A Trip to the Yao Medicine Home Base

WE introduced Yao medicine practitioner Qin Xunyun in the January issue. This month we give an account of our visit to Jinxiu Yao Autonomous County, home of the Yao people who formulated Yao medicine. The five Yao sub-groups-the Chashan, Pan, Hualan, Shanzi and Ao-all live in Jinxiu. After visiting the county five times noted sociologist Fei Xiaotong says, "Jinxiu is the center for research into the Yao ethnic group."     

Financial Markets Must Not Return to "Bad Old Ways"

Thanks to the draining effects of the Iraq war and the financial meltdown emanating from Wall Street, a powershift away from American dominance is taking place. Caught between a rising China and an America in relative decline, the new leadership in Japan is recalibrating its post-World War II relationships. The G-20 has usurped the role once played by the G-8 as the governing committee of globalization. And the symbiotic coupling of "Chimerica", born out of the credit bubble built up over the past two decades, is being put to the test.
In this section, the new prime minister of Japan, the president of the European Union, the president of Brazil and a leading economic historian assess these shifts.     

Qin Xunyun——Traditional Yao Medicine Practitioner

Editor: In recent years, the efficacy of folk medicines formulated by various ethnic groups and practiced locally for centuries has gained increasing international acknowledgement. It is reported that the American medical research department has scheduled a US＄ 220 million alternative medicine research and training program, the greater part of which entails research into Asian traditional medicines. As from this issue, China Today will look at China's traditional medicine, beginning with that practiced by the Yao ethnic group of southwestern China.     

Practical Reason and Legislation

Abstract
The author's starting point is Bobbio's theoretical approach to the problems of the relations between law and reason. He then appraises the meanings of reason and the concept of theoretical and practical rationality in the application of law. He examines the complex problem of the rationality of legislation and distinguishes five levels of rationality.     

Output of the Spanish Cortes (1979–2000): A case of adaptation to party government

Abstract.  This article considers the activity of the Spanish Cortes in law production and the control of the executive during the six parliaments of the democratic government. It mainly examines the output of the lower chamber due to the asymmetrical bicameralism and weak status of the Senate. In Spain, the legislative output has been dependent on different situations of party government. In general terms, the Cortes have been always very active in controlling the executive and its participation in law-making was highly relevant when there was a minority government. Because parties are central actors in parliament and due to the strong party discipline in the Spanish case, the author mainly studied parliament output from the viewpoint of strategies of opposition parties. Sometimes parties behaved in parliament procedures in a competitive way, while in others they behave cooperatively. There was a great variety of patterns of strategic behaviour on account of the different situations of party government and the diverse opposition parties. Half of the parliaments had minority governments in which minority parties played a very important role by supporting the government in parliament; however, the main opposition party was never the same since there were two changes of government.