Browsing by Subject "Law and legislation"
Now showing 1 - 2 of 2
Results Per Page
Sort Options
Item Comparative population policy(2011-05) Hardy, David McGrath; Wilson, Robert Hines; Stolp, ChandlerIn the last thirty years an increasing number of governments are taking an interest in the growth rate and age structure of their populations. The chief concern among advanced economies is that pay-as-you-go pension and health care systems for the elderly will be unsustainable as the ratio of younger workers to older beneficiaries shrinks from aging populations. Resistance to reforms such as reduced or delayed benefits, or higher taxes has focused attention on a third option, growing the working-age population. There is a growing consensus on the economic benefits of population growth, a reversal from the 1960s through 80s. Governments try to grow the population through incentives for more children and/or accepting more immigrants. This report compares the population policies of Singapore, the United States, France, and Japan to analyze governments' motives and policy outcomes. Middle-income nations like China and Brazil can learn from the experiences of developed nations to avoid the same predicament in the future. Each government's mix of fertility incentives, immigrants, and guest workers is a product of their economic and political circumstances. The surest way to grow the population, accepting immigrants, is usually the least popular. The most popular is the most unproven, providing benefits for larger families. There is no consensus what the most effective fertility incentives are. Population policy has never been just about the economy, it is steeped in political and cultural visions. Shedding that political baggage is a prerequisite to a more rational, sustainable policy approach to demography.Item Protecting Argentina : lawmaking, children and sexual crimes in Buenos Aires, 1853-1921(2011-05) Rahe, Julia Grace; Twinam, Ann, 1946-; Garrard-Burnett, Virginia"Protecting Argentina" explores how the definitions of sexual crimes (rape, seduction, abduction and the corruption of minors) changed in Argentine penal law during the process of congressional codification between 1853 and 1921. It contextualizes an in-depth analysis of legal definitions within the legislative process and the shifting ideologies of criminology that influenced it. It argues that, as nineteenth century positivist criminology replaced Enlightenment-inspired "Classical" criminology, the meaning and foundational presupposition of these crimes shifted from those of their colonial predecessors. Where in colonial times "Acts of lechery" were criminal when committed against chaste women, in the republican era, the law punished "Crimes against honesty" when the victims were children. Liberal lawmakers defined these sexual acts primarily by the age of the victim and secondarily by the violence used in their perpetration. The year 1903 was a watershed in this process, as it marked Positivism's displacement of "Classical" criminology as the guiding ideology of criminal law. These conclusions suggest there were substantive correlations between elite campaigns to ensure the future of the nation by saving children and the codification of national criminal law undertaken by Congress. As argentine elites began to witness what they perceived to be the negative effects of modernization, rapid population growth, industrialization and the accompanying increase in crime, they sought to ensure the future of the nation through "child saving" campaigns. The increasingly age-based definitions of sexual crimes, which aimed to protect young victims, fit within the broader state-led campaign to protect future citizens. "Protecting Argentina" therefore suggests that historians should consider legislative processes of state building as forming an integral part of turn-of-the-century nationalist projects in Latin America. Tying together positivist penology, nationalist discourse, and congressional codification, this report places children at the center of Argentine elites' attempts to ensure the future of the nation through the protection of children.