Civilian Tradition and the Chinese Company Law

What is the role of company’s legislation in the Chinese transition? In the first paragraphs of the paper it will show the emergence, in a historical perspective, of some enterprise-related legal structures. These structures will be described by emphasizing model-function relations, and connecting them to the features of ‘different societies’ in which they developed. We will consider then, the role of status. The law, a legal structure as well, is used by China to manage its gradual and controlled, yet rapid, transition. By these means, it has been possible, for instance, to move status based distinctions among enterprises inside, at least formally, ‘equality’ based legal structures.     

Israeli policy toward veterans with disabilities: a snapshot and insights of the proposed reform

The policy toward Israeli veterans with disabilities is based on the Invalids Law (Benefits and Rehabilitation) of 1949 . This legislation has served as the foundation for an intricate disability policy, providing benefits and psychosocial services for veterans with disabilities. Sixty two years later, in light of the emergence of a new social model and disability rights conceptualization, there is a need to reevaluate the current legislation and policy. In this article the authors present the essence of the current Israeli disability policy and explore the applications of a proposed reform aimed at adapting the disability policy and services to the new principles of the social model of disability.     

Chinese disability independent living policy

Despite strong statements on disability rights in Chinese legislation since 1990, independent living policy as experienced by disabled people falls short of the social inclusion goals expected from such a policy commitment. Analysis of empirical research about disabled people's experiences shows that responsibility for independent living rests primarily with disabled people and their families. Only when they have no family does the government provide support, in the form of institutional care. Very little personal assistance or community-based housing is available. Minimum income support and the introduction of social services are slowly addressing the social exclusion of disabled people in China.     

我国《预防未成年人犯罪法》评析

近年来，随着对未成年人犯罪问题的愈加重视，我国儿童和青少年权益保护、犯罪预防工作日益增强，社会各界给予了愈来愈多的支持和关注，倾注了越来越多的心血。1999年6月28日，《中华人民共和国预防未成年人犯罪法》由九届全国人大常务委员会第十次会议审议通过，自1999年11月1日起施行。该法作为我国第一部预防犯罪的专门立法，在某种程度上来说具有一定的特殊性，并在我国立法史上具有重要的历史地位和意义，为我国预防未成年人犯罪起到了不可忽视的作用。然而，在该法的实施过程中，一些立法上和实践中的缺陷开始逐一显露。结合预防未成年人犯罪工作中的实践，揭示我国现行《预防未成年人犯罪法》存在的缺陷，为预防未成年人犯罪法的修订提出一定的建议。     

Bridging the Gap between Planned and Market Economies: employment policies for people with disabilities in two Chinese cities

From 1978 on wards, China has experienced a radical transition from a centrally-controlled planned economy to a market economy. At the same time, the Chinese economy is developing at high speed. This dynamic situation poses numerous opportunities and challenges to people with disabilities in China. The research finds that, with the help of government's employment policies, disabled people in two Chinese cities have benefited from both the market reforms and high speed economic growth. The Chinese government did not simply throw away the previous institutional arrangements and withdraw from its responsibility for supporting people with disabilities. In contrast, it adjusted the previous policies in order to mobilise resources from the newly-developing market economy. However, the policies have their limitations. They are temporary in nature and suitable for the transitional period only. There are potential problems and challenges ahead for disabled people in a fully fledged market economy in China.     

Disability advocacy in Kinshasa,Democratic Republic of the Congo

This article frames a discussion of disability advocacy in Kinshasa by arguing the importance of disability rights legislation for the quality of life of people with disabilities and by outlining the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s situation as a nation characterized by conflict. The author provides an overview of the recent positive steps the government has taken to affirm the rights of its citizens with disabilities, discusses the strong disability advocacy movement based in the capital city of Kinshasa, and identifies some of the challenges to Congolese disability rights legislation.     

The Right to Return in China

The right to return has been affirmed as a fundamental human right in several international instruments. While being a fundamental human right, each state has the sovereign right to regulate the right to return in accordance with its own laws. The regulation of the right to return, however, is not only an attribute of sovereignty but an issue with important political, economic and security implications for the state. Given its significance, it is understandable and desirable that states regulate the right to return. The regulation must however take account of both the interests of the state and the human rights dimension of the right. A careful and well-coordinated returning strategy with a well-defined the right to return focus could enhance China's economic progress as well as its international human rights image.
China's current policies on the right to return still reflect a closed culture. Few among the 5 million Huaqiao lodge applications to return to China for permanent residence or employment. Eleven million illegal migrants have difficulty meeting the impracticable requirements of passport re-issue, replacement and extension. The Chinese government's behaviour in imposing limitations on citizens from returning to China is unacceptable. China may have some justifications for its restrictive approach, but on balance, has more to gain from adopting a more liberal approach. The issue of the right to return in China is crucial both for the future of China, and for development of the right to return in the world.     

Disability and social protection in Latin American countries

This article aims to compare and analyse the different models used to define and understand disability in the legislation on disability and social protection in five Latin American countries. Five countries with different structure and historical development of social protection systems were selected (Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica and Mexico) and a thematic analysis of 75 legal documents was conducted. The results demonstrate a contradiction between definitions and perspectives used to understand and establish strategies to include disabled people. Indeed, the five countries have used an International Classification of Functionings, Health and Disability perspective in their legislation on disability, but an individual perspective for the social protection legislation. The article offers insight into the inherent tensions presented in such models given the legislative and policy framework around them and reflects on the impact this has for implementation.     

The Use of Law to Protect and Promote Age-Friendly Environment

China had more than 200 million elderly people by the end of 2013 while the urbanization rate was over 50%, indicating the population ageing is interacted with the city developing. With the aim of letting more elderly adults participate in society and allowing them to share the fruits of economic and social development, Livable Environment was added as a separate chapter to the revised Law of the People's Republic of China on Protection of the Rights and Interest of the Elderly in December 2012. This article analyzes the new regulations on age-friendly environment in detail and then review the historical development of relative regulations regarding livable environment. Furthermore, the article analyzes the effects of legislation on building an age-friendly environment in the future.     

我国无障碍立法与构想

无障碍已成为国际公认的一项重要权利,而且与其他基本权利的实现密切相关.本文在厘清无障碍概念及发展的基础上,阐述我国无障碍立法的必要性和可行性,从依法治国的基本方略角度探讨无障碍立法在完善法治体系中的重要意义.无障碍立法对于引领全体社会成员正确理解和维护无障碍环境,对于我国残疾人事业和人权事业的发展都具有重要的推动作用.在无障碍立法中,应当参考域外无障碍法例,比较不同的立法模式,建立以权利为本位,以物质无障碍、信息无障碍、社区服务无障碍为主干,强化无障碍环境的监督和管理,完善法律责任,加大违法成本,从而建立和完善具有中国社会主义特色的无障碍法律制度.     

西方残障身份发展理论述评及本土化思考

积极的残障身份认同对残障者本身具有重要意义,残障身份发展是残障者实现身份认同的路径,理解残障身份发展的过程也可以让残疾人工作者更好地为残障者提供教育、康复等相关服务。本文通过梳理较为典型的西方残障身份发展理论,结合国内残障身份相关研究及本土社会文化背景展开讨论。文章认为,在西方残障身份发展理论框架下,残障者形成积极身份认同的关键在于认同并融入一套在残障社区内共享的残障文化,而在我国社会文化背景下,目前并没有一套成体系的残障文化,残障者也难以体会残障的文化身份感,国内残障者的身份认同缺少本土残障文化依靠。     

Multiculturalism and Disability: a critical perspective

In an effort to counter discrimination and powerlessness, the disability community has espoused sociopolitical and cultural factors as defining characteristics of disability identity. This view of disability has replaced the historical medical model of disability as a deficit, and has had important implications for social action, political agendas, legislation and overall quality of life for individuals with disabilities. This article reviews current multicultural thinking, and offers a critical view of the advantages and disadvantages of positioning disability within the emergent multicultural discourse. Implications for future thinking and action to promote equal opportunity and self-determination for persons with disabilities as a cultural group with a political agenda are then advanced.     

Mapping the terrain of disability legislation: the case of Israel

In this study we systematically map and analyze all disability-related laws and regulations in Israel from 1948 – the year the State of Israel was established – to the present. All 55 laws and 124 regulations (and their amendments) that addressed disability were analyzed via qualitative content analysis; we categorized the legislation into either bio-medical-based policy or rights-based policy. Findings show that most of the legislation reflects the bio-medical approach. Bio-medical-based legislation is being carried out in Israel alongside rights-based legislation even after the enactment of the Equal Rights for Persons with Disabilities Law of 1998. It seems that legislators tend to perceive disability as synonymous to impairment, as a personal tragedy and a medical problem, rather than as a civil rights issue.     

Applying a barriers approach to monitoring disabled people's employment: implications for the Disability Discrimination Act 2005

The year 2005 witnessed the passing of the Disability Discrimination Act 2005 through Parliament. The Act responds in part to the perceived need for more proactive legislation that seeks to encourage good employer and service provider practice from the outset and diminish discriminatory action. This article focuses on the employment provisions of the 2005 Act. The article is based on a scoping study carried out during the gestation of the Act that looks at the challenges of applying a barriers approach to a disability employment monitoring schemes. Monitoring schemes have been a key part of recent anti-discriminatory legislation. The text of the Act and its Guidance might suggest that the future of monitoring as an explicit feature of proactive employer practice is uncertain. The article makes clear however the importance of disability employment monitoring if disabled people are to be better represented and receive equitable treatment in the workplace.     

The empowerment of marginals: strategic paradoxes

This article is about the disability movement in the Netherlands and its strategies for empowerment of disabled people. Only since the end of 2003 has the Netherlands enjoyed anti‐discrimination legislation for disabled people. But, how important actually is legislation for the empowerment of disabled people? To answer this question, we take a closer look at social movements and their involvement in empowerment and active citizenship. We criticise the disregard of differences and care in notions of active citizenship and propose instead the idea of a ‘varied society’ based on the notions of diverse and ‘careful citizenship’. One of our main arguments is that empowerment strategies necessary to create this kind of society are above all bottom‐up strategies. However, the highly organised disability movement in the Netherlands is confronted with strategic paradoxes that have ‘de‐powering’ consequences. Based on these paradoxes, five recommendations for the disability movement in the Netherlands are presented.     

Return to work still possible after several years as a disability pensioner due to musculoskeletal disorders: a population-based study after new legislation in Sweden permitting "resting disability pension"

Different strategies have been used to stimulate a return to work (RTW) among individuals suffering from long-term ailments. In Sweden a new law on "resting disability pension" permits disability pensioners to go back to work without jeopardising their benefits. In this study different variables related to RTW during 2000 by means of this legislation were identified among disability pensioners with musculoskeletal disorders. Individuals in the study group, when compared to a control group, had more often been disability pensioners for several years, had additional education, estimated their previous job to have been physically strenuous to a lesser degree, were more satisfied with the treatment at the social insurance office and had a more positive self-image. This study shows that it may be meaningful to continue/resume rehabilitation efforts and to try to motivate an individual suffering from musculoskeletal disorders to return to work even after several years as a disability pensioner.     

Three Days to Walk: a personal story of life writing and disability consciousness in China

Through a close reading of Three Days to Walk, a memoir of disability by Chinese writer Zhang Yuncheng, this paper develops a new understanding of self-narrated life writing and its intersection with disability consciousness in the contemporary Chinese context. It examines the changing nature of disability life writing since the end of the early 1980s, a time when the images and voices of disabled began to emerge from effective cultural invisibility and silence. In a move away from state-sponsored ‘triumph over tragedy’ biographical narratives typical of the immediate post-Cultural Revolution period, Three Days to Walk is characteristic of a new popular trend to publish self-narrated life stories that reveal unique and intimate histories of disability experience both imbued with and propelled by a burgeoning sense of disability consciousness in the Chinese context.     

为公用事业市场化经营创造一个良好的法律环境——基于特许经营融资的视角

从特许经营项目可融资性角度,分析我国目前特许经营立法及实践中存在的问题,并就如何提高政府依法行政能力和为公用事业市场化经营创造更好的法律环境提出建议。     

Afraid to care; unable to care: A critical ethnography within a long-term care home

This paper describes the findings of a critical ethnographic research study conducted in an urban long-term care home. While our intention was to learn more about the culture of care, specifically as it relates to mental health care provision, the participants in the study consistently spoke with us about (what we have labeled as) a culture of compliance. In a context where new long-term care legislation is being implemented along with new, standardized resident assessment instruments, gaining a deeper understanding of the (un)intended consequences of government's efforts to ensure a high quality of care is of paramount importance. This research demonstrates how policy-driven structural mechanisms can (re)produce conditions that result in frontline staff being afraid and unable to care, and thus contributes to a better understanding of the lived experience of frontline long-term care staff who find that their caregiving responsibilities are displaced by caregiving accountabilities.     

From isolated fence to inclusive society: the transformational disability policy in China

China’s disability policies are changing, some of which are gradually closer to the requirements of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Based on the social model of disability, this article explains the driving forces of disability policy reform, and especially adopts the critical policy analysis approach to evaluate the revised education policy along with the rehabilitation policy of disabled people. The inclusive education policy is improving disability policy issues the most compared with others because of the disability advocacy by disabled persons’ self-help organizations. Meanwhile, the nascent rehabilitation policy is typically top-down oriented by the government. Public participation may be the main way forward, especially with the growth of the disability movement in China. It is hoped that scholars pay more attention to the transformational disability policy in non-western settings.