对澳门特区立法会议员质询的分析:1999—2008

本文描述了质询制度在澳门特别行政区的确立和变迁,重点对1999—2008年9个立法会会期内的质询材料进行了统计分析。文章发现,尽管特区立法会曾采取了减少书面质询、增加口头质询的措施,但却出现了书面质询大幅增加、口头质询并不活跃的状况。作者认为,澳门特区的选举制度及议员所代表的利益对议员的书面质询有较大的影响,口头质询则由于程序设计原因数量有限,为此,政府应对书面质询作出积极回应,立法会可通过定期召开质询会议、建立顺畅的口头质询与辩论的衔接机制等措施完善口头质询制度。     

债权实现中的利益平衡——以汶川震后银行贷款处理为中心

汶川地震使得银行的巨额债权难以实现,舆论认为应当进行债务豁免,商业银行则更希望其债权能得到保护,冲突解决的关键在于如何平衡债权人的合法权利与债务人的生存权,但现行法律及司法解释对此的规定或者不够精细,或者其风险分配值得商榷。债权人与债务人的风险分担应该满足公平原则与效率原则,其核心就是使个体所承担的风险最小化。短期看,可以通过比较债务豁免、债务延期、强制执行等策略的优劣来选择最为实用的措施,政府应当明确其能与不能的边界;长期看,需要个人破产、巨灾保险等制度的建立与完善。     

Squeezing the balloon?

Drug policy scholars generally agree that coercive attempts by the United States to reduce drug supplies from abroad have negative side effects. This article confirms that US coercion has made a bad situation worse. However, it also argues against oversimplified statements about the creation of side effects. The empirical focus is on the Air Bridge Denial Program, a US-sponsored attempt from the late 1980s to 2001 to reduce aerial drug trafficking in South America. A causal mechanism is developed that helps to understand and explain how air interdiction contributed to the displacement of coca cultivation from Peru to Colombia, an increase in Peruvian and Bolivian cocaine production, and a diversification of trafficking routes and methods. The analysis also examines contingent conditions, empirical black boxes, and alternative explanations. A complex empirical picture means that the popular metaphor of a balloon whose air, when squeezed, simply moves elsewhere is misleading. Although US-sponsored air interdiction has contributed to displacement, other factors have played a role as well.     

Application of false discovery rate procedure to pairwise comparisons of refractive index of glass fragments

This study was undertaken to apply a new method of controlling type I error when performing pairwise comparisons. The Benjamini and Hochberg false discovery rate (FDR) controlling procedures have proved to be very powerful tools in solving many practical problems but have not yet been applied to pairwise comparisons of refractive index of glass samples. Students t-test and Welch test (unequal variance Student's t-test) were applied to all possible pairwise comparisons. The comparisons were made on the basis of refractive index values of 72 glass fragments from different car windows and 69 different fragments from one windscreen. The type I error was controlled by the use of Benjamini and Hochberg false discovery rate (FDR) controlling procedure. To illustrate the importance of controlling type I error when using pairwise comparisons, results of pairwise comparisons with the FDR controlling procedure were compared to those comparisons made without any controlling procedure. Significantly fewer false negative results (false rejection of H0) were found during the use of FDR procedure in the comparison of refractive indices from the same windscreen than when comparing without controlling type I error. The results of application of FDR method were also compared to the results of other post-hoc tests, such as Tukey HSD test and Bonfferoni test. The FDR method has higher power than Bonferroni method and Tukey HSD method and control errors better than comparing without controlling type I error. The method of choice, for pairwise comparison of glass fragments on the basis of refractive index is Welch test with FDR adjustment. The method gave type I errors at level about 5.3% and type II error at about 3.7%.     

加拿大面对的北极挑战:主权、安全与认同

由于全球暖化对北极地区产生的影响,使得北极资源开采与航运的战略价值再度成为人们关注的亮点。西北航道开通的可能性,以及北极蕴藏的丰富石油、天然气与矿物,让观察家认为加拿大北极主权问题将再度成为争议的核心。美加之间多年来关于西北航道控制权的争议,以及环北极国家之间因大陆架延伸的重叠而发生纠纷,并非一定会导致冲突,相反地,透过协调与外交斡旋或许对各方更有利。加拿大北极主权问题,其实也是认同问题,而加拿大必须展现对北极地区更多的投入意愿。