The Executive Committee Working Group on “Cosmic Light” was created in 2014 (at its EC94 Meeting, Apr.30-May 2, Canberra, Australia), in preparation of the contribution of the IAU to the UNESCO “2015 International Year of Light and Light Technologies” (IYL2015), which had been approved by the UN in December 2013 (see http://www.light2015.org/Home.html).

The following seven papers in this section are from the 9th Region Workshop of the European Microbeam Analysis Society (EMAS) on Electron Probe Analysis of Materials Today—Practical Aspects that took place April 25–28, 2010 in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. The meeting was organized in collaboration with the Netherlands Institute for Cultural Heritage (ICN).

This issue of Microscopy and Microanalysis contains papers from the Seventh Regional Workshop of the European Microbeam Analysis Society (EMAS) on Electron Probe Microanalysis of Materials Today—Practical Aspects that took place May 13–16, 2006 in Karlsruhe, Germany. The meeting was organized in collaboration with the Institute for Transuranium Elements (ITU) of the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission.

It was Robert Nozick who, distinguishing the classical liberal ‘night-watchman State’ which protected citizens against violence and enforced contracts on their behalf, conjured instead the ‘ultra-minimal State’1 in which the task of the State is confined to the monopolization of violence rather than the actual provision of security (unless paid for by citizens by choice). On the face of it, it seems that Western governments are increasingly keen to move towards this model of the ultra-minimal State and to allow even the provision of force to be assumed by private enterprise on a contractual model in which the rich or the desperate may choose to avail themselves of fortifications at the going rate while the rest take their chances in life. The ultra-minimal State is left with a residual steering2 policy role in which the parameters of contractual engagement for protection can be set. In short, it appears that nothing is sacrosanct in the onward march of the principles of neo-liberalism. Even the ultimate bastions of establishment—Her Majesty's armed forces—are not immune from processes of commodification and marketization that have previously been applied to core functions such as policing3 and imprisonment.4

This issue of Microscopy and Microanalysis contains selected papers from the fifth Regional Workshop of the European Microbeam Analysis Society (EMAS) on Electron Probe Microanalysis—Practical Aspects that took place May 22–25, 2002 at Szczyrk, Poland. The meeting was organized by the Polish National Branch of EMAS in collaboration with the Silesian University of Technology (Faculty of Materials Engineering and Metallurgy) and the Polish Academy of Science (Institute of Metallurgy and Materials Science).

ONE of the less vaunted aspects of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 is Part X, entitled “Cross-Border Enforcement”. On closer scrutiny, one quickly discovers that the borders in question are those internal to the distinct legal jurisdictions of the United Kingdom—in other words, the territories of England and Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland. As for “enforcement”, it is apparently the enforcement of the law via police powers and not the enforcement of court judgments which is the concern. As with other, more notorious parts of the Act, three main questions need to be answered in order to reach an understanding of these provisions: what prompted Part X to be passed; how does it seek to attain its objectives; and does it seek to attain its objectives in ways which are effective and appropriate?

The issue of miscarriages of justice1 has been at the heart of much recent discourse—legal, political and social—concerning the English criminal justice system. Indeed the crisis of confidence in the system has prompted attempts to re-establish legitimacy, which include such tried and tested methods as changes of personnel,2 and the appointment of a wide-ranging Royal Commission 3 which followed the attempt to quell the disquiet by the more focused May Inquiry.4 Much of the concern has arisen from the conduct of terrorist trials in Britain in the mid-1970s, the most important and significant 5 of which for the purposes of this paper were the trials of groups of terrorist suspects commonly known as the Birmingham 6,6