以作案过程为主线的勘查方法

刑事案件的现场勘查工作,是刑事侦查工作的第一步,它直接影响以后的侦破工作。应当把是否弄清作案过程作为衡量现场勘查质量的一个标准,勘查中必须以作案过程为主线,一切勘查活动均在这个主线指导下进行,一切勘查活动均为完成对这条主线的认识而展开。     

将过程思想引进立法研究的思考

立法过程是立法研究的一个重要方面。过程思想提供了一种新的方法论视角,使我们动态地、联系地观察立法过程,全面、完整地把握其规律性。有关过程和立法过程的思想观点有助于我们加深认识立法过程的内涵、特点和复杂性,并可以在立法实践中具体应用。     

“Regulation,I presume?” said the robot – Towards an iterative regulatory process for robot governance

This article envisions an iterative regulatory process for robot governance. In the article, we argue that what lacks in robot governance is actually a backstep mechanism that can coordinate and align robot and regulatory developers. In order to solve that problem, we present a theoretical model that represents a step forward in the coordination and alignment of robot and regulatory development. Our work builds on previous literature, and explores modes of alignment and iteration towards greater closeness in the nexus between research and development (R&D) and regulatory appraisal and channeling of robotics’ development. To illustrate practical challenges and solutions, we explore different examples of (related) types of communication processes between robot developers and regulatory bodies. These examples help illuminate the lack of formalization of the policymaking process, and the loss of time and resources that the waste of knowledge generated for future robot governance instruments implies. We argue that initiatives that fail to formalize the communication process between different actors and that propose the mere creation of coordinating agencies risk being seriously ineffective. We propose an iterative regulatory process for robot governance, which combines the use of an ex ante robot impact assessment for legal/ethical appraisal, and evaluation settings as data generators, and an ex post legislative evaluation instrument that eases the revision, modification and update of the normative instrument. In all, the model breathes the concept of creating dynamic evidence-based policies that can serve as temporary benchmark for future and/or new uses or robot developments. Our contribution seeks to provide a thoughtful proposal that avoids the current mismatch between existing governmental approaches and what is needed for effective ethical/legal oversight, in the hope that this will inform the policy debate and set the scene for further research.     

HRM: Performance Relationship: Need for Further Development?

The last decade of empirical research on the HRM value additions, also known as the “HRM and performance” debate, demonstrates evidence that HRM does matter (Huselid, 1995 Huselid, M. 1995. The impact of human resource management on turnover, productivity and corporate financial performance. Academy of Management Journal, 38(3): 635–672. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; Guest et al., 2003 Guest, D.E., Michie, J., Conway, N. and Sheehan, M. 2003. Human resource management and corporate performance in the UK. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 41(2): 291–314. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; Wright et al., 2003 Wright, P., Gardner, M. and Moynihan, L. 2003. The impact of HR practices on the performance of business units. Human Resources Management Journal, 13(4): 21–36.  [Google Scholar]; Rehman et al., 2010). Unfortunately, the relationships are often statistically weak and the results ambiguous. This article reviews and attempts to extend the theoretical and methodological issues in this debate. Its aim is to build an agenda for future research in this area. A brief overview of achievements to date is followed by the theoretical and methodological issues related to what constitutes HRM, what is meant by the concept of performance, and the nature of the link between these two. In the final section, it is argued that research designs should start from a multi-dimensional concept of performance, including the perceptions of employees, and build on the premise of HR systems as an enabling device for a whole range of strategic options. This implies a reversal of the strategy-HRM linkage.     

The Politics of Infrastructural Projects: A Case for Evidence-Based Policymaking

Many developing countries currently face tightening fiscal constraints as a result of the global financial crisis and associated reduction in both credit and demand. Policymarkers therefore have less fiscal space within which to undertake projects, so the opportunity cost of any misallocation of resources will be correspondingly higher. There is therefore an increasing need to rely more on evidence-based policymaking (EBPM). The is particularly so for large infrastructural projects, as these tend to be costly, and especially for transportation projects as these are particularly prone to result in sub-optimal outcomes. This paper examines the policy process for the implementation of the Jamaican Highway 2000, one of the largest and most costly infrastructure projects in Jamaica in recent years. A number of primary and secondary data sources were explored to ascertain the extent to which the decision to implement the project reflects a case for evidence-based decision-making in practice. This made it clear that the decision was taken at least partly on political grounds, largely in the absence of any supportive evidence, and on the basis of over-optimistic and unrealistic assumptions, and that this has created a number of serious, long-term challenges for Jamaica.     

Business Process Re-Engineering and Balanced Scorecard in Swedish Public Sector Organizations: Solutions for Problems or Problems for Solutions?

This article analyzes and discusses the adoption and implementation of Business Process Re‐Engineering (BPR) at a hospital and Balanced Scorecard (BSC) at a local government. At the hospital, BPR was adopted as a solution to problems, but became de-coupled from operations, and later used for legitimacy reasons. At the local government, without having identified clear problems, BSC was adopted as an attractive solution but became coupled, rather than de-coupled, to operations. Our study shows that de-coupling does not follow the path proposed by neo-institutional theory, and that legitimacy from popular management concepts can be obtained both by coupling and by de-coupling the concepts from operations.     

The Internet and Parliamentary Democracy in Europe

The overall aim of this volume is to investigate the impact of new information and communications technologies (ICTs), in particular the Internet, upon parliamentary democracy in Europe. Through a comparative study of four parliaments (the British, European, Portuguese and Swedish), our research addresses three important dimensions of the impact of the Internet on parliamentary democracy, namely, the practices, principles and rules related to the use of the Internet in a parliamentary context. It is hoped that, by comparing the experiences of the four parliaments and their Members, a European perspective on the development of and issues about ‘parliamentary e-Democracy’ can be established. The main sources of data and methodologies employed in this volume include a questionnaire survey, content analysis of parliamentary websites, interviews with parliamentarians and parliamentary staff and research workshops. Here we highlight the main features of the individual contributions included in this volume.     

Beyond normative constraints: Declining institutionalism and the emergence of substantive and procedural justice

Popular notions of what it means to be put on trial invariably generate thoughts of the adversarial criminal trial, most often before a judge and jury. However, the criminal trial as the site for the testing of evidence of wrongdoing via a model of proof that proceeds according to prescribed processes in a normative institutional milieu is in decline. Controversially, this decline has been met with resistance from the legal profession, academics, policy makers and other stakeholders seeking to preserve the due process model that defines the criminal trial as an adversarial exchange between state and defendant. While the due process model continues to dominate as popular conceptualisation, the twenty-first century criminal trial has changed to such an extent that it is no longer seen as the quintessential form for the meting out of procedural fairness and testing of state's evidence, that emerged toward the end of the seventeenth century. Rather, the rise of control orders, modifications to the law of evidence, and the right of the accused to confront their accuser, together with the inclusion of non-traditional agents of justice, specifically victims and the community, has brought forward an era of substantive and procedural justice that lies beyond the normative constraints of the criminal trial. Robed counsel and bewigged judges beware; the advent of substantive and procedural justice has allowed for greater innovation transgressing the orthodoxies of criminal law in common law systems of justice. This paper will consider the virtues of the introduction of a transgressive criminal procedure.