Environmental advocacy: insights from East Asia

Environmental advocacy in East Asia takes place in a context where there are few well-funded professional advocacy organizations, no viable green parties, and governments that are highly pro-business. In this advocacy-hostile environment, what strategies are environmental organizations using to promote better environmental outcomes? Using an original database of environmental organizations and interviews with activists and officials throughout the region, this paper investigates which strategies are most common, and compares them to the advocacy strategies found in the United States. It finds, perhaps surprisingly, that (a) environmental organizations across East Asia employ similar advocacy strategies, even though they are operating in very different political conditions, and (b) the strategies most favoured in East Asia are also the strategies most often utilized in the United States. It then argues that new theories of advocacy should be developed to pay closer attention to certain actors (academics and artists), and particular processes (organizational networking, government collaboration, and culture-making), that appear to play important roles in advocacy in countries around the world, irrespective of political context.     

Formal institutions,informal institutions,and red tape: A comparative study

Firms across the globe are affected by red tape, but there is little academic research on how country‐level institutions shape red tape perceptions. Drawing on institutional theory, we argue that a variety of formal and informal country‐level institutions affect perceptions of red tape in the private sector. We test our hypotheses using six data sources, including the World Economic Forum and the World Bank. Our results indicate that red tape is weakly associated with a country's level of formalization and rule enforcement effectiveness and more prevalent in federal as opposed to unitary states. As for informal institutions, we find that red tape perceptions are more pronounced in countries with an increased conservative political ideology, higher levels of corruption, and cultures that emphasize individualism and uncertainty avoidance. We conclude with a discussion of the implications for theory and practice.     

中国和平发展与东亚合作机制构建

地区合作机制的创设能力不仅是大国崛起的一般性标尺,也是大国崛起的内在要求。参与和创设东亚合作机制是保证中国和平发展的重要条件,它有助于奠定中国和平发展的地区性根基,构筑平衡的大国关系,咒化经济结构和扩大对外开放。同时,中国的制度化行为也拉动了地区经济增长,缓解了地区安全困境,促进了东亚地区一体化。实际上,中国和平发展和东亚合作机制是一种相互促进的关系。     

State aid programs for equalizing spending across local school districts: does the structure of the program matter, or only it’s size?

This paper provides interesting insights into an important causal mechanism underlying Murray, Evans and Schwab’s (Am. Econ. Rev. 88(4):789–812, 1998) finding that court mandated reforms result in less inequality in spending per pupil levels across rich and poor school districts within a state. Treating the choice of an education program’s structure as endogenous, following the analysis of Leyden (Public Finance/Finances Publiques 47:229–247, 1992; Public Choice 115(1–2):83–107, 2003), yields empirical results suggesting that court mandated reforms increase the likelihood that a program’s structure will include a price effect and that the inclusion of a price effect in turn results in a decrease in spending inequality.     

刑事再审启动程序比较研究

刑事再审程序是对已生效裁判是否符合正当性、合法性要求的重新审视的司法程序,是追求刑事诉讼活动根本宗旨的体现.在中国司法改革进程中,刑事再审程序的改革是关系维护基本人权和保障法律尊严的重要举措.刑事再审中的启动程序是其重中之重.要借鉴发达国家的有关制度和理念,在我国现有国情的基础上,结合我国的司法实践,完善我国再审程序制度.     

网络环境下国家安全面临的严峻挑战和对策思考

当前,信息安全已经对政治安全、经济安全和文化安全产生了全面的影响,给国家安全带来了新的挑战.如何实现信息化建设又好又快的发展,已成为建设和谐社会的重大问题.为此,特提出五大对策建议.