Perceptions of Relatedness with Classroom Peers Promote Adolescents’ Behavioral Engagement and Achievement in Secondary School

Secondary school is a vulnerable time where stagnation or declines in classroom behavioral engagement occur for many students, and peer relationships take on a heightened significance. We examined the implications of adolescents’ perceptions of relatedness with classroom peers for their academic learning. Participants were 1084 adolescents (53% female) in 65 middle and high school classrooms. Multilevel cross-lagged path analyses found that adolescents’ perceived relatedness with classroom peers subsequently predicted their increased self-reported behavioral engagement in that classroom from fall to winter and again from winter to spring. Higher engagement in spring predicted higher end of year objective achievement test scores after statistical control of prior year test scores. Implications are discussed for increasing classroom peer relatedness to enhance adolescents’ achievement.     

Patently designed and trade marked: MMORPGs

Legal context: A market has grown around massively multiplayer online role-playinggames (MMORPGs) and a lucrative online market has emerged outsidethe games for the sale of game characters and items. Much discussionand debate have focused on the copyright issues and the roleof End User Licence Agreements (EULAs), and strong criticismshave been levelled at those EULAs that give game providers IPownership and rights over any dealings with the game charactersand items. MMORPGs also raise legal issues in other IP law areasof trade marks, designs, and patents, and this article willdeal with these. Key points: Trade marks can be a powerful tool to protect the creativityof online characters and items but the first issue that needsto be considered is whether these creations in the online worldcan be trade marked. Similar considerations exist for patentsand designs. Further, there are also issues with trade marks,patents, and designs properly registered in the real world beingused in MMORPGs by those who are not the owners. The ownersof these registered IP rights would obviously wish to protecttheir interests to the fullest. Practical significance: There have been a number of issues and debates raised concerningthe game characters and items between game developers, gamersand farming companies. This article examines the key trade mark,patent and design law issues at stake.     

香港中文大学的大学通识教育

通识教育虽已有百余年的历史,其理念也得到了广泛的认同,但在实践中却困难重重。香港中文大学自1963年创校以来,一直把通识教育作为本科学位课程中的有机组成部分。1986年香港中文大学对通识教育全面改革,通识课程由大学通识与书院通识组成。2002年,进一步对大学通识教育作出全面检讨,厘清中大通识教育的目标与要求,重新规划整体课程和确立有效管理与素质保证的机制。现时中文大学的大学通识教育课程,由七个学院四十多学系提供二百多门通识科目。各科教师来自不同的专业领域,开设的通识科目都以专业的深度和修养为基础;学系开办通识课程时,除考虑本科教学的目标外,更要注意学科知识与其他学科的联系,以及和现代社会生活经验的关联。同时所有科目均有严格机制定期审视,以保证通识学科的素质。     

Notes on the International Court of Justice (Part 2): Reform Proposals Regarding the International Court of Justice--A Preliminary Report for the International Law Association Study Group on United Nations Reform

Written for the International Law Association Study Group onUN Reform, this Preliminary Report reviews the more significantreform proposals regarding the International Court of Justice(ICJ) and makes some suggestions for further consideration suchas the appropriateness of an ICJ Bar and a Model Code of Conductfor practice before the ICJ, the role of the ICJ and its heavycaseload, and possible coalitions to promote the ICJ.     

Democratic Representation and the Property Franchise in Australian Local Government

Australia remains one of the last liberal democracies to retain a property franchise at the local government level. This particular feature is both the result of historical particularities and contemporary political arrangements. This article analyses the property franchise in the City of Melbourne, the capital of the Australian State of Victoria, based on democratic theory and an empirical study. It illustrates the tensions between the democratic principles of representation and political equality in defining structures for representation at the local government level. The authors suggest that a more nuanced interpretation of representation can be adopted at a local level based on territorial residency rather than legal citizenship. Despite this, based on analysis of both electoral and non‐electoral mechanisms, the property franchises are found to be anachronistic and indefensible from a democratic perspective and unrelated to the status of capital city. The article concludes that, at a local level, deliberative democracy holds the promise to better represent various interests, including property interests.     

Legitimacy‐Building in the Macau special administrative region: Colonial legacies and reform strategies

The retrocession of Macau to Mainland China's sovereignty since December 20, 1999 has initiated an unprecedented process of legitimacy‐building in the new Special Administrative Region. The Chief Executive, Edmund Ho, has implemented a multiplicity of reform strategies for the sake of consolidating his legitimacy. The twilight of the Portuguese colonial era was plagued by a rapid deterioration in law and order and the persistence in public maladministration, thus weakening the departing colonial regime's performance legitimacy seriously. As such, the political environment was conducive to Ho's herculean efforts at establishing his performance legitimacy. While the new Chief Executive's procedure legitimacy was enhanced by his election from an Election Committee composed of political elites, Ho's performance legitimacy has been buttressed by depoliticisation, economic development, civil service reforms, and new constitutional conventions. The abolition of the Municipal Councils in 2000 ran the risk of delegitimising the Ho regime. Yet, such delegitimisation was by no means serious given the relatively weak political opposition. Still, in the face of a more active and assertive citizenry, political reforms will have to be pondered and implemented by the post‐colonial regime in Macau. It will be necessary for the Macau government to utilise democratic reforms in a bid to preempt the increasingly vociferous demands for more participatory channels. The case of Macau corroborates the existence of a dialectical process of legitimisation, which has been strengthened mainly by depoliticisation and economic development, and delegitimisation, which is looming in the midst of a steadily growing political activeness on the part of the Macau people.     

The 2001 Legislative Assembly Elections and Political Development in Macau

The objective of this article is to analyze the major trends in post-1999 Macau's political development as evidenced by the evolving role of its legislature as well as the 2001 legislative elections. The article argues that (1) the Macau Special Administrative Region (MSAR) political system, thanks to the constitutional design of its Basic Law and the political convention inherited from the former Portuguese administration, is dominated by the executive branch of power or an ‘executive-led’ system; (2) the dramatic win by the Association for New Democratic Macau in the direct elections does not suggest a breakthrough in Macau's democratization process because altogether the pro-democracy groups won less than one-third of the total votes; (3) Macau is ruled by a conservative pro-Beijing power elite comprising prominent local businesspeople and leaders of the labour unions and neighbourhood associations; and (4) a new political convention that the MSAR government, though not popularly elected, is accountable to the Macau citizens seems to be emerging. In any event, democratization in Macau is likely to be a very long and gradual process.     

More than a primitive imperialism: The colonial government and the social relief of Hong Kong in the early twentieth century

The implication of the social relief of Hong Kong in the early twentieth century has not been stressed sufficiently by researchers on social administration. The post‐colonial historiography, which would likely be dominated by Chinese communist historians, most probably will reinforce the reductionist view ‘British imperialist was indifferent to the social relief for Hong Kong grassroots’ to fit in the political correctness of the upcoming hegemony. This documentary analysis shows a different picture to the above common sense. Based on the new picture, we try to unveil the danger lurking in the anti‐imperialist nationalism, and suggest a possible new understanding of the history of Hong Kong's social welfare development.