This land is my land: the Ethio-Sudan boundary and the need to rectify arbitrary colonial boundaries

Ethiopia and Sudan share a common boundary of over 1600 km which was drawn through a series of treaties between Ethiopia and the colonial powers of Britain and Italy. To date, this boundary has not been clearly demarcated. In 2007, the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front, the current ruling government, entered into a secret agreement with the Sudan to make adjustments on the border. This paper identifies the major factors that have frustrated efforts to address the Ethio-Sudan boundary problem and also proposes solutions on how Ethiopia and Sudan could resolve their differences. The analysis reveals that political, social and cultural factors; the decision to adopt the western concept of the boundary; and the failure to recognise the historic and cultural constructs have contributed to the frustration of negotiations on the border. The paper proposes that Ethiopia and Sudan embrace the African Union Border Program, which encourages mutual cooperation, regional integration and the building of communities with strong economic and cultural ties.     

One lawyer acting for two clients: implications arising from an experimental practice model ‘Family Matters’

The legal services market has faced unprecedented change following implementation of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (LASPO). Alternative business models and wider use of digital technologies have developed alongside debates about the future of legal practice in family law. Arguments have been made for new hybrid models that combine legal advice with mediation and for solicitors to be enabled to work with two clients. This paper contributes to that debate by highlighting implications for such practice innovations based on research evidence of solicitors’ experiences of delivering an experimental model of practice: ‘Family Matters Guides’. This model, piloted by Resolution, involved the Guides providing intensive support and legal information (not legal advice) to both separating parents to help them reach agreements. This paper is timely as the professions await the new regulations from the Solicitors Regulation Authority (autumn 2018) making flexible practice models a reality.     

To play with phantoms : Jean Baudrillard and the evil demon of the simulacrum

It is only by historically contextualizing Baudrillard's concept of the simulacrum that we can understand its form and effects – its historical efficacy,its nihilistic ungrounding of certain epistemological foundations, its subsequent demonization in the West, and the latter's attempt to domesticate its power. Baudrillard opposes the contemporary simulacrum with the Durkheimian symbolic but, as a privileged critical site functioning as the 'real', this only repeats the Western domestication. Ultimately, however, the diabolical power of the simulacrum is too great for the symbolic, and its success today overwhelms Baudrillard himself. The pact with its demon is a dangerous one.     

Symbolic state-building in contemporary Russia

Vladimir Putin has made state-building a central goal of his presidency and recent scholarship has demonstrated that Russian formal institutions have indeed been deliberately reformed. Unlike studies that ass’ess state-building vis-à-vis a particular outcome, our research examines what kind of state Russian political elites seek to build, and focuses on symbolic state-building strategies. To capture symbolic state-building in the Putin era, we examine the Pryamaya Liniya broadcasts: annual, high-profile TV broadcasts in which citizens pose questions to the president. We find that a broad range of formal institutions appear to be central to Putin’s state-building project, a finding that runs counter to claims that governance is largely deinstitutionalized, informal and personal. We argue that symbolic state-building seeks to reconcile personalism and institutionalism, by conveying a dual image of a state in citizens’ everyday lives – emphasizing both formal institutions, while also affirming Putin as the personal guarantor of the state’s authority.     

论公司自治的法律边界

公司自治的法律边界是规范公司治理行为的重要内容。公司自治的法律边界可以从其实体法、公司章程和法律救济等三个方面进行划定。实体法介入的主要改革思路是减少实体性规定，增加程序性强制规范的适用范围。公司章程约束的主要完善对策除了要增加章程的类型，提高章程的灵活性外，更重要的是要合理分配股东会与董事会的职权范围，固化股东权利。法律救济的完善则应着眼于商事审判理念的确立、经营判断规则的引入和专任商事陪审员制度的建立等几个方面。     

Theorizing identity: beyond the ‘us’ and ‘them’ dichotomy

ABSTRACT

Yuval-Davis discusses three interconnected questions relating to identity. She first examines whether and in what ways the notion of identity should be theorized, on the one hand, and empirically researched, on the other, focusing on the opposing views of Stuart Hall and Robin Williams. She then examines the contested question of what is identity, positioning it in relation to notions of belonging and the politics of belonging, and in relation to several influential schools of thought, especially those that construct identity as a mode of narrative, as a mode of performativity or as a dialogical practice. Her third interrelated question concerns the boundaries of identity and the relationship between self and non-self. She explores both social psychological and psychoanalytical approaches to that question, and deals with questions such as reflexivity, identifications and forced identities. The last part of the article explores several types of relationships between self and non-self, such as: ‘me’ and ‘us’; ‘me/us’ and ‘them’; ‘me’ and other ‘others’; ‘me’ and the transversal ‘us/them’. Yuval-Davis's basic argument here is that dichotomous notions of identity and difference, when theorizing boundaries of individual and collective identities, are more misleading than explanatory.     

When Is a Gerrymander Not a Gerrymander: Who Benefits and Who Loses from the Changed Rules for Defining Parliamentary Constituencies?

Members of the British Labour party have, not for the first time, criticised the Boundary Commissions’ proposals for new constituency boundaries as gerrymandering. This represents a misuse of the term: the Commissions have produced recommended constituencies in the context of new rules for such redistributions that give precedence to equality of electorates across all seats and the boundaries of those constituencies have been defined without any reference to the likely electoral consequences. The Conservatives, who were responsible for the change in the rules to emphasise electoral equality, wanted to remove a decades‐long Labour advantage in the translation of votes into seats because of variations in constituency size, and the Commissions’ implementation of those rules has achieved that. A Labour advantage has been removed but not replaced by a Conservative advantage: in terms of electoral equality between the two, the playing field has been levelled. Labour's claim to have been disadvantaged by decisions on the electoral register is also examined; the disadvantage is probably only small.     

论敲诈勒索罪与抢劫罪的界限

抢劫罪与敲诈勒索罪时有发生,当两罪都以威胁手段实施时,而容易混淆。本文就具体案例结合犯罪的构成要件,谈一下对两罪界限的理解和认定。     

符号互动理论视野下的仇恨犯罪原因探析

与西方国家略有不同,我国的仇恨犯罪并非由宗教差异及宗族歧视等极端的社会矛盾引发,而是源于普通的社会矛盾。在仇恨犯罪发生之前,行为人往往处于冲突当中,由于主客观因素的综合作用,使得行为人将冲突理解为偏见、歧视、侮辱、嫉妒等。受这种心理状态的影响,行为人产生仇恨情绪,再加上我国传统复仇文化的刺激以及正当复仇途径受阻,最终导致了仇恨犯罪的发生。从这个意义上讲,行为人与被害人的不良互动是触发仇恨犯罪的重要原因。     

基于风险控制的职业健康和安全管制权力配置研究

职业健康和安全管制本质上属于社会性管制的范畴,其管制过程受到经济市场个体理性与政治市场制度选择的双重影响,这两个要素之间也存在着相互影响、相互制约的关系。权力配置作为外生性制度环境的要素基础,对内生性的经济市场理性具有调节作用,并决定着管制风险的发生概率和管制均衡的实现程度。论文从风险控制与效率优化的角度分析了职业健康和安全管制权力配置的边界、形态及其对权力协作、管制均衡所产生的影响。论文以此为分析框架,分析了不同时期中国职业健康和安全管制的权力配置形态、效率状况及风险控制等问题。论文认为,中国职业健康和安全管制的权力配置应实现由多元分散式协调管理模式向一元单向式综合管理模式的转变。