Jurisdictional Approaches Research Articles

Changes in Alcohol and Cannabis Retail Sales in Canada During the Early Phase of COVID-19

Background: Changes in the use of alcohol and other substances during COVID-19 is of considerable public health interest. This study examined changes in per capita alcohol, cannabis and other essential retail sales across Canada during the early phase of COVID-19, and associations between these changes and different jurisdictional approaches to drug control.Methods: A time series analysis was used to examine trends in monthly per capita alcohol, cannabis, and essential and non-essential retail sales before and during the first three months of COVID-19 for 12 jurisdictions across Canada. We compared observed sales during the first three months of COVID-19 to predicted sales based on model outputs using pre-COVID-19 trends. Next, we used difference in difference models to estimate the associations between different models of alcohol and cannabis retail systems and changes in retail sales during COVID-19.Findings: In Canada, observed per capita sales were significantly greater than predicted for alcohol (+9.6%) and cannabis (+14.1%) during March 2020, and consistent with predicted sales in April and May 2020. Essential retail sales were significantly less than predicted during March to May 2020 (average of -7.4%). During COVID-19, per capita alcohol sales in jurisdictions with a private retail system increased significantly (+$8.5 on average, 95%CIs; 2.1,15.6) after accounting for changes over time. In contrast, the relative change in per capita alcohol sales in jurisdictions with a public retail model prior to and during COVID-19 was, on average, $13.3 lower (95% CIs; -22.6,-4.0) compared to the changes in jurisdictions with a private retail model. Similar trends were observed for cannabis sales with respect to retail model.Interpretation: There was a modest increase in alcohol and cannabis purchasing during the first three months of COVID-19. Changes in sales were influenced by pre-existing policies, and jurisdictions with a private retail model had greater than expected alcohol and cannabis sales compared to jurisdictions with a public model. This study adds to the body of research showing that government-run retail models for alcohol and cannabis provide protection for public health.Funding Statement: There is no funding to disclose for this project. Declaration of Interests: The authors have all completed ICMJE conflict of interest forms. The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare.Ethics Approval Statement: This project was approved by the Public Health Ontario Ethics Review Board file number 2020-038.01.

Lessons for Jurisdictional Approaches From Municipal-Level Initiatives to Halt Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon

Jurisdictional approaches have become popular in international forums as promising strategies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions caused by deforestation and to guarantee sustainable commodity supply. Yet, despite their growing popularity, up to now, there is little consensus on how such approaches should move forward in specific jurisdictions. In this paper we examine two contrasting municipal-level case studies in the eastern Amazonian state of Para where jurisdiction-wide efforts are underway to reduce deforestation. By developing detailed environmental governance timelines since 2005, conducting semi-structured interviews with key informants, analyzing municipal deforestation trends, plus extensive examination of project reports, governmental documents and other secondary sources, this paper performs two main analyses. First, it characterizes the processes in each municipality by linking the context and the environmental governance timeline to deforestation trends. Second it provides a systematic comparison of processes based on (1) the role of the government, (2) multi-stakeholder participation and inclusiveness, (3) adaptive governance, (4) horizontal and vertical coordination, and (5) alignment of public and private (supply-chain) initiatives. In so doing, this article answers some of the imperative questions on how to implement and improve jurisdictional approaches aimed at halting deforestation in the tropics.

How Can Jurisdictional Approaches to Sustainability Protect and Enhance the Rights and Livelihoods of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities?

Tropical forests are posited to hold up to one-third of the solution to slow climate change. It is estimated that over two-hundred million “forest peoples”- including indigenous peoples and local communities- live within and depend upon the tropical forests in the Amazon, Southeast Asia, Mesoamerica and the Congo Basin. To successfully mitigate climate change, we must find new forms of collaboration that meet the goals of forest-dependent communities for secure land rights, equitable participation in decision-making, and dignified livelihoods in conjunction with meeting commitments to reduce GHG emissions. In 2018, 34 subnational governments and 18 indigenous and local community organizations announced their endorsement of the “Guiding Principles for Collaboration between Subnational Governments, Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities”. The Guiding Principles of Collaboration (GPC) are a set of 13 universal tenets, which lay out a blueprint for collaboration between subnational state actors, indigenous peoples and local communities to recognize rights, support livelihoods, strengthen participation of forest-dependent communities in decision-making, and protect indigenous and community environmental defenders within the context of joint action for climate change mitigation. Their implementation would advance the integration of climate justice in subnational efforts for forest conservation. Taking the GPC as a departure point, we explore how approaches to jurisdictional sustainability can protect and enhance the rights and livelihoods of Indigenous Peoples (IP) and Local Communities (LC). We develop and apply a suite of indicators to assess existing conditions across 11 tropical forest jurisdictions towards meeting the commitments described in the GPC. Our findings suggest that while Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities rights are recognized within national legal frameworks, implementation and security of those rights is uneven across subnational jurisdictions. Participation of IP and LC is not yet formalized as part of jurisdictional climate change mitigation initiatives in most cases, limiting their potential inform policy outcomes and benefit-sharing mechanisms. Monitoring the implementation of the GPC may foster greater accountability for commitments, as well as collective action and learning to support regional transformations to sustainability.

REDD+ in Theory and Practice: How Lessons From Local Projects Can Inform Jurisdictional Approaches

Subnational projects for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+) were frequently designed as pilot actions to inform future upscaled initiatives. Drawing lessons from these project experiences may thus help improve the design of jurisdictional-level actions. Here we scrutinize how REDD+ was historically conceptualized, the most prominent model being that of a multitier payments for environmental services (PES) scheme of ‘passing on’ carbon mitigation responsibilities and credits across scales, from international buyers to forestland owners. Using a database of 226 conservation-oriented REDD+ projects, in a principal component analysis we identify three main clusters: public, private-commercial, and NGO type of initiatives. Only 88 projects had planned conditional payments to landowners—the key feature of PES. Intentions to apply PES rise after 2007, and correlate strongly with efforts in seeking certification, including as a benefit-sharing strategy, and with carbon sales. Zooming closer into a portfolio of 23 implemented local REDD+ initiatives, we found project proponents reported conditional incentives as potentially being both the most promising and effective intervention. Likewise, treated households identify conditional incentives as comparatively effective in changing their land-use plans, while also providing above-average welfare returns. Still, these conditional incentives remained underutilized in implementation, with only one-third of the treatment intensity compared to non-conditional incentives. Only 39% of project proponents believed that conditional incentives would eventually become their single-most important tool, citing insecure land tenure impeding effective contracting of land stewards, and the REDD+ insecurity in financial flows jeopardizing longer-term contractual arrangements as key limitations. The original vision of a multitier PES model for REDD+ thus ran into both supply and demand side problems, jointly explaining the discrepancy between REDD+ theory and practice. Since jurisdictional climate approaches so far also receive only hesitant and slow climate financing flows, coming mostly in non-conditional form, and operate under forest-frontier governance with similar tenure restrictions, jurisdictions would seem well-advised to only rely significantly on conditional landowner incentives in scenarios where the preconditions for PES are met.

Seeking a Clearer Picture: Assessing the Appropriate Regulatory Framework for Broadband Video Distribution

This Note examines the appropriate regulatory framework for the distribution of commercial video content over broadband networks. As online video providers such as Netflix and Hulu expand, they are beginning to compete directly with the video services of major cable and telecommunications companies. Frequently, these companies also serve as a customer’s Internet service provider, leaving them in the position of carrying these competitive services over their broadband networks. This conflict has led to calls for regulation that would protect nascent online video services from feared anticompetitive actions by the major providers. In April 2010, against the backdrop of this expanding conflict, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in Comcast Corporation v. FCC dealt a blow to the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) ability to regulate in this arena. There, the circuit court invalidated the FCC’s jurisdictional approach to regulating broadband Internet. Although the FCC has subsequently reasserted its jurisdiction over broadband, the fallout from Comcast has rekindled debates as to whether broadband is best governed by proscriptive FCC regulation, or whether oversight of this marketplace should be left to the general antitrust authorities - the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission. This Note discusses the jurisdictional challenges to broadband oversight faced by each agency, and assesses the substantive and procedural merits of FCC and antitrust governance regimes. It then argues that, given the uncertainty regarding its authority, the FCC should abandon its efforts to regulate broadband video distribution in the absence of clear market harms. Finally, this Note proposes that this dynamic and rapidly evolving marketplace should develop outside the bounds of proscriptive regulations, with antitrust serving as a backstop if market intervention proves necessary.

Forestry Decentralization in the Context of Global Carbon Priorities: New Challenges for Subnational Governments

The recent emphasis on the role of tropical forests in facing climate change has made forest decentralization debates more relevant than ever. Discussions on multilevel governance, polycentricity, and nested approaches to governance surround the central question, ever more pertinent considering global environmental change, of who holds the mandate over forests. Different levels of government, as well as private and civil society actors (companies, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), indigenous peoples and local communities), compete over the rights of ownership, administration and management of forest landscapes – decisions with a crucial impact on land use, land use change and the future of forests. Understanding the relations among different levels of governance, and government specifically, is essential to understand how carbon forestry has engaged with decentralization and the role of subnational governments (SNGs) in developing practical land use solutions. We draw on current trends in the forestry decentralization literature to ask: (i) has carbon forestry opened new opportunities for SNGs to support the sustainable governance of forest landscapes?; (ii) have meaningful powers been assigned to SNGs in support of democratic processes of decision-making over forest landscapes? And (iii) is carbon forestry influencing the relationships between levels of government in a way that challenges unequal power relations? By examining carbon forestry projects and forestry decentralization processes across five countries (Indonesia, Mexico, Peru, Tanzania and Vietnam) with carbon forestry initiatives, we demonstrate how the role of SNGs is circumscribed by existing forestry decentralization trends. Decentralization initiatives in recent decades have provided SNGs with new mandates to manage forests, but new attributions do not always imply meaningful powers. The implementation of carbon forestry projects is moulded by pre-existing power relations that shape the impacts of forestry decentralization on livelihoods and forest ecosystems. We find that carbon forestry, with both centralizing and decentralizing tendencies, operates within the spaces left by existing power dynamics that mould the way transfers of power are put into practice. Jurisdictional approaches will need to negotiate with this context to be able to push forward sustainable pathways.

JCOERE Judicial Cooperation Supporting Economic Recovery in Europe Report 1: Identifying Substantive Rules in Preventive Restructuring Frameworks Including the Preventive Restructuring Directive which May Be Incompatible with Judicial Cooperation Obligations

The JCOERE Project, funded by the European Commission’s DG Justice Programme (2014-2020), addresses two aspects of the EU’s strategy to respond to the problems of cross-border insolvency within the increasingly integrated internal market. The Commission’s strategy is described in the Recommendation setting out A New Approach to Business Failure. The first aspect concerns the implementation of co-operation obligations that have been imposed on all EU domestic courts and judiciary under the EIR Recast. The second concerns the introduction through the Preventive Restructuring Directive (PRD) of a preventive restructuring framework in the domestic insolvency laws of all Member States. This first JCOERE Report examines these initial substantive and procedural aspects arising from the preventive restructuring frameworks. This, together with JCOERE Report 2, will contribute to answering the overall project research question, which asks: Based on existing experience with restructuring (e.g. Ireland), if obstacles to court co-operation will arise from substantive rules, which are particular to preventive restructuring. If some of these obstacles will be exacerbated in the preventive restructuring context, given that they pertain to existing procedural rules. JCOERE project Report 1 (reflecting the goals of Workpackage 2 of the Project) will accordingly concentrate on the nature of substantive and procedural aspects that may arise in complex preventive restructuring or rescue regimes as envisaged by the PRD. The Report also focuses on identifying substantive doctrinal and procedural restructuring rules relevant to court-to-court, and to court-to-practitioner co-operation obligations described in the EIR Recast Regulation 2015/848. The Report includes an analysis of pre-existing systems, such as the Irish Examinership process, the French sauvegarde, and the Spanish and Austrian reorganisation and restructuring procedures. In addition, the approaches of other jurisdictions included in the Project Consortium, namely Italy and Romania, will be discussed. In view of the anecdotal evidence of its influence on the drafting of the PRD, and given its popularity of a restructuring destination, the UK is also considered as a benchmarking exercise. The comparative analysis was extended to other jurisdictions, for example the Netherlands, because of its timely and pre-emptive response to the PRD, and Germany, Poland and Denmark. The JCOERE Project was conducted by a team at the University College Cork in collaboration with teams at the University of Florence, Titu Maiorescu University in Romania, and INSOL Europe. The content of this document represents the views of the author only and is his/her sole responsibility. The European Commission does not accept any responsibility for use that may be made of the information it contains.

Designing for engagement: A Realist Synthesis Review of how context affects the outcomes of multi-stakeholder forums on land use and/or land-use change

This Realist Synthesis Review (RSR) examines the scholarly literature on multi-stakeholder forums (MSFs) set up to support efforts towards more sustainable land use. In this review, we focus on subnational MSFs that include at least one grassroots and one government actor. MSFs have been presented, especially by practitioners, as a panacea to address land-use change and support climate mitigation, such as through “landscape” or jurisdictional approaches. However, it is not clear that these initiatives are learning from past experience, particularly from research analyzing the effect of context on the ability of such approaches to reach their objectives. To address this gap, the academic literature was assessed using the RSR method to elucidate the key contextual variables affecting outcomes. In addition to analyzing context, this review identifies four common lessons learned for MSFs: the importance of commitment (to the people, the process and its goals); engaging the implementers (key middle level brokers and government officials who determine what happens on the ground); openness to learn from and listen to stakeholders; and having a design that is adaptive to this context, with time and resources to do so. Findings suggest that the most successful MSFs are those that are recognized as part of a wider process that seeks to transform practices at multiple levels; entail a period of research and meetings at upper levels to identify potential roadblocks and existing capacities with those who would implement the project locally; build consensus and commitment from higher levels, and thus political will; and are designed as adaptive learning processes. The central lesson, then, is not one of how to design initiatives, given such different and distinct contexts. Rather, it is about how to design for engagement to address context, whatever its distinct features, in order to develop and implement initiatives with greater chance of success.

The transnational crime of human trafficking: taking the Canadian human security approach

Dr Maria O’Neill (University of Abertay, Dundee) examines a number of jurisdictional approaches taken to tackle the crime of trafficking in human beings (THB), making comparisons in particular with the approach in Canada.

Toward REDD+ Implementation

After several years of REDD+ (reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation in developing countries, and the role of conservation, sustainable management of forests, and enhancement of forest carbon stocks in developing countries) readiness, countries are starting to move toward REDD+ implementation and accessing results-based payments (RBPs). Currently various parallel processes for accessing RBPs exist, including project and jurisdictional—approaches that often operate under a nascent national framework. This review is structured around the key considerations for countries to implement REDD+ and access RBPs. It offers a discussion focusing on three areas that are crucial for the success of REDD+: ( a) REDD+ in the context of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) under the Paris Agreement and the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), ( b) the role of the private sector in achieving emissions reductions, and ( c) access to RBPs for REDD+. We present some key considerations for future issues and possible successes of REDD+ implementation.

Protection of digital health information: Examining guidance from the physician regulatory colleges in Canada.

The use of information and communication technology (ICT) has tremendous potential to enhance communication among physicians, leading to improvements in service delivery. However, the protection of health information in digital/electronic format is an ongoing concern. The purpose of this study was to examine guidance for the protection of health information when using ICT from all 10 of Canada's provincial regulatory colleges for physicians and to discuss the potential policy and service delivery implications. A search of the regulatory college websites was conducted, followed by a document analysis (content and thematic). The college website search identified 522 documents; 12 of these documents (from 8 of the 10 colleges) met the study criteria. These documents were notable for the considerable variation in the scope and detail of guidance provided across the colleges. While the federal-provincial division of powers in Canada enables different jurisdictional approaches to health service delivery and, thus, opportunities for policy learning, this governing structure may also contribute to a lack of incentive for collaboration, leading to an absence of standardised guidance for health information protection when using ICT. This, in turn, may result in unequal and inequitable protection of health information across the provinces. Therefore, a macro-level approach to policy development in this area may hold the greatest promise for enhancing the protection of health information and doing so in a more standardised manner in countries with federal systems of governance.

Classifying Regulatory Approaches of Jurisdictions for Accessory Dwelling Units: The Case of Long Island

Accessory dwelling units (ADUs) are a strategy for providing affordable rental housing. We suggest a typology of regulatory approaches in Long Island, New York, differentiating between jurisdictions that allow nonfamily/nondomestic employee renters in ADUs (Type 1), allow only family members and domestic employees in ADUs (Type 2), and do not allow any ADUs (Type 3). Content analysis, descriptive statistics, and t tests reveal that there is variation among occupancy and design regulations, suggesting that jurisdictional fragmentation and exclusionary zoning present obstacles to using ADUs as an affordable housing strategy.

Treaty of Waitangi Duties Relevant to Adaptation to Coastal Hazards from Sea-Level Rise

This paper addresses duties under Te Tiriti o Waitangi/the Treaty of Waitangi (the Treaty) for protection of particular Māori interests in the face of coastal hazards associated with sea-level rise. Under Te Tiriti o Waitangi, the Crown has a duty to actively protect Māori lands, estates, forests, fisheries and other taonga, and must enable Māori to protect these taonga. It is necessary to assess what Treaty duties may exist in relation to decisions to adopt measures to adapt in an attempt to prevent the risks of damage eventuating from coastal hazards associated with sea-level rise. Much of the climate adaptation measures that would be necessary to actively protect Māori coastal interests fall within local government authorities' jurisdictions; they are thus guided by the procedures and standards under the Local Government Act (LGA) and Resource Management Act (RMA), as well as by district and regional plans and related documents. Local government authorities are not currently directly accountable for Treaty duties when acting pursuant to these Acts; these relevant obligations are still held by the Crown, or central government. But the actions of local government, on delegated authority from the Crown, can give rise to these authorities either upholding the central government Treaty obligations or creating new, modern-day breaches of the Treaty (that the central government would have to answer for). This paper is interested in what might be necessary in order to uphold the Crown’s Treaty obligations in the area of adaptation to the coastal hazards associated with sea-level rise. The paper forms part of a New Zealand Deep South National Science Challenge project on what to do about housing that will be adversely affected by such coastal hazards. Because of the nature of Treaty interests, it is hard to limit the scope of this paper to housing only. However, housing and marae are the key focus, even while some comments may also be made on some other coastal interests protected under the Treaty. Because of the multi-layered jurisdictional approach to climate adaptation measures in law and practice in Aotearoa, such an enquiry needs to address central government rules and initiatives as well as local government actions.

Managing pharmaceutical shortages: an overview and classification of policy responses in Europe and the USA

This exploratory article gives a cross-sectional account of how established health-care systems have responded to the novel challenge of drug shortages. In line with previous research, our analysis confirms the existence of strong path dependence in the adoption of policy responses. This path dependence is manifested in a pronounced typology of response patterns where jurisdictional approaches to the management of drug shortages differ along two core dimensions. These are the salience attributed to the problem, and the level to which state organisations engage with the problem. These patterns are mirrored in the conceptual framing and strategic orientation of the respective drug shortage policies, with: Spanish and Irish drug shortage policies focusing on the individual product level and being largely reactive; US policies focusing on the therapeutic level, with a focus on mitigation; and German and Austrian policies seeking to address the active ingredient level, with a proactive focus on shortage prevention. Despite the importance of legacies, we find evidence of innovation and path creation particularly in relation to the US and German approaches, which we explain by the simultaneous occurrence of internal crisis and pressures from local stakeholders. Points for practitioners This article addresses a major challenge, drug shortages, which has emerged in recent years and could be characterised as a ‘system shock’. A typology of policies adopted based on an analysis of a range of health system responses is developed. Fundamental differences across these responses are evident, such as level of action (individual product level/therapeutic level/active ingredient level), time frame (from ad hoc/short term to long term) and strategic approach (reactive/mitigating/preventive). This analysis finds fundamentally different policies, such as delegated institutional powers and census management/network governance. The typology based on the salience attributed to the problem and the nature (proactive/reactive) of policymaking may assist stakeholders in health systems to critique their approach to this challenge and, at a more fundamental level, how the system responds to disruptive events.

A false promise? Regulating land-grabbing and the post-colonial state

AbstractSince 2008, a global ‘land rush’ has been unfolding and so have efforts by international, national and regional actors to position themselves as the principal authorities in the determination of appropriate usages of land. This article examines three of the most influential ‘soft law’ instruments: the Principles for Responsible Agricultural Investment; the Principles for Responsible Investment in Agriculture and Food Systems and; the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure. Despite their substantive differences, all three documents share a specific form of state-centrism. They imagine the host state of such large-scale investments as internally unitary and externally independent and entrust it with the bulk of responsibilities regarding the management of land investments. However, I argue that this particular form of state-centrism obscures the legal and administrative realities of the post-colonial state that is often legally bifurcated and subject to pervasive forms of international authority. Rather, an appreciation of the multitude of actors who claim jurisdiction over the lands of the South enables a better understanding of the legal mechanics of land-grabbing. Sierra Leone, which has been positioned as a ‘poster child’ for the implementation of such ‘soft law’ instruments, serves as the focal point of this jurisdictional approach to land-grabbing. In this context, the promise of ‘soft law’ instruments to make the post-colonial state the guarantor of universally beneficial large-scale land acquisitions is shown to be a false one.

Hii Chii Kok v (1) Ooi Peng Jin London Lucien; (2) National Cancer Centre: Modifying Montgomery.

In Hii Chii Kok v (1) Ooi Peng Jin London Lucien; (2) National Cancer Centre, the Singapore Court of Appeal followed the approach of other Commonwealth jurisdictions by rejecting the application of Bolam as the standard of disclosure in claims concerning informed consent to medical treatment. Instead, the court employed a modified version of the standard of disclosure adopted in Montgomery v Lanarkshire Health Board. While broadly welcomed, Montgomery has been criticised for its lack of clarity on the application of some elements of its disclosure standard. In particular, questions remain as to: what factors should be taken into account within the reasonable and particular patient limbs of the test of materiality; how will the ‘reasonableness’ of alternative treatments be determined; and what is the scope of the therapeutic exception. This case commentary explores how Hii’s analysis of the modified standard offers insights into how those elements of Montgomery could be interpreted in the future.

Policy Pilots: Experimentation in the Administration of the Law

Continuation of article is available at: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3499202 Rigorous tests are being used every day to develop effective medical treatments, drive consumer engagement, and, more generally, discover what works. But so far, rigorous policy piloting — temporarily introducing a change in law or policy in order to learn from it using well-designed and well-implemented methods — has not been used widely because of the perception that policy experimentation is unfair and possibly illegal, difficult, and rare. This Essay draws upon case law and agency practice to show that, to the contrary, rigorous policy pilots are presumptively legal, feasible, and increasingly common, proceeding in several steps. First, it finds that many kinds of pilots, including those that vary internal agency processes, or which are opt-in are unlikely to be controversial. But a review of relevant cases suggests that courts are likely to uphold even pilots that treat like members of a population differently, including through randomization, when they advance learning. Further, it finds experimentation, by itself, to be unlikely to create special procedural or substantive hurdles. Second, it finds that agencies are engaging in a range of rigorous piloting activities to fill informational gaps in policy- and law- making, some of which simulate and others which effect policy variation on a temporary basis, and that developments such as the growth of open data are making such forms of information gathering easier. It draws from agency experience to develop a framework for proposing a policy pilot and identify steps that would further support the use of rigorous pilots. A companion online appendix applies this framework to propose several rigorous pilots that the United States Patent and Trademark Office (“USPTO”), building on its already strong tradition of piloting, could try to evolve its own policies and practices with respect to patent quality (through the robust vetting of applications in view of non-patent literature and team/time examination on demand) and inclusion in innovation (through automated correction and addressing gender bias in examination). A first pilot would give applicants the option of requesting that all of the relevant art in their case be provided up front, through the examiner's initial searching of the entire specification rather than just the claims, following the approach of jurisdictions that bifurcate search and examination. The early certainty would help applicants make early determinations about whether or not the patent was worth pursuing. Quality pilots, in general, could also more explicitly measure the robustness of art vetting as a quality metric, given the prior art between US examiners and others reviewing a patent. Piloting development of error detection technology for vetting compliance with the Patent Act's Section 112 disclosure requirements, following previous examples of agencies adopting outside technology, could also help close the applicant readiness gap that this essay documents between smaller and larger inventors, enhancing both inclusion and patent quality. Finally, the essay proposes a pilot for testing for the presence of implicit gender bias in the award of patents to help get at the root causes of the 7-21% difference in patent grant rate between male and female-led inventions.

Exploring the design of jurisdictional REDD+: The case of Central Kalimantan, Indonesia

Jurisdictional approaches to REDD+ have received less attention than project-based REDD+ activities, yet they are needed for the successful implementation of REDD+ at the national level. Three subnational levels can be considered for the implementation of jurisdictional REDD+ in Indonesia: Provincial, District and Village. REDD+ implementation should involve all levels of jurisdiction, however, the implementation at the village level will be better coordinated at the district level due to the size of areas and potential emissions reduced. In this paper, we estimate the potential contribution of sub-national jurisdictions to reducing deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions using a case study from Central Kalimantan. District governments can contribute to reducing emissions by stopping deforestation from oil palm concessions, which in the case study considered has the potential of reducing emissions by as much as 15% from the business as usual scenario. Provincial governments have the authority to reduce emissions from state forest areas. In Central Kalimantan, if no more deforestation occurs in production forests, the projected avoided emissions between 2013 and 2020 are about 21% from the business as usual scenario.

Trifecta of Success for Reducing Commodity-Driven Deforestation: Assessing the Intersection of REDD+ Programs, Jurisdictional Approaches, and Private Sector Commitments

To date, numerous public- and private-sector efforts, commitments, and initiatives to reduce commodity-driven deforestation have emerged. In and of themselves, these elements—namely REDD+ programs, jurisdictional approaches (JAs), and private sector commitments—are necessary, but they are not sufficient to reduce deforestation. When operating together, however, these efforts have the potential to significantly reduce commodity-driven deforestation. This research aimed to determine whether and where REDD+ programs, JAs, and private sector commitments overlap in what are termed “trifecta jurisdictions”. Considering that each element possesses features that can enhance and complement those of the others, the authors hypothesized that—but did not ascertain whether—trifecta jurisdictions present the greatest potential to reduce commodity-driven deforestation. A total of 13 trifecta jurisdictions and six bifecta jurisdictions—where two of the three elements are present—were identified by: compiling a dataset of REDD+ programs, JAs, and private sector commitments; evaluating all potential options against established criteria; and categorizing them according to trifecta or bifecta jurisdiction status. The fact that a majority of trifecta and bifecta jurisdictions are located in countries with the most tropical tree cover loss is also significant in that it highlights the presence of these elements where most needed, and how high deforestation rates might be attracting REDD+ program, JA, and private sector commitment activities. Although many of the REDD+ programs, JAs, and private sector commitments are relatively nascent and their ability to collectively reduce deforestation is not yet clearly evident, this article posited that synergistic potential is greatest in trifecta and bifecta jurisdictions and that efforts should be made to greater align these elements.

Trybunalskie i sądowe stosowanie zasady „ignorantia iuris nocet” na gruncie praktyki orzeczniczej w Polsce

The article discusses the issue of the Constitutional Court’s and other courts’ application of the principle of ignorantia iuris nocet in the practice of issuing rulings. Based on the analysis of the case law, it presents the Constitutional Court’s standpoint concerning the role of the principle of ignorantia iuris nocet in the Polish system of law and its application in the Constitutional Court’s case law. At the same time, it discusses other courts’ application of this principle, i.e. its influence on the decision-making processes of the application of law by the Supreme Court, courts of appeal and administrative courts. The analysis of the case law show that the principle of ignorantia iuris nocet plays a special role in the Polish system of law. In their decisions, both the Constitutional Court and other courts concerned emphasise that the Polish system of law, like other contemporary systems of law, is based on this principle, and its violence would lead to unpredictable results in the practice of issuing rulings. There are no major differences between the application of the principle of ignorantia iuris nocet by the Constitutional Court and other courts concerned. In cases involving the ignorance of the law, both the Constitutional Court and other courts commonly recognise and apply, within the scope of their competence, the principle of ignorantia iuris nocet. Administrative law takes a particular stance on the application of this principle. In the Supreme Administrative Court’s judicature, a jurisdictional approach has been adopted that recognises that the operation of this principle is reduced in administrative procedure. In turn, the study of the case law of provincial administrative courts shows that these courts still have not adopted a uniform jurisdictional pattern in this respect.