Racism on the Web: Its rhetoric and marketing

Poster (1989) and Schiller (1996) point out that electronic communications have the power to change social and political relationships. The ‘new’ discourse of the Internet has political uses in spreading neo-Nazi ideology and action. I look at two kinds of online neo-Nazi discourse: hate speech itself, including text, music, online radio broadcasts, and images that exhort users to act against target groups; and persuasive rhetoric that does not directly enunciate but ultimately promotes or justifies violence. The online location of these discourses poses urgent questions. Does information technology make the re-emergence of prejudicial messages and attitudes swifter and more likely? Does the Internet's wide range of distribution make for more followers and finally more persuasion?     

修辞与科学知识传播论纲

科学知识的有效传播离不开修辞,以修辞的方式传播科学知识是可能的和必要的。第一,语言文字是科学知识的最基本的载体之一,以承载科学知识的修辞话语传播科学知识常常能为更广泛的公众所喜闻乐见;第二,修辞方式往往可以给特定科学知识传播以策略上的支持;第三,修辞过程与科学知识传播过程均为且均必为一互动的过程;第四,修辞和科学知识传播的效果都可以通过审美的方式体现出来。     

Virtuous reality: moral theory and research into cyber-bullying

This article draws on a study investigating how 11–14 year olds growing up in England understand cyber-bullying as a moral concern. Three prominent moral theories: deontology, utilitarianism and virtue ethics, informed the development of a semi-structured interview schedule which enabled young people, in their own words, to describe their experiences of online and offline bullying. Sixty 11–14 year olds from six schools across England were involved with the research. Themes emerging from the interviews included anonymity; the absence of rules, monitoring and guidance and, the challenges associated with determining the consequences of online actions. The findings demonstrate the advantages of adopting a character-based moral theory to compliment rules and/or consequence based moral theories as the basis for future research into cyber-bullying. The findings evoke some wider implications for future research into cyber-bullying that might equally be applied to investigations into other Internet related moral concerns.     

Robots and reality: a reply to Robert Sparrow

We commonly identify something seriously defective in a human life that is lived in ignorance of important but unpalatable truths. At the same time, some degree of misapprehension of reality may be necessary for individual health and success. Morally speaking, it is unclear just how insistent we should be about seeking the truth. Robert Sparrow has considered such issues in discussing the manufacture and marketing of robot ‘pets’, such as Sony’s doglike ‘AIBO’ toy and whatever more advanced devices may supersede it. Though it is not his only concern, Sparrow particularly criticizes such robot pets for their illusory appearance of being living things. He fears that some individuals will subconsciously buy into the illusion, and come to sentimentalize interactions that fail to constitute genuine relationships. In replying to Sparrow, I emphasize that this would be continuous with much of the minor sentimentality that we already indulge in from day to day. Although a disposition to seek the truth is morally virtuous, the virtue concerned must allow for at least some categories of exceptions. Despite Sparrow’s concerns about robot pets (and robotics more generally), we should be lenient about familiar, relatively benign, kinds of self-indulgence in forming beliefs about reality. Sentimentality about robot pets seems to fall within these categories. Such limited self-indulgence can co-exist with ordinary honesty and commitment to truth.     

循环经济:理论与政策选择

循环经济是我国经济持续、健康、快速发展的现实选择，是当前经济研究的热点问题。本文论述了循环经济的实质和理论背景，分析环境恶化的经济原因，指出环境资源是公共资源，由于通过市场机制的配置是失灵的，因而，政府干预是必要的；认为发展循环经济必须把环境资源作为一种生产要素，纳入生产函数作为内生变量处理；制度安排应使政府、市场、社会三者有机结合，也就是使政府的规制作用、市场的竞争机制、公众的参与监督有机结合起来，达到提高效率、兼顾公平、高效统一，以形成“规制化的市场”，从而为发展循环经济而拓展新的制度空间，论文最后提出了政策建议。     

The rhetoric of consensus politics: a critical review of technology assessment

Technology Assessment is a policy scientific lstoolrs which has recently enjoyed a great deal of increasingly enthusiastic attention, yet there is no clear idea of what it is. In this article, the author examines the literature on TA, and attempts to develop an analysis of its real political significance, as opposed to those overly optimistic prognostications that have seen it as the new panacea. In his view, TA is constrained in its scope and depth by implicit assumptions and commitments of a political character. These premises are obscured by the further founding canon of TA, namely that knowledge begets social consensus, and that where there exists no social consensus as to the evaluative framework by which society will assess its technology, then it can be objectively created by gathering and disseminating more social data. The author argues instead that this data collection (social indicators) is selectively constrained and structured by the prior commitment to consensus around a particular idea of the goals, purpose and meaning of social life. TA is in fact an integral part of a much more broad-ranging attempt to secure social consensus around a corporate-industrial consumer society, in which the latter institutions control a much wider range of social activity that even hitherto. Much of the lstheoryrs of TA can be seen as a rhetoric by which this paradigm is lstried outrs on the public; by ldtelling them how things arerd, this rhetoric at the same time tacitly asks them to adopt a view of social reality which corresponds with the premises framing the corporate industrialists' world view.     

政策过程与政策质量

近年来,科技政策质量越来越受到关注。本文依据科技政策的特殊性,提出政治与知识结合的ICD3PA模型描述政策过程,探讨政策过程与政策内容的互动关系,讨论了政策质量的五条标准,提出从完善政策过程入手改善政策内容、提高政策质量。     

Critical thinking: Kahneman and policy making

Robin Mansell is professor of new media and the internet at LSE. She is interested in how and why people communicate with each other, especially when their relationships are mediated by the use of information and communication technologies.     

Sustainability transitions: A political coalition perspective

In the case of technology transitions to low-carbon sources of energy, there is growing evidence that even in countries with a strong political consensus in favor of a transition, the pace has been slow in comparison with the need to reduce greenhouse gases. One factor that affects the slowness of the transition is political resistance from the incumbent industrial regime. Using data on the mobilization of resistance from the fossil-fuel industry in the United States, the study builds on the growing literature on the political dimensions of sustainability transitions by drawing attention to the role of incumbent regime coalitions, grassroots coalitions in support of green transition policies, and countervailing industrial power. Case studies of political coalitions for ballot propositions in the U.S. are used to show how countervailing industrial power, especially from the technology and financial sector, can tip the balance of electoral spending in favor of grassroots organizations.     

Transformative innovation policy: Addressing variety in an emerging policy paradigm

This paper presents an analytical framework for assessing the emergence of a new policy paradigm labelled “transformative innovation policy”, which can be seen as layered upon, but not fully replacing, earlier policy paradigms of science and technology policy and innovation systems policy. The paper establishes conceptual diversity in this emerging policy paradigm. Despite a common agenda for transformative change, there are notable differences concerning the understanding of the innovation process. Two global initiatives to promote such new innovation policies, Mission Innovation and the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy, are used to illustrate how different articulations of transformative innovation policy are expressed in practice. These may be seen as a positive expression of the breadth of the emerging policy paradigm. While there are grounds for such a positive reading, this paper ends with a caution by stressing the political nature of paradigm change and the strong legacy of an economic, firm-centred and technology-oriented tradition in innovation policy. It makes a plea for more emphasis on a broader conceptualization of transformative innovation, and suggests that a socio-technical understanding of innovation provides several appropriate analytical concepts that can help to shape our thinking and understanding of transformative innovation policy.