再论侵权行为概念

长期以来学界对侵权法中最基本侵权行为概念的认识存在误区。本文从比较法的角度对这些误区进行了评析,提出界定该概念的思路：抛弃以保护侵权人为中心的“无过错即无责任”的传统观念,代之以保护受害人合法权益为中心的“无损害就无救济”的新思路。本文认为侵权行为是指行为人不法侵害法律所确认和保护的他人民事权益的行为。     

Capital Gains and Spatial Inequalities: Developing Fairer Suburbs

One of the longest‐running debates in urban development, enshrined within the evolution of the British planning system, is how best to capture the increased value of land arising from development. This article outlines the historic and contemporary context before proposing an approach towards ‘land value capture’, based on practice in continental Europe but adapted to Britain's specific circumstances. In doing so, it also sets out why new approaches are needed as part of the search for better ways of funding local infrastructure, developing mixed communities and improving Britain's suburbs for the benefit of all.     

Coming to grips with corporate governance in local government

Local government, the tier of government closest to the people, provides services and infrastructure which impact daily on the well‐being of local communities. Despite the Australian state‐based regulatory framework, governance dysfunction regularly results in dismissal of councils. This paper seeks to gain an insight into what is understood by corporate governance at the local government level, an area not addressed in previous research. The methodology was a case study of one local municipality in Tasmania using explanatory sequential mixed methods. Findings revealed a narrow compliance‐based understanding, with effective accountability strategies not included in that understanding. Diverse information sources, such as previous employment experience and industry‐based training, led to embedded beliefs about the meaning of corporate governance which were not necessarily shared by all. This study has implications for state governments seeking to find long‐term solutions for dysfunctional councils, and to bring about positive change.     

Cornwall's Devolution Deal: Towards a More Sustainable Governance?

This article considers the devolution deal signed by Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly in the summer of 2015. It asks if the deal constitutes a more sustainable approach to governance, concluding that while there are some factors that help to enhance sustainability, other areas urgently require more attention. These claims are made through an analysis of a model of sustainability which emphasises the importance of networks and feedback loops envisaging civil society as an adaptive organism. This helps to show that although power is significantly dispersed in some aspects of the ‘Cornwall Deal’, this latter does little to alter the highly centralised nature of governance across England, or provide spaces where local actors can feed back into central policy.     

The Australian Experience of Municipal Amalgamation: Asking the Citizenry and Exploring the Implications

Debate over municipal amalgamations in Australian continues to dominate local government reform agendas, with the putative need to achieve economies of scale and scope consistently set against anti‐amalgamation arguments designed to preserve extant communities. Following from an examination of recent episodes of consolidation in Australia, this paper reports on citizens' attitudes to amalgamation garnered from a national survey of 2,006 individuals. We found that generally, citizens are ambivalent toward amalgamation, although attitudes were influenced by particular demographic characteristics and attitudes to representation, belonging, service delivery requirements and the costs thereof. The results suggest that, away from the local government sector itself, structural reform may not be the vexatious issue it is often portrayed as. The implications of this are explored here.     

Territorial government reforms at the time of financial crisis: the dawn of metropolitan cities in Italy

On 1 January 2015 a new institution, the metropolitan city, took its place among the Italian territorial authorities. Despite its incorporation in the Italian Constitution since 2001, the metropolitan city become a reality only when the national government carried out a process of reform and transformation of Italian territorial government by transforming 10 large cities into metropolitan cities and depriving other intermediate governments (regions and provinces) of their fundamental competences. This article critically reviews the activation of metropolitan cities and the reshuffle of Italian territorial authorities. It stresses the way in which this reform marks the shift towards a new phase of Italian regionalism, which is dominated both by a dynamic of recentralizing intergovernmental relations and by the resulting loss for provincial and regional governments.     

Measuring Local Autonomy in 39 Countries (1990–2014)

Local autonomy is a highly valued feature of good governance. The continuous efforts of many European countries to strengthen the autonomy of local government show the importance given to decentralization and the transfer of far-reaching competences to the lowest units. Measuring and comparing local autonomy, however, has proven to be challenging. Not only are there diverging ideas about the core elements of local autonomy, there are also considerable difficulties applying specific concepts to different countries. This paper outlines a comprehensive methodology for measuring local autonomy. It analyses 39 European countries and reports changes between 1990 and 2014. A network of experts on local government assessed the autonomy of local government of their respective countries on the basis of a common code book. The 11 variables measured show an overall increase of local autonomy but significant variation between the countries. The variables also add up to an overall measurement of local autonomy.     

‘Event,politics, and space: Rancière or Badiou’?

This paper takes a critical view of Rancière’s ideas on politics, subjectivity, and space by building on the criticisms offered by Alain Badiou in a series of critical exchanges between the two authors. The first part of the paper reviews the main points of difference between them, which centre around their different interpretations of what constitutes a political event, subjectivity, and the nature of radical politics. Later sections then develop these differences with respect to further issues concerning the nature of political spaces, the pre-evental, and political organization.     

Intangible activities—the prevalence of informal helping in Denmark

‘Informal helping’ is often associated with other types of prosocial behaviour such as formal voluntary work. Therefore, one could jump to the conclusion that it would be the same factors driving both types of activities. This article demonstrates that this is not the case. The study relies on a population survey on informal helping and volunteering in Denmark. The two contributions of this article are as follows: (1) it demonstrates that the socio-demographic indicators that are closely linked to formal volunteering are not related to informal helping in the same manner and (2) it demonstrates that it is necessary to separate the decision to help and the amount of hours that people help, a distinction that previous empirical studies on this topic fail to include. The results show that informal helping may not simply be compared to other instances of prosocial behaviour. In particular, the socio-demographic indicators that are closely linked to formal volunteering are not necessarily related to informal helping. Moreover, the results emphasize the need for including informal helping as an act of civic engagement, which ought not to be confused with other forms of engagement within the civil society.     

Peace and Justice through a Feminist Lens: Gender Justice and the Women’s Court for the Former Yugoslavia

ABSTRACT

Post-conflict interventions to ‘deal with’ violent pasts have moved from exception to global norm. Early efforts to achieve peace and justice were critiqued as ‘gender-blind’—for failing to address sexual and gender-based violence, and neglecting the gender-specific interests and needs of women in transitional settings. The advent of UN Security Council resolutions on ‘Women, Peace and Security’ provided a key policy framework for integrating both women and gender issues into transitional justice processes and mechanisms. Despite this, gender justice and equality in (post-)conflict settings remain largely unachieved. This article explores efforts to attain gender-just peace in post-conflict Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH). It critically examines the significance of a recent ‘bottom-up’ truth-telling project—the Women’s Court for the former Yugoslavia—as a locally engaged approach to achieving justice and redress for women impacted by armed conflict. Drawing on participant observation, documentary analysis, and interviews with women activists, the article evaluates the successes and shortcomings of responding to gendered forms of wartime violence through truth-telling. Extending Nancy Fraser’s tripartite model of justice to peacebuilding contexts, the article advances notions of recognition, redistribution and representation as crucial components of gender-just peace. It argues that recognizing women as victims and survivors of conflict, achieving a gender-equitable distribution of material and symbolic resources, and enabling women to participate as agents of transitional justice processes are all essential for transforming the structural inequalities that enable gender violence and discrimination to materialize before, during, and after conflict.