A Slaveholders' Republic in the Tumult of War

Review essay of recent work on wartime disaffection in the southern Confederacy: Stephanie McCurry's award-winning _Confederate Reckoning_ and Victorian Bynum's _Long Shadow of the Civil War_. Includes a broader assessment of recent historiography, state of the field.

The Cold War and British Debates over the Boycott of the 1980 Moscow Olympics

This article examines the debate precipitated by the Thatcher government's (unsuccessful) attempt to secure a British boycott of the 1980 Moscow Olympics in response to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Aware that it faced a struggle to win over the autonomous British Olympic Association, but with Thatcher in particular keen to support the United States, the government's case that the invasion required a specific response in the form of a boycott was steadily overshadowed as the public debate increasingly focused on arguments over human rights and détente and the use of state power.

Right to War in the Islamic Tradition:Jihad and its Compatibility with Modern International Law (will be submitted to the publisher in April 2014)

In the last century, Islam drew the world’s attention though such phenomena as the Islamic revolution in Iran, the fierce Muslim resistance against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and the assassination of Egypt’s President Sadat by a radical Islamic group. But it was when Osama Bin Laden and his organization Al Qaeda were established to have been behind the 11 September attacks in the US, the age-old images of Islam, the fanatical and belligerent religion threatening what the Western world stands for, were revitalized. The impact of 9/11 attacks was so great that even balanced portrayals of Islam were eclipsed by stereotypical images of a fundamental, anti-Western and warmongering religion that bore the hallmarks of medieval prejudices and rhetoric. The popular image tailored for the Western audience reflected Islam as monolithic, intrinsically aggressive, and determined to engage in religious wars against the interests and values of the Western civilisation.
This book intends to help reduce, at least to a reasonable degree, the impact of sweeping, and at times tendentious, generalisations about Islamic laws of warfare. The main purpose of this book is to place the legal, cultural and historical practices of Islamic wars in their broader socio-political contexts, thereby establishing that there has been no undisputed understanding of what defensive or aggressive warfare entails in Islam, whether in doctrine or in practice.

'Just be Brave' - The Experiences of Young Witnesses in Criminal Proceedings in Northern Ireland

The last three decades have witnessed considerable interest in the position of children and young people acting as witnesses in criminal cases and on how best to facilitate them to give their best evidence and minimise the trauma involved. This paper presents the findings of a small-scale study in Northern Ireland examining the experiences of young witnesses pre-trial, during the trial and post-trial. Interviews were carried out with 37 young witnesses and 33 parents, and a questionnaire was completed by 16 volunteers and practitioners working in a local young witness support scheme. The findings indicate that the prospect and actuality of giving evidence in a criminal trial are anxiety-provoking and stressful for the majority of young witnesses. Particular issues identified are delay, both in terms of cases coming to court and in waiting times at court, the availability of pre-trial preparation and support, facilities at court buildings and the treatment of young people during cross-examination by defence lawyers. The paper concludes that there is a continuing need to strive for improvement, and that this necessarily involves reviewing the experiences of young witnesses and seeking their views on measures designed to enable them to give their best evidence. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

More than just a ‘nasty’ decade::Classifying the popular in the 1980s

This chapter moves beyond studies of the 'video nasties' to consider the BBFC's approach to other films, including popualr blockbusters like Return of the Jedi and Raiders of the Lost Ark. This work draws attention to emergent discourses at the Board relating to children, the importance of the teen audience and violence in a variety of generic formats.