Smart and secure borders through automated border control systems in the EU? The views of political stakeholders in the Member States

The European Commission launched the “Smart Borders” policy process in 2011 to enhance border security in the European Union (EU) using technologisation and harmonisation. This includes the use of automated border control (ABC) systems. The Member States crucially shape the process, weighing security technologies and costs, privacy and rights, and further institutional choices. We examine the views of political stakeholders in four Member States by conducting a systematic empirical and comparative study unprecedented in the existing, political-theory-inspired research. In our Q methodological experiments, political stakeholders in Finland, Romania, Spain and the UK rank-ordered a sample of statements on Smart Borders, ABC and harmonisation. The factor analysis of the results yielded three main views: the first criticising ABC as a security technology, the second welcoming the security gains of automation and the third opposing harmonised border control. While impeding harmonisation, the results offer a consensus facilitating common policy.     

甘肃省禁毒方略探讨

作为西部地区之一的甘肃省,禁毒工作在取得了显著成效的同时面临的形势依然严峻,禁毒斗争依然任重道远。为了使甘肃省禁毒斗争取得新的突破,本文探讨了甘肃省禁毒工作面临的新形势,并提出了进一步开展禁毒工作的建议。     

Augusta Webster’s Mother and Daughter and the only child debate

The enduring debate about family size has roots in Victorian England, most notably in literary works addressing the issue of balancing motherhood and a writing career. One Victorian writer and activist, Augusta Webster (1837–1894), directly addressed the issue of family size in her uncompleted sonnet sequence Mother and Daughter (1895), which she began when her only child was a newborn. In this posthumous series of 14-line poems, Webster defends her decision to have one child and, in doing so, challenges popular assumptions that only women with multiple children could be considered ‘complete’, socially-acceptable mothers. Despite her efforts, however, and despite the rising popularity of one-child families, the results of numerous scientific studies and the lingering critiques of mommy blogs make it clear that challenges to mothers of ‘onlies’ remain.     

A Comparative Study of Denmark and New Zealand’s National Health Targets

This paper investigates the influence of nationally imposed health targets on current management control practices in New Zealand and Denmark. It reveals how variants of New Public Management (NPM), arising from specific historical socio-political contexts, rise to the challenge of national differences. The study finds that both nations are challenged to ensure data registration procedures produce valid and comparable performance measures. Denmark’s reliance on a single efficiency measure of health sector performance reflects a historic socio-political context that reduces the feasibility of additional measures whereas New Zealand’s context enables the government to impose a more extensive range of health targets.     

Senior Public Managers’ Engagement: A Person–Situation-Interactionist Perspective

This article examines the engagement of senior public managers by developing a person–situation-interactionist perspective. It integrates the literature on social exchange theory and person–organization fit to explore the effects of decision autonomy and shared vision on the engagement of more than 2,000 senior public sector managers in the central government agencies of three continental European countries: France, Germany, and The Netherlands. Then, it examines whether the locus of control of those managers moderates the decision autonomy–engagement and shared vision–engagement relationships. The structural equation modeling results suggest that there are positive relationships between both decision autonomy and shared vision and employee engagement. Further analysis revealed that an internal locus of control strengthened the decision autonomy–engagement relationship, but that it weakened the shared vision–engagement relationship.     

全球安全治理视域下的自主武器军备控制

随着人工智能的飞速进展,不断智能化的自主武器日益显现出伦理和安全风险,使得限制或禁止自主武器成为全球安全治理领域的新兴议题。相比其他军控对象,自主武器军控进程在过去几年中获得较快推进,其中《特定常规武器公约》会议已决定设立政府专家组专门探讨自主武器问题。文章系统梳理了自主武器军备控制的概念、伦理和安全争议,旨在通过这种梳理更好地理解自主武器军控进程发展的动因,并对这一进程的未来走向做出预测。当前,自主武器军备控制的主要动因集中在道德层面,特别是让机器自主决策杀伤引发的伦理忧虑。而从安全层面看,自主武器蕴涵的安全风险在其他新兴技术领域同样存在,而发展和使用自主武器带来的战略红利依然显著,这使得主要国家推动自主武器军控的意愿并不强烈。在权力政治与道德政治的博弈下,自主武器军控在可预见的时期内将难以形成实质性成果,稍有可能的是通过“软法”等非约束性方式塑造一定的国际规范。在这个过程中,中国可以发挥更加积极主动的作用,在确保战略利益的同时营造有利的大国形象。     

Public-Sector Consolidated Financial Statements: An Analysis of the Comment Letters on IPSASB’s Exposure Draft No. 49

Public sector consolidated financial statements can be drafted according to different approaches, especially the “control approach” or “budgetary perspective.” Considering the growing importance of the International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS) in the international scenario, the aim of the article is to investigate these approaches through an analysis of the comment letters submitted to the Exposure Draft no. 49, which will replace the current IPSAS 6. The main finding concerns the acceptance of the key role played by the control approach, even though it needs to be better specified, in order to take into account the public sector characteristics.     

The peasants in turmoil: Khmer Rouge,state formation and the control of land in northwest Cambodia

Over the past 15 years, northwest Cambodia has seen dramatic agrarian expansion away from the central rice plain into the peripheral uplands fuelled by peasant in-migration. Against this background, we examine the nature of relations between the peasantry and the state. We first show the historical continuities of land control processes and how the use of violence in a post-conflict neoliberal context has legitimised ex-Khmer Rouge in controlling land distribution. Three case studies show the heterogeneity of local level sovereignties, which engage the peasants in different relations with authority. We examine how these processes result in the construction of different rural territories along the agricultural frontier and argue that, in this region of Cambodia, the struggles between Khmer Rouge and neoliberal modes of land control are central to state formation processes.     

法医精神病鉴定质量控制对策研究

法医精神病鉴定是一种经验型或技能型鉴定类型,大多数鉴定项目只能依靠鉴定人的经验进行判断,质量控制更显重要。遗憾的是,目前该专业并未像其他法医类鉴定那样实行认证认可制度,质量控制手段不多。为有效保障鉴定质量,必须围绕鉴定意见形成过程的各个阶段或环节进行过程控制与监督,重点关注“人、机、料、法、环”等要素。为此,建议在该行业内逐步恢复认证认可制度,完善质量体系建设,运用好各种内外部质量控制方法,严格把关鉴定人准入,实行鉴定人执业分类管理、强化鉴定人执业能力考核,以规范行业鉴定活动,维护行业司法鉴定的公信力。     

Critical Misunderstandings: Ineffective International Governance and the UK Nuclear Industry

In 2017, significant media and political interest was sparked by the UK decision to leave Euratom, the European Atomic Energy Community. While such interest in nuclear matters has to be welcomed, the apparent lack of knowledge displayed in the regulatory governance of the UK nuclear industry is disquieting. This article therefore offers an overview of the publicly funded UK nuclear industry and its regulatory governance including its links with European and global nuclear agencies to inform the debate and to identify critical issues in need of resolution.