警务活动与非警务活动之界分——一个辩证的观点

警务活动与非警务活动之界分是公安执法实践中的一个重要问题，对基层公安工作有很大的影响。目前学界对公安机关警务活动与非警务活动的界分存在一定的问题，公安机关警务活动的范围应当依据法律的规定以及公安机关自身的性质来决定。警务活动可分为主体型与非主体型警务活动，很多所谓的“非警务活动”，其实应当属于警务活动的范畴。相应地，这些“非警务活动”之所以造成了不良影响，原因不在于其是“非警务活动”，而在于执法的规范化存在问题。     

我国民事诉讼中悬赏取证问题探讨

所谓悬赏取证，是指当事人为证明诉讼事实，以公开许诺奖励的方式，请求证人为其作证的举证形式。诉讼法理论界以及司法实务界针对悬赏取证问题出现了两种不同的观点，从两个典型案例出发，探讨悬赏取证出现的现实基础，是否具有合法性以及其证据效力；并且悬赏取证不等于收买证人，与收买证人是两种不同的概念。在此基础上，对悬赏取证的法律规制问题予以阐述，以期规范我国的取证方式。     

中国通论犯罪构成理论体系评判

如果将犯罪构成理论理解为解释法律的理论体系，那么理论体系的设定就应当遵循安全性、可操作性两个价值前提。依据这两个价值前提评价我国通论的四要件犯罪构成理论体系，该理论体系的一次性评价的体系设计，出罪通道的不畅通，导致刑法运行安全方面的保障欠缺；将一个总体的犯罪评价对象即犯罪行为，拆分为四个方面的理论体系思路，难于符合人的一般思维习惯；具有可操作性方面的问题。因此，通论四要件的犯罪构成理论体系不具有选择的合理性。     

论铁路法和《民法通则》的冲突及解决

《铁路法》和《铁路交通事故应急救援和调查处理条例》规定,从2007年9月1日以后,火车撞死违章的行人,铁路部门不承担任何赔偿责任。这种规定既不人道,也不合理,更不合法。我国的《民法通则》和世界各国的法律均规定铁路部门无论有无过错,都要对铁路事故造成的损害承担责任。依照“上位法优于下位法”的原则,《铁路法》和《民法通则》相冲突时,人民法院应当适用《民法通则》的无过错责任原则,判决“行人违章,火车撞了不白撞”,使铁路部门承担起应负的社会责任,以加强对受害人利益的保护,促进社会稳定,从而更有利于我国铁路事业的发展。     

民营经济是中部地区构建和谐社会的重要力量

民营经济作为最活跃的经济形式，不仅在经济领域而且在整个国家与地区和谐社会的构建中意义重大。和谐社会的构建依靠地区经济的良性发展，而地区经济良性发展的基础是民营经济，民营经济强则地区强，民营经济富则地区稳，民营经济优则百姓和。长三角和珠三角地区的繁荣稳定就是来自于民营经济的发展与成长。因而，大力发展民营经济是中部地区构建和谐社会的重要力量。     

全球化背景下的新农村建设

建设社会主义新农村是应对全球化的必然选择。全球化既给社会主义新农村建设提供了有利条件,也给其带来了不利影响。在全球化不断加深的趋势下,必须按照“生产发展、生活宽裕、乡风文明、村容整洁、管理民主”的总体要求,扎实推进社会主义新农村建设。     

Regulating Autonomy: An Assessment of Policy Language for Highly Automated Vehicles

Self‐driving cars (also known as driverless cars, autonomous vehicles, and highly automated vehicles [HAVs]) will change the regulatory, political, and ethical frameworks surrounding motor vehicles. At the highest levels of automation, HAVs are operated by independent machine agents, making decisions without the direct intervention of humans. The current transportation system assumes human intervention though, including legal and moral responsibilities of human operators. Has the development of these artificial intelligence (AI) and autonomous system (AS) technologies outpaced the ethical and political conversations? This paper examines discussions of HAVs, driver responsibility, and technology failure to highlight the differences between how the policy‐making institutions in the United States (Congress and the Public Administration) and technology and transportation experts are or are not speaking about responsibility in the context of autonomous systems technologies. We report findings from a big data analysis of corpus‐level documents to find that enthusiasm for HAVs has outpaced other discussions of the technology.     

Polycentric Systems and Multiscale Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation in the Built Environment

Addressing climate change requires consideration of mitigation and adaptation opportunities at multiple spatial scales. This is particularly true in the built environment, defined here to include individual buildings, neighborhoods, and the spaces between. The current U.S. political environment portends fewer resources and coordinating services for mitigation and adaptation at the federal level, however, reinforcing the relevance and necessity of actions at subnational levels. In this study, we evaluate the applicability of a polycentric model of governance to the implementation of mitigation and adaptation practices, as well as the presence of polycentric systems in the built environment. We assemble a database of practices with the potential to achieve both mitigation and adaptation objectives, as well as those that may be cross‐purposed or that may achieve one but not the other. We review practices to gauge the applicability of a polycentric model of governance to mitigation and adaptation practices in the built environment, and examine the attributes of three existing adaptation and/or mitigation programs to assess the extent to which they exhibit polycentric attributes. We conclude with recommendations for a broader research agenda, including efforts to develop more in‐depth examinations into individual programs and comparative analysis of performances of different governance attributes.     

Policy Narratives across Two Languages: A Comparative Study using the Narrative Policy Framework

The Narrative Policy Framework (NPF) focuses on the role of narratives, drawing from a rich scholarship in narrative, language, and culture. Despite the understanding that narratives are constructions of language and that narrative construction differs across languages, NPF studies have not focused on policy narratives in languages other than English. Language characteristics of narratives are important to assess the stability of policy narratives when there are multiple dominant languages in a political system. This study investigates the use of narrative elements in policy narratives in agricultural biotechnology policy in India across Hindi and English media coverage to examine the NPF assumption that narratives have generalizable narrative elements irrespective of variation in linguistic context and, specifically, tests the transportability of narrative elements. Findings validate the transportability of narrative elements in Hindi narratives, indicate variation in the use of narrative elements over time, and have implications for applying NPF across languages.     

Smokescreen Politics? Ratcheting Up EU Emissions Trading in 2017

The reform of the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) adopted in November 2017 was surprisingly strong, given the previous opposition from central member‐states like Poland and key stakeholders like the energy‐intensive industries. The carbon price has also increased substantially since then. To explain why such major reform was possible, we present several findings with wider relevance. Importantly, all the actors pushing for a more ambitious reform benefitted from having a central, “second‐best” mechanism in place—the Market Stability Reserve (MSR)—which could be further tightened. By focusing cancelation on allowances in the MSR and taking place only after 2023, policy entrepreneurs managed to make the distribution of costs obscure and diffuse, whereas the benefits (a probable higher carbon price and related greater auctioning revenues for member‐states) were more specific and closer in time. That is what we call “smokescreen politics.”