‘I Think it Just Made Everything Very Much More Intense’: A Qualitative Secondary Analysis Exploring The Role Of Friends and Family Providing Support to Survivors of Domestic Abuse During The COVID-19 Pandemic

Journal of Family Violence - The COVID-19 pandemic, and associated social restrictions, have amplified women’s experiences of domestic abuse (DA). In usual times, female DA survivors reach...     

The attribution of responsibility in cases of stalking

There is a general belief that stranger stalkers present the greatest threat to the personal safety of victims, despite national victimisation surveys and applied research demonstrating that ex-partner stalkers are generally more persistent and violent. The just-world hypothesis offers a possible explanation for this apparent contradiction. The current research used nine hypothetical scenarios, administered to 328 university students, to investigate the assumptions that underlie attributions of responsibility in cases of stalking. It explores whether these assumptions are consistent with the proposed mechanisms of the just-world hypothesis, and whether they vary according to the nature of the perpetrator–victim relationship and conduct severity. Thematic analysis revealed that the victim was perceived to be more responsible for the situation when the perpetrator was portrayed as an ex-partner rather than a stranger or acquaintance. Furthermore, victims were perceived to be more responsible when the perpetrator's behaviour was persistent and threatening. These findings are discussed in the context of the just-world hypothesis and related to the proposed mechanisms by which a person can reinterpret a situation so that the perceived injustice disappears.     

The effect of odour reinstatement on children's episodic memory

Children's memory reports are often sparse, which increases the need for efficient interview methods. The present study investigated whether odour reinstatement can aid children's memory and increase the amount of information recalled from an experienced event. Children (N = 106, mean age 10 years, 8 months) experienced a magic show where a vanilla odour was present and were interviewed about their memory of the event either one week, or six months, after the magic show. During the interview, half of the children re-experienced the same vanilla odour. In contrast to studies on adult participants, no odour-reinstatement effect was found with the child participants in the present study. On the other hand, odour reinstatement reduced the children's ratings of how strong their emotions were during the event. Thus, odour reinstatement may affect different forensically relevant factors, and this should be considered in future research.     

The recovery of fibres from non-textile items using a static charge

This study investigated a new method of fibre recovery from non-textile items using polystyrene rods which have a static charge. A range of natural and man-made fibres were used on a number of substrates, including weapons, paper and plastic bags. The average recovery rate from all substrates was 99.1%. The effect of humidity on fibre recovery was also studied and it was found to reduce the ability of the rods to recover fibres. However this is unlikely to be an issue if recovery takes place in a forensic laboratory. It was concluded that the rods would prove a beneficial addition to the forensic laboratory as a relatively quick method of fibre recovery from non textile items where the standard method of recovery using tape lifts cannot be used.     

Decentralization as a constraint to Leviathan: a panel cointegration analysis

This paper extends the empirical literature about the effects of fiscal decentralization on the growth of government along three dimensions. It distinguishes between the effects of the level of decentralization from the way local governments finance their expenditures (common pool versus own resources); it uses a panel cointegration approach to separate the long run effects of decentralization from the short run dynamics; and it extends and revises the datasets generally used in these empirical analyses. The results show that the amount of revenue raised by sub-national governments leads to a long-term fall in the size of government but grants have the opposite effect. In addition, a greater decentralization of expenditure leads to greater overall spending. When the short-term is considered these influences work slowly, as the speed of adjustment towards the desired government size is relatively sluggish. In addition, in the short run, there is also a clear effect from the role of local revenue raising powers that stimulates the growth of government. These results appear robust to changes in the composition of the variables, countries and periods included the sample.     

Growth and Poverty Revisited from a Multidimensional Perspective

The actual impact of economic growth on poverty reduction is of fundamental importance to the development agenda. This paper offers new empirical evidence on growth and poverty measured from a multidimensional perspective using the global Multidimensional Poverty Index. Results from a First Difference Estimator Model suggest that while economic growth reduces multidimensional poverty, this impact is well below a one-to-one relationship and lower than the impact of growth on income poverty. Results from a cross-section model additionally suggest that countries with higher levels of exports, higher share of industry and services and higher control of corruption have lower multidimensional poverty.     

Title by Registration: Rectification,Indemnity and Mistake and the Land Registration Act 2002

Our understanding of the system of registered title is crucial to our understanding of real property in general but there is no consensus as to the best way to interpret ‘correcting a mistake’ in Schedule 4 LRA 2002. This provision should be interpreted to mean that subsequent registrations following a ‘mistaken’ registration are not in themselves a mistake. Section 58 means that the subsequent transferee is relying on good title and a valid transfer and this ought to protect them from rectification. Where an original registered proprietor loses out as a result of this interpretation, they should be entitled to an indemnity however and this requires a change of approach to the interpretation of Schedule 8 LRA 2002. This approach best accords with the logic of the principle of title by registration whilst also avoiding a clash with Article 1, Protocol 1 ECHR.     

Towards a new aid paradigm: South Africa as African development partner

As the largest African economy and the leading African aid-provider, with plans to establish an aid agency, South Africa is often ranked among the developing world's ‘emerging donors’. However, the country's development cooperation commitments are smaller in scope, scale and ambition than the aid regimes of the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, China) or Gulf state donors. Given its limited resources and domestic socioeconomic challenges, South Africa prefers the role of ‘development partner’. In this role, South Africa's development cooperation in Africa has ranged from peacekeeping, electoral reform and post-conflict reconstruction to support for strengthening regional and continental institutions, implementing the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) and improving bilateral political and economic relations through dialogue and cooperation. This article seeks to determine whether Pretoria's development cooperation offers an alternative perspective to the aid policies and practices of the traditional and large rising donors. We conclude that South Africa does not fit neatly the ‘donor’ category of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's (OECD's) Development Assistance Committee (DAC) and neither is Pretoria's aid-spending typically ‘ODA’ (official development assistance). Instead, with its new aid agency, South Africa occupies a unique space in Africa's development cooperation landscape. With fewer aid resources, but a ‘comparative advantage’ in understanding Africa's security/governance/development nexus, South Africa can play an instrumental role in facilitating trilateral partnerships, especially in Southern Africa.