Environment,Self-Regulation,and the Chemical Industry: Assessing Responsible Care*

This study examines the role of self-regulation as a strategy for environment protection. In particular it explores the chemical industry's Responsible Care Program. Responsible Care is afar-reaching and sophisticated self-regulatory scheme intended to reduce chemical accidents and pollution, to build industry credibility through improved performance and increased communication, and to involve the community in decision making. The study identifies the collective action problems and other weaknesses of Responsible Care and argues that a more effective approach to environmental regulation of the chemical industry would be tripartite, involving co-regulation and a range of third party oversight mechanisms.     

Failure to Update: An Institutional Perspective on Noncompliance With the Family and Medical Leave Act

At least one‐quarter of covered workplaces violated the parental leave requirements of the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (FMLA) when surveyed in 1997. What explains this noncompliance? Using a survey of 389 U.S. workplaces and qualitative interviews with managers in 40 organizations, I demonstrate that noncompliance comes in distinct forms. Some forms of noncompliance result from a failure to update institutionalized—and gendered—policies, practices, and norms. This form of noncompliance (indicated by illegally short leaves) is better explained by the institutional perspective, while outright noncompliance (as evidenced by a lack of leaves) is best explained by rational choice and deviant culture theories.     

Global Sustainable Development Governance: Institutional Challenges from a Theoretical Perspective

This paper submits that efforts to achieve sustainable development at global level call for, inter alia, institutional reform. It argues that there is no optimal institutional design, and that different schools of thought have different perspectives of the future. It briefly presents the history of institutional evolution in the area of sustainable development up to the latest developments in the context of the UN World Summit on Sustainable Development. This history sets the context for the rest of the discussions. It then presents a taxonomy of the various options suggested in the literature for improving the institutional structure of the United Nations in order to achieve sustainable development. This paper critically examines the feasibility of these options from the perspective of the different schools of thought in international relations theory. It argues that from the point of view of idealistic supranationalists, a hierarchic supranational environment and/or development organisation should be established to integrate and coordinate activities in the UN in order to promote sustainable development governance. It argues that from a realist/neo-realist and neo-liberal institutionalist approach, coordination, whether hierarchical or horizontal, is doomed to failure. From a historical materialist approach all efforts at institutional design are likely to lead to asymmetrical results reflecting global power relations. This paper concludes with a speculative argument that institutional design is not a question of the best architectural option, but calls for multiple pathways including strengthening of individual organisations, promoting the progressive development of the law of sustainable development, developing a high level advisory body to advise the Secretary General, promoting the concept of the decentralised network organisation and possibly finding ways to cluster regimes. The effectiveness of these multiple efforts are dependent on the support of civil society. In order for sustainable development to take the key concerns of developing countries into account, it is necessary that institutions are able to represent the variety of views of their members and that countries develop good policies domestically.     

从制度上保证审判独立——以司法独立的国际标准为参照

司法独立的国际标准要求法院和法官在行使审判权的时候不受干预,有关各方也不得进行干预,并且还应当为法院和法官独立审判提供积极保障。我国的审判独立原则包含了法院集体独立和法官个体独立的内涵,但无论是在立法上还是在实践中,都与国际标准存在着一定差距。只有以国际标准为指导,对我国不符合审判独立要求的制度和做法进行改革,才能够达到从制度上保证审判独立的目的。     

生态补偿法律制度略论

生态环境补偿的法律机制作为环境保护法律体系中的一项重要制度,实质就是通过一定的法律或政策手段实现生态保护外部性的内部化,使从事生态建设和保护者得到相应的补偿,通过制度创新解决好生态投资者的合理回报,激励人们从事生态保护投资并使生态资本增值。生态环境补偿机制的不断完善将成为我国环境保护的重要法律保障。     

“牢头狱霸”问题与我国囚犯管理的制度选择——基于博弈论的法经济学分析

牢头狱霸现象在我国的监狱和看守所中长期存在,国家机关希望通过法律和政策对其进行打击,但这种现象却屡禁不止。对于牢头狱霸的产生原因和解决方式,相关的法律经济学分析尚属空白。本文通过非合作的完全信息静态博弈理论对新老囚犯的行为进行分析,揭示了在管制资源不足的状况下,管理者在制度选择时宁可冒着承担法律责任的风险,依然选择产生牢头狱霸制度的深层原因和动机。在此基础上,本文还进一步分析了这种非正式制度的优势和不足,并对我国的狱政管理提出相应的立法和政策建议。     

环境侵害下的我国的代表人诉讼制度:功能局限与制度创新

我国的代表人诉讼制度通过集中行使当事人诉权的方式,克服了传统的个人诉讼在解决环境侵害纠纷方面的不足。但是,与西方国家的集团诉讼制度相比,我国的代表人诉讼制度仍存在固有的功能缺陷,仍不能完全适应环境侵害纠纷之解决的需要。改革我国的代表人诉讼制度势在必行。     

政府管理视角下的制度变迁

对制度变迁的探索与研究是为了从根本上把握制度变迁的动因及其运行机理,由此对制度的创新与发展给予理论支持,进而为化解社会矛盾,推进经济社会健康发展做指导.本文对制度变迁的原因及其过程展开结构性分析,并通过构建具有现代政府管理思想的制度变迁的立体模型,为我国社会转型期的制度设计提供参考.     

基于内生博弈规则制度观的制度效率分析

制度差异与经济绩效存在着密切的关系.忽视制度的内生性特征和制度之间的相互依存性,是导致新制度效率低下的根源所在.青木昌彦提出的内生博弈规则制度观,阐明了制度差异和经济绩效的关系,揭示了制度之间应当如何相互协调和配合,可以帮助我们认识我国制度效率低下的主要原因.基于内生博弈规则制度观,应当正确选择提高我国制度效率的有效路径.     

The Puzzle of Firm Performance in China: An Institutional Explanation

China has achieved phenomenal economic growth in an institutional environment that defies conventional economic rationales. Researchers offer different theories to explain this puzzle. But so far, due to the lack of data, little effort has been made to test these theories at the firm level. We develop a framework of endogenous institutional change to explain this puzzle and we test our framework with firm-level data. We argue that the decentralization from the central to the local governments and from government to firms are the driving forces behind China's institutional changes that have shaped the roles of government and market, which in turn significantly affect firm performance. We then submit our theory to a vigorous empirical test using data from China's industrial census, covering all 2000 counties and over 500 manufacturing industries. The test shows that two results of decentralization, the involvement of low-level governments in business and the process of privatization, positively affect firm performance.     

Transparency in the EU Council of Ministers: An Institutional Analysis

The development of access to documents and open meetings provisions by the Council of Ministers of the European Union shows an interesting pattern: before 1992 no formal transparency provisions existed, between 1992 and 2006 formal transparency provisions dramatically increased, and since 2006 this increase has come to a halt. This paper aims to enhance our understanding of these shifts by conducting a historical institutional analysis of policy change. As explanatory factors, we consider the preferences and power resources of Member States, as well as external catalysts and social structures. We conclude that the current revision deadlock is more stable than the situation before 1992 because now the pro‐transparency coalition and transparency‐sceptic Council majority have entrenched their positions. Nevertheless, and in spite of Council entrenchment, we expect that Council transparency will continue to develop in the longer term, under the pressure of increasingly influential outside actors, particularly the European Parliament.     

我国高校趋同化现象的理论解释——新制度主义的视角

在我国高等教育大众化进程中,出现了较严重的高校趋同化现象。虽然目前对这种趋同化现象所带来的后果还不能作出最终判决,但作为一种已经出现并在不断强化着的现象,则需要我们从理论上作出解释。组织社会学的新制度主义认为,在不确定的环境中,组织为了生存和发展,其外部形态、内部结构、运行模式等会在环境的逼迫和诱导下走向趋同,这是组织追求合法性的表现。我国高等教育大众化阶段出现的高校趋同化现象,正是高校在竞争激烈、环境不确定的情况下寻求合法性的本能反应。深刻认识和正确分析高校这种趋同性,对优化高等教育生态环境具有重要意义。     

International Law in Practice: An Irish Perspective

Netherlands International Law Review -     

Business Response to Regulation: An Economist's Perspective

This chapter presents an economist's perspective on the interrelationship of the compliance and enforcement decisions of business and regulators in the context of regulations governing occupational health. Assuming profit-maximizing firms and harm-minimizing enforcement agencies, it is argued that a degree of preventive activity would be undertaken by businesses even in the absence of regulation. However, if employees are not fully informed about the risks of the workplace, it is likely that the profit-maximizing level of prevention will be less than socially optimal, and consequently there will be a need for regulation. An enforcement agency which attempts to minimize harm through inducing compliance with regulatory standards will be faced with similar informational difficulties to individual employees, and this suggests some scope for cooperative gains with individual firms through negotiated compliance, rather than prosecution.