Domestic Policy Initiatives Research Articles

Russian humanitarian policy: problems and solutions

The article examines some problems of Russia’s humanitarian policy and humanitarian cooperation. According to the author, domestic humanitarianism does not go beyond the boundaries established by the Helsinki Final Act. The formulation of tasks and directions of domestic humanitarian policy contained in strategic planning documents is reduced only to a description of the methods and conditions of communication, leaving the specifics of humanitarian activities and humanitarian instruments outside the scope of strategic planning documents, thereby complicating its institutionalization. The author believes that the goal of humanitarian cooperation may be the formation of a global structure of support for domestic foreign policy initiatives, representing a dense network of interactions that provides ripple effects, expanding Russia’s influence and forming new dependencies. But achieving such a goal is impossible without putting forward a clear alternative to the modern world order, which will reflect not only the interests of Russia, but also of countries that disagree with the Western-centric world order.

France’s presidential election

French President Emmanuel Macron won a second term in a run-off election on 24 April, beating challenger Marine Le Pen by 17 percentage points. But Le Pen received the highest-ever number of votes for a far-right presidential candidate, illustrating how French politics is continuing to become polarised around the extremes. An emboldened Macron will seek to launch new domestic-policy initiatives and redouble his diplomatic efforts related to the war in Ukraine. He will also pursue an ambitious policy agenda in the European Union, focused on building a more robust indigenous economic base, reducing energy dependencies and improving European defence capabilities.

Leveraging the Entrepreneurial Method as a Tool for the Circular Economy: The Case of Wood Waste

New global and domestic policy and regulatory initiatives promoting a circular economy have renewed interest in the beneficial repurposing of commercial waste streams. Likewise, consumer trends and customers’ increased understanding of what they purchase, where it comes from, and what happens to it post-consumption have forced firms to consider reducing and reusing their production waste streams. The forest products industry is an exemplar of becoming more adept at reorganising and exploiting repurposed waste streams for beneficial reuse. This paper explores three case studies from the Australian forestry sector that illustrate how wood waste is being profitably repurposed as an input into other products. We use the lens of the entrepreneurial method to explore how firms recognise, strategically access, and exploit the sustainable opportunities that can range from sustainably sourced inputs to environmental-, social-, and governance-driven consumption and investments. Effectual logic allows the reconceptualisation of forestry waste streams into inputs for use in creating new commercial products and provides a theoretical framework. While the repurposing of wood waste is profitable for the forestry firm, we found that social and economic gains reach far beyond the region in which these activities occur. Innovations often stimulate other innovations, resulting in a virtuous cycle within regional Australia’s emerging circular economy.

Механизмы влияния ЕС на международное регулирование цифровой экономики (аналитический обзор)

The European Union (EU) is trying to increase its influence on the international regulation of the digital economy through domestic and foreign policy initiatives. The EU’s digital strategy, adopted in 2020, envisages measures to further consolidate the single digital market and promote EU standards and regulation internationally. The main goal of the strategy is to ensure the EU’s digital sovereignty. This objective is at the core of policy measures in three priority areas: the elimination of remaining barriers in the internal market, the development of advanced technologies, and the safeguarding of the rights, freedoms and development of democracy in Europe. These three strategic priorities determine sectoral policies: 5/6G development, high performing computers, regulation of digital markets and platforms, cybersecurity, and data governance. The EU uses regulatory, economic, institutional, networking, and foreign policy instruments and mechanisms to achieve its objectives in specific policy areas. Regulation includes further raising standards for personal data protection and consumer rights, control over digital platforms, laying down a legal framework for the development of cutting-edge technologies, attracting investments, and allocating the EU’s own resources to potentially occupy niches in international markets in the future, all of which will strengthen the EU’s claim to leadership in regulating the digital economy and ensure its digital sovereignty. Foreign policy mechanisms are an important part of the toolkit and include a developed European diplomacy, established ties through the Neighbourhood Policy, and the conditionality of development aid.

Safeguarding women at work? Lessons from Aotearoa New Zealand on effectively implementing domestic violence policies

Although domestic violence is increasingly acknowledged as a workplace issue and a gender equality issue, a gap remains in the effective implementation of domestic violence policies in workplaces. The Domestic Violence – Victims Protection Act passed in 2018 in Aotearoa New Zealand was a global landmark for holding workplaces accountable for safeguarding victims through a codification of employer responsibility. While the legislation is a milestone, such moves are nascent compared with other workplace gender equality initiatives. In this article, we assess ‘where we are now’ in relation to domestic violence policy initiatives, arguing that knowledge necessary for successful policy implementation is limited by the historical ‘gender blindness’ of industrial relations scholarship. For successful implementation, scholars and practitioners must understand domestic violence as a public issue embedded in broader patterns of gender inequality, reinforced by a gendered labour market. Drawing upon vignettes of victims’ experiences from empirical data on intimate partner stalking in Aotearoa New Zealand, a research and practice agenda is proposed to consider ‘where to next’ for implementing domestic violence policies. Our agenda proposes recognising domestic violence as a gendered, public issue which blurs boundaries between work, home and society in order to truly safeguard women at work.

ТРАНСПОРТНЫЕ КОММУНИКАЦИИ КАК ИНСТРУМЕНТ РЕАЛИЗАЦИИ ВНУТРЕННЕЙ И ВНЕШНЕЙ ПОЛИТИКИ МОНГОЛИИ

The article examines Mongolia - a landlocked country located between its neighbors, the Russian Federation and the PRC. Due to the lack of direct access to the sea, limited geographical opportunities, as well as due to certain historical aspects, Mongolia faces challenges that are directly related to its foreign and domestic policy initiatives. These include the need to diversify natural resources to accelerate the country's socio-economic development and increase its influence on the world stage. During its socialist existence, Mongolia was oriented towards the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. After the collapse of the socialist bloc, Mongolia followed the path of democratic transformations, defining integration with Northeast Asia as a foreign policy priority. The geographical location of Mongolia, the remote distance from the seas and the location between two large neighbors make its external transport links very important from the point of view of international trade for the country. In this regard, the development of transport infrastructure will help economic diversification and sustainable development of Mongolia. The regional cooperation and integration are Mongolia's main goals to maximize the benefits of its geographic location. Mongolia currently uses Chinese ports for almost all its imports and exports and has a small volume of freight traffic through Russian Pacific ports to ship goods to and from North America. In this regard, to reduce economic dependence on China, the Mongolian side interested in expanding cooperation with Russia in the development of transport communications to create a competitive pricing of exported products. At the same time, the implementation of a successful foreign policy is hampered by the country's internal political processes associated with an unfair distribution of power, government instability, high level of corruption, and the absence of a unified and consistent resource policy■丨n addition, as noted by Mongolian experts, to solve the problem of diversifying the economy it is necessary to improve the legal environment for investment, and to increase the transparency of the work of foreign mining companies

FOREIGN AND DOMESTIC POLICY OF THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE IN THE ESTIMATES BULGARIAN MILITARY ATTACHÉ IN ISTANBUL, COLONEL TODOR MARKOV (JULY 1914 – OCTOBER 1915)

The aim of this article is study of the information about the domestic political situation in the Ottoman Empire and the foreign policy of the Porte that was provided to the government and the General Staff of Bulgaria by the military attache in Istanbul Colonel Todor Markov. His views about the process of rapprochement between Sofia and Istanbul at the beginning of the First World War, his attitude towards Porte as a potential partner of Bulgaria are indicative in the context of understanding the mood of the Bulgarian military and diplomatic elite. He sent to Sofia telegrams, reports, bulletins. These documents form an idea of the colonel’s foreign policy preferences and his attitude towards the Bulgarian-Ottoman partnership. Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire systematically approached each other under the influence of Germany from July 1914 to October 1915. Colonel Todor Markov has expressed disapproval of Istanbul’s domestic and foreign policy initiatives since the fall of 1914. The military attache clearly does not believe in the power of Ottoman weapons and in the monolithic nature of the Ottoman Empire. He does not directly express his attitude to the prospect of military cooperation between Sofia and Istanbul, but the facts presented by him indicate the unreliability of Porte as a military-strategic partner. The First World War ended in defeat and significant territorial losses for them.

How did Ferdinand I of Saxe-Coburg‑Gotha become Frenchman?

The aim of the article is to reveal the image of the Prince/Tsar Ferdinand in the historiography of the Russian Empire and to identify the factors that influenced the interpretation of the activities of the Bulgarian monarch. Research methodology. The concept of “image”, which is considered as a form of representations of various aspects of life and work of the Bulgarian Prince/King Ferdinand in the works of Russian historians of the late XIX – early XX centuries, was important for achieving the goal set in the work. We can consider individual images created by different researchers as well as general one which was formed under the influence of all the above-mentioned researchers. It should be noted that the representations are subjective and do not correspond to the realities of the domestic and foreign policy of the Bulgarian monarch or partially coincide with them. Main results. The author outlined the circumstances of international situation in Europe and in the Balkans in particular, which in the last quarter of the XIX and in the first twenty years of the last century determined the assessments of the domestic and foreign policy initiatives of the Bulgarian monarch Ferdinand I Coburg made by Russian historians. Other factors that influenced the interpretations of researchers, including their political views and the affiliation to a particular state institution, are also revealed in the work. The author notes the desire of the university professorship to create more neutral images of the Bulgarian prince, in contrast to the scientists involved in political battles in the interests of certain parties. Scientific novelty. The author for the first time described the image of Ferdinand I in the historiography of the Russian Empire, and also clarified the factors that determined the assessments of the Bulgarian prince activities. The type of the article: empirical.

Policy, Perceptions, and Practice: A Study of Educational Leadership and Their Balancing of Expectations and Interests at Micro-level

As international and domestic policy initiatives continue to sweep over higher education, it is of utmost importance to study how those responsible for the implementation of the many initiatives taken perceive and respond to the many expectations about change and renewal. Through three different analytical perspectives — a managerial, a disciplinary, and a stakeholder perspective — the current article offers insights into how educational leaders responsible for the management of study programmes at micro-level interpret external expectations and how they prioritize between them. Based on data derived from a representative sample of Norwegian educational leaders, the current article finds — somewhat surprisingly — that the managerial perspective is less relevant for understanding the sense-making of educational leaders and how they prioritize between different tasks in their daily work. Disciplinary and the stakeholder perspectives are in this respect more relevant for explaining the practices related to programme management. The study provides indications of a (continued) gap between macro-level policy-making and its implementation at micro-level. In the conclusion, the findings are reflected upon and implications for policy and practice are outlined.

Is Indonesia utilising its international partners? The driving forces behind Forest Management Units

International forest regimes have been influencing the development of Indonesia's forest policy, and have complemented its domestic policy initiatives. Indonesian political entities utilise the regimes to pursue bureaucratic benefits and national interests. Forest Management Units (FMUs) comprise our heuristic model. We identified international and domestic actors and institutions that underlie the concept of FMUs and how FMUs are implemented along with the actors' interests. We built our framework and propositions based on bureaucratic politics theory and the theorem on pathways of influence. We used observations, content analysis, and expert interviews to distinguish among actors and institutions, as well as various actors' interests in FMU development. We found that the German government, via the German company Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit GmbH (GIZ), is the most powerful actor behind FMUs. International actors have dual motivations for supporting FMUs: (i) formally, they want to find the clearest, most efficient way to invest their international cooperation funds in tropical countries and to counter global deforestation; and (ii) informally, they want to counter the influence of Indonesian palm oil plantations. In addition, international interests could be contrary to domestic interests in terms of utilising FMUs. There is a strong, converging concern shared by international and domestic actors, whereby domestic actors use the formal goals of international regimes to pursue domestic interests. Domestic bureaucracies use FMU programmes to relocate power back to the central bureaucracies by preparing instruments that are formally in line with international regimes, but informal in that these instruments are dominated by domestic bureaucracies. For example, the instruments include reinforcing state forest areas, promoting forest benefits, centralising the budget, capacity building, and centralising information.

Clemency and the Unitary Executive

President Obama’s use of enforcement discretion to achieve important domestic policy initiatives – including in the field of criminal law – have sparked a vigorous debate about where the President’s duty under the Take Care Clause ends and legitimate enforcement discretion begins. But even with broad power to set enforcement charging policies, the President controls only the discretion of his or her agents at the front-end to achieve policy goals. What about enforcement decisions already made, either by his or her own agents or actors in previous administrations, with which the President disagrees? The Framers anticipated this issue in the context of criminal law and vested the President with broad and explicit back-end control through the constitutional pardon power. But while centralized authority over enforcement discretion at the front-end has grown, the clemency power finds itself falling into desuetude.This Article explores the fall of the clemency power and argues for its resurrection as a critical mechanism for the President to assert control over the executive branch in criminal cases. While clemency has typically been referred to as an exercise of mercy and even analogized to religious forgiveness, it also serves a more structurally important role in the American constitutional order that has been all but overlooked. It is a critical mechanism for the President to control the executive department. Those in favor of a unitary executive should encourage its more robust employment. But even critics of unitary executive theory should embrace clemency as a mechanism of control because, whatever the merits of other unitary executive claims involving military power or oversight over administrative agencies, clemency stands on different footing. It is explicitly and unambiguously grounded in the Constitution’s text, and it comes with an established historical pedigree. It is also a crucial checking mechanism given the landscape of criminal justice today. The current environment of overbroad federal criminal laws and excessive charging by federal prosecutors has produced a criminal justice system of unprecedented size and scope with overcrowded and expensive federal prisons and hundreds of thousands of individuals hindered from reentering society because of a federal record. Clemency is a key tool for addressing poor enforcement decisions and injustices in this system, as well as checking disparities in how different United States Attorneys enforce the law.

The Obama Presidencies, African-American Politics, and the Inclusionary Dilemma

The Obama Presidencies, African-American Politics, and the Inclusionary Dilemma

Assessing policies for attracting international students: case of Malaysia

While the world market for international students in higher education is dominated by traditional major players such as the US, UK and Australia, Malaysia has emerged as a recent contender with a market share of 2%. There is a gap in the literature in assessing the contributions of policy initiatives, including trade agreements, towards attracting inbound international students, especially from emerging contenders such as Malaysia. The objective of this paper is to compare and assess the policy initiatives at the unilateral, multilateral, regional and bilateral level and their impact on the host environment which is defined in terms of the key pull factors that have attracted international students to Malaysia. The main findings show that domestic policy initiatives have enhanced the host environment for attracting international students by providing a governance system that protects the interests of international students through its regulations. Efforts to improve quality assurance and accreditation also serve to attract international students. The regulation of fees contributed towards competitively priced programmes that are also pull factors. Multilateral, regional and bilateral commitments are relatively new, emerging only after 2006, and have less potential influence on inflows of international students as these commitments reflect, at best, existing practices in this sector.

Customs in the Regional Trade Agreements of Australia and New Zealand: Efforts to Improve Customs Instruments and Develop Trade

Australian and New Zealand regional trade agreements have improved customs administration and built opportunities for trade-driven economic development. As champions of trade liberalization and economic reform and multilateral trade liberalization, both Australia and New Zealand have increasingly focused on regional trade agreements (notably free trade agreements (FTAs)) to expand opportunities for trade in the Asia-Pacific region. This effort has important implications for customs law and administration. In addition, a renewed focus on efficiency, risk management, and border security means that domestic policy initiatives from within Australia and New Zealand are now increasingly being reflected in the respective countries’ trade negotiating agenda. This article offers a practitioner’s perspective on these and related developments. It updates contemporary developments in Australia and New Zealand and highlights useful lessons. This article begins with a discussion of the importance of trade facilitation through driving efficiency in customs administration. It also offers an overview of the Australian context of customs reform and Australia?s efficiency agenda. It then reviews the current suite of trade agreements in Australia and New Zealand, highlighting the approach taken to customs issues. After addressing the facilitation agenda, revenue issues, and security issues, this article concludes that Australia and New Zealand have been successful in making progress in improving customs instruments and developing trade. It suggests there may be lessons for other trade negotiating agendas in the incremental and under-the-radar approach that has been taken over more than a decade in relation to customs in Australian and New Zealand trade agreements.

Public Policy and the Ethics of Care

Considered here are Eva Feder Kittay's Love's Labor (1999) and Mona Harrington's Care and Equality (1999). Although these books are written from very different disciplinary perspectives, Kittay and Harrington share conviction that public policy in United States must be altered to give more support not only to recipients of care-the young, old, ill, or disabled-but also to those who take care of them. Each presents a thoughtful critique of individualistic premises of classical liberal philosophy, and offers a persuasive reformulation that incorporates an understanding of human dependency. Each also presents concrete policy prescriptions rooted in that new understanding. Harrington and Kittay create a wonderfully paired set of books because they support their similar perspectives with radically different materials, a diversity that makes their arguments all more thought-provoking and convincing. Kittay is a philosopher; Harrington trained as a political scientist and lawyer. At core of Kittay's work is her contention that John Rawls's theory of justice is deficient because it does not understand that dependency and need to care for dependents are inescapable aspects of human condition. The heart of Harrington's work is a provocative interpretation of many of domestic policy initiatives and political crises of Clinton administration. Despite their different focuses, authors share conviction that philosophy matters to public policy. How we understand nature of human beings and principles of justice is reflected in law and social practice, and one of ways to improve policy is to improve our understanding of principles of justice. Kittay argues that condition of dependency affects not only those persons who are weak, ill, or disabled, but also those who take care of them. Rawls's depiction of original position fails to recognize that the conditions of human development, disease, and decline are . . . unalterable, as are

Meeting the Needs of Abused Older Women? A British Columbia and Yukon Transition House Survey

ABSTRACTOlder women victims of violence by a partner or family member are more often categorized as victims of elder abuse, not victims of family violence. Their needs are assessed, if at all, by social and health service agencies, often with little knowledge or understanding of domestic violence, while domestic violence policy initiatives, advocacy, and services focus on younger women and children. A survey of domestic violence services in British Columbia and the Yukon found that women over 60 years of age were a very small fraction, generally less than two percent, of women served, and those 50 to 59 years of age were also substantially under-represented. Only four percent of respondents had special services for older women. Comments from respondents confirm that abused older women face enormous difficulties in trying to establish a safe and secure future. It was also evident that better interaction is needed between those providing support and advocacy for abused women, and those who provide health and social services for older persons. A majority of the shelters provided community education to a wide range of agencies. Most have only partial accessibility to women with mobility handicaps.

CRYPTOGRAPHY POLICY UPDATE

This is one of an occasional series of cryptography policy updates that will appear in Cryptologia as events warrant. Readers, especially those outside the United States, are invited to alert us to policy developments of interest. Our focus this issue is on encryption export bills before the 106th United States Congress and on related domestic encryption policy initiatives undertaken by the Clinton Administration.

White House Control of Domestic Policy Making: The Reagan Years

As the federal government has increased its role in society, the executive departments have each become responsible for thousands of programs and billions of dollars. The challenge to presidents in the modern presidency has been how to ensure that the myriad policies developed within the departments meet the programmatic and political goals of the administration. That challenge has been met with a series of different strategies by recent presidents, each of which focused on using White House staff to influence or directly control the policy direction being taken within the departments. The focus of this article is the examination of the structure employed by Ronald Reagan to manage departmental policy making from the White House. I explore several questions: How different was this structure from ones used in previous administrations? How did the Reagan structure operate? and Are there parts of the Reagan structure that can or should be continued? Continuing the Domestic Policy Office The 1947 National Security Act institutionalized a White House structure for coordinating foreign policy, but domestic policy remained an enigma with no formal structure for coordinating or guiding the departments. The 1939 Reorganization Act provided a White House staff for presidents, but none had directly focused White House staff on managing domestic policy. In 1969, Richard Nixon became the first president to develop a formal White House structure for coordinating the departments in the development of domestic policy initiatives. By executive order, Nixon established the Urban Affairs Council in January 1969, creating ten small working groups of cabinet officers. Yet, in spite of the efforts of its executive director, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, the Urban Affairs Council had a rather short life of only 11 months. Richard Nixon, dissatisfied with the policy initiatives continuing to emerge from the departments, abolished the Urban Affairs Council and created the Domestic Council, also through executive order (Public Papers of the President, 1970). The Domestic Council was given broader control than the Urban Affairs Council over the departments in managing domestic initiatives and in controlling the proliferation of existing programs. Every president since Richard Nixon has continued to have a White House-based domestic policy office. Although Nixon and Ford referred to the unit as the Domestic Council, successive presidents changed the name. Carter referred to the unit as the Domestic Policy Group, Reagan and Bush called it the Office of Policy Development, and Clinton has again changed its name to the Domestic Policy Council. Although the names have been different, the goal of each president has been to create an internal structure that ensures that the political and programmatic objectives of the president are maintained throughout departmental policy making. The Reagan Structure for Managing Domestic Policy Making The experiences of Presidents Nixon, Ford, and Carter in managing domestic policy making from the White House were mixed. Each had created an office in the White House for domestic policy and had used that office with varying degrees of success in controlling departmental agendas. Reagan built on the experiences of his predecessors and continued the use of a White House structure for managing domestic policy making. The legacy of the Reagan years, however, is that the administration expanded the White House structure to include not only the domestic policy office but a network of interrelated White House offices to oversee departmental policy making. The White House exercised more control over domestic policy under Reagan than in any previous administration.(1) Reagan's White House network revolved around three key units within the White House: the Office of Policy Development that guided departmental initiatives; the White House personnel office that sought to expand the number of departmental political appointees and to ensure that those appointees were Reagan loyalists; and an internal clearance system that allowed White House staff to bargain departmental policies with Congress without departmental involvement. …

Who's Bashing Whom? Trade Conflict in High-Technology Industries

This study seeks to resolve the free vs. managed trade debate. It provides innovative recommendations for US policy based on detailed and rigorous case studies of high-technology conflicts between the United States, Japan and Europe in aircraft, telecommunications, electronics and supercomputers.The study addresses three key issues: What policy should the United States adopt to support its high-technology industries? What domestic policy initiatives are necessary to realize this goal? Are new international rules needed to reduce conflicts over high-technology industries? Tyson, formerly Chair of the President's Council of Economic Advisers, develops a cautious activist policy agenda to promote US competitiveness in high-technology sectors and to strengthen international rules to encourage and reduce conflicts among nations.

Who's bashing whom?: trade conflict in high-technology industries

This study seeks to resolve the free vs. managed trade debate. It provides innovative recommendations for US policy based on detailed and rigorous case studies of high-technology conflicts between the United States, Japan and Europe in aircraft, telecommunications, electronics and supercomputers.The study addresses three key issues: What policy should the United States adopt to support its high-technology industries? What domestic policy initiatives are necessary to realize this goal? Are new international rules needed to reduce conflicts over high-technology industries? Tyson, formerly Chair of the President's Council of Economic Advisers, develops a cautious activist policy agenda to promote US competitiveness in high-technology sectors and to strengthen international rules to encourage and reduce conflicts among nations.