Politicizing connectivity: beyond the biopolitics of information technology in international relations

The traditional way of politicizing information technology (IT) in international relations is to raise questions concerning access. Rarely is the question posed of what IT does to people, how becoming connected subjectifies peoples, constituting them as a socius distinguished by properties and capacities of connectivity. Thus does this article address the biopolitics of connectivity; the implication of IT in liberal governance; the evolutionary posthumanism that has inspired faith in the governance properties of IT; and, crucially, the war and violence that are legitimated internationally on account of this faith. Following this critique it asks how to constitute an alternative politics of connectivity. How can we rework the concept of connectivity to conceive of alternative political horizons and possibilities? Exploring questions of the quality and intensity of connectivity, at expense of disciplinarily hegemonic ones of equality and quantity, the article engages with the rhizomatic theory of connectivity as advanced by Deleuze and Guattari.     

Thomas Aquinas and Viscount Stair: the Influence of Scholastic Moral Theology on Stair's Account of Restitution and Recompense

This article examines the impact of scholastic moral theology on aspects of Stair's Institutions of the Laws of Scotland. It is argued that both Stair's general concept of justice and his account of the ‘obediential’ obligations of restitution and recompense were influenced by Aristotelian philosophy and Thomist moral theology. The complex interaction in Stair's thinking of Presbyterian religion, scholastic philosophy and a commitment to the rational natural law are sketched in order to shed light on the historical and cultural context within which he wrote. The result is a more complex picture of the influences which informed the writing of the Institutions.     

The Value of Crime Scene and Site Visitation by Forensic Psychologists and Psychiatrists

Site visits and crime scene visitation by forensic psychologists and psychiatrists may enhance the accuracy and credibility of their forensic work in criminal, civil, and other important contexts. This ethically sound technique of after‐the‐fact data collection and verification offers numerous potential benefits to the forensic mental health professional: clarifying the subject's actions, assessing the reliability of witness reports, identifying contextual determinants of behavior, and more fully illuminating subject motivation and decision‐making. Limitations and suggested guidelines for conducting site visits are offered. Guidelines include preplanning, arranging for an informed guide to accompany and narrate the visit, and conducting the site visit prior to forensic examinations.     

Mythological representation in popular culture today

Abstract

Mythologies that reside and operate within popular culture representations and the mass communications media reveal valuable insights into the way in which audiences are conditioned to interact with the social world. These myths require critical attention, and an understanding of contemporary myths should be established, as myths (being residents of the popular mass media) are decoded on a near constant basis by audiences.

This article addresses selected mythological representations in popular culture mass media, in order to examine the nature and societal functions of myths. Part of the importance of deconstructing contemporary myths is constituted by the myth's fictional content. While myths function to inform individuals of acceptable societal behaviour and contribute to an ordered social environment, they can also function negatively to represent negative connotative meanings about certain social groups or issues.

The importance of myth is therefore paramount, but the wealth of mythical nuances that could potentially receive critical attention is multitudinous. This article aims simply to uncover some insights into mass media mythological functionalities as a starting point for investigation.     

The remythologisation of white collective identities in post-apartheid South African film by myth and counter myth

Abstract

Since 1994 a collection of films, referred to here as post-apartheid South African history film, has thematically represented South Africa's apartheid history, and in so doing has engaged with the representation of the white figure in ways which suggest a reformulation of collective South African white identity construction. Part of this process is the phenomenon of the remythologisation, or the counter myth construction, of whiteness as an identity on film. Such mythic representations frequently describe the white figure as connected to aspects of guilt (whether individual or collective), remorse and forgiveness. Often the mythic construction of whiteness on film is delivered in a seemingly oversimplified binary fashion, reducing the representation of white identity in the post-apartheid South African situation to one that is robbed of complexities and nuances.     

Democratic Theory and the Public Sphere Project: Rethinking Knowledge,Authority, and Identity

This paper is concerned with the problem of academic acquiescence in the decline of public discourse in the United States. Noting current tendencies for the university to operate as another transnational corporation, the argument targets and probes post-communal professionalism which as a sub-ideology is linked to the dualistic social imaginary of the corporate state. Discussing works by Rieff and Lasch, the critique situates this ideology in the liberal-progressivist middle-class culture that is much more bound to the transnational corporate state's consumer culture than many academics wish to acknowledge. A theoretical critique of the subjectivization of postmodern "resistance" is presented as one way of facilitating democratic Left intellectual interest in pursuing a true "border politics" between academic and general cultures. Disembodied, placeless visions of professionalism must be replaced with perspectives and projects foregrounding agency rather than "identity" and political action rather than "self-fulfillment." Scholars critical of the university's role in corporate globalization should take a lesson from John Dewey's "civic professionalism" and envision a post-professional politics projecting democratic public spheres that connect with recent political forms of grassroots globalization aiming at more sustainable ways of life.     

“In My Eyes,Each Photograph was a Masterpiece”. Construction of children's photos in a family album on kibbutz in Israel

This article explores the process of the creation of photographs on kibbutz through a case study of one nuclear family living on kibbutz in Israel. It examines the process of construction of photographs in the private family album of the nuclear family in relation to the public forms of documentation on kibbutz. The article explores to what extent the photographs enabled the family to express their individuality in kibbutz society, which was self-governed by a socialist, egalitarian ideology. It examines the influences of the childhood photographs of the mother, who joined the kibbutz as an adult, on the construction of images of motherhood in her private kibbutz photo album. It investigates the way in which the construction of private photographs in one family album contested dominant mythologies on kibbutz at that time.     

Reviews

Opening Rounds: Lessons of Military History, 1918–1988, by Anthony Farrar‐Hockley. Andre Deutsch, London, 1988. xiii+188 pp. £12.95. ISBN 0–233–98009–1.

The Blunted Sword: The Erosion of Military Power in Modern World Politics, by Evan Luard. I. B. Tauris, London, 1988. v+196 pp. £16.95. ISBN 1–85043–068–3.

Total War: The Causes and Courses of the Second World War (Revised second edition), edited by Peter Calvocoressi, Guy Wint and John Pritchard. Viking, London, 1989. xxviii+1,315 pp., illus., maps. £25. ISBN 0–670–80311–1.

Codebreaker in the Far East, by Alan Stripp. Frank Cass, London, 1989. xiv+204 pp., illus. £18. ISBN 0–7146–3363–1.

The Pacific: Peace, Security and the Nuclear Issue, edited by Ranginui Walker and William Sutherland. Zed Books, New Jersey; UN University, Tokyo; 1988. xiii+243 pp. £8.95 paperback. ISBN 0–86232–815–2.

China eyes Japan, by Allen S. Whiting. University of California Press, Berkeley, Los Angeles and London, 1989. xi+228 pp. $29.95. ISBN 0–520–06511–5.

Single Sparks: China's Rural Revolutions, edited by Kathleen Hartford and Steven M. Goldstein. M. E. Sharpe, New York, 1989. xi+216 pp. $35.00. ISBN 0–87332–427–7.

China's Regional Development, edited by David S. G. Goodman, (The Royal Institute of International Affairs) Routledge, London and New York, 1989. xvi+204 pp. £32.50 hardback. ISBN 0–415–03510–4.

China's Science Policy in the 80s, (Studies on East Asia), by Tony Saich. Manchester University Press, Manchester, 1988. iv+188 pp. £29.95. ISBN 0–7190–2986–4.

The Chinese Communist Party's Nomenklatura System, edited by John P. Burns. M. E. Sharpe Inc., New York and London, 1989. xlii+166 pp. $39.95. ISBN 0–87332–543–5.

The Thought of Mao Tse‐tung, by Stuart Schram. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1989. x+242 pp. £27.50 hardback, £8.95 paperback. ISBN 0–521–32549–8 and 0–521–31062–8.

The Secret Speeches of Chairman Mao: From the Hundred Flowers to the Great Leap Forward (Harvard Contemporary China Series: 6), edited by Roderick MacFarquhar, Timothy Cheek and Eugene Wu. The Council on East Asian Studies/Harvard University, Harvard, 1989. xxiii+561 pp. £11.95 paperback. ISBN 0–67 4–7967 3‐X.

Marxism and the Chinese Experience: Issues in Contemporary Chinese Socialism, edited by Arif Dirlik and Maurice Meisner. M. E. Sharpe, Armonk NY and London, 1989. xii+384 pp. $45.00. hardback, $17.95 paperback. ISBN 0–87332–515‐X and 0–87332–546‐X.

The Asiatic Mode of Production in China, edited by Timothy Brook. M. E. Sharpe, Armonk NY and London, 1989. xi+204 pp. $39.95. ISBN 0–87332–542–7.

The New China: Comparative Economic Development in Mainland China, Taiwan and Hongkong, by Alvin Rabushka. Westview Press, Boulder and London, 1987. xii+254 pp. £28. ISBN 0–8133–0519–5.

Golden Inches: The China Memoir of Grace Service, edited by John S. Service. University of California Press, Berkeley, 1979. xxvi+346 pp. $19.95. ISBN 0–520–06656–1.

Information China: The Comprehensive and Authoritative Reference Source of New China, (3 volumes), organized by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, compiled and translated by the China Social Sciences Publishing House. Edited for Pergamon Press by C. V. James. (Oxford, New York, Beijing, Frankfurt, Sao Paulo, Sydney, Tokyo, Toronto: Pergamon Press, 1989). 1,621 pp., 1,250 photographs, line drawings and tables; 52 full colour plates; 23 maps. £450. ($795.00). ISBN 0–08–034764–9.

New China's Population, by China's Financial and Economic Publishing House. (New York and London: Macmillan, 1988). xxiv+232pp., tables, charts. £64. ISBN 0–02–905471–0.

China: Facts and Figures Annual, Volume 12, 1989, edited by Charles E. Greer (Gulf Breeze, FL: Academic International Press, 1989). xxiii+510 pp. $91.00. ISBN0–87569–112–9.

The Cambridge History of Japan: Volume 5: The Nineteenth Century, edited by Marius B. Jansen. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and New York, 1989. xiv+828 pp. £60, $89.50. ISBN 0–521–22356–3.

The Cambridge History of Japan: Volume 6: The Twentieth Century, edited by Peter Duus. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and New York, 1988. xx+866 pp. £60, $89.50. ISBN 0–521–22357–1.

Children of the Sun: The Japanese and the Outside World, by Michio Kitahara. Paul Norbury Publications, Sandgate, Folkestone, Kent, 1989. 160 pp. £12.95. ISBN 0–904404–68–4.

The Sun also Sets: Why Japan will not be Number One, by Bill Emmott. Simon and Schuster, London, 1989. xii+275 pp. £14.95. ISBN 0–671–69696–3.

Japan: The Blighted Blossom, by Roy Thomas. I. B. Tauris, London, 1989. xii+299 pp. £16.95. ISBN 1–85043–125–6.

A History of Japanese Economic Thought, by Tessa Morris‐Suzuki. Routledge, London and New York; with the Nissan Institute of Japanese Studies, Oxford, 1989. vii+213 pp. £30. ISBN 0–415–01264–3.

The Japanese Business Community and the National Trade Policy, 1920–1942, by William Miles Fletcher III. University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill and London, 1989. x+226 pp. £34.95 ($37.45). ISBN 0–8078–1847‐X.

Management and Higher Education Since 1940: The influence of America and Japan on West Germany, Great Britain, and France, by Robert R. Locke. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1989. xiii+328 pp. £30. ISBN 0–521–34102–7.

Democracy in Japan (Pitt Series in Policy and Institutional Studies), edited by Takeshi Ishida and Ellis S. Krauss. University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, Pa., 1989. x+354 pp. $39.95 hardback, $14.95 paperback. ISBN 0–8229–3608–9 and 0–8229–5414–1.

A History of Singapore, 1819–1988 (Second Edition), by C. M. Turnbull. Oxford University Press, Singapore, Oxford and New York, 1989. xiv+388 pp. 16 plates, 8 maps. £30. ISBN 0–19–588911–8.

Asia's Next Giant: South Korea and Late Industrialization, by Alice H. Amsden. Oxford University Press, New York and Oxford, 1989. xvi+379 pp. £25. ISBN 0–19–505852–6.

Korea: A Religious History, by James Huntley Grayson. Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1989. xii+319 pp. £37.50. ISBN 0–19–826186–1.

Authoritarianism and Opposition in South Korea, by Hak‐Kyu Sohn. Routledge, London and New York, 1989. xii+287 pp. £35. ISBN 0–415–03550–3.

Australian Public Policy and Economic Vulnerability: A Comparative and Historical Perspective, by Francis Castles. Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 1988. xii+184 pp. £12.95 paperback. ISBN 0–04–324021–6.

The Politics of Development in Australia, edited by Brian Head. Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 1989. xv+274 pp. £11.95 paperback. ISBN 0–04–861880–2.

The Great Betrayal: Britain, Australia and the Onset of the Pacific War 1939–42, by David Day. Angus and Robertson, Sydney and London, 1988. x+388 pp. Illus. £14.95, AS39.95. ISBN 0–207–15328–0.

India and South East Asia: Indian Perceptions and Policies, by Mohammed Ayoob. Routledge, London, 1989. xi+105 pp. £25. ISBN 0–415–03894–4.

Southeast Asia: An Illustrated Introductory History (Expanded Edition) by Milton Osborne. Allen & Unwin, Sydney, Wellington, London and Boston, 1989. viii+263 pp., illus., maps. £11.95 paperback. ISBN 0–04–352238–6.

Crisis and Response: The Challenge to South‐South Economic Cooperation, edited by Noordin Sopiee, B. A. Hamzah and Leong Choon Heng. Kegan Paul International, London, 1989. xxvii+450 pp. £45. ISBN 0–7103–0370‐X.

Women's Asia, by Yayori Matsui. Zed Books Ltd., London and New Jersey, 1989. viii+172 pp. £26.95 ($49.95) hardback, £7.95 ($12.50) paperback. ISBN 0–86232–826–8 and 0–86232–827–6.

Urbanization in Asia: Spatial Dimensions and Policy Issues, edited by Frank J. Costa, Ashok K. Dutt, Laurence J. C. Ma, and Allen Noble. University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu, 1989. ix+412 pp. $44.00. ISBN 0–8248–1151–8.

The Far East and Australasia 1990 (updated and revised edition), (London: Europa Publications, 1990), xxi+1,054 pp., maps. £105.00. ISBN 0–946653–53–4.     

Use of sibling pairs to determine the familial searching efficiency of forensic databases

Pairs of individuals tested at the 13 CODIS core STR loci to determine sibship were used as a source of familial data that was seeded into a larger data set of 12,000 plus DNA profiles simulating a CODIS-like offender database. To determine whether known sibs could be found in the larger database two methods were used: degree of allele sharing and a kinship matching approach. The allele sharing method detected 62 of 109 of the known sib pairs (57%) while kinship matching detected 90 of the sib pairs (83%). Although kinship matching was the more efficient method of the two, the number of false positives generated prior to finding a true match was inversely related to the likelihood of sibship suggesting that many true siblings would not be easily found in a large forensic database via familial searching techniques.     

Analysis of mutations in father–son pairs with 17 Y-STR loci

We have examined 389 father/son sample pairs from U.S. Caucasians, African Americans, Hispanics and Asians using the 17 Y-STR loci in the Yfiler™ kit and observed a total of 24 differences between father and son. Thirteen mutations resulted in the gain of a repeat in the son and 11 resulted in a loss of a repeat. All samples resulted in single repeat mutations except one sample which contained a two repeat loss at Y-GATA-H4. Furthermore, two different sample pairs were found to have two mutations. An African American sample pair had a mutation at DYS458 and a second at DYS635 and an Asian sample pair had mutations at DYS439 and Y-GATA-H4.