Between resistance and negotiation: indigenous organisations and the Bolivian State in the case of TIPNIS

A government-driven road-building project, crossing the national park and demarcated indigenous communitarian native land Isiboro Sécure (TIPNIS) in the Bolivian Amazon, has caused considerable debate, divisions and conflict. Based on extensive fieldwork in Bolivia, I examine the conflict between 2011 and 2013, focusing on specific cases of micro-politics with examples of changing strategies, local negotiations and strategic framings in the interactions between the indigenous organisations and the state involved in the conflict. I show that the evolution of the conflict has been affected by these micro-political issues, as well as strategic state projects. Secondly, I focus on how discursive framings have legitimised advanced or marginalised certain solutions, ideas and interests.     

Land tenure,land law and development: some thoughts on recent debates

This paper offers a discussion of some of the features of recent land tenure debates and policies. It argues that two different orientations can be discerned: one that tends to regard land primarily as an economic asset and another that rather takes a (human) rights orientation and emphasises food and shelter security. These different orientations can be seen to be related to contrasting conceptualisations of extra-legality and different ranges of policy options when it comes to the legalisation or formalisation of land tenure and the acknowledgement of arrangements alternative to Western style individual ownership.     

The political economy of Australian regulatory reform

The problem of regulatory accumulation has increasingly been recognised as a policy problem in its own right. Governments have then devised and implemented regulatory reform policies that directly seek to ameliorate the burdens of regulatory accumulation (e.g. red tape reduction targets). In this paper we examine regulatory reform approaches in Australia through the lens of policy innovation. Our contributions are twofold. We first examine the evolutionary discovery process of regulatory reform policies in Australia (at the federal, intergovernmental, and state levels). This demonstrates a process of policy innovation in regulatory mechanisms and measurements. We then analyse a new measurement of regulatory burden based on text analytics, RegData: Australia. RegData: Australia uses textual analysis to count ‘restrictiveness clauses' in regulation – such as ‘must’, ‘cannot’ and ‘shall’ – thereby developing a new database (RDAU1.0). We place this ‘restrictiveness clauses’ measurement within the context of regulatory policy innovation, and examine the potential for further innovation in regulatory reform mechanisms.     

Citizenship policies and ideas of nationhood in Scandinavia

This article analyzes the recent changes in naturalization policies in three Nordic countries, Norway, Denmark and Sweden. Considering the homogeneity of the region in terms of culture, social structure and polity, the discrepancy in current citizenship regulation is remarkable. Similar problem definitions have generated diametrical opposite solutions. This is even more striking as the three countries, hailing on perceived ideas of common interests and various experiences of shared rule in different political constellations for the best part of the last 500 years, also cooperated closely in forging their national citizenship legislation from the 1880s up till 1979. The article gives perspective to this novel variation, analyzing the interplay between aims and means in the naturalization policies. Basic questions like citizenship rights, the social and cultural cohesion of the nation state, national ideology and questions of identity will be addressed.     

The effects of global crisis on the Albanian economy

East European countries, including Albania aren＇t totally immune from the troubles of the international financial trade, although they will not have direct influence on their finances system. These effects of the global economy crisis have begun to be felt even in Albania. The poor classes will be much more and faster effected from this crisis. This article will treat the effects of the crisis into these classes, and the risks that this crisis brings to their finances. Important factors for this will be the decrease of the monetary incomes in the country, the emigrant remittance and foreign investments decrease and as a result they will influence in a decrease of the income for person in the country, which will have much influence at this level. The intention of the article is to treat the policies that should be taken by the government to protect them. The government of these countries should be concentrated in the social protection of the poor classes and in the ways of overcoming the crisis for them.     

Unemployment in transition countries： Albanian case

In this paper, the topic how the unemployment rate is changing year after year in Albania will be treated. Nearly 20 years of transition is a long period and seeing changes in the affect of the flow of foreign direct investment （FDI） on the unemployment rate. As a result of numerous changes, people migrate from other districts of the capital, investment concentrates in some areas that cause different development from one area to another. Other which highlights problems is the fact that a part of the unemployed are unregistered. Most of the data are presented only to unemployed individuals living in Tirana. However, the number of the unemployed has increased uniformly, while the number of the unemployed treated with economic assistance and payment of unemployment has reduced, because the state through the Office of the Employment Promotion employed persons in this category Although we say that year after year employed individuals who are able to work should not forget that every year new graduates are added to the labor market and again unemployment remains a problem in our society, causing a series of problems. The unacceptable reality is directly affecting people＇s physical, psychological, moral and spiritual health, not only the unemployed but also every citizen in Albania. This social pathology is named unemployment, and we wish that their values are going to change soon.     

法院的功能

在现代社会,法院扮演的角色是“社会纠纷的裁判中心”,除承担着一般的纠纷裁判功能外,还承担着从纠纷裁判功能中衍生出来的权力制约功能和公共政策创制功能。我国法院在功能上仍带有明显的“传统法院”的色彩：一方面,法院承担了大量的非裁判性功能;另一方面,许多应该由法院承担的功能事实上并没有归入法院。所以,应该立足于法院功能的现代化,理性地界定和建构我国法院的功能。     

The Power of Mercy: Amnesty Policies in Fugitive Cases in the Qing Dynasty

A new statute, “Hiding New and Old Fugitive Slaves of Manchus,” was added to the first version of the Qing code in 1647, and this statute surprisingly regulated that any offenders would be excluded from any amnesties. This is especially noteworthy because, according to both Ming and Qing codes, only severe crimes, such as treason and rebellion, were excluded from any amnesties. Previous scholars have not considered why the statute excluded any amnesties, nor have they analyzed how this amnesty policy was implemented in practice. This article contends that the exclusion did not arise from Manchu tradition. Instead, it was an exceptional response to the norms of amnesties in the Ming and Qing codes. Because the fugitive problem, involving slaves of Manchus fleeing from the banner system, endangered Manchus’ interests, the Qing court was compelled to exclude fugitive criminals from amnesties. However, the Qing court did not strictly apply the amnesty policy of this statute. Criminals in fugitive cases were sometimes pardoned because of amnesties during the Dorgon regency period. Dorgon, Shunzhi, Oboi, and Kangxi all initially excluded those harboring fugitives from amnesties, but later changed their amnesty policies in this regard. Even though the crime of harboring fugitives became a permanent symbol of Manchu rule and was recorded in every emperor’s enthronement edict from Kangxi to Xuantong, the Qing court gradually came to accept norms concerning amnesties as practiced in Han society and treated fugitive cases as ordinary court cases during and after the Kangxi emperor’s reign.     

Rethinking Indigenous Politics: The Unnoticed Struggle for Self-Determination in Peru

Most scholars characterise Peru as a country with weak indigenous movements, whose demands would have no influence in regional and national policies, even though its socio-economic structures are similar to those of Bolivia and Ecuador, where indigenous movements are stronger. Based on fieldwork in the northern Peruvian Amazon and Lima between 2012–2013 and 2016–2018, this article argues that pro-indigenous legislation enacted as a response to strong indigenous mobilisation as well as the creation of indigenous autonomous governments in the Amazon express an unnoticed struggle for indigenous self-determination. These social phenomena also raise questions about the common assessment of the strength or weakness of indigenous movements.     

Does women’s empowerment through policy intervention reduce food insecurity in South Africa?

This article determines the extent to which the food insecurity status of women in South Africa can be reduced by participating in gardening around the homestead, using survey data from 207 women farmers. A household food insecurity average score index and an empirical model that accounts for observed and unobserved factors contributing to food insecurity were employed. The findings reveal that participating in the programme worked to reduce the food insecurity of women significantly, and also show other policy factors that need to be taken into consideration to reduce food insecurity. We recommend that policy interventions towards promoting high participation by women are a sustainable strategy to address food insecurity and to achieve the 2030 agenda targeting an end to poverty and hunger.