Corporate liability for environmental harm

Book synopsis; This wide-ranging and comprehensive Handbook examines recent developments in international environmental law (IEL) and the crossover effects of this expansion on other areas of public law, such as trade law and law of the sea. The contributors offer analysis on foundational issues in IEL, such as responsibility for environmental damage, sustainable development and the precautionary principle, alongside studies in topical subject areas like marine protection and the law of international watercourses

Reading the story of law and embeddedness through a community lens: A Polanyi-meets-Cotterrell economic sociology of law?

In this article I propose that the role of law in Karl Polanyi’s concept of the “always embedded economy”1 can be enriched by the application of the “lens of community”2developed by Roger Cotterrell.3I begin with Polanyi’s suggestion that economic action and interaction are always “embedded” in wider social life. Reading through the lens of community, we can be more specific: any actor is at once engaged, to different degrees (from fleeting to stable), in multiple types (whether focusing on instrumental, traditional, affective and/or belief-based action) of social life. I then explore a second, implicit, cornerstone of Polanyi’s argument: that analytical and normative approaches to economy may become disembedded from wider social life. Reading through the lens of community we can again be more specific: in the transformation to a market society, the analytical and normative approaches that are central to economic actions and interactions are confused with, and privileged over, those that are central to non-economic actions and interactions. This confusion and privileging can have what we might call a performative effect on action and interaction. Finally, I explore Polanyi’s story of law as a facilitator both of disembedding movements and of re-embedding counter- movements. The application of a law-and-community lens suggests some additional details of that storyline and that there are additional plotlines to be pursued. The practical potential of this Polanyi-meets-Cotterrell economic sociology of law is briefly illustrated with references to two twenty-first-century cautionary tales: the World Bank’s investment climate programme and the 2008 financial crisis

Global business, local law: the Indian legal system as a communal resource in foreign investment relations

This volume establishes a theoretical framework for exploring the role of host state legal systems (courts and bureaucracies) in mediating relations between foreign investment, civil society and government actors. It then demonstrates the application of that framework in the context of the south Indian city of Bengaluru (formerly Bangalore). Drawing on the 'law-and-community' approach of Roger Cotterrell, the volume identifies three mechanisms through which law might, in theory, ensure that social relations are productive: by expressing any mutual trust which may hold actors together, by ensuring that actors participate fully in social life and by coordinating the differences that hold actors apart. Empirical data reveals that each of these legal mechanisms is at work in Bengaluru. However, their operation is limited and skewed by the extent to which actors use, abuse and/or avoid them. Furthermore, these legal mechanisms are being eroded as a direct result of the World Bank's 'investment climate' discourse, which privileges the interests and values of foreign investors over those of other actors. Book description from publisher website at: http://www.ashgate.com

Demonstration of earlier detection of Salmonella species from stool samples by using chromogenic media

Background: Salmonellosis is a worldwide public health issue and non-typhoid species are one of the most common causative agents of gastroenteritis in the western world.1 Typhoidal and Paratyphoidal salmonellae cause systemic syndromes characterised by sustained bacteraemia.2 Although the number of cases is under reported and therefore the incidence rates are underestimated,3 worldwide up to 1.3 billion non-typhoidal and an estimated 20 million typhoidal cases of Salmonella infection are reported annually.4,

Making sociolegal research more social by design: Anglo-German roots, rewards and risks

In this moment of ‘social distancing’ the need for sociologically-informed approaches to understanding, responding to and shaping our changing world has never been clearer. This paper makes the case for a sociologically-informed approaches to legal design. It argues, firstly, that sociologically-informed approaches allow us to conceptualise legal design as aform of social relations, and that this opens the door to understanding the roles of legal design in social relations, and the potential of legal design to work for particular forms of social relations. Secondly, it argues that sociologically-informed approaches emphasise the social dimensions of doing legal design, focusing on one emergent field of legal design—that is, the application of designerly ways in a sociolegal research context

Factors Influencing Teachers\u27 Decisions to Refer Students for Special Education Evaluation

This study examined the factors that influence teachers to refer students for psycho-educational evaluation. Fifty seven teachers from Midwest and Southwest suburban and rural school districts completed a questionnaire designed to gather information about the factors teachers consider when referring students for evaluation, as well as their opinion of the etiology of Learning Disability and their preferences for services. Results indicated that the most influential factors in participants\u27 referral decisions were low achievement and behavioral problems. The majority of teachers agreed that eligibility decisions should be based on the child\u27s needs. However, there was no agreement that an ability-achievement discrepancy accurately identifies Learning Disabled students. Further, brain dysfunction and genetics were implicated as the cause of LD, and most teachers preferred mainstreaming for students with mild LD

Collecting value/valuing collecting

A visual essay exploring the concept of value in the context of a special issue on value

The Union Idea in 21st Century America

This project explores the development of the “union idea” and its role in low wage labor markets in the 21st Century. The labor question became a central issue in the early 20th century because its solution seemed essential to the survival of American democracy itself: could a society based on wage labor provide a rising standard of living and full social participation for those workers? For a time during and after World War II the “union idea” - workplace democracy, working class solidarity, and the allocation of resources partly on a social rather than a market basis – became a widely accepted solution to the labor question. From the 1950s on however, management successfully limited union expansion and circumscribed labor’s power. Unions and policymakers contributed to this decline in the union idea by pressing for firm rather than government provided social benefits and by suggesting a false parity between labor and capital. Despite the widespread belief that the US solved its labor problem and that the union idea is a relic, recent developments in US labor relations indicate that the opposite is true. The standard of living for workers has stagnated, labor laws are often unenforced, union density has declined, and there is a widespread sense of alienation towards existing political institutions. Gross violations of what were once generally accepted worker rights have become commonplace. For instance wage theft is now rampant in America’s low wage labor markets. In response to this revival of the labor question some trade unionists have tried to develop a new “union idea” centered on comprehensive campaigns. Rather than bargaining over a narrowly circumscribed set of economic issues, comprehensive campaigns utilize corporate research, community coalition-building, political pressure, and public relations to recapture the political and ideological high ground from employers. This project examines one comprehensive campaign, UNITE HERE’s campaign at the Westin Hotel in Providence RI. Based on my own participation as an intern with Local 217 and interviews I conducted, I interpret the success of this campaign in light of the literature on union decline, labor law violation, and organizing tactics. My initial conclusion is that comprehensive campaigns are contributing to a “new union idea” that addresses the 21st century labor question. After analyzing the Westin campaign I discuss some of the conditions under which campaigns are most likely to be successful

Dietzia papillomatosis sp. nov., a novel actinomycete isolated from the skin of an immunocompetent patient with confluent and reticulated papillomatosis

An actinomycete isolated from an immunocompetent patient suffering from confluent and reticulated papillomatosis was characterized using a polyphasic taxonomic approach. The organism had chemotaxonomic and morphological properties that were consistent with its assignment to the genus Dietzia and it formed a distinct phyletic line within the Dietzia 16S rRNA gene tree. It shared a 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity of 98.3 % with its nearest neighbour, the type strain of Dietzia cinnamea, and could be distinguished from the type strains of all Dietzia species using a combination of phenotypic properties. It is apparent from genotypic and phenotypic data that the organism represents a novel species in the genus Dietzia. The name proposed for this taxon is Dietzia papillomatosis; the type strain is N 1280T (=DSM 44961T=NCIMB 14145T)

Toxic Cyanobacteria Aerosols: Tests of Filters for Cells

Aerosolization of toxic cyanobacteria released from the surface of lakes is a new area of study that could uncover a previously unknown route of exposure to toxic cyanobacteria. Since toxic cyanobacteria may be responsible for adverse human health effects, methods and equipment need to be tested and established for monitoring these airborne bacteria. The primary focus of this study was to create controlled laboratory experiments that simulate natural lake aerosol production. I set out to test for the best type of filter to collect and analyze the aerosolized cells as small as 0.2-2.0 µm, known as picoplankton. To collect these aerosols, air was vacuumed from just above a sample of lake water passing through either glass fiber filters (GFF) or 0.22 µm MF-Millipore™ membrane filters (0.22 Millipore™). Filter collections were analyzed through epiflourescence microscopy for determining cell counts. Data analysis revealed that 0.22 Millipore™ filters were the best option for cell enumeration providing better epiflourescence optical quality and higher cell counts