Post-Soviet Civil Society Development in the Russian Federation: The Impact of the NGO Law

The passing of the Russian NGO Law in mid-2006 set clear parameters for Russian NGO activity and civil society development. In this paper we assess the impact of the NGO Law on both NGOs and Russian civil society. Our findings illustrate that the NGO Law has led to a reduction in NGO activity and curtailment of civil society development. We conclude that Russian civil society appears to be dominated by groups funded and thus controlled by the state. This has implications for Russia's on-going democratic development.     

Gender,HipHop and Pop-Islam: the urban identities of Muslim youth in Germany

While many opponents construe the growing presence of Muslim headscarves in Germany as evidence of creeping Islamicization, religious activism can also be interpreted as an attempt on the part of migrant offspring to forge positive ‘hyphenated identities’, rooted in urban culture, material consumption, and specific mosque communities. Islam has become ‘young, chic and cool’ among ethnic minorities, often denied citizenship and opportunity in their country of birth owing to jus sanguinis and/or other complex naturalization requirements. Religiosity, in turn, is slowly giving rise to new types of civic engagement, leading more ethnic youth to pursue German citizenship. Drawing on representative surveys, inter alia, this essay argues that while not problem free, an emerging Pop-Islam movement has provided Muslimas especially with an important platform for breaking with traditional gender roles, building social capital and acquiring the participatory skills necessary to bring ‘civil society’ into their own communities. It moreover infers that national policies banning headscarves in public service professions are increasingly at odds with European Union directives addressing gender equality and religious discrimination.     

Compensating Irish Female Revolutionaries, 1916–1923

The newly released Irish Military Service Pensions Collection offers the most comprehensive opportunity to examine the role of women in the Irish revolution (1916–23) or in any comparable nationalist revolution. It is also an extremely useful source of evidence for an emerging historiographical trend of tracing the post-revolutionary lives of female veterans by examining the award of service pensions to them by that state. This article will examine the role played by gender in the award of such pensions, the economic and financial significance of them in a state that had underdeveloped welfare provision and the importance of them as a symbolic recognition of women's roles in helping to achieve Irish independence. It also compares the post-conflict experience of Irish female revolutionary veterans with women who were involved in comparable international military conflicts.     

Police attitudes in assigning responsibility for wife abuse

Prevailing myths concerning wife abuse generally tend to blame the victim. The present study examines the degree of responsibility assigned by police officers to the wife, the husband, as well as the couple's socioeconomic situation in cases of wife abuse. The officer's position (neutral vs supportive) adopted toward the woman is also investigated. The influence of eight characteristics related either to the spouses or to the situation of violence on both the officer's position and the attribution of responsibility is analyzed. The characteristics are: couple's socioeconomic status, type of household, drinking by husband, alleged antagonism on the part of the wife, ambivalence of wife to press charges, type of abuse, history of assault, and violence toward children. The results are based on answers to case vignettes provided by 235 municipal police officers. The data were analyzed by performing a multivariate analysis of variance. Results indicate the type of abuse to be the characteristic with the greatest impact on police attitudes. While the husband is systematically considered more responsible than the wife, police officers always consider the wife somewhat responsible, particularly when there is alleged antagonism by the woman and when threats of violence are present.     

Reviews

Leslie Holmes, Post‐Communism: An Introduction. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1997, xiv + 384 pp., £14.95.

Stephen White, Richard Rose & Ian McAllister, How Russia Votes. Chatham, NJ: Chatham House Publishers, 1997, xx + 332 pp., £14.95.

Matthew Wyman, Public Opinion in Postcommunist Russia. London: Macmillan, 1997, xiv + 269 pp., £15.99.

David Kotz with Fred Weir, Revolution from Above: The Demise of the Soviet System. London: Routledge, 1997, xiv + 302 pp., £16.99.

F. Barry (ed.), Douze Etats indépendants issus de l'ex‐URSS, special issue of Le Courrier des Pays de l'Est. Paris: La Documentation Francaise, March‐April 1995, 225 pp., abstracts in English.

Jeffrey Kopstein, The Politics of Economic Decline in East Germany, 1945–1989. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1997, xii + 246 pp., $39.95.

David Childs & Richard Popplewell, The Stasi: The East German Intelligence and Security Service. London: Macmillan, 1996, xii + 253 pp., £40.00.

Eric Solsten (ed.), Germany. A Country Study. Washington, DC: Library of Congress, 1996, xlix + 642 pp.

Valery Tishkov, Ethnicity, Nationalism and Conflict in and after the Soviet Union: The Mind Aflame. London: Sage, 1997, xv + 334 pp., £14.95.

Aleksandar Pavkovi?, The Fragmentation of Yugoslavia. Nationalism in a Multinational State. Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1997, xii + 222 pp., £40.00.

David A. Dyker & Ivan Vejvoda (eds), Yugoslavia and After: A Study in Fragmentation, Despair and Rebirth. London, Longman, 1996, xi + 268 pp.

Tanya Renne, Ana's Land: Sisterhood in Eastern Europe. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1997, xi + 240 pp., £13.50.

Carol Skalnik Leff, The Czech and Slovak Republics: Nation versus State. Nations of the Modern World. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1997, xvii + 295 pp., $22.95.

Dennis Deletant, Ceausescu and the Securitate: Coercion and Dissent in Romania, 1965–1989. London: Hurst, 1995, xxxii + 403 pp., £39.50 h/b, £16.50 p/b.

Paul Robert Magocsi, A History of Ukraine. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1996, xxvi + 784 pp., £56.00 h/b, £26.00 p/b.

Leokadia Drobizheva, Rose Gottemoeller, Catherine McArdle Kelleher & Lee Walker (eds), Ethnic Conflict in the Post‐Soviet World: Case Studies and Analysis. New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1996, xv + 365 pp., $69.95.

Edgar O'Ballance, Wars in the Caucasus, 1990–95. Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1997, xxviii + 238 pp., £42.50.

Leokadia Drobizheva, Rose Gottemoeller, Catherine McArdle Kelleher & Lee Walker (eds), Ethnic Conflict in the Post‐Soviet World: Case Studies and Analysis. New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1996, xvi + 365 pp., $69.95.

Garry Rodan (ed.), Political Oppositions in Industrialising Asia. London: Routledge, 1996.

Diane P. Koenker & Ronald D. Bachman (eds), Revelations from the Russian Archives: Documents in English Translation. Washington. DC: Library of Congress, 1997, xxv + 808 pp., £69.95.

Theresa C. Smith, in collaboration with Thomas A. Oleszczuk. No Asylum. State Psychiatric Repression in the Former USSR. Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1997, xi + 290 pp., £40.00.

Stephen E. Hanson, Time and Revolution. Marxism and the Design of Soviet Institutions. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1997, xv + 258 pp., $45.00 h/b, $18.95 p/b.

Dmitry Shlapentokh, The French Revolution in Russian Intellectual Life 1865–1905. Westport, CT, London: Praeger, 1996, viii + 202 pp., £46.50.

N. E. Andreyev, To, chto vspominaetsya. Tallinn: Avenarius, 1996, Vol. 1. 336 pp., Vol. 2, 320 pp.     

The Attitudes Towards Dating Violence Scales: Development and Initial Validation

This study describes the development and validation of three Attitudes Towards Male Dating Violence (AMDV) Scales and three Attitudes Towards Female Dating Violence (AFDV) Scales. These scales measure attitudes toward use of psychological, physical, and sexual dating violence, respectively, by boys and by girls. Eight hundred twenty-three students from grades 7, 9, and 11 participated in the validation study. All six scales have good internal consistencies. As predicted, students were more accepting of girls' use of violence than of boys' use of violence, and boys were more accepting of violence than were girls. The six scales were positively correlated with traditional attitudes toward gender roles and with each other, providing evidence for their construct validity. Higher scores on the AMDV Scales were related to boys' past use of violence in dating relationships and to their having aggressive friends, supporting their criterion-related validity. Higher scores on the AFDV Scales were associated with girls' past use of dating violence but not with their having aggressive friends, providing partial support for their criterion-related validity. Singly or in combination, the Attitudes Towards Dating Violence Scales can be used to increase our understanding of the development and maintenance of violence-supportive attitudes in adolescents of all ages.     

Visualization of gunshot residue patterns on dark clothing

ABSTRACT: Determination of the muzzle‐to‐target distance is often a critical factor in criminal and civil investigations involving firearms. However, seeing and recording gunshot residue patterns can be difficult if the victim's clothing is dark and/or bloodstained. Trostle reported the use of infrared film for the detection of burn patterns. However, only after the film is developed are the results visible and multiple exposures at different settings may be needed. The Video Spectral Comparator^? 2000 (Foster & Freeman Ltd., Evesham, Worcestershire, U.K.) is an imaging instrument routinely used by forensic document examiners. Without use of specialized film could the VSC 2000 (at appropriate instrument settings) quickly, easily, and reliably provide instantaneous viewing, saving, and printing of gunshot residue patterns on dark and/or blood soaked clothing? At muzzle‐to‐target distances of 6, 12, and 18 in., test fires were made into five different types of dark clothing using eight different handguns of different calibers. Gunshot residues were detected for all eight calibers, and powder burn patterns were seen on dark clothing for all three target distances and calibers except 0.22 long rifle and 0.25 ACP. Bloodstains did not preclude the viewing of these patterns.