Sub-prime mortgage lending: a cultural economy

Abstract

Developing cultural economists’ concerns with the assembly of agency in financial markets, agency in sub-prime mortgage lending in the United States is shown to have been made up through calculative devices of risk. Credit reporting and scoring provided for the targeting, sorting, pricing and governing of customers in terms of risk. The securitization of mortgages into risk-structured financial instruments made possible extended lending. Interest-only adjustable rate mortgage products called up mortgagors who, as leveraged investors, embraced risk in a rising property market. The current sub-prime mortgage crisis is understood in critical terms as a moment when the contradictions of these risk devices and their incapacity to capture the uncertain future have come to the surface, and agency in sub-prime lending has been disassembled. Cultural economy is thus shown to make a distinctive contribution to the politicization of sub-prime that stresses the ambiguous politics of calculation.     

Regulating finance after the crisis: Unveiling the different dynamics of the regulatory process

It is now widely recognized that regulatory failures contributed to the onset of the global financial crisis. Redressing such failures has, thus, been a key policy priority in the post‐crisis reform agenda at both the domestic and international levels. This special issue investigates the process of post‐crisis financial regulatory reform in a number of crucial issue areas, including the rules and arrangements that govern financial supervision, offshore financial centers and shadow banking, the financial industry's involvement in global regulatory processes, and macroeconomic modeling. In so doing, the main purpose of this special issue is to shed light on an often understudied aspect in regulation literature: the variation in the dynamics of regulatory change. Contributors examine the different dynamics of regulatory change observed post‐crisis and explain variations by accounting for the interaction between institutional factors, on the one hand, and the activity of change agents and veto players involved in the regulatory reform process, on the other.     

Writing about Rwanda since the Genocide: Knowledge,Power and ‘Truth’

This debate article reflects upon four articles recently published in this journal as part of a special Forum on Rwanda (Volume 8, Issue 4, 2014)—released to coincide with the 20-year commemoration of the 1994 genocide. In doing so it highlights what this author considers to be a crisis in contemporary ‘Rwanda studies’. This crisis—referenced and reproduced to some extent in all four articles—combines methodological (‘how can we write about Rwanda?’) and epistemological (‘how should we write about Rwanda?’) uncertainty against a backdrop of highly polarized, partisan and sometimes personalized research agendas. In exploring this phenomenon, the study explores not only the role of academics (mainly European and Rwandan) but also of the Rwandan government itself, highlighting the rise of ‘activist polities’ such as that in contemporary Kigali. These regimes consider knowledge production to be an aspect of their own sovereignty and this poses fundamental challenges, as yet largely unacknowledged, to parts of Western Africanist scholarship.     

Large-scale land deals,global capital and the politics of livelihoods: Experiences of women small-holder farmers in Chisumbanje,Zimbabwe

Abstract

Large scale land acquisitions by foreign conglomerates in Zimbabwe have been a recurrent phenomenon within the last five years. This has led to land deals being negotiated with state, individual and nongovernmental actors, leading to the production of agro fuels. This article investigates how the large scale commercial land deals have affected the livelihoods of women small holder farmers, the role of global capital in entrenching discrimination of women and how the politics of resource use and distribution has become a central force in shaping livelihoods in Zimbabwe's communal areas. The article is based on field work that was conducted in Ndowoyo communal area, in Chisumbanje village, from July 2011 until April 2012. The methods used for collecting data were in-depth interviews with the women, interviews with officials from the Platform for Youth Development, a nongovernmental organisation, Macdom Pvt Ltd and Ratings Investments, focus group discussions and personal observations that involved interactions with the women. In 2011, Macdom Pvt Ltd and Ratings Investments, both bio fuels companies owned by Billy Rautenbach started green fuel production operations in Chisumbanje and this has led to the altering of the livelihoods systems of women smallholder farmers. The argument seeks, first, to demonstrate how the company‘s green fuel production systems have led to the loss of land for women and the redefinition of tenure in a communal area. Secondly it explores how the company has been involved in political issues that have undermined the role of development for the women and, thirdly, the article investigates how the women have created livelihood alternatives in an area which has been transformed from a communal rural area into almost an urban area. It concludes by suggesting the need to give primacy to women centred notions of agency in coping with the negative implications of commercial land deals on women‘s livelihoods.     

论代理制度的独立性——从一种法技术运用的角度

德国民法所创设的独立的代理制度所采用的抽象技术方法与物权行为理论同出一辙,代理权授予行为的独立性为提取意定代理和法定代理的共同规则并形成独立的代理制度创造了条件,而授权行为的无因性则使其独立性具有了保护交易安全的实质意义。我国民法承认了授权行为的独立性,应进一步承认其无因性。     

间接代理制度研究——以《合同法》第402条与第403条为中心

我国《合同法》第402条、第403条是对英美法隐名代理与不公开被代理人身份的代理的借鉴,分别规定了我国的隐名代理与间接代理制度。间接代理与行纪虽然存在一定的相似性,但两者也存在着明显的区别。绝不能将间接代理归入行纪,也不能认为行纪为典型的间接代理。     

检察公益“两诉”衔接机制探析——以“检察公益诉讼解释”的完善为切入

民事公益诉讼与行政公益诉讼在内容和功能上大量重叠,但又各自具有不可替代的独特部分,故二者既不能当然并立,也不能绝对排斥,而应通过衔接机制在避免重复的情况下形成“互补”关系。为此,“检察公益诉讼解释”应增加“两诉衔接”一章,从诉前、诉中和诉后三阶段作出相应规定。     

论委托代理授权不明时代理人的责任

在委托代理中,一旦出现授权范围、期限等内容不明确的情况,即可导致授权不明。在授权不明的情形下,课以代理人承担连带责任既不符合委托代理制度的基本法律构造,也不利于鼓励交易,影响代理制度功能的发挥。确定授权不明情形下代理人责任,需要先确定被代理人的授权范围以及代理行为的效力,在维护交易安全的前提下充分尊重被代理人的意思自治,由其事后确定授权范围。授权不明情形下代理人的代理行为可能构成有权代理、狭义的无权代理或者表见代理。     

行政机构设置程序研究

当前行政机构的设置大多处于随意性和非理性的状态,这其中一个重要原因在于行政机构设置程序的缺位,行政机构设置程序是一种行政程序,受到行政组织法、行政机关编制法和行政程序法的共同规范.行政机构的设置需要遵循提议、论证、审核、批准、公告等程序.对于违反程序规定者,要依法追究其纪律责任、行政责任或者是法律责任,以确保行政机构设置的依法进行,从而保障行政机构设置的科学性和合理性.     

劳动派遣用工的法律规制

劳动派遣为一种新型用工方式,在政府及企业的推动下发展迅猛,被视为是促进就业、解决剩余劳动力有序流动的主要手段。但伴随出现的却是劳动派遣机构的高额利润、用工企业的低成本使用劳动力,劳动者权益受到极大损害。因此,应根据我国国情,参考国外劳动派遣法律规制的有益经验,构建我国的劳动派遣法律制度。