Development under patrimonial conditions: Suriname's state oil company as a development agent

This article analyses the conditions under which the Surinamese State Oil Company (Staatsolie) has been consolidated, not only as an oil producer, but also as a development agent. Staatsolie's chances of success seemed rather slim at its creation in the early 1980s, mainly because of the non-developmental, patrimonial character of Surinamese politics and the nature of Suriname's state, which has traditionally been oriented toward patronage and clientelism. The analysis documents the origins of Staatsolie and focuses on its commitment to the acquisition and further development of technological and managerial expertise. At present, Staatsolie ranks among the most successful companies in Suriname and its contributions to the economy of this small middle-income country are considerable. The success of Staatsolie's attempt to become a development agent is attributed, in particular, to the company's double strategy. The internal part of this strategy, derived from the management vision and ideological commitment of the company's leadership, was aimed at developing technological and management skills. The external part of the strategy was aimed at steering away from political influences on the company and playing out, politically, the formal-legal position of the firm in the petroleum sector. After 25 years of Staatsolie, it is argued that the same factors that were responsible for the company's success may turn out to be the main challenges for the years ahead.     

A Hybrid Peace through Locally Owned and Externally Financed ssr–ddr in Rwanda?

This article aims to critically examine Rwanda's security sector reform and disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration (ssr–ddr) process through a theoretical framework outlining four different models of peace processes in order to identify the sort of peace that can emerge from Rwanda's ssr–ddr approach. The author analyses how the Rwandan government has managed to keep the process ‘locally’ owned, while largely financed by external actors, despite strong criticism of its apparent lack of democratisation. The ‘genocide credit’, the Rwandan government's preference for national, rather than international solutions and its recent troop contribution to peacebuilding operations in the region are identified as the main reasons for this development. The paper argues that the peace emanating from the ssr–ddr process may be considered a hybrid form of state formation and state building, because of the local agency's preference for security and stability while simultaneously enjoying financial and technocratic support for its ‘liberal’ peacebuilding actions in the region.     

40‐Hz Square‐Wave Stimulation Requires Less Energy to Produce Muscle Contraction: Compared with the TASER® X26 Conducted Energy Weapon

Conducted energy weapons (CEWs) (including the Advanced TASER^® X26 model produced by TASER International, Inc.) incapacitate individuals by causing muscle contractions. In this study using anesthetized swine, the potential incapacitating effect of primarily monophasic, 19‐Hz voltage imposed by the commercial CEW was compared with the effect of voltages imposed by a laboratory device that created 40‐Hz square waves. Forces of muscle contraction were measured with the use of strain gauges. Stimulation with 40‐Hz square waves required less pulse energy than stimulation with the commercial CEW to produce similar muscle contraction. The square‐pulse stimulation, at the higher repetition rate, caused a more complete tetanus at a lower energy. Use of such a simple shape of waveform may be used to make future nonlethal weapon devices more efficient.     

The Anti-Politics of Development: donor agencies and the political economy of governance

This article discusses the attempt undertaken by several development aid agencies since the turn of the century to integrate political economy assessments into their decision making on development assistance. The article discusses three such attempts: the Drivers of Change adopted by the UK's Department for International Development, the Strategic Governance and Corruption Analysis (sgaca) developed by the Dutch Directorate General for International Cooperation and the new thinking on political economy analysis, policy reform and political risk advanced by the World Bank. On the basis of a political-economic interpretation of development agencies, two main factors are found to hinder the successful application of political economy assessment. In the first place, the agencies' professional outlook leads them to see development in primarily technical terms. In the second place, the nature of incentives for development professionals leads them to resist the implementation of political economy analyses.     

政府层级管理体制改革的实践与思考

改革开放以来,我国进行了政府层级管理体制改革,方式多种多样,如行政建制调整,扩权强县(镇)与省直管县,设置开放城市、开发区与经济特区,作为国家战略的区域规划及其各类试验区等。中心是减少管理层级,提高行政效率。目前要进一步加大改革力度,注意改革的关联性、系统性、连贯性,加大利益统筹协调的力度,把区域、局部的改革上升为整体改革,地方各级也要在率先试验方面积极拓展体制创新的空间。     

论教育公平与政府正义

本文从教育公平、政府正义内涵切入,寻求二者在逻辑上的契合,认为教育公平是政府正义的基本指向。目前政府教育资源配置政策与教育法规制定存在双重失衡,当下教育在地区、城乡、阶层和性别间等的不公平现象凸显。匡扶政府正义以促进教育公平,必须注意四个方面,即重铸政府理念、重现制度正义、重塑行政人员美德和重申宪法救济等。     

试析维基解密对政府管理的影响

维基解密这一新的信息传播方式,必将对当下及未来的政府管理产生重要影响。维基解密会成为全球性的监督政府管理的新形式,一定程度上颠覆了传统的政媒关系,这促使政府在提高对这一类媒体警惕性并加强监管的同时,探索驾驭这类媒体的新途径。在未来政府间关系的处理上,维基解密既可能成为政府间竞争的新工具,也可能使政府间关系发生微妙变化。     

Achieving the 1.5 °C objective: just implementation through a right to (sustainable) development approach

Achieving the 1.5 °C objective of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change in a just manner requires equitably sharing the responsibilities and rights that relate to this objective. This paper examines how international law concerning the Right to Promote (Sustainable) Development can contribute to determining what would be a “just” approach to achieving the 1.5 °C objective. This entails building on both the Right to Development (RtD) and the Right to Promote Sustainable Development (RtPSD). The RtD is a central notion within international human rights law and the RtPSD has been adopted under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Based on a literature review and legal analysis, we argue that, although the two Rights are prima facie different, in the context of the unanimously adopted Agenda 2030, including the SDGs, they partly complement and partly merge with each other. Together they provide a framework for assessing how a just transition towards a low greenhouse gas development process could be achieved and what this means for phasing out fossil fuels especially in the context of prospective oil producing countries.     

Community,market, and state: Reflections on their potential for achieving economic justice

This paper investigates the potential of distinct societal decision-making and coordinating mechanisms as means of achieving economic justice. Within the enormous diversity of actual institutional arrangements that guide and shape whatever happens in economies, three overarching ideal types of mechanisms which separately or in combination enable mankind to cope with its economic challenge are discernible: communities, markets, and states. Each of these ideal types represents a different way in which economic decisions are made and the economic actions of members of society are coordinated. The specific question to be answered is how each of these mechanisms can contribute to the solution of the problem of economic justice in modern times.     

From “smart regulation” to “regulatory arrangements”

When regulators are faced with practical challenges, policy instrument choice theories can help them find the best solution. However, not all such theories are equally helpful. This paper aims to offer regulators a better alternative to the current policy instrument choice theories. We will specifically address the shortcomings of “smart regulation theory” and present an alternative that keeps the best of that theory while remediating its weak points. Some authors (Böcher and Töller 2003; Baldwin and Black 2008) say that smart regulation theory does not address institutional issues, compliance type-specific response, performance-sensitivity and adaptability of regulatory regime. We have resolved these problems by merging the smart regulation theory with the policy arrangement approach and the policy learning concept. We call the resulting approach “regulatory arrangement approach” (RAA). The central idea of the RAA is to constrain the almost infinite “smart” regulatory options by: the national policy style; adverse effects of policy arrangements of adjoining policies; the structure of the policy arrangement of the investigated policy and competence dependencies of other institutions. The reduction can be so drastic that the potential governance capacity falls below the smart regulation threshold. In other words, no smart regulatory arrangement can be developed in that institutional context unless policy learning occurs. In addition, a “smart” regulatory arrangement is no guarantee that the policy will succeed. For this reason, the performance of the regulatory arrangement is measured and evaluated. Performance below a certain threshold indicates that the regulatory arrangement needs to be adapted, which then results in policy learning. We illustrate the usefulness of this new approach with a secondary analysis of the Flemish sustainable forest management policy.