Enforcing the Law and Being a State

Many anarchists believe that a stateless society could and should feature laws. It might appear that, in so believing, they are caught in a contradiction. The anarchist objects to the state because its authority does not rest on actual consent, and using force to secure compliance with law in a stateless society seems objectionable for the same reason. Some people in a stateless society will have consented to some laws or law-generating mechanisms and some to others – while some will have consented to none. Someone’s obedience to a legal requirement could be justly enforceable absent the state, nonetheless, given either her actual consent to the requirement or to a mechanism responsible for generating it or the coextensiveness of the legal requirement with a moral requirement. And it could thus be just on the anarchist’s own terms to enforce a narrow range of positive legal requirements even against outlaws who had declined to consent to them.     

Spatial and Temporal Patterns of Terrorist Attacks by ETA 1970 to 2007

Rational choice perspectives maintain that seemingly irrational behavior on the part of terrorist organizations may nevertheless reflect strategic planning. In this paper we examine spatial and temporal patterns of terrorist attacks by the Spanish group ETA between 1970 and 2007. Our analysis is guided by a public announcement by ETA in 1978 that the group would shift from emphasizing attacks in the Basque territory to instead launch attacks more widely in the hopes of exhausting the Spanish government and forcing it to abandon the Basque territory. This announcement suggests that prior to the end of 1978 ETA attacks were based mostly on controlling territory in the Basque region that they hoped to rule; and after 1978 the organization decided to instead undertake a prolonged war of attrition. Accordingly, we argue that before the end of 1978 ETA was mostly perpetrating control attacks (attacking only within the Basque territories) and that the diffusion of attacks between provinces was mostly contagious (spreading contiguously). After the 1978 proclamation, we argue that the attack strategy shifted toward attrition (attacking in areas outside of the Basque territories) and that the attacks were more likely to diffuse hierarchically (spreading to more distant locations). As predicted, we find that after ETA moved toward a more attrition based attack strategy, subsequent attacks were significantly more likely to occur outside the Basque region and to target non-adjacent regions (consistent with hierarchical diffusion). We also find that hierarchical diffusion was more common when a longer time elapsed between attacks (a likely consequence of the fact that more distant attacks require more resources and planning) and that attacks against Madrid were unlikely to be followed immediately by more attacks on Madrid or surrounding provinces. After ETA announced a shift in policy, they maintained a highly dispersed attack strategy even during their period of decline. Using information about where and when prior attacks occurred could provide useful information for policy makers countering groups like ETA.     

Rethinking police education in the United States

ABSTRACT

Higher education for police in the United States began as police science and police administration in the early-to-middle 1900s but morphed into criminal justice starting in the 1960s, continuing in that mold to the present. This paper examines curricula at a handful of universities to provide a snapshot of U.S. police education today, illustrating that modern criminal justice programs do not focus very much on police at either the undergraduate or graduate level. The paper then considers alternative models that could provide students a more in-depth encounter with the now-robust policing body of knowledge, something that barely existed 50 years ago but could, at this point, serve as the foundation for a respectable and relevant academic and professional education.     

Transferring Health Technology to South Africa: The Importance of Traditional African Culture

The transfer of new health technology to South Africa is occurring despite the fact that North American and European health care planners and entrepreneurs have a very limited understanding of traditional Black South African cultures which condition the health-related behaviors of the majority of the population. Consequently, relatively few people of African descent in this very diverse nation are, at least initially, benefiting from the new imported medical technology. This study gives an overview of traditional Black medicine in South Africa and, through the presentation of several case studies, discusses its implications for the societal adoption of new health technology received from the United States and other industrialized nations. The example of the successful application of cervical cancer exams in rural and urban clinics of the Eastern Cape is analyzed and institutional mechanisms that support successful transfer are identified.