International Organizations and Government Killing: Does Naming and Shaming Save Lives?

Do international organizations affect government killing? Extant work has studied international organizations' effects on a set of human rights, but has not examined the abilities of specific actors to protect specific rights. I analyze naming and shaming by three types of international organizations (human rights nongovernmental organizations [NGOs], the news media, and the United Nations), focusing on their impacts on a single type of abuse: one-sided government killing. I present a principal-agent theory in which the government develops a preference for killing, and then delegates the murderous task to a set of individual perpetrators. The theory reveals new ways for international organizations to make killing costly, and statistical analyses support my expectations: By calling attention to abusive states, human rights NGOs and the United Nations can reduce both the likelihood and severity of state-sponsored murder. I also find that international organizations are better equipped to prevent killing from the beginning than to limit mounting body counts once it has begun.     

中国汉族女性青少年法医学活体骨龄推断数学模型的建立

目的建立推断中国汉族女性青少年活体骨龄的数学模型。方法摄取华中、华南及华东等地区的838名年龄介于11～20周岁正常女性青少年双侧锁骨胸骨端以及左侧肩、肘、腕、髋、膝、踝关节的X线片。依据青少年骨发育分级标准对24项骨骼发育指标进行阅片、分级,结合考虑身高、体质量及地区等影响因素．应用SAS8．1及SPSS11．0软件进行统计学处理,探索各指标与年龄的相关性。结果建立了我国汉族女性青少年利用锁骨胸骨端及6大关节骨骺闭合程度联合推断活体年龄的多元回归数学模型．推导出判定我国汉族女性青少年是否已满14、16和18周岁的Fisher’S两类判别分析方程。结论本研究所建立的判定活体年龄的数学模型丰富了活体年龄的法医学鉴定方法,有利于提高活体骨龄鉴定方法的科学性和结论的准确性。     

How you can tell if the simulations in computational criminology are any good

Computational criminology applies computer simulations to study topics of interest for criminologists. Just as for all computer modelling in science, the validity of the simulations ultimately depends on whether they are able to reproduce empirical phenomena with sufficient accuracy. The only way in which this can be determined is by comparing model output to real observations. This paper provides an overview of how such model evaluations can be undertaken.

中国城市化进程与犯罪率之间关系的实证研究——基于结构突变的协整分析

在我国城市化发展进程中,伴随着犯罪率的显著上升,二者具有显著的长期趋势的一致性和短期波动的差异性。＂严打＂运动的外部冲击对协整模型具有显著的结构影响,＂严打＂运动在短期也起到了遏制犯罪的震慑效果。     

The rise of the ‘China Model’ and ‘Beijing Consensus’: evidence of authoritarian diffusion?

The rise of authoritarian great powers has raised questions about the dominance of the liberal democratic model and has led to a perception that the relative balance between democracy and authoritarianism is shifting. Consequently, there is increasing interest in and concerns about the diffusion of alternative ‘models’ of political and economic development. Given that China's impressive economic development has led to growing military strength and geopolitical prestige, evaluating perceptions of the legitimacy, effectiveness, and applicability of that country's model of ‘illiberal capitalism’ is a good place to start. This paper evaluates whether the ‘China Model’ or ‘Beijing Consensus' is gaining traction internationally through a content analysis of eight years of US and non-US media sources. It finds that concerns about the beginnings of an anti-democratic ‘reverse wave’ are exaggerated and that at the present time there does not appear to be a decisive shift in favour of a model of authoritarian-capitalism.     

A test of the stability of punishment hypothesis: The Dutch case

This paper tests the hypothesis of the stability of punishment as developed by Blumstein and his associates against Dutch prison data. After summarizing the existing empirical evidence, Dutch prison data are presented pertaining to the average daily population in penal institutions, on the one hand, and the number of admissions in these institutions, on the other hand. In three ways it is tested whether these data do support the hypothesis: regression analysis, Box-Jenkins analysis, and the analysis of a few dynamic models as presented by Berket al. (1981). The paper ends with discussing Blumstein's hypothesis and considers the way research into the extent of the prison population should be continued.     

Justice and emotional reactions to the disadvantaged

Various attitutidinal, cognitive, emotional, and actional reactions to problems and needs of less fortunate people (unemployed, poor people in the developing countries, foreign workers in West Germany) were assessed in a questionnaire study with 865 respondents. The external validity of self-report data was established by external ratings. The focus was on emotional reactions (existential guilt, sympathy, moral outrage because of unjust disadvantages, anger about the disadvantaged, contentment with one's own advantages, fear of losing these, hopelessness with respect to the fate of the less fortunate). Several justice-related variables (beliefs, views, appraisals) as well as responsibility-related variables and social attitudes were assessed as predictors of emotions. The importance of justice-related variables for the arousal of different social emotions was clearly shown. The use and usefulness of cognitive models of discrete emotions is discussed. The impact of emotions on the readiness to various forms of prosocial activities in favor of the less fortunate was also shown: Moral outrage and existential guilt proved to be much more salient predictors than sympathy. Crucial differences between these three prosocial emotions as well as the impact of justice-related variables on readiness to prosocial activities are discussed.     

The measurement of specialization and escalation in the criminal career: An alternative modeling strategy

Recent research using indices of specialization and escalation, such as the forward specialization coefficient and the escalation coefficient, have generally shown that repeat offenders tend to commit the same type or a more serious type of crime on successive arrests. Unfortunately, there are two important limitations to the use of specialization and escalation indices: (1) the meaning and interpretation of the coefficients is often unclear, and (2) the coefficients cannot be tested for statistical significance across groups. In an attempt to account for these limitations and to extend prior research in this area, this paper applies a class of log-linear models developed for studying social mobility tables with matched categories (for one or more groups) to crime-type switching tables. The benefits of using these models, in comparison with prior specialization and escalation research, are that the parameter estimates can be interpreted directly as tests of specialization and escalation in a meaningful way and the parameter estimates can be tested for equality across groups, such as age, race, and gender. The application and interpretation of these models are illustrated with arrest data from a sample of felony offenders in Michigan.     

Surface Curvature of Pelvic Joints from Three Laser Scanners: Separating Anatomy from Measurement Error

Recent studies have reported that quantifying symphyseal and auricular surface curvature changes on 3D models acquired by laser scanners has a potential for age estimation. However, no tests have been carried out to evaluate the repeatability of the results between different laser scanners. 3D models of the two pelvic joints were generated using three laser scanners (Custom, Faro, and Minolta). The surface curvature, the surface area, and the distance between co‐registered meshes were investigated. Close results were found for surface areas (differences between 0.3% and 2.4%) and for distance deviations (average <20 μm, SD <200 μm). The curvature values were found to be systematically biased between different laser scanners, but still showing similar trends with increasing phases/scores. Applying a smoothing factor to the 3D models, it was possible to separate anatomy from the measurement error of each instrument, so that similar curvature values could be obtained (p < 0.05) independent of the specific laser scanner.     

Gender Determination of Adult Individuals by Three‐Dimensional Modeling of Canines

Gender determination is a fundamental issue in forensic anthropology. Many techniques based on bone and dental remains have been proposed. It is not always possible to implement the techniques using bones, but teeth are often perfectly preserved. It has been demonstrated that the canine has the greatest sexual dimorphism, and the aim of this work was to provide an easy and accurate dental technique for determining the gender in the absence of other skeletal elements. The sample was composed of 210 CT scans with four healthy canines. The 840 canines were modeled using MIMICS^® 10.01 software. The total volume of each tooth was determined. Seven mathematical models were determined by binary logistic regressions and ranked in order of relative performance. The seven proposed predictive models thus performed (0.910 ≤ AUC ≤ 0.938), with overall rates of correct predictions between 82.38 and 85.24%. The 4‐canine model is the most powerful for predicting the gender.