Funds sharing regulation in the context of the sharing economy: Understanding the logic of China's P2P lending regulation

“Sharing economy” is an umbrella term that encompasses a wide range of digital platform-based activities that includes P2P lending and other forms of internet-based lending. The core aim of the sharing economy is to leverage the utilization of idle capacity. P2P lending can not only be used to leverage small amounts of money on the lender's side, but also be used to promote financial democracy and inclusion both on the lender and borrower's sides. P2P lending regulation, therefore, should place an emphasis on the utilization of dead money and promotion of financial democracy. This article scrutinizes the regulation of P2P lending in China. The existing regulatory system for P2P lending in China is built upon rules and regulations that have been designed solely with traditional brokers in mind. The article contends that the rigid rules placed on lending platforms limited their ability to maintain their roles as brokers and, in turn, heavily endangered the commercial sustainability of P2P platforms, thereby harming the sharing economy's openness and inclusivity. Additionally, the article argues that the fact that there is no limit on the amount a lender can invest poses a threat to the notions of leveraging idle money and financial inclusivity. The closed-ended P2P lending regime in China would cause some chilling effects to financial innovation in the P2P lending industry, and in a wider sense, the rising FinTech sector. Regulators in China need to cope with these challenges in a flexible but pragmatic manner, and particularly make use of the benefits the sharing economy may bring to the Chinese economy more broadly.     

An experimental model of regulating the sharing economy in China: The case of online car hailing

Online car hailing represents a disruptive innovation model in the sharing economy and requires a new regulatory response. China's attempts to regulate this emerging industry can be considered highly experimental model. To relieve the pressure from offline competitors and to clarify the ambiguous legal status of online car hailing, China currently enforces a strict regulatory scheme through what can be described as a central-local dual system. Questions, however, have arisen regarding the legality, proportionality and effectiveness of this approach. Moreover, the current system's choice for a segmented market strategy heavily impairs the sustainable development of the sharing economy. Therefore, the adoption of Internet-based regulations for online car hailing might create better prospects to establish a fairly competitive market as well as to further boost the ever dynamic Internet sharing economy in China.     

The challenges of applying turnover threshold to the sharing economy for control of concentrations between undertakings in China

The existing notification threshold for Chinese control of concentrations between undertakings is a turnover threshold, complemented by a market share threshold. The business model adopted by platform enterprises in the sharing economy, where services are provided free and subsidies are given to the platform's basic users, make it very hard for platform enterprises to produce notable turnover for a long period of time; therefore, the turnover threshold is unlikely to be satisfied in the context of concentrations. On the other hand, it is also not appropriate to apply the traditional methodology of constitutionality analysis and the SSNIP (Small but Significant and Non-Transitory Increase in Price) test to define the relevant market for the sharing economy, which is characterized by a two-sided market and cross-group network externalities. The size-of-transaction threshold reflects the importance of the number of basic users to the market power possessed by platform enterprise and has the same advantages of transparency and certainty. Therefore, legislation can be used to introduce the size-of-transaction threshold to Chinese control of concentrations between undertakings in addition to the traditional turnover threshold.     

To share is fair: The changing face of China's fair use doctrine in the sharing economy and beyond

Copyrighted works are greatly entwined with the concept of the sharing economy because of their status as informational public goods. Unlike commercial sharing models that address tangible goods such as bikes and houses, the sharing of which is limited by their physical nature, sharing models for intangible copyrighted works such as Google Books and live game webcasting must account for the comparatively unfettered ability for these to be shared. Accordingly, these models are more focused on exploiting such works to their full commercial potential. However, these sharing models are to a large extent based on the unauthorised exploitation of copyrighted works and will be unworkable if the related copyright issues cannot be solved. The interest that copyright owners have in exclusivity must thus be balanced with the public's interest in further exploitation of copyrighted works. Article 22 of the Copyright Law of China outlines an exhaustive list of copyright exceptions; such a restrictive list is incompatible with the sharing economy. The Chinese courts have realised this problem and have gone beyond the law in their judgments, taking a cue from their US counterparts. However, many of these decisions appear to be inconsistent with one another.To address the aforementioned problems, this paper examines the latest proposed amendment to the Copyright Law of China and proposes several legislative and judicial actions that could help promote the sharing economy. At the legislative level, enacting legislation based on a refined open-ended fair use model is necessary to promote the development of the sharing economy. At the judicial level, Chinese courts should employ the concept of transformative use to correctly interpret legislation based on the proposed open-ended model. With transformative use as the cornerstone of copyright policy, the public gains the freedom to share others’ works, participate in the innovation process, and create works with new value. Moreover, authors would retain an incentive to create works under such a legal regime because market substitution will not occur if a work is used for a different expressive purpose than that for which the work was originally created. Thus, a balance can be achieved between promoting the sharing economy and protecting the exclusivity of copyright in China.     

China's new regulatory regime tailored for the sharing economy: The case of Uber under Chinese local government regulation in comparison to the EU,US, and the UK

Although Uber's arrival in China has resulted in disruptive competition for incumbent taxi companies, it offers an attractive alternative in China's supply-demand-imbalanced urban passenger transport system. China's regulatory regime for Uber has evolved in three stages: from the regulatory vacuum prior to 2015 to its official legalization in 2015–2016, and the enactment of numerous local regulations in 2016, with specific and more demanding requirements for Uber. This policy is a part of the Chinese approach to the gradual liberalization of the urban passenger transport market. Policymakers should consider ‘fair competition’ as the guiding principle to balance the interests of sharing firms and incumbent service providers, as well as between different sharing firms. The core value of this principle lies in the benefits it provides for consumers and the way it engenders a pro-competitive market environment. The labor protection arrangements for sharing firms’ laborers should be more flexible and diversified. In order to recognize whether an Uber-Driver is an employee or independent contractor, a new standard taking into account a range of factors should be established through collective negotiations between the participants of the sharing economy, and dialogues between members of the judiciary, academics, and the policymakers. Further, consumer protection law and personal data protection provisions should apply when sharing firms misuse their distinctive algorithmic management model to compete unfairly to the detriment of consumers and other users. Ex ante regulatory measures designed to protect the personal data of users should be introduced for deployment in the context of the sharing economy. When enforcing these rules, a balance should be struck ensuring free data flow that is essential to sharing firms’ innovation and competition, and the need to ensure the level of data security required to underpin a well-functioning sharing society.     

Economic constitutionalism: Path for state to intervene in the economy

Constitutional agreement and support is a necessity to a legitimate collective economic action. The purpose of economic constitutionalism is to determine the due process of government economic actions. Economic constitutionalism can provide a set of constitutional economic commands for the social economic actions. It is a path that allows the state to intervene in the economy. Under the structure of economic constitutionalism, liberty and intervention can be balanced. Only the intervention defined and established by an economic democratic mechanism can avoid economic autocracy. The share of economic powers by both the state and the social members can safeguard the social and democratic nature of intervention. Intervention is not always accompanied by the public, and the public is not inevitably superior to individuals. Individualism in the public is the value guide to form the public.     

Children in the 20th-century family economy: From co-providers to consumers

The position of children in the family economy changed fundamentally from the 19th century onward. In the Netherlands, the first child labor act was introduced in 1874; compulsory schooling was established in 1901. Since then, the economic contribution to the family income by children has gradually disappeared. Until the 1960s, in working-class families, the financial contribution of adolescents to the family income remained of great importance. Young workers gave their whole wage to the family in exchange for housing, food, clothes, and some pocket money. This article describes how the economic role of teenagers has changed since then. Nowadays, children and adolescents do not contribute to the family purse any longer.     

The transition from central planning to a market economy: A computable general equilibrium model

This paper develops a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model of the transition from a central planned economy to a market economy. The model is an extension of Wellisz and Findlay's (1986) model of the Soviet ‘second economy.’ By distinguishing alternative assumptions about the disposition of the government budget, two model variants — the ‘activist’ and ‘non-activist’ — are analyzed. Equilibria of these model variants are computed for various parameter specifications of the Kantorovich ray, which represents the stringency of central planners' direction of the economy. The paper shows that increasing efficiency of the private sector, while it reduces the size of government subsidies to the state sector, does not necessarily increase the net government budget.     

The effects of marital status and social isolation on adult male homicides in the United States: Evidence from the National Longitudinal Mortality Study

With data from the 1979–1985 Longitudinal Mortality Study, we examine the effects of marital status and social isolation on adult male homicide (ICD-9 Codes E960-E978). Cox proportional hazards models were fitted to a 1979–1981 population cohort of approximately 200,000 adult men and their mortality experiences were followed until 1984–1985. Multivariate hazards regression analysis showed that marital status and social isolation are associated with significantly higher risks of homicide victimization. Controlling for age and other socioeconomic covariates, single persons were 1.9 times, and divorced, separated or widowed persons were 1.7 times, more likely to die from homicide than married persons. Socially isolated persons were 1.6 times more likely to become homicide victims. Other adult males with increased risk of homicide victimization were African Americans and those who lived in the inner city.     

政府管理创新：从建设节约型政府到打造廉价政府

廉价政府是指由于政府行政职能的转变、行政效率的提高和施政成本的降低,使得公众能够获得优质服务并能承担得起的政府模式。从建设节约型政府向打造廉价政府的转变,这是我国政府管理创新的核心目标之一。     

从方法到方法论——以刑事科学为场域的反思

方法的局限性导致了刑事科学发展的瓶颈。在刑事科学的场域中,结合法学方法论的一般理论,以刑事一体化为研究基点,以“根据刑事法律的思考”和“关于刑事法律的思考”为分析模式,能够界定出由理论假定、学术立场、方法体系及实践功能四部分所组成的刑事科学法学方法论之原理。在方法论原理的指引下,回应和消除具体方法的局限性,整合、调整具体方法的使用,并最终从方法走向方法论,从方法论走向成熟与理性的刑事科学。     

从利益联合到文化融合:走向大学与中小学的深度合作

大学与中小学的合作可分为三种不同的基本类型,即利益联合型、智慧补合型、文化融合型。它们在合作动机、地位认知、身份界定、角色关系、关注重心、行动过程、力量投入、自身体验及评价内容等方面存在重要区别。要想使大学与中小学得以可持续的深度合作,要想使中小学与大学得以可持续的共同发展,双方在合作中的文化融合乃为必由之路。     

自治如何形成——对证券交易所法律地位的历史比较

本文通过对旧中国清末民初时期和新中国改革开放以后的证券交易所自治地位的考察,分析了这两历史个时期证券交易所自治状态的形成原因,并在此基础上得出了关于证券交易所、甚至是自治组织自治地位形成的一些共同因素或要求。     

The unexpected effect of social status on reproduction: a case study in Joseon Korea from the nineteenth to the twentieth centuries

We examine how parents have made decisions about the number of children they have, given their social status in accordance with residential location (either urban or rural areas) and time (either the pre-modern or modern periods). We use two sets of microdata – Jokbo and Jejeokbu – spanning the early nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries in Korea. Combining the two data-sets, we use multiple imputation to fill the missing entries of some observations and apply a Poisson regression model on the augmented data. Our empirical results reveal statistically significant evidence that higher socioeconomic status is related to having more children. Additionally, our findings indicate that: (1) all else being constant, among high-status people, rural residents had more children than urban families; (2) for people born between 1800 and 1945, those born closer to the 1940s tended to have fewer children; and (3) during modernization, there was still a significant trend for high-status families to have more children.     

东方社会主义的法律发展——从马克思到邓小平的理论探索

本文指出 ,马克思对于未来社会主义社会法制建设的思考 ,经历了一个从以西欧社会为背景的研究到晚年关注东方社会法权关系转型变革的转变 ;列宁的历史性贡献之一 ,在于他对在俄国这样一个“半亚细亚”国家建立社会主义制度以后的法律发展作出了艰辛的创造性探索 ;毛泽东把马克思主义法学理论与中国具体的法制实践结合起来 ,力图走出一条具有中国特色的法制建设之路 ;邓小平探讨了人治到法治这一法律革命进程的内在规律性 ,建构了一个具有鲜明中国风格的社会主义法制现代化模式     

虚拟货币的国际监管:以反洗钱为起点走出自发秩序

虚拟货币诞生已逾十年,其并未对现有法定货币体系造成冲击,因此,主要国家货币当局并未对个人持有并使用虚拟货币进行禁止。同时,由于虚拟货币是否适合普通投资者并没有定论,主要国家证券监管当局也并未正面注册或审批任何一种面向公众投资者发行的虚拟货币或与其挂钩的金融产品。但是,投机、欺诈和严重的洗钱问题促使各国当局不得不以实质性...     

清末及民国地方教育行政体制的历史审思:1906—1949

清末民国时期,我国地方教育行政体制相继经历了成立劝学所、设教育科、恢复劝学所、成立教育局、教育局改组与重建、裁局设科、恢复设局等阶段。彰显出规范化、民主化、独立化、专业化与开放化等特征。同时,也存在着机构紊乱、目标理想、内容西化、方式激进等问题。清末民国地方教育行政体制的变迁历史对于当下我国地方教育行政体制改革具有重要的启示与借鉴意义。     

民法动机错误论考——从类型论到要件论之嬗变

严格区分动机错误与表示错误、原则上将动机排斥于法律评价之外,唯有表示于外的动机始受保护的传统的“类型论”观点日益露出其破绽,将动机错误与表示错误一元化并构造统一法律要件的“要件论”思想渐次成为今日“错误论”之主流,而统一的“错误要件”如何最大限度地保持合理性,仍在继续的探索与求证之中。     

The Promised Land: A Study of Trafficking in Women from Central and Eastern Europe to the Netherlands

This study on trafficking in women from Central and Eastern Europe explores the contextual factors, the characteristics, and the motivation of victims as well as the methods of traffickers. A combination of rational choice theory, strain theory and social control theory forms the theoretical framework of our research. Based on information from experts in the field, interviews with victims, questionnaires, a study of dossiers and a search of the literature, we developed a typology of victims, which may be helpful for prevention and law enforcement.     

Continuity and Pathways from Aggression in Childhood to Family Violence in Adulthood: A 30-year Longitudinal Study

Literature suggests that early patterns of aggressive behavior in both girls and boys are predictive of later violent behavior, including violence that takes place within family contexts. Utilizing the Concordia Longitudinal Risk Project, a study of individuals recruited as children in the 1970s from inner-city schools in Montreal, this study examined different pathways whereby aggressive behavioral styles in childhood may place individuals at risk for continuing patterns of violence towards children and spouses. Childhood aggression directly predicted self-reported violence towards spouse for both sexes, with indirect routes through lowered educational attainment and marital separation. Aggression in childhood was also found to predict parents’ self-reports of using violence with their children. For mothers, educational attainment and current absence of the biological father from the child’s home also played important roles in predicting violent behavior towards offspring. These findings provide evidence of both continuity of aggressive behavior and indirect risk paths to family violence, via lower educational attainment and parental absence. In both men and women, childhood aggression may be an identifiable precursor of family violence and child abuse.