Overcrowding and Inmate Fatalities

A number of theorists have suggested that prison overcrowding produces greater tendencies toward violence and interpersonal aggression. Empirical studies of the effects of overcrowding on the prison population have been conducted on individual inmate buffer zones, or have focussed on specific institutions within a state or federal prison system.

This paper reevaluates the relationship between prison overcrowding and inmate violence using official data reported for fifty-one (N = 51) Departments of Corrections reported in the Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics.

Results of the analysis indicate that although overcrowding relates to the number of suicides and homicides in expected directions, these connections reverse themselves as indicators of inmate violence are translated into percentages of respective inmate populations.

The number of suicides reported explains a significant (R² = .27) portion of the variance in the number of homicides and clearly suggests that both forms of violence tend to occur together in state reporting areas.     

Lawyer Specialization–Managing the Professional Paradox

This article explores a series of paradoxes exposed by specialization within the legal profession. It will argue that while the existing literature rightly identifies specialization as posing potential challenges to coherence, legitimacy, and professional ethics, it fails to grapple with the relationship between professional competence and specialization. In exploring this relationship, three paradoxes are articulated. The first is that specialization is both a necessary element in the development of professionalism and a threat to it. The second is the normative ambiguity of specialization: specialization is capable of giving rise to both benefits and detriments. The third paradox is the profession's response to this ambiguity. It will be argued that the profession's approach is incoherent in public interest terms and can be best explained as part of a desire to protect its members' interests and its collective identity over the public interest in competence. These arguments are made in the context of a series of three empirical studies of specialists and nonspecialists in legal aid practice in England and Wales. The evidence is worrying enough to suggest significant concerns about the quality and indeed legitimacy of the professional qualification as a general warrant of competence. The implications for institutionalizing specialization within the legal profession are discussed.     

Choosing Your China Structure:Representative Offices

The representative office (RO) is the least dynamic of the entities for establishing a foreign presence in China. The RO can facilitate market entry and coordinate sourcing activities and marketing, but it is a toothless version of the possible foreign entities that have little control over the movement and sale of goods and services. ROs are the     

China's Transfer Pricing Measures

Earlier this year, the State Administrationof Taxation promulgated the much-antic-ipated transfer pricing measures detailingthe administrative rules for all special taxadjustments. These special tax adjustments,including cost sharing, thin capitalization,     

Blowback: Investor–State Dispute Mechanisms in International Trade Agreements

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) gave unprecedented rights to private investors. These provisions quickly became entrenched in policy and practice, appearing in most multilateral and bilateral trade agreements in the 1990s as American investors began to bring Canada and Mexico to arbitration. However, the Australia–U.S. Free Trade Agreement (AUSFTA) of 2004 contained no such provisions. The purpose of this article is to explain why enthusiasm for NAFTA‐style protections waned so dramatically after a decade of entrenched practice. We argue that the reason lies in the “blowback,” the unintended and negative consequences created by NAFTA’s Chapter 11, and conclude that the abandonment of NAFTA‐style protections in the AUSFTA sets important precedents for the future of international free trade agreements.