Investments in Global Warming Mitigation: The Case of “Activities Implemented Jointly”

This paper examines bilateral cooperation between developed countries (home country) and developing countries (host country) to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to enhance carbon dioxide sinks. With the home-host country pair as the unit of analysis, our logistic regression model examines 158 Activities Implemented Jointly (AIJ) investment projects from 1993 until 2002 across 2541 country-pairs. Because the marginal costs of reducing emissions may be lower in developing countries, the AIJ projects served as a policy laboratory to assess whether such investments might be advantageous to both countries in the event future regimes allowed emission credits from such bilateral projects. Instead of investing in home countries where maximum pollution reductions (or carbon sequestration) might be possible, home countries invest in locations where they can conduct their policy experiments at low transaction costs. Prior trade and aid relationships were used as a proxy. Regarding energy projects, location decisions are driven by home countries’ desire to reduce air pollution that they receive from abroad. Geography – proximity of a host country to a home country – in interaction with host country's coal production, is a very important driver of location decision in AIJ energy sector projects. Location of sequestration projects is impacted by the host country's potential for avoiding deforestation as well as by previous aid and trade patterns between a home and a host country. Proximity is not important in this case.     

电子政务现实冲突及其解决

当前我国电子政务在现实中与政府管理创新、政府组织结构、法律滞后、行政成本、信息资源开发利用及安全等产生冲突。对于这些冲突,一方面要从行政机制上寻求解决方案,另一方面要用立法的办法来解决。立法解决是在立法原则的基础上,订立电子政务相关法律的基础性体系、核心性体系和运作性体系。     

Capacity Building as an Instrument of Institutional Reform: Improving the Quality of Higher Education through Academic Audits in the UK, New Zealand, Sweden, and Hong Kong

As countries convert from state to market-centered public policies, there is increasing interest in new forms of public accountability. Capacity building initiatives that reform institutional frameworks are useful policy instruments during this period of transition. What are the impacts and implementation problems characteristic of this approach? This article reviews the experience with "Academic Audit," a capacity building accountability instrument for universities adopted in the UK, Sweden, New Zealand, and Hong Kong. Academic audits altered the incentives for cooperative behavior among faculty members to improve student learning. Identified implementation problems included: training for the new process, the uncertainty of capacity building benefits, and the central role of information.     

Between Domestic Learning and External Coercion: Budgeting and Fiscal Management Reform in Greece

ABSTRACT

The article examines the interplay between external pressure and domestic learning through a case-study of Greek budgetary and fiscal management reform. Pre-crisis, budgetary management inadequacies were not efficiently addressed, mainly due to lack of awareness of problems, a low uncertainty environment and a strong political propensity to maintain discretionary use of financial resources. In contrast, crisis-era bailout conditionality represented a drastic change in the environment, increasing uncertainty and encouraging domestic openness to reform. The fiscal governance framework was significantly transformed, to a point of paradigm change. While there is no doubt regarding the impact of external pressure, the analysis highlights certain aspects that point to a domestic learning process, though variable in different parts of the political-administrative system.     

Mobile phones and self-determination among Muslim youth in Uzbekistan

ABSTRACT

This paper examines the new ways to navigate family power dynamics among Muslim youth in contemporary Uzbekistan. Migration of labour from Uzbekistan increased rapidly in the 2000s. When young workers began to experience the freedom of making their own decisions in their everyday lives after migration, they became uncomfortable with the elders of the household making decisions on everything from daily chores to serious matters concerning their families. Youth who continued to live in Uzbekistan also expanded their areas of self-determination, such as in choosing their spouses, by securing private space through the use of mobile phones. The mobile phone can be an effective tool to improve the position of young wives, who tend to have the lowest status in the husband's family. Thus, the existing hierarchy or classical patriarchy in Muslim families can be navigated, challenged and circumvented by the use of mobile phones among the youth today.     

大珠三角区域的制度学习:动因、过程及前景

在经济全球化和区域化竞争不断加剧的条件下,区域的制度竞争力已经成为决定区域整体竞争力的核心要素。在"一国两制"下,粤、港、澳三地结成的大珠三角区域,共同建构学习型区域,相互进行制度的模仿、学习,进而走向制度的协调和制度的融合,这是缩小区域制度落差,提升区域整体制度竞争力的重要途径。     

WTO背景下中国行政法治理念之转变

“入世”不仅是我国经济发展的重要里程碑,同时也是我国行政法治建设的重要里程碑。“思想是行动的先导”,为适应WTO规则,我们必须转变行政法治理念,实现从“管理”行政向“服务”行政、“治民”行政向“治官”行政、“万能”行政向“有限”行政、“黑箱”行政向“阳光”行政、“命令”行政向“契约”行政的转变。     

Trade Measures and Climate Compliance: Institutional Interplay Between WTO and the Marrakesh Accords

This article examines the potential of trade measures to induce more climate-friendly policies, focusing on the relationship between global trade rules and the Kyoto climate regime. At the core of this interplay is the normative consistency of trade-related rules in the two regimes and any hierarchical relationship between them. The stronger clout of the WTO and its compulsory dispute settlement system suggest that issues involving competing claims would be referred to WTO bodies. Such bodies have so far been restrictive regarding the exceptions in WTO agreements to the general ban on embargoes and discrimination. The normative compatibility of the two regimes will also depend on their participatory interplay, specifically how they differentiate groups of actors as to rights and obligations. Non-members of WTO receive the least protection, and their vulnerability to climate-related trade measures is largely determined by their interdependence with states that consider employment of such measures. Among WTO members, the findings of a dispute settlement body would presumably differ depending on the status of the target under the Kyoto Protocol. A non-complier with Kyoto commitments would be more shielded than a non-party, because by joining the Kyoto regime a non-complier has exposed itself to regime-internal and less trade intrusive measures that should be exhausted first. A third dimension of interplay is linkage, or efforts to influence the regime interplay. To date there has only been moderate cross-agency coordination, but considerable attention is paid within each regime, including in the Millennium Round of trade negotiations, to the desirability of avoiding conflict between them.     

The Future Climate Regime: A Regional Comparison of Proposals

This paper compares and clarifies differences revealed in proposals from different regions on a future multilateral climate regime, after the year 2012. More than 100 articles in English were collected, categorized according to the lead authors region, and then reviewed to identify the general tendencies of each region. Proposals on emission allocation rules were the most popular in Europe, while rules related to international emissions trading dominated proposals from the United States. Few articles came from other Annex I countries, but these generally provided only the most basic aspects of a future regime. Meanwhile, concerns for equity and the relevance of any new regime in terms of sustainable development were clear in proposals from non-Annex I countries. Differences among regions were considered to be a reflection of current circumstances in each authors region. The capacity and culture of authors in some regions were considered to be other possible factors in differences. The paper concludes that recognition of regional background that formulate respective preferences and concerns regarding a future climate regime will be important to help reach a multilateral agreement in future official negotiations.