从人民币汇率制度改革看中美关系的前景

经济全球化背景下中美关系的纷争不可能回避货币汇率制度。近年来在人民币汇率制度改革过程中,中美两国政府的多重多次博弈,展现出中美关系中合作与冲突的鲜明特征。只有理性地分析中美两国间的利益与分歧,才能在有限的冲突中达成合作。     

20世纪美国社会保障制度的困境及其社会影响

美国的社会保障制度发挥了保护器、安全阀和调节器的作用,并且成为现代美国资本主义制度重要的有机组成部分。但是,它却面临着财政危机、工作伦理危机和家庭危机等困境,随着人口结构的老龄化,老年危机也成为与之相关的重大社会问题,需要加以关注和调整。     

中国汉族人群2个高变MVR基因座遗传多态性

常染色体小卫星基因座D16S309(MS205)位于16p13.3(AE006466)[1],核心序列为45~54bp,重复次数8~87次[2]。D2S44(YNH24)基因座位于2q21.3-q22(AJ001534)[3],核心序列为31bp。本文采用MVR-PCR技术,选择重复单位3′侧翼区引物(公共引物)和MVR特异性引物匹配进行PCR扩增,对中国河北汉族人群2个基因座遗传多态性进行了调查。1材料与方法1.1样本及DNA提取116份枸橼酸钠抗凝血样由河北省血液中心提供,采自无血缘关系汉族健康个体。常规饱和酚-氯仿法提取DNA。1.2MVR-PCRD16S309引物序列参见文献[2,4]。反应体系为25μl,分别加入5μl…     

幼建鲤维生素B6缺乏的病理组织学观察及消化和免疫指标变化

选取450尾健康幼建鲤,随机分成3组,每组3个重复,分别饲喂维生素B6含量为0.20、1.71和6.32 mg/kg的饵料,研究了维生素B6缺乏对幼建鲤组织器官病理学变化及消化能力和非特异性免疫能力的影响。试验结果显示,维生素B6缺乏组的幼建鲤死亡率增加,出现肝细胞溶解,肠绒毛失去正常结构,脾拟淋巴细胞减少,头肾含铁血黄素沉积,肾小管上皮细胞变性、坏死,心肌纤维间隙增宽等病理变化;肝、胰消化酶活力和非特异性免疫指标显著下降(P<0.01)。表明,维生素B6缺乏会造成水生动物组织器官不同程度的病理损伤,消化能力和非特异性免疫力降低,死亡率增加。     

The distorting effects of racial animus on proximity voting in the 2016 elections

While the use of racial appeals by the 2016 Trump campaign is indisputable, researchers are actively debating their precise role in influencing voter behavior in the election. We seek to expand upon existing research which finds that racial animus electorally benefited the Trump campaign. We examine to what extent those benefits also materialized for GOP candidates down-ballot and whether racial animus distorted ideological proximity voting in the 2016 election. We find that racial animus among voters helped Republicans at multiple ballot levels and that higher levels of racial animus distorted spatial voting among voters ideologically closest to the Democratic candidate.     

Regulating Autonomy: An Assessment of Policy Language for Highly Automated Vehicles

Self‐driving cars (also known as driverless cars, autonomous vehicles, and highly automated vehicles [HAVs]) will change the regulatory, political, and ethical frameworks surrounding motor vehicles. At the highest levels of automation, HAVs are operated by independent machine agents, making decisions without the direct intervention of humans. The current transportation system assumes human intervention though, including legal and moral responsibilities of human operators. Has the development of these artificial intelligence (AI) and autonomous system (AS) technologies outpaced the ethical and political conversations? This paper examines discussions of HAVs, driver responsibility, and technology failure to highlight the differences between how the policy‐making institutions in the United States (Congress and the Public Administration) and technology and transportation experts are or are not speaking about responsibility in the context of autonomous systems technologies. We report findings from a big data analysis of corpus‐level documents to find that enthusiasm for HAVs has outpaced other discussions of the technology.     

Polycentric Systems and Multiscale Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation in the Built Environment

Addressing climate change requires consideration of mitigation and adaptation opportunities at multiple spatial scales. This is particularly true in the built environment, defined here to include individual buildings, neighborhoods, and the spaces between. The current U.S. political environment portends fewer resources and coordinating services for mitigation and adaptation at the federal level, however, reinforcing the relevance and necessity of actions at subnational levels. In this study, we evaluate the applicability of a polycentric model of governance to the implementation of mitigation and adaptation practices, as well as the presence of polycentric systems in the built environment. We assemble a database of practices with the potential to achieve both mitigation and adaptation objectives, as well as those that may be cross‐purposed or that may achieve one but not the other. We review practices to gauge the applicability of a polycentric model of governance to mitigation and adaptation practices in the built environment, and examine the attributes of three existing adaptation and/or mitigation programs to assess the extent to which they exhibit polycentric attributes. We conclude with recommendations for a broader research agenda, including efforts to develop more in‐depth examinations into individual programs and comparative analysis of performances of different governance attributes.     

The Effects of Women Officeholders on Environmental Policy

Studies show that women and girls consistently demonstrate higher levels of concern for the environment than men and boys. Separately, research also indicates that women officeholders pay particular attention to the issues prioritized by their female constituents. Interestingly, despite the consistency of the gender gap in attitudes to environmental issues the literature has paid scant attention to the role of women officeholders in the adoption of environmental policy. The goal of this paper was to start to address that lacuna. Using pooled cross‐sectional time series analyses of environmental standards in 18 Western parliamentary democracies (1990–2012), our initial findings indicate women officeholders are associated with the adoption of higher environmental standards.     

Policy Narratives across Two Languages: A Comparative Study using the Narrative Policy Framework

The Narrative Policy Framework (NPF) focuses on the role of narratives, drawing from a rich scholarship in narrative, language, and culture. Despite the understanding that narratives are constructions of language and that narrative construction differs across languages, NPF studies have not focused on policy narratives in languages other than English. Language characteristics of narratives are important to assess the stability of policy narratives when there are multiple dominant languages in a political system. This study investigates the use of narrative elements in policy narratives in agricultural biotechnology policy in India across Hindi and English media coverage to examine the NPF assumption that narratives have generalizable narrative elements irrespective of variation in linguistic context and, specifically, tests the transportability of narrative elements. Findings validate the transportability of narrative elements in Hindi narratives, indicate variation in the use of narrative elements over time, and have implications for applying NPF across languages.     

Smokescreen Politics? Ratcheting Up EU Emissions Trading in 2017

The reform of the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) adopted in November 2017 was surprisingly strong, given the previous opposition from central member‐states like Poland and key stakeholders like the energy‐intensive industries. The carbon price has also increased substantially since then. To explain why such major reform was possible, we present several findings with wider relevance. Importantly, all the actors pushing for a more ambitious reform benefitted from having a central, “second‐best” mechanism in place—the Market Stability Reserve (MSR)—which could be further tightened. By focusing cancelation on allowances in the MSR and taking place only after 2023, policy entrepreneurs managed to make the distribution of costs obscure and diffuse, whereas the benefits (a probable higher carbon price and related greater auctioning revenues for member‐states) were more specific and closer in time. That is what we call “smokescreen politics.”