Experimental Effect of Shots Caused by Projectiles Fired from Air Guns with Kinetic Energy Below 17 J

Pursuant to the Polish Weapons and Ammunitions Law (Legal Gazette No 53/1999 item 549 with subsequent amendments), air guns with kinetic energy of the fired projectiles below 17 J are not regarded as weapons. The aim of the study was to assess the potential effect of shots caused by projectiles of various mass and structure fired from air guns with kinetic energy below 17 J on human soft tissues. As a model of soft tissue, we used 20% gelatin blocks. After shooting, we measured the depth of gelatin block penetration by pellets fired from various distances and compared these results with autopsy findings. The results demonstrated that examined pneumatic guns may cause serious injuries, including damage to the pleura, pericardium, liver, spleen, kidneys, femoral artery, and thoracic and abdominal aorta. Experiment shown that gelatin blocks do not reflect fully the properties of the human body.     

Orientalism and African Development Studies: the ‘reductive repetition’ motif in theories of African underdevelopment

Contemporary Africa is generally depicted as a ‘failure’. ‘Progress' has eluded the continent throughout the 20th century, and despite new ways of thinking about the reasons for failure and possibilities for success, allusions to the ‘natural weakness and incapacity’ of Africans and their social realities remain evident in theoretical, policy and political discourse on development in Africa. The practice of ‘reductive repetition’, as identified by Abdallah Laroui and Edward Said, has been imported into African development studies from Orientalist scholarship. Reductive repetition reduces the diversity of African historical experiences and trajectories, sociocultural contexts and political situations into a set of core deficiencies for which externally generated ‘solutions’ must be devised. In the field of development studies, the notion of development is introduced to Africa as a deus ex machina. In this article modern conceptualisations of development are challenged in three steps. First, it traces the history of development discourse over the post-Berlin Conference colonial and post-WWII development eras, suggesting that, while rhetoric of racial and cultural inferiority has been transformed, the notion of African deficiency remains at the conceptual and discursive levels. Second, the primarily liberal idea that ‘development for all’ is possible is challenged as being an ecological and economic, and therefore also social, impossibility. Third, given the problems of growth-based development, the article suggests that modern development theory ought to give way to post-developmental thinking which challenges standard a priori assumptions regarding rationality, linearity and modernity, thus offering some modest hope for a move ‘beyond’ the current development impasse.     

Let's Argue about Migration: advancing a right(s) discourse via communicative opportunities

The emerging global governance of migration is dominated by two discourses which shape policy approaches: 1) migration management and 2) the migration–development nexus. With large numbers of labour migrants being marginalised, migrant rights organisations have formed global alliances to argue for the centrality of a third discourse, the rights-based approach to migration. The question is how to inject this into the global debate which has sidelined migrant rights issues. Despite having hardly any bargaining power and restricted space for direct access vis-à-vis global governing institutions, migrant rights organisations are employing a number of strategies to overcome this marginalisation. We analyse these efforts by drawing on social movement studies and International Relations research on communicative action. Empirically this article draws on observations made during two major global fora: the negotiations in connection with the new Convention on ‘Decent Work for Domestic Workers’ at the International Labour Conference (ilc) and civil society participation in the Global Forum on Migration and Development (gfmd).     

What if morality should turn out to be the danger of dangers?1 Global ethics terrorism and the growth of ignorance

Abstract

Two characteristic features of the age of globalisation are (i) the increasing areas that are being moralised and an inflation in the production of discourses on ethics, and with it (ii) an increase in the salience of nonsense in public discourse and mass media content. While scholars and media pundits argue that the proliferation of discourses about morality and global ethics is aimed at moral regeneration and an elimination of nonsense, this article argues that on the contrary, the proliferation of moralising and the formulation of codes of ethics result in an increase of nonsense in public discourse and are eliminating freedom of speech and critical scholarship. Taking a Nietzschean and Machiavellian perspective, this article seeks to unveil the discourse on ethics as a strategy and tactic in the global clash of civilizations, whereby moralising and ethics are used as weapons of war. Today the fabrication of politically correct global ethics is an intellectual treason and poses a greater danger than terrorism.     

Reviews

Opening Rounds: Lessons of Military History, 1918–1988, by Anthony Farrar‐Hockley. Andre Deutsch, London, 1988. xiii+188 pp. £12.95. ISBN 0–233–98009–1.

The Blunted Sword: The Erosion of Military Power in Modern World Politics, by Evan Luard. I. B. Tauris, London, 1988. v+196 pp. £16.95. ISBN 1–85043–068–3.

Total War: The Causes and Courses of the Second World War (Revised second edition), edited by Peter Calvocoressi, Guy Wint and John Pritchard. Viking, London, 1989. xxviii+1,315 pp., illus., maps. £25. ISBN 0–670–80311–1.

Codebreaker in the Far East, by Alan Stripp. Frank Cass, London, 1989. xiv+204 pp., illus. £18. ISBN 0–7146–3363–1.

The Pacific: Peace, Security and the Nuclear Issue, edited by Ranginui Walker and William Sutherland. Zed Books, New Jersey; UN University, Tokyo; 1988. xiii+243 pp. £8.95 paperback. ISBN 0–86232–815–2.

China eyes Japan, by Allen S. Whiting. University of California Press, Berkeley, Los Angeles and London, 1989. xi+228 pp. $29.95. ISBN 0–520–06511–5.

Single Sparks: China's Rural Revolutions, edited by Kathleen Hartford and Steven M. Goldstein. M. E. Sharpe, New York, 1989. xi+216 pp. $35.00. ISBN 0–87332–427–7.

China's Regional Development, edited by David S. G. Goodman, (The Royal Institute of International Affairs) Routledge, London and New York, 1989. xvi+204 pp. £32.50 hardback. ISBN 0–415–03510–4.

China's Science Policy in the 80s, (Studies on East Asia), by Tony Saich. Manchester University Press, Manchester, 1988. iv+188 pp. £29.95. ISBN 0–7190–2986–4.

The Chinese Communist Party's Nomenklatura System, edited by John P. Burns. M. E. Sharpe Inc., New York and London, 1989. xlii+166 pp. $39.95. ISBN 0–87332–543–5.

The Thought of Mao Tse‐tung, by Stuart Schram. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1989. x+242 pp. £27.50 hardback, £8.95 paperback. ISBN 0–521–32549–8 and 0–521–31062–8.

The Secret Speeches of Chairman Mao: From the Hundred Flowers to the Great Leap Forward (Harvard Contemporary China Series: 6), edited by Roderick MacFarquhar, Timothy Cheek and Eugene Wu. The Council on East Asian Studies/Harvard University, Harvard, 1989. xxiii+561 pp. £11.95 paperback. ISBN 0–67 4–7967 3‐X.

Marxism and the Chinese Experience: Issues in Contemporary Chinese Socialism, edited by Arif Dirlik and Maurice Meisner. M. E. Sharpe, Armonk NY and London, 1989. xii+384 pp. $45.00. hardback, $17.95 paperback. ISBN 0–87332–515‐X and 0–87332–546‐X.

The Asiatic Mode of Production in China, edited by Timothy Brook. M. E. Sharpe, Armonk NY and London, 1989. xi+204 pp. $39.95. ISBN 0–87332–542–7.

The New China: Comparative Economic Development in Mainland China, Taiwan and Hongkong, by Alvin Rabushka. Westview Press, Boulder and London, 1987. xii+254 pp. £28. ISBN 0–8133–0519–5.

Golden Inches: The China Memoir of Grace Service, edited by John S. Service. University of California Press, Berkeley, 1979. xxvi+346 pp. $19.95. ISBN 0–520–06656–1.

Information China: The Comprehensive and Authoritative Reference Source of New China, (3 volumes), organized by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, compiled and translated by the China Social Sciences Publishing House. Edited for Pergamon Press by C. V. James. (Oxford, New York, Beijing, Frankfurt, Sao Paulo, Sydney, Tokyo, Toronto: Pergamon Press, 1989). 1,621 pp., 1,250 photographs, line drawings and tables; 52 full colour plates; 23 maps. £450. ($795.00). ISBN 0–08–034764–9.

New China's Population, by China's Financial and Economic Publishing House. (New York and London: Macmillan, 1988). xxiv+232pp., tables, charts. £64. ISBN 0–02–905471–0.

China: Facts and Figures Annual, Volume 12, 1989, edited by Charles E. Greer (Gulf Breeze, FL: Academic International Press, 1989). xxiii+510 pp. $91.00. ISBN0–87569–112–9.

The Cambridge History of Japan: Volume 5: The Nineteenth Century, edited by Marius B. Jansen. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and New York, 1989. xiv+828 pp. £60, $89.50. ISBN 0–521–22356–3.

The Cambridge History of Japan: Volume 6: The Twentieth Century, edited by Peter Duus. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and New York, 1988. xx+866 pp. £60, $89.50. ISBN 0–521–22357–1.

Children of the Sun: The Japanese and the Outside World, by Michio Kitahara. Paul Norbury Publications, Sandgate, Folkestone, Kent, 1989. 160 pp. £12.95. ISBN 0–904404–68–4.

The Sun also Sets: Why Japan will not be Number One, by Bill Emmott. Simon and Schuster, London, 1989. xii+275 pp. £14.95. ISBN 0–671–69696–3.

Japan: The Blighted Blossom, by Roy Thomas. I. B. Tauris, London, 1989. xii+299 pp. £16.95. ISBN 1–85043–125–6.

A History of Japanese Economic Thought, by Tessa Morris‐Suzuki. Routledge, London and New York; with the Nissan Institute of Japanese Studies, Oxford, 1989. vii+213 pp. £30. ISBN 0–415–01264–3.

The Japanese Business Community and the National Trade Policy, 1920–1942, by William Miles Fletcher III. University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill and London, 1989. x+226 pp. £34.95 ($37.45). ISBN 0–8078–1847‐X.

Management and Higher Education Since 1940: The influence of America and Japan on West Germany, Great Britain, and France, by Robert R. Locke. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1989. xiii+328 pp. £30. ISBN 0–521–34102–7.

Democracy in Japan (Pitt Series in Policy and Institutional Studies), edited by Takeshi Ishida and Ellis S. Krauss. University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, Pa., 1989. x+354 pp. $39.95 hardback, $14.95 paperback. ISBN 0–8229–3608–9 and 0–8229–5414–1.

A History of Singapore, 1819–1988 (Second Edition), by C. M. Turnbull. Oxford University Press, Singapore, Oxford and New York, 1989. xiv+388 pp. 16 plates, 8 maps. £30. ISBN 0–19–588911–8.

Asia's Next Giant: South Korea and Late Industrialization, by Alice H. Amsden. Oxford University Press, New York and Oxford, 1989. xvi+379 pp. £25. ISBN 0–19–505852–6.

Korea: A Religious History, by James Huntley Grayson. Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1989. xii+319 pp. £37.50. ISBN 0–19–826186–1.

Authoritarianism and Opposition in South Korea, by Hak‐Kyu Sohn. Routledge, London and New York, 1989. xii+287 pp. £35. ISBN 0–415–03550–3.

Australian Public Policy and Economic Vulnerability: A Comparative and Historical Perspective, by Francis Castles. Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 1988. xii+184 pp. £12.95 paperback. ISBN 0–04–324021–6.

The Politics of Development in Australia, edited by Brian Head. Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 1989. xv+274 pp. £11.95 paperback. ISBN 0–04–861880–2.

The Great Betrayal: Britain, Australia and the Onset of the Pacific War 1939–42, by David Day. Angus and Robertson, Sydney and London, 1988. x+388 pp. Illus. £14.95, AS39.95. ISBN 0–207–15328–0.

India and South East Asia: Indian Perceptions and Policies, by Mohammed Ayoob. Routledge, London, 1989. xi+105 pp. £25. ISBN 0–415–03894–4.

Southeast Asia: An Illustrated Introductory History (Expanded Edition) by Milton Osborne. Allen & Unwin, Sydney, Wellington, London and Boston, 1989. viii+263 pp., illus., maps. £11.95 paperback. ISBN 0–04–352238–6.

Crisis and Response: The Challenge to South‐South Economic Cooperation, edited by Noordin Sopiee, B. A. Hamzah and Leong Choon Heng. Kegan Paul International, London, 1989. xxvii+450 pp. £45. ISBN 0–7103–0370‐X.

Women's Asia, by Yayori Matsui. Zed Books Ltd., London and New Jersey, 1989. viii+172 pp. £26.95 ($49.95) hardback, £7.95 ($12.50) paperback. ISBN 0–86232–826–8 and 0–86232–827–6.

Urbanization in Asia: Spatial Dimensions and Policy Issues, edited by Frank J. Costa, Ashok K. Dutt, Laurence J. C. Ma, and Allen Noble. University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu, 1989. ix+412 pp. $44.00. ISBN 0–8248–1151–8.

The Far East and Australasia 1990 (updated and revised edition), (London: Europa Publications, 1990), xxi+1,054 pp., maps. £105.00. ISBN 0–946653–53–4.     

Zukunftsfähige Agrarlandschaften in Deutschland – Ziele und Anforderungen aus ökologischer, ökonomischer und rechtlicher Sicht

Natur und Recht - Die global steigenden Treibhausgase verändern in zunehmenden Maße auch in Deutschland die klimatischen Verhältnisse. Betroffen sind insbesondere hiesige...     

Linguistic Radicalisation of Right-Wing and Salafi Jihadist Groups in Social Media: a Corpus-Driven Lexicometric Analysis

European Journal on Criminal Policy and Research - Social media groups, for example on Facebook, WhatsApp or Telegram, allow for direct exchange, communication and interaction, as well as...     

Ingestion of pointed objects in a complex suicide

A 51-year-old woman with a psychiatric history of depression and drug abuse was found hanged in her bedroom. The ligature was a scarf attached to the door handle. The autopsy findings suggested that two methods of suicide had been used one after the other. In the first stage, numerous nails, pins and needles were swallowed; in the second stage, the suicide was completed by hanging.