Determination of impurities in illicit methamphetamine samples seized in Iran

In this study fifty samples of crystalline methamphetamine obtained from antinarcotics police of Iran seized during the year 2010 were analyzed. In order to determine the chemical characteristics of these samples, anion test, Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (GC-MS) and Liquid Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (LC-MS) were carried out on the samples. All of the samples containing methamphetamine tested positive for chloride anion. The range of methamphetamine hydrochloride content in these samples was 33-95%. One sample out of 50 contained no methamphetamine. The fact that 1,2-dimethyl-3-phenylaziridine was the most frequently found impurity in the analyzed samples, indicates that most of the methamphetamine samples seized in Iran have been synthesized from pseudoephedrine as starting material.     

When the Elders of Zion relocated to Eurabia: conspiratorial racialization in antisemitism and Islamophobia

Zia-Ebrahimi’s objective in this article is two-fold. First, to argue that antisemitism and Islamophobia display similar dynamics in representing their target population as a separate and antagonistic race (a process referred to as ‘racialization’). Second, to suggest that conspiracy theories of the ‘world Jewish domination’ type or their Islamophobic equivalent ‘Islamization of Europe’ type are powerful enablers of racialization, something that the race literature has so far neglected. In pursuing these two interrelated objectives, he offers a textual comparison of two conspiracy theories featuring Jews and Muslims. The first is The Protocols of the Elders of Zion (1903), the notorious forgery claiming to be the minutes of a meeting of Jewish leaders planning to take over Europe and the world. This text is largely considered to be at the very heart of modern-day antisemitism and an essential ingredient of the ideational context of the Holocaust. The second is Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis (2005), a pamphlet by polemicist Bat Ye’or claiming to have uncovered another ominous conspiracy, that of Muslims plotting to turn Europe into Eurabia, a dystopic land in which jihad and sharia rule, and non-Muslims live in a state of subjection. Zia-Ebrahimi argues that, despite some differences in format, the two texts display strikingly similar discursive dynamics in their attempt to racialize Jews and Muslims as the ultimate Other determined to destroy Us. This process is referred to as ‘conspiratorial racialization’.     

Dynamics of consumption distribution and economic fluctuations

Economic Change and Restructuring - This study aims to investigate the dynamics of consumption distribution and to determine how it is affected by macroeconomic fluctuations based on two different...     

Reflections on the Methodological Issues of the Sociology of Law

The general focus of this paper is on the methodological limitations of the sociology of law in capturing the law's 'truth' as its practitioners experience it. The paper starts with arguing that the law does not have a monolithic 'truth'. Some aspects of its 'truth' are produced through its own recursively sealed operations, while its other aspects are generated with reference to empirically grounded knowledge, which potentially links the discourses of law and sociology. Notwithstanding this discursive kinship, the sociological studies of the law's internal processes cause difficulties even to those scholars who are versed in substantive law. To expound this problem, the sociology of law is compared with medical sociology and attention is drawn to the way sociology copes with the 'truth' of medicine. The final part of the paper initiates a quest for possible solutions to the methodological problems of the sociology of law by placing them in the context of the ongoing conflicts and competitions of the field of science.     

Changes in human capital and earnings inequality: Recent evidence from Brazil 1

Abstract

This paper estimates changes in the rates of return to human capital across the earnings distribution using data from over a 10-year period for Brazil. It uses these estimates to simulate the separate impacts of changes in returns to skills and changes in the supply of skills on earnings inequality. Evidence points strongly to growing inequality in rates of return to education in Brazil. This finding suggests that recent macroeconomic and trade reforms have been of most benefit to the skilled rather than the unskilled. Supporting evidence points to an improved competitiveness in the labour market, with workers increasingly rewarded for productivity. However, although increases in returns to education are more pronounced at the top of the earnings distribution, this did not in practice led to increased inequality. This is because levels of education and other labour market-rewarded endowments have increased and offset the rate of return effect. Appropriate education policy is therefore an essential partner for macroeconomic and trade reform if a developing economy is to avoid worsening income inequality.