Politics, culture, and political crime: Covariates of abortion clinic attacks in the United States

This study examined crime and violence against abortion clinics, testing elements of several theories that may help explain the variation of such attacks. The study theoretically and methodologically improved upon the prior research on abortion-related crime and violence. Theoretically, it investigated previously unexamined hypotheses from the social movement literature that may be relevant to this type of behavior. Methodologically, it used more careful measures for several variables, employed unique and heretofore ignored data bases, and examined hundreds of criminal acts across several types of crime (e.g., violence, vandalism, and harassment) directed at abortion clinics. Employing robust logistic regression and correcting for clustering of clinics by state, the study investigated the cross-sectional effects of state-level cultural and structural characteristics on anti-abortion crimes against clinics and staff. Results indicated that some crimes against clinics are more likely in areas where female empowerment is weaker, female victimization is more tolerated, and the anti-abortion movement has failed to reduce abortions.     

Book reviews

Handbook of Legal Information Retrieval Edited by J Bing, Norwegian Research Centre for Computers and Law, Oslo, in co‐operation with T Fjeldvig, T Harvold and R Svoboda North‐Holland 1984, US $96.25

Information Technology: The Challenge to Copyright. James Lahore, Gerald Dworkin and Yvonne Smyth Sweet & Maxwell and The Centre for Commercial Law Studies 1984, £12.00

Data Processing and the Law Edited by Colin Campbell Sweet and Maxwell 1984, £20.00

Le droit des Contrats Informatiques — Principes — Applications Centre de Recherches informatique et droit des Facultes Universitaires de Namur Maison Ferdinand Larder (Brussels), 1983, 45 FB

Computer Insecurity Adrian R.D. Norman Chapman and Hall 1983, £14.95

The Data Protection Act Richard Sizer and Philip Newman Gower Publishing, 1984, £16.95

The Data Protection Act 1984 Professor Bryan Niblett Oyez Longman Publishing, 1984, £18.00

The Data Protection Act 1984 — A Guide to the New Legislation J. A. L. Sterling CCH Editions, 1984, £15.00

Privacy and Data Protection — An International Bibliography Professor David H. Flaherty Mansell Publishing, 1984, £23.50

Computer Contracts R Morgan & G Stedman Oyez Longman Publishing 1984, 2nd Edition, £27.50

Computer Contracts Handbook Michele Rennie Sweet & Maxwell 1984, £15.00

Computer Contracts — An International Guide to Agreements and Software Protection Hilary Pearson Financial training 1984, £14.95     

Reviews

Susan Gross Solomon (ed.), Beyond Sovietology: Essays in Politics and History. New York and London: M.E. Sharpe, 1993, 254 pp., £38.00.

Alice H. Amsden, Jacek Kochanowicz & Lance Taylor, The Market Meets Its Match. Restructuring the Economics of Eastern Europe. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994, 250 pp.

Robert E. Ebel, Energy Choices in Russia. Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies, 1994, xii + 152 pp., $16.95.

Michael Waller, The End of the Communist Power Monopoly. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1993, viii + 287 pp., £35.00 h/b., £9.99 p/b.

Minxin Pei, From Reform to Revolution: The Demise of Communism in China and the Soviet Union. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994, 253 pp., £29.95.

William G. Rosenberg & Lewis H. Siegelbaum (eds), Social Dimensions of Soviet Industrialisation. Bloomington and Indianapolis, IN: Indiana University Press, 1993, xix + 296 pp., £12.99 p/b.

Taras Kuzio & Andrew Wilson, Ukraine: Perestroika to Independence. Basingstoke: Macmil‐lan Press, 1994, xiv + 260 pp., £40.00.

Russell F. Farnen (ed.), Nationalism, Ethnicity, and Identity. Cross National and Comparative Perspectives. New Brunswick, NJ, and London: Transaction, 1994, xiv + 538 pp., £49.95.

Edwin Thomas Bacon, The Gulag at War: Stalin's Forced Labour System in the Light of Archives. Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1994, xii + 190 pp.

Robert S. Ross, China, the United States and the Soviet Union: Tripolarity and Policy Making in the Cold War. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1993, x + 204 pp., £42.00.     

Who are the Darfurians? Arab and African identities, violence and external engagement

This article examines processes of identity formation in Darfur,now part of the Republic of Sudan, over the last four centuries.The basic story is of four overlapping processes of identityformation, each of them primarily associated with a differentperiod in the region's history: namely, the ‘Sudanic identities’associated with the Dar Fur sultanate, Islamic identities, theadministrative tribalism associated with the twentieth-centurySudanese state, and the recent polarization of ‘Arab’and ‘African’ identities, associated with new formsof external intrusion and internal violence. It is a story thatemphasizes the much-neglected east-west axis of Sudanese identity,arguably as important as the north-south axis, and redeems theneglect of Darfur as a separate and important locus for stateformation in northern Sudan, paralleling and competing withthe Nile Valley states. It focuses on the incapacity of boththe modern Sudanese state and international actors to comprehendthe singularities of Darfur, accusing much Sudanese historiographyof ‘Nilocentrism’, namely, the use of analyticalterms derived from the experience of the Nile Valley to applyto Darfur.