Palynology and mycology as biological evidence in a homicide case

Criminal cases are studied from several disciplines to link a suspect with a criminal act. In this case, a man was reported missing in a coastal area in Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. The victim's relatives pointed to a possible suspect, and the local police carried out the investigation. We contributed to this research by applying palynological and mycological techniques. Palynomorphs and fungal spores offer valuable trace evidence, as they can be easily transferred between objects and crime scenes due to their minute size and persist on them for a long time. The victim was found 25 days later, lying on sandy soil, which partially covered the body, 35 km from where the suspect was arrested. Comparative samples were collected from the crime scene and the suspect's home and belongings (clothes, footwear, and seized vehicle). The palynological associations obtained from the crime scene and the defendant's belongings were dominated by diatoms and acritarchs (Acantomorphitae), all elements of marine origin, and a high CFU number of Bipolaris cynodontis, which allowed the defendant's clothing to be related to the place of corpse discovery. Soil from the defendant's home had an entirely continental composition, and the fungal biota was characteristic of prairie areas which were different from those of the crime scene.     

Implementing national food policies to promote local family agriculture: Belo Horizonte's story

Policies in Brazil promoting family agriculture such as the Food Acquisition Programme (PAA) and the 30% minimum procurement law for the National School Meals Programme have had varying success across the country. To understand why these policies work effectively only in some areas, the implementation processes must be clarified. This exploratory, ethnographic study identifies the causal mechanisms involved in implementing PAA and the 30% law in the city of Belo Horizonte. The findings reveal that although beneficial, large supply volumes and transportation costs are challenges faced by farmers in the implementation process.     

European Union Training Missions: security sector reform or counter-insurgency by proxy?

With European Union Training Missions (EUTM) Mali and EUTM Somalia, the EU seeks to stabilize countries facing state weakness caused by intrastate conflict. While the EU formally promotes security sector reform (SSR) through its foreign policy, the EUTM missions in Mali and Somalia in one sense can be described as “counter-insurgency by proxy” as military trainees combat local insurgencies shortly upon graduation. This raises the question whether the EUTM missions are consistent with SSR aims, such as creating a security sector that is legitimate, sustainable, and under civilian control, or inadvertently risk contributing to negative side effects in the medium term. Based on extensive interviews in Belgium, Kenya, Mali, Sweden, and Uganda with personnel who either served in or planned these missions, this study analyses factors which hinder the EUTM concept from being fully consistent with SSR and identifies possible policies to ameliorate the risk of unintended side effects.     

Care to Compare

This article explores constructions of marginality in practices and processes in schools. The main focus is on games played in and around the margins by school students, and on the feelings of pleasure and anxiety generated in this process. The data are drawn from a collective ethnographic project Citizenship, Difference and Marginality in Schools: With Special Reference to Gender, exploring ways in which students are differentiated in terms of gender and other dimensions of inequality. Margins construct both inclusion and exclusion. Processes of marginalisation take place in the official school (teaching and learning), in the informal school (social interaction) and in the physical school (spatiality and embodiment). Emotions located in the margins are explored through these analytically differentiated but intertwined layers. Marginality is a social positioning, a spatial location and a subjective experience.     

Can foreign aid reduce income inequality and poverty?

This paper’s goal is to examine the effect of foreign aid on income inequality and poverty reduction for the period 1971–2002. Since simple cross-country regressions cannot be taken as ‘true’ time series findings we focus on dynamic panel data techniques, which allow accounting for potential simultaneity and heterogeneity problems. We find some weak evidence that foreign aid is conducive to the improvement of the distribution of income when the quality of institutions is taken into account; however, this result is not robust. This finding is consistent with recent empirical research on aid ineffectiveness in achieving economic growth or promoting democratic institutions.     

Thinking about Violence

In the book, Enduring Violence: Ladina Women’s Lives in Guatemala, I assembled a lens to shed light on the less visible and routinized aspects of violence in women’s lives, based on field work I conducted among ladina women in eastern Guatemala and indigenous Maya women in the western highlands. In this piece I reflect on the connections between the framework I developed in this book and theoretical extensions to study similar cases of gender violence in other contexts as well as on the possibilities for engaging in public sociology that this work has created. I also take the opportunity to respond to a few critics so as to engage in productive dialogue that can inform future work in this area.     

The Association Between Family Factors and Depressive Disorders in Adolescents

The main aim of this study was to examine the familial factors (parental psychopathology and attachment to parents) in depressed adolescents. Another aim was to compare level of psychosocial impairment, use of mental health services, suicidal ideation and attempt, and the clinical features of depression (e.g., severity and age of onset) among depressed adolescents with depressed parent(s) with those whose parent(s) do not have any depression. Result showed that the adolescent depression was significantly associated with an elevated rate of having a depressed mother. Perceived level of attachment to parents, as measured using the Inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment, was significantly lower among depressed adolescents than among adolescents without any psychiatric disorders. Depressed adolescents with depressed parents reported significantly higher suicidal ideation and had more recurrent depressive episodes than depressed adolescents with nondepressed parent(s). Our results imply the importance of shifting our focus from universal programs to family-based prevention and intervention programs for depression.