District magnitude and representation of the majority’s preferences: Evidence from popular and parliamentary votes

Representatives have more effective incentives to cater to the preferences of the majority of citizens when they are elected in districts with few rather than many seats. We investigate this hypothesis empirically by matching Swiss members of parliament’s voting behavior on legislative proposals with real referendum outcomes on the same issues for the years 1996 to 2008. We thus identify the impact of district magnitude on representatives’ incentives to adhere to citizens’ revealed preferences. We find systematic, statistically significant and economically relevant evidence that individual representatives from districts with few seats vote more often in line with majority preferences.     

全面禁食野生动物的法理基础与制度构建

面对新冠疫情全球蔓延,第十三届全国人大常委会第十六次会议表决通过了全面禁食野生动物的决定.全面禁食野生动物的决定主要建立在公共安全与生命伦理两大法理基础之上:前者侧重于社会整体利益的维护与风险规制,是一个功利性标准;而后者则侧重于对生命的尊重和人与自然和谐关系的维护,主要为伦理性标准.现实中,对"野生动物"概念范畴的理...     

Vegetation dynamics as a tool for detecting clandestine graves

The burial of a body can affect plant communities through mechanical disturbance and nutrient balance alteration. We performed an experimental trial using five swine carcasses buried in an open site in Italy. Vegetation dynamics was monitored recording monthly every plant individual on a regular sampling grid during 1 year on the graves, on an empty control grave, and on an undisturbed plot. Plant species composition and cover were significantly different between the disturbed and the undisturbed plots. Disturbed plots showed the increase in ruderal species and the reduction in stress-tolerant ones. Graves and the control grave could not be distinguished from each other. Disturbance was the main factor affecting plant cover, while the presence of a buried body did not affect vegetation dynamics. However, disturbance could be easily detected; the functional approach seems promising for the identification of dynamic patterns to be used in different biogeographic and ecological contexts.     

解读“技术侦查”与“乔装侦查”——以《刑事诉讼法修正案》为中心的规范分析

第十一届全国人民代表大会第五次会议通过了《关于修改<中华人民共和国刑事诉讼法>的决定》(即《刑事诉讼法修正案》),明文规定在《刑事诉讼法》第二编第二章第七节后增加第八节"技术侦查措施"。但是,《刑事诉讼法修正案》在技术侦查措施的立法技术上采取了"概括授权"的方式,即仅笼统规定侦查机关对于危害国家安全犯罪、恐怖活动犯罪、黑社会性质的组织犯罪、重大毒品犯罪或者其他严重危害社会的犯罪案件,根据侦查犯罪的需要,经过严格的批准手续,有权采取技术侦查措施,而并未明确列举可采取的技术侦查措施的具体种类和手段。与此相关,《刑事诉讼法修正案》在"技术侦查措施"这一章节下同时授权公安机关为了查明案情,在必要的时候,经公安机关负责人决定,可以由有关人员隐匿其身份实施侦查,此即"乔装侦查措施"。问题在于,《刑事诉讼法修正案》在乔装侦查措施的立法技术上同样采取了概括授权的方式,除列举性地规定了作为乔装侦查方式之一的"控制下交付"之外,并未在立法上明文列举乔装侦查措施的具体类型和方式,其结果是造成《刑事诉讼法修正案》中"技术侦查措施"、"乔装侦查措施"等基础概念含义不清、相关法条内容模糊,减损了法条的可操作性,威胁到司法的确定性,可能直接或间接地冲击《刑事诉讼法》保障人权和打击犯罪的终极目的。《刑事诉讼法修正案》施行在即,上述基础概念的界定问题不解决,司法实务中将无法正确操作《刑事诉讼法修正案》中与"技术侦查措施"和"乔装侦查措施"相关的程序与制度。因此,应运用法律解释的方法对"技术侦查措施"和"乔装侦查措施"这两个基础性概念进行规范解释,勘定"技术侦查措施"和"乔装侦查措施"的合理内涵与外延。     

海商法和海事法的联系与区别——兼论海商法学的建立与发展

文章从分析英文admiralty与maritime两词的语源和语义出发,讨论了中国法律框架下"海事"与"海商"的区别,厘清了海商法与海事法的关系,提出海商法体系的构建和完善主要是物权体系和债权体系的构建和完善。     

How to protect better intellectual property

Different policies aimed at protecting intellectual property are not equally efficient. This paper provides support in favour of those policies affecting the unit value of damage produced by infringers, contrarily to those policies aimed at reducing the frequency of infringements. The finding has practical spillovers both in terms of policy and in terms of further research.     

An experimental investigation on optimal bankruptcy laws

We performed an experimental investigation to assess whether the “restricted auction” mechanism proposed by Berkovitch, Israel and Zender in 1997 works effectively as an optimal bankruptcy law or not. An optimal bankruptcy law is a commitment device that implements efficient choices both before (ex ante) and after (ex post) financial distress, even if moral hazard is binding. We designed an experiment focused on ex ante efficiency and we found that the restricted auction mechanism was able to direct an optimal amount of effort toward entrepreneurial activities. This result confirms the theoretical predictions. Nonetheless, we found that under a plain unrestricted auction mechanism our experimental subjects chose to allocate into their firms a larger amount of effort than that predicted by theory. Although difficult to justify on theoretical grounds, this experimental evidence is robust. Our behavioral interpretation is that this result is due to “moral sentiments”, such as the natural propensity of subjects toward socially desirable behaviors. In fact, we show that it vanishes once these motives are removed.     

《欧洲版权法典》评述

《欧洲版权法典》在充分考虑《伯尔尼公约》、《TRIPS协定》以及欧盟之前在版权领域制定的七个指令的基础上,对作品、作者身份与权利归属、精神权利、经济权利以及限制这五个方面的问题作了规定.法典在有些内容上作了创新,尤其是在涉及权利限制的部分,提出了区别于现有的“封闭式”和“开放式”的立法模式,引入了类比适用的新立法模式.鉴于我国已经启动《著作权法》第三次修改,因此《欧洲版权法典》的规定,对于我国的修法工作有着重要的参考价值.