Environmental Law and Policy in the People's Republic of China

The purpose of this paper is to take a look at the main reasonsfor the apparent ineffectiveness of the environmental regulatoryregime in the People's Republic of China. In order to assessthe current state of China's environmental legislation framework,an overview of all major environmental codifications is provided,firstly, by establishing the institutional and historical contextand, secondly, by reviewing environmental legislation and policies.This examination will reveal that China's environmental protectionregime is surprisingly comprehensive, even though statutorydeficiencies exist, and will highlight enforcement tensionsbetween the centre and the periphery—a result of decentralizationand growing local protectionism—as major obstacles tothe implementation process.     

Microeconomic efficiency in the Polish enterprise during the NEM period

Microeconomic efficiency in the Polish enterprise has been an important aspect of nearly all economic reforms in Poland. This paper develops a model of a hypothetical Polish enterprise during the NEM period. The enterprise is viewed as maximizing an objective function which is a linear combination of production added and profits within a short run planning period. The optimality conditions for factor usage are derived and compared with the efficient (profit maximizing) firm. It is found that an increase in the emphasis on production added in the evaluation of enterprise performance (in an attempt by central planners to increase output) may yield results contrary to the central planners' desires. Output will actually fall unless enterprises receive a higher level of subsidies. A brief discussion of the institutional characteristics unique to the Polish economic system is presented as well.     

The difficult issue of age assessment on pedo-pornographic material

The issue of juvenile pornography has seen an increase in the past few years of the number of expert opinions requested to forensic pathologists, paediatricians and other various experts within the forensic and medical fields concerning the age of represented individuals. Regardless of the entity of the problem, no actual method exists which can allow us to give an objective and scientific answer, particularly in the postpubertal stage. Using parameters related to sexual maturation can be very dangerous. Nonetheless some experts still insist with similar types of “expertises”. This study aims at verifying the ability of different experts in assessing age of postpubertal individuals represented in pornographic material. Results underline the difficulties and major uncertainties of age evaluation by visual observation of photographic material particularly when the subjects have reached the sexual maturation stage – and therefore in verifying whether the individual is above or below 18 years of age (an important age limit for most European countries as far as this type of crime is concerned). Furthermore the study stresses the need both to search for an alternate approach and to apply extreme caution in judicial evaluation.     

Fall from a Balcony—Accidental or Homicidal? Reconstruction by Numerical Simulation

In the case presented, conflicting witness accounts and the subject's injuries were highly suspicious of an assault that might have caused the balcony fall. For the reconstruction, a simulation software, originally designed for motor vehicle accident reconstruction, was used. Three scenarios were simulated using the PC‐Crash multibody pedestrian model: (S1) Subject was pushed against and fell over balcony rail, (S2) subject fell off from a seated position, (S3) subject fell off from a prone position on the rail. (S1) could be ruled out due to inconsistent results in terms of landing area and minimum velocity. Realistic results were obtained for (S3) with a fall off from a prone position on the rail. After a few months, the comatose subject awoke and gave an account of what had happened being consistent with the simulation results. This case demonstrates the feasibility of multibody simulations also in cases of nontraffic incidents.     

Capture Theory and the Public Interest: Balancing Competing Values to Ensure Regulatory Effectiveness

Problems arise when a regulatory agency acts in the interests of the industry it is charged with regulating, rather than in the public interest. When a governmental agency established to regulate an industry for the benefit of society acts instead for the interests of the industry it is regulating, it has been “captured” by the industry. This article examines the level of input received from the regulated community and the tendency of regulatory agency capture. Here, the proposed zone of effectiveness suggests a balance between the two scopes by incorporating a stronger focus on public interest.     

The Supply Side of Second-Order Elections: Comparing German National and European Election Manifestos

The second-order character of past European elections is a well-established hypothesis with respect to voter turnout and voting behaviour. This paper presents a conceptual framework for testing this hypothesis on the supply side of European elections. It includes three groups of indicators allowing for the comparison of national and European election manifestos to determine the latter's second-order nature: (1) resource allocation, measured by the number of actors involved in manifesto adoption and by the manifestos' length; (2) the manifestos' content, comparing issue congruence and framing; and (3) political competition, measured by the ideological distance between manifestos. Building on this, we analyse the manifestos of all relevant German parties in the 2009 European and national elections using Comparative Manifesto Project data as well as original, self-created data on election manifestos. We find major variations between parties which can neither be explained by government participation nor satisfaction with the European Union.     

The power of legislative hot air: Informal rules and the enlargement debate in the European parliament

Integration theorists disagree over the extent to which the European Parliament can substantially influence policy‐making processes in the absence of formal agenda‐setting power. This article discusses the impact the European Parliament had on the current enlargement negotiations. Although the legislature does not yet possess the means to alter the stance of the European Council, it has tried to reverse the status quo through the use of its informal bargaining power. We argue based on a principal‐agent framework of analysis that the effectiveness of this strategy is largely a consequence of the ability to speak with one voice. The article evaluates various mechanisms to help the European Parliament build a unified position. It refutes socialisation and specialisation theories, showing that party group pressure towards a unified position overrode national concerns and constituted a necessary precondition in the development of an integrationist attitude. A statistical analysis of the pre‐bargaining positions inside the Foreign Affairs and Security Committee largely confirms the insights from qualitative interviews with participants and observers.     

Taking Stock: What Drives Landlord Participation in the Housing Choice Voucher Program

ABSTRACT

To succeed, the Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) program must be attractive to rental property owners. When landlords refuse to accept subsidized renters, lease-up rates decline, administrative costs increase, and options become limited to high-poverty neighborhoods where owners are most desperate. This article examines what motivates landlords’ decisions to accept subsidized tenants. We use 127 interviews with a random and field sample of landlords, combined with administrative data from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development on property ownership in Baltimore, Maryland, Dallas, Texas, and Cleveland, Ohio. We find that landlords’ perspectives on the HCV program, including rents, tenants, and inspections, are highly dependent on context; landlords weigh the costs and benefits of program participation against the counterfactual tenant that a landlord might otherwise rent to in the open market. We argue that policymakers can boost landlord participation by better understanding how landlords think about their alternatives within each local context. Finally, we consider what drives nonparticipation in the program. Our results show that the majority of landlords who refuse voucher holders had accepted them previously. We suggest that policy reform should be dually focused on improving bureaucratic inefficiencies that deter landlord participation, and providing training and education to landlords.