论国家承认与当代国家身份的建构——以科索沃“独立”为例

在当代国际法中,对以分离方式产生的新国家,母国和广泛的国际社会的承认具有构成性,国家承认是建构国家身份的决定因素。科索沃的"独立"实质上是一种分离行为。由于科索沃缺少母国和国际社会的广泛承认,其目前并不具有国际法中的主权国家身份。     

我国小额诉讼程序的构建

随着我国法制水平的不断提高,诉诸司法的纠纷将会越来越多,现有的审判力量已难负其重。而解决的有效途径之一就是构建小额诉讼程序,分流大量简单的民事案件,使当事人及法官从繁琐、低效的程序中解脱出来。     

What role for trade in food sovereignty? Insights from a small island archipelago

The food sovereignty movement has been gathering momentum in advocating the rights of individuals and nations to control their own food systems. Alongside this is a mounting critical engagement regarding its privileging of local food production as the means through which to achieve this goal. Adopting a place-based approach, we explore the foodways of diverse communities across a small island archipelago – the Turks and Caicos Islands in the West Indies. Based on interviews and focus groups, we unpack narratives relating to islanders’ changing food practices and aspirations. These are understood as two competing but inter-related themes of disruption and reification of current practices shaped by wider food regimes in interaction with ecological challenges. Given that conditions of historic dependency implicate the islands in a myriad of dependent trade relationships, we argue that small island economies offer, and require, unique cases for understanding how sovereign conditions for trade might be developed in line with a food sovereignty framework. We underline the importance of an inter-disciplinary focus for bringing forth a nuanced understanding of what might be required to shape more sustainable, sovereign and secure food futures. Doing so is necessarily rooted in an appreciation of islanders’ accounts of social, economic, political and ecological change over time.     

Status and Foreign Policy Change in Small States: Qatar’s Emergence in Perspective

ABSTRACT

Small states are just as easily seduced by status and glory as other states. When conceived as situated in a stratified international society, small states acquire an inherent tendency to overcome their disadvantage in conventional power terms through the pursuit of status. Hence, it is precisely because of their position in the international hierarchy, not in spite of it, that strategic ideas based on state size stimulate foreign policy change in small states. This mechanism provides an explanation to the question why the small state of Qatar has pursued such a high-profile diplomatic strategy since its emergence in the late 1990s.     

Why monarchy persists in small states: the cases of Tonga,Bhutan and Liechtenstein

Monarchical rule is said to have become anachronistic in a modern age of legal rational orders and representative institutions. And yet, despite successive waves of democratization having usurped their authority across much of the globe, a select few monarchs remain defiant, especially in small states. This stubborn persistence raises questions about the application of Huntington’s “King’s Dilemma” in which modern monarchs are apparently trapped in a historical cycle that will ultimately strip them of meaningful power. Drawing on in-depth historical research in three small states that have sought to combine democratic and monarchical rule – Tonga, Bhutan, and Liechtenstein – we argue that, contra Huntington, monarchs in small states are neither doomed to disappear nor are they likely to be overwhelmed by the dilemma posed by modernist development. The lesson is that the size of political units is a critical variable too often overlooked in existing studies.     

Beyond the nation: global democratisation in Uganda and the politics of dispensation

Global frameworks for democratic development today tend to remain within a comparative lens where each country is treated as a sovereign capsule. This portrait eludes the political structures that accompany contemporary globalisation and set the conditions for domestic development. Notably, the comparative perspective eschews the hierarchical nature of states and influential non-state actors that impact democracy movements. Merging international relations theory and comparative politics and using the example of Uganda to illustrate, I create ‘the politics of dispensation.’ Like a doctor dispensing a pill to a patient, Uganda shows how susceptible a country can be to forces beyond democratic control.     

Hemispheric reconfigurations in Northern Amazonia: the ‘Three Guianas’ amid regional change and Brazilian hegemony

Regional and hemispheric reconfigurations in Latin America and the Caribbean are increasingly mediated by Brazilian power, and the engagement of Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana with this emerging context is intriguing. They are tentatively moving away from a Caribbean region with which they are culturally contiguous, towards a South American continent in which they are geographically located. This is partly a reflection of the gradual opening up of the Northern Amazonian space that they share collectively, and also with Venezuela and Brazil. These processes are occurring as cause and effect of Brazil’s emergence as a regional – and even regionally hegemonic – power. With reference to wider debates on regionalism and hegemony, we analyse the uncertain consequences of these shifts.     

美国行政性版权小额索赔制度革新及借鉴

由于版权作品数字化侵权使用的日益泛化,且现有版权司法救济途径多存在"周期长、举证难、成本高、收益低"的弊端,使得版权人,尤其是中小版权人,很难以较低的维权成本,真正实现其权利的司法保障。鉴于此,美国率先在行政性版权小额索赔制度的革新上作出突破性的示范,于司法体制外另辟蹊径,在版权局之行政性框架内,设置版权小额索赔委员会,专门处理小额版权纠纷。在知识产权保护方面,我国亦存在司法救济效率不高、数字版权侵权泛化的问题,因此,为迎合强化知识产权保护的时代政策,有必要总结美国行政性版权小额索赔制度革新经验,以为我国版权小额索赔问题的解决提供有益的制度借鉴。     

A future,but at what cost? Cuba and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea’s quest for sustainable development

This paper looks at the question of development by focusing on both Cuba and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. At the heart of the project is the notion of sustainability, and how to achieve well-being even in the most challenging conditions, isolated economies and sanction-laden realities. This is done by tracing both countries’ engagement and development in the fields of health and education. We suggest that political engagement with these countries should be prioritised, without challenging an established political order but with its consent, and with the hope that future generations are socialised to a culture of openness.