Police-Induced Confessions: Risk Factors and Recommendations

Reviewing the literature on police-induced confessions, we identified suspect characteristics and interrogation tactics that influence confessions and their effects on juries. We concluded with a call for the mandatory electronic recording of interrogations and a consideration of other possible reforms. The preceding commentaries make important substantive points that can lead us forward—on the effects of videotaping of interrogations on case dispositions; on the study of non-custodial methods, such as the controversial Mr. Big technique; and on an analysis of why confessions, once withdrawn, elicit such intractable responses compared to statements given by child and adult victims. Toward these ends, we hope that this issue provides a platform for future research aimed at improving the diagnostic value of confession evidence.     

Inconsistencies in children's recall of witnessed events: The role of age,question format and perceived reason for question repetition

Purpose. Children's inconsistencies when answering repeated questions about past events are a source of concern in forensic, educational, and other contexts. Theoretical accounts of these inconsistencies have predominantly assumed that children shift because they infer adult dissatisfaction with their initial answer. This study aimed to test this account via examination of the effects of question format on shifting, as well as via direct questioning of children. Method. Four‐, five‐, and seven‐year‐olds (N = 226) were asked 17 recall questions about a recent classroom activity, with eight target questions repeated in one of four formats: no‐correct (mildly misleading questions to which the correct answer was ‘no’), yes‐correct (mildly misleading questions to which the correct answer was ‘yes’), specific open wh‐ questions, and forced‐choice questions. They were then asked about the adult's reasons for repetition. Accuracy, shifting, and interpretations of question repetition were examined. Results. Shifting from accuracy decreased with age, and was affected by question format in 4‐year‐olds only, who shifted more to no‐correct than to forced‐choice questions. Shifting towards accuracy was more common in forced‐choice questions than either no‐correct or open questions, but there were no significant age differences. First‐answer‐unsatisfactory interpretations of question repetition were rare, especially in the two younger groups. The oldest group offered a wider range of interpretations and also showed some evidence of an association between first‐answer‐unsatisfactory interpretations and shifting. Conclusions. Overall, our findings present a challenge to first‐answer‐unsatisfactory explanations of young children's shifting in recall settings, at least where overt pressure to shift is low. Forensic implications are considered.     

Protest Patterns in Provincial Russia: a Paired Comparison of Company Towns

Following the Soviet Union’s collapse, Russia implemented reforms aimed at transitioning to a market economy and devolving power to regional and municipal levels of government. Although it is well known that these reforms created significant uncertainty, economic crises, and protest, most existing studies do not explore the considerable variation in protest patterns across localities. This article asks why, despite similar pressures, some cities have experienced protests that are consistently larger and more intense than others. Focusing on the context of the many company towns that emerged during Soviet industrialization, I construct a paired comparison of two average-sized company towns using process tracing through interviews and archival documents. This article also employs an original protest database created through newspaper analysis that tracks not only the instances of protest but also protest size, demands, and targets. What emerges are two pathways that explain the divergent protest structures in the two company towns studied. In Cherepovets, a city that is less dependent on the central state, local elites pursued strategies of co-optation and suppression, limiting the opportunity structure for contentious politics to small-scale, local protests. In Komsomolsk-na-Amure, a city where the primary industry is in decline and dependent on support from the center, local elites converged with opposition groups to improve their bargaining position vis-à-vis the central government; this produced protests that were larger and more extreme and targeted the system as a whole.     

Peace building with the body: resonance and reflexivity in Colombia’s Legion del Afecto

ABSTRACT

Youth in Medellín, Colombia have been recognized as potential peacebuilders through initiatives for urban peace and non-violence, including the initiative Legión del Afecto. This paper explores the development of the Legión del Afecto in order to ask questions about the peace building potential of specific frames (e.g. coexistence) and specific strategies of mobilization (e.g. embodied). We describe how differences between the earlier and later years of the Legión have come to highlight tensions between affective versus market-based relationships in motivating youth. These tensions may be productive, but without serious attention to reflexivity, may also derail peacebuilding efforts.     

Regulating Assisted Reproduction in Canada,Switzerland, and the USA: Comparing the Judicialization of Policy-Making

This article analyses the extent to which courts shape policies for assisted reproduction. While the USA is considered to be the most litigious country, Canada has observed a growing involvement of the courts from the 1980s onward, and Switzerland is characterized by a modest degree of judicialization. Based on national patterns, we would expect litigation and court impact to vary across these three countries. As the empirical analysis reveals, policy-process-specific variables such as the novelty of regulation, self-regulation by key stakeholders, and the policies in place better explain the variation in the judicialization of policy-making.     

HMG, AIOC and the Anglo-Iranian oil crisis: In defence of Anglo-Iranian

At the interface of big business and government, with whom does influence and responsibility lie? Rarely is the answer clear-cut, yet accounts of the Anglo-Iranian oil crisis of 1948-54 have often roundly blamed the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (AIOC) for British mishandling of it. This article seeks to redress the balance. Whilst no apologia for AIOC policy, it contends that HMG should shoulder much more responsibility than hitherto allowed. From clandestine partnership through to sacrificial pawn, the government used the company as an instrument of foreign policy as it sought to marry the protection of AIOC interests in Iran with wider concerns for combating communism and promoting the Anglo-American 'special relationship'.     

Book reviews

Philip Towle, Enforced Disarmament: From the Napoleonic Campaigns to the Gulf War (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), x + 268 pp., £35 (hb), ISBN 0-19-820636-4.

Paul K. Davis, 100 Decisive Battles: From Ancient Times to the Present (Oxford and Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-Clio, 2000), 474 pp., £59.95 (hb), ISBN 1-57607-0751.

David Nicholls, Napoleon: A Biographical Companion (Oxford: ABC-Clio, 2000), 340 pp., £29.95 (hb), ISBN 0-87436-957-6.

The Satow Siam Papers: The Private Diaries and Correspondence of Ernest Satow, vol. i, 1884-1885, introduced and edited by Nigel Brailey (Bangkok: The [Thai] Royal Historical Society, 1997), iv + 203 pp., price not obtainable, ISBN 974-89918-7-3.

Ernest Satow, C.M.G., A Diplomat in Siam: H.B.M. Minister-Resident, Bangkok, 1885-88, introduced and edited by Nigel Brailey (Bangkok: Orchid Press, rev. edn. 2000), 208 pp., price not obtainable, ISBN 074-8304-73-6.

John Lukacs, Five Days in London, May 1940 (New Haven CT: Yale University Press, 1999), viii + 236 pp., £12.95, ISBN 0-300-08030-1.