The role of prosecutorial independence and prosecutorial accountability in domestic human rights trials

A prosecutorial organ is always in charge of the investigation and prosecution of crime, which makes this institution a key gatekeeper to the courts. Empowered with prosecutorial discretion, a prosecutorial organ dictates what, when, and whom to prosecute. The institutional design of the prosecutorial organ varies across time and across countries, which raises an important, yet quite understudied question: Does institutional design matter for how states respond to human rights violations and, if so, how? In this article, I develop a theoretical framework that highlights the importance of prosecutorial independence and prosecutorial accountability. I argue that understanding the factors that impact the use of prosecutorial discretion in human rights cases can potentially provide a more complete understanding of why and when states fail to investigate, to prosecute, and to punish human rights violations committed by state agents.     

A proposed methodology for assessing the economic needs of safeguard zones protecting groundwater intended for human consumption within the context of the European Water Framework Directive

This paper describes the gross domestic product and hydrological environment service method for assessing the socio-economic consequences of implementing necessary measures for safeguarding the quality of groundwater for human consumption and eliminating the risk of pollution. This method assesses the positive and negative impacts of designations of protected areas. Economic assets and social goods are the two integrated variables used in analysing the method. The first includes economic impacts on the local gross domestic product of defining protected areas, and the second considers the benefits of this designation in the conservation of water resources, assigning a monetary value to the preserved resources. In addition, tools have been incorporated, such as payment for hydrological services and generation of permissible activities, which reduce negative social impacts through positive economic impacts. These tools can only be used when compliance with conservation requirements for protected areas is demonstrated. The conclusions of this study include an application of the proposed methodology and provide essential and specific assessments that show that this methodology fulfils the requirements of the European Water Framework Directive requirements and that it is an effective tool in the implementation and development of strategies for hydrological planning processes.     

How Brazil outpaced the United States when it came to AIDS: the politics of civic infiltration, reputation, and strategic internationalization

Using a temporal approach dividing the reform process into two periods, this article explains how both Brazil and the United States were slow to respond to AIDS. However, Brazil eventually outpaced the United States in its response due to international rather than democratic pressures. Since the early 1990s, Brazil's success has been attributed to "strategic internationalization": the concomitant acceptance and rejection of global pressure for institutional change and antiretroviral treatment, respectively. The formation of tripartite partnerships among donors, AIDS officials, and nongovernmental organizations has allowed Brazil to avoid foreign aid dependency, while generating ongoing incentives for influential AIDS officials to incessantly pressure Congress for additional funding. Given the heightened international media attention, concern about Brazil's reputation has contributed to a high level of political commitment. By contrast, the United States' more isolationist relationship with the international community, its focus on leading the global financing of AIDS efforts, and the absence of tripartite partnerships have prevented political leaders from adequately responding to the ongoing urban AIDS crisis. Thus, Brazil shows that strategically working with the international health community for domestic rather than international influence is vital for a sustained and effective response to AIDS.     

Markets,Politics, and Learning: Explaining Monetary Policy Innovations in Brazil

An increasing number of developing and emerging economies have adopted an inflation targeting framework for monetary policy during the last two decades. This article investigates the politics of inflation targeting by focusing on the case of Brazil. I argue that the decision to implement an inflation targeting system in 1999 did not only reflect the concerns of political leaders with maintaining electoral support and external credibility. In addition, the choice of this new policy approach was informed by a shift in the technical consensus among Brazilian economists about the most effective way to tame inflationary pressures in a context of high capital mobility. The shift to inflation targeting thus reflected a process of social learning among technical elites, facilitated not only by the failure of the previous policy but also by the successful experience of other inflation targeting countries. Moreover, the evidence presented here suggests that, as the first country to adopt inflation targets in the context of an IMF-supported program, Brazil became a test case and a natural experiment for the redefinition of IMF conditionality and surveillance mechanisms. The paper thus sheds light on a process of reciprocal learning, whereby the IMF not only contributed to collective learning but also learned from the Brazilian case, subsequently becoming an active promoter of inflation targeting among developing countries.     

Multicriteria Decision Aid to support Multilateral Environmental Agreements in assessing international forestry projects

The three Rio Conventions—the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Convention on Biological Diversity, and the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification—face the challenge to create synergies at different levels. The objective of this article is to describe how we have assessed synergies between the Rio Conventions at the project level in the forest sector. Since the complexity of the decision problem is high, we adopted the Multicriteria Decision Aid approach, which can provide a broad insight into the decision problem and find a compromise solution to a problem with multidimensional and conflicting criteria including social, economic and environmental features. The ELECTRE TRI model was used for assessing synergies at the project level, and has been a useful tool to quantify the performance of afforestation and reforestation projects into three categories (synergistic, reasonably synergistic, and not synergistic). For the first time, afforestation and reforestation projects have been assessed in a comprehensive way through decision criteria that reflect global and local interests using a non-compensatory multicriteria method.     

Comparison of methods to determine sex by evaluating the greater sciatic notch: Visual, angular and geometric morphometrics

Sex estimation is the first step for biological profile reconstruction of an unknown skeleton (archaeological or contemporary) and consequently for positive identification of skeletal remains recovered from forensic settings. Several tools have been developed using different osseous structures. With the intention to provide an objective method comparison, we reported the analysis of three different methods (visual, metric and geometric morphometrics) for sex assessment of the greater sciatic notch. One hundred and thirty pelvic bones (45.4% females and 54.6% males) from the National Autonomous University of Mexico Skeletal Collection pertaining to the contemporary Mexican population were analyzed. We used the ROC-analysis to test between desired false positive thresholds (1-specificity) and expected true positive rates (sensitivity) in order to predict the best approach to sex assessment. The comparison of the area under the ROC-curves shows significant differences among visual and metric methods. At the same time, the analysis suggested that higher morphological variation among the sexes is independent of the methodological approach. The results indicate that the metric (angle), with a high percent of indeterminate cases (34.6%), and visual, with 26.2% of the cases allocated as intermediate cases, were poorly accurate; we cannot recommend these techniques for sexing an unknown specimen. On the other hand, the geometric morphometrics approach improves sex estimation in 82.3% of correctly classified individuals with more than 95% of posterior probability. In addition to the method comparison, the major sexual variation of the greater sciatic notch was determined to be located on its posterior border.     

Target screening and confirmation of 35 licit and illicit drugs and metabolites in hair by LC-MSMS

A liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MSMS) target screening in 50mg hair was developed and fully validated for 35 analytes (Δ9-tetrahidrocannabinol (THC), morphine, 6-acetylmorphine, codeine, methadone, fentanyl, amphetamine, methamphetamine, 3,4-methylenedioxyamphetamine, 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine, benzoylecgonine, cocaine, lysergic acid diethylamide, ketamine, scopolamine, alprazolam, bromazepam, clonazepam, diazepam, flunitrazepam, 7-aminoflunitrazepam, lorazepam, lormetazepam, nordiazepam, oxazepam, tetrazepam, triazolam, zolpidem, zopiclone, amitriptyline, citalopram, clomipramine, fluoxetine, paroxetine and venlafaxine). Hair decontamination was performed with dichloromethane, and incubation in 2 mL of acetonitrile at 50°C overnight. Extraction procedure was performed in 2 steps, first liquid-liquid extraction, hexane:ethyl acetate (55:45, v:v) at pH 9, followed by solid-phase extraction (Strata-X cartridges). Chromatographic separation was performed in AtlantisT3 (2.1 mm × 100 mm, 3 μm) column, acetonitrile and ammonium formate pH 3 as mobile phase, and 32 min total run time. One transition per analyte was monitored in MRM mode. To confirm a positive result, a second injection monitoring 2 transitions was performed. The method was specific (no endogenous interferences, n=9); LOD was 0.2-50 pg/mg and LOQ 0.5-100 pg/mg; linearity ranged from 0.5-100 to 2000-20,000 pg/mg; imprecision <15%; analytical recovery 85-115%; extraction efficiency 4.1-85.6%; and process efficiency 2.5-207.7%; 27 analytes showed ion suppression (up to -86.2%), 4 ion enhancement (up to 647.1%), and 4 no matrix effect; compounds showed good stability 24-48 h in autosampler. The method was applied to 17 forensic cases. In conclusion, a sensitive and specific target screening of 35 analytes in 50mg hair, including drugs of abuse (THC, cocaine, opiates, amphetamines) and medicines (benzodiazepines, antidepressants) was developed and validated, achieving lower cut-offs than Society of Hair Testing recommendations.