Conflicts and coordination between the right to issue US dollars as international currency and the protection of international human rights

In the existing global financial system, the US private central bank controls the right to issue international currency, while the rest of the world have to involuntarily leave their destiny to such system. In the current financial crisis, American government evaded and deviated from due regulation. It is virtually a robbery of other countries as well as a serious infringement upon international human rights. In such a situation, other countries should stick to the international community standard and the protection of international human rights to fairly distribute the interest deriving from the right to issue international currency, and establish a monetary exchange mechanism; or abide by the principle of “one world, one currency” and accordingly come up with a common international currency, or form a monetary union to safeguard the economic sovereignties; or enhance the due position, rights and interest of the developing economies in the existing international financial system; or strengthen efforts in reforming and building the regime of international financial regulation to prevent people’s legitimate property, rights and interest from being infringed.     

美国奥巴马政府南海政策研究

相对于以往历届美国政府的南海政策,奥巴马政府对南海地区国家利益和国际利益的政策表述体现了更多将南海问题推向地区化和国际化的特征。出于亚太战略和重返东南亚的需要,奥巴马政府在南海问题上更倾向于表达与东南亚各国相近的共同利益,支持东南亚各南海权益声索国,反对中国的南海权益主张,并与东南亚国家共同遏制中国日益上升的地区影响力。然而,作为调整亚太战略的一种手段,奥巴马政府的南海政策不会走向因过度干预而损及亚太利益的极端。2011年,印度尼西亚担任东盟轮值主席国,鉴于不同于越南的南海利益诉求,印尼应当不会比越南更热衷于推动南海问题的继续升温。受地区主要国家政策温和化的影响,奥巴马政府的南海政策及其对地区形势的影响将呈现相对减弱的态势。     

美军军官考核的特点与启示

改革我国干部选才用人制度是人们长期热议的话题。在全面考察美军军官考核工作具有考核机构的权威性、考核周期的短频性、考核内容的全面性、考核程序的公正性、考核方法的科学性、考核结果的客观性等六个特点的基础上,从干部考核主体、过程和方式方法三个角度,分析了我国干部考核工作中存在的问题;通过比较中外干部考核制度,从改革干部考核的主体结构、程序和期限三个方面,对我国干部考核工作提出了进一步优化的路径。     

Evangelical Protestantism and foreign policy in the United States after September 11

Much that has been written on evangelicals in the United States concerns their impact on domestic politics. But the election of George W. Bush has resulted in a new importance for the relationship between evangelicals and US foreign policy. This has become particularly clear following the 11 September 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Three issues deserve further study. One is evangelicals’ attitude to Islam. The second involves the relationship between evangelicals and Israel. The third concerns the stance of evangelicals towards war with Iraq. Through an examination of these three issues, Durham explores a number of important ­questions, ranging from the relationship of evangelicals’ theology and their politics to their partly supportive, partly critical attitude towards an administration itself led by an evangelical. Many evangelicals see the ‘war against terror’ as a war against Islam and unreservedly approve of Israeli policy, and many supported the launch of war in Iraq. Yet evangelicalism is not a monolith and, with regard to its disputes over how to respond to the ‘threat’ of Islam or what view to take of the Israel–Palestine conflict, Durham offers new insights into a powerful voting bloc and source of pressure within US politics.     

Barack Obama and the South: demography as electoral opportunity

ABSTRACT

Barack Obama was more successful in the South in the 2008 election than many previous Democratic presidential nominees had been. While John McCain continued Republican dominance in the conservative region, it was a major breakthrough for a northern liberal Democrat, especially an African American from Illinois, to win three southern states and secure 55 electoral votes. Florida, North Carolina and Virginia were good opportunities for Obama because, demographically, they had come to resemble other large states outside the South. In these ‘converging’ southern states, the Latino and Asian communities had grown substantially. The percentage of college-educated Whites had increased and there had been large-scale migration from other regions of the country. The states that Obama won in the South were not as ‘southern’ as they once were. In some southern states, those called the ‘neo-Confederate South’ in this article, white support for Obama was less than John Kerry had received in 2004. This decline in white voting for the Democratic presidential nominee occurred despite the difficult economic times that enveloped the country in the months preceding the election, and the general unpopularity of the incumbent Republican administration headed by George W. Bush. Some of these states, like Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi, had been among the most intransigent states in resisting the claims of the civil rights movement for social and political equality for African Americans in the 1950s and 1960s. In the future it may be more accurate to speak of more than one South, rather than refer to the region as an undifferentiated whole.     

Generating a Vertebrae‐based Method to Discriminate between Korean and U.S. White Male Casualties from the Korean War,

Low recovery rate of intact crania in conflict‐related contexts necessitates the use of postcranial elements for ancestry estimation. This study aimed to develop a new method to discriminate between Korean and U.S. White casualties from the Korean War using vertebrae. Maximum body heights of C2 through L5 were measured from 75 Korean and 51 U.S. males to generate discriminant functions. U.S. vertebral heights were statistically greater than Koreans in 18 out of 23 vertebrae (C2, C4‐6, T3‐6, and T8‐L5). The functions with lumbar vertebrae tended to yield higher correct classification ratios (CCR) than those with cervical or thoracic vertebrae. Inclusion of the femur and tibia lengths in the vertebrae‐involved functions enhanced the CCR's. Discriminant functions using the femur and tibia length were also presented. The results of this study are expected to complement the current practices of the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency and the Ministry of National Defense Agency for KIA Recovery and Identification, which are primarily based on cranial and dental morphology.     

Stop,Collaborate, and Listen: Women's Collaboration in US State Legislatures

Collaboration plays a key role in crafting good public policy. We use a novel data set of over 140,000 pieces of legislation considered in US state legislatures in 2015 to examine the factors associated with women's collaboration with each other. We articulate a theory that women's collaboration arises from opportunity structures, dictated by an interaction of individual and institutional characteristics. Examining the effect of a combination of characteristics, we find support for an interactive view of institutions, where women's caucuses accelerate collaboration in Democratic‐controlled bodies and as the share of women increases. Collaboration between women also continues in the face of increased polarization in the presence of a caucus, but not absent one. Our findings speak to the long‐term consequences of electing women to political office, the importance of institutions and organizations in shaping legislative behavior, and the institutionalization of gender in politics.     

Fighting Windmills: The Coalition of Industrialists and Environmentalists in the Climate Change Issue

This paper extends the political economy idea developed by Ackerman and Hassler [Clean Coal/Dirty Air, or How the Clean Air Act became a Multibillion-Dollar Bail-out for High Sulfur Coal Producers and What Should Be Done About It. New Haven: Yale University Press], which suggested that a coalition of environmentalists and industrialists successfully lobbied the US Congress. More strict technology-based standards for new emitting sources than for existing sources was the resulting policy outcome serving the common interest of the coalition because it offered both a barrier to entry for new firms and improved environmental quality. We focus on the case of international climate negotiations and the promotion of wind-based energy. Along the lines of the Ackerman and Hassler approach, we suggest that one reason for EU eagerness to push forward ambitious reduction target levels (and thereby promote new green industries) could be a similar coalition between industrialists and environmentalists. Such a strategy can be seen in the context of the Bootleggers and Baptist theory developed by Yandle [Bootleggers and Baptists: the Education of a Regulatory Economist, Regulation, 7, 12–16], where the Baptists (in our case the environmentalists) demand changes in behaviour on moral grounds. In contrast, the Bootleggers (the producers of renewable energy), who profit from the very regulation, keep a low profile. The actual heavy subsidisation of renewable energy sources, such as wind energy, can be viewed as a successful policy outcome for the coalition of industrialists and environmentalists offering both market protection and improved environmental quality. Solving the current dead-lock in international climate negotiations may well imply fighting the strong coalition of industrialists and environmentalists. Such a political battle may turn out to be just as tough as fighting windmills and needs to be addressed in future and more rigorous empirical research. At the end of the day, transparent incentives of relevant stakeholders in the climate change issue are necessary preconditions for progress in the climate change negotiations.JEL Classification: Q28,H2, H4     

Political Science and Prediction: What's Next for U.S. Climate Change Policy?

This article analyzes how U.S. climate change politics and policy making are changing in the public, private and civil society sectors, and how such changes are likely to influence U.S. federal policies. It outlines the current status of U.S. climate change action and explores four overlapping pathways of policy change: (1) the strategic demonstration of the feasibility of climate change action; (2) the creation and expansion of markets; (3) policy diffusion and learning; and (4) the creation and promulgation of norms about the need for more aggressive climate change action. These four pathways seek to fruitfully draw from rationalist and constructivist approaches to policy analysis, without collapsing or confusing the different logics. Building on this analysis, it predicts that future federal U.S. climate policy will include six major components: (1) A national cap on GHG emissions; (2) A national market based cap‐and‐trade GHG emissions trading scheme; (3) Mandatory renewable energy portfolio standards; (4) Increased national product standards for energy efficiency; (5) Increased vehicle fleet energy efficiency standards; and (6) Increased federal incentives for research and development on energy efficiency issues and renewable energy development. In addition, expanding federal climate policy may bring about significant changes in U.S. foreign policy as U.S. international re‐engagement on climate change is likely to occur only after the development of more significant federal policy.     

美国对欠发达地区经济开发的金融支持及启示

美国为了开发欠发达地区采取了一系列的金融支持措施。通过这些金融支持措施的实施，美国欠发达地区的经济开发取得了显著的效果，实现了区域经济的协调发展。美国金融支持的成功经验为我国加快少数民族与民族地区的经济社会发展提供了重要的启示。