Networked and Polycentric Governance in South Korea: The Case of Dam Politics after Devolution

The South Korean intergovernmental environment has undergone drastic changes after the reintroduction of local autonomy in 1995. This study investigates how and why the governance has changed in terms of its structure and processes after devolution using the case of dam politics in South Korea. It also addresses the accountability implications of the changed governance. This study analyses two cases of dam construction initiative, which are the Youngwol dam project (1990–2000) and the Hantangang dam project (1998–2004). The analysis of these cases reveals that the governance structure concerning water resource supply has changed from a form of policy community, which can be characterized by its closed membership and stability in relationships, to a form of issue network, where the membership is enlarged to include various participants. More specifically, there are three important findings. First, the cancellation of the Youngwol dam project served as the moment to establish and empower a network of opposition against dam building, which had long been advocated and led by the policy community comprising the Ministry of Construction and Transportation, Korea Water Resources Corporation, engineering experts, and some private companies related to dam construction. Second, as the central government plans to build 12 more dams including Hantangang dam, the network of opposition tends to be further vitalized with heated participation from local activists, some water resource management experts, and environmental activists. Third, as the pro-dam policy community and the network of opposition initiate dialogue among themselves, they are forming an issue network which works as a governance mechanism in the area of water resource supply management.     

Co-opting Good Governance Reform: The Rise of a Not-so-Reformist Leader in Kebumen,Central Java

Challenging the existing literature, which tends to downplay the impact of good governance reform in post-Suharto Indonesia, the article suggests that greater intervention by international donors, combined with the process of decentralisation, has influenced the dynamics of political competition at the local level. It suggests that the increasing availability of international aid has provided local elites with an option to engage in a new form of patronage politics that relies less on old instruments, such as money politics and violence. By selectively committing themselves to good governance reform, Indonesian local elites can now seek a new source of power in the form of support from international donors, with which they can raise their profiles as ‘reformists’ and consolidate power, only to engage in familiar, if less blatant, forms of patronage politics. The article highlights such a dimension of local politics with reference to the case of Kebumen's former regent, Rustriningsih.     

‘Joe everyday,people off the street’: a qualitative study on mediators’ roles and skills in victim–offender mediation

This qualitative study examined multiple perspectives of participants who experienced a Victim–Offender Mediation (VOM) program in a Midwestern city in the United States. Of particular interest are the roles and skills of mediators. Data consisted of 34 face‐to‐face interviews with 37 participants including adult crime victims, juvenile offenders and their parents, mediators and representatives from referring agencies. Insider perspectives regarding the roles and skills of the mediators in restorative processes were revealed through personal stories. Although the majority of the participants reported that the roles and skills of mediators were consistent with restorative justice principles, this exploratory study also revealed that some roles and skills exhibited by mediators were inconsistent with restorative justice values, which shows the variance of ‘real world’ restorative justice. Recommendations are made to promote mediators’ roles and skills that are compatible with restorative justice principles.     

Uncertain allies or uncomfortable neighbors? Making sense of China–North Korea Relations, 1949–2010

Abstract

This study is based upon two premises: (1) the available literature, though voluminous, fails to provide systematic understandings of the complex and evolving relations between China and North Korea; and (2) China and North Korea had been short of being trusted allies bound in blood and belief even before the launch of post-Mao reforms and the normalization of Beijing–Seoul relations. This article dissects this curious relationship into four questions: (1) What does history inform us about China's relations with (North) Korea? (2) Has China communicated effectively with North Korea? (3) Have China and North Korea been ‘trusted allies’? (4) How effective has China been in inducing North Korea to comply with its demands over the years? The authors argue that, geo-strategically, China can hardly afford to put North Korea in an adversarial position. Furthermore, residues of the Factional Incident of 1956 and North Korea's deep-rooted suspicion of China still linger on. These have been the sources of Beijing's dilemma in consistently opting for ‘soft’ measures despite that North Korea's provocative acts and nuclear weapons programs have negatively affected China's interests. From the outset, China and North Korea had been more uncertain allies who had to cooperate with each other under the ideological and geopolitical imperatives of the difficult times. The authors also suggest that it would be misleading to put Sino–North Korean dynamics in a usual category of big power–small nation relations where power asymmetry generally works against the latter. North Korea has undoubtedly been an atypical ‘small nation’. It is due to these limitations that China's pressurizing has not been always effective and that Beijing's reactions have been continuously cyclical. This cyclical trend is not likely to be broken since the upcoming drama of Sino–American rivalry is bound to close the window of such opportunities for China, which will nevertheless regard North Korea increasingly as a liability, if not uncomfortable neighbor.     

Constructing a decolonized world city for consumption: discourses on Hong Kong Disneyland and their implications

The paper argues that, under the globalized economy, state power is far from diminishing. I study how the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government officials in 1999 developed “competition-development” discourse and “disappearing-world-city” discourse to persuade the public to approve the unequal and non-transparent Hong Kong–Disney deal for setting up the Hong Kong Disneyland (HKDL). I also examine how newspaper reports have circulated and have reinforced these two pairs of political discourses in wider popular discourse. I further reveal, in the post-colonial context of HongKong, how the HKDL project functions to accomplish decolonization tasks and to reshape Hong Kong as a consumption-based tourist spot instead of a citizen-based participatory community.     

Singapore's cultural policy and its consequences

Abstract

This article explores the effects of Singapore's Global City for the Arts project on the local theater industry. It begins by describing the character of the Singapore state and its ability to meet the challenges of globalization. It then shows that while historically global in orientation, the city-state's early cultural policies were resolutely local and insular prior to the economic recession in 1985. From that year on, local arts and culture was driven by an economic rationale — eventually culminating in the birth of a globally oriented national cultural policy: the Global City for the Arts project. The author contends that the Global City for the Arts project has pressured the Singapore state into shedding some of its authoritarian practices in order to conform to international norms. However, the author also illustrates how certain theater companies with the requisite cultural capital for the Global City for the Arts project have benefited from the country's cultural policies while others that do not possess such cultural capital are marginalized. The article concludes by arguing that the Singapore state, in going global, exacerbates the economic disparity by accentuating preexisting inequalities and divisions in the local.     

以绿色奥运为契机全面推进我国政府绿色采购的发展

改革开放三十年，我国经济社会得到了飞速发展，成功申办第29届奥林匹克运动会就是国际社会对我国经济与社会发展成果的充分肯定。如何通过政府采购这一强有力的宏观调控杠杆以实现北京奥运会绿色奥运、科技奥运、人文奥运的理念，进一步实现我国经济社会的可持续发展，全面推进我国政府绿色采购的发展将是关键。本文旨在通过对国外政府绿色采购发展状况的分析，以北京奥运会为契机，探讨推进我国政府绿色采购发展的途径。以期促进循环经济发展和环境友好型社会的构建。     

A Ferris Wheel Accident at a Movable Amusement Park

This study presented a Ferris wheel accident case. A Ferris wheel is composed of many parts, and the outmost ring of it is assembled using a lock pin. This accident occurred because the lock pin caught the door of a gondola and the gondola overturned. Five of the seven passengers in the gondola fell to the ground, along with the gondola's viewing window. The investigation revealed that the gondola became stuck when its door was caught by a lock pin at the Ferris wheel's three o'clock position. The contact between the door and the lock pin was due to a structural problem: There was not enough space allotted between the door and the lock pin. Therefore, if a passenger pushed on the gondola's door, the potential existed for contact between the door and the lock pin.     

The Etiology of Basal Vacuolizations in Renal Tubular Epithelial Cells Evaluated in an Isolated Perfused Kidney Model

To determine whether basal lipid vacuolization characteristic of ketoacidosis could be induced with short‐term hypertriglyceridemia, adult Sprague Dawley rat kidneys were perfused in an isolated perfused kidney model with, and without, 11.3 mM (10 g/L) of triglycerides in Krebs‐Henseleit buffer, for 1 and 2 h (n = 5/group). Additional treatments included perfusion with triglycerides with 20 mM of β‐hydroxybutyrate and 2 mM of acetoacetate (n = 5) and perfusion with triglycerides with 70 mM of glucose (n = 1). Basal vacuolization was produced in all groups, but differed in morphology to that reported in postmortem studies. There was no further increase in vacuolization after 2 h of perfusion compared to 1 h (p = 0.24), and the addition of ketones did not alter the morphology or extent of vacuolization. This study using an ex vivo model has confirmed that isolated hypertriglyceridemia is sufficient to cause basal lipid vacuolization in renal tubular epithelial cells, but with different morphology to vacuoles observed in lethal ketoacidosis at autopsy.     

GFP标记的重组新城疫病毒HN基因乳酸菌表达载体的构建及原核表达

为构建具有示踪特性的新城疫病毒(NDV)HN基因乳酸菌穿梭表达载体,采用PCR方法扩增NDV HN基因与绿色荧光蛋白(GFP)基因,将两基因克隆至乳酸菌表达载体pW425et中,转化入表达宿主菌BL21(DE3)后利用IPTG诱导表达。用荧光显微镜检查重组菌的绿色荧光效应,采用SDS-PAGE和Western-blotting检测其在大肠杆菌中的表达情况。结果显示,NDV HN和GFP基因与表达载体pW425et正确重组。荧光显微镜下可见阳性重组菌落的绿色荧光,且该重组菌传代30代次以上,荧光效应依然稳定。SDS-PAGE显示表达出约63ku的条带,与已知表达的HN蛋白大小相符。Western-blotting进一步证实该蛋白能被NDV阳性血清所识别,具有反应原性。构建了GFP标记的重组NDV HN基因乳酸菌穿梭表达载体且能在大肠杆菌中表达。