Verfassungsvergleichung im Mehrebenensystem

Das Mehrebenensystem steckt einen institutionellen Rahmen für jene Bereiche ab, in denen Prozesse der Verfassungsvergleichung stattfinden. Das Mehrebenensystem stellt mit seiner Differenzierung mehrerer miteinander interagierender Ebenen aber darüber hinaus einen Ansatzpunkt dafür dar, auch die Funktionen der Verfassungsvergleichung entsprechend zu differenzieren. Verfassungsvergleichung auf einer staatlichen Ebene erfolgt daher unter anderen Rahmenbedingungen und zu anderen Zielen als in einem inter- und supranationalen Kontext. Die auf europäischer und internationaler Ebene vorgenommene Verfassungsvergleichung durch die im jeweiligen Kontext agierenden Gerichte stellt die Stabilität des Gesamtsystems her, indem zum einen eine Rückkopplung an die unteren Ebenen vorgenommen wird, zum anderen aber untere Ebenen einen Stabilitätsmaßstab in den oberen Ebenen vorfinden. Durch die Internationalisierung und Europäisierung hat die Verfassungsvergleichung an Bedeutung gewonnen. In allen Fällen der Verfassungsvergleichung ist der wertbezogene Aspekt von Verfassungsrecht stets ins Kalkül zu ziehen.     

Antisocial features are not predictive of symptom exaggeration in forensic patients

Purpose

To investigate the predictive value of antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) and features of ASPD (i.e., lack of remorse, blame externalization, and deceitfulness) for symptom exaggeration.

Methods

A sample of forensic psychiatric patients (N = 57) was asked to complete several self‐report instruments (measuring symptom exaggeration, lack of remorse, blame externalization, and offense minimization) and a semi‐structured interview about their most recent offense. To quantify patients’ deceitfulness, the information collected via the semi‐structured interview was checked against the official records of patient's offenses. Additionally, patient's mental disorders and the extent to which patients denied their delinquency were determined by gathering clinician's judgement on this matter from patient records. The relation between symptom exaggeration and the potential predictors of symptom exaggeration was examined through correlational analyses and cross‐tabulation of prevalence rates of symptom exaggeration with prevalence rates of the potential predictors.

Results

Antisocial personality disorder was not a useful predicator of symptom exaggeration. Also, patients who showed little regret for their offenses, or tended to blame their offenses on external factors, or minimized their delinquency, or were inaccurate when reporting their delinquency, had similar levels of symptom exaggeration as those without these tendencies.

Conclusions

Neither ASPD nor antisocial traits, including lack of remorse, blame externalization, and deceitfulness, were meaningfully related to symptom exaggeration and therefore should have no place in the assessment of symptom validity or the detection of malingering. On the contrary; focusing on antisocial traits as indicators of symptom exaggeration is likely to result in large portions of misclassifications.     

The Power of Symbols—Communism and Beyond

Examining the revolutionary origins of Soviet communism this paper argues that symbolic structures were crucial in the making of Soviet communism as a political force. It conceptualizes symbolizations as contingent interpretive acts that capture people in extraordinary situations of dissolutions of political order. In the first part, I identify the dramatic and imaginative sources of the Bolshevik Revolution, which created a schismogenetic system, in which symbolic structures of time, representation, and leadership would become disintegrative forces in Soviet society. In the second part, I elaborate on the creativity of political symbolism by understanding symbolizations as rites of passage, constructions of origins and ends, as well as reality-creating self-fulfilling prophecies. Rather than to know the origins of symbols, the proposition here is to understand how symbolic meanings contributed to the creation not only of the empirical-objective world of Soviet communism but also of dominant social science interpretations.     

Analysis of Explosives by GC‐UV

A mixture of explosives was analyzed by gas chromatography (GC) linked to ultraviolet (UV) spectrophotometry that enabled detection in the range of 178–330 nm. The gas‐phase UV spectra of 2,4,6‐trinitrotoluene (TNT), 2,4‐dinitrotoluene (DNT), ethylene glycol dinitrate (EGDN), glycerine trinitrate (NG, nitroglycerine), triacetone triperoxide (TATP), and pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN) were successfully recorded. The most interesting aspect of the current application is that it enabled simultaneous detection of both the target analyte and its decomposition products. At suitable elevated temperatures of the transfer line between the GC instrument and the UV detector, a partial decomposition was accomplished. Detection was made in real time and resulted in overlaid spectra of the mother compound and its decomposition product. Hence, the presented approach added another level to the qualitative identification of the explosives in comparison with traditional methods that relies only on the detection of the target analyte. As expected, the decomposition product of EGDN, NG, and PETN was NO, while TATP degraded to acetone. DNT and TNT did not exhibit any decomposition at the temperatures used.     

Implantation of radio frequency identification device (RFID) microchip in disaster victim identification (DVI)

The tsunami catastrophe of December 2004 left more than 200,000 dead. Disaster victim identification (DVI) teams were presented with the unprecedented challenge of identifying thousands of mostly markedly putrefied and partially skeletised bodies. To this end, an adequate body tagging method is essential. Conventional body bag tagging in terms of writing on body bags and placing of tags inside body bags proved unsatisfactory and problem prone due to consequences of cold storage, formalin (formaldehyde) embalming and body numbers inside storage facilities. The placement of radio frequency identification device (RFID) microchips inside victim bodies provided a practical solution to problems of body tagging and attribution in the DVI setting encountered by the Austrian DVI team in Thailand in early 2005.     

Re-thinking the cost of supply chain security

Post 9/11 we have witnessed the introduction and further strengthening of a range of trans-border security programs designed to protect international supply chains against acts of unlawful interference. In some cases compliance with these programs is mandatory. In other cases compliance results in a preferential treatment by appropriate authorities. To a great extent, these programs comprehend the introduction of situational measures. In most instances, however, operators within the supply chain—being made responsible for their actual implementation—are left with limited guidance. In this paper it is argued that a lack of guidance may result in measures being introduced without taking full account of their potential consequences. Based on an analysis of previous research findings and on the outcome of a literature review, direct and indirect implementation costs have been differentiated from a range of (consequential costs provoked by) potential reverse effects, and from a series of generic preconditions, enabling practitioners in industry to conduct a proper cost analysis and come to an informed decision on what particular measure(s) best to implement. It is argued that criminology and management science can support this decision making process, provided that policy makers allow operators a certain freedom of choice between alternative measures and approaches.     

Other people's memory

Abstract

How optimistic are people's evaluations of their own memory as compared to that of most others? To find out, we asked 563 Sa. to compere their own memory for events, faces and names to that of others. The results show that many, and especially young respondents, tend to be illusory optimistic about the power of their memory for events and faces, but not for names. The implications of this result for evaluating eyewitness reports by tries of fact in legal cases are discussed.