Level Two Negotiations: Helping the Other Side Meet Its “Behind‐the‐Table” Challenges

A long analytic tradition has explored the challenge of productively synchronizing “internal” with “external” negotiations, with a special focus on how each side can best manage internal opposition to agreements negotiated “at the table.” Implicit in much of this work has been the view that each side's leadership is best positioned to manage its own internal conflicts, often by pressing for deal terms that will overcome internal objections and by effectively “selling” the agreement to key constituencies. Far less frequently have analysts considered how each side can help the other side with its “behind‐the‐table” barriers to successful agreement. Following Robert Putnam's two‐level games schema, I characterize such “behind‐the‐table” or “Level Two” barriers more broadly, offer several innovative examples of how each side can help the other overcome them, and develop more general advice on doing so most effectively. As a fuller illustration of a Level Two negotiator helping the other side with its formidable behind‐the‐table challenges, I pay special attention to the end‐of‐Cold‐War negotiations over German reunification in which former American Secretary of State James Baker played a key role.     

The roadmap to net-zero emission: Do geopolitical risk and energy transition matter?

Global crises have heightened policy uncertainties and efforts to address global climate change. Limited evidence exists in the literature on geopolitical risk's direct and indirect roles in addressing global emissions. In this study, we examine whether geopolitical risk could impede or facilitate efforts to attain a net-zero emissions target through energy transition using panel data for 42 countries from 1990 to 2020. Various econometric techniques were applied in this study to present robust findings and reliable conclusions. Estimates from the Driscoll-Kraay, Lewbel two-stage least squares and method of moment regression techniques consistently showed that countries' geopolitical risk directly increases emissions (total greenhouse gas, carbon, methane, and nitrous oxide). At the same time, energy transition, measured with renewable energy consumption, mitigates these emissions. In addition, evidence from the partial linear functional-coefficient model technique indicates that renewable energy consumption consistently mitigates emissions when geopolitical is minimal (at a minimum and mean level). However, the role of renewable energy consumption in reducing emissions becomes weaker when geopolitical risk is heightened—thus, when geopolitical risk reaches its maximum level. We recommend that efforts to sustain renewable energy transition and maintain geopolitical stability are vital for achieving net-zero emissions and climate change mitigation.     

Uneven local implementation of federal policy after disaster: Policy conflict and goal ambiguity

As climate change continues to increase both the frequency and intensity of environmental hazards and disasters, the need for a cohesive national mitigation policy grows. As the environmental federalism scholarship indicates, the inherent tension in federal, state, and local policy implementation highlights that despite a national need, environmental quality is a local public good. To complicate matters, there is disagreement about the optimal level of decision-making regarding the adoption and implementation of environmental policy. This study addresses this gap by considering the role of policy ambiguity and conflict in policy implementation. The analysis relies on primary qualitative data collected from open-ended interviews with 22 local government officials in 12 municipalities following Hurricane Harvey. Through the lens of policy ambiguity and conflict, we find confirmatory support for the idea that policies with less ambiguous goals are more likely to be implemented. Furthermore, we find that policy conflict arises when local governments perceive there is little for the community to gain by implementing the federal program. Thus, the level of protection afforded to citizens varies greatly between communities and is influenced heavily by politics. This research supports the Ambiguity-Conflict Model of policy implementation, an oft-cited but rarely tested theoretical framework for assessing the intergovernmental politics of policy implementation. It also demonstrates the barriers to local implementation of federal environmental policy in a nested system of government.     

Analyser les réformes institutionnelles sur le terrain: l'exemple de la réforme de l'armée suisse «Armée XXI»

L'étude des réformes de l'administration et des institutions publiques suisses a considérablement délaissé la problématique des conséquences des changements sur le terrain et surtout n'a pas analysé le vécu des acteurs administratifs de base. Notre étude vise, au niveau analytique, à rendre compte du vécu des réformes à l'échelon des «petits fonctionnaires»; sur un plan méthodologique, une enquête de nature ethnographique est introduite pour étudier ce questionnement. Notre enquête sur la réforme de l'armée suisse «Armée XXI» sert d'illustration. Si notre démarche permet de parvenir à des résultats intéressants sur les conséquences et le vécu de cette réforme, elle comporte également des enjeux empiriques spécifiques articulés autour de la question centrale de la relation du chercheur à son terrain. Au final, une microsociologie ethnographique du vécu des réformes par les acteurs de base nous semble susceptible de contribuer à un enrichissement de la recherche sur les transformations récentes des institutions publiques en Suisse.     

Actions Speak Louder than Words: A Behavioral Analysis of 183 Individuals Convicted for Terrorist Offenses in the United States from 1995 to 2012

Involvement in terrorism has traditionally been discussed in relatively simplistic ways with little effort spent on developing a deeper understanding of what involvement actually entails, and how it differs from person to person. In this paper, we present the results of a three‐year project focused on 183 individuals associated with the global jihadist movement who were convicted in the United States, for terrorist offenses, between 1995 and 2012. These data were developed by a large‐scale, open‐source data collection activity that involved a coding dictionary of more than 120 variables. We identify and explore the diversity of behaviors that constitute involvement in terrorism. We also compare lone actors and those who acted as part of a group, finding that lone actors differed from group‐based actors in key demographic attributes and were more likely to be involved in attack execution behaviors. Implications for counterterrorism are then discussed.     

TESTING THE TRANSITIVITY OF REPORTED RISK PERCEPTIONS: EVIDENCE OF COHERENT ARBITRARINESS

An often implicit assumption of perceptual deterrence tests is that the elicited values pertaining to arrest risk reflect stable underlying beliefs. But researchers in other disciplines have found that reported expectations are highly susceptible to exogenous factors (e.g., anchors and question ordering), indicating that such values are somewhat arbitrary responses to probabilistic questions. At the same time, reported expectations are coherent within persons, such that respondents rank order them rationally. For deterrence, then, absolute values reported on arrest risks are likely not stable but individuals still rank order specific crimes in meaningful ways. We examine the interpretability of reported arrest risk for three possibilities: 1) Reported risks are stable probabilistic values; 2) reported risks are arbitrary and uninformative for deterrence research; or 3) reported risks display “coherent arbitrariness” with unstable values between individuals but stable rank ordering of crimes within individuals. Through the use of three random experiments of college students, our results indicate that elicited risk perceptions are arbitrary in that they are influenced by the presentation of anchors and question ordering. Nevertheless, the rank ordering of crimes within and across conditions is unaffected by the presentation of anchors, suggesting that reported risks are locally coherent within persons.     

公共卫生事件风险沟通中社会信任问题研究

在风险社会中,有针对性地进行风险沟通已成为应对风险不确定性的有效手段.随着我国经济的迅速发展,具有"脱域"特质的陌生人社会逐步形成,且移动智能终端进一步普及使得生活场景向虚拟化趋势发展,社会生活现状的改变对风险沟通提出了新要求.应从风险治理、立法完善、专家系统以及公众参与等方面着手完善公共卫生事件风险沟通中的社会信任机...     

医疗责任保险制度初探

笔者从医疗风险、医疗责任保险的可保性及医疗责任保险的性质与意义等方面多角度的进行详细的论述,对医疗责任保险制度在国内外的发展及现状进行了较为客观的分析,最后结合我国实际,在借鉴国内外成功经验的基础上提出了我国建立医疗责任保险制度的初步构想。     

改革开放 40 年来中国企业员工集体离职机制的 典型案例研究

企业员工集体离职对相关组织和员工群体影响深远。本研究从 1978—2021 年中国知网（CNKI） 4 类论文数据库及报纸 1 类新闻数据库中，甄选出我国 102 个企业员工集体离职典型案例。研究发现：集体离 职集中发生在时代的热门行业、朝阳产业，其中制造业、IT 业的集体离职始终处于焦点；集体离职的主要原 因是个体自身因素、企业内部因素以及二者互动因素；集体离职的直接原因同样主要在内因，成为集体离职的 “导火索”或“催化剂”。研究提炼出企业员工集体离职影响因素和作用机制模型、企业员工集体离职主要原 因和直接原因作用模型。基于此，研究建议：预防集体离职需整体上更加关注企业的内部管理，化解集体离职 需避免主要原因的积累，缓解集体离职还需注意直接原因的作用。