Stotts\u27 Denial of Hiring and Promotion Preferences for Nonvictims: Draining the Spirit from Title VII

The author questions whether the dicta in a recent Supreme Court case, Local Union No. 1784 v. Stotts, effectively narrow the scope of relief available under Title VII to non-victims. Specifically, the Court addressed affirmative action and the possible reparations under a Title VII employment race discrimination class action. The dicta in question appear to limit courts\u27 ability to grant relief to non-victims (individuals who were not named parties in an employment discrimination suit) in the form of consent decrees or post-trial injunctive relief. The author examines Supreme Court caselaw on affirmative action, the legislative history of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and Title VII before determining that race-based employment discrimination is inherently a group wrong. Therefore, limiting recovery and injunctive relief to members of the group who were not named parties in the suit betrays the spirit of Title VII and penalizes minority employees and job applicants

Comments on A Political Ecology of Water and Enslavement: Water Ways in Eighteenth-Century Caribbean Plantations by MW Hauser

2018-04-0

Raskolnikov: Not the Typical Criminal Man

Criminologists in the nineteenth century gave much effort to identify, classify, and understand the physical, social, and psychological characteristics of the world’s criminals. Using the lens of these early criminological theories and the scholarly interpretations of Dostoevsky’s Raskolnikov, this paper explores the dimensions of Raskolnikov as a criminal character. Ultimately, these developing psychological and criminal anthropological theories are not successful in explaining the character of Raskolnikov. This exploration sheds light on a fundamental characteristic of human nature that Dostoevsky understands. Just as Raskolnikov is unable to be fully characterized by his utilitarian social theories, and by the theories of early criminologists, humanity is fundamentally unable to be reduced to a theory

Did One Veil Give Women a Better Life?

Unfortunately, a young woman in Renaissance Florence did not have many options for her future. A woman\u27s family usually decided whether she would be able to get married or would have to enter the convent, but sometimes she was able to make this choice. In this paper, I look at the lives of wives and nuns to analyze how their lives differed in responsibilities and freedoms, but also to see how all women had similar restrictions and expectations placed upon them

Teaching Integrity in the Professional Responsibility Curriculum: A Modest Proposal for Change

Aquest treball no té altre objectiu que introduir la qüestió de la recepció de l’obra de Charles Péguy (1873-1914) per Maurice Blanchot (1907-2003). Hi exposem algunes notes, donant la paraula molt sovint als propis escriptors, per tal que aquesta exposició descriptiva pugui resultar útil a desenvolupaments posteriors. Hem estructurat aquestes notes en quatre parts. En un primer moment introduirem la qüestió del lligam de Blanchot amb els entorns catòlics dels anys ’30, tot seguit, farem una lectura de l’article titulat «La solitude de Péguy», aparegut al Journal des débats el 1941 i recollit després al volum Faux pas de 1943, a continuació, parlarem de la qüestió política en relació amb la vocació de l’intel·lectual, que troba el seu origen en l’afer Dreyfus, i que Blanchot repensà a «Les intellectuels en question», i per acabar farem referència a la interpretació de la relació entre els dos autors proposada per Deleuze en dos cursos de principis dels anys ’80 i que concerneix sobretot la seva comprensió de l’esdeveniment.Ce travail n’a pour but que d’introduire la question de la réception de l’œuvre de Charles Péguy (1873-1914) par Maurice Blanchot (1907-2003). On y expose quelques notes à propos de cette question, en laissant très souvent la parole aux propres écrivains, de sorte que cette exposition descriptive puisse être utile à développements postérieurs. Nous avons structuré ces notes en quatre parties. Dans un premier moment nous allons introduire la question du rapport de Blanchot aux milieux catholiques des années ’30, ensuite, nous lirons l’article intitulé « La solitude de Péguy », paru au Journal des débats en 1941 et repris dans le volume Faux pas en 1943, à continuation, nous allons parler de la question politique concernant aux intellectuels, que trouve son origine à l’affaire Dreyfus, et que Blanchot a repris à « Les intellectuels en question », et pour finir nous ferons référence à l’interprétation du rapport entre les deux auteurs faite par Deleuze dans deux cours du début des années ’80 et qui concerne surtout sa compréhension de l’événement

Electrocatalysis in Solid Acid Fuel Cells

Solid state electrochemical reactions play a crucial role in many energy conversion devices, yet the pathways of many reactions remain unknown. The elusiveness of the reaction mechanisms is due, in part, to the complexity of electrochemical reactions; because electrochemical reactions require the interaction of many species (e.g., ions, electrons, and adsorbates) across multiple phases (e.g., electrolyte, catalyst, and gas phases), elucidation of the reaction pathway can quickly become complicated. In this work, we develop and utilize model catalyst | electrolyte systems, that is, structures of reduced complexity, to study electrode reactions in solid acid fuel cells which operate at intermediate temperatures of ~ 250 ºC. We employ AC impedance spectroscopy to explore the reaction pathway for hydrogen electro-oxidation over Pt thin films sputter-deposited atop the proton-conducting solid acid electrolyte CsH2PO4. We observed that hydrogen electro-oxidation occurs by diffusion of hydrogen through Pt, taking advantage of the entire Pt | CsH2PO4 interfacial area rather than being confined to the triple-phase sites. This insight opens up new avenues for developing high performance electrodes with low Pt loadings by eliminating the requirement that Pt-based electrodes be comprised of high triple-phase site densities long considered to be critical for Pt electrocatalysis. Indeed, even for flat, planar electrodes of very thin Pt films, we obtained a Pt utilization that is significantly higher than in typical composite electrodes. We also demonstrate the efficacy of a new tool for probing the spatial heterogeneity of electrochemical reactions at the metal | electrolyte interface. We characterized oxygen electro-reduction kinetics at the nanoscale Pt | CsHSO4 interface at ~ 150 ºC using conducting atomic force microscopy in conjunction with cyclic voltammetry and AC impedance spectroscopy. Not only did we find the electrochemical activity for oxygen electro-reduction to vary dramatically across the electrolyte surface but the current-voltage data, when analyzed in the Butler-Volmer framework, exhibited a strong counter-correlation between two key kinetic parameters, the exchange coefficient and exchange current. Specifically, the exchange current spanned five orders of magnitude while the exchange coefficient ranged between 0.1 and 0.6. Such a correlation has not been observed before and points to the power of atomic force microscopy for electrochemical characterization at electrolyte | metal | gas boundaries in general. As reduction in microstructural complexity is a key advantage in model electrode | electrolyte systems, we also sought to understand the bulk properties of solid acid compounds, specifically, the relationship between microstructure and the superprotonic phase transition, the latter of which lends solid acid compounds their high proton conductivities at intermediate temperatures. We found a correlation between phase transformation hysteresis and crystallographic compatibility of the high- and low-temperature phases of the Cs1–xRbxH2PO4 solid solution series. Therefore, it is to be expected that hysteresis, and therefore microcrack formation, can be minimized during phase transformation via the principle of crystallographic compatibility. This is confirmed in single crystals of CsHSO4, which was found to have higher crystallographic compatibility, lower hysteresis, and significantly fewer microcracks formed during phase transition compared to CsH2PO4. The apparent applicability of the theory of crystallographic compatibility implies a new tool for identifying solid acid compounds with suitable microstructures for fuel cell application and for model electrode | electrolyte systems. </p

Strong Families or Patriarchal Economies? Southern European Labor Markets and Welfare in Comparative Perspective

Italy; Spain; Mediterranean; unemployment; welfare state