Consensus,Difference and Sexuality: Que(e)rying the European Court of Human Rights’ Concept of‘ European Consensus’

Law and Critique - This paper provides a queer critique of the European Court of Human Rights’ use of ‘European consensus’ as a method of interpretation in cases concerning...     

High-Risk Cases at the Intersection of Domestic/Family Violence and Child Protection: Learning from Practice

Journal of Family Violence - Domestic/family violence (DFV) and child protection co-occurrence of risk is common, with related homicides remaining a grave public concern. Recognising and...     

In Search of a Non-Eurocentric Understanding of Modernization: Turkey as a Case of ‘Multiple Modernities’

This article uses the Turkish case of modernity to critically examine different understandings of modernization put forward by competing schools of thought, namely the ‘classical modernization theory’, the ‘neo-modernization theory’ and the ‘multiple modernities paradigm’. In the context of modernization studies, Turkey has long held a special place as numerous scholars have studied this country in an attempt to validate the ‘convergence thesis’ – namely the idea that once a non-western society launches a secularization and/or an industrialization programme, its political regime and socio-economic life would eventually resemble its western counterparts. Firstly, the three theories are comparatively analysed by discussing how they perceive the concept of modernity and its interaction with religion, economic development and democratization. Then, the theories are reviewed in light of the Turkish experience. It is argued that the Turkish modernity can be best comprehended through the lens of the multiple modernities paradigm that challenges the Eurocentric assumption of classical modernization and neo-modernization theories based on the convergence thesis.     

First Things First: R2P Starts with Direct Negotiations

Abstract

Public debates on R2P one-sidedly focus on its forcible aspects. They should, however, also focus on R2P’s non-coercive aspects, which include the legal obligations to cooperate and to pursue peaceful conflict resolution, notably the obligation to undertake meaningful attempts at negotiation before coercive means are taken into consideration. After the Arab Spring erupted in Libya and Syria, other countries did not exhaust reasonable efforts to deal and negotiate with the incumbent powers, and to assist and encourage them to meet their obligations under R2P, even though negotiations are part and parcel of the R2P framework and constitute the very first step to be taken whenever a state seems to ignore its obligations under that framework.     

The Philippines Discovers its Maritime Domain: The Aquino Administration’s Shift in Strategic Focus from Internal to Maritime Security

With China’s naval expansion in the South China Sea, the Philippine government has eased up its counter-insurgency/counter-terrorism campaign and has vigorously pursued instead the modernization of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) particularly in developing the deterrence capability of the Philippine Navy (PN). However, slow-paced and hampered by scant resources, the naval build-up will hardly deter China’s encroachment on the Philippine maritime territory. Faced with this predicament, the Philippines has resorted to forging new security partnerships with the United States and Japan, two major naval powers in East Asia. The paper concludes that maritime security will remain the Philippines’ priority concern way into the third decade of the 21st century.     

Endogenous knowledge and the development question in Africa*

An apt analogy for speaking to Africa's experience with development is offered by the twinning of colonialism and modernization. While colonialism left behind some forms of hybridity and mimicry, the urge to decolonize—to be free from the colonizer's control in every possible way—was integral to all anti-colonial criticism after the Second World War. The politics of decolonization followed by the new states in the mid twentieth century, however, displayed an uncritical emphasis on modernization, in which development, pursued—with technology and tools of scientific progress—was a catching-up exercise with the West. As an epistemological export from the West, taking the form of science as hegemony and ideology within colonial discourse, this has not delivered material progress for Africa. The widespread concern about the intractability and magnitude of the problems facing the continent has made development a popular theme in the literature on African studies. The disappointment across various academic circles and the popular press over the dwindling prospects of development in Africa—illustrated in its food insecurity, low life expectancy and the familiar litany of its ills—has made revisiting the debates on African development both compelling and timely. Much has consequently been written on what development is or should be about in Africa. This article underlines the centrality of endogenous knowledge as the material precondition for autonomous development for Africa.     

Reliability of Craniofacial Superimposition Using Three‐Dimension Skull Model

Craniofacial superimposition is a technique potentially useful for the identification of unidentified human remains if a photo of the missing person is available. We have tested the reliability of the 2D‐3D computer‐aided nonautomatic superimposition techniques. Three‐dimension laser scans of five skulls and ten photographs were overlaid with an imaging software. The resulting superimpositions were evaluated using three methods: craniofacial landmarks, morphological features, and a combination of the two. A 3D model of each skull without its mandible was tested for superimposition; we also evaluated whether separating skulls by sex would increase correct identifications. Results show that the landmark method employing the entire skull is the more reliable one (5/5 correct identifications, 40% false positives [FP]), regardless of sex. However, the persistence of a high percentage of FP in all the methods evaluated indicates that these methods are unreliable for positive identification although the landmark‐only method could be useful for exclusion.     

Developing a new scoring method to evaluate human decomposition in a humid,continental (Dfb) climate in Quebec

The published literature shows a lack of methods to evaluate the patterns and extent of decomposition of human remains and to estimate the post-mortem interval (PMI) in humid, continental (Dfb) climates such as Quebec. The aim of this study was to address this gap in the current knowledge base by providing the first observations from human corpses studied under controlled conditions in Quebec. A 12-month study was conducted at the site for Research in Experimental and Social Thanatology; the first human taphonomy facility in Canada. Six human donors with known time of death were deposited across spring (n = 1), summer (n = 3), and autumn (n = 2) 2021. The lack of suitability of the total body score method to evaluate the extent of decomposition at the facility prompted the development of a new scoring system based on the macromorphoscopic changes observed. The scoring system was applied to the donors to evaluate decomposition throughout seasons. All donors followed comparable decomposition trajectories, regardless of the season of deposition. Eighty-five percent of taphonomic patterns appeared in the first 25 experimental days or 5000 Kelvin accumulated degree days (350 ADD). Extensive desiccation of tissues was observed at a median of 21 experimental days across donors, resulting in a plateau within decomposition with no extensive skeletonization. To the authors' knowledge, this is the first published report of experimentally observed desiccation in such a form in a Dfb climate. This study provides new data on the types of decomposition patterns to expect in forensic investigations in southern Quebec and comparable climates.     

Using FastID to analyze complex SNP mixtures from indoor dust

Forensically relevant single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) can provide valuable supplemental information to short tandem repeats (STRs) for investigative leads, and genotyping can now be streamlined using massively parallel sequencing (MPS). Dust is an attractive evidence source, as it accumulates on undisturbed surfaces, often is overlooked by perpetrators, and contains sufficient human DNA for analysis. To assess whether SNPs genotyped from indoor dust using MPS could be used to detect known household occupants, 13 households were recruited and provided buccal samples from each occupant and dust from five predefined indoor locations. Thermo Fisher Scientific Precision ID Identity and Ancestry Panels were utilized for SNP genotyping, and sequencing was completed using Illumina^® chemistry. FastID, a software developed to permit mixture analysis and identity searching, was used to assess whether known occupants could be detected from associated household dust samples. A modified “subtraction” method was also used in FastID to estimate the percentage of alleles in each dust sample contributed by known and unknown occupants. On average, 72% of autosomal SNPs were recovered from dust samples. When using FastID, (a) 93% of known occupants were detected in at least one indoor dust sample and could not be excluded as contributors to the mixture, and (b) non-contributor alleles were detected in 54% of dust samples (29 ± 11 alleles per dust sample). Overall, this study highlights the potential of analyzing human DNA present in indoor dust to detect known household occupants, which could be valuable for investigative leads.     

The impact of lipid degradation on fingerprint quality on fired firearm cartridges

The recovery of identifiable fingerprints from fired cartridge cases is challenging. Therefore, the characterization of chemical modifications and their effects on fingerprint integrity post-firing is essential. In this study, the primary fingerprint lipids, including myristic acid, pentadecanoic acid, palmitoleic acid, palmitic acid, stearic acid, squalene, and cholesterol in fired and unfired cartridges, were extracted with acetonitrile, followed by derivatization using N,O-Bis(trimethylsilyl)trifluoroacetamide with 1% trimethylchlorosilane (BSTFA/1%TMCS). Squalane was used as the internal standard, and all quantifications were performed using gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry using a triple-quadrupole mass filter. All lipids identified in the unfired cartridges were also detected in the fired cartridges, and statistical analysis using Student's t-test and F tests was performed with a 95% confidence level. The concentration of lipids in the unfired cartridges was found to be similar to that detected in the fired cartridges, except for squalene, the recovery of which was 28% lower in the fired cartridges.