美国和欧盟正在分道扬镳吗?--关于文化的概念及文化差异的思考

文化可以定义为一个成规系统,借助这一概念,可以将文化区分为不同的类别,从而清晰地描述和阐释两种或几种文化之间的同异。在伊拉克战争中的不同表现,凸显了美国与欧盟文化层面上的歧异,有学者将之归结为具有"现代"与"后现代"特征的战略文化之间的不同,这种观点值得进一步辨析。文化成规不是一成不变的,美国与欧盟的战略文化也必将随着全球语境的变化而变化。     

Coping with Concerns: An Exploratory Comparison of Australian,Colombian, German,and Palestinian Adolescents

Consistent with an emphasis on positive psychology, and on ability rather than deficit, this study of adolescents in 4 communities sought to examine how young people cope with their concerns. Samples of Australian, Colombian, German, and Palestinian students completed the general form of the Adolescent Coping Scale, an 80-item instrument used to measure coping. A comparison of young people's usage of 3 coping styles and 18 coping strategies within these communities indicated that Palestinian youth report greater usage of all but three strategies (namely, physical recreation, relaxation, and tension reduction), and German youth report the least usage of 2/3 of the strategies assessed. Both Palestinian and Colombian youth were noted to utilize more seek to belong, focus on the positive, social action, solving the problem, seeking spiritual support, and worry than were German or Australian adolescents. When the relative usage of coping strategies within national settings was considered, some noticeable differences were apparent. For example it was found that regardless of the national setting young people reported most frequent use of working hard and use of problem solving strategies. When it comes to more culturally determined activities such as physical recreation, the Australian and German students ranked this strategy more highly in their coping repertoires than do the Colombians, and more noticeably, the Palestinian students. For example, although physical recreation is ranked as the second most commonly used strategy for the German sample, it is ranked 16th by the Palestinians. The study demonstrates the importance of identifying coping strategies that are reflective of each community under investigation. Similarity in coping cannot be assumed across different student populations. Consequently caution needs to be exercised when importing coping programs from one community to another.     

Adolescents' Perceptions of the Relevance of Domains of Identity Formation: A South African Cross-Cultural Study

This study investigated South African Afrikaans-, English-, and Xhosa-speaking secondary school adolescents' (N = 1217) perceptions of the relative importance of identity-related domains. For this purpose a structured questionnaire consisting of 14 domain-specific items was used. Most of the domains were regarded as very important or fairly important by a significant majority of participants. Four domains were regarded as very important by more than 70% of the total research group, namely, future career, moral values, family relationships, and religious matters. Political and sexual matters were regarded as of least importance. Intercultural differences were evident in most domains. Significant gender differences were also found. Relatively more females than males reported a high priority to domains such as future career, moral values, friendships with same sex peers, gender role, and community matters. The male participants regarded relationships with the opposite sex and sexual matters as more important than the females did. The findings of this study emphasize the importance of carefully considering the domains included in future research on identity formation, depending on variables such as socioeconomic and sociocultural characteristics of the specific research groups to be included in the investigation.     

Mandates, Powers, and Policies

Elections provide a mandate to pursue a set of policies. Party label provides a concise ideological cue for voters to choose among candidates, and research on industrial democracies verifies a link between the parties voters elect and subsequent policy outcomes. The combination of inchoate party systems and economic vulnerability elsewhere may weaken the link between voter choice and policy. When examining economic policies in Latin America, there is some controversy as to whether governments carried out "reform by surprise"—promising one thing during a campaign while implementing another in office. We test whether the ideological reputations of executives' and legislators' parties explain whether they adopt market-oriented policies. We find that the future behavior of presidential candidates is difficult for voters to predict. However, the ideological reputation of legislators is a reliable predictor of policy outcomes, and the relationship is clarified by the prospects of collective action by legislative delegations.     

澳大利亚《信息技术证据管理指引》述评

在实行诉讼对抗制的国家，人们可以通过以下三种方法使信息技术证据成为保护企业利益的一种工具：(1)起诉，包括刑事诉讼；(2)法庭辩护；(3)为规则制定者和企业作出重要决策提供依据。然而，对于什么样的信息技术证据具有可采信性，人们仍有质疑。计算机法学正是研究如何确定、保存、分析及如何提交数字证据的一门新兴的学科。尽管传统上计算机法学被认为是一门滞后的学科，但是澳大利亚《信息技术证据管理指引》还是前瞻性地规定了能使电子证据效力最大化的系统生存周期的一些重要原则。     

Under Two Flags: Symbolic Voting in the State of Mississippi

Participants in a specialelection held in the State of Mississippion April 17, 2001, voted overwhelminglyagainst changing the design of the state'sflag, which incorporates a symbol of theConfederacy. The determinants of voting onthe flag are analyzed and turnout rates inApril 2001 are compared with those forrecent gubernatorial and presidentialelections. We find that the flag votedivided Mississippians sharply along linesof race, class and political ideology. Akey empirical implication is that voterpositions in issue space tend to be morepolarized when political choices haveexpressive as opposed to instrumentalconsequences.     

Campaign-Finance Reform: A Public Choice Perspective

The Federal Election Campaign Act as passed in 1971 and amended in 1974represented landmark federal legislation. It imposed new restrictions oncampaign contributions and contained path-breaking provisions for the useof public funds to partially finance the campaigns of qualifyingpresidential candidates. The nominal intent of the legislation was torestrain the skyrocketing campaign costs and the feared abuses thatgrowing dependencies on such money engendered. Three decades later, withthe campaign spending ``arms race'' still raging. Congress sought toimpose further constraints on campaign spending with enactment of theBipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (BCRA). Competing theories ofgovernment regulation are reviewed to better understand the intent andlikely consequences of the 2002 legislation in particular and campaignfinance regulation in general. A simple model of the campaign spendingprocess highlights the likely causes of the rapid growth in campaignspending. Data and evidence are presented to test hypotheses concerningthe timing of and underlying motivations for BCRA.