Allele frequencies of nine STR loci--D16S539, D7S820, D13S317, CSF1PO,TPOX, TH01, F13A01, FESFPS and vWA--in the population from Alagoas,northeastern Brazil

The polymorphism of nine STR loci has been studied in a sample of 598 individuals from the population of Alagoas, Northeastern Brazil. Determination of the allele frequencies as well as of several commonly used statistics in forensic and paternity testing were defined. The most polymorphic loci were TH01 and D7S317. The exact test demonstrated that the nine loci analyzed in the population have no deviation from Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium (P > 0.05).     

'Deeds and Words': The Woman's Press and the Politics of Print

The political and constitutional impact of the early twentieth-century British women's suffrage movement has been the subject of extensive research since the advent of second-wave feminism, yet the broader cultural impact of the movement remains a developing scholarly area. Murray examines the role of the Woman's Press, the publishing house established in 1907 as a strategic component of the Pankhursts' influential Women's Social and Political Union. The press is located within multiple and interpenetrative analytical contexts: examined in turn are its role in the various power struggles of the WSPU and the broader British suffrage movement; its significance as an independent means of cultural production around the contested site of the suffragette; and its ambiguity as a feminist publishing house run by male pro-suffragist and lobbyist, Frederick Pethick Lawrence. The Woman's Press and its central London retail outlet figured prominently in WSPU administration as a material concern-as literature packing department, revenue raiser and recruiting centre. Yet, symbolically, the Woman's Press was also integral to the campaigning of the WSPU to an extent that has generally remained under-examined. As an independent publishing house the press constituted a vital conduit guaranteeing the entry of suffrage arguments into public discourse, and a crucial tool for appropriating and refashioning the contested image of the suffragette in the wider politico-cultural landscape of the day. Acknowledging the significance of the Woman's Press provides both a necessary historical context for the post-1970 feminist press boom, as well as a counterpoint to the ongoing political-financial conundrums that beset its modern descendents.     

A Practical Guide for the Formulation of Propositions in the Bayesian Approach to DNA Evidence Interpretation in an Adversarial Environment

The interpretation of complex DNA profiles is facilitated by a Bayesian approach. This approach requires the development of a pair of propositions: one aligned to the prosecution case and one to the defense case. This note explores the issue of proposition setting in an adversarial environment by a series of examples. A set of guidelines generalize how to formulate propositions when there is a single person of interest and when there are multiple individuals of interest. Additional explanations cover how to handle multiple defense propositions, relatives, and the transition from subsource level to activity level propositions. The propositions depend on case information and the allegations of each of the parties. The prosecution proposition is usually known. The authors suggest that a sensible proposition is selected for the defense that is consistent with their stance, if available, and consistent with a realistic defense if their position is not known.     

Screening for mental disorder using the UK national offender assessment system

Probation officers have large caseloads with high levels of psychiatric morbidity but receive minimal training in recognising/managing mental health problems. In the UK, there is no national screening procedure for mental illness among offenders that is considered effective. This study’s aim was to develop a screening system for mental/personality disorders using the Offender Assessment System. Seven screens for mental disorder were developed using items from assessments on 574 prisoners: alcohol misuse, drug dependence, antisocial personality disorder, psychopathy, learning difficulties, psychosis and severe mood disturbance. Internal validation showed that the screens performed well across accuracy estimates. Prevalence of mental disorders identified with the screens in test and validation samples was similar. However, the psychopathy and severe mood disturbance screens may be more effective in screening for true negatives. The screens are an economical method for prioritising mental health needs of the UK prison and probation population using routinely collected data.     

‘Tesco for Terrorists’ Reconsidered: Arms and Conflict Dynamics in Libya and in the Sahara-Sahel Region

How does arms availability affect armed conflict? What implications does increased arms availability have for the organisation of armed groups involved in war against the state? This article explores these questions by looking into the civil war in Libya and the subsequent proliferation of weapons in the broader Sahel/North Africa region. Its argument is based on secondary sources: online databases, international organisations reports and news media. First, we examine the question of firearms in Libya in order to understand how changing conditions of weapons availability affected the formation of armed groups during different phases of war hostilities (February–October 2011). We highlight that, as weapons became more readily available to fighters in the field during this period, a process of fragmentation occurred, hindering efforts to build mechanisms that would allow control of the direction of the revolutionary armed movement. Next, as security continued to be a primary challenge in the new Libya, we consider the way in which unaccountable firearms and light weapons have affected the post-war landscape in the period from October 2011 to the end of 2013. Finally, we put the regional and international dimensions under scrutiny, and consider how the proliferation of weapons to nearby insurgencies and armed groups has raised major concern among Libya’s neighbours. Short of establishing any causal relationship stricto sensu, we underscore the ways in which weapons from Libya have rekindled or altered local conflicts, creating permissive conditions for new tactical options, and accelerating splintering processes within armed movements in the Sahara-Sahel region.     

Enduring Financial Sustainability Through “Bottom-Up” Local Authority Ingenuity and Rational “Top-Down” State Regulation: The Case of Lake Macquarie City Council

For decades Australian policy-makers have relied on the blunt instrument of forced amalgamation to reform local government. However, a host of recent public inquiries has demonstrated that despite compulsory mergers in all states, except WA, financial unsustainability has become more acute. Using the case study of the successful achievement of ongoing financial sustainability by Lake Macquarie City Council in NSW through its resourceful “bottom-up” use of the “top-down” financial parameters set for NSW local government, this paper argues that state governments should concentrate on “process change” by establishing sound “top-down” regulatory frameworks thereby enabling “bottom-up” ingenuity by local authorities rather than “structural change” through compulsory mergers.     

Unequaled Acts of Injustice: Pan‐Indigenous Encounters with Colonial School Systems

This essay reviews a recent film dealing with the forced removal of Australian Aboriginal children from their communities by the Australian government for the best part of 60 years. It uses the review to draw parallels between Australian Aboriginal ‘stolen generations,’ the colonial schooling experienced by the indigenous Maori of New Zealand, the ‘mission school syndrome’ suffered by First Nations people in North America, and the routine punishment for language offenders experienced by the Coorg people from India. Anachronistic as they may seem, such racist policies are not relics of the past but features of modern governance that have only been abandoned relatively recently. In some cases, their ramifications are only just beginning to be felt. Some of the implications for criminology are touched upon. The film is situated in the context of existing video and literary materials dealing with the issue of schooling as a tool for assimilation that readers may find equally informative.     

Health care system change and the cross-border transfer of ideas: influence of the Dutch model on the 2007 German health reform

To increase understanding of the cross-border transfer of ideas through a case study of the 2007 German health reform, this article draws on Kingdon's approach of streams and follows two main objectives: first, to understand the extent to which the German health reform was actually influenced by the Dutch model and, second, in theoretical terms, to inform inductively on how ideas from abroad enter government agendas. The results show that the streams of problem recognition and policy proposals have not been predominantly influenced by the cross-border transfer of ideas from the Netherlands to Germany. The Dutch experience was taken into consideration only after a policy window opened by a shift in politics in the third, the political, stream: the change of government in 2005. In many respects, the way Germany learned from the Netherlands in this case sharply contrasts with an image of solving policy problems by either lesson drawing or transnational deliberation. Instead, the process was dominated by problem solving in the sphere of politics, that is, finding a way to prove the grand coalition was capable of acting.