代孕背景下亲子关系的确定

人工生殖技术的发展改变了传统的自然生育方式,给法律上亲子关系的认定带来了巨大的冲击。传统"分娩者为母"原则受到了技术上的挑战,无法满足现实需求;根据基因来源确定亲子关系,在某种情况下背离了捐精者或供卵人的意思自治;而以"儿童最大利益原则"为标准使得代孕子女出生前无法形成有效的身份预期。从代孕协议的效力上来看,代孕协议本身并不与强制性法律法规相悖,也不会对公序良俗造成剧烈的冲击,代孕协议的效力不应被轻易否定。因此,代孕背景下亲子关系应当依据代孕协议确定,并以"儿童最大利益原则"作为补充要素。另外,由于代孕协议涉及到伦理色彩浓厚的身份法领域,其不能简单地适用《合同法》的规定,因此,在代孕协议无效的情况下,应当坚持"身份确定原则",严格限定当事人提起无效之诉的时效,并承认事实抚养关系。     

Customization in Civil Service Training: Implications for Outsourcing Human Resources Management

In the public sector, central training institutes once played an irreplaceable role in formulating training policies and providing training programs to government employees. The introduction of new public management (NPM) has stimulated a reform agenda in human resources (HR) management, resulting in a shift from centralized training to decentralized or outsourced training; to be precise, making civil service training more demand-driven and lessening the role of central training institutes. Local-level governments and agencies have acquired more autonomy in deciding whether to provide training in-house, or to purchase relevant services from private providers. In addition, dramatic institutional, economic, and operational changes in the public sector in the twenty-first century have brought about competition among governments worldwide in terms of innovative and creative ideas, prompting them to equip their employees with the relevant skills for the governments to remain competitive. This study explores how civil service training in Hong Kong has been decentralized and customized from the viewpoint of civil servants being trainees, and assesses the role of the Civil Service Training and Development Institute as a centralized training institute for Hong Kong civil servants within the modern, decentralized, and consumerized HR management regime.     

Is development studies becoming too brainy? A comparison of World Development Reports

This article argues that two types of “brainisation” hinder development studies researchers in their phronetic understanding of poor people’s realities. It first provides a literature review on two types of knowledge and their differences, as well as two types of brainisation and how they prevent development studies scholars gaining a holistic understanding of the marginalised. Subsequently, a comparative analysis is conducted on two World Development Reports. Finally, alternative scenarios are outlined for the “debrainisation” of development studies and researchers’ mind-sets by learning from the fundamental features of human life.     

Sen’s capability approach and microcredit: lessons from a Malaysian case

This article examines a case study from Malaysia, the Credit Union Malaysia, to illustrate how the capability framework and institutions have practical value within the scope of microcredit, and how the constraints that the disadvantaged face can be relaxed through the use of microcredit. The capability approach provides an analytical framework to describe how a microcredit scheme can overcome the problems posed by conversion factors in order to enlarge the space of capabilities available to individuals.     

Language,NGOs and inclusion: the donor perspective

Listening to communities is valued by UK’s Department of International Development (DFID) for contributing to “beneficiary” empowerment and programme efficiency. This article is based on interviews with elite DFID officials to explore their understandings on how they expect NGOs to engage with local languages and the role of language intermediaries. It uncovers their perceptions of the ways that languages and cultural knowledge shape NGO relationships with communities. It finds that the officials assume that listening is unproblematic for NGOs, and ask few questions about translation and interpretation. The article concludes by reflecting on policy implications and directions for further research.     

How democratic decentralisation facilitates,sustains, and interrupts market-driven development in India

Democratic decentralisation has emerged as an instrument to implement market-driven development, and elected bodies now extend commercial inputs for commodity production and link households to firms. However, the nature of market-driven development under this condition is understudied. This article focuses on an Indian case where, while access to market inputs was shaped by political capital with elected leaders, narrowing market participation, leaders – now market intermediaries – fostered trust in firms, helping sustain market participation. Conflicts over electoral politics interrupted market production. Markets rely on state institutions and are intertwined with politics, contrary to market proponents’ claims that markets stand above society and are unmediated spaces of exchange.     

Climate change research in bilateral development programmes: experiences from India and Peru

This article reflects on the merits and shortfalls of bilateral research programmes aimed at strengthening climate change research capabilities, using the experience from two programmes, the PACC and IHCAP in Peru and India, respectively. The study highlights key aspects of these types of bilateral programmes, namely: capacity; performance, salary and appreciation; funding; bureaucracy and hierarchy; publishing; and data sharing. Furthermore, it emerged that these programmes would benefit from a more extensive consolidation phase of the research activities and partnership rather than rapidly transferring into out- and up-scaling phases.     

Participatory modelling and development practice: artisanal fishers in Nicaragua

Development plans with insufficient knowledge about local realities, and that do not share technical or planning details with the target communities, bedevil development practice. This study used a form of participatory modelling in three fishing communities in Nicaragua to enable fishers to explore their economy and the potential impacts of fishery-based development projects. Co-designing a model of the fishing economy in the form of a board game created a forum in which facilitators and participants could arrive at a shared understanding of local fishing practices and the costs and benefits of strategies for addressing the fishers’ priorities.     

Community assessment of NGO housing delivery: lessons from Port Vila,Vanuatu

This article reports on a 2016 field-based multiple case study of three communities in peri-urban Port Vila, Vanuatu. It offers robust empirical evidence that participatory planning, partnerships, and programme evaluation, as espoused in the literature from the last two decades and readdressed in Habitat III Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development, is not regularly occurring in aid-based housing programmes. The study identifies that in sacrificing consultation – community cohesion, capacity building, resiliency, and innovation, are also sacrificed. This research differs from peer literature by employing an inductive and underutilised methodology, storytelling, and by focusing on an at-risk country which receives little academic, NGO, or development attention.     

At the root of participatory approaches: uncovering the role of accompaniment

This article examines the impact of a participatory development project in rural Uganda and offers explanations for the results obtained. Though successful in facilitating the creation of specific goods and services, the project did not fully realise its intended outcome: empowering local actors and generating lasting human development. These mixed results were the consequence of inconsistent dialogue and listening among the actors, often resulting in a lack of genuine accompaniment. In evaluating community engagement through the lens of accompaniment, the study considers the potential for participatory approaches to overcome often-asserted criticisms, namely the presence of dependency and elite capture.