The use of phosphate buffered saline for the recovery of cells and spermatozoa from swabs.

In the forensic science laboratory, the recovery of spermatozoa from vaginal swabs, or vaginal cells from penile swabs, can help determine if sexual intercourse may have taken place. There are several methods used to recover spermatozoa and cells from the swabs before visualisation on a microscope slide and most of these methods use water. Phosphate buffered saline (PBS) is a non-toxic solution used in many biological laboratories. Unlike water, PBS prevents cells rupturing or shrivelling up due to osmosis. This study demonstrates that PBS can be used for the extraction of spermatozoa and cells from swabs and that PBS does not affect subsequent DNA profiling.     

Drivers of natural resource-based political conflict

Policy Sciences - Why are some natural resource-based political conflicts so controversial, acrimonious and intractable? What factors drive these conflicts? And what turns the common political...     

Empathic emotions and justice in society

Empathy is defined as an affect more appropriate to another's situation than to one's own. The paper (i) summarizes different modes of empathic affect arousal; (ii) shows how empathic affect may interact with social-cognitive development, to produce four levels of empathy development; (iii) suggests that causal attributions may transform empathic affect into sympathy, guilt, and empathic anger, which are major moral affects; (iv) discusses how these affects may influence moral judgment and behavior; (v) points up empathic morality's limitations and the need to embed empathy in relevant moral principles; (vi) discusses possible links between empathy and justice principles, with special focus on Rawls; (vii) illustrates the interplay of empathy, moral judgment, and justice; and (viii) suggests that moral principles may become hot cognitions.     

Morgentaler v. The Queen in the Supreme Court of Canada.

In Morgentaler v. R., the Supreme Court of Canada struck down the abortion provisions in the Criminal Code. In a five to two split, a majority of the Supreme Court judges found that section 251 offended a pregnant woman's constitutionally protected right not to be deprived of her "life, liberty, and security of the person." Sheilah Martin reviews the three majority judgments and focuses on the decision written by Madame Justice Wilson. She believes that Madame Justice Wilson's opinion merits special attention in several regards: her conclusions on the constitutional rights of pregnant women; her recognition and validation of women's perspectives on abortion; and her approach to balancing women's interests in reproductive self-determination against the state's interest in regulating reproduction. Sheilah Martin concludes that this decision will reverberate far into the future. Even though it fails to establish clear guidelines concerning governmental power to control access to abortion, its principles outline the legal framework in which future litigation will occur, and it will limit and shape the terms of any ensuing political debate. In addition, Madame Justice Wilson's judgment holds great promise for those looking to the Court to promote the rights of women and other historically disadvantaged groups.     

Tension, compression, and shear: directions, stresses, and outcomes of health care cost control

"Control" of health care costs is often portrayed as a struggle between external, "natural" forces pushing costs up and individuals, groups, and societies trying to resist the inevitable. This picture is false. Control includes strenuous efforts by some to raise costs, and by others to resist those increases, and/or to transfer costs to someone else. But all such forces originate in the purposes and interests of individuals and groups. Health care cost control is a struggle among conflicting interests over the priorities of a society, and claims of "inevitability" are simply part of the political rhetoric of that struggle. International experience supports certain conclusions. First, there is no basis for the claim that limits on expenditure growth must threaten the health of (some members of) a society. Second, there is a substantial variety of experience with cost control. Failure in the United States is often presented as evidence of the impossibility of control, but most other countries have succeeded. Finally, control requires the direct confrontation of interests, with substantial build-up of stress. Advocates of expansion are more successful if they can transform compressive forces into efforts to shift the burden onto someone else. Pressures from providers in every country for "privatization" and/or payment by users reflect this recognition of economic interest.     

C. Reviews: general

THE HISTORY OF AL‐TABARI. VOL. III: THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL. Translated by WILLIAM M. BRINNER. Albany, N.Y., SUNY Press, 1991. xii, 194 pp. $44.00 (hb), $14.95 (pb).

THE HISTORY OF AL‐TABARI. VOL. XXXIII: STORM AND STRESS ALONG THE NORTHERN FRONTIERS OF THE ‘ABBASID CALIPHATE. Translated by C.E. BOSWORTH. Albany, N.Y., SUNY Press, 1991. xix, 239 pp. $57.50 (hb), $18.95 (pb).

THE AWAKENING OF PERSIA: THE REIGN OF NASR AL‐DIN SHAH 1848–1896. By A.J. ABRAHAM. USA, Vande Vere Publishing, 1992. 64pp. $18.95.

THE EMERGENCE OF KURDISH NATIONALISM AND THE SHAIKH SAID REBELLION, 1880–1925. By ROBERT OLSON. Austin, University of Texas Press, 1992.

THE ARAB BUREAU: BRITISH POLICY IN THE MIDDLE EAST, 1916–1920. By BRUCE WESTRATE. University Park, PA, Pennsylvania State University Press, 1992. xvi, 240 pp. $35.

DIE TÜRKEI UND ÄGYPTEN IN DER WELTWIRTSCHAFTSKRISE 1929–1933. By CAMILLA DAWLETSCHIN‐LINDER. (Studien zur modernen Geschichte, 40). Stuttgart, Franz Steiner Verlag, 1989. xviii, 187 pp. 20 tables, 6 diagrams. DM 68‐.

EGYPT FROM INDEPENDENCE TO REVOLUTION, 1919–1952. By SELMA BOTMAN. Syracuse, Syracuse University Press, 1991.

EXPULSION OF THE PALESTINIANS: THE CONCEPT OF ‘TRANSFER’ IN ZIONIST POLITICAL THOUGHT 1882–1948. By NUR MASALHA. Washington, DC, Institute for Palestine Studies, 1992. iii, 235pp. $24.95 (hb), $11.95 (pb).

TRANSITION TO SELF‐GOVERNMENT: PRACTICAL STEPS TOWARD ISRAELI‐PALESTINIAN PEACE. Report of a study group convened by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, ANN MOSELY LESCH, principal author. Indiana University Press, 1993. 160pp. £22.50 (hb), £9.99 (pb).

GREATER SYRIA: THE HISTORY OF AN AMBITION. By DANIEL PIPES. New York and Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1990. viii, 240pp.

IBN SAUD: FOUNDER OF A KINGDOM. By LESLIE McLOUGHLIN. Basingstoke, Macmillan in association with St Antony's College, Oxford, 1993. 240pp. £40.00.

THE DESPAIRING DEVELOPER: DIARY OF AN AID WORKER IN THE MIDDLE EAST. By TIMOTHY MORRIS. London, Tauris, 1991.

A MODERN CULTURAL HISTORY OF BAHRAIN. By SAMI A. HANNA. Bahrain, National Council for Culture Arts and Literature, 1991. 107pp.

THE ECONOMIC CONSEQUENCES OF THE GULF WAR. By KAMRAN MOFID. London, Routledge, 1990. xxiv, 177pp.

EARLY ARABIC POETRY: MARATHI AND SU'LUK POEMS, Vol. 1. Edition, translation, and commentary by ALAN JONES. (Oxford Oriental Institute Monographs, 14.) Reading, Ithaca Press, 1992. ix, 270 pp. Map. £25.00.

RELIGION, LEARNING AND SCIENCE IN THE ‘ABBASID PERIOD. Edited by M.J.L. YOUNG, J.D. LATHAM and R.B. SERJEANT. (The Cambridge History of Arabic Literature.) Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1991. xxi, 587pp. £ 60.00 (hb).

THREE SHADOW PLAYS. By MUHAMMAD IBN DANIYAL. Edited by PAUL KAHLE. Critical apparatus by DEREK HOPWOOD. Introductory Essay by MUSTAFA BADAWI. (E.J.W. Gibb Memorial, New Series, 32.) Cambridge and Warminster, Gibb Memorial Trust/Aris and Phillips, 1992. 154pp. in Arabic and 30pp. in English. £12.00.

GENRE AND LANGUAGE IN MODERN ARABIC LITERATURE. By SASSON SOMEKH. Wiesbaden, Harrassowittz, 1991.

DER ARABISCHE DIALEKT DER JUDEN VON ‘AQRA UND ARBIL (Semitica Viva, 5.) By OTTO JASTROW. Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz, 1990. 438pp. DM 112.‐

1 For technical reasons, the symbol ‘e’ has been substituted for the ‘inverted e’ of the original throughout this review. [—Ed.]

WADAAN: REINFORCING READING/WRITING/FIRST LEVEL ARABIC COURSE, Vol.4. By DIONISIUS A. AGIUS, and PARWEEN N. ARIF. Leeds, University of Leeds, 1991. 65 pp.

HAYYAN BINA: KITAB AL‐TAMARIN. DRILLS/FIRST LEVEL ARABIC COURSE, Vol.5. By DIONISIUS A. AGIUS. Leeds, University of Leeds, 1991. 111 pp.

MUGHAMARAT ‘AJIBA FI QISAS MUFIDA: THIRD LEVEL ARABIC COURSE BOOK 1. By PARWEEN N. ARIF and DIONISIUS A. AGIUS. Leeds, University of Leeds, 1991. 64 pp.

UNVEILING ISLAM. By ROGER DU PASQUIER. Cambridge, Islamic Texts Society, 1992. viii, 157pp. £6.95.

CULTURAL SCHIZOPHRENIA. By DARYUSH SHAYEGAN. London, Saqi Books, 1992. vii, 188pp.     

Explaining “Pain and Suffering” Awards: The Role of Injury Characteristics and Fault Attributions

The present research explored factors thought to affect compensatory awards for non-economic ham (pain and suffering) in personal injury cases. Experiment 1 showed that the nature and severity of the plaintiffs injury had a strong effect on perceptions of the extent of harm suffered and on award amounts. The parties' relatively active or passive roles in causing the injury affected assessments of their degree of fault, but perceived fault had little influence on awards. Experiment 2 replicated with more varied cases the strong impact of injury severity on harm perception and on awards for pain and suffering. In both studies, the disability and the mental suffering associated with injuries were stronger predictors of awards than were pain and disfigurement.