The City as a Human Environment (Duane G. LeVine & Arthur C. Upton eds., Praeger Publishers 1994) ISBN 0-275-94659-2; LC 94-1146. About the authors, bibliography, foreword, index, preface, tables. [216 pp. Cloth $55.00. 88 Post Road West, Westport CT 06881-5007.]
One essay describes developments in New Jersey where builders provide one low income unit for every four at market rate. This is made attractive for developers by, e.g., permitting higher density zoning.
Another outlines how Community Development Corporations have helped cities like Boston, New York and Cleveland develop affordable, desirable housing opportunities in spite of the Scylla and Charybdis of rapid gentrification and urban flight. Through innovative financing techniques that link local advisory committees with business and philanthropic leaders, Local Initiative Support Corporation, for example, "seeks to change the behavior of institutions and individuals with respect to low-income communites, not simply to undertake individual projects."1 This would seem worthy of consideration by declining cities throughout the country.
In dealing with public transportation, the essays point out that the U.S. lags shamefully behind other western countries. One obstacle to improved transportation options is the public's love affair with the automobile. As Matthew Coogan states in his essay: "While it may be well and proper for the maid to arrive by public transportation," some citizens consider such an indignity "below their desired lifestyle."2 Such attitudes may be changing, however. After spending an hour and fifty minutes traversing forty miles of New Hampshire roads last Fourth of July weekend, I'm ready to give my car a rest. Perhaps some in the endless line of traffic behind me felt the same.
Essays in The City as Human Environment may often be too elementary for seasoned urban planners. Yet, it is difficult to believe that the book will not offer useful insights to all of them -- and, perhaps the rest of us -- for example in the disclosure of myriad ways public officials can involve all citizens in the process of addressing the decline of our cities.
The book, of course, leaves many questions unanswered. One of the more interesting for many readers of Risk will be: How are officials to deal with a public that tends "to believe in your omniscience and your infinite ability to hide the facts from them."3
Claudia Grimes*
2 At 35.
3 At 129.
* Ms. Grimes is a candidate for the J.D. at Franklin Pierce Law Center. She holds a B.A. (History) from the University of Rhode Island and previously worked for an environmental political action committee for over ten years.
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Bonnie L. Walker, Injury Prevention for the Elderly: A Research Guide (Greenwood Press 1995) Acknowledgments, appendices, author index, bibliographical references, foreword, preface, subject index. LC 95-32989; ISSN 0743-7560 [328 pp. Cloth $75.00. 88 Post Road West, Westport, CT 06881.]
to provide information that could be used to develop an injury prevention training program curriculum for people who care for the elderly in long-term care facilities as well as in the community.Those who either have extensive contact with the elderly or implement prophylactic measures to protect them will find this annotated compilation especially useful.
In chapter 1, General Injury Prevention,2 Walker lists resources that address broad public health concerns about the elderly. She presents a comprehensive listing of pamphlets, books, articles, reports, studies and bibilographic works, arranged alphabetically by author. These detail economic, epidemiological, medical, legal, public health and other issues pertaining to the health of seniors. For example, one reference, The Handbook of Gerontological Nursing,3 offers various methods of assessing common conditions. It is for clinicians, but other references will be helpful, e.g., to elder care advocates, counselors, other health care workers and family members.
In later chapters, Walker organizes according to specific concerns, e.g, alcohol and substance abuse,4 burns,5 choking,6 drowning,7 elder abuse,8 falls,9 food poisoning10 and suicide.11
Walker's organization is impressive. Researchers can access information through her table of contents, subject index or author index.
Additionally, each chapter briefly introduces and reviews the specific cause of injury and its particular affect on the elderly. For instance, in the prelude to a chapter on malnutrition,12 Walker points out that it is often not detected in seniors because symptoms are attributed to the aging process. Following this, selected resources on sub-topics range from the specifics of salt consumption to the broader subject of nutritional screening and intervention strategies.
While each of 621 references in the guide is followed by a concise synopsis, I was disappointed by her lack of explanation for why particular books and articles were chosen (or not) -- and lack of comment on the strengths and weaknesses of most references.
On the whole, Injury Prevention for the Elderly contains an impressive compilation of materials useful for both experts and laypersons. Yet, like a fine dictionary, it is not an engaging read.
David E. Belfort*
2 At 1.
3 At 14.
4 At 19.
5 At 61.
6 At 77.
7 At 87.
8 At 93.
9 At 115.
10 At 153.
11 At 259.
12 At 179.
* Mr. Belfort is a candidate for the J.D. at Franklin Pierce Law Center. He holds a B.A. (Economics) from the Hobart College and has worked for the New York State Department of Health.
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Ralph L. Barnett & Steven R. Schmid, Safeguard Evaluation Protocol -- A Decision Tree for Standardizing, Optionalizing, Prohibiting, Ignoring, Enhancing or Characterizing Safeguards (Triodyne Inc., 1995) Figures, references, table. ISSN 1041-9489. [14 pp. $25.00. 5950 W. Touhy, Niles, IL 60714.]
The purpose of Safeguard Evaluation Protocol is to provide an objective framework for decision making that will satisfy guidelines developed within the engineering and manufacturing communities, as well as meet legal and regulatory requirements. The authors make good use of specific examples, both to introduce the evaluation flowchart and to explore the process of choosing between various options it presents. The evaluation protocol involves three basic considerations. First, in considering the safety value of the safeguard, all information from various value systems (e.g., regulatory requirements or industry standards) is reflected in a single decision point: Is the safeguard required, recommended, or permitted? When value systems have conflicting positions with regard to a safeguard, the most stringent is adopted. Next, use of the safeguard in conjunction with the underlying product is assessed: Will the safeguard eliminate any of the product's functions? Last, the protocol invites analysis of the economic impact of implementing the safeguard: Would the cost be reasonable or not?
While the authors hold out their flowchart as a tool for helping decision makers meet later legal scrutiny of their actions, they acknowledge the difficulties inherent in balancing the benefits and costs of a safeguard.1 The authors' defensive attitude toward the legal system does nothing to dispel these difficulties, however.
For example, Barnett & Schmid suggest that determining whether the cost of a safeguard is reasonable depends more on supplier perception of the judicial system, including anticipation of possible "jury award(s)," than on an objective evaluation.2 And when it comes to balancing the costs to suppliers of additional safeguards against the value of human health and safety, they recommend an estimation of the cost of saving human lives, as "courts have severely punished manufacturers who have had the temerity to publish their valuations of human life and limb."3 Rather than make what is basically an editorial comment, it would have been more useful for the authors to support this point of view with references or cases in which similar economic evaluations have been made successfully (or unsuccessfully) from both a manufacturing and a legal standpoint.
The booklet concludes with the discussion of two frequently cited product liability cases, Barker v. Lull Engineering Co.4 and Bexiga v. Havir Mfg. Corp.,5 as examples of the compatibility of their evaluation protocol with overall judicial analysis of product safeguards. The evaluation protocol does incorporate many of the factors discussed in Barker for cost/benefit analysis of alternative product designs and is useful in identifying weak points in the assessment of safeguard feasibility in Bexiga. While the authors intend this protocol to help suppliers reach a legally defensible result with respect to a potential safeguard, Safeguard Evaluation Protocol must be regarded as only a useful starting point in the complex process of legally defensible cost/benefit analysis.
Suzanne A. Sprunger*
2 Id.
3 At 6.
4 573 P.2d 454 (Cal. 1976).
5 290 A.2d 281 (N.J. 1972).
* Dr. Sprunger is a candidate for the J.D. at Franklin Pierce Law Center. She holds a B.S. ( Biology) from Cornell University and a Ph.D. (Genetics) from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
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Robert M. Hardaway, Population, Law, and the Environment (Praeger 1994). About the author, acknowledgements, index, notes, preface, selected bibliography. LC-93-44501; ISBN 0-275-94570-7 [188 pp. $55.00 Cloth. 88 Post Road West, Westport CT 06881.]
Hardaway's style draws the reader in, as does his thought-provoking statistics:2
Every one-third of a second, at about the speed a machine gun fires its bullets, the planet earth makes room to accommodate one additional human being. To provide that one human being with minimum standards of human dignity, he must be provided annually with fuel and energy resources... 2000m3 of fresh water... [and] 207 GJ of energy... from nonrenewable sources.... His waste products include 355,000 metric tons of phosphorus... 270,000 metric tons of methane, 30,000 of sulfur, and 80,000 of carbon monoxide....
He explains that societies earlier coped with overpopulation through, e.g., emigration and technology and have most recently turned to regulation. In that vein, Hardaway discusses what former EPA Administrator, Lee Thomas called "the circle game" -- an impression given to voters that the environment is being improved, when regulation merely transfers pollution from one medium to another.3 He argues that, while reduction in one air contaminant might be hailed as an environmental victory, its simultaneous appearance in, e.g., soil is rarely greeted as defeat or even acknowledged.
Hardaway also argues that regulatory improvements are often nullified by population increases, even before they go into effect. For instance, before states could implement car emission legislation, the number of cars on the road increased so much that the legislation's benefits were reduced to almost nothing.
Hardaway also discusses other factors that he believes to be important with regard to population growth such as family planning, abortion, immigration and economic growth. Yet, he offers possible solutions, leaving the reader with some basis for optimism.
All-in-all, Population, Law, and the Environment suggests that the key to controlling our future is awareness. In that vein at its close,4 Hardaway refers to a 1992 slogan indicating what some Democrats thought the Presidential campaign was mostly about -- "It's the Economy, Stupid." He then suggests that a sign should be prominently posted in the headquarters of environmental groups, saying, "It's the Population, Stupid."
Carey Ann Zadra*
2 At 17.
3 At 43.
4 At 167.
* Ms. Zadra received her B.S. (Biological Science) from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She is completing work for her J.D. at Franklin Pierce Law Center (FPLC), focusing on environmental and intellectual property law.
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Ike Jeanes, Forecast and Solution -- A Trilogy for Everyone Grappling with the Nuclear (Pocahontas Press 1996). Addenda, appendix, figures, front matter, notes, references, tables. ISBN 0-936015-62-4 [800 pp. Cloth $32.00; paper $25.00. P.O. Drawer F, Blacksburg VA 24063-1020.]
The first book, Formula k, The Guide, "reveal[s] the end process of applying annual probabilities of initiating a nuclear strike year after year."2 In it, Jeanes bombards the reader with a host of formulae, tables, charts and graphs. He discusses a Reluctance Level said to measure the average number of years before a given party with the capacity would be inclined to initiate a nuclear strike for any reason whatsoever. Overall, Jeanes attempts to establish statistically what might be an otherwise simple and believable fact: As more entities can produce or procure nuclear warheads, we face an increased probability of some form of hostile or accidental detonation.
Book two, Unified Theories, begins a long discussion of how the equations introduced earlier enable readers to analyze the likelihood of nuclear detonation and to be conversant in ways to increase the number of years before one is likely to occur. Henry Kissinger is quoted as saying:3
What the potential aggressor believes is more crucial than what is objectively true. Deterrence occurs above all in the minds of men.However, Jeanes places little faith in deterrence; he argues that proliferation alone is the critical factor reducing the time until a nuclear explosion. He considers many historical and social perspectives relative to this problem. The history of the 20th Century is recounted, with interspersed discussions from moral and religious sources, to support his contentions.
Book three, Unified Theories Defied in WW I, WW II and After, is a tour-de-force, prosaic analysis of the course of history primarily since WW I. Yet, Jeanes even weaves threads from the U.S. Revolutionary War and Constitutional Convention in telling his tale. He addresses the failure of the Treaty of Versailles to produce the League of Nations and gives much credit for resulting imbalances to Henry Cabot Lodge. At one point, he places responsibility for WW II on both Lodge and Adolph Hitler.4 Jeanes continues spinning his tale of our nuclear future to a simple conclusion: "[T]he question is not so much one of `good' or `bad' guys, but the number of `guys.'"5
Some will find Jeanes' book quirky, e.g., because of extensive citation to the Encyclopedia Britannica, a work he regards as generally underutilized. Also, a glossary of acronyms found at the beginning of Book II is not listed in the Table of Contents; nor is it logically located at the end of the text. Moreover, 77 tables and 178 figures are not indexed for quick access, and the organization is occasionally unclear.
I found Forecast and Solution a reminder of how little I know of statistics. Yet, I found it nonetheless fascinating and recommend it to all who are interested in, or involved, with nuclear energy -- peaceful or otherwise.
Drew Schaefer*
2 At 37.
3 At 189.
4 At 586.
5 At 653.
* Mr. Schaefer received his B.A. (International Relations) from the University of Colorado-Denver, where his senior thesis was titled "The PARADOX of United States Arms Reduction in a Three Tier Production Market." He is an extern at the International Telecommunications Union in Geneva and a candidate for the J.D. at FPLC.
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Peter K. LaGoy, Risk Assessment: Principles and Applications for Hazardous Waste and Related Sites (Noyes Publications 1994). Appendices, figures, index, notes, preface, references, tables. LC 94-2510; ISBN 0-8155-1349-6. [260 pp. Cloth $48.00. 120 Mill Road, Park Ridge NJ 07656.]
This is not an introductory text. It contains no glossary. Thus, those without a basic understanding of hazardous site evaluation and remediation should probably begin elsewhere.
Moreover LaGoy seems to assume that readers are aware of the tension between saving lives and saving money. Thus, not until the fourth chapter, does he note, e.g., that:2
[H]azardous waste site risk assessment is more focused on protecting human health than in getting the right answer. The focus is somewhat misguided in that... being overly conservative... can increase risks from other causes.This book makes good use of examples drawn from over twelve years of experience, and its appendices, running over 50 pages, discuss two case studies. Readers already familiar with basic terms and concepts (and even some who are not) may may feel that they are next to him, working in the field.
Risk Assessment is well produced, and its chapters treat a wide variety of topics, including chemical characteristics, toxicology, exposure assessment, risk characterization, uncertainty, risk communication, as well as radiation and ecological risk assessment.
Adam K Sacharoff*
2 At 59.
* Mr. Sacharoff holds a B.S. (Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering) from Purdue University and is a candidate for the J.D. & Masters in Intellectual Property at FPLC.
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Dennis W. Nixon, Marine and Coastal Law: Cases and Materials (Praeger 1994). Index, notes, preface, tables, table of cases. LC 93-30986; ISBN 0-275-93763-1. [392 pp. Cloth $65.00. Post Road West, Westport CT 06881.]
Marine and Coastal Law is clearly not for the average reader of Risk. Yet, some who are neither lawyers nor aspiring lawyers may find it (or other casebooks) useful. Many risk professionals find court decisions important to their work but learn about them only second or third hand. Such people are apt to find direct exposure to be more interesting and enlightening than imagined. And it is helpful when related cases are collected in a single source and arranged by topic.
Subject matter of most possible interest includes Public Access to the Shoreline (Ch. 4), Regulating Development in Coastal Zones: The Coastal Zone Management Act of 1972 (Ch. 5 -- also contains selected provisions of the Act), When Does Regulation Go Too Far? The Takings Issue (Ch. 6) and Marine Pollution Law (Ch. 10).
When regulation amounts to a taking for which compensation is due under the 5th Amendment, for example, is not generally well understood. A variety of regulatory professionals would find value in having a better sense of the judicial perspective on that issue alone. It could also lay a foundation for better understanding of legislative proposals that would go well beyond Constitutional requirements.
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Science Advice to the President (William T. Golden, ed. AAAS Press 2d Ed. 1993). Acknowledgments, index of names, introductions, notes, tables. ISBN 0-87168-509-4 [340 pp. $29.95 paper. American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1333 H St. NW, Washington DC 20701.]
A central premise is that science has extraordinary power and influence and should be a vital factor in presidential as well as congressional policy-making. This is probably best illustrated by William G. Wells' essay:1
In a very brief time science has proved itself an incredibly powerful revolutionary force which has swiftly and dramatically affected society's beliefs and values, created and destroyed industries, revolutionized war, transformed and overturned political and social organizations, and modified man's conception of his place in the universe.In regard to the politician's role, he quotes Eisenhower:2
"[I]t is the task of statesmanship to mold, to balance, and to integrate these and other forces... within the principles of our democratic system -- ever aiming toward the supreme goals of our free society."Thus, the book's main focus is exploring the most effective way of encouraging presidents to seek, consider, evaluate and use scientific and technological advice. It provides, too, an analysis of how the less than smooth relationship between science advisors and presidents has evolved and suggests paths it should take in the future.
Science Advice to the President seems to be written for present and future presidents, members of congress, career civil servants, educators and others directly concerned with the social effects of rapid technology growth and its management by government. It may also be of particular interest to funded university researchers. For example, the essay by Gerald Piel 3 gives an interesting analysis of the current state of basic and applied science research funding, the direction it is heading and a proposal to maintain its well-being. Finally, with close attention, even casual readers should have little difficulty exploring the important area the book addresses.
Since the first edition was published in 1980, only a few articles have been added. Many older articles argue for reestablishing the President's Science Advisory Committee. Because President Bush did exactly that in 1989 and President Clinton has continued it, the argument has already been won. Nevertheless, a thorough discussion of recurring issues provides an excellent framework for assessing its continuing viability.
Timothy Van Dyke*
2 At 255.
3 At 205.
* Mr. Van Dyke received a B.S. (Biology) from the University of Florida and a M.S. (Microbiology) from the University of South Florida. He is a candidate for the J.D. at FPLC.
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