Guest editor's introduction

In 1933 the army of the nascent Iraqi state launched an exterminatory attack on members of the Assyrian community who had fled to Iraq during the First World War. 'The Assyrian affair' which at the time sent shock-waves around the world has now been largely forgotten. But an examination of its origins and causation reveals much about the nature and pattern of modern genocide. Levene argues that typecasting genocide as the outcome of prejudice, racism or even xenophobia, while these may be significant ingredients, proves to be insufficient as a comprehensive explanation. Rather, these factors need to be analysed within the context of an emerging international system of nation-states. This itself may be a factor in helping to catalyse the most extreme and radically ideological responses, especially from new and untried national elites seeking to overcome perceived obstacles to their state's development and genuine independence.     

Imagining modernity: the language and genealogy of modernity in nineteenth-century Arabic

This article employs the methodology of conceptual history to contest two of the most common theoretical approaches dominating our understanding of modernity in the field of Middle Eastern studies. The first approach relies on the assumption of incompatibility between modernity and Islam and captures Arab modernity using concepts such as ‘adoption’. The second understands Arab modernity through concepts such as ‘imitation’, contending that it is a legacy of Western imperialism. This article challenges both theories by examining the genealogy of tamaddun (civilization, being civilized), a pivotal concept used in nineteenth-century Arabic to imagine modernity. The genealogy of tamaddun elucidates that medieval paradigms derived from the concept of madina (polity) were rediscovered, reimagined, and reused in the context of the rise of the nation-state and the challenge of Western imperialism. The article suggests understanding Arab modernity and its critique from within, rather than outside of, the temporality of the historical condition.     

欲拒还迎：政治与法律关系的社会系统论分析

由于政治体制改革相对干经济体制改革的滞后性,政治在要求法律对私法关系进行整合的同时,却面临法律对具有政治意义的公法关系普遍化实施的合法性要求。政治系统一方面想利用法律来为自身赋予合法性以及对政治自身解决不了的社会冲突进行整合,另一方面又不愿意让法律独立运作以正常发挥功能。政治之所以对于法律有这种欲拒还迎的分裂与两难态度,原因在于法律系统的结构二重性：使动性与制约性。对于政治系统来说,法律结构扩展了权力的普遍有效性,而权力如要实现这一点又必须受法律结构的制约。为避免法律对政治权力的“合法／非法”二元规则化,政治系统设定政治禁忌,要求法律不得违反,但法律系统的二元规则化对于政治系统来说是难以任意伸缩的。     

市场规制中的执法权冲突及其解决路径

清晰的执法权配置是提高市场规制质量的首要条件。在我国竞争法实施过程中,频繁发生的执法权冲突现象严重影响着市场规制的质量。如何解决执法权冲突,是一个兼具理论和实践意义的课题。从程序主义视角,国务院相关部委和最高人民法院都难以从根本上解决这一）中突,只有全国人大常委会及其授权立法机构才是最合适的裁决者。从实体主义视角,构建公权力的横向配置理论才是解决执法权冲突的根本。该理论认为,执法权应当配置给能以最低的管理成本完成管理目标的主体。影响管理成本的核心要素包括规制机构的重置成本、信息获取成本、管制俘获和多元执法机构的协调成本,这些要素所组成的成本衡量体系是配置执法权的一个基本分析框架。     

The patterns and prevalence of mass murder in twentieth-century America

Even though previous research has not examined mass murder prior to 1965, scholars have asserted that the mid-1960s marked the onset of an unprecedented and ever-growing mass murder wave. Using news accounts and the FBI's Supplementary Homicide Reports (SHR) as sources of data, this study analyzes 909 mass killings that took place between 1900 and 1999. Although the mid-1960s marked the beginning of a mass murder wave, it was not unprecedented, because mass killings were nearly as common during the 1920s and 1930s. The results also show that familicides, the modal mass murder over the last several decades, were even more prevalent before the 1970s. Moreover, mass killers were older, more suicidal, and less likely to use guns in the first two-thirds of the 20th century. Although some have claimed that workplace massacres represent a new “strain” in mass murder, the findings suggest that the only new type of mass killing that emerged during the 20th century was the drug-related massacre.     

涉外同性婚姻法律适用问题研究

世界范围内,同性婚姻为一些国家法律认可的事实,与中国大陆对该身份领域的变化,仅存于学者呼吁应保护少数人人权的现状,则提出了在中国大陆涉外同性婚姻的法律适用问题。依据我国"涉外民事关系法律适用法"的有关规定,同性结合存在的客观事实,医学上界定其不是一种疾病的科学论断,及公平与正义、且具有全球视野的、与时俱进的现代意识,我们在法律观念与法律制度上应倾注切实可行的法律人文性。在一定的条件和法律环境下,适宜的冲突法或者直接调整方法运用于该领域,是保障人的自由权、契约身份权,维护依法设立的民事关系的稳定性,内外有别地对待与处理涉外民事身份关系的需要。     

中外防止公务员利益冲突制度之比较及启示

针对反腐败过程中出现的新情况、新问题,很有必要借鉴、学习国外防止利益冲突在立法方面的成功经验。本文从公务员利益冲突涉及的回避制度、兼职取酬制度、财产申报制度、禁止收受贿赂制度、岗位轮换制度、离职后的行为限制等主要方面进行了中外防止公务员利益冲突的制度比较。本文认为,借鉴发达国家在防止公务员利益冲突上的法律法规,可以弥补我国在防止公务员利益冲突方面的不足,从而使我国防止公务员利益冲突制度更加科学化和规范化。     

基于中阿合作视域的宁夏文化“走出去”战略探析

在中阿合作的进程中,宁夏文化的"走出去"是极其重要的,这是中阿合作的基础性和根本性工作。文化的"走出去",势必会深化中阿合作的内涵,丰富其内容,推动其不断走向更高的阶段,取得新的、更大的成效。因此,要明确中阿合作中宁夏文化"走出去"的重点领域,也要发挥政府在其中的主导作用。     

Toward multidimensional information: A derivatization-free UHPLC-QqQ MS/MS method for amino acid components of fingerprint

The analysis of fingerprint chemical composition is a meaningful way to excavate the multidimensional information of fingerprint, including the donor profiling information and the age of a fingerprint, which broadens the evidential values of fingerprint, especially for the partial and distorted fingerprint. But the research remains still in the pilot phases or is ongoing. Amino acids are the dominant organic substances in latent sweat fingerprint and influenced by many donor factors. Hence, their content reflects personal information of donors. Forensic science will be revolutionized if suspects can be individualized by their amino acid content. The diverse nature, distinct physicochemical properties, and ultra-micro levels of amino acids present in fingerprints make it hard to detect. A high sensitivity method for detecting and quantifying multiple amino acid components is required. UHPLC-QqQ MS/MS offers high sensitivity, high separation, simultaneous multicomponents detection, and no derivatization, making it an ideal method for detecting and analyzing amino acids in fingerprints. Therefore, in this study, we propose and validate an efficient UHPLC-QqQ MS/MS method for the extraction and analysis of 13 amino acids from fingerprint. We compared the results of amino acids of 10 different substrates and found that the inherent amino acids in most porous substrates would have been extracted along with the fingerprint amino acids, making them unsuitable for quantitative amino acid analysis. Instead, plastic sheets are ideal substrates for laboratory studies. Then, extensive experiments were conducted among 30 donors for multidimensional information analysis. The type of samples analyzed were eccrine-rich fingerprints. A Binary Logistic Regression (BLR) model was developed, and the female and male donors were successfully differentiated by amino acids in fingerprints. Two other mathematical models were also developed to verify the accuracy, and all three different mathematical models were able to identify donors of different genders with over 90% accuracy. This demonstrates that amino acids have the potential to provide more information for donors as metabolic markers. In the future, we will conduct a series of experiments to analyze more multidimensional information for individual identification by amino acid content in the fingerprint.     

Lethal Connections: The Determinants of Network Connections in the Provisional Irish Republican Army, 1970–1998

Using stochastic methods we illustrate that the Provisional Irish Republican Army's (PIRA) network is clustered along three primary dimensions: (a) brigade affiliation, (b) whether the member participated in violent activities, and (c) task/role within PIRA. While most brigades tended to foster connections within the brigade (that is, “closure”), the tendency to do so varied across the organization. Members who engaged with violent activities were far more likely to connect with each other; in later periods there is polarization into those who engage in violent activities and those who do not. Across brigades, those who engage in a particular task and role (improvised explosive device [IED] constructor, IED planter, gunman, robber/kidnapper/drug smuggler/hijacker) are more likely to connect with others who do the same task or play the same role than with other members who fulfill other roles. Standard forms of homophily (that is, the tendency to make connections with people who are similar in terms of demography or status) play a very weak role in explaining which members interact with one another. Finally, our analysis illustrates clear patterns of relational change that correspond to changes in the formal structures that PIRA's leadership promoted.