The hidden trillions: Secrecy,corruption, and the offshore interface

This paper considers the role of secrecy jurisdictions in creating a supply-side stimulus for corrupt practices and explores the use of the newly created Financial Secrecy Index as a tool for assessing and ranking such jurisdictions. Secrecy jurisdictions are a prominent feature of international financial markets, providing a combination of low or zero tax rates, lax regulation, weak international judicial cooperation, and—above all—legalised secrecy facilities. Citing the case of Barbados, this paper shows how an environment of legalised secrecy is purposefully created by not requiring disclosure of ownership information for corporations, trusts, foundations and other legal entities; through non-participation or ineffective participation in judicial cooperation and information exchange; and through laws to protect banking secrecy arrangements. Taken in combination these factors make secrecy jurisdictions attractive conduits for illicit cross-border financial flows and the harbouring of dirty money. Using secrecy jurisdictions as platforms for their operations, legal and financial intermediaries create complex and opaque offshore structures to facilitate economic crime and impede investigation. Current international efforts to stem the activities of secrecy jurisdictions are largely ineffective, but civil society is raising pressure for effective action to be taken against offshore secrecy.     

Exploring the Patent Explosion

This paper looks more closely at the sources of patent growth in the United States since 1984. It confirms that the increase is largely due to U.S. patenters, with an earlier surge in Asia, and some increase in Europe. Growth has taken place in all technologies, but not in all industries, being concentrated in the electrical, electronics, computing, and scientific instruments industries. It then examines whether these patents are valued by the market. We know from survey evidence that patents in these industries are not usually considered important for appropriability, but are sometimes considered necessary to secure financing for entering the industry. I compare the market value of patents held by entrant firms to those held by incumbents (controlling for R&D). Using data on publicly traded firms 1980--1989, I find that in industries based on electrical and mechanical technologies the market value of entrants' patents is positive in the post-1984 period (after the patenting surge), but not before, when patents were relatively unimportant in these industries. Also, the value of patent rights in complex product industries (where each product relies on many patents held by a number of other firms) is much higher for entrants than incumbents in the post-1984 period. For discrete product industries (where each product relies on only a few patents, and where the importance of patents for appropriability has traditionally been higher), there is no difference between incumbents and entrants.     

地役权探析

地役权是传统用益物权之　一。通过分析地役权的发展及特征,论证地役权在我国物权体系中不可或缺的地位,并　对我国地役权制度的构建提出个人设想。     

Exploring ancestral variation of the hyoid

This study utilizes metric analysis to examine size and shape variation between hyoids of Africans and Europeans in the Robert J. Terry Anatomical Collection. A total of 200 fused and unfused hyoids were measured and three statistical methods were employed to explore variation between ancestries. First, independent sample t-tests showed that some significant size differences do occur between ancestries. Second, to examine shape variation, skeletal measurements were regressed on the geometric mean using least squares linear regression with the residuals used to evaluate size-corrected shape differences. Finally, discriminant function analysis was used to develop two functions for ancestry prediction with overall accuracies of 73% and 77%. Results of the analyses suggest hyoid size and shape differences do occur between ancestries, notably that European hyoids are broader than African hyoids, while the African hyoid is longer than Europeans.     

Exploring System Boundaries

Autopoiesis is normally considered to be the systems theory in law. In this paper complexity theory is presented as an alternative systems approach. In order to position complexity theory as a plausible alternative to autopoiesis I discuss the differing understanding of boundary within each theory, and use this as a vehicle to critique autopoiesis. My critique is situated within systems theory thinking but is external to both autopoiesis and complexity theory (although I must oscillate between the two objects of critique). Because both approaches possess an understanding of boundary it provides an effective tool to contrast their differences, while permitting each to be described in its own language. It is argued that complexity theory offers an approach to boundaries as contingent, emergent interfaces, which the autopoietic construction of boundary can learn from in several ways. More generally it is suggested that the complexity approach to boundaries offers lawyers engaging with systems theory a new critical perspective to assess legal constructions.     

公安院校心理学课程改革探析

公安院校的心理学课程的教育目的除了让学生掌握心理学知识外,还应包括提高学生的心理素质和促进学校德育工作的有效性这两方面.要实现上述教育目的,就必须改革公安院校心理学课程的教学内容和教学方法.     

Exploring the Sequential Lineup Advantage Using WITNESS

Advocates claim that the sequential lineup is an improvement over simultaneous lineup procedures, but no formal (quantitatively specified) explanation exists for why it is better. The computational model WITNESS (Clark, Appl Cogn Psychol 17:629–654, 2003) was used to develop theoretical explanations for the sequential lineup advantage. In its current form, WITNESS produced a sequential advantage only by pairing conservative sequential choosing with liberal simultaneous choosing. However, this combination failed to approximate four extant experiments that exhibited large sequential advantages. Two of these experiments became the focus of our efforts because the data were uncontaminated by likely suspect position effects. Decision-based and memory-based modifications to WITNESS approximated the data and produced a sequential advantage. The next step is to evaluate the proposed explanations and modify public policy recommendations accordingly.     

航运企业在“海陆仓”融资方式中的法律风险及防范

“海陆仓”融资方式以传统的供应链融资为基础,融“提单质押”、“在途货物质押”和“仓单质押”为一体,最大限度上满足了企业的融资需求.实际运作过程中,航运企业受银行委托,负责质物在境内外在途、异地实施监管服务操作,监管范围覆盖生产地到消费地,以及中间的海运及陆运全过程,流程的复杂性和特殊性决定了其中蕴含的巨大法律风险.结合航运实践,通过介绍可行的防范途径,为航运企业更好地开展“海陆仓”业务提供帮助.     

Restorative Sentencing: Exploring the Views of the Public

Within the past decade, restorative justice has emerged as a truly global phenomenon. Although retributive justice has dominated the penal landscape, more recently, restorative principles at sentencing have attracted increased attention. Restorative sentencing emphasizes the importance of compensation and reconciliation between victims and offenders and pays less attention to establishing proportionality between the seriousness of the offense and the severity of the sentence imposed. Although voluminous (and proliferating), the scholarly literature on restorative justice has to date neglected one critical issue: public opinion with respect to this justice paradigm. Public opinion researchers too, have generally overlooked this topic. The goal of this paper is to determine which elements of the new paradigm generate public approval, and which features are likely to encounter or provoke public opposition, drawing upon related international research published in English over the past 20 years (1982–2002). The review reveals widespread support for restorative sentencing options, such as community service, compensation, and restitution, particularly when applied to young offenders. However, it also seems clear that public support for these alternatives to punitive sentencing options declines as the seriousness of the offence increases, suggesting strong public adherence to the retributive principle of proportionality in sentencing.     

Exploring Itinerant Crime Groups

Starting a decade ago, property crimes by Eastern European crime gangs have gained attention of Belgian law enforcement agencies. Due to the mobile nature of these groups, the term ‘itinerant crime groups’ has been used. The aim of this article is to explore what is incorporated in this term. By analyzing 27 case files, a large degree of variation is revealed. Groups differ in size, organizational structure, offender characteristics, the crimes in which they are involved and the methods they use. Following these features, two main types of itinerant crime groups can be distinguished, each with their own diversity. As such, the observed heterogeneity is larger than we might suspect by looking at the policy definition of the phenomenon.     

风雨二十载开创新航程——记中国科学技术法学会成立20周年纪念大会

全国科技法制高峰论坛暨中国科学技术法学会成立20周年纪念大会于2008年11月18日在北京友谊宾馆隆重举行。全国人大常委会副委员长司马义·铁力瓦尔地,全国政协副主席、科技部部长万钢以及最高人民法院副院长奚晓明向大会发来贺信。全国人大教科文卫委员会主任委员白克明、国务院法制办副主任郜风涛、中国科学技术法学会会长段瑞春等领导出席会议并做了重要讲话。会议由中国科学技术法学会副会长徐杰主持。     

Exploring public values implications of the I-Corps program

This paper examines how the concept of public values can be operationalized in an ongoing public initiative to stimulate innovation in an emerging technology. Our study focuses on Innovation Corps (I-Corps)—a program initiated in 2011 by the National Science Foundation (NSF) to accelerate the process of commercializing science-driven discoveries. The I-Corps method has since spread rapidly across multiple US agencies. Separately, there has also been heightened attention to the early anticipation and mitigation of the implications of emerging science and technology. Drawing on the case of nanotechnology, the paper considers how public values related to nanotechnology commercialization can be integrated alongside the fast start-up procedures embedded in I-Corps. We use a public values framework to pose societal impact questions that can be probed in parallel with the current I-Corps process, highlighting values such as identification of societal problems that the technology might potentially address; types of potential customers likely to be overlooked; groups who might oppose the application as well as those who might support it; and potential environmental, health, and safety risks. The paper discusses the challenges of adding specifications related to equity as well as safety in efforts to foster rapid commercialization and considers how these can be integrated within the I-Corps approach.     

Exploring the Impact of Child Sex Offender Suicide

This paper explores the issues and widespread impact surrounding child sex offenders (CSO) who commit suicide after learning they are under criminal investigation. This phenomenon, which has received scant attention in the literature, affects family, friends, and victims of offenders who may experience a range of conflicting emotions including anger, guilt, confusion, betrayal, and loss. Involved law enforcement may, likewise, experience a range of complex reactions. Law enforcement personnel are neither trained nor required to assess offenders’ suicidality. However, awareness of how CSOs are impacted by an investigation may mitigate the risk of suicide and enhance operational strategies, including officer safety.     

论国际海洋石油开发环境污染法律救济机制的构建

长期以来,国际海洋石油开发环境污染法律救济机制一直是一个法律空白。随着海洋石油资源开发利用步伐的日益加快,这一问题理应引起国际社会的关注。美国墨西哥湾漏油事故和中国渤海湾漏油事故的先后爆发,使得这一问题的解决更显迫切。建立国际海洋石油开发环境污染法律救济机制,具有深厚的国际法基础,应当遵循三个基本的法律原则,从应急处理和损害赔偿等不同层面加以系统构建。     

公证文书的证据效力探析

我国现行法律中关于公证文书的证据效力的相关规定条文简单粗糙,在适用过程出现了一定的问题.从公证文书的性质着手,公证与见证确实存在差异,不应否认其作为书证之证据方法.而以公证之二元区分来看,对于公证标的不同的公证与认证应分开讨论其形成的公证文书的证据效力.基于现行民诉及公证立法,公证程序中的公证审查实质上确属形式审查,实际体验的要素欠缺因而无法为公证文书的实质证据力提供基础.因此,宜借鉴德日等大陆法系国家相关立法例,将公证文书与一般的公文书作相同处理,而非赋予其特殊的实质证据力甚至将其作为免证事实.对于文书之公证,实质上即认证,其形成的公证文书则以认证书来处理.     

Exploring the Positive Punishment Effect Among Incarcerated Adult Offenders

The vast majority of offenders released from prison will re-offend, about two-thirds will be re-arrested with three years, most current prison inmates have prior prison experience, and many repeat offenders are devoted to what has been termed a criminal lifestyle. Findings from a survey of over 700 incarcerated adult offenders explore the effect of different measures of past punishment on inmates’ perceptions of the certainty and severity of future sanctions, and self-reported likelihood of re-offending after release. Results are mixed, with measures of current imprisonment being associated with a deterrent effect, while measures of past imprisonment (juvenile and adult) and experience with alternative sanctions being associated with a criminogenic effect. Recognizing that the data are not longitudinal and contain no measures of actual re-offending, the implied positive punishment effect is explained by applying social learning dynamics and insights from ethnographic studies. Specifically, a) non-social reinforcers-particularly affective costs and benefits experienced through offending, b) association with criminal reference groups in and out of prison, and c) a lack of legitimate, reintegrative opportunities upon reentry all serve to promote re-offending. Findings have implications for the study of offender decision-making processes, and speak to the efficacy of imprisonment as a deterrent to crime.     

Exploring the Structure of Positive and Negative Justice Judgments

The study challenges the commonly assumed symmetry between justice judgments that refer to the distribution of positive and negative outcomes. Based on equity and multiprinciple approaches, and particularly on the theory of framing choices, we propose a conceptual framework for analyzing the dynamics of relations between positive and negative justice judgments. According to this framework, negative judgments are more generalized (simple) and more emphatic than are positive judgments. Data analysis was based on responses of 240 German adults to 39 justice judgment items that were subjected to a Similarity Space Analysis (SSA). The analysis corroborated the hypothesis when the type of resource to be distributed was held constant. Thus, the findings may reflect the primacy and high emotional intensity of negative experiences. They also suggest that, without specification of the distributed resource, this facet of justice judgments (sign of outcome distribution) is devoid of content.