Political Decentralization and Technological Innovation: Testing the Innovative Advantages of Decentralized States

Are politically decentralized states better at fostering long‐run technological innovation than centralized states? Societies with decentralized governments are widely seen as agile, competitive, and well structured to adapt to innovation's gale of creative destruction. Meanwhile, centralized states, even when democratic, have come to be viewed as rigid and thus hostile to the risks, costs, and change associated with new technology, or prone to cling too long to foolhardy or outdated technological projects. Therefore government decentralization is often perceived as a necessary institutional foundation for encouraging long‐run technological innovation. However, in this article, I analyze data on international patent activity, scientific publications, and high‐technology exports, and show that there exists little evidence for an aggregate relationship between government structure and technological innovation.     

Destination Based Indirect Taxation: The Case of Bosnia and Herzegovina

Development of a strategy to foster strong economic growth was seen by the international community as a key aspect to nation building and sustaining the end of the armed conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Tax policy was a key aspect of the strategy, but the very decentralized institutional arrangements and limited cooperation between the governments complicated the design. This paper reviews and assesses the indirect tax structure that has been the focus of the first five years. Among the findings are the importance associated with creating destination-based revenue attribution, the strong tendencies for tax competition, the unwillingness to accept formula-based revenue distribution, and the high administrative and compliance costs that result from structuring a system to achieve all of the necessary goals in a decentralized government context.     

基层法院审判委员会“放权”改革的过程研究——以对某法院法官的访谈为素材

从过程的角度来看,基层法院审判委员会的“放权”是法院内部各层次行动者以最高法院推行的审判委员会改革为契机,在审判委员会自身功能逐渐弱化、其他替代性机制功能逐渐强大的条件下,以法院的组织利益、中间组织的部门利益以及法官的个人利益为中心进行公共选择的结果。这样一种公共选择的逻辑,最终使得审判委员会的“放权”被异化“放权”不但没有减弱反而加强了法院对法官的控制,法官的独立审判在很大程度上演变成了一种“咨询型”审判。     

英国新宪政改革述评

近几年 ,英国开展了规模宏大的宪政改革 ,涉及到王权、议会、选举制度和地方权限等诸多方面 ,其广度和深度令人惊叹 ,显示出该国巨大的勇气和开拓精神。论述了 1997-2 0 0 2年间英国宪政改革的主要内容及初步成果 ,并探讨了其对我国制度改革的借鉴意义。     

论我国“分税制”的宪法性质

我国1994年实行分税制改革的目标是在中央政府与地方政府之间建立起制度化的财税分权体制,然而时至今日这一目标并未实现,改革的结果演化为中央政府与地方政府的财税分工,导致这一结果的根源在于我国缺乏宪政国家意义的地方自治制度这一中央政府与地方政府（联邦政府与组成部分政府）财税分权的制度基础。或许具有高度地方自治性质的人民代表大会制度,能够作为实现我国未来分税制改革中央政府与地方政府财税分权目标的制度前提。     

Decentralization, Subsidiarity, Rodney King and State Deification: A Libertarian Analysis

This paper posits that the government is indistinguishable from a robber gang except for the fact that it enjoys exceedingly good public relations (supplied to it, symbiotically, by the intellectual classes) and thus legitimacy. The paper attempts to see beyond this superficiality, and thus to interpret cases in which the state and an ordinary criminal interact not in this manner, but rather as the interaction of two criminal organizations.     

我国中央与地方立法权限的划分

《立法法》采取列举的方式明确了中央与地方立法权限的划分,具有一定的开拓精神和现实意义。但它的规定存在局限性,没有从根本上改变中央和地方立法工作中出现的混乱和无序等现象。对于中央和地方立法权限的划分,应当以其制约因素为切入点,进而分析目前立法规定和立法实践中存在的问题,从而厘清我国中央和地方立法权限划分的思路和方法,推动我国的法治建设。     

浅析法国近年宪法修正案

法国近年来的宪法修正案扩大了公民参与政治的范围,强化了总统与政府、议会与政府的互动关系,在中央与地方关系安排上进行了重大调整,进一步扩大地方民主,发展参与式直接民主。但这些修正案具有一定的复古色彩。