Continuously Representable Paretian Quasi-Orders

Two forms of continuity are defined for Pareto representations of preferences. They are designated “continuity” and “coordinate continuity.” Characterizations are given of those Pareto representable preferences that are continuously representable and, in dimension two, of those that are coordinate-continuously representable.     

Fatherhood regimes and father involvement in France and the UK

This paper contrasts and compares the institutional framework for fatherhood and father involvement and the survey evidence relating to fathers’ contribution to childcare and domestic work in the two countries. It shows that while men's contribution to such activities appears to be increasing in both France and the UK, change is slow and father involvement does not necessarily seem to correlate directly either with patterns of female labour force participation or with the support offered by the institutional framework. The authors explore the theoretical frameworks most appropriate for explaining their findings and situate them primarily in terms of Pfau-Effinger's theorization of the gender arrangement (1998, 2002, 2004). The authors conclude that while change in father involvement is slow, the introduction of statutory and organizational work–life balance measures which alter the gender order open up opportunities for negotiated change in the division of the labour in the home.     

Sharing beliefs and the absence of betting in the Choquet expected utility model

Choquet expected utility maximizers tend to behave in a more “cautious” way than Bayesian agents, i. e. expected utility maximizers. We illustrate this phenomenon in the particular case of betting behavior. Specifically, consider agents who are Choquet expected utility maximizers. Then, if the economy is large, Pareto optimal allocations provide full insurance if and only if the agents share at least on prior, i. e., if the intersection of the core of the capacities representing their beliefs is non empty. In the expected utility case, this is true only if they have a common prior. Received: July 2000; revised version: May 2001     

A sociological economy of HIV/AIDS vaccine partnerships: case studies from Africa and India

Public–private partnerships (PPPs) are perhaps the key emergent theme in the delivery of what the socio-economic literature terms global public goods. In light of the problems relating to the distribution of health services and products in developing countries, partnerships between public and private institutions are often proposed as an innovative mechanism to reconnect and reorient supply and demand. In this area, the International Aids Vaccine Initiative (IAVI), which is driving the development of candidate HIV/AIDS vaccines through injections of capital into the research process, represents a significant case study. IAVI seeks to form partnerships between key public and private interests committing them to sharing the risks, costs and benefits of research into an effective and affordable vaccine against HIV. Our empirical work covers partnerships based in several countries including Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and India. Our early findings highlight IAVI's ability as a learning institution as it adapts its institutional arrangements to various local contexts. An offshoot of this appears to be the building of real local capacity.     

How to combine pareto optimality with liberty considerations

I argue that the liberty condition of Sen's important impossibility of a Paretian liberal result is not a condition that liberals (or libertarians) would accept. The problem is that an appropriate liberty condition must be formulated in terms of consent - not in terms of preference. To formulate an adequate condition the framework needs to expand from collective choice rules (which only take information about preferences as input) to rights-based social choice rules (which also take as input information about which options have been consented to and which would violate someone's rights). I formulate a more adequate liberty condition based on the notion of consent that is acceptable to liberals, and then show that Pareto optimality is incompatible even with that condition. I then show how the liberty condition can be weakened in a plausible manner, and describe an interesting class of theories - rights-based Paretian theories - that satisfy the Pareto optimality requirement while being sensitive to liberty considerations.     

“竞合”理论的帕累托效应研究

企业竞争战略理论已经进入了合作竞争时代.为了揭示竞合理论的形成及其特性,通过运用博弈理论的分析方法,文章剖析了竞合理论形成的博弈机制,并得出了这种博弈机制不仅能满足企业追求利润最大化的要求,而且也符合整个社会的帕累托原则.     

Expanding the focus of cost–benefit analysis for food safety: a multi-factorial risk prioritization approach

A pressing need in the area of food safety is a tool for making overall, macro-judgments about which risks should be given priority for management. Governments often seek to base this prioritization on public health impacts only to find that other considerations also influence the prioritization process. A multi-factorial approach formally recognizes that public health, market-level impacts, consumer risk preferences and acceptance, and the social sensitivity of particular risks all play a role in prioritization. It also provides decision-makers with a variety of information outputs that allow risk prioritization to be considered along different dimensions. Macro-level prioritization of risks based on multiple factors is an important expanded use of cost–benefit analysis to manage risk.     

城乡协调发展:理论与实证的分析——以黑龙江省为案例的讨论

在当前建设社会主义新农村目标提出之际,回顾以往关于城乡协调发展理论的讨论,我们需要深思:城乡协调发展的实质究竟是什么?正本清源,卡尔多改进作为城乡协调发展的实质,而建立收益——成本评估机制以期实现改进成本的最小化则成为必须要关注的内容。以城乡产业差异为主要对象的卡尔多改进的优化路径为通过农村中的产业化发展模式,实现增加非农产业人口、减少农业人口。文中以黑龙江省为案例展开了详细的讨论。     

逆向选择条件下带奖惩金的两期保险契约模型及其Pareto改进性研究

为了更有效的规避影响保险市场交易效率的逆向选择问题,本文分投保人风险类型为两种和多种情形建立了带奖惩金的两期保险契约模型,首次提出可以用奖励金和惩罚金有效甄别投保人的风险类型。该模型根据投保人第一个保险期内的索赔情况在第二个保险期对其进行奖励或惩罚,高风险类型的投保人如果选择为低风险类型投保人设计的保险契约,则其在第二阶段受到惩罚的概率要远远大于得到奖励的概率,即风险越高的投保人越害怕惩罚金,因此所建模型满足斯彭斯-莫里斯分离条件。带奖惩金的两期保险契约模型中保险公司的期望利润仍然为0,并不会给投保人带来额外的经济负担,却能够实现对传统部分保险契约简单重复两次的严格帕累托改进。最后采用一个算例说明了该模型的有效性。     

在关联与无涉之间--关于社会学研究方法的再思考

价值立场的问题一直是社会科学研究中重要而又容易引起争议的问题,社会学作为一门独立的学科有其自身的一套研究方法,同时也涉及到遵循何种价值立场的问题.从经典的社会学家那里我们可以获得这样的启发,在研究社会现象时我们总是带有一定的目的或者说价值兴趣,但在研究过程中则应该努力做到价值无涉,还原事实本身.