Enforcing cooperation in public goods games: Is one punisher enough?

We experimentally investigate a finitely repeated public goods game setting where, in each round, access to sanctioning power is exclusively awarded to one single player per group. We show that our central ‘Top Contributors as Punishers’ institution – a mechanism by which a player needs to be the highest contributor in her group in order to earn the right to sanction others – is extremely effective in raising cooperation and welfare due to turnover in the top contributor role and to top contributors’ willingness to substantially sanction others. Our findings yield implications for the design of mechanisms intended to foster cooperation in social dilemma environments.     

“Empowerment” as efficiency and participation: gender in responsible agricultural investment principles

Amidst global concern over the state of transnational large-scale agricultural investments, several efforts have been made to set global standards for “responsible agricultural investment.” While these efforts have received mixed reviews from the international community, very little attention has been paid to the gendered language of these principles. Through examining two separate sets of agricultural investment principles – one created by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, the International Fund for Agricultural Development and the World Bank, and the other by the United Nations Committee on World Food Security – this article finds that, despite different processes and participants in the creation of these principles, they nonetheless share a language of “empowerment” targeted at women and marginalized groups. However, in contrast to early feminist discourses of empowerment, these principles instead perpetuate the notion that empowerment is to be found through efficiency, productivity and participation in land and labor markets. This article takes a critical look at this language of economic empowerment in each set of principles, and points to the dangers of equating efficiency, productivity and participation with feminist empowerment. By not acknowledging the broader gender dynamics of agricultural governance and markets, these discourses risk deepening existing inequalities rather than moving toward meaningful social change.     

Social dilemmas: When self-control benefits cooperation

Individuals in a social dilemma may experience a self-control conflict between urges to act selfishly and their better judgment to cooperate. Pairing a public goods game with a subtle framing technique, we test whether perception of self-control conflict strengthens the association between self-control and cooperation. Consistent with our hypothesis, cooperative behavior is positively associated with self-control in the treatment that raised the relative likelihood of perceiving conflict, but not associated with self-control in the treatment that lowered the likelihood. These results indicate that it is important to understand the role of self-control in cooperation.     

Building ‘cowshed cultures’: A cultural perspective on the promotion of stockmanship and animal welfare on dairy farms

Improving animal welfare is an important part of the development of the agricultural industry, particularly at a time when intensification and the encroachment of factory-style production systems is making the maintenance of human-animal relations increasingly difficult. Animal science deals with the issue of improving stockmanship by focusing on the relationships between attitudes and behaviour, under the premise that improved attitudes will lead to improved behaviour. From an analysis of 42 interviews with owners, sharemilkers and workers on dairy farms in New Zealand we present a different view, seeing behaviour instead as part of a self-reinforcing culture in which animals, humans and the physical structure all contribute to the development of farm specific ways of doing and being. We further suggest that changing one stockperson's attitude alone is insufficient to ensure a change in the culture as other actors – including animals and non-human actors – reinforce any existing culture that has developed, making both attitudinal and behavioural change difficult. We conclude by discussing the key importance of designing farm systems and structures that promote positive interactions between animals and humans and suggest that this, rather than simply promoting knowledge and attitudinal change, is likely to be the most effective way of maintaining stockmanship in the face of an industrialising agriculture.     

大学生与务工返乡青年农村创业刍议

改革开放尤其是党的十六大以来,我国农村经济社会建设在取得显著成就的同时,城乡失衡的矛盾和问题在某些方面也日益突出。如何统筹城乡发展,缩小区域差距成为“十二五”时期重大攻坚课题。立足农村发展实际,对大学生与务工返乡青年农村创业进行相关研究有历史和现实意义,大学生和务工返乡青年创业竞合将成为农村经济社会发展的强劲动力源,是当前统筹城乡发展有效的途径之一。     

中东剧变以来的东盟与海合会关系研究

中东剧变对阿拉伯世界整体格局和阿拉伯板块在国际体系中的地位产生了深刻影响。阿拉伯世界转型促使海合会正不断向阿拉伯君主共同体转型,也加快了东盟本身及其许多成员国的民主化进程。面对当前海合会从海湾次地区力量迈向中东地区性力量的战略走向,东盟在政治与经济层面加强了与海合会的协作,海合会的大国外交战略也将不断变化中的东盟纳入其重要战略目标领域。尽管如此,双边政治合作仍滞后于经贸合作,东盟—海合会自由贸易区仍是未来的首要目标。     

伊盟、伊合与中国中东人文外交

伊斯兰世界联盟与伊斯兰合作组织是泛伊斯兰主义制度化的产物,伊盟主要通过朝觐平台间接对伊斯兰国家政治施与影响,伊合则通过推进议题的方式直接对伊斯兰国家政治产生影响;我国历来重视发展与这些泛伊斯兰国际组织的友好关系,并取得了宝贵历史经验与良好的成效;在明确我国与泛伊斯兰国际组织开展人文交流与合作的资源优势、基本目标及其实现途径的基础上,探索我国对中东国家开展“全方位、多层次、宽领域”人文外交的应对之策,旨在进一步提升我国对中东伊斯兰国家的人文外交能力.     

劳动力外出务工对农户农业商品化率的影响——基于江西省四个县农户调研的实证分析

农村劳动力向非农产业和城镇转移是提高农业商品化水平的必然要求。本文使用近期的农户调研数据考察了家庭成员外出务工对农户农业商品化率的影响。计量分析表明,从整体上看,务工户与非务工户之间的农业商品率不存在显著差异。我们将农业生产按要素密集程度进行划分后,才发现成员外出务工所带来的潜在影响,务工户粮食生产的商品化率有了提高,而其它农业生产的商品化率则显著下降了。此外,我们还发现,农地市场及农村信贷市场发育对农户农业商品化发展具有重要作用。     

基于因子分析的产学研合作教育影响因素研究

本文通过构建产学研合作教育影响因素的指标体系,运用因子分析法导出其中的主要影响因素,通过多元回归分析,进一步厘清各因子的影响程度,提出促进产学研合作教育人才培养机制的对策建议。     

民众运动与平民政权的实现──中共在国民会议运动中对政权问题的探索

国民会议运动的意义和价值,并非在于仅仅起到了宣传和动员民众的作用。作为国民会议运动的实际主导者,中共更是把民众运动看作达成国民革命目标的新手段和新方法,期望通过召开由民众团体选举的国民会议,建设"真正民主政治"和"平民革命政权",从而推翻帝国主义和军阀在中国的反动统治。在国民会议运动的不同阶段,中共关于政权问题的具体主张也有变化,并在上海工人第三次武装起义期间进行了初步实践。虽然国民会议运动最终归于失败,但中共对政权问题的探索为尔后苏维埃政权建设提供了历史的启示。