Quong on Proportionality in Self-defense and the “Stringency Principle”

Jonathan Quong proposes the following “Stringency Principle” for proportionality in self-defense: “If a wrongful attacker threatens to violate a right with stringency level X, then the level of defensive force it is proportionate to impose on the attacker is equivalent to X.” I adduce a counter-example that shows that this principle is wrong. Furthermore, Quong assumes that what determines the stringency of a person’s right is exclusively the amount of force that one would have to avert from someone else in order to have a necessity justification for one’s transgressing the right in order to avert said force. Yet, Quong provides no argument as to why, first, the stringency of a right should be measured exclusively with reference to permissible rights-infringement; and second, he provides no explanation as to why the permissibility of the rights-infringement should be established with reference to “someone else,” namely with reference to an “innocent person,” instead of with reference to the person against whom the right in question is actually being held: the aggressor. I argue that the latter option is certainly the more plausible one, but so amended the stringency principle will be unable to adjudicate any substantive questions about proportionality in self-defense. In particular, Quong’s account cannot “explain” – contrary to what Quong claims – the allegedly intuitive judgment that one must not kill in defense of property or in order to avoid minor injuries

'Don't get arrested!' Trust, miscommunication, and repression at the 2008 anti-G8 mobilization in Japan

Transnational coordination and communication have become increasingly important themes in scholarship on social movements. The alterglobalization movement is one of the most globally networked movements in recent history. As part of its repertoire, every year thousands of people travel from around the world to protest the G8, the gathering of the world's eight most powerful leaders. When the G8 came to Japan in 2008, local activists decided to organize a mobilization similar to those previously held in Western Europe and North America. The shift from Europe to Japan, however, proved more difficult than anticipated. I explore three factors that together hindered the mobilization: trust, miscommunication, and state repression. Through an analysis of action planning meetings, I explore how interpersonal trust combined with dynamics of individual and collective risk to shape relations of inclusion, exclusion, and hierarchy. I describe the interplay among trust, miscommunication, and repression to show how interpersonal trust undermined the movement's own goal of prefiguring more horizontal political structures and, paradoxically, expanded the impact of state repression by creating an individuation of responsibility that implicated movement actors themselves in narrowing the forms of protest available

Enhancing Access to Research Materials on East Asia: An Interim Report on the East Asian Libraries Cooperative World Wide Web

The East Asian Libraries Cooperative World Wide Web (http:/pears.lib.ahio-statc.edu/) uses the World Wide Web to help researchers overcome geographical barriers which hinder access to resources, both print and electronic. This project, which is directed at the Ohio State University, has received funding from the Japan - United States Friendship Commission, the U.S. Department of Education Title II-A (Library Technology and Cooperation Program) and other sources. In addition to Ohio State, universities participating in the two major grant-funded projects which make up this effort include: UC-Berkeley, Columbia, Duke, Illinois. Indiana, Iowa, MIT, Minnesota, and Wisconsin, However, already the number of participants has grown to include librarians and scholars at other institutions. The presentation describes the origins of the project, its evolution, and its future plans. Particular emphasis is given to discussing the challenges that activities such us construction of a distributed database and development or proactive services for remote users pose for librarians, as well us the various strategies that are being used in this project to address them

Vergleich der Einleitungen in deutschen und in chinesischen Abschlussarbeiten

Wissenschaftliches Schreiben an der Universität ist für die Studierenden schwierig und führt nicht selten sogar zum Abbruch des Studiums (vgl. Ehlich/Steets 2003; Dittmann/Geneuss/ Nennstiel/Quast 2003; Steinhoff 2007). Bisher wurden Abschlussarbeiten nur zwischen europäischen Sprachen verglichen (vgl. Kaiser 2003), aber nicht zwischen Deutsch und Chinesisch. In diesem Artikel werden Unterschiede in den Makrostrukturen von Abschlussarbeiten aus beiden Ländern analysiert und dazu authentische Belege herangezogen. Dabei werden als Forschungsmethoden sowohl die Move Analysis als auch statistische Analysen verwendet. Als Ergebnis werden deutliche Unterschiede zwischen deutschen und chinesischen Abschlussarbeiten in Bezug auf die Makrostruktur berichtet und deren Bedeutung diskutiert

Vergleich der Einleitungen in deutschen und in chinesischen Abschlussarbeiten

Wissenschaftliches Schreiben an der Universität ist für die Studierenden schwierig und führt nicht selten sogar zum Abbruch des Studiums (vgl. Ehlich/Steets 2003; Dittmann/Geneuss/ Nennstiel/Quast 2003; Steinhoff 2007). Bisher wurden Abschlussarbeiten nur zwischen europäischen Sprachen verglichen (vgl. Kaiser 2003), aber nicht zwischen Deutsch und Chinesisch. In diesem Artikel werden Unterschiede in den Makrostrukturen von Abschlussarbeiten aus beiden Ländern analysiert und dazu authentische Belege herangezogen. Dabei werden als Forschungsmethoden sowohl die Move Analysis als auch statistische Analysen verwendet. Als Ergebnis werden deutliche Unterschiede zwischen deutschen und chinesischen Abschlussarbeiten in Bezug auf die Makrostruktur berichtet und deren Bedeutung diskutiert

When May Soldiers Participate in War?

I shall argue that in some wars both sides are (as a collective) justified, that is, they can both satisfy valid jus ad bellum requirements. Moreover, in some wars – but not in all – the individual soldiers on the unjustified side (that is, on the side without jus ad bellum) may nevertheless kill soldiers (and also civilians as a side-effect) on the justified side, even if the enemy soldiers always abide by jus in bello constraints. Traditional just war theory and self-proclaimed “revisionist” just war theory think otherwise since the former focuses on the law enforcement or public authority justification for inflicting harm and the latter on the self-defense justification. These are both intrinsically asymmetrical justifications: there is no justified self-defense (properly understood) against justified self-defense, nor is there justified law-enforcement against justified law-enforcement. However, there can, as I will show, be justified self-defense against force that is justified by a necessity justification, and there can be force justified by a necessity justification being used against force that is also justified by a necessity justification. The necessity justification is not intrinsically asymmetrical, and it is an indispensable justification in the context of war. Moreover, with regard to some forms of inflicting harm on others one may give special weight to one’s own interests and the interests of those to whom one has special responsibilities when assessing the proportionality of those acts. That is, the proportionality calculation may be agent-relative. This is in particular so in the case of foreseeably preventing innocent and non-threatening people from being saved (for instance, by shooting down a tactical bomber who would have saved them by destroying an ammunitions factory) but less so in the case of the intentional or foreseeable direct harming of innocent and non-threatening people (dropping bombs on people standing near an ammunitions factory). In the light of these considerations, I will then answer the question as to when soldiers may justifiably participate in war (and when not)

What Is Self-Defense?

In this paper, I will provide a conceptual analysis of the term self-defense and argue that in contrast to the widespread “instrumentalist” account of self-defense, self-defense need not be aimed at averting or mitigating an attack, let alone the harm threatened by it. Instead, on the definition offered here, an act token is self-defense if and only if a) it is directed against an ongoing or imminent attack, and b) the actor correctly believes that the act token is an effective form of resistance or the act token belongs to an act type that usually functions as a means to resist an attack. While resistance is effective in making the attack more difficult, it can often be overcome and therefore does not necessarily stop or mitigate the attack. This concept of self-defense, I shall argue, not only matches ordinary language use and plausible accounts of self-defense in the legal literature but also has important practical implications in helping to avoid confusions about necessity and proportionality. In particular, it avoids the notorious problem of the “knowingly helpless rape victim” whose futile struggle against the rapist (futile in terms of averting or mitigating harm) counter-intuitively could not count as justified self-defense on an instrumentalist account

O ideário nazista nos filmes de Hans Steinhoff

Este artigo analisa a ideologia nazista nos filmes de Hans Steinhoff (1882-1945), diretor medíocre no cinema da República de Weimar, que se tornou, com a tomada do poderpelos nazistas, por sua identificação total com o regime de Hitler, um dos principais criadores do “cinema de entretenimento” do "Terceiro Reich", transfigurando a ideologia antissemita em imaginários de destruição dos judeus, associados na tela a vilões humanos e inumanos, numa estética e numa dramaturgia que contribuíram a seu modo para o Holocausto, fornecendo a dimensão artística desejada para o crime sem nome e o clima psicológico propício para sua perpetração. The Nazi system of ideas in Hans Steinhoff´s films - Abstract: This article reviews the Nazi ideology in the films of Hans Steinhoff (1882-1945), mediocre filmmaker of the Weimar Republic, who became, with the seizure of power by the Nazis, by his total identification with Hitler’s regime, one of the leading creators of the “entertainment cinema” of the ‘Third Reich’, transfiguring the anti-Semite ideology in an imaginary of destruction of the Jews, associated in the screen with human and inhuman villains, in an aesthetic and in a dramaturgy who contributed in its own way for the Holocaust, providing the desired artistic dimension to the crime without name and the psychological climate to its perpetration

The Liability of Justified Attackers

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