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.”     

How Values Shape Program Perceptions: The “Organic Ethos” and Producers’ Assessments of U.S. Organic Policy Impacts

Among the more recognizable programs related to natural and sustainable food is the United States Department of Agriculture’s National Organic Program. Although the robustness of the organic food market is difficult to contest, many debate the extent to which U.S. organic policy outcomes adequately serve consumers and the organic agriculture producers they rely on. This paper engages the debate from the perspective of certified organic producers. Drawing on the results of a nationwide survey of USDA‐certified producers, we first provide a snapshot of how producers assess the environmental, consumer, and market impacts of U.S. organic food policy. We then examine the extent to which organic producers’ policy impact perceptions are associated with their alignment with an “organic ethos”—understood as producers’ commitment to core organic principles and the organic movement. The paper highlights producers’ values as perceptual filters and cognitive mechanisms that help shape producers’ policy impacts perceptions, illustrating a contributing factor to the enduring nature of organic policy debates.     

Multiple Streams in Hawaii: How the Aloha State Adopted a 100% Renewable Portfolio Standard

Renewable portfolio standards (RPS) are an important policy tool for reducing carbon emissions and advancing the global shift toward renewable energy. As the U.S. federal government backs away from commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, subnational governments play an increasingly important role in mitigating climate change. In June 2015, Hawaii became the first state in the United States to adopt a 100% RPS. Through understanding the conditions that gave rise to Hawaii’s RPS, policy actors will be better informed as they navigate policy processes in other states and jurisdictions. This study uses Kingdon’s Multiple Streams Framework (MSF) to explore the policy process that led to Hawaii’s 100% RPS. Data were collected during the summer of 2016 via interviews with 25 key policy actors and informants in Hawaii. Expectations based on the MSF are confirmed, and the results suggest factors that might be included or explored in future studies of RPS adoption.     

Conservation in Context: Toward a Systems Framing of Decentralized Governance and Public Participation in Wildlife Management

Governance scholars have long championed the adaptive utility of decentralized management institutions, in part due to their ability to bring diverse stakeholders into decision‐making processes. However, research into the link between decentralization and participation often looks at policy design but bypasses important system feedbacks that shape sustained participation over time. To paint a more robust picture detailing how decentralization and participation are related, this paper uses a complex systems framework to explore interacting structural, operational, and cultural components of decentralized wildlife governance institutions in the United States and Botswana. Through this comparative analysis, I argue that the landscape of public participation in decentralized governance institutions appears to be significantly impacted by three factors: 1) how decentralization processes occurred, 2) where in the process of decision making participation is situated, and 3) perceptions of power distribution between groups with competing interests.     

Governing Unconventional Oil and Gas Extraction: The Case of Pennsylvania

Over the past decade, directional drilling and hydraulic fracturing enabled an unconventional oil and gas extraction (UOGE) boom in many regions of the United States, including parts of Pennsylvania. This revolution has created serious concerns about the capability of existing institutions to govern important societal outcomes associated with UOGE. We present a conceptual framework for assessing key societal outcomes influenced by UOGE governance. In applying this framework to Pennsylvania, we discern certain institutional strengths that have allowed the Commonwealth to reap appreciable short‐term economic growth from rich resource endowments. We also find, however, that several institutional weaknesses have allowed costs externalized to the environment, public health, and community integrity to offset some proportion of those economic benefits. Likewise, we find that governance of UOGE in Pennsylvania has contributed to a bifurcated sociopolitical landscape wherein adversarial coalitions dispute the legitimacy of the industry and its governance.     

双语环境下的少数民族语言维护

中国是一个多民族、多语种的国家。一个国家的语言越多样化,相应的双语程度化就越深。双语教育作为双语制的重要组成部分,对维护和发展一个民族的语言,进而加强民族群体的身份认同感和文化构成的多样性意义深远。在切实可行的双语教育环境下,语言维护以及语言维护的相关因素也应受到考虑和重视。少数民族语言维护对贯彻我国的民族政策、繁荣民族文化和巩固民族统一与和平有着非凡而深远的意义。     

The devil we know and the angel that did not fly: An examination of devil/angel shift in twitter fracking “debates” in NY 2008–2018

Recent work has applied the Narrative Policy Framework (NPF) to examine narrative strategies in policy debates on social media platforms. We contribute to the literature by applying the NPF to fracking policy debates in New York using well-established Natural Language Processing tools, including sentiment analysis. We combine this computational approach with a qualitative hand-coding of pro- and antifracking Twitter influentials. This approach allows us to consider a much larger corpus of tweets over a much longer time frame than has been done thus far. We adapt and test NPF propositions related to the use of the devil/angel shift strategies before and after a major state-wide policy change, that is, a state-wide moratorium on high volume hydraulic fracturing or fracking. Overall, we find evidence for the use of the devil shift narrative strategy by the pro-fracking coalition aimed at the Governor prior to the moratorium. After the moratorium, the relative percentage of Tweets containing devil shift sentiments decreases as the pro-fracking coalition generally downshifts in its use of angel shift language without a corresponding increase in devil shift language, whereas, conversely, the anti-fracking coalition generally downshifts in its use of devil shift language without a general increase in angel shift language. When we shifted our analysis to Tweets containing fracking and the Governor, we found a similar postban decrease in devil shift language among anti-fracking users. Our findings offer lessons for using computational tools in the NPF as an approach to expand analytic ability and for the operationalization of concepts such as narrative strategies and policy entrepreneurs.     

活动理论与当代教育

活动理论对当代教育的启发在于:启发了学习环境设计和教学课堂设计,提倡小组学习;为网络学习提供了理论指导。     

外语教师跨文化能力的多层面分析

跨文化能力的形成是一个长期的社会化过程.外语教师应从情感能力、行为能力和认知能力三个层面培养自己的跨文化能力.教师在教学过程应运用恰当的教学方式培养学生的跨文化交际能力.     

集体腐败的情景预防理论分析

因集体腐败引致损失更大、影响更恶劣、作案更隐蔽使其成为了近期反腐工作中的焦点,集体腐败具有集体腐败主体的潜在性特征、集体腐败行为的被动性特征及集体腐败行为被动性转化的特征,聚焦腐败主体本位是目前集体腐败进行类型划分及其成因探源的主要方式,内因驱动是其主要逻辑起点。然而,忽视外因是这一研究路径的主要局限。情景预防理论为认知和防治集体腐败提供了新的理论视角和实践引导。因此,必须在集体腐败特征、类型及其成因分析的基础上,从削减外在引致环境、强化内在防控机制,切断内外关联三方面入手严惩集体腐败。