Oran Young and international institutions

Current understandings of global environmental governance owe much to the numerous theoretical, empirical, and methodological contributions of Oran Young. Over the course of 50 years, Young has created many of the theories and typologies we use to explain why international environmental institutions form and what types of effects they have and the conditions under which they have them. His contributions have been central to the development of the concepts of institutional dynamics, interplay, and scale. He has made major contributions to environmental policy globally and in the Arctic, both through his own work and by fostering the work of other scholars. This article summarizes the contributions Young has made to the field and introduces the articles in this special issue that honor those contributions.     

当代国际刑法与国际犯罪问题学术研讨会综述

2002年4月26日,"当代国际刑法与国际犯罪问题学术研讨会"在香港大学隆重举行.此次会议是继2000年8月在贵阳市召开的"当代国际刑法问题学术研讨会"之后,国家重点研究基地中国人民大学刑事法律科学研究中心主办的又一关于国际刑法问题的学术研讨盛会,也是中心首次在境外举办学术研讨会.此次研讨会顺应当前国际社会惩治与防范国际犯罪的现实需要,有选择、有针对地就国际刑法领域诸多热点、难点问题进行了深入细致的探讨,有力地促进了我国内地与香港地区对国际刑法与国际犯罪问题的研究,因而具有重要的理论与实践意义.     

The freedom of navigation in international law and the utility of international society discourse

In the international law of the sea, the emergence of new actors and systems influencing relations between states has lead to evolving rules and calls for the redefinition of the traditional issues such the allocation of jurisdiction and rights to states in its maritime zones. In the maritime domain, this is seen thrice in the evolution of the various maritime zones in the United Nations Conferences for the Law of the Sea （UNCLOS I, II and III）. In the maritime domain, there are certain actions that are not dependent on any state＇s consent. One of such is the rule of freedom of navigation. This paper, argues for the possibilities of concomitance between international law and studies in international society based on the growing recognition of the importance of examining the sociological and historical element in rule development. This paper focuses on a rule in the international law of the sea with the aim of determining the extent to which norms have caused changes in rule development, if any. This method, known as the English School method of international relations, acknowledges the benefits of international law positivism in highlighting generality with the benefits of a normative discourse in highlighting alternatives and the utility of compliance. So, although the maritime domain is rooted in a state system, one where the parts interact as a whole, a branching-out analysis towards the normative discourse in the development of this rule will facilitate more understanding, as the case-specificity of most issues in the maritime domain cannot be overemphasised.     

论现代国际关系理论与国际法研究的三次联结及其影响

自现代国际关系理论产生以来,与国际法研究的联结已有三次,均对国际法理论与实践的发展产生很大影响。一战后国际法的繁荣与理想主义对其的重视紧密相关。而在冷战时期现实主义占据国际关系理论与实践的主流的情势下,国际关系理论与国际法研究一度疏远,直到20世纪80年代国际机制理论的兴起才重新拾起这种联结纽带,并为国际法晚近的发展构建了合理性基础。在全球化迅猛发展的背景下兴起的建构主义实现了两个学科的第三次联结,并对国际法的理论与实践产生积极影响。     

2001年国际私法学研究的回顾与展望

进入21世纪,国际私法的发展既面临着诸多挑战,又存在着许多机遇,本年内,我国国际私法学的研究也反映了这种现实的要求,在许多新的领域内,取得了丰硕的成果,主要集中在互联网对国际私法的影响、国家及其财产豁免权等问题.此外,我国国际私法研究工作还表现在对其他国家国际私法研究的深入.十分可喜的是,在传统的冲突法领域出现了一批有份量的专著和论文.据不完全统计,年内共出版国际私法方面的著作十余部,论文160余篇.     

Pollution and international trade in services

Two central topics in recent rounds of international trade negotiations have been environmental concerns and services trade. While each is undoubtedly important, they are unrelated. In this paper, I show that the services-environment link is small, for two reasons. First, services account for only a small fraction of overall pollution. For none of five major air pollutants does the service sector account for even 4% of total emissions; for three of the five services account for less than 1%. Second, those service industries that do pollute are the least likely to be traded internationally. Those services for which the United States collects and publishes international trade data—presumably those services that are traded internationally—are less polluting than services for which trade data do not exist—presumably because the services are not traded. Even if we limit attention to the services that are traded across borders, the service industries most intensively traded are the ones that pollute the least. The bottom line is simple. International services trade bears little relation to the environment, because services in general contribute relatively little to overall pollution, and those industries that are traded internationally are among the least polluting.     

Interdisciplinary research on international relations theory and international law in China over the past 10 years

From the origin, there has been a strong connection between international relations and international law. In the development of the history of different academic subjects, the research on international relations and international law are interdependently promoting each other. As a result, the realization of interdisciplinary research on international legal theory and the study of international law is inevitable. As a matter of fact, even though the interdisciplinary research of the two subjects has been separated for almost half a century, the need for the development of the subject and the changing world political and economical status give them a new chance for reunification. Recently, the interdisciplinary research on international relations theory and international law by the Western academic is becoming the order of the day, which has become the latest shining point of the recent development of the two subjects, which is even regarded as the new revolution of international relations theory and the study of international law. In this context, the past ten years is a period of emergence of Chinese international relations and the interdisciplinary research of international law. In the past ten years, some scholars have overcome “the difficulty of interdisciplinary research,” “the prejudice within the subject” and “the gap among different subjects,” and made pioneering research in the field of “systematic connection” and “issues in overlapping field.” Moreover, they gradually make the interdisciplinary research to be a popular method and a common recognition. Based on the current studies, interdisciplinary research will have a broad future in the fields such as “the interchange of concepts,” “the exchange of method,” and “the mutual assistance of materials,” which will provide scholars in this area with a broad space for research.     

Equity, international trade and climate policy

The literature of welfare-maximising greenhouse gas emission reduction strategies pays remarkably little attention to equity. This paper introduces various ways to consider efficiency and equity simultaneously. Lower (higher) discount rates lead to higher (lower) emission reduction. Higher (lower) inequity aversion leads to higher (lower) emission abatement, unless one also considers the negative effects of OECD emission reduction on the exports of developing countries; in that case, the effect of inequity aversion is ambiguous. In the absence of international co-operation, higher (lower) risk aversion leads to lower (higher) emission abatement. With international co-operation, the effect of risk aversion is ambiguous because the higher risk aversion gives more weight to poorer regions and poorer generations. We analyse four ways to introduce compassion in a non-cooperative setting. If observed development aid is a guide, international altruism is small and has little impact on optimal emission control. If countries act as if they 'feel' but not 'physically experience' the climate impact of the most vulnerable country, optimal emission reduction increases, but not substantially so. However, if countries actually have to pay for the damage done, they would prefer to reduce their emissions to much lower levels. Finally, if countries pay as much for emission reduction as other countries suffer from climate change, (that is, if climate policy restores the income distribution to what it would have been without climate change), emissions are rapidly cut to very low levels.