现代矿业地役权制度探析

矿业用地制度创新的根本出路在于资源产权的合理安排。以现代矿业地役权作为矿业用地的重要方式,既是拓展矿业用地获取途径的出路,更是提高资源利用效率的出路。从主体、客体、内容等方面构建的现代矿业地役权是传统地役权的转型升级,以地下空间为需役地的空间地役权、为获取矿业广场而设立的地表地役权等基本覆盖矿业用地领域。地役权的主体界定以及合同订立,是矿山企业设立地役权的重要内容。地役权的从属性而显示其弱权利性,可通过地役权登记原则、物权请求权以及法律责任等方式,维护地役权的预期、稳定和圆满。     

论破坏性采矿罪的地位及转向

为保护国有矿产物权而设置的破坏性采矿罪,一直闲置而没有进入司法程序。主要是该罪的理论性和法定性犯罪构成不能独立而包含于非法采矿罪之中,本不应该存在的破坏性采矿罪长期处于尴尬地位。资源与环境的压力,凸显破坏性采矿罪占着立法位置而妨碍了制度创新。出路是解体和重构破坏性采矿罪,转向设置破坏矿业环境罪。新增的罪名有独立的犯罪构成,为遏制矿业环境严重破坏的现实所急需。     

Why do Historians Ignore Digital Analysis? Bring on the Luddites

This article argues that historians have failed to grasp the profound opportunities afforded by computational analysis. Despite the abundance of machine-readable data liberated by digitisation—alongside tools and exemplar studies—there has been no widespread embrace of text mining or revival of cliometrics. This ambivalence has arisen mainly through apathy and side-lining of computational analysis to a specialist methodological niche. The absence of justification is damaging to the intellectual vitality of the discipline and its capacity to face the dawning age of data science. The article calls for an urgent debate about the historian and the computer. More than anything else, this requires sceptics to come forward to meet the advocates to discuss how we face the future. British political history has a proud tradition of methodological innovation and there is no better subfield in which to begin a debate that has fundamental implications for the whole discipline.     

Mining against the State? Gold Mining and Emerging Notions of Territoriality in Southeastern Venezuela

The current economic crisis in Venezuela has drawn members of Pemón communities to the practice of informal (illegal) gold mining, as mining, undertaken alongside other ‘traditional’ economic activities, is a more effective source of income than waged jobs. The increased involvement of Pemón people in informal mining has encouraged their partial retreat from the state's frontiers, and it reveals transformations in the ways in which local people imagine and relate to the Venezuelan state. These transformations are embodied in both a reorganisation of the space, and in burgeoning notions of land ownership.     

公权力、私权利与法律保留——从“山西煤改”事件切入

“山西煤改”事件表明，公权力与私权利的边界如果放任政府文件自行调整，公民权利易受到肆意侵犯；但交由法律完全保留则会压制地方政府应对治理危机的能力。对此，在中国的现实与制度语境下，一方面可适当通过立法主体与规则位阶的下移来弥合政府治理与权利保障之间的紧张；另一方面，也是更为重要的一面，就是通过对法律保留事项与方式的选择，以实体上的抽象保留和程序上的具体保留来规范公权力对私权利边界的调整，搭建一个刚性而又不失灵活的法治平台，以便不同的立法（广义）主体和规则发挥各自的优势，最终实现公共利益与公民权利的双赢。     

Biometric Security and Privacy Using Smart Identity Management and Interoperability: Validation and Vulnerabilities of Various Techniques

The central position of this article is that validation and interoperability are paramount for the effective and ethical use of biometrics. Illuminating the relevance for policymakers of the science underlying the security and privacy aspects of biometrics, this article calls for adequate and enforceable performance metrics that can be independently corroborated. Accordingly, the article considers biometrics and forensics for the dual challenges of addressing security and privacy using smart identity management. The discussion revolves around the concepts of “personally identifiable information” (PII) and interoperability with emphasis on quantitative performance analysis and validation for uncontrolled operational settings, variable demographics, and distributed and federated operations. Validation metrics includes expected rates of identification/misidentification, precision, and recall. The complementary concepts of identity and anonymity are addressed in terms of expected performance, functionality, law and ethics, forensics, and statistical learning. Biometrics encompasses appearance, behavior, and cognitive state or intent. Modes of deployment and performance evaluation for biometrics are detailed, with operational and adversarial challenges for both security and privacy described in terms of trustworthiness, vulnerabilities, functional creep, and feasibility of safeguards. The article underscores how lack of interoperability is mostly due to overfitting and tuning to well‐controlled settings, so that validation merely confirms “teaching to the test” rather than preparation for real‐world deployment. Most important for validation is reproducibility of results including full information on the experimental design used, that forensic exclusion is allowed, and that scientific methods for performance evaluation are followed. The article concludes with expected developments regarding technology use and advancements that bear on security and privacy, including data streams and video, de‐anonymization and reidentification, social media analytics and cyber security, and smart camera networks and surveillance.     

Taming Risks in Asia: The World Bank Group and New Mining Regimes

Abstract

Despite the admonishments of the 2003 Extractive Industry Review, the World Bank Group (WBG) has continued to promote the expansion of mining activities in resource-rich client-countries. While maintaining its mantra on the economic benefits of the sector in cash-strapped countries, in recent years poverty reduction and environmental sustainability have become the new buzzwords to justify the need for the WBG to remain actively involved in the sector. Building on the cases of the Philippines, Papua New Guinea and Lao PDR, this paper analyses this new socio-environmental narrative in conjunction with the highly political nature of the role played by the WBG in the mining sector of its country-clients. The cases demonstrate that the World Bank has played a key role in influencing a wave of new mining regimes in the region. Further, these new regimes, which comprise multilateral social and environmental safeguards, circumscribe the risks faced by industry, rather than by local populations. While successful in stimulating foreign investments in the sector, these regimes might prove ineffective in taming local and national resentment against mining activities. Crucially, the engineering of mining regimes and norm-settings in multilateral arenas raises concerns about the legitimacy of the transformations of roles and responsibilities assigned to local mining stakeholders and the possible subsequent contraction of local political spaces.     

Playing the “Game” of Transparency and Accountability: Non-elite Politics in Kyrgyzstan’s Natural Resource Governance

ABSTRACT

This article demonstrates the role of non-elites in the struggle for transparency and accountability in Kyrgyzstan’s mining sector. Most existing accounts foreground elite strategies and political machines in the governance of post-Soviet societies. Drawing on recent anthropological work on post-Soviet politics and applying it critically to the literature on neopatrimonialism, this article sheds light on the adoption of political game strategies by community members (non-elites) to advance their interests and challenge elite dominance within the case study’s mining communities. This finding responds to recent calls to interrogate the activities of non-elites at the margins of neopatrimonial contexts. The article advances a research agenda on how practices by non-elites shape the multiple meanings and enactments of transparency and accountability by elites in natural resource governance. It also points to the need to explore how and why “communities” exert their “agency” in governing natural resources within post-Soviet contexts.     

The governance of shale gas production in South Africa

The proper governance of shale gas mining in the Karoo region of South Africa is important. With an estimated 390 trillion cubic feet of recoverable shale gas, large economic gains are possible. This may dramatically change the South African energy sector; in the United States, similar explorations have led to what pundits term the ‘shale gas revolution’. The development and production of shale gas hold economic advantages, but also potential environmental costs, thus the regulation of fracking activities is an important consideration as the development of shale gas in the Karoo progresses. This study reviews the regulations imposed in other countries as well as the current regulatory framework of South Africa. This article analyses these regulations in terms of the content of fracking fluid, seismic activity and the pricing regime. Effective regulation will be key to maximise a positive impact, should shale gas development continue.