Wanted dead and alive : to what extent are hunting and protection of an endangered species compatible?

Cash-constrained wildlife departments must increasingly look towards revenue-generating activities such as sales of permits for hunting common species combined with fines for those caught with rare species. Pertinent to west Africa, an optimal enforcement model demonstrates the conditions under which a department with neither external budget nor tourism revenue can fully protect a rare species, and the impact on other species and local hunters' livelihoods. The department's effectiveness is shown to depend critically on the extent to which hunters can discriminate among different species. Improvements in hunting technology selectivity are therefore a substitute for increased enforcement spending.

An assessment of the surface ozone trend in Ireland relevant to air pollution and environmental protection

Hourly data (1994–2009) of surface ozone concentrations at eight monitoring sites have been investigated to assess target level and long–term objective exceedances and their trends. The European Union (EU) ozone target value for human health (60 ppb–maximum daily 8–hour running mean) has been exceeded for a number of years for almost all sites but never exceeded the set limit of 25 exceedances in one year. Second highest annual hourly and 4th highest annual 8–hourly mean ozone concentrations have shown a statistically significant negative trend for in–land sites of Cork–Glashaboy, Monaghan and Lough Navar and no significant trend for the Mace Head site. Peak afternoon ozone concentrations averaged over a three year period from 2007 to 2009 have been found to be lower than corresponding values over a three–year period from 1996 to 1998 for two sites: Cork–Glashaboy and Lough Navar sites. The EU long–term objective value of AOT40 (Accumulated Ozone Exposure over a threshold of 40 ppb) for protection of vegetation (3 ppm–hour, calculated from May to July) has been exceeded, on an individual year basis, for two sites: Mace Head and Valentia. The critical level for the protection of forest (10 ppm–hour from April to September) has not been exceeded for any site except at Valentia in the year 2003. AOT40–Vegetation shows a significant negative trend for a 3–year running average at Cork–Glashaboy (–0.13±0.02 ppm–hour per year), at Lough Navar (–0.05±0.02 ppm–hour per year) and at Monaghan (–0.03±0.03 ppm–hour per year–not statistically significant) sites. No statistically significant trend was observed for the coastal site of Mace head. Overall, with the exception of the Mace Head and Monaghan sites, ozone measurement records at Irish sites show a downward negative trend in peak values that affect human health and vegetation.

Securing critical infrastructures and critical control systems: approaches for threat protection

The increased use of technology is necessary in order for industrial control systems to maintain and monitor industrial, infrastructural, or environmental processes. The need to secure and identify threats to the system is equally critical. Securing Critical Infrastructures and Critical Control Systems: Approaches for Threat Protection provides a full and detailed understanding of the vulnerabilities and security threats that exist within an industrial control system. This collection of research defines and analyzes the technical, procedural, and managerial responses to securing these systems.

EU membership of the WTO: international trade disputes and judicial protection of individuals by EU Courts

The European Union (EU) is embedded in a pluralistic legal context because of the EU and its Member States’ treaty memberships and domestic laws. Where EU conduct has implications for both the EU’s international trade relations and the legal position of individual traders, it possibly affects EU and its Member States’ obligations under the law of the World Trade Organization (WTO law) as well as the Union’s own multi-layered constitutional legal order. The present paper analyses the way in which the European Court of Justice (ECJ) accommodates WTO and EU law in the context of international trade disputes triggered by the EU. Given the ECJ’s denial of direct effect of WTO law in principle, the paper focuses on the protection of rights and remedies conferred by EU law. It assesses the implications of the WTO Dispute Settlement Understanding (DSU) – which tolerates the acceptance of retaliatory measures constraining traders’ activities in sectors different from those subject to the original trade dispute (Bananas and Hormones cases) – for the protection of ‘retaliation victims’. The paper concludes that governmental discretion conferred by WTO law has not affected the applicability of EU constitutional law but possibly shapes the actual scope of EU rights and remedies where such discretion is exercised in the EU’s general interest.

Home, meaning and identity: learning from the English model of shared ownership

This article explores the problematic nature of the label “home ownership” through a case study of the English model of shared ownership, one of the methods used by the UK government to make home ownership affordable. Adopting a legal and socio-legal analysis, the article considers whether shared ownership is capable of fulfilling the aspirations households have for home ownership. To do so, the article considers the financial and nonfinancial meanings attached to home ownership and suggests that the core expectation lies in ownership of the value. The article demonstrates that the rights and responsibilities of shared owners are different in many respects from those of traditional home owners, including their rights as regards ownership of the value. By examining home ownership through the lens of shared ownership the article draws out lessons of broader significance to housing studies. In particular, it is argued that shared ownership shows the limitations of two dichotomies commonly used in housing discourse: that between private and social housing; and the classification of tenure between owner-occupiers and renters. The article concludes that a much more nuanced way of referring to home ownership is required, and that there is a need for a change of expectations amongst consumers as to what sharing ownership means.

Low cost home ownership: legal issues of the shared ownership lease

Analysis of the decision in Richardson v Midland Heart Ltd (formally Focus Homes Options) [2008] L&TR 31

Protection of dried probiotic bacteria from bile using bile adsorbent resins

Enteric coated oral tablets or capsules can deliver dried live cells directly into the intestine. Previously, we found that a live attenuated bacterial vaccine acquired sensitivity to intestinal bile when dried, raising the possibility that although gastric acid can be bypassed, significant loss of viability might occur on release from an enteric coated oral formulations. Here we demonstrate that some food-grade lyophilised preparations of Lactobacillus casei and Lactobacillus salivarius also show temporary bile sensitivity that can be rapidly reversed by rehydration. To protect dried bacterial cells from temporary bile sensitivity, we propose using bile acid adsorbing resins, such as cholestyramine, which are bile acid binding agents, historically used to lower cholesterol levels. Vcaps™ HPMC capsules alone provided up to 830-fold protection from bile. The inclusion of 50% w/w cholestyramine in Vcaps™ HPMC capsules resulted in release of up to 1700-fold more live Lactobacillus casei into simulated intestinal fluid containing 1% bile, when compared to dried cells added directly to bile. We conclude that delivery of dried live probiotic organisms to the intestine may be improved by providing protection from bile by addition of bile adsorbing resins and the use of HPMC capsules.

The role of team leadership in Portuguese child protection teams

The majority of team leadership studies have ignored the specific context in which that leadership takes place and the cyclical correlation of inputs and processes on ongoing performance. It is our contention that leadership is a mediator of team processes and team effectiveness on ongoing functioning of multidisciplinary teams (MDT). The members of 126 multidisciplinary teams responded to a survey on several aspects related to the functioning and leadership of their teams. The results support the hypothesis that leadership does mediate the relationship between reflexivity and effectiveness (i.e. team management performance, boundary spanning and satisfaction) within the team. Theoretically, these findings challenge those of linear models that typically analyse the impact of leadership as something that happens in isolation. Future research should describe and consider not just the team type and tasks but also investigate the roles that context and time play in team leadership.

Configurations institutionnelles de la protection de l’enfance: regards croisés de l’Afrique, de l’Europe et de l’Amérique du Nord

Cet article porte sur l’analyse de trois configurations institutionnelles de la protection de l’enfance : celle en place au Burkina Faso, en Belgique et au Québec. Pour chaque configuration, le texte explore les transformations qui ont marqué le passage de la prise en charge exclusive de l’enfant par la famille vers la présence accrue de l’État et la manière dont la Convention internationale des droits de l’enfant de 1989 a influencé ce passage. Il montre, au travers d’une lecture historique, que l’implication de l’État dans la protection des enfants a connu des formes et des modalités variables selon le temps et l’espace. L’approche actuelle en matière de protection de l’enfance au Nord et au Sud, approche largement inspirée de la perspective des droits, représente un défi tant pour les intervenants que pour les familles, car son application dépend à fois des ressources disponibles pour aider les enfants et les familles en difficulté, de la capacité d’action des institutions publiques et de l’efficacité des interventions. This article deals with the analysis of three institutional configurations of child protection: those in Burkina Faso, in Belgium, and in Québec. With respect to each configuration, the text explores the changes from situations in which the family had sole control of the child to those where the State played a greater role, and the manner in which the 1989 International Convention on the Rights of the Child has affected such changes. It shows, through a reading of history, that the involvement of the State in child protection has gone through different forms and stages over time and space. The current strategies as regards child protection in the North and in the South—an approach that is largely subject to a legal perspective—represent a challenge both for intervenors and for families, since their application depends on the resources available for helping children and families in difficulty, on the ability of the public institutions to intervene, and on the efficiency of such interventions.

Shared authority: courts and legislatures in legal theory

This book advances a fresh philosophical account of the relationship between the legislature and courts, opposing the common conception of law, in which it is legislatures that primarily create the law, and courts that primarily apply it. This conception has eclectic affinities with legal positivism, and although it may have been a helpful intellectual tool in the past, it now increasingly generates more problems than it solves. For this reason, the author argues, legal philosophers are better off abandoning it. At the same time they are asked to dismantle the philosophical and doctrinal infrastructure that has been based on it and which has been hitherto largely unquestioned. In its place the book offers an alternative framework for understanding the role of courts and the legislature; a framework which is distinctly anti-positivist and which builds on Ronald Dworkin’s interpretive theory of law. But, contrary to Dworkin, it insists that legal duty is sensitive to the position one occupies in the project of governing; legal interpretation is not the solitary task of one super-judge, but a collaborative task structured by principles of institutional morality such as separation of powers which impose a moral duty on participants to respect each other's contributions. Moreover this collaborative task will often involve citizens taking an active role in their interaction with the law.