伪满洲国的法律文本与人权实态

伪满成立后,颁布了殖民史上独一无二的《人权保障法》。通过对法律文本的解读,本文批驳了日本右翼史学家美化《人权保障法》的观点,还以结社权和通信自由为例,揭示了日本殖民统治下人权实态与法律规定的严重背离。可以说,伪满洲国任何冠冕堂皇的法律文本都掩盖不了三千万东北同胞生存权受到根本威胁的事实。     

Improving Reputation BIT by BIT: Bilateral Investment Treaties and Foreign Accountability

The literature on foreign direct investment (FDI) has paid an increasing interest to international institutions such as bilateral investment treaties (BITs), but whether BITs help attract FDI is an unsettled question. Building on the existing literature, this article argues that BITs can change investors’ perceptions and the corresponding investment they make because signing BITs signals the involvement of another powerful country that is able to compel the host government to comply. This implies that the effect of BITs is not constant across signatory countries: BITs are more effective when they are signed with rich and influential countries. Using monadic and dyadic FDI data, this article finds that BITs signed with powerful countries (defined as the top six largest economies) lead to an increase in FDI inflows (both from these signatory countries and from other countries). BITs signed with other countries, despite in a larger quantity, have little influence on FDI inflows.     

人权还是知识产权:美国对华政策的一个重要转折

克林顿政府初期处于对华政策的十字路口。冷战结束,美国全面调整对外政策,把经济放到对外战略的首位,知识产权问题凸现。而对华政策背离这一主旨,把人权作为首要目标,并与最惠国待遇问题挂钩。这种矛盾决定其必然改弦更张。以经贸为立足点的接触政策的确立,使知识产权问题再次回到中美关系的中心,美国经历了对华政策的一次重要转折。     

Agent permeability, principal delegation and the European Court of Human Rights

A growing body of international relations literature examines the delegation of state authority to international organizations. Delegation is a conditional grant of authority from a principal to an agent in which the latter is empowered to act on behalf of the former. This paper explores the effect of agent permeability to interested third parties on the efficacy of control mechanisms established by principals. Our central argument is that higher levels of agent permeability are likely to lead to higher levels of agent autonomy. Because of this, principals who face a potentially permeable agent are likely to delegate more cautiously—partially, in stages, or with clear limits. We illustrate our argument with a case study of the European Convention of Human Rights and its two principal institutions, the Commission and the Court. We find that principals (contracting states) historically delegated quite cautiously to the Court, clearly concerned about the Court’s autonomy. Court behavior in its first two decades reassured principals while increasing the Court’s permeability. Over time, that increased permeability increased Court autonomy in conjunction with the Court’s growing visibility and experience.

From Media Attention to Negotiated Peace: Human Rights Reporting and Civil War Duration

Violations of human rights in the context of a conflict have in recent years received an increasing amount of attention from the international media. Yet how such media attention influences conflict remains understudied and, a priori, uncertain. On the one hand, media coverage of human rights abuses may constitute “naming and shaming” that might temper hostilities. On the other hand, such coverage might spark intransigence and complicate negotiations among conflicting parties, thereby hindering rather than hastening peace. This article tries to adjudicate among these and other possibilities by exploring how media reporting on human rights abuses influences the development of conflicts. The analysis reveals that such reporting is associated with shorter conflicts and negotiated agreements between fighting parties.     

When Killers Become Victims: Diversionary War,Human Rights,and Strategic Target Selection

The diversionary theory largely focuses on the incentives leaders have to use force. However, little attention has been given to the characteristics that make for a good target. We argue that US presidents choose targets that repress human rights since they are the easiest to sell to international and domestic audiences. By targeting repressive states US presidents can justify their use of force by cloaking their motivation in the language of human rights, responding to calls for intervention, pointing to the failure of international actors and institutions to resolve these problems, and building upon emerging norms that allow for intervention in repressive states. Updating US Use of Force data, we empirically test and find support for our hypothesis that presidents target human rights abusers when they face trouble at home. This paper contributes to target selection process by offering a complete theory of diversionary conflict accounting for cost/benefit calculation of presidents. Moreover, we believe that our findings reveal human rights practices’ role in international conflict, as well.     

Party prohibition cases: different approaches by the Turkish constitutional court and the European Court of Human Rights

The article deals with the different approaches followed by the Turkish Constitutional Court and the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in party prohibition cases. The Turkish Constitution and even more so the Law on Political Parties contain a long list of party bans, the violation of which leads to the closure of the party by the Constitutional Court. The Turkish Constitutional Court, both under the 1961 and the 1982 Constitutions, interpreted these provisions in an exceedingly illiberal manner, and has so far closed down a total of 24 political parties. Turkish rules and practices concerning the prohibition of political parties are among the most important ‘democracy deficits’ of the Turkish political system. In the article, the Turkish Court's illiberal approach to party prohibition cases, especially those involving the protection of the national and territorial integrity of the state and of the principle of secularism, is compared with the much more liberal criteria developed by the ECtHR and the Venice Commission.     

More Bang for the Buck: Media Freedom and Organizational Strategies in the Agenda-Setting of Human Rights Groups

Studies investigating the agenda-setting of human rights groups disagree on both their prospects of garnering political attention, and the factors that help them in that quest. This study makes the argument that we need to take account of both macro-institutional opportunity structures and actor-level strategies in order to gain a more complete understanding of the group-media interface. Specifically, it posits that the urgency of social problems only drives media attention toward groups if a country’s media landscape is sufficiently free, and that within these institutional constraints, groups themselves can enhance their media access by providing newsmakers with information subsidies. These claims are substantiated by way of a novel cross-nationally comparative data set of more than 1,000 domestic election monitoring and advocacy organizations. Findings show that media attention is structurally limited by the degree to which the news media serve as an open arena, and that even in countries with a free press, few groups achieve media access. At the same time, the most successful groups are not necessarily the most resourceful ones. Rather, strategic choices to invest in media effort, narrow policy engagement, and professionalization substitute for scarce resources, thereby giving groups “more bang for their buck.” The results clarify the causal mechanisms behind the dominance of resource-rich groups on the media agenda and reinforce calls for more globally comparative research into media agenda-setting.     

Linking Experiential and Classroom Education: Lessons Learned from The American University–Amnesty International USA Summer Institute on Human Rights

How can internships and other forms of experiential or service learning be designed to best accomplish academic goals? This article explores the benefits and pitfalls of experiential education by looking at the relevant scholarly literature and at students' and faculty members' experience with the American University–Amnesty International USA Summer Institute on Human Rights. Overall, faculty and students report that internships, when integrated with traditional classroom learning, greatly enhance learning overall. The article suggests strategies for structuring internships to enrich students' learning.