LOOKING TO THE TWO SESSIONS

The following three stories lay out an overview of the hot issues to be addressed in the upcoming two sessions of the National People’s Congress as well as the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference in the nation’s capital in March     

A tale of firsts: the 2019 Austrian snap election

Abstract

The 2019 Austrian snap election, held on 29 September 2019, was preceded by a series of scandals. Most prominent among them was the so-called ‘Ibizagate’ involving the former Vice-Chancellor and FPÖ party leader, Heinz-Christian Strache. The scandal eventually led to the collapse of the ÖVP-FPÖ coalition in May 2019 and the formation of a caretaker government. The election day in September brought a clear victory for the ÖVP with an increase of almost six percentage points, compared to its vote share in the 2017 election. The second big winner was the Green party which scored the best result in the party history with 13.9 per cent of the vote. Amid scandals, the FPÖ saw its support fall to only 16.2 per cent; the election also resulted in an all-time low for the SPÖ achieving only 21.2 per cent. The article presents the background, the election campaign and the results of the 2019 Austrian election, discussing the wide range of ‘firsts’ that characterized them, including the formation of the first ÖVP-Green coalition government in Austria.     

当前阶段我国农村劳动力永久性迁移问题

如何实现农村劳动力永久性迁移、结束"两种城市化"的对立,一直是困扰我国城乡协调发展的重要问题。结合我国当前农村劳动力非永久性迁移的状况、影响我国未来农村劳动力转移的基础因素、当前阶段我国促进劳动力永久性迁移的户籍政策效果以及政策建议等四个方面对此问题进行了研究。研究发现:随着我国经济向高质量发展转变,影响劳动力转移的基础因素发生了改变并对未来我国劳动力转移和农村劳动力永久性迁移产生了较大影响;当前我国已经开始部分放开户籍管理制度,这将对未来农村劳动力永久性迁移产生积极影响,省会城市及部分地级市、新生代农民工及在校大学生等将是主要受益者;然而,不能寄希望于通过放宽户籍制度大规模促进新增农村劳动力转移,同时要特别防止部分城市希望通过吸引外来人口来促进房地产行业发展的倾向。     

Patterns of intra-election volatility: the impact of political knowledge*

One key trend changing political environments across advanced industrial democracies is increasing electoral volatility. Despite extensive research, at the individual level we still know relatively little about the mechanisms behind electoral volatility during election campaigns, including the impact of political knowledge. Against this background and based on a four-wave panel study in the context of the 2014 Swedish national election, the purpose of this paper is to investigate (a) patterns of intra-election volatility and the impact of (b) political knowledge on patterns of electoral volatility. Distinguishing between party alienation, crystallization, wavering, reinforcement, and conversion, among other things, findings show some effects from political knowledge on patterns of electoral volatility but only for acquired political knowledge.     

The Regulation of Third Party Campaigning in UK Elections

This article looks at the regulation of third parties in UK election law. During the 2019 general election campaign, media reports noted an increase in non-party organisations spending money on electoral advertisements on social media. Such advertisements raised a number of ethical questions, related to spending, transparency, and the content of the messages. Despite such recent concerns, third party electoral activity in the UK is not new, and the existing legal framework regulates campaign spending. That framework has its roots in Victorian-era election law and has been periodically updated. This article will look at the challenges in designing laws to regulate third party electoral activity, as a difficult line has to be drawn to ensure the laws are effective, while at the same time not imposing too many burdens on independent political activity. Moreover, the move to digital campaigning poses some further challenges, such as monitoring compliance by third party campaigners. While there are no simple solutions to some of the issues raised by third party electoral activity, this article will note some of the measures that could at least improve the transparency of such campaigning.     

2011年新加坡大选中工人党的竞选策略探析

在2011年国会大选中,新加坡工人党在保住后港单选区的基础上,在阿裕尼集选区击败外交部长杨荣文率领的人民行动党团队,共取得了6个议席。这是自新加坡1988年集选区制度实行以来,反对党第一次战胜人民行动党拿下集选区,也是1966年以来反对党取得议席最多的一次大选。这届大选被认为是新加坡的政治分水岭。工人党之所以能取得如此战绩,是由于它采取了正确的竞选策略：工人党整合人才资源,物色到了可媲美人民行动党的候选人;抓住转战时机,刘程强适时走出后港;提出了“第一世界国会”“副司机”等全国性课题;不为反对而反对,打造理智的建设性反对党形象;挟上届大选余威,综合考量历史、地理因素;准确把握竞选过程中的细节。     

论预防性环境民事公益诉讼永久禁止功能的实现

预防性环境民事公益诉讼属于停止侵害诉讼,旨在通过判决及其执行永久性禁止未来侵害行为,实现对重大生态环境风险控制.基于我国规范出发型的裁判模式及环境司法"审执合一"的专门化探索,通过比较德国停止侵害诉讼与美国禁令救济的运行机理,有必要通过审执协作,体系化地扩大停止侵害判决辐射范围,以实现预防性环境民事公益诉讼的永久禁止功...     

War Chests as Precautionary Savings

I present a model of campaign spending and saving in repeated elections which yields empirical implications on the creation of war chests. As previous studies disagree whether war chests deter potential challengers from running against incumbents, I present an alternative model that intentionally excludes deterrence as a motivation and formalizes under what circumstances (if any) a war chest would be created for savings. The model predicts that an incumbent creates a war chest when she faces a weaker challenger, i.e. as precautionary savings for future elections. The model yields several other predictions of incumbent fund-raising, spending, and saving behavior. Using incumbents from 1982–1998 U.S. House elections, I find strong empirical support for the predictions of the model.     

"严打"的法理学探析

"严打"这一阶段性的刑事政策,相对于法律而言,与依法治国及罪刑法定原则尚存在一些冲突之处.本文试从上述两个方面予以分析,并提出完善我国刑事法制的构想.