Reviews

Silvana Malle, The Economic Organization of War Communism, 1918–1921. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985, xv + 548 pp. £30.00.

Nicholas Lampert, Whistleblowing in the Soviet Union: Complaints and Abuses under State Socialism. (In association with the Centre for Russian and East European Studies, University of Birmingham) New York: Schocken Books, 1985, xi + 221 pp. £25.00.

Christian Schmidt‐Häuer, Gorbachev: The Path to Power. London: I. B. Tauris, 1986, v + 218 pp. £12.95.

Zhores Medvedev, Gorbachev. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1986, ix + 272 pp. £15.00.

Paul Dibb, The Soviet Union: The Incomplete Superpower. Basingstoke and London: Macmillan (in association with the International Institute for Strategic Studies), 1986, xiii + 293 pp. £27.50.

Mark Harrison, Soviet Planning in Peace and War, 1938–1945. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985, xiv + 315 pp. $44.50.

Peter Rutland, The Myth of the Plan. Lessons of Soviet Planning Experience. Hutchinson and Co. (Publishers) Ltd., London‐Melbourne‐Sydney‐Auckland‐Johannesburg, 1985, 286 pp. £15.00.

Stanislaw Gomulka, Growth, innovation and reform in Eastern Europe. Brighton: Wheatsheaf Books Ltd, 1986, viii + 305 pp. £28.50.

Mark E. Schaffer, ed., Technology Transfer and East‐West Relations. London: Croom Helm, 1985, 273 pp. £22.50.

Jonathan Alford, ed., The Soviet Union: Security Policies and Constraints. London: Gower for the International Institute for Strategic Studies, 1985, xii + 180 pp. £16.50.

Daniel S. Papp, Soviet Perceptions of the Developing World in the 1980s: The Ideological Basis. Lexington, Mass: Lexington Books, 1985, xii + 176 pp. £22.00.

Jerry F. Hough, The Struggle for the Third World. Soviet Debates and American Options. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution, 1986, x + 293 pp. $32.95 h/b, $11.95 p/b.

Mark N. Katz, Russia and Arabia. Soviet Policy toward the Arabian Peninsula. Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986, xvi + 279 pp. £24.45.

James P. Scanlan, Marxism in the USSR: A Critical Survey of Current Soviet Thought. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1985, 362 pp. $35.00.

Rasma Karklins, Ethnic Relations in the USSR: The Perspective from Below. Boston, London, and Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1986, xvi + 256 pp. £18.00.

S. Enders Wimbush, ed., Soviet Nationalities in Strategic Perspective. London & Sydney: Croom Helm, 1985, xxviii + 253 pp. £19.95.

Rosalind J. Marsh, Soviet Fiction Since Stalin: Science, Politics and Literature. London: Croom Helm, 1986, 338 pp. £25.00.

Ludmilla Alexeyeva, Soviet Dissent. Contemporary Movements for National, Religious, and Human Rights. Wesleyan University Press, Middletown, Connecticut, 1985, xxii + 522 pp. $35.00.

Omer Bartov, The Eastern Front, 1941–45, German Troops and the Barbarisation of Warfare. Basingstoke/Oxford: MacMillan/St. Anthony's, 1985, xvi + 214 pp. £27.50.

Donald J. Raleigh, Revolution on the Volga. 1917 in Saratov. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1986, 373 pp. $35.75.

Janos Kornai and Xavier Richet, La Voie Hongroise: Analyses et Experimentations Economiques. Paris: Caiman‐Levy, 1986, 319 pp. 174F.

Maria Hirszowicz, Coercion and Control in Communist Society: The Visible Hand in a Command Economy. Brighton: Wheatsheaf Books, 1986, vii + 226 pp. £25.00.

Irwin L. Collier, Connections, Effective Purchasing Power and Real Product in the German Democratic Republic. Heft 135, Reihe Wirtschaft und Recht, Berichte des Ost‐Europa‐Instituts an der Freien Universitä Berlin, 1985, ix + 216 pp.

Jan Jozef Lipski, KOR: A History of the Workers’ Defence Committee in Poland, 1976–1981. Translated by Olga Amsterdamska and Gene M Moore. Berkeley and London: University of California Press 1985, x + 561 pp. £33.95.

Patrick F. R. Artisien, Joint Ventures in Yugoslav Industry. Brookfield, Vermont: Gower, 1985, xv + 223 pp. h/b £16.50.

Barbara Holland, ed., Soviet Sisterhood. Bloomington, Indiana. Indiana University Press, 1985. 272 pp. £17.95 h/b, £5.95 p/b.

Sharon L. Wolchik and Alfred G. Meyer, eds., Women, State, and Party in Eastern Europe. Durham: Duke University Press, 1985, xiv + 453 pp. h/b $42.50, p/b $16.95.     

Concealed homicidal strangulation by burning.

Compression of the neck, either with the hands or by a ligature, is not an uncommon method of homicide. Burning of the body to try to conceal the homicide may complicate the situation by making it difficult to interpret the findings. We hereby report two cases of homicidal ligature strangulation with extensive burning of the bodies. In both cases, external findings included the presence of a soft piece of fabric around the neck that, when removed, disclosed a portion of pale, unburned skin that vividly contrasted with surrounding areas. Osteocartilaginous lesions were present in only one case. Carboxyhemoglobin levels in both cases were very low, and the histopathologic examination of distal airways for soot particles was negative.     

Term Limits: Causes and Consequences

This paper consults multiple literatures to specify andevaluate the economic rationales for term limitation,particularly on Congress. I first consider theories that aroseto explain, among related issues, why individual states mightunilaterally self-impose term limits on their own delegationsto Congress. Next I consider two main lines of argument foruniversal limits, both of which begin with the empiricalphenomenon of high and rising congressional tenure. First,supporters of term limits argue that higher tenure biaseslegislatures toward inefficiency big government (highspending). Second, higher tenure creates inefficient (anti-competitive) conditions in the legislative election market.Term limitation would remedy these inefficiencies by virtue ofdecreasing average tenure. These claims are then evaluated inlight of the evidence amassed in the literature. Based on theliterature reviewed, this paper finds that, while term limitswill reduce average tenure, there is no evidence to suggestthat term limits will affect the underlying causes of theseinefficiencies. Further research on a more general reform,which would strike deeper at these underlying causes, isimplied.     

Globalisation and Conceptualisation in the Sphere of International Criminal Law

Professor Wiener mentions that [w]hile an agreement has evolvedin the juris-prudence concerning the meaning of criminal law' and publicinternational law', the opinions regarding what international criminallaw is still diverge to a great extent.1 The task of this report isto clear up what we mean by international criminal law, because itis not an exact expression.     

Semantics and pragmatics of normative qualification statements

The present paper has been presented in the seminar San Giuseppe (Bologna, March 7th 1989) and during the IASL Annual Meeting (Edinburgh, August 15th 1989). The author thanks the participants for many valuable comments, and especially to P. van den Hoven, who was the commentator during the IASL conference.     

Suicidal hanging within an automobile.

Accidental asphyxia related to cars has been described in different reports, but suicidal hanging in an automobile is very unusual. Two cases of suicidal hanging inside an automobile are described, illustrating an unusual form of hanging. In one case, the deceased used his belt as a ligature, and the point of attachment was the window of the car. The second victim used the safety belt of the passenger seat. In both cases, the automobile engine was turned off, all the windows were closed, and the door locks were blocked. The medicolegal cause of hanging was based on the scene of the investigation, police and witness reports, social history, autopsy findings, and toxicologic examinations.     

The Effect of Coercion on Aggression and Mental Health Among Reciprocally Violent Couples

Researchers have not investigated mental health outcomes among couples who are reciprocally violent towards each other. The present study investigated differences in partner violence (psychological, physical, and sexual) and mental health symptoms (depression, anxiety, hostility, and somatic) between two types of reciprocally violent couples: situational couple violence (SCV) and mutual control violence (MVC). SCV couples use violence to address stressful family conflicts, while MVC couples use violence as a tool to control each other. Participants (N = 609) completed surveys that contained several instruments that measured past violence, coercive behaviors, physical injuries, and mental health symptoms. Results revealed that MVC reported significantly higher levels of violent perpetration and worse physical and mental health than SCV. These findings have implications for understanding the role of coercion in partner violence and mental health, which can be used for the development of appropriate mental health services for couples who are mutually violent towards each other.     

Using an evolutionary perspective to understand the relationship between physical aggression and academic performance in late adolescents

In this study, we applied an evolutionary perspective to analyze the relationship between aggressiveness, academic performance, and sociality in a population of 528 adolescents of both sexes. In men, we expect physical aggression (PA) and sociality to be negative predictors of academic performance. However, in women, PA would be a negative predictor of academic performance, and sociality a positive one. Our results report a negative association between academic performance and PA in both sexes. As we expected, social effect derived from the use of PA seems to be different for each sex, where men could display a rebellious attitude to increase chances of finding a mate. In contrast, results for women are not conclusive, because no relationship between academic performance and any aggressive mechanism, were predicted by sociality. We conclude that an evolutionary framework, which includes sex-specific hypotheses, is appropriate to obtain a holistic perspective of this phenomenon.     

Perceptions of Economic Inequality and Support for Redistribution: The role of Existential and Utopian Standards

Perceived greater economic inequality is supposedly associated with higher demand for redistribution. However, the findings in the literature are mixed in this regard, with some researchers providing evidence in favour of this association and some findings evidence against it. Given that perceived economic inequality and endorsement of system-justifying beliefs are related to increased inequality acceptance, we explore the interplay between them in relation to support for redistribution. This study is intended to shed light on the role of utopian standards (ideal estimates about what ought to be) as one mechanism that affects the relationship between perceived greater economic inequality and support for redistribution. Based on correlational data (N?=?794), we conducted a conditional process analysis and found that perceived greater inequality displayed a negative indirect effect on support for redistribution, through acceptance of ideal level of economic inequality: Perception of higher inequality was related to increased ideal levels of inequality and thus with lower support for redistribution. In addition, we found that economic system-justifying beliefs conditioned the effect of perceived economic inequality in two ways: First, perceived economic inequality was positively associated with higher acceptance of inequality, and this association was stronger for those that justified the economic system more, and perceived greater inequality was associated with higher support for redistribution—but only for those who endorsed lower levels of economic system justification beliefs. These findings provide evidence that perceived greater economic inequality does not in itself lead to a push for more redistribution; rather, utopian standards such as ideal estimates of economic inequality, which are conditioned by system-justifying ideologies.