Die Haftung des Veräußerers für öffentliche Äußerungen Dritter – insbesondere durch Werbung – nach § 922 Abs 2 ABGB

Mit der Umsetzung der Verbrauchsgüterkauf-Richtlinie durch das Gew?hrleistungsrechts-?nderungsgesetz wurde im ?sterr Recht das Einstehenmüssen des übergebers nicht nur für eigene ?ffentliche ?u?erungen, sondern auch für jene Dritter ausdrücklich festgeschrieben. Der vorliegende Beitrag untersucht die einschl?gige Regelung des § 922 ABGB sowohl unter dem Gesichtspunkt gemeinschaftsrechtlicher Vorgaben als auch im Lichte des (nationalen) Privatrechtssystems und stellt dabei in Frage, dass ein Einstehenmüssen für ?ffentliche ?u?erungen jedenfalls deren Einbeziehung in die Parteienvereinbarung voraussetzt.     

Mietvertragsklauseln auf dem Prüfstand des Verbraucherrechts

In einer jüngst in einem Verbandsklageverfahren ergangenen Entscheidung erkl?rte der OGH zahlreiche Klauseln eines Mustermietvertrages, der von einer gro?en ?sterreichischen Hausverwaltung verwendet wurde, für unzul?ssig. Der vorliegende Beitrag er?rtert die Entscheidung des 7. Senats, was angesichts ihres Umfanges nur hinsichtlich einiger ausgew?hlter Aspekte erfolgen kann. Den Schwerpunkt der Analyse bildet dabei die in den meisten Mietvertr?gen wohl ganz zentrale Regelung der Erhaltungspflicht. Ausgehend von den Ausführungen des OGH wird auch versucht, alternative Regelungsm?glichkeiten für Mietvertragsformulare aufzuzeigen.     

Using Bayes’ theorem in behavioural crime linking of serial homicide

Purpose. The study extends research by Santtila et al. (2008) by investigating the effectiveness of linking cases of serial homicide using behavioural patterns of offenders, analysed through Bayesian reasoning. The study also investigates the informative value of individual behavioural variables in the linking process. Methods. Offender behaviour was coded from official documents relating to 116 solved homicide cases belonging to 19 separate series. The basis of the linkage analyses was 92 behaviours coded as present or absent in the case based on investigator observations on the crime scene. We developed a Bayesian method for linking crime cases and judged its accuracy using cross‐validation. We explored the information added by individual behavioural variables, first, by testing if the variable represented purely noise with respect to classification, and second, by excluding variables from the original model, one by one, by choosing the behaviour that had the smallest effect on classification accuracy. Results. The model achieved a classification accuracy of 83.6% whereas chance expectancy was 5.3%. In simulated scenarios of only one and two known cases in a series, the accuracy was 59.0 and 69.2%, respectively. No behavioural variable represented pure noise but the same level of accuracy was achieved by analysing a set of 15, as analysing all 92 variables. Conclusion. The study illustrates the utility of analysing individual behavioural variables through Bayesian reasoning for crime linking. Feasible applied use of the approach is illustrated by the effectiveness of analysing a small set of carefully chosen variables.     

No Evidence of Specific Deterrence under Penal Moderation: Imprisonment and Recidivism in Finland

International literature on prison effects on recidivism tends to find little evidence of specific deterrence. If anything, imprisonment seems more likely to increase than decrease rates of offending. The present study adds to this literature by examining imprisonment and recidivism in Finland, a nation characterized by an exceptionally moderate penal culture. It has been suggested that severe sanctions need to be imposed selectively in order for them to be effective. In this research, we estimated the impact of first imprisonment on recidivism in comparison with offenders sentenced to either suspended imprisonment or community service. Using data from government population registries, we controlled for a large number of legal and extra-legal confounding factors, including criminal history and socio-demographic characteristics. We found no evidence of reduced recidivism as a result of imprisonment. Instead, consistent with prior research, we find evidence of increased recidivism in certain offender categories. We conclude with a discussion of policy implications.     

Introducing Social Media Intelligence (SOCMINT)

Abstract

We introduce the latest member of the intelligence family. Joining IMINT, HUMINT, SIGINT and others is ‘SOCMINT’ – social media intelligence. In an age of ubiquitous social media it is the responsibility of the security community to admit SOCMINT into the national intelligence framework, but only when two important tests are passed. First, that it rests on solid methodological bedrock of collection, evidence, verification, understanding and application. Second, that the moral hazard it entails can be legitimately managed. This article offers a framework for how this can be done.     

What the surrender of extra‐territoriality will mean to us

The paper argues that during the Mandate period the Labor Zionist movement was able to successfully create a Sabra identity based on its ideology that was constructed in opposition to the presumed characteristics of the “exile Jew” and how such an identity played a central role in the formation of a security oriented foreign policy. Labor's creation of the Sabra through the "Hebrew Revolution" can be considered as one of the most successful episodes of the twentieth century in which a new identity was created in order to serve ideological goals. Labor's Zionist ideology, which sought to create a “new Jew” that would form the basis of the Jewish national movement, was translated into an identity that in contrast to the diaspora Jew relied on collectivism, agriculture, secularism, and most important of all physical strength and sacrifice in defence of the Jewish nation. This translated into a security-oriented foreign policy that heavily relied on military force and emphasized internal power and strength, which Labor elites argued could only be achieved through self-reliance and independence particularly in regards to defence issues. Such an orientation would form the basis of Israeli foreign policy for years to come.     

Culture,Contiguity and Conflict: On the Measurement of Ethnolinguistic Effects in Spatial Spillovers

Research on ethnolinguistic heterogeneity has so far mostly focused on domestic measures, while little attention has been paid to ethnolinguistic relations between nations. In this paper, I propose a way of measuring ethnolinguistic affinity between nations. This index measures the degree of similarity two randomly drawn individuals from two different populations are expected to display. I show that this measure has several attractive theoretical characteristics, which make it particularly useful. Subsequently, I construct the measure for all countries in Africa and use it to show that civil conflict in Africa is likely to spill over between contiguous ethnolinguistically similar countries.