Virtuous Interactions in Removing Exclusion: The Link between Foreign Market Access and Access to Education

We outline a methodology which aims to give an answer to the widespread demand of impact analyses by regulators or by funding agencies which need to evaluate the current and past performance of development projects and may lack time series evidence. We devise a retrospective panel data approach to evaluate the dynamics of the effects of fair trade affiliation on the schooling decisions of a sample of Thai organic rice producers across the past 20 years. We find that the probability of school enrolment in families with more than two children is significantly affected by fair trade affiliation years. We try to ascertain whether our finding is robust to endogeneity of producers' choices of local cooperative affiliation and adoption of organic techniques. The significant difference between pre- and post-fair trade affiliation performance documents that fair trade participation generates a significant break in the schooling decisions of affiliated households.     

From a cosmopolitan to a fascist land: Adriatic irredentism in motion

This article explores Adriatic irredentism, a complex political, cultural, and social movement, by specifically analyzing the unique role it played in the legitimization of Italian territorial claims over “language frontiers” such as Trieste and its hinterland. Through a close reading of first-hand sources, it examines how Italian irredentist intellectuals, public press, and associations purposefully utilized anti-Slav and anti-German arguments to shape public perception of both the Italian nation as well as Trieste’s Italian identity or “Italianità.” Although recent historiographical interpretations have emphasized continuities in local understandings of “Italianità,” this article examines the discontinuities in the debate over its identity. It suggests that although Italian identity was first conceived as an expression of cultural and linguistic autonomy within the broader intellectual framework of Adriatic multi-nationalism, this idea gradually vanished amidst the structural crisis triggered by the Ausgleich or Compromise of 1867 and then inexorably faded on the eve of the Great War. Thus, notions of Italian national identity took an exclusionary and sometimes xenophobic meaning that was publicly used by a wide set of political actors to justify the territorial reincorporation of the “unredeemed” land within the borders of the new Italian state. The fascist regime, especially, utilized Italianness to further its aggressive and chauvinist agenda toward the Adriatic borderland. Consequently, Italian language and culture became instruments as well as symbols of repression and imperialism that were used to fulfill the regime’s ambitions of “fascistization” of the Slavic population living in the region.     

The evolution of nationhood in twentieth century Europe: lessons from the Northern Adriatic borderlands

This article is a short introduction for a special edition on Italian nationhood. The articles that comprise the special edition are the following: From a cosmopolitan to a fascist land: Adriatic irredentism in motion; Erecting fascism: nation, identity, and space in Trieste in the first half of the twentieth century; Building Italianità in northern Adriatic: The case of population from Pola.     

Savoring semiotics: food in intercultural communication

Food is both a relevant source of signification and an effective form of communication, based on a limited – although very wide – variety of edible substances, practices, beliefs, and norms that form a network of interconnected systems. These systems and their uses in social practice, constituting a specific semiosphere, are challenged when their users travel and are confronted with unfamiliar foodways in terms of ingredients, cooking techniques, flavorings, preparations, utensils, meal structure, table manners, distribution of the meals during the day, and social dynamics. When different culinary semiospheres interact, food-related experiences reveal the cultural character of gastronomic competences, forcing individuals to engage with otherness through embodied communication.     

Electoral Institutions and Distributive Policies in Parliamentary Systems: An Application to State Aid Measures in EU Countries

Electoral institutions should systematically affect the propensity of a country to rely and spend on distributive measures. Supporting evidence is however still rare because of the difficulty in finding comparable cross-national data, the employment of dummy variables to account for the electoral systems, and the failure to recognise the interacting effects of different electoral rules on policy outcomes. Employing national data on state aid expenditure and a number of measures across European Union countries, the article provides evidence that legislators elected in higher magnitude districts spend less. More interestingly, it shows the interlocking policy effects of electoral institutions. Where high district magnitude is combined with ballot control, party-based voting and pooling, these rules conjunctly dampen politicians’ incentives to cultivate a personal vote and lead to lower spending on, and use of, distributive measures. Where high district magnitude is not combined with these rules, results are inconclusive. With one exception though, if leaders do not have control over the ballot rank, higher magnitude increases reliance on distributive measures. Results are robust to several alternative political-economy explanations of fiscal policy outcomes.     

Suicidal or Homicidal Sharp Force Injuries? A Review and Critical Analysis of the Heterogeneity in the Forensic Literature

The differential diagnosis between self-inflicted and nonself-inflicted, suicidal and homicidal, injuries is difficult or impossible in many cases and, above all, cannot be made on the basis of information obtained solely from the autopsy or the medicolegal clinical examination. The purpose of this study is to analyze the literature on suicidal and homicidal sharp force injuries and identify the relevant parameters that may help differentiate between suicidal and homicidal deaths. To achieve this goal, a review of 595 potentially relevant articles was performed. After excluding the nonrelevant papers by screening the titles, all abstracts were reviewed, and articles meeting the inclusion criteria underwent a full-text review. The following parameters were compiled into a table: number of cases, localization of the injuries, and number of injuries. The data were statistically analyzed and compared with those available in the forensic literature. On the basis of the heterogeneity of data revealed by the present review, a simple and short checklist of the parameters that should be included when reporting suicides and homicides by sharp force has been proposed.     

Subarachnoid hemorrhage during sexual activity after sildenafil intake: an accidental association?

We report and describe an autopsy case of a man dead for rupture of cerebral artery aneurysm with subsequent subarachnoid hemorrhage after sexual intercourse. Toxicologic analysis demonstrated that he had consumed sildenafil (Viagra). Although subarachnoid hemorrhage has been reported to be associated with sexual intercourse, it is not among the known adverse effects of sildenafil. However, sildenafil has been found to interact with vascular physiology via multiple mechanisms and in most of the vascular districts of the human body. This case provides an example of a very rare association between this drug and a fatal pathologic event and deserves to be added to the existing clinical knowledge about sildenafil and the pathophysiology of the events involved. This knowledge may be helpful in orienting further investigation into the mechanisms of action of sildenafil and their clinical implications.     

Nanotechnology for forensic sciences: Analysis of PDMS replica of the case head of spent cartridges by optical microscopy, SEM and AFM for the ballistic identification of individual characteristic features of firearms

A novel application of replica molding to a forensic problem, viz. the accurate reproduction of the case head of gun and rifle cartridges, prior and after been shot, is presented. The fabrication of an arbitrary number of identical copies of the region hit by the firing pin and by the breech face is described. The replicas can be (i) handled without damaging the original evidence, (ii) distributed to different law enforcement agencies for comparison against other evidences found on crime scenes or ballistic tests of seized firearms, (iii) maintained on a file by the laboratories. A detailed analysis of the morphological features of the replicas has been carried out by standard microscopy techniques as well as by advanced microscopy such as scanning probe and scanning electron leading to a quantitative morphological characterization of the case heads down to the nanometer scale. The assignment of the cartridge replicas to the shooting weapon is demonstrated to hold below the micron scale, while it is hindered at the nanometer level both by the manufacturing differences and by eventual modifications occurring on the firing pin.     

Homicide by methane gas

Two cases of sudden death due to myocardial infarction which were associated external injuries on the chest are discussed here. Injuries were in the form of abraded contusions on the anterior part of chest. Both the cases were declared dead on arrival to the casualty section (Accident and Emergencies Department). In these cases, mention of injuries was not made in the inquest report. In both the cases, suspicion of foul play or the trauma induced myocardial infarction were ruled out by inquiring into the incidents by the autopsy surgeon. The cases highlight the importance of detailed history by the autopsy surgeon in cases of sudden death with associated injuries on the front of the chest.