State-Sponsored Social Control of Illegitimate Social Movements: Strategies Used to Financially Damage Radical Islamic,Terrorist-Labeled Organizations

This article documents strategies and tactics of social control used by the U.S. government to detect and deter financing of radical Islamic, terrorist-labeled organizations. Through grounded theory, social control strategies were identified based on data from congressional committee hearings from 1999 to 2011. Findings revealed the presence of nine such strategies: (1) discover sources of funding, (2) deny or restrict access to money, (3) establish information networks and communication norms, (4) create derogatory labels, (5) influence the media, (6) impose legal sanctions, (7) offer financial incentives, (8) construct a shared collective identity, and (9) force terrorist-labeled organizations on the defensive.     

“A Forgotten Human Rights Crisis”: Statelessness and Issue (Non)Emergence

Despite international laws guaranteeing the right to a nationality, statelessness remains a pervasive global problem that has been termed a “forgotten human rights crisis.” The issue highlights an important question for scholars that has not yet received enough attention: Why do some issues make it onto the international agenda while others do not? This study examines the characteristics necessary for successful issue emergence, or the step in the process of mobilization when a preexisting grievance is transformed from a problem into an issue. Using qualitative data from interviews with 21 decision makers at leading human rights and humanitarian non-governmental organizations, the study highlights shortcomings in the existing literature and provides additional explanations for issue emergence (or non-emergence). Statelessness serves as a case study for better understanding this process, and the article ends with specific recommendations for addressing key obstacles to its full emergence within the international community.     

Preliminary evaluation of the persistence of organic gunshot residue

The organic components of gunshot residue (OGSR, also called firearms discharge residue (FDR) or cartridge discharge residue (CDR)) have been studied and discussed in the literature. These residues, consisting of particulates such as burned and unburned powder as well as molecular compounds, are rarely used in casework except for purposes such as shooting reconstructions. Molecular compounds that survive the firing event or that are created as a result of the firing event could, with focused research and development, open a new avenue for forensic gunshot residue analysis. In this study, the persistence of organic gunshot residue was evaluated using diphenylamine (DPA) as a target analyte and ion mobility spectrometry (IMS) as the detection system. Samples were collected from hands using a solvent swabbing technique and the swab was analyzed using direct thermal desorption for sample introduction into the IMS. OGSR was found to persist for at least 4h. Although DPA is a widely used industrial compound, analysis of numerous blank and background samples (n～100) did not show any significant response for DPA using this detector. Variations were noted among individuals and as such, the data set does not support estimation of a half-life as has been done for traditional primer residues. No secondary transfers were observed, suggesting the possibility of skin adhesion via interactions between the lipophilic organic compounds and skin lipids. IMS proved valuable as a means of generating patterns for forensic pattern matching and shows promise as a screening tool applied to firearms discharge.     

The Gender in Stories: How War Stories and Police Narratives Shape Masculine Police Culture

This research examines storytelling and narrative development in police culture related to gendered aspects of policing. Interviews with 28 officers indicates that women are frequently viewed through a gendered lens and that police storytelling appears an important context for understanding police culture. The types of stories explored in this paper–flow of action, war stories, and gender narratives–provide a context for understanding the (re)production of masculinity in policing. By paying close attention to police narratives we can gain insight into the maintenance of masculine police culture. The findings also build on the growing foundation of narrative inquiry in criminology.     

Recovering from statelessness: Resettled Bhutanese-Nepali and Karen refugees reflect on the lack of legal nationality

The very notion of international human rights relies on state governments to serve as the legal “duty bearers” for protecting rights, yet governments are often responsible for creating the conditions that necessitate mass displacement. For some refugees, the lack of legal nationality creates an added dimension of vulnerability that exacerbates suffering. In order to illustrate the human rights challenges inherent to statelessness, this article focuses on the lived experiences of 30 formerly stateless refugees who have been resettled to the United States. Qualitative research interviews with 15 Bhutanese-Nepalis and 15 members of the Karen ethnic minority (from Burma and Thailand), all currently resettled in the United States, provide insights into the everyday realities of stateless individuals. In both cases, statelessness represented a human rights violation in itself as well as a contributing factor for further abuses related to recognition and membership, denied education, and serious impediments to employment and livelihoods.     

Frayed Connections,Fraught Projections: The Troubling Work of Shirin Neshat

Moore discusses the work of visual artist Shirin Neshat exhibited at the Serpentine Gallery, London, from July to September 2000, which comprised the photographic series Women of Allah and the video installation trilogy Turbulent, Rapture and Fervor . Her emphasis is on the way in which Neshat's work addresses the critical issues of positioning, representation and cross-cultural reception. The exhibition was marketed as referring to 'the social, cultural, and religious codes of Muslim societies in general, and Iranian society in particular'. Moore argues, however, that the images tend to project a departicularized cultural context that encourages a neo-orientalist interpretation. She first analyses Women of Allah in terms of symbolic projections of womanhood during the Islamic revolution in Iran and in light of post-revolutionary gendered realities. A critique is also mounted of Neshat'snostalgic self-investment in the revolutionary scene. In a discussion of the later video trilogy, Moore disentangles gendered and cross-cultural binaries in order to theorize the space between the dual screens. Her conclusion is that this intermediate space figures the ambivalence of a displaced cultural perspective. As such, it forces a spectatorial enactment of the frayed or troubled connections that the artist makes between two cultural locales.     

Mental Health and Educational Experiences Among Black Youth: A Latent Class Analysis

Disproportionately lower educational achievement, coupled with higher grade retention, suspensions, expulsions, and lower school bonding make educational success among Black adolescents a major public health concern. Mental health is a key developmental factor related to educational outcomes among adolescents; however, traditional models of mental health focus on absence of dysfunction as a way to conceptualize mental health. The dual-factor model of mental health incorporates indicators of both subjective wellbeing and psychopathology, supporting more recent research that both are needed to comprehensively assess mental health. This study applied the dual-factor model to measure mental health using the National Survey of American Life—Adolescent Supplement (NSAL-A), a representative cross-sectional survey. The sample included 1170 Black adolescents (52% female; mean age 15). Latent class analysis was conducted with positive indicators of subjective wellbeing (emotional, psychological, and social) as well as measures of psychopathology. Four mental health groups were identified, based on having high or low subjective wellbeing and high or low psychopathology. Accordingly, associations between mental health groups and educational outcomes were investigated. Significant associations were observed in school bonding, suspensions, and grade retention, with the positive mental health group (high subjective wellbeing, low psychopathology) experiencing more beneficial outcomes. The results support a strong association between school bonding and better mental health and have implications for a more comprehensive view of mental health in interventions targeting improved educational experiences and mental health among Black adolescents.     

Detection of Malingered ADHD Using the MMPI-2-RF

This study examined the utility of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory—2 Restructured Form (MMPI-2-RF) validity scales for detecting feigning and exaggeration of attention-deficit/hyperactive disorder (ADHD) among college students. Under a simulation study design, participants with and without ADHD were assigned to perform honestly or to feign or exaggerate deficits related to ADHD while completing self-report symptom inventories. Participants instructed to feign produced symptom profiles similar to honest clinical profiles and more severe than honest nonclinical profiles. Participants with ADHD instructed to exaggerate produced less severe profiles than those instructed to feign and more severe profiles than clinical controls. MMPI-2-RF scale Fp-r showed potential for use in malingered ADHD detection at a revised cut score, which was significantly lower than the cut score suggested in the test manual; use of the revised cut score will require further validation. Scales F-r, Fs, and FBS-r did not classify well, but should be assessed in future studies of malingered ADHD. Detection of exaggeration was consistently poorer than detection of feigning.     

War Stories and Occupying Soldiers: A Narrative Approach to Understanding Police Culture and Community Conflict

Narrative theory and methods are gradually finding a place in the study of crime and its control. However vibrant narrative criminology has been to this point, narrative scholars have somewhat ignored policing, both in terms of the language and grammar of individual officers and the cultural life of the institution itself. In this article, we elaborate the importance of storytelling in the (re)production of contemporary police culture and the broader police power. While storytelling as cultural production is, of course, not the sole purview of police, they are uniquely positioned to shape the broad social, cultural and political imaginaries of crime and the realities of crime control and community interactions. Therefore, in paying close attention to the narratives of police and the cultural work accomplished through storytelling, we gain insight into the production and maintenance of police authority and culture.