A Research Note on the Cost of Not Being White in Brazil

This research note revisits the theme of “the cost of not being white in Brazil.” Based on 1996 National Household Survey (PNAD) data, the results point out to still sizeable and significant monetary disadvantages suffered by nonwhites in the Brazilian labor market. It is estimated that about 18 percent of the white-nonwhite income gap can be attributed to differential rates of return to human capital investments and to other individual characteristics between the race/color groups. Nelson do Valle Silva is Researcher at Laboratorio Nacional de Computacao Cientifica and Professor at Instituto Universitario de Pesquisas do Rio de Janeiro. His most recent books areMobilidade Social no Brasil, Sao Paulo: Makron Books, 1999 (with J. Pastore) andCor e Estratificacao Social no Brasil Rio: Contracapa, 1999 (with C. Hasenbalg and M. Lima). He received his Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Michigan.     

Identification of victims of the collapse of a mine tailing dam in Brumadinho

The collapse of the B1 Dam of VALE SA mining company in Brumadinho, Minas Gerais, Brazil was the largest humanitarian disaster and occupational accident in the country’s history, and it posed challenges regarding the management and identification of multiple victims. We evaluated the impact of the iron ore tailings on the victims’ bodies. We examined the scientific identification of the victims and the dynamics of the disaster over the 1st year after it occurred. We also determined the socio-demographic profiles of the victims. In this retrospective, cross-sectional study, we investigated the expert reports of the victims’ biological remains from 25 January 2019 to 25 January 2020. We analysed the socio-demographic data, identification methods, identification status, identification time, and necroscopic information. During the study period, 259 of 270 victims were identified, and 603 biological materials were analysed; among them, 86.2% were body parts and 13.8% were whole bodies. Of the total cases registered that year, 476 (78.9%) were submitted during the first 10 weeks after the disaster. Friction ridge analysis accounted for 67.9% of primary identifications and DNA analysis did so for 91.6% of re-identification cases. Body dismemberment was 3.4 times greater among mine workers than among community victims. Adult males accounted for the greatest number of victims (P < 0.001). Polytraumatic injury was the prevalent single cause of death. Necropsy examination revealed the occurrence of asphyxia in 7% of cases. The higher number of fatalities and greater dismemberment among employees than with community residents underlines the occupational dangers in the mining industry and clarifies the dynamics of the disaster. In the initial weeks after the dam collapsed, friction ridge analysis was the most appropriate method for identification. Subsequently, DNA analysis became the most-used technique for identification and re-identification owing to the great volume of body parts and decomposed biological tissue. Autopsy allowed diagnosis of the causes of death to be clarified according to the Brazilian criminal legal system.     

The Portuguese adaptation of the Gudjonsson Suggestibility Scale (GSS1) in a sample of inmates

This paper comprises two studies which address the validity of the Portuguese adaptation of the Gudjonsson Suggestibility Scale, GSS1. In study 1, the means and standard deviations for the suggestibility results of a sample of Portuguese inmates (N = 40, M_age = 37.5 years, SD = 8.1) were compared to those of a sample of Icelandic inmates (Gudjonsson, 1997; Gudjonsson & Sigurdsson, 1996). Portuguese inmates' results were in line with the original results. In study 2, the means and standard deviations for the suggestibility results of the sample of Portuguese inmates were compared to those of a general Portuguese population sample (N = 57, M_age = 36.1 years, SD = 12.7). The forensic sample obtained significantly higher scores in suggestibility measures than the general population sample. ANOVA confirmed that the increased suggestibility in the inmates sample was due to the limited memory capacity of this latter group. Given that the results of both studies 1 and 2 are in keeping with the author's original results (Gudjonsson, 1997), this may be regarded as a confirmation of the validity of the Portuguese GSS1.     

Policy Monitoring and Ministerial Survival: Evidence from Multiparty Presidentialism

Studies on policy monitoring and ministerial survival within coalition governments are usually conducted separately. In this study, we bring these topics together and argue that the strategy of coalition partners to oversee the implementation of one another's policies has surprising consequences on the duration of office-holding ministers. Our main theoretical insight suggests that the degree to which ministers behave as faithful agents of the government depends on their expectations about their partners' monitoring behavior, such that when they expect to be under high scrutiny, they moderate their drifting behavior. Using evidence from legislative information requests on the activities of individual ministers over all multiparty cabinets formed in Brazil between 1995 and 2014, we demonstrate that: (1) greater policy monitoring by coalition partners is observed under more ideologically heterogeneous cabinets, and (2) more frequent policy-monitoring efforts by coalition partners lead to a lower ministerial replacement within the government term.