Actively Cultivating Policy Similarity. A Regional Strategy in Education Policy in France and Germany

Regionalization processes across Western Europe have triggered analyses of regional policy divergence. Yet, in a number of cases, regional governments appear to have deliberately strived to achieve policy conformity. Previous research tends to emphasize exogenous explanations of regional policy convergence. In contrast, this paper addresses the issue of regional policy convergence by focusing on endogenous explanatory factors. Its objective is to carry out an investigation of when, how, and with what effect a ‘desire for conformity’ arises, and contends that regional governments may actively cultivate policy similarity as a strategy to develop or secure their policy capacity. Specifically, the paper argues that the adoption of this strategy is contingent upon two requirements that may or may not be met, and that its outcome is the convergence on targeted dimensions of regional policies. The two requirements are: (i) a countrywide public preference for policy uniformity in the policy area of concern, and (ii) the presence of a threat posed to regional policy capacity by various political entrepreneurs, including the central state, who blame regions for providing divergent policies on particular dimensions. This paper is based on the comparison of two case studies where regional governments deliberately pursued policy conformity on targeted dimensions of their education policy: school-building policy in France and curricula policy in Germany. The two case studies also present dissimilar features that make it possible to investigate the effects of institutional setting and policy distribution on the adoption and operation of the active-cultivation-of-policy-similarity strategy.     

The OECD and “The Rest”: Analyzing the Limits of Policy Transfer

Abstract

Prompted by the rise of the emerging economies and the growing importance of the G20, the OECD has formally announced its intention of establishing itself as a key actor in global policy coordination. As part of this ambition, it has embarked on cultivating closer relations with five G20 countries it designated as key partners through the so-called “Enhanced Engagement” programme: Brazil, China, India, Indonesia and South Africa. This article mobilizes concepts from the policy transfer literature to explain why the OECD’s attempts to increasingly involve all five countries in its policy have fallen short of its original ambitions, and also why the transfer of its policy work has been uneven across policy and country issue.     

制定我国《药品再评价管理办法》的法律依据及有关问题分析

本文通过介绍我国开展药品再评价的法律依据,探讨制定我国《药品再评价管理办法》的必要性和急迫性,并 就有关实际工作中存在的问题提出了解决建议。     

Policy or person? What voters want from their representatives on Twitter

Social media have the potential to transform democracies as they allow for direct contact between representatives and represented. Politicians can use social media to show their policy positions but they can also give insight into their private lives. Based on survey experiments in Germany and Switzerland we show that social media messages about politicians’ private lives rather deter voters. Instead, we find that voters prefer candidates that communicate policy positions. The effect of a policy-oriented communication style on Twitter can even lead to appreciating a politician from a different party in Switzerland, which has an electoral system that gives a strong incentive to cultivate a personal vote.     

Internet of things – Need for a new legal environment?

The Internet of Things as an emerging global, Internet-based information service architecture facilitating the exchange of goods in global supply chain networks is developing on the technical basis of the present Domain Name System; drivers are private actors. Learning from the experiences with the “traditional” Internet governance it is important to tackle the relevant issues of a regulatory framework from the beginning; in particular, the implementation of an independently managed decentralized multiple-root system and the establishment of basic governance principles (such as transparency and accountability, legitimacy of institutional bodies, inclusion of civil society) are to be envisaged.     

The limits of regulatory convergence: globalization and GMO politics in the south

Is globalization promoting regulatory convergence in agricultural biotechnology policies in the South? This article examines the nature and limits of regulatory convergence in the field of agri-biotechnology and investigates the effects that international forces have on biotechnology and biosafety policies in developing countries. Based on detailed case studies of Mexico, China and South Africa this article shows that these three leading biotechnology countries in the South are exposed to powerful international influences but are responding to the regulatory challenges of genetically modified organisms (GMO) adoption in distinctive ways. The existing regulatory polarization between US and EU biotechnology approaches has not forced a convergence around either of these two international models. GMO policies in the South do not simply follow the binary logic of the US–EU regulatory conflict. Instead, they integrate elements from both regulatory approaches and are steering a course that suggests substantial regulatory diversity in the South. The globalization of biotechnology thus goes hand in hand with regulatory diversity in the developing world. Furthermore, regulatory polarization between the EU and US has helped to open up political space in key developing countries.     

西方政策网络理论研究的最新进展及其评价

近年来西方政策网络理论研究出现了三个明显趋势:1、理论研究上从新制度主义的视角探讨政策网络为什么产生、为什么改变和为什么能够持续的深层理论问题;2、实践问题上重点探讨了政策网络的管理问题,包括政府间网络的管理问题;3、重视政策网络与政策执行效果关系研究.     

Land use and forestry based CDM in scientific peer-reviewed literature pre-and post-COP 9 in Milan

This article explores the science-policy interactions between peer-reviewed literature and decisions and declarations on Land Use, Land-Use Change and Forestry (LULUCF) projects in the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) taken at Conference of the Parties (COP) meetings. The results are based on a literature analysis capturing 88 articles published from 1997 to 2005. By using a matrix search method and a structured reading form, the method and analysis focussed on whether issues of CDM and LULUCF were presented as ‘supportive of the inclusion of LULUCF’ and ‘critical of the inclusion of LULUCF’. A matrix search method and a structured reading form were applied. Of the 88 articles, 66% included discussions supportive to the inclusion of LULUCF. Forty-nine percent had a first author affiliated in natural sciences. Only 19% had first authors affiliated in developing countries while the same number for contributing authors was 38%. The results show no clear connection between scientific literature and decisions and declarations, but indicate that policymakers set the research agenda by declarations, while researchers feed the process up until decisions are made.

试论中日关系的新向度——以前首相福田康夫对中外交遗产为中心

近年来,从小泉、安倍、再到福田,日本政府都非常重视构成两国关系之潜流的精神和价值理念领域。特别是前首相福田转变了小泉和安倍的"价值本位"外交方向,并从"回归古典"着手,力图通过重构中日两国的精神、价值大厦,使中日关系不仅仅是一种利益、利害关系的存在,而是建立在双方共同理解、追求并能够互相接受的价值阈值的基础之上。这样,中日关系才可能从根本上克服其脆弱性的一面,从而走得更远。而中日两国在第四个政治文件中就此所达成的共识,即为实现这一目标的"新向度"。无疑这是前首相福田对中外交的重要遗产。     

The coordinate plane of global governance

The ‘coordinate plane of global governance’ developed in this paper describes the trade-off between static gains and dynamic losses associated with international policy harmonization. A simple model illustrates how potential gains result from producing positive international spill-overs, whereas potential losses come from restricted systems competition between national policy regimes. The solution to this model allows identifying the cut-off level between policies suitable for global harmonization and policies which should better not be centralized. An application of the concept to selected policy fields illustrates its relevance for decision-making on global governance.