英国公务员培训与开发新趋势的启示和借鉴

英国公务员培训与开发在英国公共管理改革与发展中发挥着十分重要的作用。为适应新形势、新发展的需要,英国公务员培训与开发出现了新的趋势和特点。本文对英国公务员培训与开发的新趋势进行了分析和总结,在此基础上对我国公务员培训与开发工作提出相应的建议。     

Legislating Against Climate Change: A UK Perspective on a Sisyphean Challenge

The UK's Climate Change Act offers a framework for civil society to achieve 'low carbon' realignment through to 2050. The Act is reviewed for its coherence as a mechanism for directing future policy. The legislation establishes a carbon budgetary process, mandates greenhouse gas reduction targets and strategies, and imposes a novel range of duties supported by processes for ensuring transparency concerning progress. Following an overview of climate change risks and likely economic consequences, the analysis identifies selected regulatory strategies. It explores the main statutory features, with an emphasis upon the implications of imposing mandatory duties on decision makers. An evaluation of the key policy choice of emissions trading is informed by perspectives of environmental justice, in particular as to questions of equitable burden-sharing in relation to impacts of climate change and related policies. A concluding section summarises reasonable expectations and ongoing challenges.     

Brexit and the British Constitution: a Long View

The Brexit referendum of 2016 brought a new concept to British politics, namely the ‘people’s will’, one that is seemingly at odds with conventional notions of parliamentary sovereignty, even a threat to its very existence. This article argues that although the device of the referendum is relatively new, the kind of popular control over Parliament and the executive that it invokes has long been a part of British politics. Ranging over 200 years, examples are drawn from the recall and deselection of MPs, mass petitioning campaigns, the role of the Speaker, and the flourishing of independent parties.     

The Recall of MPs Act 2015: Petitions,Polls and Problems

Under the terms of the Recall of MPs Act 2015, there have been three recall petitions brought against MPs who have committed misconduct. The outcomes have been variable. The first petition failed to attract enough signatures to trigger a by‐election. The second led to the unseating of the MP, who declined the opportunity to stand in the subsequent by‐election. The third led to the removal of the MP and an unsuccessful candidature to regain his seat at the by‐election. Variation has not been confined to outcomes. There have been differences in how the legislation has been implemented—in terms of the ease of access of constituents to the recall petition. This article suggests that in the interests of fairness and transparency, there is a strong case for adjusting the legislation to ensure national standardisation of local implementation.     

Breaking with tradition? South Africa–UK relations

Just over twenty years into its new era of democracy, South African foreign policy appears to be undergoing important changes in orientation and global positioning. Indeed, post-apartheid South African foreign policy has been steadily shifting away from a preoccupation with more traditional partnerships to developing alliances and coalitions with emerging economies and actors seeking to reform the global governance order. The paper seeks to understand the implications of this shift for South Africa's relationship with its most pivotal and enduring traditional ‘partner' – the United Kingdom. Thus, the paper proposes that this relationship can be best understood by considering it on different and at least partially contradictory levels, reflecting South Africa's own ambiguous identity as an emerging middle power.     

Under the radar: policing non-violent domestic abuse in the US and UK

Physical violence is but one of many tools that may be used to gain greater power within intimate relationships, yet the legal response has been critiqued for failing to recognise and respond to the full spectrum of abusive behaviours, such as coercive control. Using a sample of police officers from the United States (US) and the United Kingdom (UK), the current study utilises hypothetical vignettes to assess police officers’ perceptions of domestic abuse, including those incidents that are not necessarily physically violent, but involve stalking and other coercive, controlling behaviours that are harmful and require intervention. Within- and between-country similarities and differences were analysed. Findings revealed that the majority of officers in both countries possessed a good level of understanding of domestic abuse and how they should respond to it – amidst and beyond the physical violence. However, our analysis of both quantitative and qualitative data also showed that the use of physical violence is at the forefront of many officers’ expectations about domestic abuse, and that when physical violence is absent, the police response is less proactive. Our study finds some support for the idea that non-physical abuse does go “under the radar” to some extent for some officers, and that this is more the case for American officers than their British counterparts. Findings are discussed in terms of context of the research sites and implications for policy, practice and future research.     

Masters of their fate? Explaining MPs’ re-candidacy in the long run: The case of Italy (1987–2013)

Why are certain Members of Parliament (MPs) more likely to get re-candidacy for national legislative elections, therefore having the possibility to continue their career? This article answers this question by comparing political elites' long-debated explanations with more legislative behaviour-related factors. By focusing on more than 25 years of the Italian Lower House's history, we have built a novel dataset on the legislative behaviour and career patterns of more than 3500 Italian MPs. A multilevel logistic regression analysis shows that, with the exception of party switching, legislative behaviour does not seem to exert a significant impact on MPs' re-candidacy. On the contrary, the career status of parliamentarians, i.e., their parliamentary position or their ministerial historical record, strongly influences their chances of obtaining re-candidacy.     

“职能革命”、管理绩效带动政府责任实现——卡梅隆政府公共机构改革的行政学意涵及对我国的启示

在卡梅隆政府一系列激进的政府改革中,尤以公共机构改革最引人瞩目。在对英国政府出台的相关公共机构改革政策、方案进行文本编码、对改革逻辑的频数和应用强度进行统计分析的基础上,我们发现"保留机构"的逻辑是要保证其更好地履行专业职能;"改造为NDPB"的逻辑是实现职能清理;"不再作为公共企业"的思路是消除公共财政负担,等等。软件拟合的改革嵌套逻辑显示了行政学意涵:牛顿力学原理为基础的线性逻辑是改革的方向盘;职能革命是公共机构获得绩效的元工具;以公共管理带动政治责任实现的后管理主义;将公共部门看成社会的一个生产部门来拉动经济复苏。这启示我们在"十二五"期间政府机构、事业单位的改革仍要强调科学管理;机构、事业单位改革应当以"职能革命"为主线;通过改善公共管理质量破解民众不满;将政府组织、公共机构当作市场主体而非"救市者"来改进其内部管理。     

Ethical and legal issues surrounding academic research into online radicalisation: a UK experience

There is a growing body of evidence that terrorists/terrorist groups have increased their use of the Internet to include a move into online social network environments in their efforts to radicalise and potentially recruit and mobilise new members. Both the US and UK governments acknowledge that not enough is known about this phenomenon and there is an urgent need for more substantive research in the area of terrorists' use of computer-mediated communication. However, research in this area carries with it some serious ethical and legal concerns that cannot and should not be ignored. UK law makes it difficult for terrorism studies researchers and other academics to conduct this online research without potentially violating the law. With careful consideration of the ethical concerns surrounding the methods of data collection, and knowledge of and adherence to Data Protection laws, along with notification of proposed research to the proper law enforcement office to insure compliance with the UK Terrorism Act, it is however possible to move forward with academic integrity and a reasonable assurance that one will not be charged and prosecuted for violations of the Terrorism Acts.     

英国派生诉讼的最新发展：普通法的回归

股东派生诉讼源于英国普通法，历经百年发展，因其诉讼程序的繁杂、裁判标准的不明确等受到诟病。2006年的公司法以制定法的形式抛弃普通法，对派生诉讼进行重新规制。但法官在最新的案例中对新规定的解释裁判仍不清晰，包括对派生诉讼程序的混淆、具体标准的不确定，如善意、替代救济方式等，甚至在很多规则上仍借助于普通法的解释，派生诉讼的发展趋势依然离不开普通法的规则。