What’s happening with the reformed diminished responsibility plea?

Ronnie Mackay

doi:10.53386/nilq.v72i2.873

What’s happening with the reformed diminished responsibility plea?

Northern Ireland Legal Quarterly ◽

10.53386/nilq.v72i2.873 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 72 (2) ◽

Author(s):

Ronnie Mackay

Keyword(s):

Empirical Study ◽

Unintended Consequences ◽

Diminished Responsibility

The reformed section 2 of the Homicide Act 1957 is markedly different from the original provision. Despite this, the ‘official line’ has been that the changes to the plea were merely ones of ‘clarification’ and ‘modernisation’. This article analyses the requirements of the new section 2 in the context of the results of an empirical study into the operation of the new plea carried out by myself and Professor Barry Mitchell. In doing so, it attempts to evaluate the changes which have taken place through an analysis of a sample of 90 cases involving the new plea. The results of the study are discussed in order to assess the validity of the ‘official line’. Is it correct, or have the new elements in section 2 resulted in unintended consequences?

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Managing the Emotions of Competition and Recognition in Academia

The Sociological Review ◽

10.1111/j.1467-954x.2002.tb03594.x ◽

2002 ◽

Vol 50 (2_suppl) ◽

pp. 113-131 ◽

Cited By ~ 15

Author(s):

Charlotte Bloch

Keyword(s):

Empirical Study ◽

Social Relations ◽

Social Bonds ◽

Sociology Of Science ◽

Analytical Framework ◽

Unintended Consequences ◽

Academic Departments ◽

Emotional Culture ◽

The Social ◽

Emotional Dimensions

In the sociology of science, social relations have been discussed in terms of competition and recognition. The purpose of this chapter is to enlarge our understanding of the social relations of Academia by incorporating the emotional dimensions of these relations into our discussion. To this purpose the results of an empirical study of emotions and emotional culture in Academia is presented. These results are based on analytical distinctions between the structural conditions of emotions, the emotional culture of Academia, lived or felt emotions and the management of emotions. Within this analytical framework different ways of managing the emotions of uncertainty, shame, anger and pride are identified and presented. It is shown how these feelings emerged from the structural conditions of the social relations and it is shown how persons try to manage the mentioned emotions according to the tacit rules of feelings of Academia. The study shows how these emotions are managed according to the representative feelings of Academia. It is also shown, however, how these emotions and their management relate to damaged social bonds. These unintended consequences of the emotions and the emotional culture of Academia are interpreted as emotional fuel to the prevalent basic moods of academic departments and their research environment.

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When ‘Good’ Leadership Backfires: Dynamics of the leader/follower relation

Organization Studies ◽

10.1177/0170840619878472 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 017084061987847 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Katja Einola ◽

Mats Alvesson

Keyword(s):

Empirical Study ◽

Empirical Studies ◽

Unintended Consequences ◽

Team Members ◽

Member Satisfaction

This paper contributes to the understanding of relational aspects of leadership and followership. Our in-depth empirical study of the leader/follower relation uncovers how and why assigning team members into ‘leader’ and ‘follower’ positions may sometimes be a double-edged sword and lead to unintended consequences undermining both the team’s potential and member satisfaction. We report on a multi-voiced story of one team that at first looked like a well-performing one with effective, ‘good’ leadership and satisfied team members. However, a closer investigation revealed frictional understandings, unresponsiveness and dynamics of immaturization as the followers overly relied on the elected leader. Leadership seen as ‘good’ may indeed backfire and encourage satisfied, trustful followers to relax and focus on limited roles. Our study further shows the need to conduct rich empirical studies that capture views of all parties in a relation.

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