Belgian and Dutch Young Men and Women Who Joined ISIS: Ethnographic Research among the Families They Left Behind

Since the end of 2012 a sizeable number of Belgian and Dutch young men and women have joined the armed conflict in Syria. According to recent estimates, there are 632 Belgian and 260 Dutch foreign fighters in Syria. Very little is known about the families these men and women come from. The research on which this article is based comprised ethnographic research among 26 families with at least one member who has left for Syria to join the armed struggle. In addition, former teachers of these youngsters were asked to reflect on their students' actions. The central question of this article is whether or not the families of youngsters who left for Syria played a supporting role in the departure decision and, therefore, the process of radicalization of the young men and women. To answer this question the families' perception of the armed struggle is described. Also discussed are signals of radicalization present prior to the youngsters' departure and actions taken by the families to prevent departure or alternatively facilitate their trip.     

Taking the Law to Court: Citizen Suits and the Legislative Process

The institution of citizen suits is a decentralized form of public participation that allows citizens to influence the implementation of public laws in courts. How does this institution influence policymaking? This article proposes a model of citizen suits. It then analyzes how this institution influences legislative decisions. The legislature bargains to choose the budget, distributive spending, and spending on an ideologically contested public good (e.g., health care or environmental protection). I find that citizen suits enable courts to forge a compromise between opponents and proponents of the public good by responding to the diverse claims of citizens. Anticipating the mobilization of citizens in courts, legislators in turn craft more socially efficient bills, with less distributive spending, which better represent the distribution of preferences for the public good compared to when citizens have no role in the implementation of legislation.     

Domestic Violence and the Gendered Law of Self-Defence in France: The Case of Jacqueline Sauvage

Legal responses to battered women who kill have long animated scholarly debate and law reform activity. In September 2012 after 47 years of alleged abuse, Frenchwoman Jacqueline Sauvage fatally shot her abusive husband three times in the back. The subsequent contested trial, conviction for murder, unsuccessful appeal and later presidential pardon of Sauvage thrust the French law of self-defence into the spotlight. The Sauvage case raises important questions surrounding the adequacy of the French criminal law in this area, the ongoing proliferation of gendered stereotypes in law and the need for reform. In the wake of the Sauvage case, this article provides a timely analysis of the gendered law of self-defence in France. Drawing from an in-depth analysis of the judgments imposed in the Sauvage case, this article examines the adequacy of French legal responses to battered women who kill and ignites an argument for further law reform.     

Letter

Tributes for the daughters of earth

Mary Jacobus, First Things: The Maternal Imaginary in Art, Literature and Psychoanalysis, London and New York: Routledge, 1995, £14.99.

Adeline Virginia Stephen . . .

Hermione Lee, Virginia Woolf, London: Chatto and Windus 1996, £20, £8.99 (pbk.).

Virginia Woolf: not so common destinations

Rachel Bowlby, Feminist Destinations and Further Essays on Virginia Woolf, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1997, £16.95 pbk.

Gillian Beer, Virginia Woolf: The Common Ground, Essays by Gillian Beer, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1996, £14.95 pbk.

Running on empty?

Parveen Adams, The Emptiness of the Image: Psychoanalysis and Sexual Differences, London and New York: Routledge, 1996, £37.50, £11.99 pbk.

Refusing to ‘Pass‘

Lola Young, Fear of the Dark ‘Race’, Gender and Sexuality in the Cinema, London: Routledge, 1995, £40, £13.99 pbk.     

Examination of heterogeneous crossing sequences between toner and rollerball pen strokes by digital microscopy and 3-D laser profilometry

The determination of line crossing sequences between rollerball pens and laser printers presents difficulties that may not be overcome using traditional techniques. This research aimed to study the potential of digital microscopy and 3-D laser profilometry to determine line crossing sequences between a toner and an aqueous ink line. Different paper types, rollerball pens, and writing pressure were tested. Correct opinions of the sequence were given for all case scenarios, using both techniques. When the toner was printed before the ink, a light reflection was observed in all crossing specimens, while this was never observed in the other sequence types. The 3-D laser profilometry, more time-consuming, presented the main advantage of providing quantitative results. The findings confirm the potential of the 3-D laser profilometry and demonstrate the efficiency of digital microscopy as a new technique for determining the sequence of line crossings involving rollerball pen ink and toner.     

On the margins of soy farms: traditional populations and selective environmental policies in the Brazilian Cerrado

In the Cerrado, the expansion of soybean cultivation since the 1990s has coincided with the strengthening of environmental regulations. We analyze how the two main environmental policies – Protected Areas and the Forest Code – have played out at the ground level in western Bahia state. These policies in Cerrado have not been designed to curb the expansion of this agricultural frontier. These norms have, on the contrary, accommodated this expansion because the way environmental managers selectively choose environmental problems and publicize them through specific information systems depreciates traditional fire-dependent production systems. These ‘politics of selection’ are likely to increase competition for resources in the margins of soybean agriculture, which is where traditional populations have now become confined.     

Australians in Shanghai: Race,Rights and Nation in Treaty Port China

Australians in Shanghai: Race, Rights and Nation in Treaty Port China . By Sophie Loy‐Wilson (London: Routledge, 2017), pp.164. £110.00 (hb).     

Elimination rates of breath alcohol

Legal driving limits are set coequally with 0.5 g/L blood alcohol concentration (BAC) or 0.25 mg/L breath alcohol concentration (BrAC) in Austria as well as in other European countries. As mostly some time elapses between BrAC measurement and driving offence, a back calculation of alcohol concentrations is often required. The calculation of hourly BrAC elimination rates can thereby help to avoid unnecessary variances. A study with 59 participants was performed under social conditions. BrAC was determined with the legally accredited Alcotest 7110 MK III A every 30 min, and concomitantly venous blood samples were drawn. Five hundred and four BrAC/BAC value pairs were evaluated. The overall mean peak BrAC was calculated with 0.456 mg/L (±0.119 mg/L standard deviation). The mean hourly BrAC elimination rate was overall determined with 0.082 mg/L per h (0.050–0.114, 95% range). Mean rate of females (0.087 mg/L h⁻¹) and the according 95% limits were statistically significantly higher than of males (mean rate 0.078 mg/L h⁻¹, p < 0.04). Our results confirm the possibility to implement hourly BrAC elimination rates, provided that adequate statistical ranges and basic forensic scientific rules that have been set up for alcohol back calculations are observed.     

Presidential rhetoric on cybercrime: links to terrorism?

Abstract

Presidents often give speeches about crime issues as a way to convince the public that there are significant problems for which an easy solution can be found. Studies have shown that presidential rhetoric on crime not only influences the public’s perception of the problem, but also the perception of the best solution. More recent research has demonstrated that presidents sometimes draw on the public’s fear of crime as a way to further affect the public’s perception of crime. In other words, presidents link crime with the public’s anxiety about other fearful events as a way to further impact the public’s perception of a problem (and thus further their agenda). This study examines presidential rhetoric on cybercrime to determine if executives link cybercrime with other issues such as national security. The findings provide credibility to both Cavelty’s threat frames approach as well as assertions made regarding the politics of fear.