Electoral Institutions,Social Diversity and Fragmentation of Party Systems: A Reassessment

The article examines the determinants of party fragmentation based on electoral district data from the Swiss cantons (2010‐2015). In contrast to previous studies, three different dependent variables are taken into account: firstly, the raw number of parties, secondly, the effective number of parties based on vote shares and, thirdly, the effective number of legislative parties. On all three levels, the exclusion magnitude proves to be the most important factor. Compared to this, other institutional variables contribute little explanatory power. However, apparentments are relevant in the first stage of our analysis as they increase the raw number of parties standing for election. In terms of sociological factors, we only find limited relevance. Denominational and linguistic heterogeneity do not have any impact. This can be explained by the fact that linguistic heterogeneity is only weakly pronounced at district level. The finding emphasises the importance of district‐based data for the analysis of party system fragmentation in general.     

Personal Criminal Victimization in the United States: Fixed and Random Effects of Individual and Household Characteristics

The present research is concerned with multilevel modeling of personalvictimization rates. Data from the 1994 National Crime Victimization Surveyare employed. Following the routine activities and lifestyle victimizationtheory, individuals' profile and lifestyle as well as characteristics oftheir household comprise the set of explanatory variables. The results ofestimated multilevel negative binomial models, which explicitly disentanglethe unexplained heterogeneity between individuals and between households,are discussed. The estimated random effects of household characteristicsshow that the unexplained heterogeneity for the average number of personalcrimes differs across household types. Further, the individual covariateswith between households random effects become less influential the more thebase personal crime rates are high.     

小农户经营现代化背景下农村阶层重塑对村庄治理的影响

小农户经营现代化进程推进了农民以要素配置方式为基础的阶层重塑。这种重塑对农民个体和乡村治理都有着深刻的影响。各阶层在生产方式、资源利用、权力和利益需求等方面存在异质性,会改变村庄治理中的权力结构、信任关系、沟通渠道、公共资源分配方式和村庄秩序,但这种异质性并非是均质的,其影响亦非都是负面的。中间层、兼业层和贫弱层农民之间有易于调和的冲突,会推动形成以中间阶层农民为主的村庄治理模式,该模式既是对原有村庄治理的自我修复和更新,又能帮助小农户经营与现代市场对接。外源农民与其他阶层农民之间存在不易调和的冲突,会推动村庄治理重塑,形成有利于资本的新模式。为此,要注重区分各地农民分化的实际,着力提高政策的系统性、瞄准性和针对性,提升村庄治理绩效,为推进小农户经营现代化提供组织和平台保障。     

Neighborhood heterogeneity and electoral turnout

We perform an empirical analysis to investigate how neighborhood heterogeneity affects electoral turnout. To this end, we rely on a unique dataset on local elections in an Italian municipality, which merges information on socio-economic characteristics of about 370.000 individuals with turnout data for 434 electoral precincts in 2004 and 2009. Exploiting both across and within precincts variation, we are able to disentangle the contextual effects on precinct-level electoral turnout of two different dimensions of neighborhood heterogeneity: income inequality and ethnic composition. Our results support the idea that contextual heterogeneity negatively affects political participation.     

中国—东盟自由贸易区产业内贸易结构优化分析

产业内贸易是当今国际贸易发展的主要趋势,对双边贸易结构调整和优化起着重要作用.中国--东盟自由贸易区(CAFTA)作为发展中国家间的最大自由贸易区,影响着东亚以及全球经济格局,产业内贸易发展必将带动双边贸易结构进一步优化.本文运用实证分析方法,对中国--东盟产业内贸易水平及贸易结构进行深入分析.研究结论表明,目前中国--东盟产业内贸易发展水平较低,并且呈现缓慢下降趋势,而以垂直异质为主的产业内贸易结构发展迅速,与产业内贸易发展水平呈现"剪刀差"趋势.     

Behavioral Heterogeneity in Adolescent Friendship Networks

Criminologists’ understanding of peer influences has been greatly advanced by social network methods; however, relatively scant attention has been paid to improving measurement. In particular, research has continued to measure peer influence by averaging the level of delinquency within a peer network, thereby neglecting the role of behavioral heterogeneity. The present study seeks to advance theory and research into peer influences on delinquency by explicitly modeling behavioral heterogeneity in peer networks measured as the variance. Drawing on social learning and opportunity theories, we argue that behavioral heterogeneity should attenuate the effect of average peer delinquency on individual offending. Models using social network data from the Add Health were estimated predicting involvement in two delinquent substance-use acts (cigarette smoking and getting drunk) as a function of peer influences. The results are consistent with our hypothesis, indicating that behavioral heterogeneity matters. Findings suggest that future research employing network models could incorporate peer behavioral heterogeneity to get a more accurate portrait of the processes of peer influence.     

Population Heterogeneity and State Dependence: State of the Evidence and Directions for Future Research

Criminological research has consistently uncovered a positive correlationbetween past and current criminal behavior. Continuity in offending overtime can be attributed to at least two processes—populationheterogeneity and state dependence. A population heterogeneity processattributes stability in offending over time to differences in ananti-social characteristic (self-control, impulsivity, psychopathicpersonality) across persons that is established early in life andtime-stable thereafter. An implication of a population heterogeneityexplanation for continuity in offending over time is that the anti-socialcharacteristic is likely to have reverberations throughout life, takingmany manifestations later in life (unemployment, drug addiction, maritalinstability). Any observed correlation between these later life events andcriminality, therefore, is spurious rather than causal, due to the factthat they are all the effects of a common cause. A state dependenceexplanation, in contrast, attributes observed stability in criminaloffending to a process of contagion. That is, criminal behavior has agenuine causal effect on subsequent criminality by eroding constraintsand strengthening incentives to crime. The implication of a statedependence process is that criminal conduct may be influenced by laterlife events. In this paper, we draw a connection between populationheterogeneity and state dependence processes and extant criminologicaltheory. We also review the literature that has investigated theplausibility of these two processes. Finally, concluding that weknow very little about them we make recommendations for future researchon population heterogeneity and state dependence.     

Persistence of innovation: stylised facts and panel data evidence

This paper investigates whether firms innovate persistently or discontinuously over time using an innovation panel data set on German manufacturing and service firms for the period 1994–2002. It turns out that innovation behaviour is permanent at the firm level to a very large extent. Using a dynamic random effects discrete choice model and a new estimator recently proposed by Wooldridge (2005), I further shed some light on the driving forces for this phenomenon. The econometric results show that past innovation experience is an important determinant for manufacturing as well as for service sector firms, and hence confirm the hypothesis of true state dependence. In addition, the results highlight the important role of knowledge provided by skilled employees and unobserved individual heterogeneity in explaining the persistence of innovation.

"文明冲突论"与跨文明比较文学研究

亨廷顿的"文明冲突论"备受研究讨论的现象,典型地体现出全球化背景下知识分子追求自身文化身份认同和生存利益的"忧患意识",也从侧面深刻反映了跨文明比较研究的必要性和深刻性.为避免陷入到由全球化所引发的文化身份认同危机而导致的"虚拟对抗"的"文明冲突"陷阱中,在文化思想界有必要进行跨文明研究与对话,而中国的比较文学界有能力、更有责任参与其中.     

Social Heterogeneity and Optimal Mix Between Public and Private Provision of Public Goods

With a framework of incomplete contract, this paper shows that for provision of public goods such as medicare and education, pure privatization may not promote competition. On the contrary, the co-existence of public and private provision may enhance de facto competition. Two competitive effects are identified. When consumers are heterogeneous, the co-existence of public and private ownership gives consumers freedom to choose from different ownership, improving allocation efficiency (Tiebout effect). While consumers are homogeneous, the co-existence can promote yardstick competition, squeezing out information rents from both ownerships, improving production efficiency (benchmarking effect). In either case, the co-existence dominates unique ownership. The paper ends up with some implications for China.s medicare and education reforms. Yongqin Wang is an assistant professor at China Center for Economic Studies, Fudan University and Haibo Xu is a M.A. student in economics at the same center. We thank Te Bao, Zhao Chen, Sujian Guo, Ming Lu, Yew-Kwang Ng and Teague Savitch, and anonymous reviewers for valuable comments.