Good governance and security: The limits of Australia's new aid programme

This article analyses the Australian Agency for International Development's (AusAID) approach to overseas development assistance (ODA) through an examination of AusAID's recent White Paper. The White Paper focuses on the nexus between poverty reduction and security in the Asia-Pacific region. We argue that the Paper's emphasis upon good governance as the key to poverty reduction and security is fundamentally flawed. This stems from the particular ideological and political conditions in which the Paper materialised. In focusing on good governance and security the Paper neglects more fundamental poverty reduction issues, while promoting policies that are difficult to implement and, when implemented, have highly problematic outcomes. This article examines the Australian-led intervention in Solomon Islands and the Australian aid programme in Indonesia as examples for the shortcomings of the approach articulated in the White Paper. We conclude by examining alternative development policies that move beyond the neo-liberal orthodoxy endorsed by AusAID.     

‘You caught ’em!’…or not? Feedback affects investigators’ recollections of speech cues thought to signal honesty and deception

Purpose. When eyewitnesses to crime receive feedback about their choice of a suspect from a line‐up (or post‐identification feedback), such information can substantially alter their recollections of the witnessing experience. This study examined whether feedback exerts similar effects on investigators’ recollections of a suspect's behaviours. Methods. Participant‐investigators received training on speech cues that they were told, when present in a speaker's account, signal either honesty or deception. After hearing a suspect's account of a theft, participants decided whether the suspect was lying or telling the truth. One‐third of participants subsequently received immediate confirming feedback about their performance, while another third received disconfirming feedback. The remaining one‐third of participants did not receive feedback about their decision. Finally, participants rated the frequencies of speech cues that they had been instructed to detect in the suspect's account. Results. Disconfirming feedback significantly altered retrospective judgments about the characteristics of the suspect's account. Specifically, when told that the decision they made about the speaker's credibility was incorrect, participants judged the speaker as having exhibited fewer behaviours consistent with the credibility decision they had made, relative to those who either received no feedback or confirming feedback. Conclusions. Biases in recollections of a suspect may have consequences in real‐world interrogations wherein investigators assess credibility on the basis of numerous behavioural cues. Results are discussed in light of findings of post‐identification feedback studies on eyewitnesses.     

The Case Against Intelligence Openness

The buccaneer as Donovan's heir

Joseph Persico: Casey: From the OSS To The CIA Viking, New York, 1990, 601 p., $24.95.

Keeping up with Jones

R. V. Jones: Reflections on Intelligence. Heinemann, London, 376 p. (Price not given.)

Toward the science of war

Edward N. Luttwak: Strategy: The Logic of War and Peace Belknap, Cambridge, Mass., 1987, 283 p., $20.00.

The Chinese puzzle

Roger Faligot and Remi Kauffer: The Chinese Secret Service: Kang Sheng and the Shadow Government in Red China William Morrow and Company, New York, 1989, 525 p., $24.95.

Peeking into keyhole

Jeffrey T. Richelson: America's Secret Eyes in Space: The U.S. Keyhole Spy Satellite Program Harper &; Row/Ballinger, New York, 1990, 375 p., $24.95.     

Using international law to assess elections

This article provides an overview of existing obligations for democratic elections in public international law (PIL), and links these obligations to criteria for assessing electoral processes. We argue that PIL provides a basis for election observation that is more transparent, more objective, and has greater authority with host countries because it relies on states' acknowledged international legal commitments. In addition, the authors argue that this approach provides a solid foundation for building broad consensus on what constitutes ‘international standards for democratic elections’, an often-used term for which there still is no single commonly accepted definition.     

Mapping Corporate Influence and Institutional Corruption Inside Canadian Universities

Corporate influences that threaten the independence of science and trust in research often remain hidden from the general public. For university administrators these improper influences are often tacitly accepted as simply the new reality of funding environments—something to be managed, rather than eliminated. In this article, we structurally map patterns of corporate influence that threaten to distort the independence of research. Specifically, we map relationships between the fossil fuel industry and three major Canadian institutions of higher education. We also provide case studies of institutional corruption inside two of these universities. Our findings reveal elite interlocking networks between the fossil-fuel sector and academia as well as corporate influences that serve to decrease the independence of science and trust in research.     

Representatives of the public? Public opinion and interest group activity

Although scholars have long speculated about how organised interests link the public to decision makers, there has actually been little empirical research on this important element of democratic theory. This important gap in the literature is addressed in this article by examining, in addition to other supply‐side and demand‐side factors, whether groups mobilise on issues in policy areas that are regarded as salient by the public. Based on an analysis of 4,501 contributions in 142 European Commission online consultations, it is found that organised interests potentially can act as a transmission belt between the public and decision makers. Although the results vary to some degree by issues, higher rates of mobilisation are found on those issues that fall within policy areas that are regarded as salient by the general public and those with consequences for budgetary spending.     

A Molecular Method to Correlate Bloodstains with Wound Site for Crime Scene Reconstruction

Bloodstain pattern analysis to determine the wound‐of‐origin of bloodstains is problematic with nonspecific patterns. In this proof‐of‐concept study, the authors examined a molecular approach to correlate bloodstains with injuries using the rat as a model. Specifically, investigations were conducted on the rat brain marker, rno‐miR‐124‐3p, with the QIAGEN miScript System and real‐time PCR analysis. Rno‐miR‐124‐3p was detected in brain homogenates diluted 100,000 times; in 3‐week‐old, room temperature stored, simulated brain–blood stains; and in bloodstains from head gunshot wounds collected with swabs and subsequently frozen for 9–18 months; however, rno‐miR‐124‐3p was not detected in whole blood. Proof‐of‐principle was demonstrated by the ability to distinguish bloodstains from a gunshot wound to the head versus bloodstains from a gunshot wound to the chest, by the testing of otherwise identical bloodstains from the two patterns for the presence of the marker. The results suggest a viable approach to a longstanding problem in casework.     

Reform or Radicalism: Left Social Movements from the Battle of Seattle to Occupy Wall Street

We examine two recent cases of relative Left success—the Battle of Seattle and Occupy Wall Street—and argue that in each case an effective dynamism between radical and reform wings drove gains. This analysis is not meant to deny political difference and hawk false unity. Instead we want to challenge the luxury of mutual dismissal with the actually existing benefits of movement dynamism. By dynamism we mean contributions arising from different activist wings and productively interacting to increase overall movement power. Our ultimate claim is that the North American Left will yield greater success by becoming more self-conscious about the concrete benefits of movement dynamism.