INCOME INEQUALITY,RACE, AND PLACE: DOES THE DISTRIBUTION OF RACE AND CLASS WITHIN NEIGHBORHOODS AFFECT CRIME RATES?*

This study tests the effects of neighborhood inequality and heterogeneity on crime rates. The results of this study, which were obtained by using a large sample of census tracts in 19 cities in 2000, provide strong evidence of the importance of racial/ethnic heterogeneity for the amount of all types of crime generally committed by strangers, even controlling for the effects of income inequality. Consistent with predictions of several theories, greater overall inequality in the tract was associated with higher crime rates, particularly for violent types of crime. Strong evidence revealed that within racial/ethnic group inequality increases crime rates: Only the relative deprivation model predicted this association. An illuminating finding is that the effect of tract poverty on robbery and murder becomes nonsignificant when the level of income inequality is taken into account; this finding suggests that past studies that failed to take income inequality into account may have inappropriately attributed causal importance to poverty. This large sample also provides evidence that it is the presence of homeowners, rather than residential stability (as measured by the average length of residence), that significantly reduces the level of crime in neighborhoods.     

提高工具痕迹实验课效果的思考

教师要根据工具痕迹学实验课的目的,注重加强学生动手操作能力,注重实验课内容的创新,在传统工具痕迹实验方法的基础上,提高教学效果。     

马来西亚的马来人教育：发展与影响

本文试图从马来人的角度,探讨马来西亚族群教育及其对社会发展的影响,分析马来西亚政府的马来人教育政策,包括教育马来化、高等教育优先、财政支持等,分析马来人普及教育和高等教育的发展,以及教育发展对马来人职业和收入的影响。本文认为,马来人教育发展及随之而至的相对畅通的社会流动机制,在某种程度上有利于各族群和睦相处和社会稳定发展,如果政府在教育资源的分配上,能公平对待其他族群,族群之间的关系将更融合,社会发展也将更稳定。     

附保护第三人作用合同研究——兼论建设工程施工合同对第三人效力的法理依据

为了加强对第三人的法律救济,德国判例创设了附保护第三人作用合同。根据该制度产生和发展的原因及其在德国法上的价值,并结合我国现行法与最高人民法院扩张了建筑工程施工合同对第三人的效力,我国目前应当有选择地引进该制度,通过合理地限制第三人的范围,从而完善保护第三人的法律制度。     

票据变造若干问题解析

票据变造作为票据实践中的突出现象 ,客观上要求对其构成要件、法律效果和付款责任加以清楚的界定。本文通过学说考辨和实务分析 ,明确提出票据变造之二构成要件说 ,并据此详细论述了票据变造的积极效果和消极效果 ,票据变造之付款与损失之负担等相关问题     

Participatory effects of regional authority: decentralisation and political participation in comparative perspective

This article studies political participation in the context of decentralisation in Europe. Recent secession attempts demonstrate how the demand for decentralisation energises citizens. Yet the fact that decentralised institutions, initially, were endorsed to increase citizens’ participation is often neglected. In order to test this contention empirically, three theoretically informed arguments are developed, making use of the most recent data on regional authority for 282 regions in 20 European countries. Results of three-level hierarchical models lend support to the arguments. Regional self-rule increases probabilities to engage only in more demanding and less common forms of participation. It also acts as a political opportunity structure, moderating the influence of individual driving forces of participation. Participatory effects on protest activity, however, turn out to be endogenous, as the instrumental variable analysis indicates that decentralisation does not increase protest, but rather the reverse. These findings seem relevant to the current heated debates both on secession attempts and waning political involvement.     

Context Effects in Forensic Entomology and Use of Sequential Unmasking in Casework

Context effects are pervasive in forensic science, and are being recognized by a growing number of disciplines as a threat to objectivity. Cognitive processes can be affected by extraneous context information, and many proactive scientists are therefore introducing context‐minimizing systems into their laboratories. Forensic entomologists are also subject to context effects, both in the processes they undertake (e.g., evidence collection) and decisions they make (e.g., whether an invertebrate taxon is found in a certain geographic area). We stratify the risk of bias into low, medium, and high for the decisions and processes undertaken by forensic entomologists, and propose that knowledge of the time the deceased was last seen alive is the most potentially biasing piece of information for forensic entomologists. Sequential unmasking is identified as the best system for minimizing context information, illustrated with the results of a casework trial (n = 19) using this approach in Victoria, Australia.     

Can whale-fall studies inform human forensics?

Experimental knowledge of human body decomposition in the deep ocean is very limited, partly due to the logistical challenges of deep-sea research. The literature on ecological responses to the arrival of naturally sunk and implanted whale carcasses on the seafloor represents a potential source of information relevant to questions of human body survival and recovery in the deep ocean. Whale falls trigger the formation of complex, localized, and dense biological communities that have become a point of interest for marine biologists for the past 2–3 decades. Researchers have documented whale falls by whale type, size, geographic location, water depth and water chemistry, and there have been some comparative analyses of decomposition rates and faunal presence on carcasses. We undertook a review and meta-analysis of the whale-fall literature to identify and statistically model trends relevant to human forensics. Results from studies using deep-sea cameras baited with pig carcasses and simulated carrion provided further validation of noted trends. The stages of whale carcass decomposition most relevant to human forensics are those characterised by mobile scavengers that strip the soft tissues from carcasses, and to a lesser degree, other biota that degrade skeletal material. Our statistical models used the number of faunal taxa attracted to the whale carcasses as a measure of the ecological response and the potential rate of decomposition. Negative binomial models identified significant influences of carcass age and dissolved oxygen concentration on the ecological response (taxon numbers). The strongest environmental effects were identified in data from experimental studies that implanted whale carcasses across a broad range of dissolved-oxygen conditions. We propose directions for further experimental research to refine models of environmental controls on decomposition in the deep sea. Our results also highlight the potential use of publicly available global databases on environmental conditions in the deep ocean for informing body scavenging activity and thus body survival. Applying a forensic lens to whale-fall studies provides a window into an otherwise unseen world from the standpoint of human forensic taphonomy.     

Diffuse reflectance infrared Fourier transform spectroscopy (DRIFTS) detection limits for blood on fabric: Orientation and coating uniformity effects

Diffuse reflectance infrared Fourier transform spectroscopy (DRIFTS) was used to analyze four types of forensically relevant fabrics coated with varying dilutions of blood. The blood was applied in two manners, dip coating with a smooth and uniform layer and drip coating with droplets from pipettes. Spectra of neat and dip coated fabrics were acquired using controlled orientations, and these were compared to spectra collected on samples with random orientations. The improved reproducibility seen in visual inspection of the spectra is confirmed by principal component and linear discriminant projections of the spectra, as well as by statistical hypothesis testing. Principal component regression (PCR), using the regions of the IR spectra associated with the amide A/B, I, II, and III vibrational bands (3500–2800, 1650, 1540, and 1350 cm⁻¹), was employed on the more uniform dip coated spectra to estimate limits of detection for blood on two of the four fabrics – acrylic and nylon. These results demonstrate that detection limits for blood on fabrics can be decreased significantly by controlling for the orientation and face of the fabric samples while collecting spectra. Limits of detection for acrylic and nylon were found to be 196 × and 227 × diluted blood, respectively.     

影响司法效果的因素分析

司法效果包括法律效果与社会效果。作为法律功能实现程度的具体表现,司法效果反映的是一个法域司法运行的整体状况。通过对司法效果进行科学评价,人们可以掌握法律对社会需要的反映程度,社会对法律的认识和遵守程度,司法裁判的公正程度等,它是立法完善和司法改革的重要依据。阐明宏观因素与微观因素对司法效果的影响,有助于设计司法效果的实现路径。