Jurisgenerative role of auditors in transnational labor governance

This article builds on the model of regulatory intermediaries by incorporating insights from the field of legal hermeneutics about the process through which the meaning of a legal rule emerges. It describes how intermediaries can take on a jurisgenerative role in the development of legal rules through their interpretation of legal rules. This role is demonstrated through an analysis of social audits from Chinese and Vietnamese factories involved in the Fair Labor Association (FLA). The analysis illustrates how the integration of fundamental labor rights into the FLA's private Code of Conduct requires auditors to develop new interpretations of the Freedom of Association as a result of uncertainties and contradictions between legal requirements at various levels, as well as with the FLA's own rules. Through this empirical analysis, the article contributes to the literature by identifying regulatory intermediaries’ jurisgenerative capacities when they monitor fundamental labor rights referenced by private governance instruments. It further highlights why legal and regulatory governance scholars need to consider the transformative effects that transnational private labor governance may have on international labor law.     

A Changing Society

Ifirst visited China in 1973. I was a serving member of the Royal Australian Navy and we were engaged in the Viet Nam War.Communism was the deadly enemy of the free world back then.     

Genesis of the CDM: the original policymaking goals of the 1997 Brazilian proposal and their evolution in the Kyoto protocol negotiations into the CDM

A body of literature is emerging applying critical consideration to the Kyoto Protocol Clean Development Mechanism’s (‘CDM’) achievement of policy goals regarding sustainable development, geographical distribution of projects and related matters. This article places this literature in the context of the policymaking goals of the CDM’s Brazilian architects. The CDM arose from the Brazilian Proposal’s Clean Development Fund, and was negotiated between Brazil and the United States in the weeks preceding the Kyoto Conference of Parties. The CDM’s Brazilian architects continued to pursue their underlying policy goals by taking a leadership position in the Marrakesh Accords negotiations. During this period Brazil’s primary policy objectives comprised achieving meaningful mitigation of GHG emissions to avoid dangerous interference with the climate system, derailing a perceived US/IPCC initiative to allocate emissions cap obligations in the Kyoto Protocol on the basis of current emissions, and taking a leadership position both among the G-77 and China and in the multilateral climate negotiations as a whole. The CDM arose in this context from the G-77 and China’s desire to coerce the North’s compliance with the North’s emissions cap obligations through an alternative means of compliance. As a result, there was no focus on broad conceptions of sustainable development, or on broad distribution of CDM projects throughout the South. Instead, the CDM’s Brazilian architects envisioned that CDM-related sustainable development would arise exclusively from the presence of the CDM projects. Similarly, the Brazilian Proposal advocated allocation of the Clean Development Fund on a basis proportionate to each non-Annex I countries projected 1990–2010 greenhouse gas emissions. These views persisted through the evolution of the Clean Development Fund into the CDM and through Marrakesh Accords negotiations. This article argues that the CDM has largely met the policy goals of its Brazilian architects and that the pursuit of different, additional, refined or more nuanced policy goals necessitates corresponding refinements to the CDM, or any successor mechanism, specifically targeting those different, additional, refined or more nuanced policy objectives, lending support to the emerging literature proposing changes to the CDM to pursue corresponding policy objectives.     

Variation in the Measurement of Cranial Volume and Surface Area Using 3D Laser Scanning Technology

Abstract: Three‐dimensional (3D) laser scanner models of human crania can be used for forensic facial reconstruction, and for obtaining craniometric data useful for estimating age, sex, and population affinity of unidentified human remains. However, the use of computer‐generated measurements in a casework setting requires the measurement precision to be known. Here, we assess the repeatability and precision of cranial volume and surface area measurements using 3D laser scanner models created by different operators using different protocols for collecting and processing data. We report intraobserver measurement errors of 0.2% and interobserver errors of 2% of the total area and volume values, suggesting that observer‐related errors do not pose major obstacles for sharing, combining, or comparing such measurements. Nevertheless, as no standardized procedure exists for area or volume measurements from 3D models, it is imperative to report the scanning and postscanning protocols employed when such measurements are conducted in a forensic setting.     

The view from city hall: Local perceptions of intergovernmental fiscal relations in the Czech Republic

This article analyzes perceptions of inter-governmental fiscal relations as held by local officials of the Czech Republic. The field study probes local perceptions of progress toward fiscal decentralization in the Czech Republic. A statistical analysis is based on a scaling of cities according to size and according to a generalized, multi-part measure of fiscal autonomy. This measure is effective in discriminating high and low autonomy cities by size, types of expenditures, and funding sources. Cities of diverse sizes are divided into groups reflecting perceptions of greater or lesser autonomy. The implications of the findings are discussed.