Separate opinions in the European Court of Human Rights

Separate opinions, both concurring and dissenting, have beena feature of judgments of the European Court of Human Rightssince its earliest days, but detailed studies of their incidenceand impact have until recently been sparse. This article, basedon an AHRC-funded research study, offers a survey of the researchliterature and describes the outcome of its own considerationof such opinions. The use of separate opinions in the EuropeanCourt of Human Rights is significant, but the incidence of soledissents by national judges is very low. It would appear thatthe main determining factor in the writing of a separate opinionis judicial temperament. There is some evidence that the backgroundof judges prior to their election to the Court has some influenceon their approach to writing separate opinions. The Court, however,demonstrates high levels of collegiality and the use of separateopinions contributes to the transparency of its decision-making.     

‘New feminist materialisms’

This review essay discusses and contextualizes four recent publications in and on ‘new feminist materialism’. The discussion of the three edited volumes and one monograph demonstrates what the new feminist materialism wants to provoke in different (inter)disciplines, and the contextualization is aimed at dealing with the question of what is ‘new’ in new feminist materialism. Ultimately, the essay boils down to exploring the theoretical tools that scholars from diverse (inter)disciplinary fields, continents and generations have developed for dealing with agential matter rather than (gendered) passive matter. The contextualization exercise wants to show how the new materialism is not a paradigm shift or a rewriting of, for instance, the linguistic turn. These two seemingly opposite epistemological tools are both grounded in an epistemology of recognition, whereas the new materialism wants to move away from such linguisticism. Experimenting with the tool of the ‘quantum leap’, the essay ends with openings for future (epistemic) research on and of the material turn.     

The Global South in Environmental Negotiations: the politics of coalitions in redd+

During international environmental negotiations developing countries have commonly employed a unified strategy through the G-77 and China (G-77/China). Compared with other negotiations, such as those on trade and security, this strategy has been relatively successful in securing financial and technical benefits. Unity among developing states is not, however, a characteristic of all environmental negotiations. This paper analyses the case of Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation plus conservation ( redd +), where unity has been absent. It argues that the negotiation positions, strategies and coalition politics from 2005 to 2013 have been a result of identifiable power asymmetries among developing states (shifting over time). Some states with vast forest resources have held an effective veto, while others have had considerable moral influence and expert authority. Coalitions have courted such relevant and reputational leaders. At the same time some developing states have had enough diplomatic capacity and economic power to stand alone in negotiations. Taking a broad, historical view of the diverse forest interests and power asymmetries among developing states helps to explain the recent stagnation in negotiations to establish an international redd+ mechanism to mitigate climate change.     

Fairness and competence in democratic decisions

The price system is generally thought to be the epitome of efficiency. In some cases, however, lotteries are preferred to the market as a social decision-making system for reasons of fairness. As recent research has shown, neither procedure is always well accepted among the general population. We analyze the social acceptability of both mechanisms and apply our framework to the allocation of social burdens, namely the siting of nuclear waste facilities. Lotteries are only acceptable if they are applied to a set of efficient options. The market is accepted if the production of fairness precedes the use of prices.     

Collecting touch DNA from glass surfaces using different sampling solutions and volumes: Immediate and storage effects on genetic STR analysis

Touch DNA has become increasingly important evidence in todays' forensic casework. However, due to its invisible nature and typically minute amounts of DNA, the collection of biological material from touched objects remains a particular challenge that underscores the importance of the best collection methods for maximum recovery efficiency. So far, swabs moistened with water are often utilized in forensic crime scene investigations for touch DNA sampling, even though an aqueous solution provokes osmosis, endangering the cell's integrity. The aim of the research presented here was to systematically determine whether DNA recovery from touched glass items can be significantly increased by varying swabbing solutions and volumes compared with water-moistened swabs and dry swabbing. A second objective was to investigate the possible effects of storage of swab solutions prior to genetic analysis on DNA yield and profile quality when stored for 3 and 12 months, as is often the case with crime scene samples. Overall, the results indicate that adapting volumes of the sampling solutions had no significant effect on DNA yield, while the detergent-based solutions performed better than water and dry removal, with the SDS reagent yielding statistically significant results. Further, stored samples showed an increase in degradation indices for all solutions tested, but no deterioration in DNA content and profile quality, allowing for unrestricted processing of touch DNA samples stored for at least 12 months. One further finding was a strong intraindividual change in DNA amounts observed over the 23 deposition days which may be related to the donor's menstrual cycle.