Decolonising online development studies? Emancipatory aspirations and critical reflections – a case study

Academics in high-income countries are increasingly launching development studies programmes through online distance learning to engage practitioner-students in low-income countries. Are such initiatives providing opportunities to critically tackle social injustice, or merely ‘mirroring’ relations of global inequality and re-entrenching imperial practices? Building on recent scholarship addressing efforts to ‘decolonise development studies’ and the complex power dynamics they encounter, we reflect on this question by analysing experiences of faculty and students in a United Kingdom-based online development studies programme, focusing particularly on perspectives of development practitioner-students working from Africa. We discuss barriers to social inclusivity – including the politics of language – that shaped participation dynamics in the programme as well as debates regarding critical development course content, rethinking possibilities for bridging counter-hegemonic development scholarship with practice-oriented approaches in a range of social contexts. Our analysis unpacks key tensions in addressing intertwined institutional and pedagogic dilemmas for an agenda towards decolonising online development studies, positioning decolonisation as a necessarily unsettling and contested process that calls for greater self-reflexivity.     

How can Public Professional Services be Restored in a Weak State? Options for Animal Health in Congo's South Kivu

How does one deal with a shortcoming in a public service when even a state “pocket of effectiveness” is unlikely to fill it directly? In the Belgian colonial era, South Kivu Province in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo had a vibrant animal production system, which then was shattered by successive wars. The regeneration of Kivu's livestock industry is greatly constrained by the unreliability of the province's state and private animal health services, which have become commercialized and are unable to overcome the asymmetric information problem inherent to the professions and provide the trustworthy effectiveness farmers need to use them effectively. The Congolese state is unlikely to be able to fill this gap itself. Nonetheless, it can be an architect of solutions to the problem. We were able to identify in the local institutional repertoire at least four possible ways policy‐makers could use non‐governmental organizations to provide missing trustworthiness to the market. This conclusion is hopeful for places with development potential that have weak states and imperfect markets. © 2017 International Livestock Research Institute. Public Administration and Development published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Forests lost and found in tropical Latin America: the woodland ‘green revolution’

Forest dynamics in the Latin American tropics now take directions that no one would have predicted a decade ago. Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon has dropped by over 80 percent, a pattern mimicked elsewhere in Amazonia, and is down by more than a third in Central America. Forest resurgence – increasing forest cover in inhabited landscapes or abandoned lands – is also expanding. In Latin America, woodland cover is increasing, at least for now, more than it is being lost. These dramatic shifts suggest quite profound and rapid transformations of agrarian worlds, and imply that previous models of understanding small-farmer dynamics merit significant review centering less on field agriculture and more on emergent forest regimes, and in many ways a new, increasingly globalized economic and policy landscape that emphasizes woodlands.

This paper analyzes changing deforestation drivers and the implications of forest recovery and wooded landscapes emerging through social pressure, social policy, new government agencies, governance, institutions, ideologies, markets, migration and ‘neo-liberalization’ of nature. These changes include an expanded, but still constrained, arena for new social movements and civil society. These point to significant structural changes, changes in tropical natures, and require reframing of the ‘peasant question’ and the functions of rurality in the twenty-first century in light of forest dynamics.     

公安现代远程教育浅探

为推进公安信息化建设,满足民警终身教育的要求,加快发展公安现代远程教育刻不容缓。各地公安院校可在公安金盾网的四级网络基础上,构筑公安现代远程网络教学平台,采用最新的网络技术解决访问受限网络教学交互性、实时性不强的问题,并可通过五种途径在三个层面上对公安现代远程教育的发展进行规划。     

我国P2P平台准入制度的检讨与重构

目前,我国P2P平台准入制度尚存在准入方式不当、准入条件混乱和准入标准模糊等不足,导致P2P市场出现野蛮增长、良莠不齐、鱼目混珠的乱象。重构P2P平台准入制度,应遵循"理念--模式--制度"的路径,以"适度"为理念设置控制与激励双重标准,选择差异化准入监管模式,具化准入方式、条件和标准等实质性要件。     

A Randomized Clinical Trial Exploring Gambling Attitudes,Barriers to Treatment,and Efficacy of a Brief Motivational Intervention Among Ex-Offenders with Disordered Gambling

Correctional populations are disproportionately burdened by disordered gambling; yet, problem awareness is minimal among both offenders and professionals within the criminal justice system. The aims of the current study were twofold: (i) to examine gambling attitudes and problem awareness among ex-offenders, and (ii) to determine the efficacy of a brief online gambling intervention for ex-offenders. Participants (N = 126) were ex-offenders on probation and parole. Gambling attitudes, attitudes toward treatment, and disorder gambling status were assessed. Disordered gamblers (n = 102) were randomly assigned to (i) a brief intervention plus referral to treatment or (ii) referral to treatment only, and these individuals were re-assessed at a 30-day follow-up. Lifetime disordered gambling was highly prevalent (86%) in the ex-offender sample, and providing information regarding disordered gambler status and referral to treatment was effective in decreasing gambling attitudes, as well as gambling severity and frequency. The current study has direct implications for treatment and intervention efforts among ex-offenders with disordered gambling and yields a greater understanding of attitudes toward gambling among ex-offenders.     

后疫情时代法院在线审理刑事案件之隐忧及纾解

“智慧法院”建设的倡导和新冠肺炎疫情防控的需要,推动法院在线审理刑事案件呈迅猛发展之势。但是在线审理存在冲击直接言词原则、减损司法的威仪、被告人辩护权保障不到位等问题。不仅加剧庭审的形式化,而且导致审理程序公正性和司法权威性的降低。在线审理刑事案件仅是线下物理空间审理的例外和补充,主要适用于速裁程序审理且被告人同意的案件和召开庭前会议以及证人、鉴定人在特殊情况下作证的环节,不能将线上审理常态化和普遍化。法院应尊重和保障被告人的程序选择权,法律援助全覆盖应“覆盖”至在线审理的案件,在线审理具有不同于线下审理的特点,应当建立相对独立的庭审规则。最高人民法院应尽快制定在线审理的技术规范,并将5G技术应用于在线审理。     

Comparative Analysis and Economic Policies with Special Reference to Financial Crises

Policies for preventing or mitigating unfavorable economic conditions, such as inflation, balance-of-payments deficits, and recessions are usually determined by successful policies used in the past, but these policies may not be relevant for certain problems in the future due to changes in conditions. In the past, developing countries with balance of payments problems seeking help from the IMF were usually required to reduce their budget deficits, restrict the money supply, and make other macroeconomic restrictions. However, financial crises experienced by the East Asian countries in 1995–1996 arose mainly from declines in their securities markets accompanied by capital exports and sharp currency depreciation. The IMF provided generous assistance conditioned on the recipients' applying restrictive macroeconomic measures, even though there was no inflation or excessive monetary expansion. The cause of the financial crises was primarily capital outflows generated by defaults on loans made by banks largely for real estate projects, and in some cases resulting bank failures. The capital outflow and the sharp depreciation of the currencies, coupled with macroeconomic restrictions, led to recession and unemployment in these countries. The article goes on to discuss the policies the IMF should have promoted. Its credits should have been used to sustain imports rather than to support currencies and maintain debt service repayments.     

风险投资法律保障机制探微

国家在推进风险投资机制的建立时,应针对高科技企业风险投资的特点,尽早建立和完善风险投资法律保障体系。本文拟从三个方面探讨我国风险投资的法律保障机制问题。     

Illegal Dealings: The Impact of Low-Level Police Enforcement on Drug Markets

This article examines the impact of low-level police enforcement on two British drug markets, and the adaptations to enforcement made by sellers and buyers. The two markets took very different forms. One was tightly controlled by a small number of middle-level dealers, and highly structured. The structure and control worked effectively to minimise risks posed by law enforcement. The other market was very loosely structured, with little control exercised on retail sellers by middle-level dealers. This lack of organisation posed different sets of problems for law enforcement. The article examines the potential for developing the role of police sources (informants) in disrupting drug markets of both sorts. It also argues the need for provision in parallel of local treatment facilities for drug users.