DIFFERENT EXPRESSIONS OF THERAPEUTIC JURISPRUDENCE IN THE SPANISH CRIMINAL PROSECUTION

The postulates of what is known as Therapeutic Jurisprudence seek to guide to a more humane, reinvigorating and resocializingjustice, and in the Spanish Legal System we can find different manifestations of itself. This paper aims to examine some of the manifestations of Therapeutic Jurisprudence in the Spanish criminal prosecution： adults and minors criminal mediation, the plea bargaining of the criminal offender and the attenuated pre-trial custody.     

Single‐Image Rectification Technique in Forensic Science

Many researchers have been working in Spain to document the communal graves of those assassinated during the Spanish Civil War. This article shows the results obtained with two low‐cost photogrammetric techniques for the basic documentation of forensic studies. These low‐cost techniques are based on single‐image rectification and the correction of the original photo displacement due to the projection and perspective distortions introduced by the lens of the camera. The capability of image rectification is tested in an excavation in the village of Loma de Montija (Burgos, Spain). The results of both techniques are compared with the more accurate data obtained from a laser scanner system RIEGL LMS‐Z390i to evaluate the error in the lengths. The first technique uses a camera situated on a triangle‐shaped pole at a height of 5 m and the second positions the camera over the grave using a linearly actuated device. The first technique shows measurement errors less than 6%, whereas the second shows greater errors (between 8% and 14%) owing to the positioning of the carbon‐fiber cross on an uneven surface.     

The electoral consequences of corruption scandals in Spain

Previous studies of the electoral consequences of corruption in Spanish local elections (Jiménez Revista de Investigaciones Políticas y Sociológicas, 6(2):43–76, 2007; Fernández-Vázquez and Rivero 2011, Consecuencias electorales de la corrupción, 2003–2007. Estudios de Progreso, Fundación Alternativas; Costas et al. European Journal of Political Economy: 28(4):469-484, 2012) have found that voters do not necessarily punish corrupt mayors. As has been pointed out in the comparative literature, the average loss of electoral support by corrupt incumbents is small and does not prevent their reelection most of the times (Jiménez and Caínzos 2006, How far and why do corruption scandals cost votes? In Garrard, J. and Newell, J. (eds.) Scandals in past and contemporary politics. Manchester: Manchester University Press). What remains unsolved, however, is the remarkable variability in this pattern. This article explores some of the micro-level variables that may mediate the effect of corruption scandal on the votes. We focus on three factors: ideological closeness to the incumbent party, political sophistication, and employment status. Our results provide only partial support for our hypotheses, suggesting that the effects of corruption are much more complex than what may seem at first sight.     

Attitudes,Perceptions, and Preferences of Individuals from Temuco (Chile) About Denture Marking

Denture marking (DM) helps identify edentulous people with different methods. Analyzing perceptions and attitudes of denture wearers would enable understanding of the practical aspects, an analysis still absent in South America. Fifty‐three individual candidates for removable dentures were instructed on disaster victim identification (DVI) and the usefulness of DM for this purpose. They were physically shown eight DM systems and a questionnaire to which they responded by highlighting preferences in those systems. Although 98.11% did not know that dentures could be marked, only 9.43% denied interest in some type of DM. The 90.57% would mark their dentures with some system, preferring the inclusion of QR codes or a micro SIM card. The proven weaknesses of DVI and propensity for disaster mean this community in Chile is an opportunity to implement DM systems. Obstacles may come not from patients but from their dentists, educational institutions, or a lack of public policies.     

Disentangling the Role of Ideology and Partisanship in Legislative Voting: Evidence from Argentina

We present a novel approach to disentangle the effects of ideology, partisanship, and constituency pressures on roll‐call voting. First, we place voters and legislators on a common ideological space. Next, we use roll‐call data to identify the partisan influence on legislators' behavior. Finally, we use a structural equation model to account for these separate effects on legislative voting. We rely on public opinion data and a survey of Argentine legislators conducted in 2007–08. Our findings indicate that partisanship is the most important determinant of legislative voting, leaving little room for personal ideological position to affect legislators' behavior.     

Participation: the ascendancy of a buzzword in the neo-liberal era

Participation was originally conceived as part of a counter-hegemonic approach to radical social transformation and, as such, represented a challenge to the status quo. Paradoxically, throughout the 1980s and 1990s, ‘participation’ gained legitimacy within the institutional development world to the extent of achieving buzzword status. The precise manipulations required to convert a radical proposal into something that could serve the neo-liberal world order led to participation's political decapitation. Reduced to a series of methodological packages and techniques, participation would slowly lose its philosophical and ideological meaning. In order to make the approach and methodology serve counter-hegemonic processes of grassroots resistance and transformation, these meanings desperately need to be recovered. This calls for participation to be re-articulated within broader processes of social and political struggle in order to facilitate the recovery of social transformation in the world of twenty-first century capitalism.     

Paths to the recognition of homo-parental adoptive rights in the EU-27: a QCA analysis

Although the recognition of the adoptive rights of LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) couples is a socially salient topic, cross-national variation regarding this issue has been largely underexplored in social science research. With the aid of configurational analysis, this article fills this gap and shows the conditions that explain the recognition of the adoptive rights of homosexual couples in the countries of the EU-27. It is argued that two different paths led to this outcome. All countries where adoptive rights were recognized had higher degrees of secularization and lower levels of social homophobia. In addition, in Northern European countries, the Protestant background and absence of conservative governments for a certain time period seemed to be the determinant. However, for the remaining European countries that recognized these rights, rising levels of gender equality appeared to have a more salient role.     

Solidarity,equality, and freedom in Pettit’s republicanism

This article discusses Pettit’s views of social justice and political legitimacy in On the People’s Terms. Although Pettit’s book presents a powerful account of the ideal of nondomination, this article probes some deficiencies regarding important questions about solidarity, equality, and feasibility.     

On evaluating success in complex policy mixes: the case of renewable energy support schemes

The aim of this paper is to propose the main elements of a theoretical and methodological framework for the assessment of the success of complex policy mixes, to highlight the conflicts between individual instruments and other elements within those mixes and to propose policy recommendations in order to mitigate them. Some criteria are defined, and different levels of analysis are considered. The challenges in evaluating policy packages are illustrated with the case of the coexistence between renewable energy support and emissions trading schemes. It is shown that policy mixes inherently lead to interactions between the different instruments, either in the form of conflicts or synergies. Conflicts are horizontal (i.e., between different types of instruments) and/or vertical (i.e., between different administrative levels). It is suggested that mitigating those conflicts could require administrative coordination. Relevant coordination could take place between different administrative levels and relate to different instruments or different design elements within similar instruments. However, given the trade-offs between different criteria, the role of coordination is necessarily limited.