挑战与应对:民行检察监督制度的新发展

民行检察监督制度获得强力推进的基本依据便是司法实践中不断增长的监督诉求,监督的范围在逐渐扩大,内含于监督中的观念性因素也在此过程中悄然转变,监督理念的现代化更新为监督制度的可持续发展提供了新的泉源基础。目前所需着力实现的制度转轨集中表现在从有限监督到全面监督、从实体监督到程序监督以及从诉讼监督到社会监督等三大转向之上,由此呈现出民行检察监督制度新发展的完整风貌。     

空白刑法规范的特性及其解释

空白罪状由于概括性的委任立法使得规范弹性具有难以避免性和合理性,法律概念的相对性更为明显,部门法规范的易变性也使得其容易出现偏离立法规范目标的情况,对其必须进行刑法的独立规范判断,区分事实问题和法律问题。提倡双向对应的规范解释路径,能够有效地实现概括的类型化转向具体的定型化,获得规范与事实的一致。由于罪刑法定在技术上并无制约作用,因此规范解释空白罪状时,重要的是合理运用解释方法,以得出妥善结论,注重目的解释和体系解释可以有效地实现刑法的规范保护任务。     

论证据意义上的事实

研究证据意义上的事实,有助于准确把握事实与事物,案件事实与证据事实的联系与区别,有助于准确理解与把握我国刑事诉讼证据规定首次明文确立的证据裁判原则、意见证据排除规则。事实与事物既有同一性又存在明显差别。事物是事实的载体,事实是事物现象的表述;事物会发生变化,事实却不会变化,事物的变化导致产生新的事实;事物的反面是无,事实的反面是假。案件事实不同于证据事实,案件事实不是适用法律的依据,证据意义上的事实才是适用法律的根据;案件事实的存在形式不受限制,无法被消灭,却有赖于证据证明,证据意义上的事实不仅存在形式和表现方式要受限制,而且还可能被消灭;证据意义上的事实除了具有客观性特征外,还具主观性特征。证人证言中的事实与意见的界定,以及确定证人证言意见性陈述合乎一般生活经验判断的方法,证人根据专业知识就专业问题作出的评论与判断意见性陈述应具有证据事实属性。     

西方世界深陷三重危机

西方的金融危机导致财政状况空前恶化,引发主权债务危机,主权债务危机的扩散造成金融市场和实体经济剧烈震荡,西方世界进入"财政危机—金融动荡—经济停滞"的严重恶性循环中,经济财政危机引起了西方社会对资本主义体制的再思考。     

Macroeconomic performance and poverty in Brazil

Drawing on Brazilian time-series data this study finds an inelastic link between poverty and wages over the macroeconomic cycle that is devoid of the asymmetric effects that characterise the phenomenon's response to changes in the rate of unemployment. Deepening of structural reforms in the second half of the 1990s had no effect on the aforementioned relationships, which also varied little by regional level of development. Finally, the connection between poverty and long-term income changes was more elastic, suggesting an association between the economy's recent disappointing performance in alleviating poverty and its lacklustre growth record over the past two decades.     

The economics of poverty traps and persistent poverty: An asset-based approach

Longitudinal data on household living standards open the way to a deeper analysis of the nature and extent of poverty. While a number of studies have exploited this type of data to distinguish transitory from more chronic forms of income or expenditure poverty, this paper develops an asset-based approach to poverty analysis that makes it possible to distinguish deep-rooted, persistent structural poverty from poverty that passes naturally with time due to systemic growth processes. Drawing on the economic theory of poverty traps and bifurcated accumulation strategies, this paper briefly discusses some feasible estimation strategies for empirically identifying poverty traps and long-term, persistent structural poverty, as well as relevant extensions of the popular Foster-Greer-Thorbecke class of poverty measures. The paper closes with reflections on how asset-based poverty can be used to underwrite the design of persistent poverty reduction strategies.     

Philippine “normalization”: The politics of form

Abstract

Third World nations, on the whole, have amply demonstrated that they cannot produce the ambiance for the democratic institutions they inherited from their former imperial rulers. In such poor nations, class cleavages are widening as a result of structurally conservative development policies adopted by the ruling elite s in collusion with the First World. Elite attempts to limit “politics” to the symbolic level, safely played out in institutions largely insulated from any popular sharing in power, have been frequently repudiated. Popular demands for structural change in these countries have induced national elites to dismantle representative institutions and to turn to more coercive methods of control.     

The African ‘oil rush’ and US national security

The world's major oil-consuming nations, led by the USA, China and the Western European countries, are keenly interested in the development of African oil reserves, making huge bids for whatever exploration blocks become available and investing large sums in drilling platforms, pipelines, loading facilities and other production infrastructure. Indeed, the pursuit of African oil has taken on the character of a gold rush, with major companies from all over the world competing fiercely with one another for access to promising reserves. This ‘oil rush’ has enormous implications both for African oil producers and for the major oil-importing countries. For the producing countries it promises both new-found wealth and a potential for severe internal discord over the allocation of oil revenues (or ‘rents’); for the consuming countries, it entails growing dependence on imports of a vital substance from a region of chronic instability, with obvious national security overtones. Both these trends are reflected in US policy towards African oil. Desperate to procure additional supplies of foreign oil (to make up for the decline in domestic output), the Bush administration has made strenuous efforts to increase the role of US energy firms in African production. But because instability in Africa is an obstacle to such investment, it has sought to boost the internal security capacity of friendly African states and has laid the groundwork for direct US military involvement in Africa. At the same time Washington has become deeply concerned by China's growing interest in African oil, provoking an intense competitive contest between the two, with growing military overtones. In the end African societies will most probably suffer from this competition as an influx of arms bolsters the capacity of entrenched African regimes.