China’s Changing Family Structure and Adolescent Development

This paper examines the relationship between family structure and junior high school students’ educational and psychosocial development and its intermediate mechanisms. Our findings show, firstly, that family structure affects children’s development, and children living with both parents have better educational and psychosocial development than those without one or both parents. Secondly, family structure affects children’s development to some extent through the two mechanisms of family socioeconomic status and parental participation in education. Thirdly, fathers and mothers play different roles in children’s development. Mothers are more important to children’s educational development, while fathers are more important to their psychosocial development. In addition, the distribution of family structure shows marked group heterogeneity, and families lacking both parents tend to be groups with a lower socioeconomic status. Since adolescent development is closely related to the acquisition of socioeconomic status in adulthood, the negative impact of parental absence on children’s development should not be neglected by academics and policy researchers.     

Condorcet’s principle and the strong no-show paradoxes

We consider two no-show paradoxes, in which a voter obtains a preferable outcome by abstaining from a vote. One arises when the casting of a ballot that ranks a candidate in first place causes that candidate to lose the election, superseded by a lower-ranked candidate. The other arises when a ballot that ranks a candidate in last place causes that candidate to win, superseding a higher-ranked candidate. We show that when there are at least four candidates and when voters may express indifference, every voting rule satisfying Condorcet’s principle must generate both of these paradoxes.     

Changes in China and China’s Diplomatic Strategy

With regard to discussions on China's diplomatic strategy, an appropriate conceptualization based on social changes in contemporary China can help us grasp the fundamental functions, underlying causes and basic direction of the strategy.     

Baby Boomer’s Substance Abuse and Researcher Indifference

The current older adult population is more likely to need and seek treatment for alcohol and drug abuse than previous cohorts of older adults, which necessitates the need for age-appropriate substance use treatment. Building on previous research that examined the lack of attention on substance use among older adults, this study examines articles addressing substance use disorders among older adults in leading gerontological and substance abuse journals and federal funding between 2011 and 2017. Publications were identified from ten leading gerontological and ten leading substance abuse journals using Medical Subject Heading (MeSH) terms. During this time-period, there were 68 and 44 articles published in gerontology and substance abuse journals respectively related to substance use disorders in older adults. Most (59.8%) addressed alcohol abuse and 7% involved intervention studies. In the 7-year period, there were 13 federal grants. A paucity of published or funded work exists in this area despite growing misuse and treatment seeking among older adults with substance use disorders. Effectively addressing substance abuse in older adults will require a coordinated effort between researchers and practitioners to establish and implement best practices for practitioners to rely on when working with substance abusing older adults.     

Marx’s International Outlook and Its Contemporary Value

Marx probed into the laws of the evolution of world history and the international system from the perspective of grand history, incisively revealing the inherent historical dynamics and evolutionary secrets of the laws of this development and thus providing a new analytical framework for our understanding of the nature of international relations and the characteristics of the era. Compared with related international relations theories of the same period, Marx’s international outlook had a unique class standpoint and methodological principles and adopted rigorous speculative logic and lofty values. Marx conducted scientific research and dialectical analysis of the laws of evolution and the intrinsic nature of international society, especially the historical mission of the proletariat. These ideas, unique in the intellectual and theoretical spectrum of international relations, provide an intellectual guide for the innovation of Chinese diplomatic theory in the new era.     

Machiavelli’s Soderini and the problem of necessity

Drawing principally on a particular example discussed by Machiavelli, this article seeks to clarify the concept of necessity and assess the Machiavellian contentions that evil-doing is in politics often necessary and justified. The example indicates that claims of necessity are best construed as allegations that evil-doing is “indispensable.” The example also indicates that these allegations are often suspect because these typically reflect limited information and knowledge and often biases and rationalizations as well, although this is not stressed by Machiavelli. Instead, Machiavelli stresses the dangers and difficulties statesmen often confront when seeking to secure important political ends or avoid costly failures, dangers and difficulties which he believes are ultimately related to the nature of human beings and the character of political elites. With respect to the morality of evil-doing, Machiavelli is suggestive of different kinds and forms of justification. Five kinds are described, and all are found unsatisfactory.     

China’s Economic Development and Development Economics Innovation

China has experienced rapid economic growth since its reform and opening up 40 years ago. The prime mover and key driver of these amazing achievements originated in China’s transformation from a planned economy to a socialist market economy, and from a closed economy to an open economy. The optimal allocation of the various factors of production and the interaction of economic growth and structural upgrading also played a significant part. China’s economic growth over the 40 years has applied, and proven effective, the general principles of development economics, and more importantly, based on the realities of China, it has contributed to theoretical innovation and institutional innovation, leading China along the road of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Entering the new era, China is committed to building a modern economic system and promoting high-quality development under the guidance of the new development concepts of innovation, coordination, green development, opening up and sharing.     

Enlightenment and Its Fortunes in China’s Modernization

Abstract

The central concept of Western Enlightenment is scientific reason. It catalyzed the development of modernity, but itself contains a series of paradoxes: between “ought” and “is,” between necessity and freedom, between universality and historicity, and so on. The impact of Enlightenment reason on China was negative in that it generated a superstitious belief in the omnipotence of scientific method and in Western experience and political principles. Consequently, Chinese liberals were unable to handle the relationship between modern Western culture and traditional local culture and the relationship between the ideals of Enlightenment modernity and the objective requirements of real-life politics. At the same time, they were unable to identify the rational and non-rational elements in Western modernity or to develop what was useful and discard what was not. The real value of the Enlightenment lies in its spirit of reflective criticism. It is, therefore, an unfinished business in terms of eliminating superstition and dogma.     

China’s Grand Strategy: Problems and Approaches

Features of the current strategic environment Qin Yaqing: Peace and development are the two main themes of the international system in the present era. The features of the current era are in sharp contrast with those of the era of "war and revolution." In the latter, the most striking expression of international relations was war between states. Survival was the first item on a state's agenda,     

The sovereign crisis and Italy’s potential output

We evaluate the effects of the European sovereign crisis on Italian potential output (natural output, in the absence of nominal rigidities) by simulating a New Keynesian model. Our results are as follows. First, the 2011–2013 recession subtracted 1.6 percentage points from potential output growth and widened the output gap. Second, the 2013 reforms limited the reduction in output capacity to 1.4 points and enhanced long-run growth by 3. Third, once a balanced budget is achieved in the medium term, reductions in either labor or capital income taxes would boost potential output growth by 0.2 points per year.     

Enlightenment Reason and Modernity: Marx’s Critical Reconstruction

Reflection on and criticism of enlightenment reason is an indispensable part of the Enlightenment itself. It is an important counterbalance to the Enlightenment myth and the crisis of modernity, as well as being a major theoretical subject for political philosophy in the age of globalization. This reflection and criticism must be grasped and examined from both the external perspective of socio-historical requirements and the internal perspective of intellectual history. While giving full credit to the achievements of Enlightenment reason and modernity, we need to review their inherent conflicts, reveal the resultant social crisis, and sort out, reflect on and reference postmodernism’s denunciation of Enlightenment reason and the crisis of modernity in order to provide a more far-reaching solution to these issues. Marx turned the critique of Enlightenment reason and modernity into a critical reconstruction of the logic of capital and the capitalist mode of production, seeing the resolution of these evils as lying in transcendence of capitalist private ownership. In this way, he brought the critique of Enlightenment reason to a climax and showed modern society a way to more advanced development.     

On Hobbes’s state of nature and game theory

Hobbes’s state of nature is often analyzed in two-person two-action non-cooperative games. By definition, this literature only focuses on duels. Yet, if we consider general games, i.e., with more than two agents, analyzing Hobbes’s state of nature in terms of duel is not completely satisfactory, since it is a very specific interpretation of the war of all against all. Therefore, we propose a definition of the state of nature for games with an arbitrary number of players. We show that this definition coincides with the strategy profile considered as the state of nature in two-person games. Furthermore, we study what we call rational states of nature (that is, strategy profiles which are both states of nature and Nash equilibria). We show that in rational states of nature, the utility level of any agent is equal to his maximin payoff. We also show that rational states of nature always exist in inessential games. Finally, we prove the existence of states of nature in a class of (not necessarily inessential) symmetric games.     

Preferences and decision errors in the winner’s curse

The problem of asymmetric information causes a winner’s curse in many environments. Given many unsuccessful attempts to eliminate it, we hypothesize that some people ‘prefer’ the lotteries underlying the winner’s curse. Study 1 shows that after removing the hypothesized cause of error, asymmetric information, half the subjects still prefer winner’s curse lotteries, implying past efforts to de-bias the winner’s curse may have been more successful than previously recognized since subjects prefer these lotteries. Study 2 shows risk-seeking preferences only partially explain lottery preferences, while non-monetary sources of utility may explain the rest. Study 2 suggests lottery preferences are not independent of context, and offers methods to reduce the winner’s curse.

Accurate Understanding of China’s Income,Consumption and Investment

Abstract

This study elaborates on the differences between resident disposable income in the flow of funds table and in the household survey; between household consumption in expenditure-based GDP and in the household survey; and between gross fixed capital formation in expenditure-based GDP and total fixed asset investment in the whole country as shown in investment statistics, from the point of view of their basic concepts and purposes, scope of specifications, data sources, calculation methods and data presentation. We show that the household survey somewhat underestimates household income and consumption, while investment statistics somewhat overestimate total investment in fixed assets. This does not, however, directly affect the accurate understanding of such major economic structures as the structure of the distribution of Chinese nationals’ disposable income among households, enterprises and government, the structure of final demand, etc.     

New Literature’s Attack on and Inheritance of Traditional Culture

Although Chinese New Literature was strongly anti-traditional in expression, this does not sever the ties of blood that link it to traditional culture; and although it advocates a Western humanistic spirit, it does not install Western literature’s aesthetic values. Due to the cultural distinctiveness and historical continuity of the Chinese language, it was never possible for the New Literature to become totally “Westernized” and turn its back on the mother culture. Therefore, when examining the modern transition of Chinese literature as a whole, we must pay attention to its conscious inheritance of the national cultural tradition and to its operating strategy of attacking traditional culture by making use of it, instead of insisting on its inevitable ties with modern Western literature. The New Literature is after all “Chinese” new literature; no matter how many external factors intervene or are involved, they cannot change its cultural attributes or identification with national culture. This is the premier precondition for our understanding of the modernity of New Literature.