What's wrong with the back of the envelope? A call for simple (and timely) benefit–cost analysis

Observers across the ideological spectrum have criticized benefit–cost analysis for as long as it has been part of the rulemaking process. Still, proponents and detractors agree that analysis has morphed into a mechanism often used by agencies to justify regulatory decisions already made. We argue that a simpler analysis of more alternatives conducted earlier in the regulatory process can resuscitate it as a tool to inform policy. Recognizing that requiring a procedure does not ensure that regulators will follow it, we offer possible remedies, including strengthening or relaxing subsequent review of proposed rules, which raise the cost of circumventing the reform or lower the cost of following it.     

Cost–benefit analysis: New foundations on shifting sand

New Foundations of Cost–Benefit Analysis, by Matthew Adler and Eric Posner, represents the most ambitious and credible effort to date to build a solid theoretical defense of the use of cost–benefit analysis (CBA) in evaluating government regulation. In this review, three cost–benefit “skeptics” offer their reactions to this ambitious and important book. We note its virtues – its humility, its scrupulousness, its open‐mindedness. We also explore its vices. If preferences are to be “laundered,” is it intellectually defensible to remove the bad but not consider adding the good? Does Adler's and Posner's welfarism really play the limited role they suppose, or does it risk “crowding out” other important deontological and distributional values? If CBA is merely a decision procedure that provides an imperfect proxy of welfare – the moral criterion we really care about – how do we know that the proxy it provides in practice will actually be accurate enough to be useful? Isn't this at bottom an empirical question that cannot be answered by this thoroughly theoretical book? If CBA is no more than an imperfect proxy for welfare, then alternative imperfect decision procedures may perform better in the real world.     

New foundations of cost–benefit analysis

This article responds to the criticisms of New Foundations of Cost–Benefit Analysis that appeared in a review by Amy Sinden, Douglas A. Kysar, and David M. Driesen. We argue that their criticisms are either based on misunderstandings of our approach or are too demanding, in the sense that no reasonable decision procedure would satisfy them. We illustrate this second argument by demonstrating that their preferred approach – feasibility analysis – has little to recommend it.     

论法规批准制度

法规批准制度是指有关主体制定的法规范性文件需经特定主体的批准才能生效的法律制度。现行法规批准制度存在批准范围小、批准程序缺少操作性等不足。完善法规批准制度需合理设置批准范围、完善批准程序等,并对经批准的法规性质进行了法理考察。     

电子商务法中删除权的法经济学分析

大数据时代的到来使得企业、团体、个人都可能获取他人信息,而当代互联网的特性——海量的数据信息、快捷的计算速度以及巨大的储存空间使大数据时代的个人信息保护问题尤为重要。国内外关于删除权的相关法律文本和司法实践已经有较多讨论展开,而从大国博弈、消费者选择和厂商行为三个视角对2019年电子商务法中有关删除权的合理性和前沿性做进一步探讨后,可开启另一认知路径。以法经济学理论和经济学原理进行论证分析后发现,我国需要专门的“个人信息保护法”以确立删除权,而鉴于立法成本和紧迫性,可暂通过完善司法的方式,实现保护公民个人信息的目的。     

浅析我国知识产权法法制建设——从知识产权的法经济博弈角度

随着科技的日益发展,知识资产的重要性和保护性已经越来越成为人们关注的焦点,知识资产的独占性而产生的经济效益更是无可置疑的,对于知识产权法制保护刚刚起步的我国,如何对知识产权保护力度的定量,是我国未来知识产权法典形成的必要基础,因此对我国知识产权法的法制建设提出几点建议:一是建立限制知识产权滥用的规范性;二是规定具体化;三是善于法经济分析;四是与国际接轨;五是加强和完善特有的知识产权优势。     

Economics and the ‘nonsense’ of law: the case of the Chicago antitrust revolution

Abstract

The Law and Economics movement that emerged in the University of Chicago through the 1940s and 1950s, around Ronald Coase's example, is a manifestation of the neo-liberal project of applying neo-classical economics to state sovereignty. In the 1970s and 1980s, Law and Economics ideas revolutionized the application of antitrust laws in the United States. However, this achievement came about not through a transformation in economic orthodoxy, but through persuading legal experts to recognize the inherent ‘nonsense’ at work in their own normative assumptions. The Chicago antitrust revolution is therefore symptomatic of trends that Foucault viewed as definitive of neo-liberalism more broadly.     

Re-measuring left–right: A comparison of SEM and Bayesian measurement models for extracting left–right party placements

This paper demonstrates the relative strengths and weaknesses of SEM and Bayesian approaches to combining different sources of data when estimating latent variables. Data on party left–right positioning collected from party manifestos and surveys of party experts, MPs and voters are used to illustrate the two techniques. Although widely used and accepted, the SEM approach is less useful than the Bayesian approach, particularly when using the latent variable in subsequent predictive estimations.     

从刑法谦抑性看“人肉搜索”的入罪问题

近年来,＂人肉搜索＂作为一种新的社会现象引起了人们的广泛关注,其入罪出罪问题更是讨论较多的问题。《刑法修正案（七）》并未涉及＂人肉搜索＂是否入罪的问题。刑法谦抑性要求刑法具有补充性与最后性、宽容性和经济性,而＂人肉搜索＂入罪是不符合刑法谦抑性的内在价值蕴涵的,从这一意义上说,＂人肉搜索＂目前不宜入罪。