Compliance with Food Safety Laws in Germany: Food Businesses in Berlin

In this article we explore how variables associated both with material temptations (economic incentives that foster rule breaking) and nonmaterial behavioral determinants (protective factors that shield people from rule breaking) are linked to compliance with food laws. The object of the study is to examine food businesses in the ready‐to‐eat industry in three districts of the German capital, Berlin. We collected data on compliance behavior and its potential drivers via an anonymous postal survey in 2014. Accounting for the data structure, we used a generalized ordered logit regression to model the relationship between the presumed behavioral drivers and compliance. One crucial finding is that a feeling of embarrassment if relevant others were to learn about noncompliance is positively related to compliance. The same holds for the internalized approval of food laws and their enforcement (acceptance of rules).     

The ecological context of interpersonal violence: from culture to collective efficacy

This brief essay outlines the progression over the last 20 years of ecological theories of interpersonal violence. The period between the present and the early 1980s began with a revival of cultural explanations of violence that paralleled the introduction of the neo-conservative social science and then witnessed a rediscovery of deficits based structural explanations of interpersonal violence under the broad rubric of social disorganization theory. The essay concludes with a more optimistic appraisal of recent refinements of social disorganization theory that consider the mediating effects of collective efficacy on urban crime and interpersonal violence.     

The manner and cause of death in a forensic series of chronic alcoholics.

Chronic alcoholics account for an increasing number of the cases which are examined in forensic pathology. The manner and cause of death in 122 chronic alcoholics is described and compared with a previous investigation and to a group of non-alcoholics. The percentage of cases in which the manner of death is undetermined is twice as high as in the control group, whilst the percentage of suicide, surprisingly enough is only half that of the control group. The patho-anatomic findings in the liver and the causes of death are discussed in detail.     

Sudden death due to congenital malformation of the left coronary artery: A case report

A case of sudden death during heavy exercise in a young athletic man due to a rare but well-known congenital coronary malformation is reported, and the main aspects concerning the condition are discussed.     

Power,Interests and Coalitions: the political economy of mass privatisation in Turkey

This article argues that ethnicity has become increasingly salient in Afghan politics and society during the years of war, and discusses how the country's new institutions can be designed in a way that will contribute towards a reversal of this trend. The article examines a series of policy issues with a bearing on inclusion vs exclusion in inter‐ethnic relations: political institution building (institutions of government, electoral system, and centre–region relations), land rights, state religion, the census and the new identity document. For each of these the article discusses what outcome would best contribute to longer‐term stability and integration by stimulating inclusive, integrative identities—and what the problems and prospects are for these outcomes to be realised. The article specifically discusses warlords' role as spoilers, and the potential and limitations to the leverage on Afghan politics that is held by international actors, above all the USA.     

Leaving Security in Safe Hands: identity,legitimacy and cohesion in the new Afghan and Iraqi armies

Built by outside powers and targeted against local insurgents, the new national armies of Afghanistan and Iraq are fragile institutions. The legitimacy of these forces is limited in the deeply divided societies in which they exist. Whereas low levels of legitimacy exert a disintegrative pressure upon an army, cohesion counterweighs such pressure. This article engages the theory of military unit cohesion for the purpose of increasing understanding of the challenges to cohesion faced by the new armies of Afghanistan and Iraq. Two main sources of legitimacy for the new armies are discussed: the (ethnic/sectarian) composition of the forces, and their respective missions. Challenges to cohesion are found to depend on how soldiers are recruited and units composed: ethnically/sectarian mixed units may disintegrate because of weak horizontal cohesion; homogeneous units (particularly when recruited as groups and not individually) may splinter off because of weak vertical cohesion. The article also argues that promoting an image of the army as ‘national’ within a society may reduce disintegrative pressures.     

Nordic labour market policies in transition

This article provides an overview of the Nordic labour market policies targeted to promote employment and reduce open unemployment since the early 1980s. Applying a disentangled approach, the goal is to analyse the policies of stimulating employment, the policies of influencing labour supply and, finally, active and passive labour market policies. It is argued that the employment crises of the early 1990s were mainly caused by domestic factors and, partly as a way to react to the challenge, the Nordic countries learned to use labour force supply as a policy instrument to combat unemployment. Additionally, the Nordic countries choose different ways to adapt to the imperatives of the globalised economy, hence, at the beginning of the new millennium, Nordic labour market policies are in flux.