Here we go round the review-go-round: Rape investigation and prosecution—are things getting worse not better?

Abstract

Despite numerous reviews, reports and commissions of inquiry, the investigation and prosecution of rape cases remains fraught. Victims are still ambivalent about reporting incidents of sexual violence, while those who do often struggle to be believed and have their cases progress through justice systems. This paper explores some of the reasons why promised reforms materialise so rarely into tangible benefits for the majority of rape complainants, and focuses on six areas: reporting, attrition, adversarial justice systems, victim support, specialisation and attitudes. These are canvassed with particular reference to examples from England and New Zealand demonstrating the barriers to substantive reform and the ways in which gender inequalities and patriarchal beliefs continue to impact upon both the prevalence of sexual violence as well as state responses to its occurrence. The paper contains a cautionary message regarding the potential dangers involved in accepting the rhetoric of reform while the underlying realities remain little changed.     

关于列宁遗产的传承问题

列宁将马克思主义运用于俄国革命实际,创建了世界上第一个社会主义国家苏联,在世界社会主义运动史上,把社会主义从理论推向在各民族国家实践的阶段。限于时、空条件,以及英年早逝的不幸自然因素,列宁来不及认识和实现社会主义国家从准军事体制到常态的转轨。从大历史的视角看,新社会制度建立之初,国家都曾实施准军事体制,以求迅速巩固新的社会制度。但是,新社会制度的优越性,只有当国家从准军事体制转轨到常态之后,才能发挥与体现出来。20世纪世界社会主义运动的曲折,概由于社会主义国家没有及时实现转轨。传承列宁的遗产,关键在于完成列宁未能完成的工作,实现国家从准军事体制到常态的转轨。苏共没能正确传承列宁的遗产,因而丢失了列宁的遗产。建设中国特色社会主义,从国家层面看,实乃建设常态社会主义国家。     

The Process Model of Closure and Nonprofits: The Exit of Exit Art

Experts think of arts nonprofits as fragile organizations, prone to closure. Despite these predictions, little research has been completed on the process of closure within these organizations. I leverage a comprehensive organizational database and seventeen in-depth interviews with staff and board members to understand the process of closing New York's Exit Art. I explore the value of Sutton's (1987) process model, and its application to nonprofits by Duckles et al. (2014), to analyze the case. This study offers novel insights into management practices that may benefit nonprofits in the future, and interest scholars who study management transitions and organizational closure.     

An economic appraisal of the Egyptian revolution

Historical research, mainly focused on early-modern Europe, has suggested a positive link between taxation and democracy. This study approaches the connection in a present-day developmental context by looking at differences between taxpayers and non-taxpaying citizens in terms of political interest, a precondition for accountability demands. Using survey data from sub-Saharan Africa, a multilevel analysis shows that taxpaying increases political interest. The causal direction of this finding is confirmed through an instrumental variable analysis. The results support the existence of the mechanisms underlying the theory of taxation working as a generator of political engagement and democracy.     

How to read Michelle Obama

ABSTRACT

Michelle Obama's role as the first African American First Lady is more than merely symbolic. Her self-representation as a professional woman, mother and spouse is directed towards a wider representativeness that is new in American political discourse. As a descendant of slaves and slave owners whose American ancestry can be traced back to the 1850s, she can lay claim to an African American legacy that the President lacks. As a result, some of her more controversial statements during the presidential campaign about the black family, class mobility and national pride need to be read in the context of an African American literature and historiography that challenges the American creed of equality, liberty and unconditional love of one's country. Michelle Obama's family history, her Princeton undergraduate thesis and her own words in interviews are analysed here in the discursive context of Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man, Toni Morrison's Beloved, Richard Powers's The Time of Our Singing, and Harriet Jacobs's Incidents in the Life of a Slave-girl, as well as the historiography of the civil rights movement. Such a reading reveals how Michelle Obama's background weaves the legacy of slavery into the American fabric, and shows that a redemptive construction of American history—in which the success of the civil rights movement of the 1960s and the Obama presidency are taken as fulfilment of the American creed (and of Martin Luther King's dream)—must be refused if a new national self-definition with African America at its heart is to take its place.     

中国近代遗产税立法及司法实践研究

遗产税的征收具有悠久的历史,近代以来西方各国普遍实行遗产税。我国1927年南京国民政府成立后,在孙中山"节制资本"思想的影响下,先后制定过三部遗产税法案,构建了较为完备的遗产税法体系。南京国民政府时期遗产税法的实施,一定程度上发挥了调节社会财富贫富不均、消除阶级对立、改良社会风气的作用,也一定程度上缓解了中国抗战时期财政经费紧张的局面。遗产税是一种良税,未来我国在制定遗产税法时,应认真总结和借鉴南京国民政府时期遗产税法立法和司法实践的经验。     

孔子军事文化遗产与传承

孔子是中国春秋末期的大思想家和教育家。他所创立的儒家学说在中国文明发展史有着十分重要的地位,是中华文化的重要组成部分。孔子的军事思想就文化层面来讲也是一份厚重的文化遗产,这一点有时会被忽视。本文首先从史籍记载的孔子的家世、生平活动、教育成就等方面考证孔子的军事造诣。详细论述了以“仁哉”、“慎战”、“教战”为特色的孔子军事文化遗产与后世传承。     

The role of peace journalism in the deconstruction of elections and the “national question” in Nigeria

Nigeria, a very fragile country, is constantly teetering towards dissolution. For several decades post-independence, the country has been plagued by protracted disputations among the diverse ethnic nationalities, which have been attributed to the inadvertent merger of the Northern and Southern protectorates in 1914 by the British colonialists. Since the merger, there has been intense unrest among the various ethnic groups with tensions for greater resource control and self-determination. The country has also witnessed the intense politicisation of religion in ways that have continued to aggravate the deepening antagonism between Christians and Muslims, further broadening already existing fault lines. The longdrawn-out bickering has led to calls for a renegotiation of the terms of cohabitation among the various ethnic nationalities; and this has given rise to the “national question”, a term used to describe the quest to review the dilemmas associated with accommodating multipleidentity communities within the framework of a single, integrated, national political system. This article argues that traditional media reportage of the “national question” in Nigeria has been more divisive than uniting. The article proposes the adoption of a peace journalism approach to reporting the “national question” to ensure that members of the various ethnic nationalities consider and value non-violent responses to conflict.     

Regional power South Africa: Co-operative hegemony constrained by historical legacy

This article argues that regional powers can be distinguished by four pivotal criteria: claim to leadership, power resources, employment of foreign policy instruments, and acceptance of leadership. Applying these criteria to the South African case, the crucial significance of institutional foreign policy instruments for the power over policy outcomes at the regional and global level is demonstrated. But although Pretoria is ready to pay the costs of co-operative hegemony (capacity building for regional institutions and peacekeeping for instance), the regional acceptance of South African leadership is constrained by its historical legacy. Additionally Pretoria's foreign policy is based on ideational resources such as its reputation as an advocate of democracy and human rights and its paradigmatic behaviour as a ‘good global citizen’ with the according legitimacy. The Mbeki presidency was more successful in converting these resources into discursive instruments of interest-assertion in global, than in regional bargains. In effect the regional power's reformist south-oriented multilateralism is challenging some of the guiding principles of the current international system.