating matters, each municipality and agency has a different list of available apartments, many of which aren’t up-to-date. For someone making calls from a borrowed phone or a prepaid phone with limited minutes, fruitless calls can be a real hurdle. </p>
<p>There are a number of reforms that could improve the process. Shouldn’t it be relatively simple to develop a single, streamlined, up-to-date list of open apartments in a metro area? What if vouchers also covered broker fees? And if the vouchers were increased to be more in line with market rates? </p>
<p>Of course, it’s unrealistic to expect bureaucratic fixes to eliminate the hardships caused by centuries of racial discrimination, historically unequal opportunities to acquire property, a growing class of people stuck in low-wage and insecure jobs, and the pressures of gentrification of America’s cities. </p>
<p>But until these changes are made, voucher holders like Carly will continue to operate under a system that doesn’t acknowledge the realities of their desperate situations.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/52480/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Miriam Boeri received funding for previous studies from the National Institutes of Health. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Susan Sered does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In a competitive rental market, landlords can easily skirt anti-discrimination laws.Susan Sered, Professor of Sociology, Suffolk UniversityMiriam Boeri, Associate Professor of Sociology, Bentley UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/519832015-12-18T11:05:38Z2015-12-18T11:05:38ZTraining to reduce ‘cop macho’ and ‘contempt of cop’ could reduce police violence<p>It must be a terrible burden knowing that you might have to make a quick decision about whether to yell at someone, shock them, or shoot them dead. That is the weight inherent in the job of a police officer. </p>
<p>Nonetheless, we appropriately expect cops to maintain a peacekeeping mentality – to remain calm, patient and controlled even in life-or-death situations. Unfortunately, patient and nonaggressive policing will be rare unless we train officers to overcome the rules of what I call <a href="http://scholars.law.unlv.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1151&context=nlj">cop macho.</a></p>
<p>While recognizing that <a href="http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/machismo">machismo </a>has special meaning in Latina/o culture, I use the term to describe a gendered, aggressive outlook that is at the heart of our current policing problems. Police officers, including women, are often particularly masculine and the culture of police departments promotes masculine responses.</p>
<p>Those masculine responses can prove deadly. Outrage over police slayings of unarmed black civilians – from Chicago to Baltimore to New York to Ferguson and beyond – has provoked <a href="http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/ct-police-reform-20151213-story.html">a national debate</a> on what should be done about the use of deadly force by law enforcement. In Ferguson earlier this week, city officials and the US Department of Justice have worked out a preliminary <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/17/us/ferguson-nears-deal-with-justice-dept-to-overhaul-police-force.html?_r=0">agreement</a> to overhaul the city’s police department, which would include new training for police officers. While the debate over police abuses has focused on race, I argue we need to consider how the desire to act in ways society deems manly has influenced policing.</p>
<h2>The masculine imperative of demanding respect</h2>
<p>One imperative of masculinity is that you may not allow another person to show you disrespect. As I have demonstrated in my <a href="http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1257183">research</a>, police officers sometimes punish disrespect because they believe “a challenge to their respect is a challenge to their manhood.” For many police officers, disrespect requires an escalation in force. </p>
<p>Such escalation is commonly known as <a href="http://scholars.law.unlv.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1151&context=nlj">“contempt of cop.”</a> Being found in contempt of court is a punishment for disobeying a judge. “Contempt of cop” occurs when an officer punishes you for failing to comply with her request. </p>
<p>Sometimes the punishment takes the form of being charged with disorderly conduct, resisting arrest or a similarly amorphous crime simply for verbally standing up for your rights. Sometimes it takes the form of physical force. Two widely discussed incidents involving unarmed black civilians demonstrate this concept.</p>
<h2>Officer to Sandra Bland: ‘I will light you up.’</h2>
<p>In the July 2015 Sandra Bland case, the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpSEemvwOn4">dashcam video</a> records white male police officer Brian Encinia telling Bland, a black female, that he pulled her over because she “failed to signal the lane change.” When Bland declares that Encinia was tailing her, sped up toward her, then pulled her over for changing lanes to get out of his way, Encinia does not deny that description. Seemingly because Bland refuses to put out her cigarette, Encinia orders her out of the car at taserpoint, shouting, “I will light you up!” Encinia later slams Bland’s head into the ground. Three days later, Bland is found hanging dead in a jail cell. </p>
<p>We do not know whether a police officer physically killed Sandra Bland, but we do know that she would not be dead but for Officer Encinia’s strange decision to arrest her following a trivial traffic violation. That decision is not so surprising, however, when the encounter is viewed as an example of cop machismo. When Bland disrespected Encinia, he punished her for “contempt of cop.” </p>
<p>In the very same city of Prairie View, Texas, white police officer Michael Kelley tasered City Councilor Jonathan Miller, a young black male, for refusing to comply with another unnecessary order. In October 2015, Miller exits his apartment when police officer Penny Goodie, a black female, is asking black men who had been visiting him what they are up to. Officer Kelley arrives and, despite being told there is no crime afoot, orders Miller to his knees for questioning the police. Very quickly, Kelley <a href="http://www.npr.org/2015/10/21/450611772/prairie-view-texas-reflects-on-history-of-racism-after-police-incidents">asks </a>Miller, “Do you always start problems?” </p>
<p>When the obviously unarmed, still kneeling Miller is slow putting his hands behind his back, Kelley tases him, with the approval of officer Goodie. The police department detains Miller for allegedly “interfering with police” and “resisting arrest.” Those charges seemed to punish Miller for his disrespect. </p>
<h2>‘Contempt of cop’ is not solely about race</h2>
<p>One might claim that “contempt of cop” cases are primarily about race, but I believe they are at least as much about gender. Officer Kelley seems to have been upset that Miller challenged him by asserting his rights. The fact that officer Goodie and police chief Larry Johnson, who is also black, supported the tasing suggests something more than race was at play. </p>
<p>Likewise, Encinia became incensed when Bland refused to cooperate with his gratuitous orders. In both cases, refusing to comply with officers’ orders pricked their egos and resulted in physical abuse. In both cases, it seems that a well trained officer could have deescalated the situation. </p>
<p>Two major proposals commonly suggested to address police abuse are problematic. The emerging <a href="http://www.proceduralfairness.org/policing.aspx">procedural fairness</a> methodology of policing, which emphasizes real-time explanations to civilians of why police are taking particular actions, seems to be a superficial change that is consistent with present, race-based targeting of suspects. The push to have police officers wear <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-its-time-for-pervasive-surveillance-of-the-police-35134">body cameras</a> is a positive development but is likely to have less value over time as police officer criminal defense attorneys learn to discredit even the most powerful videos, as was done in the unsuccessful first <a href="http://scholar.valpo.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2316&context=vulr">Rodney King</a> trial. </p>
<p>Procedural fairness and body cameras do not reach the root causes of police abuse. If we are serious about reducing unnecessary police violence, we need to acknowledge the gendered aspects of police misuse of power. </p>
<p>The best method I have found for reducing cop macho is <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/28/us/long-taught-to-use-force-police-warily-learn-to-de-escalate.html?_r=0">deescalation training.</a> For instance, a method called “verbal judo” teaches techniques for verbally deflecting hostility and verbally manipulating civilians into compliance. That approach would allow police officers to deemphasize the masculine preoccupation with disrespect and play the peacekeeping role we admire them for.</p>
<p>I concede that many situations fall into a gray area where civilian disrespect seemingly conveys an actual physical threat. Consequently, an awareness of the way cop macho leads to “contempt of cop” punishments will not prevent all police uses of force. Training machismo out of police officers’ habits would be worth the effort, though, because it would allow the deescalation of many potential police-civilian conflicts.</p>
<p><em>Editor’s note: The language in the section about Sandra Bland has been corrected to make clear that she was forced out of her car at “taserpoint” not “gunpoint.”</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/51983/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Frank Rudy Cooper is affiliated with Black Lives Matter-Cambridge, Massachusetts. </span></em></p>After two more fatal shootings by police of black men this week, we republish one legal scholar’s argument that what needs addressing is the police’s culture of masculinity.Frank Rudy Cooper, Professor of Law, Suffolk UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/384572015-03-10T10:14:08Z2015-03-10T10:14:08ZThe Boston Marathon bombing trial: not a question of guilt or innocence but life or death<p>The trial of the Boston Marathon bomber started with an eye-opening twist on March 4, 2015. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s lawyer melodramatically announced in open court that “it WAS him” who planted one of the bombs that killed three, maimed dozens and terrified an entire city. </p>
<p>This admission of guilt is, however, not the equivalent of the entry of a plea of guilty, as might come about through a plea bargain with the government. (In which case the defendant pleads guilty in exchange for a sentence of life). </p>
<p>The case is thus no longer directly about guilt or innocence, although the jury will still have to find beyond a reasonable doubt that each count has been proven. </p>
<p>Now, it’s all about the sentence.</p>
<p>Does the Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev deserve to die for his crimes? Or should he serve life in prison without possibility of parole? This is what the federal jury will decide. </p>
<h2>The facts</h2>
<p>The basic facts of this case are not in doubt. Dzhokhar and his older brother Tamerlan planted two pressure cooker bombs near the finish line of the 2013 Boston Marathon. </p>
<p>In the resulting explosions, three people were killed, including a young boy, and hundreds were seriously injured. This crime was committed to avenge alleged offenses by the United States against Muslims and “innocent civilians.” In June 2013, the United States obtained a 30-count indictment against Dzhokhar; 17 counts carried the death penalty.</p>
<p>As I pointed out in my <a href="https://vandeplaspublishing.com/store/product.php?productid=115&cat=9&page=1">book</a> on the historic 2004-2005 Hearings into whether or not the death penalty should be re-instated in New York state, the United States Supreme Court has said that the death penalty primarily serves three purposes: retribution, deterrence, and incapacitation.</p>
<h2>The criteria for the death penalty</h2>
<p>Retribution concerns moral equivalency and society’s right to inflict the harshest punishment available in our criminal justice system - death - on behalf of victims and their families. In fact, the <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/07-343.ZO.html">Supreme Court has refused</a> to authorize capital punishment for crimes short of murder. </p>
<p>Under the Eighth Amendment “cruel and unusual punishments” clause, only the “worst of the worst” killers may be executed. The manner of the killing and the characteristics and culpability of the defendant must be carefully assessed. In 2005, for example, the Supreme Court <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A62584-2005Mar1.html">abolished</a> the death penalty for juvenile offenders.</p>
<p>With deterrence, we ask: would execution of this 21 year old deter other terrorists from committing similar crimes? Whether the death penalty actually deters <a href="http://nccadp.org/issues/deterrence/">continues</a> to be hotly <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/11/AR2007061100406.html">debated</a>, but it will surely be argued in Tsarnaev’s case that dedicated jihadists will not only not be deterred but are prepared for death as a path to matyrdom. </p>
<p>The final question regarding incapacitation is a straightforward one to answer: an executed murderer can never kill again. </p>
<p>The judge and jury in Tsarnaev’s trial must agree that one or more of these justifications for the death penalty is present in the case.</p>
<h2>The importance of federal involvement</h2>
<p>It is critically important that the Tsarnaev prosecution is being brought by the United States and not the state of Massachusetts. </p>
<p>Massachusetts excludes the death penalty as a sentence in a murder case. Indeed, <a href="http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2015/02/05/matters-justice-personal/1HXYIwyRx22d4Pvtxh2SOJ/story.html">polls </a> showed that Massachusetts citizens generally opposed charging Dzhokhar with capital murder (a crime eligible for the death penalty.) </p>
<p>But, none of that matters in a federal prosecution. Federal law – the anti-terrorism laws of the United States – provides multiple categories of death penality-eligible crimes. These include such acts as using a weapon of mass destruction resulting in death and conspiracy to bomb a place of public use. These categories have been aggressively invoked by federal prosecutors in the <a href="http://www.fbi.gov/boston/press-releases/2013/federal-grand-jury-returns-30-count-indictment-related-to-boston-marathon-explosions-and-murder-of-mit-police-officer-sean-collier">indictments</a> in this case. </p>
<p>Defense counsel strategy for the remainder of this trial is to make out Dzhokhar as a pawn of his older brother. Because of that, the argument will go, his culpability is insufficient to support a capital sentence. </p>
<p>Will the facts show that he was substantially under Tamerlan’s influence or was he independently motivated to kill Americans? </p>
<p>Did his youth, apparent timidity, or simplistic views on American military actions remove him from the “worst of the worst” category of killers? Or, is he in the same category as terrorists like the assassin “Jihadi John,” or the leader of Al-Shabaab? </p>
<p>By starting off its case with victim testimony, the prosecution is painting the picture of a cruel, heartless and unremorseful killer, the “worst of the worst,” who caused the death of three innocent people, including a young boy. </p>
<p>The government is saying, in other words, that this is a case of simple justice in which the death penalty is the only fair sentence for one whose crimes have caused so much suffering.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/38457/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Russell Murphy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The case seemed to end on the first day of the trial when the lawyer for the accused declared Dzhokhar Tsarnaev did plant one of the bombs. So what is really at stake here?Russell Murphy, Research Professor of Law, Suffolk UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/385162015-03-06T20:09:51Z2015-03-06T20:09:51ZClinton’s reversal on openness may impact more than her presidential ambitions<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/74103/original/image-20150306-13543-1jmctg9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Hillary Clinton in Hampton, N.H. in 2007 Photo by Marc Nozell</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/37996583933@N01/459271450/">Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Does the Clinton email issue represent mere sound and fury or is it a real controversy about government transparency? </p>
<p>Let’s examine the facts, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/04/us/politics/using-private-email-hillary-clinton-thwarted-record-requests.html?_r=0">as reported by the New York Times</a> and the Associated Press. </p>
<p>While Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton never used a governmental email account. Instead, she used a private email account maintained on a server located in her Chappaqua, New York home. Last year, she turned over a selection of her email records to the State Department, which has begun the slow process of determining which of those emails might be released to the public.</p>
<h2>Is this really a problem?</h2>
<p><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/05/john-kerry-hillary-clinton-emails_n_6809408.html">The current Secretary of State, John Kerry, doesn’t seem to think this is an issue</a>. But a closer look reveals a lack of respect by Clinton for the principle of democratic accountability. </p>
<p>Her email practice is inconsistent with the rhetoric on openness generated by the Obama administration during her tenure as Secretary of State, as well as by her husband’s administration between 1993 and 2000. More importantly, Clinton’s action provides a license for the governments of more fragile democracies abroad to evade their own transparency rules.</p>
<p>Clearly, Secretary Clinton isn’t the first government official to use private email to circumvent laws intended to preserve government records and make them accessible to the public. But she may have set a new standard for evasion by relying exclusively on private email, and setting up a server dedicated to that purpose. </p>
<p>Clinton may have been attempting to preserve her own power to determine which of those emails would enter the public domain, either through congressional inquiries, Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, or eventually through research in government archives. Clinton would no longer have to rely the judgment of government lawyers, FOIA officers, and archivists about the release of potentially damaging emails.</p>
<p>Now, suppose that this practice was adopted more broadly. Imagine that all those working for the federal government decided that they should have the right to do what Clinton has done. (That’s roughly 4.2 million people, by the way.) Or suppose that state and local officials (another 15 million people) also took the view that what is good enough for Mrs Clinton is good enough for them. </p>
<p>Think of the gap that would be created in the nation’s historical record. And think of the immense difficulties that would be created for legislators and citizens who are struggling to understand what their governments have done, or to hold them accountable for misbehavior.</p>
<h2>Clinton’s practice versus promises of openness</h2>
<p>Some commentators have emphasized that Mrs Clinton, a survivor of several intense political battles, has particularly strong reasons for wanting to control access to her emails. Perhaps so – but Clinton has also been associated with administrations that made powerful statements about the importance of promoting governmental openness.</p>
<p>In October 1993, for example, President Bill Clinton sent a <a href="http://www2.gwu.edu/%7Ensarchiv/nsa/foia/whinitial.pdf">memorandum</a> to federal department heads emphasizing “the fundamental principle that an informed citizenry is essential to the democratic process and that the more people know about their government the better they will be governed.” </p>
<p>The Clinton administration also exported the rhetoric of openness. It was one of the main sponsors of the <a href="https://www.community-democracies.org/Visioning-Democracy/To-be-a-Democracy-The-Warsaw-Declaration">2000 Warsaw Declaration</a>, which upheld the principle that government institutions should be “transparent, participatory and fully accountable.” The administration encouraged new democracies to adopt laws like the US Freedom of Information Act.</p>
<p>The Obama administration, in which Mrs. Clinton served from 2009 to 2013, made an even more forceful commitment to the principle of transparency. </p>
<p>On his first day in office, President Obama sent a <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/TransparencyandOpenGovernment">memorandum</a> to Secretary Clinton and other heads of executive departments emphasizing that his administration “is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government.” Transparency, Obama said, strengthens democracy, promotes accountability, and builds public trust.</p>
<p>Obama reinforced this message with a <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/FreedomofInformationAct/">second memorandum,</a> sent on the same day, also addressed to Secretary Clinton and other heads of executive departments. It focused specifically on the implementation of the Freedom of Information Act. </p>
<p>FOIA, Obama reminded the department heads, “is the most prominent expression of a profound national commitment to ensuring an open Government.” Clinton and her colleagues were warned that government agencies should “adopt a presumption in favor of disclosure” and that decisions to withhold information “should never be based on an effort to protect Government officials at the expense of those they are supposed to serve.”</p>
<p>The Obama administration renewed its commitment to openness when it launched the <a href="http://www.opengovpartnership.org/">Open Government Partnership</a> in 2011. </p>
<p>The OGP is an international project that requires individual countries to report on their progress toward increased transparency.</p>
<p>The United States produced its first <a href="http://www.opengovpartnership.org/country/united-states/action-plan">national action plan</a> for the OGP in September 2011. Open government, the plan said, was a “high priority” for the Obama administration. The plan recognized that “the backbone of a transparent and accountable government is strong records management that documents the decisions and actions of the Federal Government.” </p>
<p>Significantly, Hillary Clinton’s State Department played a key role in promoting the Open Government Partnership (OGP). </p>
<p>At the OGP’s launch in 2012, Clinton criticized “<a href="http://iipdigital.usembassy.gov/st/english/texttrans/2012/04/201204174027.html#axzz3TXoEcaqO">governments that hide from public view and dismiss the idea of openness</a>.” Her State Department emphasized the need for “<a href="http://www.state.gov/j/ogp/">political leadership</a>” to promote transparent government. The department was represented on the <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/open/about/working-group">working group</a> responsible for developing the overall US action plan on openness, and also produced its own departmental <a href="http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/164473.pdf">Open Government Plan in 2011</a> that “reflects the personal commitment of the Secretary of State … to the principles and practices of Open Government.”</p>
<p>The issue isn’t just whether Clinton complied with federal law. Over the years, Clinton subscribed to a higher standard on transparency. Her decision to privatize her email communications is not consistent with the strong statements on openness made by the Clinton and Obama administrations, and even her own State Department. </p>
<p>Her action will encourage government officials at home and abroad to walk away from their own promises on transparency. The revelations come at a particularly bad time for advocates of openness. As <a href="http://napawash.org/images/Why_Critics_of_Transparency_are_Wrong.pdf">a recent Brookings Institution study</a> observes, there is a rising tide of resistance to the principle of transparency in the United States. And, as I’ve noted elsewhere, there is <a href="http://aroberts.us/2014/10/22/keynote-address-at-international-seminar-in-mexico-city/">a similar backlash internationally</a>. </p>
<p>For years, Clinton talked a good game on transparency. But in management of her email, she has fallen far short of the ideal.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/38516/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alasdair S. Roberts does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The uproar over Hillary Clinton’s email practices raises crucial issues about transparency in government and seems to contradict her own previous commitment to openness.Alasdair S. Roberts, Professor of Law , Suffolk UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/339202014-11-17T10:39:44Z2014-11-17T10:39:44ZWhy brain science won’t cure poverty<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/64592/original/gdm84s9d-1415981673.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Uncritically invoking neuroscience is a risky proposition.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-184017407/stock-photo-thinking-mechanism-human-head-with-gears-inside.html?src=MyRvXR8E36V60Xb4Qnzj2g-3-49">Image of head via www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Recently I’ve seen news reports with headlines like this one: “<a href="http://commonhealth.wbur.org/2014/06/can-brain-science-help-lift-people-out-of-poverty?utm_source=cc&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nwsltr-14-06-06">Can Brain Science Help Lift People Out Of Poverty?</a>” </p>
<p>This particular article described the near miraculous recovery of a woman who grew up surrounded by violence in the housing projects, became a “single mom on welfare” who wasted her money and damaged her health with a pack-a-day smoking habit, and was stuck in an abusive relationship. Then, with the help of “a novel program that uses the latest neuroscience research to help women dig themselves out of poverty” by making better choices, she quit smoking, got rid of the bad boyfriend, earned a business management degree and landed a job as an administrative assistant. It’s not the only article I’ve seen recently that is looking at <a href="http://news.sciencemag.org/economics/2014/05/training-brain-lift-toddlers-out-poverty">brain science</a> as a way to cure <a href="http://brainworldmagazine.com/hope-the-key-to-using-the-brain-well-for-poverty-reduction-and-universal-welfare/">poverty</a>. </p>
<p>The enchantment with neuroscience to explain social misery has spread among individuals and organizations with longstanding commitments to progressive social change. “What the new brain science says is that the stresses created by living in poverty often work against us, make it harder for our brains to find the best solutions to our problems. This is a part of the reason why poverty is so ‘sticky,’” <a href="http://commonhealth.wbur.org/2014/06/can-brain-science-help-lift-people-out-of-poverty?utm_source=cc&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nwsltr-14-06-06">explained</a> Elisabeth Babcock, chief executive of the nonprofit Crittenton Women’s Union. Recent research from Princeton University has suggested that living in poverty can have an impact on concentration. Other research has found a similar correlation between <a href="http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/21967-this-is-your-brain-on-poverty-what-science-tells-us-about-povert">poverty and neuroscience</a>. </p>
<p>There is growing public discourse invoking neuroscience to re-emphasize that poverty really is bad, that <a href="http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2010/11/28/inside_the_bullied_brain/and%20abuse">bullying</a> and abuse really hurt children, and that someone who has <a href="http://dana.org/Cerebrum/2000/Wounds_That_Time_Won%E2%80%99t_Heal__The_Neurobiology_of_Child_Abuse/and%20rape?">experienced</a> <a href="http://nij.gov/multimedia/presenter/presenter-campbell/Pages/presenter-campbell-transcript.aspx">rape</a> or torture really is suffering. But uncritically invoking neuroscience is a <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/29/neuroscience-crime-idUSL6E8JO74920120829">risky proposition</a>.</p>
<h2>Proving the obvious</h2>
<p>Studies showing that trauma and poverty change people’s brains can too easily be read as <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3181836/">scientific proof</a> that poor people (albeit through no fault of their own) have inferior brains or that women who have been raped are now brain-damaged. In light of the ongoing failures of the Veterans Administration to adequately serve our veterans, I am particularly concerned with statements like this on the US Department of Veterans Affairs <a href="http://www.research.va.gov/currents/dec12-jan13/dec12-jan13-03.cfm">website</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Recent combat veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder have less volume in an area of the brain critical that is critical in fear and anxiety responses, say researchers with VA and Duke University. The scientists say their finding, published Nov. 1 in the Archives of General Psychiatry, is the first clear evidence that smaller amygdala volume is associated with PTSD, regardless of the severity of trauma. But there’s still a chicken-or-the-egg question: Is the physiological difference caused by a traumatic event, or does PTSD develop more readily in people who naturally have smaller amygdalas?”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In other words, is some sort of pre-existing neurological flaw the reason that some people suffer?</p>
<p>“Brain imaging is an extremely blunt tool quite incapable of determining if someone is traumatized or has some ‘poverty-stricken’ thought process, whatever that might be,” according to Tom Schwarz, Professor of Neurology and Neurobiology in the Department of Neurology at Harvard Medical School. “It only detects masses of activity by entire brain regions…. Those imaging methods are somewhat useful for neuroscientists if they tell us what part of the brain is engaged in a certain task, but only very partially because their resolution is so poor. Neurons that give rise to the sense of fear are mixed in and side by side with neurons that suppress anxiety and brain scans can’t tell them apart.” </p>
<p>At most, Schwarz explains, brain imaging can tell us “how;” it cannot tell us “why.”</p>
<p>Focusing on the neurological changes caused by poverty or violence bequeaths upon doctors and psychologists the power to decide what constitutes sufficient misery to entitle an individual to merit assistance. Right now, it seems the focus is shifting from the causes of suffering to the medicalized “proof” of suffering as the yardstick for determining who gets things such as reparations or refugee status.</p>
<h2>Brain damage as evidence of trauma?</h2>
<p>In settings where medical experts have a monopoly on determining and corroborating claims of abuse, what would happen when a brain scan doesn’t show the expected markers of trauma? Does that make the sufferer into a liar? Ineligible for asylum? Not entitled to veteran’s benefits? Does it make the testimony of a woman who was raped less credible in court? </p>
<p>In my <a href="http://susan.sered.name/cant-catch-a-break/">own research</a> with women who have been raped and abused I’ve witnessed reactions ranging from fear and insomnia (classic symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder) to anger, self-blame or even a relatively blasé sense that this kind of thing happens all the time and you can’t let it destroy your life. Would these different sorts of personal reactions show up differently in the brain? Would the rape of a woman who was not traumatized not “count”?</p>
<p>The new neuroscience offers wonderful possibilities regarding Alzheimer’s disease, epilepsy, brain injuries and much more. In particular, the notion of neuroplasticity – the ability of the brain to “re-wire” – is one of the most exciting and optimistic implications of cutting-edge neuroscience research. But scientific knowledge always develops and is utilized within social contexts. </p>
<h2>Holding the individual to blame</h2>
<p>Social attitudes and policies regarding poor and marginalized Americans today are dominated by a culture that emphasizes individual rather than social pathology, and holds the individual accountable for the failings of the collective. That orientation is made clear in our national welfare policy - the “<a href="http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-104hr3734enr/pdf/BILLS-104hr3734enr.pdf">Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act</a>,” and in our world-leading rates of incarceration and use of psychiatric medication.</p>
<p>Within this climate, the notion that we can change or cure the brains of poor people so that they will no longer be poor assumes that if the individual just tries hard enough, in the right way, with the right mentoring, there really is a path out of poverty, abuse or prison. And it assumes that the current social landscape gives all people a fair shot at a decent life, that violence and deprivation are isolated incidents that took place in the past, and that it’s always possible to “move on”.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/33920/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Susan Sered does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Recently I’ve seen news reports with headlines like this one: “Can Brain Science Help Lift People Out Of Poverty?” This particular article described the near miraculous recovery of a woman who grew up…Susan Sered, Professor of Sociology, Suffolk UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.