Legislative Twitter Style: Electoral Vulnerability,Social Media,and Constituency-Building in Large Multimember Electoral Systems

How do legislators use social media to cultivate their constituencies in large multimember electoral districts? Colombia's Senate nationwide district offers a suitable case to examine how lawmakers, through their behaviour on Twitter, geographically target their audiences. We employ microblog user geolocation methods which infer locations using textual content in order to identify where Colombian senators' Twitter ‘home’ is. We find that senators' location targeting on Twitter largely mirrors the geographical distribution of their votes. Deviations from that pattern mostly stem from their vulnerability to intraparty competition and the nature of their parties' organisation.     

The coastal zone as an administrative entity for governing U.S. marine minerals development

The coastal zone is being promoted as a spatial unit to coordinate and administer offshore minerals development with other coastal uses. Rather than aiding the administration of minerals development , the coastal zone is being used as the reason to block such development. This paper explores the coastal zone concept as an entity for administration. It concludes that just because minerals may be found in a coastal zone does not mean that physical entity is the most appropriate vehicle for administering mineral development. Arbitrariness at to what is included or excluded from a coastal zone as well as many minerals impacts being found outside of the coastal zone militate against such an entity being the sole criterion for decisionmaking. While the coastal zone may be appropriate for some mineral decisions, the choice to implement it must be arrayed against alternative criteria to ensure a high degree of effectiveness and efficiency in those decisions.     

Public budgeting and financial management curriculum reform: A conceptual framework

Public budgeting and financial management (PBFM) education has been undergoing intense scrutiny which can be seen through many professional conferences, journal symposia, and recently, the creation in 1984 of a Task Force on Budgeting and Financial Management Curriculum Reform by the Section on Budgeting and Financial Management of the American Society for Public Administration. This study analyzes pedagogic deficits in PBFM, suggests a comprehensive scope of PBFM, points to some dilemmas in PBFM curriculum design or reform, proposes some models for a curriculum reform, and raises some implementation constraints in each model.     

Categorization of Narcomessages in Mexico: An Appraisal of the Attempts to Influence Public Perception and Policy Actions

The current article brings together the conclusions of an exercise carried out in an attempt to analyze and classify narcopropaganda, or “narcomessages” in Mexico. The analysis and classification of narcomessages is able to provide some insights about the motivations underlying the increase of violent attacks in the country; at the same time, the classification of these messages can help in the identification of those groups that are more likely to influence public perception and support public policy measures against them.     

社会正义与制度建设

正义是社会制度的首要价值。然而,中国当代的正义存在一些缺损问题,即正义取向出现了偏差,形式正义与实质正义、算术正义与比例正义、交换正义与分配正义等正义形式出现了缺损。本文提出通过加强制度建设来改善正义缺损问题的现状,因为制度最基本、最重要的功能就是保障社会的公平正义。     

基本公共服务均等化视阈下的政府间转移支付制度——从法治视角的分析

政府间转移支付制度是实现基本公共服务均等化的重要途径。从促进基本公共服务均等化的目标来看,政府间转移支付制度需要实现从政治模式向法治模式的转变。本文从基本公共服务均等化与政府间转移支付制度的关系入手,分析了政府间转移支付的传统运作模式及其不足,并从法治的视角提出了政府间转移支付制度的发展方向。     

试析行政法领域的思想解放及其走向

新中国行政法是在党的十一届三中全会以后迅速发展起来的。它前行的每一步都凝结着思想解放的成果,它未来的发展亦有赖于思想进一步解放。行政法观念与制度变迁的基本走向是:从管制行政到控权行政再到服务行政,从依政策行政到有法可依再到实质法治,从全能政府到职能转变再到行政组织法治化,从单方强制到刚柔相济再到合作参与,从轻视程序到程序合法再到程序当正,从公权神圣到接受监督再到完善监督、救济制度和建立责任政府等。