Googled justice: an examination of the citation of Internet sources in judicial opinions in Uganda

Search engines like Google have made it incredibly easy to access vast amounts of information with little effort. Many lawyers now prefer to go online for their legal research. Lawyers are citing online sources to establish legal and factual positions in their submission briefs to court and, in turn, judges are citing them in their opinions. Judges are also conducting online research to better understand the complexities of disputes before them. This paper examines the challenges arising from the citation of online sources in judicial opinions in Uganda. It argues that while there are significant benefits to relying on Internet sources, there are also challenges like inaccuracy of online information, excessive reliance on non-legal sources and inaccessibility of some online sources. It concludes with recommendations for best practices that can be adopted by the Ugandan courts in dealing with these limitations when citing online authorities.     

Wikipedia in the Courts: An examination of the citation of Wikipedia in judicial opinions in Uganda

Wikipedia has been cited at least fourteen times by courts of record in Uganda. Courts have a constitutional mandate to interpret the laws of the land. The idea that they are basing their interpretations on information from an encyclopaedia that anyone can edit is rightfully alarming. The ease with which Wikipedia can be edited raises questions about the accuracy, impartiality and permanence of the information contained on the website. This article examines the citation of Wikipedia by courts of record in Uganda highlighting the limitations and potential pitfalls of this practice.     

加强司法所业务建设夯实司法行政基层基础

在全国司法厅(局)长会上,张福森部长代表部党组指出,全系统都要关注、重视基层工作,基层司法行政机关尤其是县区司法局要将工作重点放到抓司法所建设和指导司法所工作上来,扎扎实实地把司法所建设好,做好活跃基层司法行政工作这篇大文章,充分发挥司法所的职能作用。这既明确了今后一个时期明确全国司法所建设工作的指导思想,也根据新形势的要求,确定了司法行政机关尤其是县区司法局的主要任务和工作重点。这必将为进一步加强司法所建设,活跃基层司法行政工作。 部党组作出这样的部署和要求,正是基于对司法所基础地位的充分认识,对从现实工作发展现状和需要作出的正确     

Why public opinion changes: the implications for health and health policy

Research on stasis or change in public opinion toward health, health policy, and medical care tends to focus on short-term dynamics and to emphasize the impact of discrete messages communicated by individual speakers in particular situations. This focus on what we term "situational framing," though valuable in some respects, is poorly equipped to assess changes that may occur over the longer term. We focus, instead, on "structural framing" to understand how institutionalized public health and health care policies impact public opinion and behavior over time. Understanding the dynamics of public opinion over time is especially helpful in tracking the political effects of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 as it moves from the debate over its passage to its implementation and operation.     

Barriers to the ballot: implications for the development of state and national crime policies

In 2013, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled in Shelby County v. Holder that Section 4(b) of the Voting Rights Act, which included the preclearance formula for determining which state and local jurisdictions needed to obtain federal approval before changing their election laws and voting procedures, was unconstitutional. By requiring federal approval, this provision prevented historically repressive jurisdictions from enacting covert policies to hinder non-whites from voting. The ruling in Shelby County is problematic because methods in use across the country prevent non-white citizens from casting their ballots, leaving their interests unaddressed. As people of color hold different attitudes and views than whites towards specific criminal justice measures, contemporary barriers to the ballot have potential implications for criminal law and policy. Consequently, analyses of two contemporary methods of denying non-whites a voice in government are warranted: felon disenfranchisement and voter identification laws. After considering the disproportionate effects of these laws on non-white voting, the paper reveals the potential harm that may result from Shelby County if similar laws spread to jurisdictions no longer covered by the Voting Rights Act.     

Medicare program: review of national coverage determinations and local coverage determinations. Final rule

This final rule will create a new process to allow certain Medicare beneficiaries to challenge national coverage determinations (NCDs) and local coverage determinations (LCDs). It will implement portions of section 522 of the Medicare, Medicaid, and SCHIP Benefits Improvement and Protection Act of 2000. The right to challenge NCDs and LCDs will be distinct from the existing appeal rights that Medicare beneficiaries have for the adjudication of Medicare claims.     

Medicare and state health programs: fraud and abuse; issuance of advisory opinions by the OIG--HHS. Final rule

In accordance with section 205 of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, this final rule sets forth the specific procedures by which the Department, through the Office of the Inspector General (OIG), in consultation with the Department of Justice (DoJ), will issue advisory opinions to outside parties regarding the interpretation and applicability of certain statutes relating to the Federal and State health care programs. The procedures for submitting a request and obtaining an advisory opinion from the OIG were established through interim final regulations published in the Federal Register on February 19, 1997. In response to public comments received on these interim final regulations, this final rule revises and clarifies various aspects of the earlier rulemaking.     

Drug policies: A study of the opinions of local law enforcement patrol officers about various policy alternatives

The article briefly reviews some literature describing the scope and seriousness of psychoactive substance misuse in the United States and then examines some chronic problems in the nature of public policy analysis. A methodology. Conceptual Review, is briefly discussed as a plausible alternative to contemporary approaches. Data from n=100 patrol officers who completed the Drug Policy Questionnaire (DPQ) are presented. Patrol officers were highly supportive of conventional policies, e.g., prevention, education, and treatment, but also recommended more punitive approaches, e.g., imprisonment for both dealers and users. Legalization was rejected as a viable policy alternative. Implications for policy and future research are also discussed.     

Beyond competition: the normative implications of consumer-driven health plans

The Federal Trade Commission/Department of Justice 2004 report Improving Health Care: A Dose of Competition appeals to efficiency arguments in promoting a wide range of health care market reforms. But the market-based reforms discussed in Improving Health Care are not simply neutral with regard to equity in access to services; they are likely to have substantial and inequitable distributional effects. We use the case of consumer-driven health plans (CDHPs), the pillar of the Bush administration's private-sector health reform efforts, to illustrate the limitations of viewing health policy reform through the lens of Improving Health Care. We conclude that the speculative efficiency gains from CDHPs need to be balanced against well-documented equity concerns within a normative framework. Moreover, other important ethical issues arise with regard to the risks imposed on the population by the introduction of policies that are based on a faith in markets rather than empirical evidence.     

Testing the implications of incivility in the United States Congress, 1977–2000: The case of judicial confirmation delay

The research argues that there are two empirically distinct types of conflict in the United States Congress. The first is partisan conflict or the relative divergence of the two major parties on policy issues. The second is the level of civility that characterises legislative processes in the country. Two unique measures of ‘civility’ are developed. The first is based on media reporting and the second on the coding of almanac summaries. The new indices are tested in an event history analysis of judicial confirmation delay that controls for partisan conflict and a multitude of logistical and contextual concerns that earlier research has argued are important. The analysis is fruitful; measures of partisan conflict are significant as are many other concerns. Most notably, however, the new indicators of aggregate civility perform as expected, and the delay prospective jurists experience can also be attributed to changes in levels of civility.     

The role of national problems in European air quality regulation: the process of amplification

International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics - Recurring themes in the literature on European environmental policy-making is the leader–laggard spectrum and regulatory...