(2006) 3:3 SCRIPTed 174–259

Issue DOI: 10.2966/scrip.030306

Volume 3, Issue 3, September 2006

Editorial


Peer-reviewed articles

  • Affidavit Evidence and Electronically Generated Materials in Nigerian Courts
    Andrew I. Chukwuemerie , pp.176-202
    In this article the author seeks to discuss affidavit evidence, which is the branch of evidence most prevalent in Nigerian Courts and in other adjudicatory processes such as Commercial Arbitration in the country. It is hoped that the discussion will be of use not only to researchers and other persons with a general interest in Nigerian law on the subject but also to foreign practitioners who are currently litigating or who may soon litigate any claim in Nigeria.
  • Parasiteware: Unlocking Personal Privacy
    Daniel B. Garrie and Rebecca Wong, pp.203-220
    Spyware presents a threat of privacy infringement to unassuming internet users irrespective of their country of citizenship. European legislation attempts to protect end-users from unethical processing of their personal data. Spyware technologies, however, skirts these laws and often break them in their entirety. Outlawing the spyware and strengthening the legal consent requirement to mine data are statutory solutions that can prevent spyware users from skirting the law. An internationally standardized technology education system for the judiciaries in Europe and the U.S. can help ensure that when spyware users do break the law, they cannot hide by escaping from one nation to another without being held accountable. Transnational improvements are necessary to remedy the global spyware epidemic.
  • Regulating the Digital Television Infrastructure in the EU. Room for Citizenship Interests?
    Eliza Varney , pp.221-242
    This article argues that the regulation of the DTV infrastructure cannot be limited to economic concerns and that it must also address citizenship values. The analysis focuses on the regulatory framework for electronic communications (eCommunications) in the European Union, with a particular emphasis on the control of bottleneck facilities. The argument for bringing public policy considerations under the European framework on eCommunications faces major difficulties. This could be achieved only in the long term and is dependent on the shaping of the European democratic dimension and on a greater supranational competence in matters such as pluralism and diversity in the communications sector. Under the current framework, public policy concerns in the communications sector are gradually forgotten, while the regulators are giving in to commercial pressures. The maintenance of the status quo commits the protection of citizenship values to an uncertain future and, unless we are prepared to look beyond economic interests in eCommunications, the commodification of the public will become an irreversible aspect of a market-dominated reality.

Analysis

  • Markets in Tradition – Traditional Agricultural Communities in Italy and the Impact of GMOs
    Johanna Gibson, pp.243-252
    This paper considers the relationship between traditional agricultural communities, regional development, and the uptake of agricultural biotechnologies, through an examination of Italian traditional agriculture in the context of attempts to introduce genetically modified organisms (GMO) to the agricultural market. Of critical interest to this paper is the cultural and economic significance of Italian traditional agricultural knowledge and national cultural identity with respect to farming practices, organic trade, and resistance to GMOs. This paper considers the interaction in Italy between traditional agriculture and GMOs (particularly in the context of international trade and intellectual property protection), and suggests some political and cultural factors that are perhaps limiting the commercial and agricultural potential of biotechnology in Italy, but at the same time triggering particular consumer preferences, thus facilitating growth in regional and local economies and effective competition in an international market.

Book Reviews