The legal aspects of corporate computer usage policies

In this paper we examine the legal aspects of corporate computer usage policies including their creation, management, and their relevance to corporate computer forensic investigations. Misuse of corporate computing facilities cannot only lead to a reduction in employee productivity and network bandwidth, but can also increase the risk of infection of such facilities by computer viruses and other malicious code. Moreover, it may lead to the risk of liability and legal action.     

人格理论视角下的宽严相济刑事政策

宽严相济的刑事政策是党和国家在建设社会主义和谐社会过程中提出的刑事司法政策,在贯彻过程中应当注重与建设和谐社会的背景相适应,调动一切积极因素打击和控制犯罪.为此,我们应当结合人格刑法理论,在定罪、量刑与行刑时,充分考虑行为人的人格,抛弃传统的刑罚万能观念,该宽则宽,该严要严,二者结合,充分发挥刑事政策的作用.     

Decision Making in Autocratic Regimes: A Poliheuristic Perspective

This paper applies the poliheuristic theory of foreign policy decision making to non-democratic states. Poliheuristic theory asserts that state leaders assign primary importance to their political survival; however, the meaning of "the political" varies dramatically from country to country. Furthermore, the types of actors who hold leaders politically accountable also vary between countries. Consequently, leaders often pursue vastly different means of ensuring their political survival. The author uses the common distinction between single-party, military, and personalist autocracies to show that apparently arbitrary differences in autocratic leaders' political concerns actually vary in systematic and potentially predictable ways. Because this argument is generalized to non-democratic states as a whole, it has important implications for the ways in which democratic states craft their policies toward autocracies.     

论检察机关自由裁量权

检察机关自由裁量权的构建对我国完善的诉讼制度具有重要意义。当今将起诉法定主义与起诉便宜主义相结合,赋予检察机关更大的自由裁量权,已成为世界检察改革的趋势。我国现行刑事诉讼法明确了检察机关相对不起诉的自由裁量权,但在法学界和司法实践中,检察机关的自由裁量权尚未获得普遍的理性认识。文章就如何加强对检察机关自由裁量权,追求法的公平、程序正义价值,体现诉讼经济原则等方面进行了探讨,并提出了完善我国检察机关自由裁量权的构想。     

Finanzpolitik als Nachahmungswettbewerb: Empirische Ergebnisse zu Budgetinterdependenzen unter den Schweizer Kantonen

This article examines whether spending decisions in Swiss cantons are interdependent, that is, whether the spending decisions of a canton are influenced by those of other cantons. Theoretically, fiscal policy imitation among cantons can be interpreted as a process of policy and innovation diffusion, as a result of tax competition or as a consequence of federalism as a policy laboratory. The panel analysis presented in this article provides evidence of the existence of budget spillovers among neighbouring cantons. Cantonal governments do not take spending decisions in isolation, but by systematically comparing the fiscal policies in neighbouring cantons.     

Whither the Liberal Democratic Model? Immigration Politics in Switzerland and Japan

A comparison of Japan's and Switzerland's immigration policies disclaims both globalist and public choice explanations that would predict a similar increase in immigrant numbers and an expansion of immigrant rights in liberal democracies. Although both countries have traditionally espoused a rather exclusionary approach towards immigration, Japan is unique in having hitherto succeeded in preempting large numbers of immigrants from entering the country and in having avoided the legal and societal integration of those migrants already present in its territory. In seeking to explain the different trajectories followed by immigration politics in Japan and Switzerland, despite their similar internal and external economic constellations, this article highlights the role of domestic institutions and norms in filtering economic pressure for immigration. Whereas these internal determinants explain to a large degree why Switzerland has become a country of immigration while Japan has not, the central factor explaining the recent expansion of foreign residents’ rights in Switzerland lies not so much in internal determinants but in the country‘s progressing approximation to the European Union and its single market. Notwithstanding these differences, the article concludes that Japan‘s greater resistance to change might now have reached a critical juncture, where demographic pressure and economic demand will make an opening up to increased labor migration unavoidable.     

试论政策执行中的政府利益

作为政策执行主体的政府,客观上存在着与公共利益不同的自身利益。政府利益的存在及其冲突是导致政策执行偏差的重要原因。对政府利益进行合理的整合与规范是保证政策有效执行的重要途径。     

Does Federalism Matter for Biopolicies? Switzerland in Comparative Perspective

This article analyses how federalism matters for the policy‐designing process and the resulting policies in the field of Assisted Reproductive Technology through the comparison of four countries, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium and Canada. It reconstructs from an actor‐centred perspective how federalism interacts with other country and policy‐field specific characteristics and empirically assesses how this interaction influenced the final policies. By focusing on Assisted Reproductive Technology, the article examines the potential influence of federalism on public policies beyond the standard discussion of the comparative political economy of federalism.     

Remortgaging Women's Lives: The World Bank'sLand Agenda in Africa

In recent months, the World Bank has issued a series of draft policy reports on land relations. This is the first time in over two decades that the Bank has sought to review its policy on lending in the land sector. Access to the draft reports and participation in the consultation process has, however, been severely limited. Nonetheless, the World Bank expects to issue the final Report by the end of this year. This paper presents a gender analysis of the two draft documents that have been made available to date. It assesses their implications for gender relations in Africa. It explores the World Bank's promotion of formal rural credit and challenges the assumption of the availability of women's unpaid agricultural labour. The paper argues that, far from being over, the struggle over land relations which has characterised the last decade in Africa, must continue. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.