Love and the State: Gay Marriage in Spain

On 30 June 2005, the Spanish Parliament approved Law 13/2005, which amends the Civil Code to permit same-sex marriage. This formal equality measure put Spain in the spotlight of the international media. It is the culmination of a series of developments spanning from the last years of the Franco regime (which ended in 1975), through the enactment of anti-discrimination measures in 1995, to the recent fight for kinship recognition. It also follows a recent shift, from 1998 to 2005, towards the enactment of same-sex partnership laws at regional level, the approval of same-sex marriage and finally, the approval of a ‹gender identity law’ (2007). This legislative note assesses the context in which the new law on same-sex marriage has been enacted. I argue that although same-sex marriage has been represented by many activists and politicians in Spain as a gender neutral contract, it has the potential for differential impacts on lesbians and gay men, and further research and debates are needed in this area.     

湖南高校女研究生婚恋观调查研究

对湖南省3所高校230名女研究生的婚恋观进行的问卷调查显示,当代女研究生的婚恋观正在发生温和但却深刻的变化。她们的婚恋观表现为恋爱态度认真沉稳,择偶标准注重内在素质,考虑长远发展,择偶方式被动含蓄;注重婚姻的爱情基础,追求高品质的婚姻生活,宁缺毋滥;性观念较宽容开放等。     

论边沁的女权思想

长期以来,国内学界一直将边沁看作是一位法律改革家、功利主义哲学家,然而被大家忽略的是他还是一位杰出的女权主义者.虽然他没有关于女权的专著,但从他大量的著作中,我们能够归纳出他关于女权的思想.边沁主要从两个方面揭露和批判了法律上关于妇女的广泛的不平等,论述了他的女权思想:一是关于妇女的政治自由,即授予妇女选举权的问题,二是妇女的个人自由,即关于妇女婚姻权的问题.     

NOT (QUITE) A HORSE AND CARRIAGE

This note critically interrogates the Civil Partnership Act 2004. Through an examination of the legislative background and some of the provisions of the Act, it is argued that civil partnership mirrors a marriage model with some exceptions. In creating this new legal status, the legislation also exacerbates the exclusion of some relationship forms from dominant legal norms. It should be understood as part of an agenda for social inclusion, rather than as radical social change.     

Institutional determinants of the largest seat share

The degree of predominance of the largest party in a representative assembly affects government formation and survival. The seat share of the largest party, in turn, is constrained by the interaction of assembly size and electoral district magnitude in the following way. When all S seats in an assembly are allocated in districts of magnitude M, a logical quantitative model proposes that the largest fractional share is s₁ = (MS)^−1/8. As a curve, the model is found to fit with R² = 0.509, considering data from the averages of 46 periods in 37 countries, during which the electoral rules were essentially steady. As a worldwide average, the expression s₁(MS)^1/8 = 1 holds within 1%. Deviations from this average express the impact of various country-specific political and socio-cultural factors that can be investigated once the basic institutional constraints are controlled-for. This means that the degree of largest party predominance may be engineered to hover around a desired average by adjusting assembly size, and district magnitude, while keeping country-specific factors in mind.     

法官独立的具体制度

法官独立是司法独立的应有之义.法官独立的具体制度包括法官选任制度、法官保障制度、法官惩戒制度.我国法官独立的具体制度存在诸多缺失和不健全,应在宪法层面改革审判制度的同时进一步建立健全司法审判具体制度,实现现代法治意义上的法官独立.     

户籍制度的历史回溯与改革前瞻

建国后我国的户籍制度经历了建国初期短暂的自由迁移、195 8年开始的严格限制户口自由迁移特别是限制农民向城市迁移以及改革开放后户籍制度的逐步改革主要是小城镇户籍制度改革三个时期。沿用近半个世纪的城乡分割的二元户籍制度逐步形成了我国特有的二元社会结构。户籍制度改革的重点尚局限于小城镇范围 ,这有其认识上的严重误区。户籍制度改革是政治体制改革的重要内容 ,是尊重和保障人权的重要措施。实行全体公民的居住和迁徙自由 ,是我国户籍制度改革的终极目标。     

Parental Socialization and Rational Party Identification

This article constructs a rational choice model of the intergenerational transmission of party identification. At a given time, identification with a party is the estimate of average future benefits from candidates of that party. Experienced voters constantly update this expectation using political events since the last realignment to predict the future in accordance with Bayes Rule. New voters, however, have no experience of their own. In Bayesian terms, they need prior beliefs. It turns out that under certain specified conditions, these young voters should rationally choose to employ parental experience to help orient themselves to politics. The resulting model predicts several well–known features of political socialization, including the strong correlation between parents' and children's partisanship, the greater partisan independence of young voters, and the tendency of partisan alignments to decay.     

政党制度优越性的比较

对不同类型政党制度进行比较 ,能帮助我们更好地认识中国政党制度的优越性。要进行比较就要有正确的比较方法和衡量标准 ,并满足进行比较的基本条件。在进行比较时要用历史唯物主义和辩证唯物主义的方法进行全面的客观的比较 ;在确定衡量标准时 ,最根本的是要从本国国情出发 ;立足本国实际是进行比较的基本条件。     

Getting a `Get' – the Limits of Law's Authority? N. v. N. (Jurisdiction: Pre-Nuptial Agreement) [1999] 2 F.L.R. 745

This note examines the decision of the Family Division of the High Court in N. v. N. (Jurisdiction: Pre-Nuptial Agreement) in which, in the context of Jewish divorce proceedings, the Court found that it had no jurisdiction to order a husband, by specific performance of a marriage agreement, to go through the procedure to obtain a ‘get’ (a hand-written bill of divorcement) allowing his wife to remarry. First, discussion of the case is contextualised broadly within the debate on the (de)merits of employing legal means in order to redress social wrongs. Secondly, adopting a theoretical perspective upon the difficulties involved in using law to achieve social change, the note goes on to examine more specifically why women from minority cultures may choose to go to the law of the dominant culture in order to obtain relief. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.