Suicidal or Homicidal Sharp Force Injuries? A Review and Critical Analysis of the Heterogeneity in the Forensic Literature

The differential diagnosis between self-inflicted and nonself-inflicted, suicidal and homicidal, injuries is difficult or impossible in many cases and, above all, cannot be made on the basis of information obtained solely from the autopsy or the medicolegal clinical examination. The purpose of this study is to analyze the literature on suicidal and homicidal sharp force injuries and identify the relevant parameters that may help differentiate between suicidal and homicidal deaths. To achieve this goal, a review of 595 potentially relevant articles was performed. After excluding the nonrelevant papers by screening the titles, all abstracts were reviewed, and articles meeting the inclusion criteria underwent a full-text review. The following parameters were compiled into a table: number of cases, localization of the injuries, and number of injuries. The data were statistically analyzed and compared with those available in the forensic literature. On the basis of the heterogeneity of data revealed by the present review, a simple and short checklist of the parameters that should be included when reporting suicides and homicides by sharp force has been proposed.     

The Mafiya and the New Russia

The rise of the Russian mafiya , a distinctive form of organised crime, reflects more than just the temporary dislocations and uncertainties of the country's transition from a Soviet state to a free market democracy. Rooted in Russian tradition and Soviet practice, it is also a formidable obstacle to this evolution. This has serious implications for the new Russian polity: weakening central authority, diluting the state's monopoly of coercion, discrediting the market economy and ultimately usurping and distorting the very functions of the state. Any solution will have to come not from tougher policing (which itself would threaten a return to authoritarianism) but from a wider political and cultural response.     

On proportional non-representation

This paper contends the main virtue conventionally attributed to proportional electoral rules (i.e., effective representation of political views). It discusses a number of shortcomings that lead too much proportionality to a self-defeat: it reduces vote mobility through the strong cultivation of voters' loyalties; it smooths out vote variations when transforming them into seat variations; it reinforces intraparty ties to the detriment of vertical attention to constituents and it impinges on the working of checks-and-balances. The paper does not aim at a systematic evaluation of the properties of various voting systems, nor is it the proportional principle as such that is under attack. However, its combination with other institutional features can entrap voters in their own choices, thus nurturing political collusion. It is because of the ensuing lower influence of the voters on political decision-making that too much proportionality can lead to poor representation.     

Reviews

William A. Clark, Crime and Punishment in Soviet Officialdom. Combating Corruption in the Political Elite, 1965–1990. London: M. E. Sharpe, 1993, xi + 242 pp., $49.95 h/b, $16.50 p/b

Leslie Holmes, The End of Communist Power. Anti‐Corruption Campaigns and Legitimation Crisis. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1993, xx + 358 pp., £45.00 h/b, £13.95 p/b.

Rachel Walker, Six Years that Shook the World: Perestroika—the Impossible Project. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1993, viii + 312 pp., £35.00 h/b, £9.99 p/b.

Stephen R. Graubard (ed.), Exit From Communism. New Brunswick, NJ, and London: Transaction Publishers, 1993, 292 pp., $19.95.

Sergei V. Chugrov, Rossiya i Zapad: Metamorfozy Vospriyatiya. Moscow: Nauka, 1993.

Zoltan D. Barany, Soldiers and Politics in Eastern Europe, 1945–90. London: Macmillan, 1993, xi + 243 pp., £40.00.

Paul Hockenos, Free to Hate. The Rise of the Right in Post‐communist Eastern Europe. London: Routledge, 1993, x + 332 pp., £17.99.

Ben Eklof (ed), School and Society in Tsarist and Soviet Russia. New York: St Martin's Press, and Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1993, xii + 254 pp., illustrations, index, £45.00.

Timothy Edward O'Connor, The Engineer of Revolution. L. B. Krasin and the Bolsheviks, 1870–1926. Oxford: Westview, 1992, xix + 322 pp., £36.95.     

Reviews

Laszlo Csaba (ed.), Privatisation, Liberalisation and Destruction (Recreating the Market in Central and Eastern Europe). Aldershot and Brookfield, NY: Dartmouth Publishing Company Ltd, 1994.

Iliana Zloch‐Christy, Eastern Europe in a Time of Change: Economic and Political Dimensions. Westport, CT: Praeger, 1994, xvii + 143 pp.

J. Michael Waller, Secret Empire. The KGB in Russia Today. Oxford: Westview, 1994 x + 390 pp., £42.50 h/b, £13.50 p/b.

James M. Goldgeier, Leadership Style and Soviet Foreign Policy. Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994, x + 169 pp., £29.00.

Vladimir Andrle, A Social History of Twentieth‐Century Russia. London: Edward Arnold, 1994, xi + 289 pp., £40.00 h/b, £14.99 p/b.

Graeme Gill, The Collapse of a Single‐Party System: The Disintegration of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994, xi + 255 pp., $35.00 h/b, $14.95 p/b.

John J. Stephan, The Russian Far East: A History. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1994, xxiii + 481 pp.     

Emission Trading Restrictions with Endogenous Technological Change

In this paper we use a simple climate model for endogenous environmental technical change in order to analyse the effects on equity and efficiency of placing different degrees of restrictions on trade in the market of pollution permits. The model is obtained by incorporating in Nordhaus and Yang (1996)'s RICE model a notion of induced technical change close to the one proposed in Goulder and Mathai (2000). With the help of such a model, we assess the pros and cons of introducing ceilings on emission trading. In particular, we analyse both the cost effectiveness and the distributional effects of placing restrictions of trading emissions. The analysis takes into account the role of environmental technical change that could be enhanced by emission trade limitations. However, this effect is shown to be offset by the increased abatement cost induced by the larger than optimal adoption of domestic policy measures when ceilings are made binding. Hence, our analysis provides little support for quantitative restrictions of emission trading, even when these restrictions actually have a positive impact of technical change. Even in terms of equity, ceilings find no justification within our theoretical and modelling framework. Indeed, we find that flexibility mechanisms in the presence of endogenous technical change increase equity and that the highest equity levels are achieved without ceilings, both in the short and in the long run.     

Age-related differences when measuring political hypocrisy

This article aims to develop a scale for measuring political hypocrisy (conceptualized as the inconsistency between values publicly expressed by politicians and the behavior they actually demonstrate) and to explore the role of age in voters' perceptions of politicians' hypocrisy, analyzing if citizens belonging to different age groups may identify politicians' hypocrisy with a different detail. Results show that the 19-item scale of political hypocrisy—composed of three dimensions, called “ambiguity,” “slyness,” and “deceit”—has good psychometric properties, and that age-related differences when measuring political hypocrisy do exist (young voters show a greater awareness of the hypocritical behavior held by politicians). Furthermore, results suggest that the perception of political hypocrisy may vary according both to voters' political orientation and voting intention.