Neopopulism and its limits in Collor's Brazil

The election of Fernando Collor de Mello as President of Brazil in 1989 was regarded as part of a new wave of neopopulist leaders in contemporary Latin America. The article explores the conditions of emergence of Collor's neopopulist project, the nature of his appeal and the causes of his downfall. The article argues that the emergence of Collor's neopopulist challenge was the result of a crisis of representation in Brazil's edging democratic order. The article concludes that Collor's demise from power in 1992 had to do with the precarious nature of his appeal and his failure to ground his project in a new set of political institutions.     

Detecting Domestic Violence: Spanish External Validation of the Index of Spouse Abuse

The aims of the study were to assess the psychometric properties of the Spanish version of the Index of Spouse Abuse (ISA), and to validate it against external criteria of intimate partner violence. The Spanish version of the ISA was administered to 223 non-abused women and 182 victims of intimate partner violence. Internal consistency coefficients oscillated between 0.88 and 0.98. The Confirmatory Factor Analysis failed to replicate the original two-factor structure. Using Exploratory Factor Analysis, a two-factor solution was found: physical (ISA-P) and non-physical (ISA-NP), but the items included in each factor were slightly different from the original two subscales. Receiver operating characteristic curve analysis revealed an AUC value for the ISA global score of 0.99 (95% CI: 0.98–0.99), with the optimal cut-off of 12 for detecting intimate partner violence. The Spanish version of the ISA is a valid instrument for detecting intimate partner violence in a female population.     

Can the United Nations support "objective" and unhampered illicit drug policy research?

Policies towards mind-altering drugs are controversial and vary among countries and cultures. Many nations feel that the United Nations should be a forum where anti-drug issues can be discussed openly and `objectively'. During the 1990s I participated frequently in U.N. sponsored research projects. This essay summarize what has been a challenging and exciting experience and raises many questions about the U.N.'s capacity to do and or fund `objective' drug research. This is so because of pressures on the U.N. from drug-policy setting countries, lack of independent funds for the U.N. drug policy agencies, the structure and internal dynamics of the U.N. bureaucracies, and the background of the involved U.N. staff. As a result of these factors, the U.N. has promoted a repressive anti-drug agenda and does not allow open debate of many of key anti-drug issues currently discussed in many coutries. This is unfortunate because the UN. has the largest amount of information about illicit drugs anywhere in the world and can play a key role improving anti-drug policies that currently are unsatisfactory to both, drug hawks and doves.     

Cell phone roulette and “consumer interactive” quality

Under current policies, cell phone consumers face a lower probability of finding the best carrier for their usage patterns than winning at roulette. Corroborating survey data consistently show significant dissatisfaction among cell phone users, network performance is a major issue, and customer “churn” is high. This problem may be traced to a new form of “consumer interactive” quality characteristic of emergent high technology products such as cell phone and broadband services. This problem is unlikely to be resolved by effective search and sampling, efficient secondary markets, or voluntary carrier disclosure. Traditional one‐dimensional disclosure responses to this new variation on an old asymmetric information problem should give way to a more multi‐faceted and fine‐grained policy approach. © 2005 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management     

Legal reserve and other questions related to the use of DNA in criminal research (part I)]

Lately, there has been an expansion phenomenon in the use of DNA techniques in criminal investigation. Several of our European neighbouring countries are undertaking reforms in this area. However, the proliferation in the use of DNA is hindering a series of guarantees that up until present were considered settled. The exceptions to the judicial due process is an evident example of this trend. Examples of this can be seen in the last interpretation that the Supreme Court has made of the Spanish regulation and the last reform in Germany, both of which we will take a look at.     

Parallel Paths A Comparison of CSR Firms and Social Enterprises

Corporate social responsibility （CSR） is the incorporation of environmental and social responsibilities into the business activity, in line with the economic responsibility that firms have traditionally focused on. The social entrepreneur is a type of entrepreneur who seeks to resolve a social or environmental problem through the application of a business model, motivated by the aim of helping others and pursuing positive social change. A key aspect of social entrepreneurship （SE） is therefore the creation of social wealth. Both concepts pursue positive social change, but unlike social entrepreneurs, the objective of a responsible firm is not to solve social issues created by others, rather to understand and limit the social and environmental impacts of their profit-generating activities. In recent decades, research on CSR has grown considerably, whereas SE has only begun to receive serious academic attention quite recently. Crucially, few studies have tried to link and differentiate the two areas. Due to the increasing interest in both concepts nowadays, the need to clarify the similarities and differences between them is greater than ever, and is the principal aim of this work.     

Age Estimation Based on DNA Methylation Using Blood Samples From Deceased Individuals

Age estimation using DNA methylation levels has been widely investigated in recent years because of its potential application in forensic genetics. The main aim of this study was to develop an age predictor model (APM) for blood samples of deceased individuals based in five age-correlated genes. Fifty-one samples were analyzed through the bisulfite polymerase chain reaction (PCR) sequencing method for DNA methylation evaluation in genes ELOVL2, FHL2, EDARADD, PDE4C, and C1orf132. Linear regression was used to analyze relationships between methylation levels and age. The model using the highest age-correlated CpG from each locus revealed a correlation coefficient of 0.888, explaining 76.3% of age variation, with a mean absolute deviation from the chronological age (MAD) of 6.08 years. The model was validated in an independent test set of 19 samples producing a MAD of 8.84 years. The developed APM seems to be informative and could have potential application in forensic analysis.