Morphometric Analysis of the Neurocranium in an Adult South African Cadaveric Sample,

Craniometric studies of South Africans yield high accuracies of sex and ancestry classification, but most assess only inter‐group variation of Black and White individuals, excluding the highly heterogeneous Colored group, which constitute a significant proportion of the population. This study applied a geometric morphometric approach to the neurocrania of 774 Black, Colored, and White individuals to assess sex and ancestry estimation accuracy based on the detected morphological variation. Accuracies of 70% and 83% were achieved for sex and ancestry, respectively, with ancestry‐related variation contributing the largest proportion of overall observed variation. Even when comparing the closely related Black and Colored groups, relatively high accuracies were obtained. It is thus recommended that a similar approach be used to develop a contemporary three‐dimensional database, which can be used to objectively, reliably, and accurately classify unknown remains in the South African forensic context.     

Small enough to fail: the structural irrelevance of the small state as cause of its elimination and proliferation since Westphalia

Since the Peace of Westphalia, few great powers have “died”, while the “death rate” and proliferation of small states has been dramatic at times. What causes these fluctuations? In this paper, I claim that the dominant reason for the extinction, emergence and proliferation of the small state over the last three and a half centuries is to be found at the system level. Ultimately, small state survival is determined by the particular set-up of the state system. I advance this argument from the perspective of international relations theory, integrating the relevant scholarship of the English School and realism, especially structural realism. The latter’s systemic perspective provides the basis for arguing that small states are structurally irrelevant. It is this feature of the small state, its irrelevance with regard to the power-based structure of the state system, which has caused the small state to “struggle for existence” in the past, and which has allowed small states to proliferate during the bipolar Cold War.     

U.S. Prosecution of State and Local Officials for Political Corruption: Is the Bureaucracy Out of Control in a High-Stakes Operation Involving the Constitutional System?

Perhaps the most serious and disabling federal intrusion ofrecent years into the independent political status of stateand local governments has been actions by the U.S. governmentto prosecute elected state and local officials and their closeassociates for local political corruption. In 1986 U.S. Attorneysin New York, Boston, District of Columbia, Pennsylvania, andelsewhere pursued such investigations and prosecutions withunusual vigor. These activities have a recent genesis—since1974—and they are basically unauthorized, in importantrespects out of control, and overall questionable in terms ofthe federal nature of our constitutional system. These findingsare supported by data from the Public Integrity Section of theCriminal Division and the Office for U.S. Attorneys, both inthe Department of Justice, and by opinions of U.S. courts, legislativehistories of bills and statutes, and sources on criminal lawand political corruption.     

“The European Union, Vietnam, and Human Rights as Law: the case of the 1995 EU–Vietnam framework agreement and its human rights clause.”

The year 1995 marked a major watershed for modern Vietnam. It completed its post-Cold War strategy of “multilateralizing” its foreign policy by joining ASEAN, normalizing relations with the US, and signing a comprehensive framework agreement with the EU. All three are recognized as major accomplishments for modern Vietnamese diplomacy. However, in the EU–Vietnam framework agreement, Hanoi made an unprecedented concession when it agreed to the human rights clause in the treaty. For the very first time, Vietnam had accepted an explicit, legally binding stipulation on human rights in a bilateral treaty. This remarkable development resulted from the confluence of three major dynamics. First, Hanoi had committed itself to establish sound relations with all major economic centers-of-gravity at the time, ASEAN, the US, and the EU. Second, the EU also was keenly interested in stronger relations with Asian countries but was flexible about prioritizing any particular bilateral relationship. Third, Brussels’ diplomats had to work off a treaty template when negotiating fundamental bilateral agreements. The standard EU framework agreement at the time included a human rights clause. In 1995, the EU was insisting that any treaty with Vietnam would have to include a clause on human rights. Initially, Hanoi rejected such a treaty provision, and the negotiations stalled. However, when Hanoi realized that Brussels felt no urgency to complete the treaty and was unable to compromise on human rights, Vietnam’s leadership reconsidered. In order to complete the strategy of “multilateralizing” its international affairs, Vietnam had to accept the human rights clause in the treaty with the EU.     

Eyewitness identification: Simulating the “Weapon effect”

The present experiment investigates the effect of weapons on eyewitness recall and recognition using a new experimental paradigm in which a syringe serves as weapon simulation. Contrary to previous weapon manipulations using slides or films of armed targets, the syringe paradigm is personally threatening to the subject. In a 2×2 design, 86 nonpsychology students were approached by an experimenter who was either holding a syringe or a pen and either did or did not threaten to administer an injection. Exposure to the syringe greatly decreased lineup recognition,p<.05, while enhancing the accuracy of recall for hand cues,p<.05. Contrary to predictions derived from the cue utilization hypothesis, threat of injection was not found to interact with the syringe manipulation. Investigation of individual differences indicated greater accuracy of recall for facial details the lower the subjects' fear of injections and the greater their cognitive abilities (closure and memory).This research project was supported in part by a grant of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft to Günther Köhnken. The authors would like to thank Gabriele Knaab, Gabriele Dieckmann, and Ursula Dannenberg for ably conducting the research.     

Groupthink and Terrorist Radicalization

Why do groups adopt terrorism? Major theories of terrorist radicalization assume it to be a rational process whereby groups select terrorism as the policy most likely to advance their goals. Not all terrorism is rational, however, and these theories cannot explain cases when groups pursue terrorism despite it being self-defeating. We distinguish between rational and irrational terrorism, and explain the latter using social psychology's groupthink mechanism. Although terrorists are widely assumed to be vulnerable to groupthink, empirical work on the phenomenon has focused overwhelmingly on decision-making by national executives. We firmly establish the link between groupthink and terrorist radicalization by tracing groupthink's operation through the development of the Weather Underground, an American terrorist group that emerged in the late 1960s and conducted six years of bombings against the U.S. government. All of the antecedent conditions, symptoms, and decision-making defects predicted by groupthink are evident in the Weather Underground, providing valuable evidence of the dangers of irrational radicalization and offering lessons for its prevention.