Reviews

Susan Gross Solomon (ed.), Beyond Sovietology: Essays in Politics and History. New York and London: M.E. Sharpe, 1993, 254 pp., £38.00.

Alice H. Amsden, Jacek Kochanowicz & Lance Taylor, The Market Meets Its Match. Restructuring the Economics of Eastern Europe. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994, 250 pp.

Robert E. Ebel, Energy Choices in Russia. Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies, 1994, xii + 152 pp., $16.95.

Michael Waller, The End of the Communist Power Monopoly. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1993, viii + 287 pp., £35.00 h/b., £9.99 p/b.

Minxin Pei, From Reform to Revolution: The Demise of Communism in China and the Soviet Union. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994, 253 pp., £29.95.

William G. Rosenberg & Lewis H. Siegelbaum (eds), Social Dimensions of Soviet Industrialisation. Bloomington and Indianapolis, IN: Indiana University Press, 1993, xix + 296 pp., £12.99 p/b.

Taras Kuzio & Andrew Wilson, Ukraine: Perestroika to Independence. Basingstoke: Macmil‐lan Press, 1994, xiv + 260 pp., £40.00.

Russell F. Farnen (ed.), Nationalism, Ethnicity, and Identity. Cross National and Comparative Perspectives. New Brunswick, NJ, and London: Transaction, 1994, xiv + 538 pp., £49.95.

Edwin Thomas Bacon, The Gulag at War: Stalin's Forced Labour System in the Light of Archives. Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1994, xii + 190 pp.

Robert S. Ross, China, the United States and the Soviet Union: Tripolarity and Policy Making in the Cold War. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1993, x + 204 pp., £42.00.     

Mental disabilities under the ADA: a management rights approach

While numerous sources have focused on employee rights and employer obligations under the Americans with Disabilities Act, this article will emphasize employer rights with respect to mental disabilities under the ADA. Specifically, it addresses the ADA's definition of "mental disability," the right of employers to screen job applicants in spite of the ADA, the conditions under which an employer may require an employee to undergo a "fitness for duty" examination, and the limits of the duty to "reasonably accommodate" an employee with a mental disability.     

The hate that dare not speak its name: Pornography qua semi-political speech

In this essay we shall examine the contemporary jurisprudential thinking and legal precedents surrounding the issue of the sanctionability of pornography. We shall catalogue them by their logical presumptions, such as whether they view pornography as speech or act, whether they view pornography as obscenity, political hate-speech or anomalous other, whether they would scrutinize legislation governing pornography by a balancing of the harm of repression against the harm of permission, and who exactly they view as the victims.We shall take a special interest in the most recent, but unsuccessful, attempt by a subgroup of feminists to proscribe pornography by treating it as neither political speech nor sexual speech but speech which causes harm which is both political and sexual. They would like it to be considered as a special kind of odious propaganda undeserving of protection because it promulgates a mental state conducive to criminal activity, and hence is criminal in and of itself. However, the repression of propaganda, even odious propaganda, is not so easily accomplished in this country.Most anti-censors have emphasized the uncertainty of the causal connection between pornography and sexual violence. We shall contend that this is not the essential issue, and that, even if we agree with the allegations of pornography's prurient non-intellectual appeal and its tendency to excite criminal hostility, the current understanding of the Bill of Rights allows sanctioning only under the stringent requirement of the showing of a clear and present danger of specific and immediate acts.We raise the question of whether there should be a new standard for speech which is simultaneously political and sexual, and/or for speech whose harmful message is presented subliminally, on the grounds that such speech may not be adequately opposed by counter speech in the marketplace of ideas.     

Does the federal Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 create a hole in ERISA preemption?

ERISA's board preemption provision has survived many challenges to its scope and effect. Now it may have succumbed in the face of a few statements tucked into the legislative history of the federal Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA). Language in the legislative history presents the view that the Act was meant to overturn ERISA preemption of state family and medical leave laws. The text of the FMLA contains no corroborating language to support that view. However, at least one court found the statements in the legislative history to be persuasive and ruled that under the FMLA, ERISA does not preempt state family and medical leave laws that regulate ERISA plans. If other courts follow that decision, there will be great implications to employee benefit plan regulation and administration. This article explores the court's decision and the relationship between the FMLA and ERISA preemption.