Online Campaigning in Russia: Evidence from the 2011 State Duma Election

Despite the continuing growth of internet use in Russia, there remains little systematic analysis of online election campaigning. This article presents an in-depth, multi-method analysis of party and candidate online activity during the 2011 State Duma election campaign—arguably Russia's first ‘internet election’—to ascertain the extent to which new social media is changing politics in Russia. The main findings indicate that the internet did indeed help to level the competitive playing field during the election campaign period, but despite the growing number of internet users, the overall level of online engagement remained weak.     

Contextualising the Teaching of Statistics in Political Science

The teaching of quantitative research methods is an integral part of most postgraduate programmes in politics, but less common at undergraduate level. This article explores the extent to which research methods in general, and quantitative research methods in particular, form part of the curricula of Politics departments in the UK. We then discuss an approach for motivating interest in a subject that tends to be unpopular with many students. We recommend an approach that utilises the links between the general quantification of politics with the quantitative study of political phenomena, as well as a combination of basic research methods for all and more advanced student-focused training for some.     

The (non) event of state terror: drones and divine violence

In this article, we interrogate how the logic of the drone reconfigures state terrorism through the politics of (in)visibility. We argue that the everyday life of the drone can be both dull and disastrous, and thus demonstrates how state and non-state terror operate around different logics of visibility and witnessing. Enhanced sight and interpretation of data wrought by drones are distinct from the politicised act of witnessing. State terrorism, however, benefits from the privatisation and depoliticisation of the witnessing of the event through a minimisation of those who appear “visible”. Further, through the language of technology and security, drones help to classify the witnessing of the event. The event produces terror without witness, and without premonition, invoking the omnipresent power of god and thus blending divine retribution with profane catastrophe. We claim that state terror seeks to: (1) limit the exposure of the state to the act of witnessing and remembrance; and (2) through the ethos of privatisation, legalistically control the narrative of violence. In our conclusion, we discuss the implications of warfare in relation to (in)visibility, memory and drones.     

Sustainable Colonization: Tar Sands as Resource Colonialism

Canada is one of the world’s largest petrostates, owing to large shale oil deposits, also known as tar sands, which can be found within its borders. In recent decades, as the price of crude oil has increased dramatically, corporations and the Canadian state have worked together to open the oil deposits in Northern Canada for extraction and transportation. Despite a stated commitment to environmental sustainability by the United States and Canadian governments, both have endorsed tar sands extraction and transport. Government and corporate entities have tried to reframe tar sands as “ethical oil,” yet all steps in the process involved pose tremendous ecological, social, economic, and cultural threats to First Nations communities in Canada, landowners in the Midwest and Texas, local ecosystems, and the global climate. This practice is part of a long-standing pattern of appropriating and using public and First Nations land for economic development. We argue that tar sands production on First Nations land is a practice of resource colonialism: the theft and appropriation of land belonging to indigenous people in order to access natural resources. By branding tar sands as “ethical oil” and labeling production companies as “sustainable,” the public and private sectors bound up in the extractive economy claim to provide an essential public service while misdirecting attention away from acts of colonialism that make these resources available. In this article, we examine the ways in which corporate and state entities use the discourse of sustainability as a cover for continued resource colonialism.     

Distal Humerus Morphological Variation and Sex Estimation in Modern Thai Individuals,

Due to differential preservation, it is necessary to develop sex estimation methods on varied anatomical regions, including the distal humerus. Sexually dimorphic differences of the medial epicondyle angle, olecranon fossa shape, trochlear extension, and trochlear constriction have been documented in several non-Asian groups. This study examines distal humerus morphological variation in 616 modern Thai individuals (f = 198; m = 418) 18–96 years old and tests the methods on a hold-out sample of 152 individuals (f = 91; m = 61). The results indicate that population-specific binary probit regression performs the best (74.1–100%), followed by composite scoring (77.0–90.1%), binary logistic regression (63.3–92.2%), and univariate sectioning points (37.7–90.1%). Age minimally effects the expression of the medial epicondyle angle in males, and trait scoring is susceptible to high intra- and interobserver error. While demonstrating relatively high sex biases, distal humerus morphology can be used to estimate the sex of Thai individuals when more sexually dimorphic regions are absent.     

The Comunidade dos Países de Língua Portuguesa at 20 years: An impact assessment

Established in 1996, the Comunidade dos Países de Língua Portuguesa – Community of Portuguese-Speaking Countries – set out an ambitious agenda to both protect and promote the Portuguese language worldwide and to pursue a range of multilateral initiatives of importance to its members. Rigorous, independent evaluation of the CPLP‘s role and impact has yet, however, to appear. This study moves some distance towards remedying this gap through evidence-based assessment of the enduring objectives of the organisation. It concludes that, while significant advance has occurred in specific respects, progress has been elusive in others. Moreover, such progress has tended to materially benefit specific members of the coalition somewhat more than others.     

King Charls His Case: The Intended Prosecution of Charles I

Charles I was put to death without having pleaded to the charges preferred against him during his trial. This article examines the case that his prosecutor later said he would have opened, had the king entered a plea. John Cook's case was predictably forthright in its denunciation of the accused. On the other hand, it has some highly significant omissions; some of it was legally and factually hopeless, and much of the rest invited fairly obvious responses; whilst its exposition was much more contentious than one might expect from a case for the prosecution of a man whose guilt had already been pronounced ‘notorious’. Rather than simply setting out a wholly unsatisfactory indictment of the king's alleged ‘guilt’, as a mere prelude to the shedding of his blood, Cook's true aim appears to have been to goad the king into making, before the eyes of the watching world, a case in his own defence sufficient to enable the king's judges, having heard what he might have to say, and subject to ‘the merit of the Cause’, to hand down some sentence other than death - all as the Act erecting the high court of justice authorized them to do.     

Patent Cases in the Court of Chancery, 1714–58

The purpose of this article is two-fold. First, it discusses recent improvements in the cataloguing of Chancery bills and pleadings entered between 1714 and 1758, held in the C 11 series at the National Archives. This has made it much easier to locate cases by subject, and a methodology for doing this is described. Secondly, the article outlines the results of work carried out in C 11 on cases relating to patents for invention. Although there has been significant research into how other forms of intellectual property right were adjudicated in the Court of Chancery, notably copyright, patent law for this period remains obscure. The article shows that Chancery (along with the common law courts) retained the principal jurisdiction in patent law, rather than the Privy Council as was once thought.