Justice Here and Now: A Personal Reflection on the Restorative and Community Justice Paradigms

Cuba has long had one of the lowest crime rates in Latin America and in the Americas generally. Incidents of crime against women such as rape and domestic violence, for example, appear to be lower in Cuba than in the rest of Latin America and the United States. Community organizations in Cuba play a significant role in controlling criminal activity by generating and sustaining citizen participation, generating an understanding of the nature of community crime, and helping to form partnerships for community policing. Cuba has attempted to obtain citizen participation in order to resolve social problems, including crime, by instilling a sense of community among its citizens and providing them with the structure of mass organizations that mobilize people on local, regional, and national levels. Residents attribute Cuba’s relatively low crime rate to the sense of community created and maintained by such mass organizations. This article focuses on the role that mass organizations and especially Committees for the Defense of the Revolution play in the Cuban experience of community policing and justice.     

Here we go round the review-go-round: Rape investigation and prosecution—are things getting worse not better?

Abstract

Despite numerous reviews, reports and commissions of inquiry, the investigation and prosecution of rape cases remains fraught. Victims are still ambivalent about reporting incidents of sexual violence, while those who do often struggle to be believed and have their cases progress through justice systems. This paper explores some of the reasons why promised reforms materialise so rarely into tangible benefits for the majority of rape complainants, and focuses on six areas: reporting, attrition, adversarial justice systems, victim support, specialisation and attitudes. These are canvassed with particular reference to examples from England and New Zealand demonstrating the barriers to substantive reform and the ways in which gender inequalities and patriarchal beliefs continue to impact upon both the prevalence of sexual violence as well as state responses to its occurrence. The paper contains a cautionary message regarding the potential dangers involved in accepting the rhetoric of reform while the underlying realities remain little changed.     

关于列宁遗产的传承问题

列宁将马克思主义运用于俄国革命实际,创建了世界上第一个社会主义国家苏联,在世界社会主义运动史上,把社会主义从理论推向在各民族国家实践的阶段。限于时、空条件,以及英年早逝的不幸自然因素,列宁来不及认识和实现社会主义国家从准军事体制到常态的转轨。从大历史的视角看,新社会制度建立之初,国家都曾实施准军事体制,以求迅速巩固新的社会制度。但是,新社会制度的优越性,只有当国家从准军事体制转轨到常态之后,才能发挥与体现出来。20世纪世界社会主义运动的曲折,概由于社会主义国家没有及时实现转轨。传承列宁的遗产,关键在于完成列宁未能完成的工作,实现国家从准军事体制到常态的转轨。苏共没能正确传承列宁的遗产,因而丢失了列宁的遗产。建设中国特色社会主义,从国家层面看,实乃建设常态社会主义国家。     

完善未成年人社区矫正工作的构想

我国目前尚未形成专门针对未成年人社区矫正的法律法规和工作机制,不利于实现未成年罪犯再社会化。文章分析了我国未成年人社区矫正存在的问题,指出应从三方面予以完善：一是要将审前帮教考察与判后矫正相结合,确保社区矫正的必要性和合理性;二是要设置符合未成年人特点的社区矫正项目,配备专业的社区矫正人员;三是要对未成年人社区矫正立法,明确社区矫正部门权责和矫正细则。     

公安微博的法律性质及功能定位

随着我国微博用户的迅速增多,公安微博的影响力不断攀升。公安微博是政务微博中数量较多,关注度较高的一类。由于相关规范及求不够明晰,因此,有必明确公安微博的法律性质和功能定位,为今后的规范化运作奠定基础。     

城镇化进程中未成年人附条件不起诉制度研究

2013年1月1日起施行的新《刑事诉讼法》增加了“未成年人附条件不起诉制度”.在我国城镇化进程快速发展的今天,这一制度的确立对促进未成年人的再社会化有着十分重要的意义.文章在对未成年人附条件不起诉制度进行立法解读的基础之上,提出完善建议,同时明确了该制度和相对不起诉的优先适用顺序,并补充介绍了相对不起诉中有关未成年人的特殊规定.     

Distributed filesystem forensics: XtreemFS as a case study

Distributed filesystems provide a cost-effective means of storing high-volume, velocity and variety information in cloud computing, big data and other contemporary systems. These technologies have the potential to be exploited for illegal purposes, which highlights the need for digital forensic investigations. However, there have been few papers published in the area of distributed filesystem forensics. In this paper, we aim to address this gap in knowledge. Using our previously published cloud forensic framework as the underlying basis, we conduct an in-depth forensic experiment on XtreemFS, a Contrail EU-funded project, as a case study for distributed filesystem forensics. We discuss the technical and process issues regarding collection of evidential data from distributed filesystems, particularly when used in cloud computing environments. A number of digital forensic artefacts are also discussed. We then propose a process for the collection of evidential data from distributed filesystems.     

孔子军事文化遗产与传承

孔子是中国春秋末期的大思想家和教育家。他所创立的儒家学说在中国文明发展史有着十分重要的地位,是中华文化的重要组成部分。孔子的军事思想就文化层面来讲也是一份厚重的文化遗产,这一点有时会被忽视。本文首先从史籍记载的孔子的家世、生平活动、教育成就等方面考证孔子的军事造诣。详细论述了以“仁哉”、“慎战”、“教战”为特色的孔子军事文化遗产与后世传承。     

The Council for the Administration of Criminal Justice and Protection of Juveniles

The Council for the Administration of Criminal Justice and Protection of Juveniles (Raad voor Strafrechtstoepassing en Jeugdbescherming) is an independent advisory, supervisory and judiciary board to the Netherlands Minister of Justice on matters relating to the prison system, the hospital order detention system, the probation system and the youth incarceration system. Members are recruited from a variety of backgrounds, such as magistracy, science, medicine, psychiatry and social work. As a rule, they have a full-time job in society. They are recruited by virtue of their expertise, competence and professional experience in relevant fields. Nowadays, there are about 60 members. The combination of the Council’s three tasks has been criticised. The argument is that the advisory and supervisory tasks of the Council could interfere with the independent and impartial nature of its judicial task. The supposed incompatibility of the three tasks has been one of the arguments of the Minister of Justice in defending his decision to set up an Inspectorate for the whole field of the administration of justice. This Inspectorate would overlap the Council’s supervisory task. So, legislation has been prepared in order to prevent overlap by taking away this task from the Council. The resistance to these plans was an important reason for the Dutch government to ask the Verwey-Jonker Institute to evaluate the performance of the Council. The Council performed very well in this evaluation. Its performance could not, therefore, really be used as an argument for curtailing its tasks. The independent nature of an Inspection Board is open to question, as it is functioning under the responsibility of the Minister of Justice. However, the Minister of Justice has not been convinced by this and other arguments, so there is a big chance that the Council will loose its supervisory task.

Some Aspects of the Principle of " common="" butdifferentiated="" responsibilities""="

The principle of common but differentiated responsibilities, one of the key concepts of sustainable development, has dual grounding; the pressures developed countries place on the global environment; and the technologies and financial resources they command. Though the developed countries are reluctant to admit the first grounding, the developing countries have a strong leverage to induce the former to accept differentiated treatment in their favor.Thus, this principle has become to be reflected in some conventions in the field of environment and development. The reflection of this principle takes two forms: one is "double standards" in environmental protection standards as well as their implementation in favor of developing countries; and the other is assistance by developed countries for sustainable development of developing countries. At present, "double standards" seem to be inevitable, but, they must be temporary measures in view of the integral and interdependent nature of global environment. And, in order to overcome these "double standards", the attainment by developing countries of their sustainable development seems to be indispensable. In a substantial number of environmental conventions, developed country parties assume obligations to assist development country parties. However, these obligations are confirmed to "incremental costs" necessary for implementation of the convention concerned, and do not extent to assistance for sustainable development in general. Changing consumption and production patterns seems to be one of the most important aspects of the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities, since this concept takes issue, for the first time, with the pattern of development pursued by developed countries. However, this concept has much difficulties in translating into international legal terms.Though it may be difficult at present to characterize the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities to be a customary norm of international law, it is surely a basic principle of international law, and as such, may operate as a guiding principle for law-making, as well as for the interpretation and application of conventions in the field of environment and development.