On the Debate Over Public Choice Theory

Hugh Strelton and Lionel Orchard, Public Goods, Public Enterprise and Public Choice: Theoretical Foundations of the Contemporary Attack on Government .     

对公共图书馆免费开放的几点思考

近几年,关于公共图书馆免费开放的争论越来越多,图书馆免费开放后如何开展服务是普通老百姓关心的话题。本文对目前公共图书馆的现状和存在的问题作了一些分析,并提出了自己的意见和建议。     

完善我国电子政务的路径选择

发展电子政务很有必要。电子政务有利于减少政务成本、改变粗放的行政管理模式,有利于转变政府职能、促进廉政建设。针对当前我国电子政务中存在的问题,应加强信息基础建设、提高社会化信息程度,建设一只高素质的公务员队伍,统一电子政务的标准,完善电子政务的安全系统。     

Conservatives,Liberals, and the Free Exercise Clause

Mark Lilla's summons to recover Hobbes's "art of intellectual separation" is stillborn. Lilla acknowledges the tendentiousness and theoretical inadequacy of Hobbes's approach, yet he falls back on that very strategy, refusing the real task of reconciling political and religious goods.     

论农地所有权经济实现形式的创新与选择

当前,中国农村土地集体所有权的收益多以收费的形式体现,这种实现形式法律依据不充分,实现成本过高,容易促成扩大收费,强行摊派。在强调减轻农民负担的同时,又使相当一部分农民对农村土地集体所有权收益这一部分合理收费也产生了误解,不利于土地集体所有权权利的实现。通过比较四种可供选择的方案,作认为,在近期内以“税收形式”实现土地所有权收益,在远期或市场经济完全成熟时以“农地所有权收益资本化形式”较合适。     

Strength,Toughness and Thermal Shock Resistance of Ancient Ceramics,and Their Influence On Technological Choice

The basic underlying theory for the strength, toughness and thermal shock resistance of brittle multiphase clay ceramics, together with the measurement procedures to determine these parameters, are first outlined. Published experimental data obtained for test bars containing different types of temper and fired to a range of temperatures are then compared both with theoretical predictions and between themselves. The results confirm that to produce pottery with high strength requires high firing temperatures and low temper concentrations. Conversely, to produce pottery with high toughness and thermal shock resistance requires low firing temperatures and high temper concentrations, with platy or fibrous temper being most effective. There is no convincing published evidence that strength and toughness requirements were a significant factor in determining the technological choices (clay type, temper type and concentration, and firing temperature) in the production of pottery used as containers for transport and storage. In contrast, the routine use of high temper concentrations and low firing temperatures in the production of cooking pots suggests that the requirement for high thermal shock resistance was a factor that at least influenced technological choice in this case. In addition, there is some evidence that limestone and shell were, on occasions, deliberately chosen as temper in cooking pots. The need to take into account the crucial role that the full range of environmental, technological, economic, social, political and ideological factors have in influencing technological choice is also emphasized. This review highlights the fact that our current understanding of the factors determining strength, toughness and thermal shock resistance of clay ceramics is still far from complete. Further systematic measurements of these parameters, together with the establishment of a systematic database of the range of technological choices associated with the production of cooking pots, are therefore to be encouraged.     

Problem Definition, Agenda Access, and Policy Choice

Problem definition is fundamental to public policy making, intertwined as it is with the political process throughout the activities of issue initiation, program design, and legislative enactment. Yet problem definition remains in immature analytic construct, productive of only a modest amount of scholarship that is lacking a coherent shared framework. Seeking to address this deficiency, this article systematically examines the origins, elements, and consequences of problem definition, relating this discussion to previous literature in the area, current policymaking developments, and future research needs.     

Ukraine's Geopolitical Choice, 2009

A noted specialist in international affairs and former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine reviews and analyzes the history of independent Ukraine's relations with Russia and the West following the disintegration of the Soviet Union. The author proceeds to examine the multifaceted Western position toward Kyiv as it has evolved through June 2009, paying due attention to the European Union and NATO. He then discusses the factors contributing to the volatility of Ukrainian-Russian relations following the Orange Revolution of 2004, including a range of specific concerns as well as more general Russian desires for a compliant government that would pay deference to key Russian interests. Concluding sections focus on Ukraine's future geopolitical trajectory in the run-up to the country's presidential elections in early 2010 and on internal problems (constitutional, market, and energy reform) that will command urgent attention once the political situation stabilizes and the outlines of a constructive engagement that could be pursued by the West are at hand. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: F500, F520, P200. 1 figure, 1 table, 39 references.     

The Liberal Party,Free Trade and the 1841 Election

It is a paradox that the Liberal Party's electoral defeat in 1841 attested to its underlying strength and vitality. This article focuses on the impact on party unity of the free trade measures advocated by the ministry in the months preceding its fall. The Liberal Party's bold electoral platform antagonised its protectionist MPs, a group previously overlooked in the historiography, but fell short of the demands of its radical wing for political reform. While all the ingredients for fragmentation existed, unity prevailed. Protestations of loyalty to the leadership could be heard from the mouths of Liberal MPs of all shades, from stalwart protectionists who coalesced around the ministry on traditional foreign policy grounds through to the most fervent radicals who celebrated its ‘new’ direction. Such findings of cohesion contradict accounts which have hitherto viewed the 1841 electoral defeat as evidence of the party's inchoateness. Indeed, this article shifts the historiographical narrative away from addressing why the Liberals lost to the more pertinent issue of why the losses suffered were not greater. In answering that question, both the sensitivity with which the financial agenda was presented by ministers and the flexibility of different sections of the Liberal Party in interpreting and presenting the free trade measures to the electorate are underlined. Above all, Lord John Russell is rehabilitated as a ‘popular’ leader and his importance in the development of the nascent Liberal Party is unearthed.     

谈高校后勤改革中现代物业管理模式的选择

在过去的几年中,高校后勤改革作为中国体制转型过程的一个子系统,经历了巨大的变革。在国家政策的推动下,后勤改革在各个高校普遍展开,取得了显著的成效,涌现出形式、内容、特征不同的后勤服务实体,对推进高等教育发展和各种类型高校的建设发挥了不可替代的作用。但是,高校后勤改革有一个不能回避的现实,即选择何种管理模式推进高校后勤服务工作的改革和发展。本文认为选择现代物业管理模式,既是社会化分工和市场经济发展的必然要求,也是高校后勤改革的必然要求和确保此项改革有序进行的惟一途径。     

Pricing, Capacity Choice, and Financing in Transportation Networks

Abstract.  This paper explores interrelations between pricing, capacity choice, and financing in transportation networks. We build on the Mohring‐Harwitz result on self‐financing of optimally designed and priced roads and investigate it in a network environment under various types of second‐best regulation. A small network model with endogenous car ownership demonstrates that optimal congestion pricing and capacity choice over an entire network may cause user prices to increase more in initially mildly congested areas compared to heavily congested areas. Furthermore, a flat kilometer charge under optimal capacity choice may result in first‐best efficiency gains.     

试论民国时期学生自由恋爱的现实困境

经过婚姻自主观念熏陶之后,不甘于接受包办婚姻的民国时期学生开始有了自由恋爱的冲动与欲求。但是,民国时期的客观与主观环境,尚不利于学生的恋爱。学校秉承社会和家长的意志,极力避免异性学生间的接触。男女学生间过于敏感的防线,也阻挡着他们的自由来往。社交环境的欠缺,对学生间的自由恋爱造成了致命的障碍。即使有部分学生冲出羁绊,他们的恋爱在社会阻力面前也未必能有结果。自由恋爱的现实困境,必然导致相当一部分学生对自己婚姻的不满,这在某种程度上催发了学生婚姻问题的产生。     

试论写意性油画对中国传统文化精神的传承

中国油画家在学习和借鉴西方现代绘画观念、思想、技法的同时,受中国几千年传统思想意识和古代哲学、美学等文化的熏陶以及中国画中写意性语言的影响,经过几代人不懈的努力和探索,形成了具有自己独特风格的画面效果和表现形式,突出了油画的写意性特色.     

Negative Freedom,Catholic Social Doctrine,and the Conciliar Challenge of the Free Society

The idea of “negative freedom” has been at the heart of modern democratic politics; it has also been an idea regarded warily by Catholic social doctrine. To be sure, Catholic social doctrine now embraces the classic negative political freedoms like freedom of religion and freedom of speech. But the hierarchical magisterium of the Church was slow to arrive at such an embrace. And in the last decades the hierarchical magisterium has renewed its skepticism of the idea, seeing it as both important and often misused. This article considers current criticisms of negative freedom by Catholic social doctrine and seeks to respond to such criticisms by appealing to personalist conceptions of freedom in the philosophy of Charles Taylor and in the theology of Walter Kasper. Overall, the aim of the article is to establish a more sure conceptual basis for negative freedom as an essential component of the commitment by the Catholic Church at the Second Vatican Council to the free society.     

Controlling Forum Choice and Controlling Policy: Congress,Courts and the IRS

Considerable scholarly attention has been paid to litigation and its influence on social and bureaucratic policy. One area of research has focused on interest group litigation. Another area of scholarship has shown that Congress encourages individual use of the courts to monitor and control bureaucratic behavior. In several areas of law, litigants have a choice of forum by deliberate legislative design, which is sometimes derided as “forum shopping.” Little attention has been paid to the dominant national political coalition's ability to encourage forum shopping through legislation and the appointment process. One area of law that the coalition can encourage forum shopping is in challenging tax audits. It can do so through implict legislative signals and the appointment process to influence litigants to sue the Internal Revenue Service in the forum that offers the litigant the greatest chance of success. Given the prominent role of courts in setting and determining policy and given the particular prominence of taxes and tax policy over the past three decades, whether and where tax litigants choose to sue is critically important to understanding the dynamics of both tax policy and tax enforcement, as well as public policy creation and change. To demonstrate the influence of political forces on tax forum choice, I compare tax and district court filings from 1994 through to 2000. I find that as the Tax Court and national political coalition become more conservative, more taxpayers sue in the Tax Court and this “forum shopping” choice is supported by the national political coalition.