Whose Justice? Rethinking Transitional Justice from the Bottom Up

This paper argues that transitional justice needs to adopt a participatory approach to achieve longer-term sustainability, shifting away from the top-down 'one-size-fits-all' approach to allow 'voices from below' to be heard and heeded. It critiques dominant interpretations of key transitional justice concepts, and links them to the difficulties of post-conflict transitional justice in a range of violently divided societies. Popular participation and local agency, it is argued, is necessary to achieve ends identified in much transitional justice discourse, and to embed mechanisms for the creation of sustainable peace. A Northern Ireland initiative (the Ardoyne Commemoration Project) will be explored in-depth, illustrating how a bottom-up 'truth-telling' process can make a significant contribution to transitional justice and casting doubt on the validity of the deference to legal dominance in current policy and practice. The paper recommends that knowledge available in development studies and participatory theory be applied more clearly in debates and approaches in transitional justice.     

Perception of family social climate and physical aggression in the home

Physical aggression between spouses is a serious social problem. This study was designed to determine if social climate is different in the homes where aggression occurs than in nonviolent homes. Students were asked to report whether physical aggression between spouses occurred in their homes during their last 2 years of high school. They were also asked to complete the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale (MC-SDS) and the Family Environment Scale (FES). Each student protocol with reported conjugal violence was matched with another protocol with an identical score on the MC-SDS and on which physical aggression was not reported. A multivariate analysis of variance indicated that these two groups differed in their scores on the FES. A dominance hierarchy, openly expressed anger, conflict, and lack of organization were salient characteristics of homes where physical aggression occurred. Nonviolent families were characterized by spontaneous expression of feelings and problems, shared pleasurable activities and goals, and an emphasis on personal rights and freedoms.     

New Wine in Old Bottles or New Wine in New Bottles?

This chapter traces the origins of what became the new university law schools, paying particular attention to the creation, culture, and contribution of the United Kingdom polytechnics. It argues that the 'equal but different' philosophy of the polytechnics has special application to law teaching. In particular, it demonstrates that legal education outside the traditional universities has a commitment to vocationalism, innovation in teaching and learning, and to widening access to both legal education and the legal profession. Drawing on research findings, the chapter explores the nature and the professional norms of law teachers in new universities, as contrasted with their counterparts in the traditional sector.     

Profiles of Victimized Women Among the Child Welfare Population: Implications for Targeted Child Welfare Policy and Practices

Despite the call to address domestic violence along with child maltreatment, little information exists to guide services for victimized women involved with child welfare. Research shows that victimized women contend with multiple problems stemming from violent victimization. Unfortunately less is known about combinations of needs and resources among victimized women, especially for those involved with child welfare. Through an examination of needs and resources among families with child maltreatment and domestic violence, we aimed to help address this knowledge gap. Needs and resources among 1,229 victimized caregivers were examined using the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-being (NSCAW). Using latent class analysis, four distinct multivariate profiles of needs and resources among victimized caregivers were identified. Significant differences were found among the profile groups in the family violence they experienced in the 18 months following child welfare investigations. Based on these findings, we discuss implications for tailored practices to enhance the safety of victimized caregivers involved with child welfare. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 9th Annual Conference of the Society for Social Work and Research, Miami, Florida in January 2005.     

Post-injection hybridization of complementary DNA strands on capillary electrophoresis platforms: A novel solution for dsDNA artifacts

Several laboratories have reported the occurrence of a split or n − 1 peak at the vWA locus in PowerPlex^® 16 and PowerPlex^® ES amplification products separated on 4- and 16-capillary electrophoresis instruments. The root cause of this artifact is post-PCR reannealing of the unlabeled, unincorporated vWA primer to the 3′-end of the tetramethylrhodamine (TMR)-labeled strand of the vWA amplicon. This reannealing occurs in the capillary post-electrokinetic injection. The split peak is eliminated by incorporation into the loading cocktail of a sacrificial hybridization sequence (SHS) oligonucleotide that is complementary to the vWA primer. The SHS preferentially anneals to the primer instead of the TMR-labeled strand of the vWA amplicon. In addition, the n − 10/n − 18 artifact that may be seen at the vWA locus was determined to be due to double-stranded amplicon formed post-electrokinetic injection into the capillary. This was also eliminated by adding in two Complementary Oligo Targets (COT1 and COT2) in addition to the SHS oligonucleotide into the loading cocktail. These three oligonucleotides are complementary to the 33 bases at the 5′-end of the unlabeled vWA amplicon strand and the 60 bases at its 3′-end and therefore compete for hybridization to the TMR-labeled amplicon strand. Incorporation of these three oligonucleotides in the Internal Lane Standard 600 (ILS600) eliminate both the split peak and n − 10/n − 18 artifact in PowerPlex^® 16 and PowerPlex^® ES amplification products without affecting sizing of alleles at the vWA locus or any locus in the PowerPlex^® 16, PowerPlex^® Y, PowerPlex^® ES, AmpFlSTR^® Profiler Plus^® ID, AmpFlSTR^® Cofiler^®, and AmpFlSTR^® SGM Plus^® kits.