跨语言和文化教学研究--在全球化背景下教育亚洲法律专业学生所面临的挑战

在过去的十年里,亚洲赴澳大利亚接受高等教育的学生人数几乎翻了一番.对于澳大利亚法律教育工作者来说,所面临的挑战是如何精心设计课程、讲授课程,使学生通过学习这些课程,掌握一些处理涉及全球复杂法律问题的方法;教师在讲课时如何尽可能地注意所讲课程的相关度,使学生获益最大.这就要求设计者采用多学科的、国际化的方法来设计课程.本文试图从教育工作者的视角,分析这些挑战,并通过教学中的两个实例,来探讨向亚洲学生讲授法律课程的教学方法,指出存在的问题,提出改进措施.     

Simulating transfer and persistence of a chemical marker powder for Lycopodium clavatum spores

In this research a chemical marker powder, based on Lycopodium clavatum spores, was studied to determine its transfer and persistence on a T-shirt. Such chemical marker powders are used to provide evidence that a person has handled a covertly marked object, such as a drug package. The powder was found to transfer readily between a marked item and the person handling it. The powder was found to persist on a T-shirt for up to 13 h; however, there was only a very small amount of powder remaining at this time. The rate of loss of the L. clavatum spores was found to follow a decay curve. The largest decrease in spores from the T-shirt was seen in the first 2 h after the marked item had been handled.     

Risk assessment in offenders with mental disorders: relative efficacy of personal demographic, criminal history, and clinical variables

Following the meta-analysis by Bonta, Law, and Hanson, (1998) this study examined the ability of personal demographic, criminal history, and clinical variables to predict reoffending in offenders in the United Kingdom who had mental disorders. The efficacy of each variable in predicting rate of general reoffending and violent reoffending was investigated. Age on admission, number of days hospitalized, and number of previous offenses were the most effective variables in predicting re-offending, with number of previous offenses being the strongest predictor. Clinical diagnosis was not predictive of reoffending when the variance attributable to these other predictors was controlled for. None of the variables were able to discriminate between general offenders and violent offenders indicating that the same variables predict both types of reoffending. The results showed that reconviction in offenders with mental disorders can be predicted using the same criminogenic variables that are predictive in offenders without mental disorders.     

Books received

The Economy of Bangladesh. By Azizur Rahman Khan. London : Macmillan and New York: St. Martins Press, 1972. Pp. xviii + 196; £4.95.

Matching Employment Opportunities and Expectations: A Programme of Action for Ceylon. Report by the International Labour Office. Geneva, 1971. Pp. xvii + 251; £1.60 and U.S.$4.

Price Consistency in Development Planning. By Peter A. Cornelisse. Rotterdam University Press, 1973. Pp. xiv + 154 n.p.

The Mexican Economy: Twentieth‐Century Structure and Growth. By Clark W. Reynolds. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1970. Pp. xxiv, 468; £6.05.

Nutrition, National Development and Planning. Edited by A. Berg, N. S. Scrimshaw and D. L. Call. Cambridge, Mass.: M.I.T., 1973. Pp. 400. £4–50.

The Nutrition Factor: its Role in National Development. By Alan Berg, Portions with Robert J. Muscat. Washington: The Brookings Institution, 1973. Pp. xii 4‐ 290, Tables, Figures. $8.95.

The Ecology of Malnutrition in Mexico and Central America. By Jacques M. May and Donna L. McLellan. New York: Hafner, 1972. Pp. xiii + 397, tables, maps; £7.50.

The Ecology of Malnutrition in the Caribbean. By Jacques M. May and Donna L. McLellan. New York: Hafner, 1973. Pp. viii + 490, tables, maps; £9.95.     

Colby college conference report

In March 1995 the Japanese doomsday cult Aum Shinrikyo conducted a well-timed and coordinated nerve gas attack on the Tokyo subway system. This represented the first use of such a weapon by a nonstate group and sent shock waves around the world. The shock came not least because the attack had been completely unexpected despite years of theorizing and literature discussing just such a possibility. The purpose of this article is to address the broad issue of terrorist use of weapons of mass destruction as it applies to Aum Shinrikyo, and within this context to critically analyze the three books listed above. Each offers a different look at Aum in terms of the group itself and of what lessons might be drawn from this new and frightening development in "terrorist" violence.     

Management,markets and democracy: Australian local government reform in the 1990s

Australian local government has been subjected to extensive reform during the 1990s. This article considers the three main dimensions of the reforms — changes to management structures, the introduction of competition policy, and municipal consolidation. It reviews the evidence available about the nature of outcomes and examines the impact of the reforms on governance values. It is argued that, so far, economic considerations have been balanced by a commitment to community particpation. Recent political developments, however, may yet prove to be an emerging threat.     

The Impact of Income on the Taste for Revolt

The question of how the level of development affects revolutionary support in society is of fundamental importance. One approach to provide an answer has been to study the relationship between actual civil conflict and income at the national level. This article takes a different approach. It uses microdata sets based on surveys of revolutionary support across one-quarter of a million people and identifies how the responses vary with their incomes. We find that a rise in GDP of $US 1,600 per capita in 2001 values decreases the chances of supporting revolt by 2.4 percentage points which represents a 41% drop in the proportion of people wanting a revolution. For a person who jumps from the bottom to top income quartile within their country, the probability declines by a similar amount. The results are robust to controlling for country and year effects, country-specific time trends and take account of the potential endogeneity of GDP.