Practical developments in law science and policy: efforts to protect the traditional group knowledge and practices of the Shuar, an indigenous people of the Ecuadorian Amazon

The purpose of this article is to broadly outline a problem in the context of relatively recent activity in the Amazon Basin. My colleagues and I found the Policy Sciences framework to be a useful blueprint for comprehensive issue analysis. The five intellectual tasks of the policy-oriented approach to solving problems helped us to clarify the apparent goals of the primary actors involved; identify certain trends associated with the problem, including estimations of their magnitude and implications; understand several conditioning factors which could impact (or have already had an impact on) the achievement of the goals identified; recognize several projections anticipated from a normative standpoint in light of the trends examined; and make some observations, including possible strategies and their alternatives, which might enable the Shuar to maximize benefits and minimize costs.     

FTA对商业活动的影响——基于对中国企业的问卷调查

加入WTO以后,中国把对外签署FTA作为一项重要战略。一般来说,FTA可以改善参与方的经济环境,促进相互之间贸易、投资的自由化与便利化。中国已经签订了多项FTA,其利用效果如何?影响如何?本文基于调查问卷数据所进行的分析表明,中国企业对FTA的利用率很低,其最主要原因是缺乏FTA信息。因此,本文建议相关部门加强对企业提供FTA服务,发展市场化的FTA服务机构。     

The irresistible decline of the medical profession? an empirical investigation of its autonomy and economic situation in the changing German welfare state

The aim of this paper is to examine various theses of loss of autonomy in the medical profession by means of an empirical investigation of changes in physicians' economic opportunities and technical autonomy in Germany since the mid-1970s. The paper shows that transitions in the organisational structure of the health care system, government policies aimed mainly at the economisation of health care, and the changing situation of the profession in the labour market, have together been responsible for the changes investigated. It is argued that technical autonomy has been retained in out-patient care, while in hospitals there has been some loss of technical autonomy. Moreover, the economic situation of physicians has in general deteriorated as a result of central state intervention.