Justifying Human Rights: Does Consensus Matter?

This paper is a critical examination of a widely accepted method of human rights justification. The method defends the universality of human rights by appeal to diverse worldviews that converge on human rights norms. By showing that the norms can be justified from the perspective of diverse worldviews, human rights theorists suggest that there is reason to believe that human rights are universal norms that should govern the institutions of all societies. This paper argues that the evidence of plural foundations of human rights fails to increase our confidence in the universality of human rights. The paper defends the following claims: (1) the convergence on human rights is better explained as an accidental outcome than as an indicator of the universality of human rights, (2) the plurality of human rights justification is superfluous to the explanation of why human rights apply to all societies, (3) the aggregation of justifications decreases rather than increases the reliability of the universality belief, and (4) the reasonable disagreement among conflicting justifications generates an epistemic dilemma.     

Adjudicated health: incarcerated women and the social construction of health

Women in prison have been identified as one of the most vulnerable groups of women in society. This study examined the social construction of health through weekly interviews with 20 incarcerated women over 15 months. The study was grounded within a critical hermeneutic context using interpretive methods for data analysis. Adjudicated health reflects the social construction of health for women prior to and during imprisonment, and is dually grounded in protection and punishment — a construction in direct apposition to the department of correction's conceptualization of health. Implications for the health of women during imprisonment and post-release are discussed. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Protect the unprotected: the escaping North Korean issue and China’s dual dilemma of theoretical enlightenment and operational trial

Escalating tensions in the Peninsula may force voluminous North Koreans to leave the country, although relevant information is limited. China has refused to grant North Korean escapees the refugee status, because the main reason of their departure, economic hardship, is not prescribed in conventional refugee definition. The Bangkok Principles provide principal guidance to Asia’s refugee issues, whereto its non-legally binding framework helps facilitate the fledgling regional efforts and still-developing states’ wills. Yet, China’s insistence in distinguishing economic hardship from political causes reifies its overt cautions to the rapidly evolving refugee causes, and an outright rejection to the indiscriminate humanitarian nature of refugee protection. Another reason is China’s ‘Asian Values’ approach to human right, seeing various aspects of human right as separable. To grant refugees only partial rights would appear theoretically unsound, and blatantly contradicting its integral human-right essence. Realistically, China has only limited refugee reception experiences. Its relevant domestic mechanism is under-developed, whereby positive public opinions cannot be effectively remoulded. China also worries about the unwanted international attentions and entailed geopolitical implications, which imply denunciation of Pyongyang’s governance performance by formally identifying these escapees, refugees. Current dramatic changes in inter-Korean relations urge China to take swift, expedient, and substantive actions.     

Characterization of Mitochondrial DNA Sequence Heteroplasmy in Blood Tissue and Hair as a Function of Hair Morphology*,†,‡

Abstract: This study characterizes mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) sequence heteroplasmy in blood tissue and hair as a function of hair morphology. Bloodstains (127 individuals) and head hairs (128 individuals) were typed using the mtDNA LINEAR ARRAY? assay. A total of 1589 hairs were interpreted: 1478 (93%) were homoplasmic and 111 (7%) exhibited heteroplasmy at one or more positions. Seventy‐one percent (82/116) of individuals were homoplasmic, whereas 29% (34/116) exhibited heteroplasmy in at least one hair. The results demonstrate intra‐ and inter‐tissue differences in heteroplasmy within individuals. Sequence heteroplasmy among hairs from each individual varied from 0 to 90%; the frequency does not differ significantly with population group, cosmetic treatment, age, gender, medulla morphology, region of the scalp, hair growth phase, or, when comparing living and deceased donors. However, the results support a correlation between heteroplasmy and hair pigmentation; typically, lighter‐pigmented hairs exhibit a higher incidence of sequence heteroplasmy compared to darker hairs.     

Reading the State as a Multi-Identity Formation: The Touch and Feel of Equality Governance

How does a sense of touch, figuratively and practically, get deployed within equality governance, and to what questions and ways of thinking about the state does this direct us? Taking 2009–2010 as a snap-shot moment in the development of British equality reform—the year leading up to passage of the Equality Act 2010—this article explores the relationship between touch (the haptic) and equality governance from three angles. First, how have governmental bodies used touch language and imagery, including in geometrical representations of disadvantage? Second, what other, more challenging encounters and actions are imaginable; specifically, can touch mobilise the feeling state as a critical form of active citizenship? Third, what re-conceptualisations of the state does the touching, feeling state invoke, and with what effects? Specifically, does conceiving of the state as a multi-identity formation reframe the risks associated with a haptic state, thereby opening up new strategies for political action?     

Long-term care: common issues and unknowns

All industrialized countries are grappling with a common problem—how to provide assistance of various kinds to their rapidly aging populations. The problem for countries searching for models of efficient and high-quality long-term care (LTC) policies is that fewer than a dozen countries have government-organized, formal LTC policies. Relatively new surveys focused on the elderly populations of about 25 countries could become the basis for research on which LTC policy design choices have desired outcomes for individuals and society and might be replicable in other countries. As in earlier decades when U.S. researchers created the Current Population Survey (CPS) modules and the Survey of Income and Program Participation to answer policy questions, researchers and policy analysts are now at a point where a concerted effort is needed to generate questions that international comparative research on LTC could answer as well as the data needed to address the questions.     

Examining the effect of dl-3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) and methamphetamine on the Standardized Field Sobriety Tests

dl-3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) and methamphetamine are commonly used illicit drugs that are thought to impair driving ability. The Standardized Field Sobriety Tests (SFSTs) are utilized widely to detect impairment associated with drugs other than alcohol in drivers, although limited evidence concerning MDMA and methamphetamine consumption on SFST performance exists. The aim of this study was to evaluate whether the SFSTs were a sensitive measure for identifying the presence of the specific isomer d-methamphetamine and MDMA. In a double-blind, within-subject, counter-balanced and placebo-controlled study, 58 healthy and abstinent recreational drugs users were administered three treatments: 100mg of MDMA, 0.42 mg/kg d-methamphetamine, and placebo. For each condition the SFSTs were administered at 4 and 25 h post treatment. d-methamphetamine was not found to significantly impair SFST performance unlike MDMA, which significantly impaired SFST performance in comparison to placebo with 22% of the sample failing the test at the 4h testing time-point. No differences were observed at the 25 h testing time-point for any of the conditions. It was concluded that the SFSTs are not efficient in identifying the presence of low level d-methamphetamine, and are significantly better at detecting the presence of MDMA at the levels assessed.