The Network of Law Reviews: Citation Cartels,Scientific Communities,and Journal Rankings

Research evaluation is increasingly influenced by quantitative data. We focus on the influential Web of Science Journal Citation Reports (JCR) ranking of law journals and critically assess its methodology. In particular, we consider the existence and impact of a tacit citation cartel between US law reviews. A study of 45 US student‐edited (SE) and 45 peer‐reviewed (PR) journals included in the category of Law in the JCR revealed that PR and SE journals are more inclined to cite members of their own class and that this phenomenon is more pronounced in SE generalist journals, reflecting tacit cartelistic behavior generated by deeply entrenched institutional practices. Because US SE journals produce more citations than PR journals, the fact that their citations are directed almost exclusively to SE journals elevates their scores and distorts the journals' ranking and can consequently undermine the flow and creation of ideas. We discuss policy measures that can counter the adverse effects of this situation.     

Digital technology uses for sustainable management of natural resources in multicultural contexts

This article questions the notion that the use of digital technologies guarantees better policy development for the sustainable management of natural resources, particularly in multicultural contexts. It is argued that input of digital technologies could positively or negatively affect the geopolitical projects and development strategies pursued by indigenous peoples.     

Return of the fetish: a plea for a new materialism

This essay argues for a renewed form of critique based upon a non-deflationary realist and materialist understanding of the nature of objects. Such an understanding is set against the deflationary conception of materiality common nowadays, one that sees ‘signs’ in the place of powerful objects (exemplars, charms, fetishes), adjudicates against the latter as mere relics of the past and can only conceive of material relations and causality in representational terms, as co-relative to our self-positing powers. Such a conception is responsible for our present inability to think the role of radical claims, thick attachments and religious objects in modern secular societies. The argument is developed from within a phenomenological tradition that includes Hegelo-Marxian themes and connects them with more and less recent insights from anthropology and elsewhere concerning value and objectification in modern times.

Secondary Traumatic Stress and Burnout among Law Enforcement Investigators Exposed to Disturbing Media Images

This study examines the psychological impact of viewing disturbing media on investigators engaged in computer forensics work. Twenty-eight federal law enforcement personnel who investigate Internet child pornography cases completed measures of secondary traumatic stress disorder (STSD) and burnout. Substantial percentages of investigators reported poor psychological well-being. Greater exposure to disturbing media was related to higher levels of STSD and cynicism. STSD and burnout scores were related to increased protectiveness of family, reliance on co-workers, general distrust, and turnover intentions. On a positive note, investigators scored high in professional efficacy, indicating they feel their work makes a difference. Furthermore, personnel with supportive relationships scored lower on both STSD and burnout.     

A Two‐Year Study of Δ 9 Tetrahydrocannabinol Concentrations in Drivers; Part 2: Physiological Signs on Drug Recognition Expert (DRE) and non‐DRE Examinations,,

Whole blood samples were examined for ?⁹‐Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) over 2 years in drivers suspected of driving under the influence. Part one of the study examined the link between [THC] and performance on field sobriety tests. This portion examined objective signs, eye examinations and physiological indicators; and their relationship to the presence of THC. Several objective signs were excellent indicators of the presence of THC: red eyes (94%), droopy eyelids (85.6%), affected speech (87.6%), tongue coating (96.2%), and odor of marijuana (82.4%). About 63.6% of THC positive subjects had dialted pupils (room light). THC positive subjects had either rebound dilation or hippus in 88.8% of cases. Pulse and blood pressure (BP) were evaluated to determine any correlation with [THC]. An increased pulse rate correlated well to the presence of THC (88.5%), but not [THC]. BP did not correlate to [THC] and was also a poor indicator of THC in the blood (50% high).     

The meta-discourse of contemporary brands and the indexing of consumption: a way to build bonds of meaning

There is an important volume of reflections on the theoretical and methodological proximity of semiotics and brand. I emphasize the texts of Lencastre and Corte-Real on brand myopia, Perez on brand expression and the proposition of a brand analysis model based on TGS de Peirce, and Mick with his studies of branding, marketing, and advertising, among others. However, the constitutive tension of the sign-brand, in its complexity as a media phenomenon determined by the sign object, pulsates in harmony with the emotional, associative, and cognitive relations it is able to generate in the interpreting minds. Brand as a complex sign, detached from the shackles of marketing management, grows toward the performing hybridism of digital technologies and arts, finding its interpreters – open-minded, active, and desirous of constant negotiations of meaning – in countless semioses. The purpose of the present article is to show that the sign strength of contemporary brands lies in their ability to index consumption based on advertising metadiscourse that reveals its audiences' social values and the objectual power by which it is determined. To this end, the study integrated knowledge of the semiotic analysis of the expressions of twenty international brands in the fashion, food, and technology industries, and the systematization and analysis of their value offers.     

Policing Australia’s ‘heroin drought’: using an agent-based model to simulate alternative outcomes

Our paper examines how street-level drug markets adapt to a macro-level disruption to the supply of heroin, under three experimental conditions of street-level drug law enforcement: random patrol, hot-spot policing and problem-orientated policing. We utilize an agent-based model to explore the relative impact of abstractions of these three law enforcement strategies after simulating an ‘external shock’ to the supply of heroin to the street-level drug market. We use 3 years of data, which include the period of the ‘heroin drought’ in Melbourne (Australia) that commenced in late 2000 and early 2001, to measure changes in a selected range of crime and harm indicators under the three policing conditions. Our results show that macro-level disruptions to drug supply have a limited impact on street-level market dynamics when there is a ready replacement drug. By contrast, street-level police interventions are shown to vary in their capacity to alter drug market dynamics. Importantly, our laboratory abstraction of problem-orientated policing is shown to be the optimal strategy to disrupt street-level injecting-drug markets, reduce crimes and minimize harm, regardless of the type of drug being supplied to the market.

Paradise Lost...: The Meaning of Modernity and the Antinomy of the Law

This essay argues for the centrality of the study of paradoxes of particularity and universality in the interface between law and politics in modernity. Particularly, in order to understand the process of constitution of a political collective and the role of supernumerary elements that re-enter a constituted legal-political system. After introducing the question of paradoxes or antinomies in the relation between law and politics in modernity, the essay engages with current understandings of exceptionalism and the possibility of a leftist or ‘real’ suspension of the law. In order to do so, this essay makes full use of certain theoretical tools developed in anthropological accounts of political and legal processes, and current French-oriented and Latin American political philosophy.