Social capital,NGOs, and development: a Guatemalan case study

Social researchers continue to grasp for critical factors that foster or impede the development of social capital. This article highlights some of these factors based on an investigation of a low‐income urban settlement in Guatemala. Community activists and leaders, elected representatives, regional government service providers, local residents, NGO directors and staff, and other key informants living and working within the designated locality indicated a complex and diverse range of social, cultural, political, and economic issues that contributed to low levels of ‘broad‐based’ social capital. Long‐standing fears related to violence and corruption within a historically top‐down authoritarian state were the most significant factors impeding social capital, social organising, and civic participation. Northern‐led service‐providing NGOs in the area also curbed ‘broad‐based’ social capital by fostering dependency through intervention strategies that were external, top down, non‐participatory, and not community based.     

Data breach notification law in the EU and Australia – Where to now?

Mandatory data breach notification laws have been a significant legislative reform in response to unauthorized disclosures of personal information by public and private sector organizations. These laws originated in the state-based legislatures of the United States during the last decade and have subsequently garnered worldwide legislative interest. We contend that there are conceptual and practical concerns regarding mandatory data breach notification laws which limit the scope of their applicability, particularly in relation to existing information privacy law regimes. We outline these concerns here, in the light of recent European Union and Australian legal developments in this area.     

For the Guidance of Martians: A Reply to Martin Smith on British Politics Textbooks

A recent review article in the British Journal of Politics and International Relations made a number of criticisms about the supposed lack of innovation and theoretical rigour found in current British politics textbooks. Jones and Robins constructively engage the points made in the article and argue that the criticisms made are only partly valid. They conclude that, within the obvious confines of a basic text, there is more on offer to students than there has ever been and that the success of these textbooks provides publishers with the means to cross-subsidise minority interest scholarship.     

Rethinking Caretaker Conventions for Australian Governments

Australia has well‐established conventions for caretaker governments. These conventions regulate how a government should operate once an election is called, and have been documented for some decades. Yet the current conventions date from an era when elections usually produced clear and immediate results. Can our caretaker conventions cope with the emerging reality of indecisive elections and long delays before a new government is confirmed? This paper canvasses the state of Australia's caretaker conventions and offers suggestions for an expanded, contemporary code.     

Mapping the road to development: a methodology for scaling up participation in policy processes

Understanding local variability in context and mobilising local participation to define development agendas are widely accepted development strategies. There remain, however, significant challenges to the systematic and effective inclusion of local communities and households. Projeto MAPLAN, a pilot project in Ceará, Brazil, is a joint effort of the public sector and civil society designed to create a process of participatory development planning which integrates local-level contextual variations. In this effort, the use of a Participatory Geographic Information System (PGIS) stimulates the participation of community members in analysing their needs, goals, and priorities. The visualisation of these factors through easily understood maps facilitates communication and contributes to a democratic and transparent planning process, thus permitting the articulation of local priorities with the state-level planning apparatus. MAPLAN represents part of a shifting paradigm for rural development planning in the state and provides the tools for the effective inclusion of citizen voice in development policy.     

Mitochondrial DNA Extraction from Burial Soil Samples at Incremental Distances: A Preliminary Study

Preservation variance of soil DNA is neglected in the literature, and exceptional cases exaggerate amplification capabilities. This study sought to amplify a short mitochondrial fragment (212 bp) specific to Sus scrofa domesticus from the soil surrounding decomposing pig remains from an open‐air locale. Samples collected above the body at incremental distances after 145 days of initial placement yielded pig DNA. A secondary sampling was collected in 2017, approximately 768 days after burial. Inhibition tests corroborated that pig DNA was no longer present in the soil resulting in a loss of original DNA between 145 and 768 days. The results provide evidence that genetic material leaches out radially from the source and DNA fragments longer than 200 bp do not persist in soil for a relatively short timeframe in western Montana. The conclusions support the collection of soil in crime scene investigation procedures within the first few months of decomposition.