A Paradox in the Making: Detecting Something Positive in UPA Under the Ten Kate Effect

Abstract:  The European Court of Justice has persisted in adopting an unduly restrictive interpretation of Article 230(4) EC and that persistence has reached its apogee in the UPA decision, while at the same time it was mirrored in the relevant provisions of the draft Constitution. Therefore, it is surprising to see that in the aftermath of UPA , there can be something positive that can be explored further and that can be tested in order to establish whether any indirect, alas limited, liberalisation of the standing criteria is possible. The Ten Kate case established that, in principle, a Member State could be under an obligation under domestic law to challenge the validity of Community legislation. If the state, in all of its different manifestations, fails to challenge the validity of a Community measure when such an obligation arises under municipal law, then the citizen could be in a position to claim compensation. Therefore, the case introduces the doctrine of state liability and the agency analogy (with the state representing the individual or as parens patriae) as connected paths trying to circumvent the standing restrictions. The advantage is that the proceedings would take place under national law and would be detached from the Plaumann conditions. It is proposed that constitutionally entrenched human rights, like effective judicial protection, combined with the principle of legitimate expectation, could create the legal basis for an obligation of the state under national law to challenge the validity of Community norms. The paradox is that effective judicial protection was the exact argument that the European Court of Justice sidelined in UPA .     

Quantitative structure–activity relationship (QSAR) methodology in forensic toxicology: Modeling postmortem redistribution of structurally diverse drugs using multivariate statistics

Postmortem redistribution (PMR) constitutes a multifaceted process, which renders the analytical results of drug concentrations inaccurate to be interpreted by forensic toxicologists. The aim of the present study was to evaluate whether quantitative structure–activity relationship (QSAR) methodology could serve as an effective tool to estimate the ability of drugs to redistribute across tissue barriers during postmortem period on the basis of their molecular, physicochemical and structural properties. In this aspect, multivariate data analysis (MVDA) was applied to a set of 77 structurally diverse drugs. PMR data expressed by the central:peripheral concentration ratio (C:P ratio) was taken from the literature. An adequate and robust QSAR model (R² = 0.65, Q² = 0.56, RMSEE = 0.34) was established for 59 (77%) out of 77 drugs. Although the derived QSAR model presented limited applicability, it provided an informative illustration of the contributing molecular, physicochemical and structural properties in PMR process. Drugs with strong basic properties and enhanced molecular size, flexibility, lipophilicity and number of halogens were found to be susceptible to increased PMR. Due to the high complexity of PMR process, further QSAR studies need to focus on structurally related drugs to develop more specific models, which could serve as alternative tools to evaluate PMR for different chemical classes.     

Field Experiments Testing the Impact of Radio Advertisements on Electoral Competition

Results from previous studies of campaign spending imply that equal-sized grants to both incumbents and challengers are a net benefit to challengers, who on average spend less money and derive greater marginal returns from each additional dollar. This study provides an experimental test of this proposition. Cities holding mayoral elections in November 2005 and 2006 were randomly assigned to broadcast nonpartisan radio ads that stated the names of the mayoral candidates, reminded listeners about the date of the upcoming election, and encouraged them to vote. Consistent with the findings of previous studies on the differential effects of incumbent and challenger campaign spending on election outcomes, we find that these radio ads produced substantially more competitive elections. The borderline statistical significance of our results, however, invites replication of this experiment.     

Identity,Recognition, Rights or What Can Hegel Teach Us About Human Rights?

Rights play a crucial role in shaping identity by organizing the recognition of self by others and by legal and social institutions. For Hegel, legal rights lead to an abstract type of recognition based on the universality of the law. The concreteness of the person, alongside the respect bestowed by legal recognition, calls for the acknowledgment of honour and esteem. Human rights move in this direction, by validating both the similarity of claimants with abstract humanity and their difference and uniqueness. But law's necessary generality cannot meet the demands for the full recognition of the postmodern self with its polymorphous desires and its complex struggles for recognition as a unique individual.     

The Enduring Effects of Social Pressure: Tracking Campaign Experiments Over a Series of Elections

Recent field experiments have demonstrated the powerful effect of social pressure messages on voter turnout. This research note considers the question of whether these interventions’ effects persist over a series of subsequent elections. Tracking more than one million voters from six experimental studies, we find strong and statistically significant enduring effects one and sometimes two years after the initial communication.