On the Legal Regulation of Algorithms

Increasingly, algorithms challenge legal regulations, and also challenge the right to explanation, personal privacy and freedom, and individual equal protection. As decision-making mechanisms for human-machine interaction, algorithms are not value-neutral and should be legally regulated. Algorithm disclosure, personal data empowerment, and anti-algorithmic discrimination are traditional regulatory methods relating to algorithms, but mechanically using these methods presents difficulties in feasibility and desirability. Algorithm disclosure faces difficulties such as technical infeasibility, meaningless disclosure, user gaming and intellectual property right infringement. And personal data empowerment faces difficulties such as personal difficulty in exercising data rights and excessive personal data empowerment, making it difficult for big data and algorithms to operate effectively. Anti-algorithmic discrimination faces difficulties such as non-machine algorithmic discrimination, impossible status neutrality, and difficult realization of social equality. Taking scenarios of algorithms lightly is the root cause of the traditional algorithm regulation path dilemma. Algorithms may differ in attributes due to specific algorithmic subjects, objects and domains involved. Therefore, algorithm regulation should be developed and employed based on a case-by-case approach to the development of accountable algorithms. Following these development principles, specific rules can be enacted to regulate algorithm disclosure, data empowerment, and anti-algorithmic discrimination.     

Self-determination,group identity and the common will

ABSTRACT

Anna Stilz defends a political autonomy account of self-determination that, she argues, best explains our intuitions about why colonization, annexation and foreign occupation are wrong. These are wrong, on Stilz’s view, because they unilaterally coerce individuals living under those systems of government. I argue that Stilz does not show that her account of self-determination explains our intuitions about autonomy in these kinds of cases, because she does not have a separate argument for the value of belonging to particular political groups.     

房产税制度中建设用地使用权刍议

我国宪法规定土地归国家和集体所有,而税法规定房产税的缴纳主体为产权所有人。实践中对个人征收住宅房产税时,应考虑将住宅建设用地使用权价值予以扣除。考察英美法系和大陆法系国家经验,我国房产税试点中有两种征税模式可供选择:一是将住宅的土地使用税合并至房地产税中一并征收;二是在房地产税的计税依据中扣减住宅建设用地使用权的价值,同时对个人住宅建设用地使用权征收土地使用税。     

Resistance to Chronic Violence in Informal Workplaces: The Strategies of Domestic Workers in Brazil (2003–2018)

This article analyses the repertoire of individual strategies utilised by domestic workers to resist routinised workplace violence in the cities of São Paulo and Ilhéus, Brazil. Findings suggest that domestic workers favour two strategies of resistance: exit (quitting work without prior notice) and voice (negotiating workplace conditions). The latter strategy is divided into two subtypes: voice-pleading (appealing to decency) and voice-confrontation (warning and rights-claiming). Voice strategies appear more effective than exit in ameliorating patterns of chronic workplace violence, particularly when they incorporate labour rights claims and when emotional ties exist between workers and employers.     

The international rule of law

ABSTRACT

The rule of law is a moral ideal that protects distinctive legal values such as generality, equality before the law, the independence of courts, and due process rights. I argue that one of the main goals of an international rule of the law is the protection of individual and state autonomy from the arbitrary interference of international institutions, and that the best way to codify this protection is through constitutional rules restraining the reach of international law into the internal affairs of a state. State autonomy does not have any intrinsic value or moral status of its own. Its value is derivative, resulting from the role it plays as the most efficient means of protecting autonomy for individuals and groups. Therefore, the goal of protecting state autonomy form the encroachment of international law will have to be constrained by, and balanced against the more fundamental goal of an international rule of law, the protection of the autonomy of individual persons, best realized through the entrenchment of basic human rights.     

Reflections on Iranian revolution of 1979: rise of subjectivity and citizenship

Iranian revolution of 1979 seems to be one of the most enigmatic events of the twentieth century. This paper attempts to shed light on this enigma by reflecting on the social processes that have been at work in Iran since early twentieth century. Beginning in that era, Iran embarked upon a process of modernization that involved the creation of a complex consisting of modern military, bureaucracy, and educational systems. This complex was instrumental in creating a rudimentary form of agency among different classes and strata in Iran which gradually engendered the potential for revolutionary action among large segments of society. Yet this rudimentary form of agency – what in the paper is referred to as ‘inchoate agentification’ – was only up to the level of revolutionary ethos, lacking the capacity to create fully democratic institutions. As a result of the mass participation in the revolution and the total war with Iraq that lasted for eight years, the process of agentification in Iran entered a new phase in which increasing number of people seem to have developed a more mature form of agency and subjectivity – in fact inter-subjectivity – that could explain the demand for rights and freedoms of citizenship in that country as is manifested in the Green Movement since 2009.     

行政诉讼中必要参加诉讼第三人权利救济制度之完善

行政诉讼中对必要参加诉讼第三人的权利救济,虽然在修改前后的《行政诉讼法》及其相应司法解释中都有涉及,但是无论在实体还是在程序方面,均存在较多的问题。这不仅给必要参加诉讼第三人的权利救济带来一定的困难,也成为许多行政案件案结事未了,甚至行政案件申诉、上访、信访率高的重要原因之一。要建立起一套完整的行政诉讼必要参加诉讼第三人权利救济制度体系,以下几个问题值得关注:必要参加诉讼第三人申请参加诉讼未获准,应当赋予其上诉权;没有申请参加诉讼,法院应当通知其参加;遗漏必要参加诉讼第三人的案件,二审法院并非一律发回重审;应赋予被遗漏的必要参加诉讼第三人提起再审之诉的权利;应当赋予必要参加诉讼第三人管辖异议权;必要参加诉讼第三人在终审前都可以参与诉讼程序;参照原被告举证责任完善必要参加诉讼第三人的举证责任制度;强化行政诉讼生效裁判执行中必要参加诉讼第三人的权利保障。     

福建省老年人再就业现状与对策研究

随着老龄化社会的到来，如何实现人口二次红利，对个人和社会都具有重要意义。研究通过对福建省9个地市586个有效样本的描述性统计，对福建省老年人再就业的状况及影响因素进行了研究。结果显示：福建省老年人的再就业处于较低水平，且城乡差距较大、职业分布不平衡，老年人再就业不仅受到老年人及其家人观念的影响，也受限于求职渠道和权益保障等条件。研究建议从政府、社会、个人等层面构建老年人再就业促进体系，包括积极发挥政府的全局导向作用、构建老年人再就业市场机制、增强老年人的劳动权益保护意识等来促进老年人的再就业。     

试析我国农村土地承包经营权的性质

农村土地承包经营权是我国农村土地制度的核心。对于土地承包经营权的法律属性,学术界曾经存在较大的分歧。结合对《中华人民共和国农村土地承包法》条文的理解,从几方面论证了土地承包经营权是物权;与传统的用益物权永佃权进行了差别比较;指出农村土地承包经营权有关制度尚须完善。     

对著作人身权转让的思考

学界对版权贸易中精神权利的协调问题有四种理论,即精神权利穷竭说、人身权利放弃论、人身权利合理使用论、精神权利转让论。通过比较分析,我们认为允许精神权利转让是可行的。