Repression of the Human Right to Personal Integrity Revisited: A Global Cross-National Study Covering the Years 1976–1993

Here we seek to build on our earlier research (Poe and Tate, 1994) by re-testing similar models on a data set covering a much longer time span; the period from 1976 to 1993. Several of our findings differ from those of our earlier work. Here we find statistical evidence that military regimes lead to somewhat greater human rights abuse, defined in terms of violations of personal integrity, once democracy and a host of other factors are controlled. Further, we find that countries that have experienced British colonial influence tend to have relatively fewer abuses of personal integrity rights than others. Finally, our results suggest that leftist countries are actually less repressive of these basic human rights than non-leftist countries. Consistent with the Poe and Tate (1994) study, however, we find that past levels of repression, democracy, population size, economic development, and international and civil wars exercise statistically significant and substantively important impacts on personal integrity abuse.     

The Relationship between Ombudsman, Government, and Citizens: A Survey Analysis

Since the 1960s, ombudsmanship has become increasingly popular. Although there is a great deal of literature on ombudsmen, existing research rarely focuses on the people who actually use the ombudsman's services. This article examines those who seek the help of ombudsmen in Belgium, and asks whether ombudsmen's intervention has a noticeable effect on citizens' confidence in government and public administration. Based on three surveys of 626 complainants, our analysis suggests that we should not see the ombudsman in Belgium as merely an instrument to help citizens but that they can also function as "change agents" and provide early warnings of problems in public administration. The role of ombudsmen in directly strengthening trust in government is limited at best. Furthermore, it seems that the profile of ombudsman complainants is skewed; our findings indicate that the socially disadvantaged are less likely to use the institution.     

Hormone Therapy, Dilemmas, Medical Decisions

The decision for women to go on hormone therapy (HT) remains controversial. An historical oscillation of beliefs exists related in part to expectations of the medicinal value of HT over longer-term use beyond the initial peri-menonpausal period. Studies thought to resolve issues surrounding the efficacy of HT were perhaps overstated as confusion still permeates the decision making with regard to HT. Overzealous advertising and exaggerated understanding of the results (negative or positive) undermine patient and physician decision making. There remains no magic bullet with regard to HT. What remains is still the possibility of HT longer-term efficacy on diverse end organ systems with pockets of clinical and scientific ambiguity while working to engender reasonable expectations.     

Editorial

When we wrote our 2008 editorial, Britain was in a period ofpolitical flux, namely the wavering popularity of Gordon Brown,the newly installed Prime Minister. Inspired by Brown's dramaticfall from grace during the autumn of 2007, we reflected on thefraught relationship between politicians and the media, onefrom which the former rarely comes out well. As this first issueof 2009 goes to press, the Western world is in the tighteninggrip of a profound economic crisis, one that threatens to developinto a slump on a scale unprecedented since the 1930s. This,at least, is how journalists on both sides of the Atlantic areexcitedly reporting the ‘credit crunch’ and itsaftermath. Most who seek to explain this crisis cite as its root the irresponsible     

Science and the Death Penalty: DNA, Innocence, and the Debate over Capital Punishment in the United States

The death penalty debate in the United States has recently undergone a fundamental shift. The possibility of executing the innocent has emerged as some abolitionists' most salient argument, displacing debates over such issues as fairness, deterrence, and cost. Innocence has managed to move to the fore of the debate in part because of the success of death penalty opponents in attaching epistemological certainty to one particular category of postconviction exonerations, those vouched for by the authority of DNA evidence. We suggest that such moves are primarily rhetorical because, while DNA evidence may be more accurate and reliable than other forensic science, it still fundamentally probabilistic in nature and is prone to uncertainties at all stages of its production. Yet, because of the certainty attached to DNA evidence in public discourse, it can be used as a lever with which to challenge law's claims to truth-making authority, and to undermine public trust in the death penalty. A few abolitionists and other scholars have expressed misgivings about the abolitionist embrace of the innocence argument. We push this concern further, suggesting that both abolitionists and death penalty reformers, who seek to promote a "scientific" death penalty centered on DNA evidence, draw upon a mythologized notion of "science" as a producer of epistemic certainty.