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Copyright of Contemporary Accounting Research is the property of Canadian Academic Accounting Association and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article explores comparative reasoning in court rulings in the aftermath of the Dieselgate scandal, when automaker Volkswagen AG admitted that it installed a defeat device in vehicles to test for contamination emissions. It provides an overview of the case filed by the U.S. Protection Agency against Volkswagen under the Clean Air Act and the settlements approved by judges in European Union countries. It examines the interplay between judges and comparative reasoning in court rulings.

ABSTRACT Background Aims Methods Results Conclusions With the increasing demand for cosmetic procedures in recent years, the implementation of some of these procedures by unauthorized persons has led to undesirable results and subsequently to the creation of a large number of case files.In this study, it is aimed to retrospectively evaluate the decision texts of the Turkish Supreme Court regarding minimally invasive cosmetic dermatology procedures and to evaluate the reasons and results of the applications reaching the high court in these procedures.The Supreme Court's decisions in cases filed due to undesirable consequences caused by minimally invasive cosmetic interventions were scanned using the Supreme Court of Appeals' online database from 2013 to 2023.The majority of the procedures addressed by the lawsuits are carried out in beauty salons; laser epilation is the procedure that is conducted most frequently, and burns are the most prevalent complication (87.8%, 85.7%, and 77.6%, respectively). As an adverse event, 94.7% (n = 36) of burns occurred in beauty centers. Thirteen (26.5%) of the cases in our analysis were carried out by an unauthorized person. When laser epilation and other procedures are considered as two separate categories, in applications due to adverse events of laser epilation, 28 (66.7%) cases were concluded in favor of the defendant.Complications, especially burns, that occur after laser epilation performed by unauthorized persons in beauty salons constitute a serious caseload, and there seems to be a need for better control mechanisms to reduce this burden. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are examples of how unconscious bias can influence actions of people. In the judiciary, however, despite some examples there is no general theory on whether different demographic attributes such as gender, seniority or ethnicity affect case sentencing. We aim to gain insight into this issue by analyzing over 100k decisions of three different areas of law with the goal of understanding whether judge identity or judge attributes such as gender and seniority can be inferred from decision documents. We find that stylistic features of decisions are predictive of judge identities, their gender and their seniority, a finding that is aligned with results from analysis of written texts outside the judiciary. Surprisingly, we find that features based on legislation cited are also predictive of judge identities and attributes. While own content reuse by judges can explain our ability to predict judge identities, no specific reduced set of features can explain the differences we find in the legislation cited of decisions when we group judges by gender or seniority. Our findings open the door for further research on how these differences translate into how judges apply the law and, ultimately, to promote a more transparent and fair judiciary system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Article presented herein focuses on two different methods of constitutional interpretation: originalism and living constitutionalism. This Article seeks to explore the advantages and disadvantages of both methods of interpretation, while simultaneously focusing on how the gap between the two methods can be bridged. To do so, this Article evaluates the impact that an applied interpretation method can have (e.g., how cases are decided from the bench based on the way the justices interpret and understand the Constitution). To the extent that the methods of constitutional interpretation cannot be reconciled, this Article proposes solutions for how to bridge the gap between two seemingly juxtaposed methods of interpretation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The apocalyptic genre was from the beginning in the centre of the theologico-political discourse which, according to Jacob Taubes, always has to choose one of the two fundamental options: either in favour of the apocalypse ("from above," as in early Schmitt, or "from below," as in Taubes himself), or against it in the katechonic defense against the apocalyptic chaos and destruction (late Schmitt). In Taubes's account, apocalypse is simultaneously revelatory and destructive. By assuming the standpoint of the Last Judgment, it passes an ultimate verdict without appeal over the world – as indeed in Taubes's most famous statement: "I have no spiritual investment in the world as it is. I can imagine as an apocalyptic: let it come down." It is precisely this form of position assuming the uncompromising perspective of the Last Judgment, which will occupy me in my essay. I want to approach critically the most recent phenomenon of what we may call an absolute judg-mentaility – or, in Nietzschean terms, a "mentality of judgment" – which takes apocalyptic form of a violent negation, exposing the whole "world as it is" to the scorching light of the verdict and leaving no space that would be free from adjudication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The interpretability of AI is just as important as its performance. In the LegalAI field, there have been efforts to enhance the interpretability of models, but a trade-off between interpretability and prediction accuracy remains inevitable. In this paper, we introduce a novel framework called LK-IB for compulsory measure prediction (CMP), one of the critical tasks in LegalAI. LK-IB leverages Legal Knowledge and combines an Interpretable model and a Black-box model to balance interpretability and prediction performance. Specifically, LK-IB involves three steps: (1) inputting cases into the first module, where first-order logic (FOL) rules are used to make predictions and output them directly if possible; (2) sending cases to the second module if FOL rules are not applicable, where a case distributor categorizes them as either "simple" or "complex"; and (3) sending simple cases to an interpretable model with strong interpretability and complex cases to a black-box model with outstanding performance. Experimental results demonstrate that the LK-IB framework provides more interpretable and accurate predictions than other state-of-the-art models. Given that the majority of cases in LegalAI are simple, the idea of model combination has significant potential for practical applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Identifying, classifying, and analyzing arguments in legal discourse has been a prominent area of research since the inception of the argument mining field. However, there has been a major discrepancy between the way natural language processing (NLP) researchers model and annotate arguments in court decisions and the way legal experts understand and analyze legal argumentation. While computational approaches typically simplify arguments into generic premises and claims, arguments in legal research usually exhibit a rich typology that is important for gaining insights into the particular case and applications of law in general. We address this problem and make several substantial contributions to move the field forward. First, we design a new annotation scheme for legal arguments in proceedings of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) that is deeply rooted in the theory and practice of legal argumentation research. Second, we compile and annotate a large corpus of 373 court decisions (2.3M tokens and 15k annotated argument spans). Finally, we train an argument mining model that outperforms state-of-the-art models in the legal NLP domain and provide a thorough expert-based evaluation. All datasets and source codes are available under open lincenses at https://github.com/trusthlt/mining-legal-arguments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Environmental & Social Management Journal / Revista de Gestão Social e Ambiental is the property of Environmental & Social Management Journal and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Environmental & Social Management Journal / Revista de Gestão Social e Ambiental is the property of Environmental & Social Management Journal and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

There is a well‐established asymmetry in our judgments of performance enhancing drugs (PEDs) in sports and in other competitive activities. When an athlete is found using such drugs, it is a scandal that prompts public outrage, fan disappointment, and even loss of title. It seems that we judge enhanced results cannot be genuinely attributed to athletes. There is no similar reaction to use of PEDs in art, science, music, literature, business, and other human endeavors. The question I tackle in this paper is whether this disanalogy is justified: Is there some underlying difference in virtue of which PEDs should be thus stigmatized in sports but not elsewhere? I survey a couple of potential justifications that I find lacking. I then consider the difference in our judgments of the participation of superman‐like characters in sports (which we censure) and in other activities (which we endorse). I argue that the fact that the athlete is human is relevant to the value of sports—and by extension, the status of the effort involved—while this fact plays no significant role with regard to the value of other activities and that this difference in the value of activities ultimately justifies our differing judgments here. I then return to my initial question and examine whether similar appeal to what is human can justify the varying judgments of the use of PEDs. I argue that it can but only under certain assumptions. I conclude by discussing wider implication of my suggestion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Artificial intelligence and blockchain can improve the effectiveness of leadership decision-making in two dimensions. Artificial intelligence technology can improve the scientificity of leadership decision-making, and blockchain technology can guarantee the democracy of leadership decision-making. Society pushes everyone to be gregarious. Group recommendation is thus one of the research focuses in recent years. Prior group recommendation algorithms fail to consider either the influence of group structure on computing scale or the impressions users of higher weights leave on other group members. To address the aforementioned challenges, this paper proposes a group recommendation model based on members’ influence and leader impact. In this paper, a model has been proposed to compute members’ influence on each other based on interactions and presence. The decisions of leaders identified by the proposed model are the basis for further group recommendation, which yields satisfactory recommendations for most group members as leaders’ judgments are more professional. Experimental results on real-world datasets demonstrate better accuracy of the proposed method compared to those of the mainstream group recommendation algorithms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Brazil, the judicialization of public health for access to medications has resulted in significant challenges to the management of public policies, especially at the municipal level. To evaluate the profile of drug litigations against the Campinas municipal health system from 2017 to 2021, this study analyzed the characteristics of litigants, medicine dispensation, and the timing of court decisions. A quantitative, analytical, and comparative cross-sectional study was conducted using data on the dispensation of 506 types of medications and 493 court cases. The analysis included sociodemographic, procedural, medical–sanitary, and pharmaceutical assistance management variables. The time of court decisions was assessed using the Kruskal‒Wallis test complemented by the Dunn test. The plaintiffs were predominantly adults, females, and self-declared students, and some cases involved nonresidents. Most of the lawsuits were represented by private lawyers, gratuitousness of justice and with decisions favorable to the plaintiff. However, only 43% of the patients obtained a preliminary injunction or early tutelage. The median time needed for a court decision from the date of case filing was 12 days until the granting of a preliminary injunction or early tutelage and 6.5 months until a judgment or dismissal without a decision on the merits. Approximately 32.4% of the medications dispensed by the judicial pharmacy already belonged to the list of the Brazil's Unified Health System in 2020; 46.3% were prescribed by their generic name; 75.5% had therapeutic equivalents, and 94.9% had marketing authorization from the Brazilian National Health Surveillance Agency. Judicialization in Campinas is an alternative way of accessing medications, but it is time-consuming and benefits only a small portion of the population (0.068%). The characteristics of the plaintiffs and judicialized medicines highlight the need to review health policies to promote equitable and efficient access to essential treatments for the population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Moral values guide consequential attitudes and actions. Here, we report evidence of seasonal variation in Americans' endorsement of some--but not all--moral values. Studies 1 and 2 examined a decade of data from the United States (total N = 232,975) and produced consistent evidence of a biannual seasonal cycle in values pertaining to loyalty, authority, and purity ("binding" moral values)--with strongest endorsement in spring and autumn and weakest endorsement in summer and winter--but not in values pertaining to care and fairness ("individualizing" moral values). Study 2 also provided some evidence that the summer decrease, but not the winter decrease, in binding moral value endorsement was stronger in regions with greater seasonal extremity. Analyses on an additional year of US data (study 3; n = 24,199) provided further replication and showed that this biannual seasonal cycle cannot be easily dismissed as a sampling artifact. Study 4 provided a partial explanation for the biannual seasonal cycle in Americans' endorsement of binding moral values by showing that it was predicted by an analogous seasonal cycle in Americans' experience of anxiety. Study 5 tested the generalizability of the primary findings and found similar seasonal cycles in endorsement of binding moral values in Canada and Australia (but not in the United Kingdom). Collectively, results from these five studies provide evidence that moral values change with the seasons, with intriguing implications for additional outcomes that can be affected by those values (e.g., intergroup prejudices, political attitudes, legal judgments). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fairness in machine learning (ML) emerges as a critical concern as AI systems increasingly influence diverse aspects of society, from healthcare decisions to legal judgments. Many studies show evidence of unfair ML outcomes. However, the current body of literature lacks a statistically validated approach that can evaluate the fairness of a deployed ML algorithm against a dataset. A novel evaluation approach is introduced in this research based on k-fold cross-validation and statistical t-tests to assess the fairness of ML algorithms. This approach was exercised across five benchmark datasets using six classical ML algorithms. Considering four fair ML definitions guided by the current literature, our analysis showed that the same dataset generates a fair outcome for one ML algorithm but an unfair result for another. Such an observation reveals complex, context-dependent fairness issues in ML, complicated further by the varied operational mechanisms of the underlying ML models. Our proposed approach enables researchers to check whether deploying any ML algorithms against a protected attribute within datasets is fair. We also discuss the broader implications of the proposed approach, highlighting a notable variability in its fairness outcomes. Our discussion underscores the need for adaptable fairness definitions and the exploration of methods to enhance the fairness of ensemble approaches, aiming to advance fair ML practices and ensure equitable AI deployment across societal sectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In light of the rapid urban and cultural renaissance in Dubai and the need to expropriate real estate owned by individuals, this paper discusses the protection of individual property in the Emirate of Dubai Real Estate Expropriation Law of 2022. It has sought to examine and investigate the process of expropriation of individual property under the Emirate of Dubai Expropriation Law No. (2) of 2022 and to show that the Dubai legislature has narrowed the concept of public benefit and defined the conditions and mechanism of expropriation, the body responsible for issuing expropriation decisions, and what procedures should be followed. This study is of great importance as it shows that property rights are protected under the UAE Federal Constitution of 1971 and the Emirate of Dubai Real Estate Expropriation Law of 2022. It contributes to illuminating the way for the expropriation committee to take the necessary measures that help determine the fair compensation that should be paid to the owner of the expropriated property. It has concluded that expropriation is one of the most dangerous interferences with property rights and this interference is restricted to exercise in the public benefit and exchange for fair compensation. Our findings, however, emphasise the need to set controls and standards for the concept of public benefit and introduce a right to appeal the expropriation committee's decision before the court. In this research, we adopt a mix of descriptive, analytical, and inductive approaches to thoroughly evaluate and link the legislative texts and judicial rulings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Against the background of the integrated development of urban and rural areas in China, land disputes are gradually increasing and becoming a prominent focus of interest in current Chinese society. In the process of dispute settlement, it is challenging for land disputes to reconstruct the evidence chain with the help of systematic land evidence, and the information asymmetry between parties intensifies social contradictions. Currently, in the context of several research practices concerning evidence, China lacks a comprehensive and traditional system of integrated land evidence theory. Specific applicable rules for different types of land evidence can only be summarized by judicial referees. The challenge in the field of land evidence lies in establishing specific rules and addressing the issue of scattered individual rules. To overcome the challenges posed by various land evidence types and the difficulties in applying traditional evidence rules, we employ the land case analysis method to examine judicial judgment documents related to land disputes. This approach allows us to summarize the facts of land dispute cases, compare the judgments made in these cases and further highlight the similarities and differences in the land evidence considered by the referees. Through this process, this paper aims to establish a legally significant practical framework for the classification of land evidence, filling the theoretical gap in the operational mechanism of land evidence and unlocking the potential for applying evidence methods in land dispute resolution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Environmental & Social Management Journal / Revista de Gestão Social e Ambiental is the property of Environmental & Social Management Journal and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Based on a quantitative analysis of a novel dataset comprising 10,093 publicly available judgments of adjudicated child custody disputes from the China Judgments Online website, this article identifies potential gender bias in Chinese family courts under certain conditions. Key findings include: 1. Mothers are generally more proactive in seeking custody and are awarded custody in the majority of cases compared to fathers. 2. Specifically, mothers have a significant advantage in cases involving daughters, while their advantage in cases involving sons is less pronounced. 3. In rural courts, the results are notably different: mothers are disadvantaged overall, fathers are particularly assertive in seeking custody of sons compared to daughters, and mothers are less likely than fathers to be awarded custody of sons. Building on existing literature, this study highlights potential judicial biases rooted in societal gender norms prevalent in rural areas. This raises questions about whether courts have achieved substantive gender equality and whether the legal principle of 'the best interests of the child' is consistently upheld in every court decision. This study enhances the understanding of gender bias within China's family court system by providing valuable insights for those interested in addressing gender inequality. It not only highlights specific challenges women face in custody cases but also calls for broader societal and policy changes to support women and combat gender discrimination in all its forms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How is prosecutorial independence lost? How does a prosecution system's design affect its political independence? This Article analyzes the inner workings of South Korea's Prosecutors' Office, which adheres to the Continental European style of prosecutorial organization and independence that emphasizes mechanisms of bureaucratic accountability for prosecutors. Based on interviews with prosecutors, police, judges, lawyers, scholars, and activists, it shows how independence is lost in three key areas of prosecutorial activity: personnel policy, investigations, and charging decisions. This article argues that aspects of the Continental tradition make prosecutors vulnerable to politicization. Personnel policy has selected prosecutors meritocratically at young ages, trained them intensively within the organization, and promoted prosecutors based on seniority and merit, in principle. Investigations and charging decisions are meticulously overseen by higher-ranked veteran prosecutors. Certain elite prosecutorial divisions have historically specialized in political cases, namely the "special investigations" and "public security" departments. The centralized, hierarchical system for supervising prosecutors in theory establishes rational management and quality-control over prosecutors. In reality, however, these mechanisms allow the upper echelons of the prosecutorial bureaucracy, and the politicians that appoint them, to exercise firm political control over the entire system. In particular, the promotion system, by dangling opportunities for career success before prosecutors, molds their mentalities and encourages them to gratify their superiors' wishes. Korean presidents have also customarily employed prosecutors within the Presidential Office (the "Senior Secretary for Civil Affairs" being the leading example) and used them to manipulate political investigations. With regards to prosecutorial independence theory, this Article offers a case study of how the concept's Continental style functions and how mechanisms of bureaucratic accountability can sometimes fail to protect against politicization. This Article is the second in a series. The first Article explains the history and doctrine of the Continental style in Korea, while the final Article provides an account of reform discourse and recent changes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Central to the American tradition of expanding protections for controversial speech is a robust distrust of potential censors to make reasonable judgments about what speech should be suppressed. But the arguments for a more restrictive approach to speech often implicitly or explicitly evince much greater trust in the likely decisionmakers who will be entrusted with the authority to suppress speech. Whether restricting Communist speech, antiwar speech, "hate speech," or "disinformation," the case for empowering some authority figure-such as campus administrators, technology company employees, or government officials-builds on an assumption that those authority figures will be motivated by good intentions and be endowed with good judgment to make reasonable distinctions between the speech that should be tolerated and the speech that should not. Such confidence would often seem to be misplaced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As vast social media platforms undertake more content policing, the U.S. government has unsurprisingly tried to urge them to police things the way it prefers. This is likely to continue and, indeed, expand. What First Amendment constraints are there on such government pressure? This essay offers some tentative thoughts: 1) Some court of appeals cases have drawn lines distinguishing permissible attempts by government to persuade intermediaries to remove their users' or business partners' materials from impermissible government coercion. 2) The Supreme Court's employer free speech cases may also inform our understanding of what counts as subtle coercion. 3) Courts considering other constitutional rights, especially the Fourth Amendment, have concluded that even noncoercive government persuasion may sometimes constitute impermissible evasion of the constitutional mandate. 4) A recent appellate decision (which the Supreme Court vacated on procedural grounds) suggests a potential distinction between ad hoc and systematic attempts to persuade platforms to remove content, though whether that line is ultimately either sensible or administrable is an open question. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Crossing the analysis of court rulings on domestic violence produced in Portuguese courts and semi-structured interviews of men convicted of this same crime, this article emphasizes the transversality of gender categories as social markers in the different dimensions of Portugal's social and institutional life, as well as the processes through which an inseparability between gender and state is built. From the comparative analysis of our research, we have identified the presence and relevance of these moral models that ascribe meanings and expectations to gender-based violence in different contexts—in courts and in prisons, with judges and inmates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Emergency calls may help law enforcement determine the proper response and provide investigative leads. Time may be wasted and appropriate resources misallocated if callers provide untruthful information. However, human ability to detect deception is generally weak. Objectives: We compared the abilities of law enforcement officers and nonlaw enforcement staff abilities to correctly identify truthful or deceptive emergency calls reporting missing children using Grice's maxims of communication (quantity, manner, relation, and quality of information). Method: Forty participants listened to 32 emergency calls reporting a missing child. Sixteen callers truthfully reported not knowing the child's whereabouts, and sixteen were responsible for killing the child before falsely reporting the child missing. Participants rated the quantity (insufficient, appropriate, excessive), manner (clear/orderly, unclear/disorderly), relation (relevant, irrelevant), and quality (truthful, deceptive) of information. Participants also provided a written narrative of their impressions of the call. Results: Accuracy in identifying truthful and deceptive callers was consistent with prior research, with sworn law enforcement slightly outperforming non-sworn staff. Participant agreement on Grice's maxims was poor. Ratings of quantity, manner, and relation of information predicted judgments of call quality, but were not associated with accurately identifying calls. Participant narratives describing reasons for judging a call to be truthful or deceptive were also not associated with accurate identification. Conclusions: Our findings do not support the use of Grice's maxims for determining deception in emergency calls. Although law enforcement officers outperformed non-sworn staff, both groups showed inconsistent rationales to support veracity judgments and relied on cues not associated with accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This section explores the history, application, and possible amendment of article 1915 of the Louisiana Code of Civil Procedure which concerns the partial judgment rendered on a case.

Consider a situation where a defendant has committed a crime that in some way harmed a victim. The court then decided to enter a judgment ordering the defendant to pay restitution to the victim as part of their criminal sentence. Typically, the victim participates in the restitution order and receives the funds they are owed. But what happens in those rare circumstances where the victim does not want to accept these payments? Where do those unclaimed funds go? These situations are governed by the Mandatory Victims Restitution Act of 1996 (MVRA), 18 U.S.C. §§ 3663A–3664. The MVRA requires restitution and states that payments may neither expire nor be modified except in limited circumstances. Additionally, victims are generally not allowed to modify the defendant’s restitution sentence through releases or settlements, as restitution is a criminal sentence, and therefore any modification must be done through the courts. At the same time, the MVRA does not require a victim to accept the restitution payments, as the victim cannot be required to participate in any part of the sentence. Victims who choose not to participate are allowed to assign and redirect their interest in the restitution. However, the MVRA is silent as to a court’s authority to redirect the funds if the victim neglects to do so. Circuits are split regarding whether the courts possess such a power. The majority of circuits that have ruled on this issue do not believe that the MVRA allows courts to redirect unclaimed funds. They believe that the goal of the MVRA is to compensate the defendant’s particular victim and that goal cannot be accomplished by redirecting funds. The minority believes that the MVRA’s silence leaves room for the courts to fashion the practical solution of allowing for disclaimed funds to be redirected to the Crime Victims Fund. This Note will argue that both law and policy dictate that courts have the power to redirect disclaimed funds. This Note will begin by looking at the wording of the MVRA and argue that the principles derived from the statute support the interpretation of allowing for redirection of disclaimed funds. It will then argue that the goals of the MVRA and restitution generally are both compensatory and punitive in nature. Further, both goals would be better served by allowing disclaimed funds to be put to positive use, rather than allowing disclaimed funds to simply accumulate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Unlike some similarly situated nations, the United States does not recognize the right to shelter. As a result, the country’s homelessness epidemic is exacerbated by anti-homelessness laws that punish homeless people for peddling, dumpster-diving, or sleeping in public encampments. Largely supported by the government, non-profit charities receive funding in order to deliver sheltering services into communities; however, shelters often have restrictions on who they allow to access their services. The U.S. Supreme Court has not held that there is no right to shelter, but federal and state courts have used Supreme Court precedent to carve out an understanding that no such right exists. The U.S. Constitution provides a limited number of enumerated rights, but the Supreme Court has utilized the substantive due process doctrine to find constitutional rights that are not explicit in the text of the Constitution. In 2022, the Court demonstrated a shift in their approach to substantive due process analyses by abandoning their practice of engaging in a balancing test to determine to what extent governments could restrict people’s liberty. Instead, the Court reasoned that for an unenumerated right to be constitutionally recognized, it must be deeply rooted in the nation’s history or essential to ordered liberty. With a change in approach, the right to shelter must be reconsidered. The philosophies of the American Founders acknowledge the importance of assisting the poorest sects of society not only because it fulfills the government’s duty to seek justice, but because it is critical for the legitimacy of a nation. From the Colonial era until the turn of the twentieth century, state and local governments provided sheltering services to their communities’ poorest. These services first came in the form of poorhouses and then via state-run institutions that provided care for people with the highest risk of homelessness, such as abandoned children and people with mental or physical impediments. Throughout the twenty-first century, the federal government stepped into the arena and began providing relief by funding programs that prevent homelessness and by providing grants and contracts to non-profit charities that deliver sheltering services directly to communities. Given the extensive history of government-backed sheltering services, the importance of shelter to the integrity of American justice, and the philosophies of the American Founders, this Article shows that a modern analysis supports the right to shelter despite prior judicial holdings to the contrary. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Language phrases are an effective way to express uncertain pieces of information, and easily conforms to the language habits of decision makers to describe the evaluation of things. The consistency judgment of a linguistic judgment matrices is the key to analytic hierarchy process (AHP). If a linguistic judgment matrix has a satisfactory consistency, then the rank of the decision schemes can be determined. In this study, the comparison relation between the decision schemes is first represented by a directed graph. The preference relation matrix of the linguistic judgment matrix is the adjacency matrix of the directed graph. We can use the n −1 st power of the preference relation to judge the linguistic judgment matrix whether has a satisfactory consistency. The method is utilized if there is one and only one element in the n −1 st power of the preference relation, and the element 1 is not on the main diagonal. Then the linguistic judgment matrix has a satisfactory consistency. If there are illogical judgments, the decision schemes that form a 3-loop can be identified and expressed through the second-order sub-matrix of the preference relation matrix. The feasibility of this theory can be verified through examples. The corresponding schemes for illogical judgments are represented in spatial coordinate system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study reveals the essential load-bearing characteristics of the steel–concrete composite floor system under fire conditions applying the structural stressing state theory. Firstly, the strain data in the entire process of the fire test are modeled as state variables which can present the slab's stressing state evolution characteristics. Then, the state variables are used to build the stressing state mode and the parameter characterizing the mode. Further, the Mann–Kendall criterion is adopted to detect the leap points in the evolution curves of the characteristic parameters during the entire fire exposure process. Also, the evolution curves of the stressing state modes are investigated to verify the leap profiles around the leap/characteristic points. Finally, the detected leap points are defined as the failure starting points and elastoplastic branching points, which is unseen in past research focusing on the failure endpoint defined at the ultimate load-bearing state of the composite floor system. The failure starting point and the elastoplastic branching point are the embodiment of natural law from quantitative change to quality change in a system rather than an empirical and statistical judgment. Hence, both characteristic points avoidably exist in the strain data of the composite floor system undergoing the fire process, which can be revealed through the proper modeling methods and update the existing theories and methods on structural analysis and design in fire. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the issue of the exemption from liability under Article 79 of the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods. This provision is crucial in international trade, as it outlines conditions under which a party may be exempted from liability for nonperformance due to «impediments beyond his control». The study is particularly relevant in light of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, which disrupted many international contracts. The article discusses the multifaceted nature of «impediments» that may qualify for exemption, including natural disasters, political upheavals, and unforeseen legal restrictions. It emphasizes that for an exemption to be valid, the impediment must be beyond the party's control, unforeseeable, unavoidable, and directly causing the nonperformance. Key judicial decisions are reviewed, including the case of Scafom International BV v. Lorraine Tubes S.A.S., where the court defined the notion of «impediment» as changed circumstances that have made a party's performance a matter of economic hardship or have increased the burden of performance of the contract in a disproportionate manner. Another case, the «Vine Wax» case, highlights the importance of the causal link between the impediment and the failure to perform. The article also addresses the challenges in proving unforeseeability, often assessed using the «reasonable person» standard. This standard considers whether a «reasonable person» from a point of view of the defaulting party could have foreseen the initial or subsequent existence of an impediment. In conclusion, the article suggests that while Article 79 provides a reliable framework for exemption from liability for a party, its application requires careful consideration of contractual obligations, trade practices, and the specific circumstances surrounding the impediment. It advocates for clearer guidelines and consistent judicial interpretations to aid in the uniform application of Article 79 across different legal systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The publication is dedicated to the scientific analysis of the problems of identifying and qualifying criminal offenses against the environment in order to develop appropriate countermeasures at the national and international legal levels. It is noted that an important step towards preserving the environment, ensuring the safety of life and health of people and other living organisms is the development of effective mechanisms for prosecuting criminal offenses against the environment, in particular the expansion of international responsibility for environmental damage, as well as the establishment of cooperation in the prosecution of criminals. It was established that crimes related to environmental pollution and depletion of ecosystems, etc., remain outside the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. It is noted that in the practice of the said court and criminal tribunals, there are no court decisions related to damage to the environment. The expediency of revising the provisions of international legislation and the relevant directive on environmental crimes, creating the operation of the International Registry of Damages was emphasized. In the opinion of the author, the introduction of appropriate changes to international legislation will allow to create a comprehensive system of measures to combat environmental crime, to ensure the unification of national legislative systems in terms of terminology, composition of crimes, as well as sanctions applied for their commission in the conditions of armed conflicts. Arguments are presented regarding the need for Ukraine to develop a unified state policy to counter ecocide and other war crimes, in particular criminalization of the specified socially dangerous acts, establishment of an effective system for monitoring the state of the environment and fixing the amount of damage caused by the aggressor country, creating a special tribunal for criminals involved in ecocide in conditions of armed conflict. It is noted that the environmental direction of the National Post-War Recovery Plan should be based on the monitoring of regulatory acts in the field of environmental protection and contain a list of measures to restore and preserve ecosystems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The impact of algorithmic systems on the criminal trial is becoming increasingly relevant in the legal sphere in the context of globalization and the development of digital technologies. The aim of the study is to assess the role of algorithmic systems in improving the transparency, consistency, and objectivity of court decisions at the international level. The research employs empirical methods, including comparison and making statistics. The obtained results indicate a 50% increase in the efficiency of the judicial system when implementing algorithmic systems based on Big Data. The study emphasizes the importance of developing ethical guidelines and regulatory frameworks to prevent bias and abuse. The practical significance is the evaluation of international experience in the application of technologies to ensure the effectiveness and fairness of judicial decisions. The results of the study indicate the importance of integrating algorithmic systems into the judicial process for improving the quality of justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The influence of judicial verdicts on juvenile offenders' recidivism is critical to understanding the effectiveness of justice and identifying strategies for further improving criminal justice. The effectiveness of court decisions directly affects the relapse into criminal behaviour of this vulnerable category of offenders. The objective of the paper is to examine the effects of court decisions on the recidivism rate among minors. The article reveals that court decisions, ensured by the rule of law and a fair judicial process aimed at rehabilitation and social adaptation, significantly reduce the risk of a relapse into criminal behaviour. The obtained result of the correlation analysis of 0.4660 indicates a stable relationship between the effectiveness of the legal system and the potential threat of recidivism of juvenile offenders. The interpretation of the results reveals the high efficiency of integrated approaches in the judicial system in processing juvenile cases in EU countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To protect the environment from ecology-related encroachments, countries implement environmental policy, determine legal, as well as criminal liability for violations in this area. The purpose of paper is to identify common features that allow distinguishing ecological criminal offences into a separate group and to investigate criminal penalties for committing such offences, as well as to highlight the problem of qualification of these crimes. The important tasks of this study include defining the term "environmental crimes", which will clearly analyse this category of offences. The following scientific methods are employed in this study: functional and dialectical approaches, the method of logical analysis, the method of synthesis, the method of comparative analysis, the method of analysis of scientific literature, the method of generalisation. This paper analysed statistical data, scientific research, court decisions, and regulations of the Republic of Kazakhstan. Using practical examples, the most typical environmental criminal offences in Kazakhstan were identified. Notably, in the Republic of Kazakhstan, as in other countries of the world, environmental problems intersect with social ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this study includes the investigation and solving of a set of issues concerning custody from the standpoint of observing and protecting human rights and freedoms. The general scientific, legal, and socio-political tools for investigating public processes, judicial decisions and the practice of the Commissioner for Human Rights in Ukraine were used for a generalising analysis of the present-day realities of custodial issues in institutions of the State Penitentiary Service of Ukraine and the activities of various subjects. An in-depth study of the human rights mechanism in Ukraine upon ensuring and guaranteeing the rights and freedoms of a person in custody has determined the practical significance and originality of the materials of this paper. The subject of this study, related to the violation of the rights and freedoms of citizens during their illegal custody in pre-trial custody centres and temporary detention facilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of the study is to consider the fundamentals of money laundering investigation, including problematic issues and development prospects, improving both the legal and procedural framework, which in the future would be able to use the tools obtained more effectively and get the most positive result. The main methodological approaches used to achieve the goals of this study are analytical and comparative, the second of which is based on comparing the achievements in the field of investigations by other states with a similar legal system, that is, international experience. The main results obtained are the designations of the main problems in the development of this part of criminal law, the identification of procedural gaps in the regulation of the work of investigative bodies, and the establishment of the main goals and objectives for the effective investigation of this category of crimes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article provides an in-depth exploration of the Chinese Social Credit System (SCS), a series of initiatives implemented by China to monitor and educate its population and businesses for creditworthiness. It presents a collection of perspectives from various objects, such as CCTV cameras, algorithms, and smartphones, to shed light on the system's socio-material aspects. The text delves into themes of privacy, data collection, social scoring, and the impact of technology on individuals' lives. It encourages readers to critically analyze and discuss the complexities and unintended consequences of algorithmic governance. [Extracted from the article]

The task of automatically evaluating acceptability judgments has relished increasing success in Natural Language Processing, starting from including the Corpus of Linguistic Acceptability (CoLa) in the GLUE benchmark dataset. CoLa spawned a thread that led to the development of several similar datasets in different languages, broadening the investigation possibilities to many languages other than English. In this study, leveraging the Italian Corpus of Linguistic Acceptability (ItaCoLA), comprising nearly 10,000 sentences with acceptability judgments, we propose a new methodology that utilizes the neural language model ELECTRA. This approach exceeds the scores obtained from current baselines and demonstrates that it can overcome language-specific limitations in dealing with specific phenomena. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Determining one's confidence in a decision is a vital part of decision-making. Traditionally, psychological experiments have assessed a person's confidence by eliciting confidence judgments. The notion that such judgments can be elicited without impacting the accuracy of the decision has recently been challenged by several studies which have shown reactivity effects—either an increase or decrease in decision accuracy when confidence judgments are elicited. Evidence for the direction of reactivity effects has, however, been decidedly mixed. Here, we report three studies designed to specifically make reactivity effects more prominent by eliciting confidence judgment contemporaneously with perceptual decisions. We show that confidence judgments elicited contemporaneously produce an impairment in decision accuracy, this suggests that confidence judgments may rely on a partially distinct set of cues/evidence than the primary perceptual decision and, additionally, challenges the continued use of confidence ratings as an unobtrusive measure of metacognition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Kangmei's first trial judgment, where the independent directors faced significant joint and several liabilities, it triggered a "wave" of resignations among independent directors of listed companies. Auditors auditing financial reports of these companies might consider this a significant signal, raising the question: does this signal influence their professional judgment? The study examines the relationship between the resignation of independent directors and auditors' professional judgment in A-share listed companies, following Kangmei's initial trial. This examination is conducted across three dimensions: audit pricing, audit input, and audit opinion.The findings indicate that the unusual resignations of independent directors prompt uditors to pay increased attention to the risk of material misstatements by clients, primarily reflected in audit pricing. However, these resignations do not significantly impact audit input or the judgment of audit opinions. Furthermore, this research enriches the existing literature on audit pricing and the role of independent directors, while also unveiling the specific pathways through which the departure of independent directors impacts auditors' professional judgment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Theoretical considerations on motor imagery and motor execution have long been dominated by the functional equivalence view. Previous empirical works comparing these two modes of actions, however, have largely relied on subjective judgments on the imagery process, which may be exposed to various biases. The current study aims to re-examine the commonality and distinguishable aspects of motor imagery and execution via a response repetition paradigm. This framework aims to offer an alternative approach devoid of self-reporting, opening the opportunity for less subjective evaluation of the disparities and correlations between motor imagery and motor execution. Methods: Participants performed manual speeded-choice on prime-probe pairs in each trial under three conditions distinguished by the modes of response on the prime: mere observation (Perceptual), imagining response (Imagery), and actual responses (Execution). Responses to the following probe were all actual execution of button press. While Experiment 1 compared the basic repetition effects in the three prime conditions, Experiment 2 extended the prime duration to enhance the quality of MI and monitored electromyography (EMG) for excluding prime imagery with muscle activities to enhance specificity of the underlying mechanism. Results: In Experiment 1, there was no significant repetition effect after mere observation. However, significant repetition effects were observed in both imagery and execution conditions, respectively, which were also significantly correlated. In Experiment 2, trials with excessive EMG activities were excluded before further statistical analysis. A consistent repetition effect pattern in both Imagery and Execution but not the Perception condition. Now the correlation between Imagery and Execution conditions were not significant. Conclusion: Findings from the current study provide a novel application of a classical paradigm, aiming to minimize the subjectivity inherent in imagery assessments while examining the relationship between motor imagery and motor execution. By highlighting differences and the absence of correlation in repetition effects, the study challenges the functional equivalence hypothesis of imagery and execution. Motor representations of imagery and execution, when measured without subjective judgments, appear to be more distinguishable than traditionally thought. Future studies may examine the neural underpinnings of the response repetition paradigm to further elucidating the common and separable aspects of these two modes of action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article clears a path for employing the affirmative way of interpreting Kant's general theory of religion as a guidepost for twenty-first century religious practitioners. Before attempting such an employment, I correct several misconceptions regarding the affirmative way of interpreting Kant's theory that, if adopted as mainstream, would risk weakening its universal applicability. With this purpose in mind, I consider and respond to a misplaced criticism of my interpretation of Kant's theory of grace, advanced by Douglas McGaughey in 2013. I then assess the current state of a debate that has arisen between several key affirmative interpreters, concerning Kant's reference to the two "experiments" that guide the argument in his Religion. I give special attention to Lawrence Pasternack's 2017 attempt to "dismantle" this whole line of interpretation as one that "may very well not be worth our time." After identifying several serious flaws in Pasternack's argument, I conclude by backing a better alternative developed by Brandon Love. By clearing away two very different sorts of potential roadblocks that could stand in the way of a reader of Kant gaining a fair understanding of the affirmative approach to interpreting his theory of religion, these arguments prepare the way for a concluding attempt to catch a glimpse of how Kant's theory of religious judgment (especially his four guidelines for designing the constitution of a church), if adopted widely by practitioners of various historical religions, could benefit the fractured world we find ourselves in, a quarter of the way through the twenty-first century. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background The 2022 Supreme Court ruling in Dobbs v Jackson Women's Health Organization nullified the constitutional right to abortion, which led to effective bans in at least 14 US states and placed obstetrics and gynecology (OB/GYN) residents in dilemmas where they may have to withhold care, potentially causing moral distress—a health care workforce phenomenon less understood among resident physicians. Objective To identify and explore moral distress experienced by OB/GYN residents due to care restrictions post-Dobbs. Methods In 2023, we invited OB/GYN residents, identified by their program directors, training in states with restricted abortion access, to participate in one-on-one, semi-structured interviews via Zoom about their experiences caring for patients post-Dobbs. We used thematic analysis to analyze interview data. Results Twenty-one residents described their experiences of moral distress due to restrictions. We report on 3 themes in their accounts related to moral distress (and 4 subthemes): (1) challenges to their physician identity (inability to do the job, internalized distress, and reconsidering career choices); (2) participating in care that exacerbates inequities (and erodes patient trust); and (3) determination to advocate for and provide abortion care in the future. Conclusions OB/GYN residents grappled with moral distress and identified challenges from abortion restrictions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For over two hundred years of Supreme Court doctrine, judges and scholars have tried to figure out how the Court's rulings impact ordinary citizens. Yet the answers often seem to depend on whose opinion or even which press releases you read. How can we actually measure the consequences of constitutional decisions? This Article provides a new methodological inroad to this thicket--one which triangulates a nationwide field experiment, a longitudinal public opinion survey, and litigation-outcome analysis. We do so while focusing on a recent set of developments at the intersection of religious freedom and anti-discrimination law that transpired in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia (2021). We find that Supreme Court decisions can have substantial behavioral and legal effects beyond a seemingly narrow holding. In Fulton, the Court avoided deciding the equality-religion conflict at the heart of the case for a fact-specific decision that should have been easy to circumvent. Yet our results suggest that the Court's audience focused on the bottom-line message of the decision rather than the holding. Across the nation, foster care agencies became less responsive to same-sex couples. The public became more supportive of religious service refusals. And courts and litigants resolved all open disputes between equality-seeking governments and refusing religious agencies in favor of the agencies. Our findings contribute to the development of an empirical approach to constitutional doctrine. Constitutional questions often require determining whether the harm to, or burden on, an individual or group is justified by a compelling state interest--and whether the means are narrowly tailored to that end. These tests often hinge on evidence, yet the Court rarely offers parties guidelines for substantiating their interests at the right level of precision. Our work provides both data and empirical tools that inform the application of this test in the realm of free exercise doctrine, equality law, and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Crawford v. Marion County (2008), the Supreme Court ruled that voter identification requirements are lawful on the grounds that, even if they do not prevent fraud, they can instill confidence in voting. However, this reasoning ignores the historical and contemporary racial biases in the enactment and administration of restrictive voting policies in the United States. This legacy likely colors the extent to which Black and white voters see reforms as deterring fraud versus increasing suppression, and as such, how confident they are in election outcomes. We examine how increasing voter restrictions affects voter fraud beliefs and voter confidence among Black and white voters. We find that the enactment of restrictive policies decreases fraud beliefs among white voters but has no effect on fraud beliefs for Black voters; however, Black voters are less confident in elections when conducted with more restrictive policies while white voters are not. Finally, we find suggestive evidence that the racial gap in the effects of restrictive voting policies on voter confidence is partially undergirded by racial elite signaling. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Disagreements persist regarding the neural basis of syntactic processing, which has been linked both to inferior frontal and posterior temporal regions of the brain. One focal point of the debate concerns the role of inferior frontal areas in receptive syntactic ability, which is mostly assessed using sentence comprehension involving complex syntactic structures, a task that is potentially confounded with working memory. Syntactic acceptability judgments may provide a better measure of receptive syntax by reducing the need to use high working memory load and complex sentences and by enabling assessment of various types of syntactic violations. We therefore tested the perception of grammatical violations by people with poststroke aphasia (n = 25), along with matched controls (n = 16), using English sentences involving errors in word order, agreement, or subcategorization. Lesion data were also collected. Control participants performed near ceiling in accuracy with higher discriminability of agreement and subcategorization violations than word order; aphasia participants were less able to discriminate violations, but, on average, paralleled control participants discriminability of types of violations. Lesion-symptom mapping showed a correlation between discriminability and posterior temporal regions, but not inferior frontal regions. We argue that these results diverge from models holding that frontal areas are amodal core regions in syntactic structure building and favor models that posit a core hierarchical system in posterior temporal regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]