Driving under the influence of chlormethiazole

This article describes a case of driving under the influence of the sedative-hypnotic-anticonvulsant drug chlormethiazole. The suspect, who was a physician, was driving dangerously on a busy highway and caused a traffic collision. When apprehended by the police, the man had bloodshot and glazed eyes and pupil size was enlarged. He could not answer the questions properly and his gait was unsteady. A roadside breath-alcohol screening test was positive but an evidential breath-alcohol test conducted about one hour later was below the legal limit for driving of 0.10 mg/L (10 microg/100 mL or 0.021 g/210 L). Because of the special circumstances of the traffic crash and the man's appearance and behaviour, the police suspected that drugs other than alcohol were involved and obtained a venous blood sample for toxicological analysis. The blood contained 0.23 mg/g alcohol, which is above the legal limit for driving in Sweden 0.20 mg/g (20 mg/100 mL or 0.020 g/100 mL), and codeine was also present at a therapeutic concentration of 0.02 mg/L. The conflict between the clinical signs of impairment and the toxicology report prompted a reanalysis of the blood sample with major focus on sedative-hypnotic drugs. Analysis by capillary GC-NPD identified chlormethiazole at a concentration of 5mg/L, the highest so far encountered in traffic cases in Sweden. In 13 other impaired driving cases over 10 years the mean (median) and range of concentrations of chlormethiazole were 1.6 mg/L (1.6 mg/L) and 0.3-3.3 mg/L. This case report underscores the need to consider clinical observations and the person's behaviour in relation to the toxicology report when interpreting and testifying in drug-impaired driving cases.     

Delinquency,unstructured socializing,and social change: The rise and fall of a teen culture of independence

This article delves into the connections between time trends in unstructured socializing and other dramatic changes in adolescence since the 1950s. Osgood et al.’s (1996) individual-level application of routine activity theory proposed that unstructured socializing contributes to crime by exposing people to situations conducive to deviance, and a large body of research supports this idea. Unstructured socializing has proven useful as an explanatory bridge that links crime and deviance to key social factors like age, class, and gender. The present article expands on two recent studies (Baumer et al., 2021; Svensson & Oberwittler, 2021), which showed that changing rates of unstructured socializing help explain time trends in delinquency as well. Based on time trends across many domains of adolescent life, I argue that changes in unstructured socializing were a manifestation of the rise and fall of a teen culture of independence from the 1950s to the 2020s. The effectiveness of unstructured socializing as an explanatory bridge demonstrates the value of focusing on ordinary, everyday activities for tapping into features of life that are consequential and that vary across social conditions.     

>Pedagogy and politics: Origins of the special conference of 1905 on primary education for non‐Russians in the east

Sean R. Roberts, Waiting for Uighurstan. 55 minute video documentary with Companion Study Guide, 1996. Study Guide: xi, 73 pp., 2 maps, works cited, Appendix I: Script to video, Appendix II: Annotated bibliography of suggested readings.

Dennis P. Hupchick and Harold E. Cox, A Concise Historical Atlas of Eastern Europe. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996, viii, 120 pp., 50 maps, index.

Jörg Brechtefeld, Mitteleuropa and German Politics: 1848 to the Present. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996, vii, 195 pp. + maps, index. $49.95.

Seamus Dunn and T. G. Fraser, eds, Europe and Ethnicity: The First World War and Contemporary Ethnic Conflict. London: Routledge, 1996, xii, 218 pp. + index.

Marc A. Weiner, Richard Wagner and the Anti‐Semitic Imagination. Lincoln, NB. &; London: University of Nebraska Press, 1995, 353 pp. + notes, bibliography, index.

Robert B. Pynsent, ed., The Literature of Nationalism. Essays on East European Identity. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996, 282 pp. + index.

Ladislav Holy, The Little Czech Nation and the Great Czech Nation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996, x, 226 pp., index.

Jaroslav Krej?í and Pavel Machonin, Czechoslovakia 1918–92: A Laboratory for Social Change. St Antony's series. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996, 244 pp. + notes, bibliography, index. ISBN 0–312–12693‐X (hard). $49.95.

Jan Rychlík, Thomas D. Mazrik and Miroslav Bielik, eds, R. W. Seton‐Watson and His Relations with the Czechs and Slovaks; Documents, 1906–1951, 2 Vols. Ústav T. G. Masaryka and Matica Slovenská, 1995, footnotes, photographs, register of documents, name index, geographic index. Distributed by Interpress, London, England. $50.00.

Peter F. Sugar, Nationality and Society in Habsburg and Ottoman Europe. Aldershot, Hampshire, U.K.: Variorum, 1997, ix + 253 + index.

Eric Roman, Hungary and the Victor Powers: 1945–1950. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996, 172 pp.

Graham Smith, ed., The Baltic States: The National Self‐determination of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996, xx, 214 pp. + maps, tables, index.

V. Stanley Vardys and Judith B. Sedaitis, Lithuania: The Rebel Nation. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1997, 222 pp. + maps, illustrations, index. $60.00 ($21.50 pbk).

Moshe Rosman, Founder of Hasidism: A Quest for the Historical Ba'al Shem Tov. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996, xii, 296 pp. + maps, photographs, tables, index.

David R. Marples, Belarus: From Soviet Rule to Nuclear Catastrophe. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996, xxi, 179 pp. + photographs, tables, bibliography, index.

Jeff Chinn and Robert Kaiser, Russians as the New Minority: Ethnicity and Nationalism in the Soviet Successor States. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1996, xii, 308 pp. + tables, maps, index.

Leokadia Drobizheva, Rose Gottemoeller, Catherine McArdie Kelleher and Lee Walker, eds, Ethnic Conflict in the Post‐Soviet World: Case Studies and Analysis. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1996, xv, 365 pp.

Kathleen E. Smith, Remembering Stalin's Victims: Popular Memory and the End of the USSR. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996, xv, 220 pp. + photographs, appendix, index.

Peter H. Solomon, Jr, Soviet Criminal Justice Under Stalin. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996, xvii, 494 pp. + photographs, tables, index.

Stephen White, Russia Goes Dry: Alcohol, State and Society. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996, xiii, 189 pp. + photographs, illustrations, notes, index.

Hafeez Malik, ed., Central Asia: Its Strategic Importance and Future Prospects. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1994, xi, 325 pp. + index.     

Book Reviews

Leonard S. Spector and Jacqueline R. Smith, Nuclear Ambitions: The Spread of Nuclear Weapons, 1989–1990 (Boulder: Westview, 1990), 450 pp, $49.95.

David D. Newsom, Ed., The Diplomatic Record 1989–1990 (Boulder: Westview, 1991), 272 pp, $49.95.

Roger Hilsman, American Guerrilla: My War Behind Japanese Lines (Washington, DC: Brassey's, Inc., with the Association of the United States Army Institute of Land Warfare, 1990), 312 pp, $12.95.

Janne E. Nolan, Trappings of Power: Ballistic Missiles in the Third World (Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution, 1991), 210 pp, $29.95.

Max G. Manwaring, Ed., Uncomfortable Wars: Toward A New Paradigm of Low Intensity Conflict (Boulder: Westview, 1991), 139 pp, $24.95.     

Dual engagement: France and the Persian Gulf

With the end of the Cold War international relations began anew without the bipolar constraints of two ideologically opposed superpowers. The Iraqi invasion of Kuwait on 2 August 1990 represented the first challenge to the nascent post‐Cold War Persian Gulf security environment. Within the region, France is once again increasingly active in the economic, political and military fields. The re‐evaluation of Washington's ability to remain engaged at its current levels within the Gulf may be attributed in large part to a growing sensitivity in Riyadh and other Arab capitals to the visible US presence coupled with an American foreign policy which is, at times, inconsistent. The net future effect of contemporary trends may be one in which the Gulf Sheikhdoms welcome French ascendancy and US decline. France has experienced its own foreign policy transformation marked by the leadership of President Chirac. Where President Mitterrand sought the role of power broker in regional affairs, President Chirac seeks increased influence and importance.     

Conceptualizing Usage in Voting Behavior for Political Marketing: An Application of Consumer Behavior

Political marketing has borrowed and adapted many terms from mainstream marketing, such as image management (segmentation, targeting, and positioning) and consumer (voter). In marketing, the terms “user” and “usage” have been established, yet their application to political marketing is less clear. This paper analyzes the feasibility and usefulness of usage in the political context. Drawing from the literature on usage, a model is developed and applied to four voting environments: Britain, Australia, Russia, and Belarus. One critical factor that emerges is the concept of choice, whereby the voter may chose to indicate their preference for one party yet be forced to use a different party as chosen by collective choice. Another issue is the potential for habitual voting behavior to limit decision making. It is concluded that usage needs to be contextualized specifically for political marketing.     

For whom does prison-based drug treatment work? Results from a randomized experiment

Objectives

Prison-based therapeutic community (TC) drug treatment followed by community aftercare is widely recognized as the most effective treatment paradigm for drug-dependent offenders. However, few randomized experiments have addressed this question and fewer studies have examined how interactions between treatment modality and individual characteristics may explain variations in outcomes.

Methods

Using a randomized experimental design, this study examined the effects of treatment modality [TC vs. Outpatient (OP) group counseling], individual psychosocial characteristics (e.g., risk, negative affect), and interactions on reincarceration over a 3-year follow-up period. Survival analysis using Cox regression with covariates was used to analyze data obtained from 604 subjects at a specialized drug treatment prison.

Results

The expected advantage of TC failed to emerge. Critical and heretofore unexamined interactions between treatment modality (TC vs. OP), inmate levels of risk, and negative effect help explain these unexpected findings.

Conclusion

The superiority of prison TC to less intensive OP counseling was not supported. The effects of TC appear to be conditioned by critical responsivity factors that have received little empirical attention.     

The law and politics of transnational rights protection: Trusteeship,effectiveness, de-delegation

International trustee courts embody a specific form of delegation, in which state principals confer on such courts the authority to interpret and apply treaties agreed by the states in order to realize specific values and interests. Human rights courts help states resolve commitment and enforcement problems that are inherent in human rights treaties. This study seeks to answer the question, what happens when states parties seek to reduce or eliminate the authority of a human rights court? To answer these questions, the article assesses six human rights treaty regimes: the Council of Europe; the Organization of American States; the African Union; the Economic Community of West African States; the East African Community; and the Southern African Development Community. The article identifies four types of de-delegation possible with respect to international human rights courts and assesses the extent to which states have sought to de-delegate from them. With one exception (the SADC Tribunal), the regimes examined here have so far successfully withstood the challenge of de-delegation.     

Preventing construction deaths: The role of public policies

Are stronger direct financial incentives or regulatory enforcement effective in reducing fatalities in the construction industry? We examine two important policies—state workers' compensation (WC) programs and federal and state Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) activities—which embody those strategies. We examine their impact by looking at state-level fatality rates in the construction industry from 1992 to 2016. Setting aside highway crashes and violence, the majority of employee deaths occur in construction. We find that states which exempt small firms from the requirement to buy WC insurance have higher fatality rates. When eligibility for compensation is restricted by longer waiting periods, fatality rates are substantially higher. More frequent federal or state OSHA inspections and, especially, consultation visits are associated with lower fatality rates, but higher average penalties are not. Limited variation in these policies over our sample period, especially for WC, makes these results suggestive rather than definitively causal.