Conflict Assessment in Energy Infrastructure Siting: Prospects for Consensus Building in the Northern Pass Transmission Line Project

As energy demand grows rapidly worldwide, power line infrastructure will continue to be a major development planning challenge. This study considers the environmental conflict that has arisen over a transnational transmission line project between Canada and the United States. A qualitative conflict assessment is presented to define the parameters for consensus that could prevent protracted litigation between stakeholders. Proactively designing a process to encourage consensus building during the early development phase remains the most critical determinant of compromise. In this article, we argue that in this case a consensus‐building effort could be feasible if certain design requirements were met, including gaining the participation of key stakeholders, paying attention to trust, and focusing on the issues specific to this transmission line rather than to a larger energy discussion. The research shows that despite potential pitfalls, reaching more widely accepted and ecologically sensitive solutions to environmental conflicts through participatory and collaborative approaches is possible and worth the effort.     

Practitioners’ perspectives on in-house versus arm’s-length structures of local economic development delivery in Ontario,Canada

ABSTRACT

The structure for local economic development is an important part of the development process. In recent years, local governments have been switching structures, leading to debates about the most appropriate structure for an effective economic development delivery. Based on in-depth interviews with practitioners of local economic development, the paper examines the strengths and drawbacks of the two primary structures in the Province of Ontario: In-house and Arms-length. In doing so, the paper accomplishes two things: first, it adds to the empirical discussion on organisational approaches to economic development; second, it provides an informed perspective to assist communities that might be considering switching their structures.     

Revitalizing Local Government Performance Management: Further Dissecting the Role of Socioeconomic Status and Social Mobilization Policy

ABSTRACT

This article examines how socio-economic status and social mobilisation are linked to local government performance management in Nepal. As part of local government reform, Nepal adopted a social mobilisation policy in selected local governments to empower communities for their effective participation. Our results show that socio-economic status and social mobilisation have a significant relationship with performance management. Female literacy, for example, is strongly and significantly associated with performance management, while area has a significant positive relationship but population has only a weak positive relationship. In contrast, poverty has a significant negative correlation. More importantly, mobilisation has a significant, though modest, positive association with performance management particularly in participatory planning and budgeting, fiscal discipline, and administrative management. This indicates that improving the socio-economic status of citizens and their mobilisation for empowered collective action can be one important strategy to improve the performance capacity of local government.     

What can we Learn from the First Major Statement of Labour’s Economic Policy under Keir Starmer?

Labour’s Shadow Chancellor, Anneliese Dodds, recently set out the first major exposition of economic policy under leader Keir Starmer. Covering a lot of ground, she gave insights into current Labour thinking on macro and micro policy. Much of the speech was aimed at emphasising the fact that Labour would be ‘responsible’, an attempt to reassure voters as well as markets. But there is plenty of room for radical approaches within this framework, so exactly what this all means for practical policy is still to be determined.     

Independent review of emergency economic stimulus measures: Global Financial Crisis and COVID-19

Major government emergency interventions demand, and generally receive, independent scrutiny. This article looks back at reviews of the Australian government's economic stimulus measures introduced in the aftermath of the 2008 Global Financial Crisis (GFC), in anticipation of reviews of responses to the COVID-19 emergency, noting similarities and differences between the two crises. We examine 10 independent reviews of the Australian government's response to the GFC with a particular focus on their nature and the context in which they occurred. As a result, we identify five themes: when and how often reviews are conducted; recognition of context; the need for clear program objectives; explicit design principles; and governance. We develop a typology of independent reviews that has three key and interrelated dimensions: purpose, timing, and reviewer. We observe that there was patchwork coverage of the GFC measures, with no single report providing a holistic assessment of what was achieved or lessons learnt. We contend that, notwithstanding differences between crises, the typology will aid understanding of the role, key issues, and contributions of reviews that have already been, or will be, commissioned into COVID-19 and future emergency economic stimulus measures.     

A Study of the Predictors of Persistence in Stalking Situations

Stalkers engaging in persistent campaigns of harassment have the potential to cause immense harm to their victims and themselves. Being able to estimate which stalkers are likely to persist longest is important to clinicians dealing with both perpetrators and victims. This study of 200 stalkers investigated characteristics of the stalkers and their behaviour that were associated with increased persistence. Logistic regression models were developed to predict low, moderate, and highly persistent stalking. The results supported previous research indicating that the type of prior relationship between stalker and victim is strongly associated with persistence, with prior acquaintances the most persistent, and strangers least. Being aged over 30, sending the victim unsolicited materials, and having an intimacy seeking or resentful motivation was also associated with greater persistence, as was the presence of psychosis.

Psychopathy and Stalking

We examined the association between psychopathy, assessed using the Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised: Screening Version (Hart et al., Manual for the psychopathy checklist screening version (PCL:SV), 1995), and stalking in 61 men convicted of stalking-related offenses. Psychopathic symptoms were rare, but their presence—especially that of affective deficit symptoms—was associated with victimization of casual acquaintances and with several risk factors from the Guidelines for Stalking Assessment and Management (SAM) (Kropp et al., Guidelines for stalking assessment and management, 2008a), including stalking in violation of supervision orders, degree of preoccupation with victims, and targeting of victims with limited access to external resources. The findings suggest that in spite of their rarity, psychopathic traits may be important in the assessment and management of stalking risk.

中小企业融资困局的经济法对策

直接融资适合于具有较高成长性的高新技术企业,而众多劳动密集性中小企业由于自身性质形成的信息不对称也难以成为银行等金融机构间接融资的对象.中小企业的融资困局是市场缺陷造成的,政府干预是弥补市场缺陷的主要方式,政府在解决中小企业融资困局中所形成的经济关系是经济法的调整对象.在借助"政府-社会中间层-市场"三元框架分析政府、与中小企业融资有关的社会中间层和中小企业的定位的基础上,应从经济法的主体角度进行相关的制度设计,探索长效机制解决中小企业的融资困局.     

新自由主义与国际经济法

全球性经济危机的危险性使人们对新自由主义产生了质疑,某些现行国际经济法制度的缺陷也日渐显露。WTO体制内各国保护主义可能抬头,国际金融体系的破绽使得加强监管和完善体制成为当务之急,从而弱化了自由主义色彩。国际经济法律秩序面临重组,这给各国提出了新的课题。但是在全球性经济衰退到来之际,新自由主义所体现的国际经济自由和开放仍然十分重要,其制度性的缺陷可以通过在危机之际建立国际经济合作机制得以修正。由于中国对外开放是在新自由主义的国际大环境下进行的,所以金融危机对新自由主义的冲击,对于中国也是一场严峻的挑战。但是,以中国的经济规模和成就,中国在国际经济法律制度和秩序的重组中也获得参与国际经济规则创制的难得机遇。     

经济组织与纠纷自决——以两个企业为例的分析

作为成本低廉的纠纷解决方式,自决是各型经济组织的首选。诉讼在多数情况下只是一种不得已的选择。而同时,由于企业规模以及各自经济实力等差异,纠纷的自我解决形式表现出明显的差异。反思经济组织自决机制的本质,既表现一定的伦理性,也呈现某种反伦理特征;就其与诉讼机制的关系而论,则既存有竞争,也有同一关系。