Probabilistic population projections for countries with generalized HIV/AIDS epidemics

In 2015, the United Nations (UN) issued probabilistic population projections for all countries up to 2100, by simulating future levels of total fertility and life expectancy and combining the results using a standard cohort component projection method. For the 40 countries with generalized HIV/AIDS epidemics, the mortality projections used the Spectrum/Estimation and Projection Package (EPP) model, a complex, multistate model designed for short-term projections of policy-relevant quantities for the epidemic. We propose a simpler approach that is more compatible with existing UN projection methods for other countries. Changes in life expectancy are projected probabilistically using a simple time series regression and then converted to age- and sex-specific mortality rates using model life tables designed for countries with HIV/AIDS epidemics. These are then input to the cohort component method, as for other countries. The method performed well in an out-of-sample cross-validation experiment. It gives similar short-run projections to Spectrum/EPP, while being simpler and avoiding multistate modelling.     

治理能力与社会机会——基于世界治理指标的实证研究

社会机会能够提高人类的发展水平,促进社会成员个人发展质量的提高.社会成员对社会机会的广泛共享是经济社会协调发展的基本取向,也是政府治理行为追求的重要目标之一.通过对各国政府治理能力和社会机会水平之间关系的实证研究发现,治理能力的提升有助于社会机会的扩大,能够促进全社会成员共享经济和社会发展的成果.     

制度文明的进化与平等的历程

国家文明的重要标志是制度文明,制度文明的道德立法原理乃是平等。人类追求平等的历程,表征为不断创建新的制度文明的历程;反之,人类创建制度文明的历程,同样是不懈探索平等生存发展的历程。平等的观念、思想来源于自然,萌生于人类前文明时期;国家诞生之后,这种自然平等观念、思想演变为等级式平等的制度立法原理;近代革命以来,人类中心主义的人人平等思想,成为现代人类制度的道德立法原理。人本中心论的人人平等的制度文明,从根本上忽视了自然权利、万物生命权利的平等这一存在事实,把人类引上片面征服和掠夺的道路,导致了人与自然之生态链的断裂。当代制度文明应该建立在物权与人权普遍平等的基础上。物权和人权普遍平等,构成了当代人类制度文明创建的道德立法原理。     

自然的城邦和城邦的自然——亚里士多德政治观中的张力分析

亚里士多德通过目的论路径和自然主义的演进方式塑造了具有内在紧张关系的政治观,这种紧张关系主要表现为:目的论路径展示了城邦超越、自足、理想的自然,而自然主义方式蕴涵着城邦现实性、多样化和变动性特征。好人和好公民之间的不一致是亚氏政治观紧张关系的深层体现,哲学沉思是好人(哲学家)最优良的生活方式,而城邦政治是好公民获得幸福生活的根本保障。     

澳门近十年人口自然增长概况

澳门是一个面积不到 2 4平方公里的地方 ,其人口在过去十年增加了近三成。人口的增加主要来源于移民 ,特别是来自中国内地的移民 ,他们同时亦对澳门人口的自然增长带来很大的影响 ,原因是来自中国内地的移民有较高的生育率。本文简单地介绍了这一现象 ,以及澳门人口自然增长的其他情况。     

Origins of the epithet ‘government by public relations’: Revisiting Bruce Catton's War Lords of Washington, 1948

While it might make public relations professionals and faculty cringe, the term ‘government by public relations’ is a negative one, implying that governmental decision-making is guided by appearances rather than on the merits. This tag line is a relatively common American put-down of politicians and senior civil servants. This article examines the origins of the term, locating its usage in the WWII memoirs of Bruce Catton, then a government public information officer and later a renowned popular historian of the American Civil War. Catton's use of the term, his 1948 book War Lords of Washington, and his philosophy of government public information are examined in more detail to give context to the phrase ‘government by public relations.’     

Segregation and protectionism: Institutionalised views of Aboriginal rurality

Rurality is a complex and contested term, with multiple notions and gazes amid calls for theoretical pluralism. In Australia, the spatial categories of ‘remote’, ‘rural’, ‘regional’ and ‘urban’ are applied to places that vary in their distance from an economic and political core and have differing population densities. We argue that natural resources institutions in rural Australia demand an ‘authentic’ performance of Aboriginality that is framed within orthodox and stable constructions of an Indigeneity associated with the remote category. Dominant representations of remote Aboriginal people living on traditional homelands and engaged in ‘traditional’ environmental protection are assumed to hold for all places and transposed when natural resources institutions satisfy compulsory Indigenous engagement. Such institutional requirements for authenticity exclude alternative and multiple Indigenous voices in natural resources management. Rather, Aboriginal people seek engagement across a portfolio of natural resources activities typically found in rural areas (such as mining, grazing, forestry, water allocation planning, and natural resources service delivery and enterprise development), and not just isolated in natural and cultural heritage conservation. This broad participation would more completely match their expressed aspirations and the multiple lived realities of their fluid and networked rural worlds. Using the rural town of Eidsvold in Australia as a case study, we discuss the findings of participant observation and semi-structured interviews with Indigenous people at regional natural resources management meetings and at ‘home’ in Eidsvold. Rather than a generic institutional approach, a place-based approach to understanding the complex ruralities of Aboriginal people is needed.     

How Sunday, price, and social norms influence donation behaviour

We describe a natural field experiment investigating donation behaviour. The setting was an art gallery where donations could be deposited into a transparent box in the foyer. Two aspects of the donation environment were manipulated: signs on the donation box and the initial contents of the box. We used three sign treatments: a control with no sign, a sign that thanked donors, and a sign that indicated donations would be matched. We used two initial contents treatments: one with relatively little money ($50) and one with four times as much. The average donation per donor was significantly larger in the $200 treatments but this was offset by a decrease in the propensity to donate. In the matching treatments donations were significantly larger both at the per donor and per visitor level. A control variable turned out to have the largest influence on donation behaviour: the day of the week. The average donation per visitor was 51% higher on Sundays, when compared to every other day of the week.     

From the Heart of the Middle East, the Energy of the Future: North Adriatic LNG Terminal

Petroleum is still our most important energy source and it will certainly remain that way for a long time to come. Moreover, an end of oil use is not foreseeable at the present. However, reserves are declining. Liquefied natural gas (LNG), on the other hand, is available in abundant quantities. Nevertheless, the use of LNG is useful to solve a significant problem: the LNG power stations produce much lower CO₂ emissions than petroleum. In fact, an 80% carbon dioxide reduction should be possible, as several companies are currently working on cleaner power stations, such as the LNG ones. Alternative energies are often not used enough as sources of energy. It is therefore all the more important that energy companies put a great deal of effort into supporting sustainable energy and developing cleaner technology, in order to make people less dependent on power from petroleum.      

Religion,Religiosity, and the Attitudes Toward Homosexuality—A Multilevel Analysis of 79 Countries

Although attitudes toward homosexuality have become more liberal, particularly in industrialized Western countries, there is still a great deal of variance in terms of worldwide levels of homonegativity. Using data from the two most recent waves of the World Values Survey (1999–2004, 2005–2009), this article seeks to explain this variance by means of a multilevel analysis of 79 countries. We include characteristics on the individual level, as age or gender, as well as aggregate variables linked to specificities of the nation-states. In particular, we focus on the religious denomination of a person and her religiosity to explain her attitude toward homosexuality. We find clear differences in levels of homonegativity among the followers of the individual religions.