‘Peasantry’ as an economic category

This paper is concerned to challenge the category ‘peasantry’ as defining a distinct and general type of economy. It is divided into three sections: i. an examination of the work of Lenin and Kautsky on capitalism in agriculture which shows that they investigated economies in which peasant production was important without using such a concept; ii. it is argued that no rigorous concept of a ‘peasant’ mode or ‘peasant’ relations of production can be constructed which has the general applicability of the common‐sense notion of ‘peasantry'; iii. the treatment of ‘peasant’ economy in non‐Marxist literature is considered.     

Hydro-politics and hydro-power: the century-long saga of the Inga project

The proposal to build the world’s largest hydro-power project on the Congo River is a century old. This article argues that the Grand Inga project could become the political, diplomatic, and economic driver to deepening integration between the Democratic Republic of the Congo and other African countries. The Inga delays were not without benefits. Twenty-first century sensibilities ensure revision of the proposed mega-project to minimize both ecological and social harm. While colonial-era projects were configured to maximize benefits to imperialist, settler, and corporate interests, independence and democratization are the prerequisites to facilitate the broadest possible distribution of the benefits of electrification. Since some of the countries involved have hybrid regimes, further democratization, and civil society lobbying, will be necessary to mitigate the downside of its ecological and social impacts.     

Concurrent Trajectories of Change in Adolescent and Maternal Depressive Symptoms in the TORDIA Study

Depression has a heightened prevalence in adolescence, with approximately 15 % of adolescents experiencing a major depressive episode by age 18. Depression in adolescence also poses a risk for future distress and impairment. Despite treatment advances, many adolescents relapse after initial remission. Family context may be an important factor in the developmental trajectory of adolescent depression, and thus in enhancing treatment. This study examined concurrent change over time in adolescent and maternal depressive symptoms in the context of the Treatment of Resistant Depression in Adolescents study. Participants were 334 adolescents (mean age: 16; SD: 1.6; 70 % female, 84 % Caucasian), and their mothers (n = 241). All adolescents were clinically depressed when they entered the study and had received previous selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) treatment. Adolescents received acute treatment for 12 weeks and additional treatment for 12 more weeks. Adolescent depression and suicidal ideation were assessed at 0, 6, 12, 24, 48 and 72 weeks, while maternal depressive symptoms were assessed at 0, 12, 24, 48 and 72 weeks. Latent basis growth curve analyses showed a significant correlation over 72 weeks between trajectories of maternal and adolescent depressive symptoms, supporting the hypothesis of concurrent patterns of change in these variables. The trajectories were correlated more strongly in a subsample that included only dyads in which mothers reported at least one depressive symptom at baseline. Results did not show a correlation between trajectories of maternal depressive symptoms and adolescent suicidal ideation. These findings suggest that adolescent and maternal depressive symptoms change in tandem, and that treatment for adolescent depression can benefit the wider family system. Notably, most mothers in this sample had subclinical depressive symptoms. Future research might explore these trajectories in dyads with more severely depressed mothers.     

All Judges Are Political—Except When They Are Not: A Response

The author explains the origins of All Judges Are Political—Except When They Are Not: Acceptable Hypocrisies and the Rule of Law (2010) as a response to a fundamental question posed by legal realism: How can the judicial process be permeated with politics and yet remain an accepted part of a legitimate legal system? The author demonstrates the ongoing importance of this question by examining debates over the place of constitutional law in the law school curriculum and by assessing public perceptions of the Supreme Court's ruling on health care reform. The author then addresses the critical appraisals presented by the symposium contributors. The critiques are taken as road maps for extending the author's arguments in new directions.     

The Law Lords and Human Rights

This article presents an empirical analysis of the impact of the Human Rights Act on the House of Lords. Drawing on a database of judgments from 1994 to 2007, changes in judgment‐giving behaviour are identified by charting patterns of agreement and dissent across different categories of case. Voting records are also examined in order to identify whether significant differences exist between individual Law Lords in their approach to human rights cases.     

The use of error rates to predict and characterize the efficacy of presumptive field tests

From a forensic perspective, a presumptive test, one which indicates the presence or absence of a certain target material such as blood, is an invaluable tool. Among these tests, there are different specificities, sensitivities, and shelf lives. The accuracy of a test is an algebraic combination of the specificity and sensitivity of the test. Each test has limitations as given by its false positive and false negative rates. The aim of this study was to illustrate how the false positive and false negative rates are to be properly determined using a simulation study for the phenolphthalein test. New presumptive tests must be properly evaluated/validated through testing of commonly encountered household items and other potentially probative items usually found at crime scenes, however, the makeup of test sets must appropriately capture all error rates. In order to correctly use these results when the test is applied to an unknown sample recovered at a crime scene, the error rates cannot be applied directly to estimate whether or not the sample is actually the analyte of interest. In a validation study, the forensic scientist calculates the false positive rate as the p(Positive Reaction|Blood), whereas at the scene, the crime scene investigator wishes to determine the p(Blood|Positive Reaction). All crime scene investigators need to ensure that the conditional is not transposed when interpreting such results. Furthermore, this work provides a model for the assessment of a multiple test diagnostic system intended for investigators.