Fatal combined anileridine-pethidine poisoning. A gas chromatography, thin layer chromatography and mass spectrometry investigation.

Anileridine and pethidine were established by gas and thin layer chromatography and mass spectroscopy. In the mass spectrum the main peak of anileridine is found at m/e 246 and that of pethidine at m/e 71. The determination was made by gas chromatography from the blood, urine, liver, muscle and stomach contents.     

Steuerung jenseits von Hierarchie

The paper sheds new light on recent debates about governance and approaches contemporary problems of governing from the perspective of contemporary theories of power. The concept of “soft governing” is developed in order to capture horizontal mechanisms of power intentionally used to govern beyond formalised hierarchies characteristic of processes of governance. The paper describes in particular the horizontal forms of governing through discursive practices, argumentation and symbols and the ways in which they interact. The example of campaigns against female genital mutilation is introduced in order to illustrate possible forms of governing beyond hierarchy.     

Gerechtigkeit zwischen den Generationen

The concept of intergenerational justice has become ever more prevalent in discussions about welfare reform in Germany. For this reason, we analyse problems of justice between generations using the terminology of philosophical theories of justice. We argue that transfers by the welfare state and transfers by the family must be distinguished in the analysis of material and immaterial transfers between generations. As our empirical results show, problems of justice between generations arise mainly in the case of welfare state transfers. Subsequently, we describe the paradigms of intergenerational justice informing the public debate. Data from surveys over the past fifteen years show to what extend these (public) paradigms are shared by individuals in the German population.     

Agile programming – Introduction and current legal challenges

Within the realms of software development, customers must specify the requirements of their new software before the start of the project. Today, this leads to considerable delays with respect to the start of the project. In addition, the integration of new requirements into a system already developed in parts is becoming increasingly time-consuming and cost-intensive. Yet the specifically necessitated functions of a software are often only revealed through the process of development. By means of agile programming, changes in the requirements of a software product can be handled flexibly in shorter development cycles. In the following, the framework of agile software development projects as it applies under German law is described and current legal problems of such projects – in particular, the issue of contract type and the new building contract law – are considered. The unplanned project design appears contrary to the legal approach. The article shows, however, that agile software products development provides customers with dynamic and quickly scalable products and that customers can leave the project after individual project steps. The new development of building contract law, which focuses on subunits and approvals, is also very much in line with the above-mentioned programming.     

Politics of Representation

The moral education of the people has been viewed historically as a function of good government in China. Models have played an important role in this educational process, constantly making people aware of correct behavior and correct ideas. Since 1949, so-called propaganda art in the People's Republic of China has played a major supporting role in the many campaigns that have been designed to mobilize the people, with the propaganda poster being the favored vehicle to convey model behavior. In the twenty-first century, state-inspired education and the posters it produces are fighting an uphill battle to grasp the attention of the people. This illustrated article discusses the state of state-sponsored propaganda art and highlights the various social and artistic pressures that weigh on the propaganda poster in the era of reform. The author examines the changes in the government's communication strategy, and focuses on the changing way in which propaganda art has been used in the reform era, the technical innovations that have been applied, and the topics that have been selected by the government as subjects for propaganda campaigns. The patriotism of the late 1990s is a topic that receives special attention. Finally, hypotheses are presented about the possible alternative applications of the medium in the light of recently published propaganda posters.     

Intracranial impalement with entrance site in the mandibular region: postmortem elucidation of an accidental fall on a wooden plant stick

A 78-year-old woman with a history of transient ischemic attacks was found in the doorway of her house in a somnolent and unresponsive condition. In the right mandibular region, a small skin wound was localized, which was surgically treated. Six days after admission to the hospital, an exploratory craniotomy was performed because of abnormal CT findings. Apart from tissue lesions and hemorrhages a small bone fragment was detected in the right cerebral cortex, which was removed. After 11 days in hospital, the patient died from failure of central regulatory functions. At the forensic autopsy, a 15 cm long wound track running upward from the skin wound in the right mandibular region through the bony skull base to the right parietal lobe of the brain was noted. Apparently, the surgically removed bone fragment had been displaced from the right middle cranial fossa. The site of the incident in the deceased's house was inspected again and a bamboo pole used to stabilize a potted plant standing on the floor was found and sent to the trace evidence laboratory. Analysis showed blood and tissue deposits from the victim. On the basis of all the findings and the circumstances of the case, a fatal impalement injury caused by an accidental fall could be assumed.     

The deployment of conditional probability distributions for death time estimation

The temperature based algorithm known as the Nomogram Method for the determination of a 95.45% death-time interval can be combined with non-temperature based (NTB) findings in the so called Compound Method (CM). The impact of such integration on the probability yielded by the resulting interval has however neither been described nor exploited. In fact the interval after integration of NTB findings rarely yields 95.45% probability. We present a method, based on the conditional probability distribution that can be calculated if the NTB findings are taken into account, which ensures the probability inside the interval to be 95.45%. The method was successfully applied to a set of 53 cases published by Henssge et al. and led to a reduction of the interval width up to more than 15% compared to the CM interval, whereas in other cases the interval width increased due to probability content of the CM intervals below 95.45%. A spreadsheet file in which the method proposed in this paper is implemented can be obtained upon email request from the authors.     

Positive constitutional economics II��a survey of recent developments

Analysis of the economic effects of constitutional rules has made substantial progress over the last decade. This survey provides an overview of this rapidly growing research area and also discusses a number of methodological issues and identifies underresearched areas. It argues that the next logical step of positive constitutional economics is to endogenize constitutional rules.