Why Liberals Should Hate ``Hate Crime Legislation'

Law and Philosophy -     

Using the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) to Conceptualize Disability and Functioning in Psychological Injury and Law

The International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health (ICF) is the World Health Organization’s classification of human functioning and disability. The ICF is addressed as an important development in healthcare and of specific importance for informing assessment in forensic psychology. The utility of the conceptual framework of the ICF to inform case conceptualization in psychological injury and law is explored. Future prospects for the ICF in psychological healthcare are reviewed, including the need for more research on the intersection of the ICF and the psychological–legal context.     

Mobilizing the Will to Prosecute: Crimes of Rape at the Yugoslav and Rwandan Tribunals

Widespread and systematic rape pervaded both the genocides in Bosnia–Herzegovina in 1992 and in Rwanda in 1994. In response to these conflicts, the Yugoslav Tribunal (ICTY) and the Rwandan Tribunal (ICTR) were created and charged with meting justice for crimes committed, including rape. Nevertheless, the two tribunals differ in their relative success in administering justice for crimes of rape. Addressing rape has been a consistent element of the ICTY prosecution strategy, which resulted in gender-sensitive investigative procedures, higher frequencies of rape indictments, and more successful prosecutions. In contrast, rape has not been a central focus of the ICTR prosecution strategy, which resulted in a sporadic approach to gender-sensitive investigative procedures, inconsistent rape indictments, and few successful prosecutions. What accounts for this disparity in rape prosecutions between the Rwandan and Yugoslav tribunals? Building off the existing literature that discusses factors such as legal instruments and resource capacity of the tribunal, this article argues that transnational advocacy helped generate the necessary political will to adopt and implement legal norms regarding crimes of sexual violence at the ICTY and the ICTR. Following the importance of transnational advocacy as agents of norm change, this paper also explores the antecedent conditions of advocacy mobilization that conditioned different levels of mobilization vis-à-vis the ICTY and the ICTR, including media attention and framing, connections and interest match with local groups, and geopolitical context.     

Liberty in Law

Law and Philosophy -     

The communicative aspect of nonfatal suicidal behavior--are there gender differences?

Data from the Norwegian part of the WHO/EURO Multicenter Study on Suicidal Behavior were used to investigate gender differences in the communicative aspect of nonfatal suicidal behavior by means of analyzing precipitating factors, intentions involved in and effects of the suicidal act within the frame of Qvortrup's interpretation of speech-act theory. Eighty-nine patients (48 women and 41 men) were included in the analyses, virtually no gender differences were found. Thus, in general, the results did not support the view that persons engaging in nonfatal suicidal behavior should receive different treatment or follow-up as a group based on their gender. The results gave some support to Qvortrup's speech-act theory and his four categories of suicidal behavior, emotional toward others, regulative toward others, emotional toward oneself and regulative toward oneself.