The Privatization of Urban Housing in China and its Contribution to Financial System Development

The privatization of urban housing and the subsequent development of a mortgage market have played a major role in the development of China's financial system. This paper explores the history and development of China's urban housing market, its impact on the financial system, and the government's efforts to grapple with new issues that have surfaced alongside these reforms. This paper concludes that although housing privatization has helped strengthen the financial standing of state-owned enterprises, urban residents, and commercial banks alike, systematic weaknesses must be addressed in order to promote sustainable economic growth.     

Positive “Water Test”—An External Indicator of Base of Skull Hinge‐Ring Fracture

Abstract: Despite having significant internal injuries, victims of motor vehicle accidents may have surprisingly few external manifestations of trauma. The water test describes a technique whereby water placed in an upwardly facing ear results in drainage from the nose and opposite ear, thus demonstrating transcranial passage of water. This sign can be demonstrated in cases of blunt cranial trauma where there is a “hinge” fracture involving the petrous temporal bones bilaterally associated with a ring fracture extending around the foramen magnum posteriorly. Such a fracture results in separation of the posterior and middle cranial fossae providing a track for water to traverse. The water test provides a quick and noninvasive method for demonstrating the presence of a particular type of skull fracture.     

The Initial Changes of Fat Deposits During the Decomposition of Human and Pig Remains

Abstract:  The early stages of adipocere formation in both pig and human adipose tissue in aqueous environments have been investigated. The aims were to determine the short-term changes occurring to fat deposits during decomposition and to ascertain the suitability of pigs as models for human decomposition. Subcutaneous adipose tissue from both species after immersion in distilled water for up to six months was compared using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, gas chromatography-mass spectrometry and inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry. Changes associated with decomposition were observed, but no adipocere was formed during the initial month of decomposition for either tissue type. Early-stage adipocere formation in pig samples during later months was detected. The variable time courses for adipose tissue decomposition were attributed to differences in the distribution of total fatty acids between species. Variations in the amount of sodium, potassium, calcium, and magnesium were also detected between species. The study shows that differences in total fatty acid composition between species need to be considered when interpreting results from experimental decomposition studies using pigs as human body analogs.     

“I Had a Confidence Epiphany!”: Obstacles to Combating Post-Identification Confidence Inflation

Research shows that eyewitnesses often become more confident with their selections from a lineup over time, a problem labeled "confidence inflation." Wells et al. (1998) Law and Human Behavior, 22, 603-647 suggested that eyewitnesses provide a confidence statement immediately following their selection to capture an unadulterated measure of confidence. Three experiments tested the effectiveness of introducing such a statement to combat the effects of confidence inflation on mock-juror judgments. All experiments provided evidence that the attributions participants formed about the eyewitness' confidence inflation differentially impacted their judgments. Although mock-jurors generally discredited eyewitnesses who showed confidence inflation and sometimes lowered probability of guilt ratings for the defendant, a clear exception occurred when mock-jurors attributed the inflation to an epiphany. Use of post-identification confidence statements to decrease the impact of confidence inflation in the courtroom may be insufficient.     

Chimeric governance and the extension of resource regulation

The contemporary securitisation of underdevelopment is based on the myth of mutual vulnerability—the idea that underdevelopment and state failure pose diverse threats both to the developed world and the poor in the developing world. The mutual vulnerability thesis provides the rationale for an attempt to expand the range of both military and regulatory interventions inside the developing world. The promise of these interventions is of a synthesis between security for the developed world and solidarism with the poor. The reality is a form of chimeric governance which purports to protect the rich from a range of imagined threats and which masks an unwillingness to really address the problems of the poor.

One illusion has been shattered on 11 September: that we can have the good life of the West irrespective of the state of the rest of the world…. Once chaos and strife have got a grip on a region or a country trouble will soon be exported. Out of such regions and countries come humanitarian tragedies, centres for trafficking in weapons, drugs and people, havens for criminal organisations, and sanctuaries for terrorists…. The dragon's teeth are planted in the fertile soil of wrongs unrighted, of disputes left to fester for years, of failed states, of poverty and deprivation.1 ?1. Tony Blair, Prime Minister, speech at the Lord Mayor's Banquet 13 Nov. 2001. View all notes