中国打击恐怖活动犯罪的刑事立法完善

全国人大常委会于2011年10月通过的《关于加强反恐怖工作有关问题的决定》对恐怖活动的定义进行了明确,并对恐怖活动组织及恐怖活动人员的认定机关及相关工作程序等问题进行了明确。但是,该决定对恐怖活动的定义过于宽泛,不利于集中打击对中国国家安全构成重大威胁的基于民族分裂主义和宗教极端主义产生的恐怖活动犯罪。而且,中国刑法没有关于恐怖活动犯罪刑罚的特殊规定,不利于实现惩处此类犯罪罪刑相适应原则的实现。为此,要通过立法完善刑法相关规定：第一,建议修改刑事立法,对恐怖活动犯罪作狭义规定,并将其界定为危害国家安全犯罪下的一类犯罪。第二,全面完善恐怖活动犯罪刑罚规定,对恐怖活动犯罪全面适用剥夺政治权利、财产刑和比客观表现相同的普通刑事犯罪更重的刑罚,并考虑设立不得减刑、假释的无期徒刑（终身监禁）刑罚制度。     

On the Political Economy of Income Redistribution and Crime

This article analyzes a general equilibrium model in which agents choose to specialize in either legitimate or criminal activities. Expenditures on police to apprehend criminals, as well as income redistribution, are determined endogenously through majority voting. We investigate how crime, redistribution, and police expenditures depend on characteristics of the underlying distribution of income-earning abilities and on the apprehension technology. Our model accounts for the positive correlation between inequality and crime, the positive correlation between expenditures on police and redistribution, and the lack of correlation between crime and redistribution observed in U.S. data.     

What causes violent crime?

This study uses panel data of intentional homicide and robbery rates for a sample of developed and developing countries for the period 1970-1994, based on information from the United Nations World Crime Surveys, to analyze the determinants of national crime rates both across countries and over time. A simple model of the incentives to commit crimes is proposed, which explicitly considers possible causes of the persistence of crime over time (criminal inertia). A panel-data based GMM methodology is used to estimate a dynamic model of national crime rates. This estimator controls for unobserved country-specific effects, the joint endogeneity of some of the explanatory variables, and the existence of some types of measurement errors afflicting the crime data. The results show that increases in income inequality raise crime rates, crime tends to be counter-cyclical, and criminal inertia is significant.     

The strength of weak ties in crime

The aim of this paper is to investigate whether weak ties play an important role in explaining criminal activities. We first develop a model where individuals learn about crime opportunities by interacting with other peers. These interactions can take the form of either strong or weak ties. We find that increasing the percentage of weak ties induces more transitions from non-crime to crime and thus the crime rate in the economy increases. This is because, when the percentage of weak ties is high, delinquents and non-delinquents are in close contact with each other. We then test these predictions using the U.S. National Longitudinal Survey of Adolescent Health (AddHealth), which contains unique detailed informations on friendship relationships among teenagers. The theoretical predictions of our model are confirmed by the empirical analysis since we find that weak ties, as measured by friends of friends, have a positive impact on criminal activities.     

CRIME,DETERRENCE AND UNEMPLOYMENT IN ENGLAND AND WALES: AN EMPIRICAL ANALYSIS*

This paper uses aggregate data from 42 police-force areas over 12 years to test predictions of Becker's economic model of crime. The effects of measures for deterrence on the incidence of three types of acquisitive criminal activity (burglary, theft, robbery) in England and Wales are explored. Mixed support for the Becker model emerges. The growth in unemployment is seen to impact positively on two of the three types of criminal activity examined. Per capita household income is seen to have a negative effect on the recorded rates of burglary and theft, but there is some evidence that the income variable is a proxy for the effects of unemployment. Poor housing conditions and the relative youth of the population were also found to play a role in the determination of criminal activity.     

SOCIAL NETWORKS AND CRIME DECISIONS: THE ROLE OF SOCIAL STRUCTURE IN FACILITATING DELINQUENT BEHAVIOR*

Delinquents compete with each other in criminal activities but benefit from being friends with other criminals by learning and acquiring proper know‐how on the crime business. We study the subgame‐perfect Nash equilibrium of this game in which individuals decide first to work or to become a criminal and then the crime effort provided if criminals. We show that multiple equilibria with different numbers of active criminals and levels of involvement in crime activities may coexist and are only driven by the geometry of the pattern of links connecting criminals.     

Profiling,Screening, and Criminal Recruitment

We model major criminal activity as a game in which a law enforcement officer chooses the rate at which to screen different population groups, and a criminal organization (e.g., drug cartel, terrorist cell) chooses the observable characteristics of its recruits. Our model best describes smuggling or terrorism activities at borders, airports, and other security checkpoints. The most effective law enforcement policy imposes only moderate restrictions on the officer's ability to profile. In contrast to models of decentralized crime, requiring equal treatment never improves the effectiveness of law enforcement.     

EMPLOYMENT,DETERRENCE, AND CRIME IN A DYNAMIC MODEL*

Using maximum likelihood techniques and monthly panel data we solve and estimate an explicitly dynamic model of criminal behavior where current criminal activity impacts future labor market outcomes. We show that the threat of future adverse effects in the labor market when arrested acts as a strong deterrent to crime. Moreover, such forward‐looking behavior is estimated to be important. Hence, policies that weaken this deterrence will be much less effective in fighting crime. This suggests that prevention is more powerful than redemption since anticipated redemption allows criminals to look forward to negating the consequences of their crimes.     

“Crime” in the lab-detecting social interaction

According to the standard economic perspective, criminal activities vary with the ‘price’ of crime, which depends on the severity of punishment and the detection probability. An alternative view claims that crime is also influenced by social interaction phenomena, such as ‘peer pressure’ or ‘neighbourhood effects’. Detecting social interaction in the field is fraught with difficulties, however. In this paper, we argue that given its extensive control possibilities, experiments are well suited to show the potential existence of social interaction effects. We present an experimental study where people can engage in ‘criminal’ activities. We find support for the importance of social interaction: On average subjects steal the more, the more others steal. This behaviour can be interpreted in terms of reciprocity.     

EMPLOYMENT, CRIME, AND RACE

This study examines the relationship between the employability and the criminality of white and black male teenagers. We find that among black teenagers, the employed engage in fewer criminal activities than do the unemployed. Thus, blacks apparently view employment and crime as alternative income-generating activities. On the other hand, employment status seems not to affect the criminal behavior of white male teenagers. Our evidence indicates that in the group studied, whites tend to use employment as a cover for crime or to moonlight in crime. Different legitimate opportunity structures for whites and blacks can explain, in part, the behavioral differences of whites and blacks. One more important policy implication is that job opportunities targeted to high-risk black teenage populations have the additional beneficial effect of reducing crime rates.     

Determinants of the long-term yield in Canada: an open economy VAR approach

An assumption of many national drug control policies is the existence of a causal relationship between illegal drug use and violent crime. However, robust empirical findings supporting this relationship are scarce. Alternatively, there is extensive research, much of it in economics, which suggests that there may actually be a stronger causal relationship between drug enforcement/control/prohibition and violent crime than drug use and criminal violence. The paper presents some of the research pertaining to the relationship between illegal drugs and violent crime. In addition, a violent crime model is empirically tested using data from 24 Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs) in the United States to determine the nature and strength of this relationship.     

The urban–rural divide,regional disaggregation and the convergence of crime

Potential regional variation in crime rates has been recognized as an issue of clear importance given its implications for the development and evaluation of theories of criminal activity, determining the appropriate level of disaggregation at which to undertake empirical analyses of crime and whether crime fighting policies should be constructed at a national or local level. Consequently, a literature has evolved examining the similarities in US regional crime rates and whether a national trend exists or is emerging. The present article extends the recent research into the emergence of a national trend by considering convergence in alternative classifications of crime using a data set subject to a higher degree of disaggregation than considered hitherto. The results obtained overturn previous findings obtained using more highly aggregated data, indicating the detection of convergence to be dependent upon the level of disaggregation considered. In addition, the extent of convergence detected is shown to vary across classifications of criminal activity and reflect anecdotally noted changes in the evolution of crime at a national level. The implications of the observed regional variation in crime for the urban–rural divide and theoretical, empirical and policy analyses are noted.     

CRIME AND EDUCATION IN A MODEL OF INFORMATION TRANSMISSION

We model the decisions of young individuals to stay in school or drop out and engage in criminal activities. We build on the literature on human capital and crime engagement and use the framework of Banerjee (1993) that assumes that the information needed to engage in crime arrives in the form of a rumour and that individuals update their beliefs about the profitability of crime relative to education. These assumptions allow us to study the effect of social interactions on crime. In our model, we investigate informational spillovers from the actions of talented students to less talented students. We show that policies that decrease the cost of education for talented students may increase the vulnerability of less talented students to crime. The effect is exacerbated when students do not fully understand the underlying learning dynamics.     

Status‐Seeking in Criminal Subcultures and the Double Dividend of Zero‐Tolerance

This paper offers a new argument for why a more aggressive enforcement of minor offenses (zero‐tolerance) may yield a double dividend in that it reduces both minor offenses and more severe crime. We develop a model of criminal subcultures in which people gain social status among their peers for being “tough” by committing criminal acts. As zero‐tolerance keeps relatively “gutless” people from committing a minor offense, the signaling value of that action increases, which makes it attractive for some people who would otherwise commit more severe crime. If social status is sufficiently important in criminal subcultures, zero‐tolerance reduces crime across the board.     

Police Violence and the Underreporting of Crime

This paper examines the relationship between police violence and the reporting of crime. Utilizing original data from a large‐scale household survey conducted in Costa Rica from October 2013 to April 2014 (n = 4,200), we find that the observation of police violence significantly reduces citizens’ willingness to report crime. The implications of this finding are explored using a game‐theoretic model of crime, crime reporting, and police misconduct. The model reveals that although the prospect of police violence against criminals may generate a degree of deterrence for criminal behavior, permissiveness toward police violence also raises expectations about the likelihood of police abuse against law‐abiding citizens. Consistent with our empirics, this reduces citizens’ propensity to report crime, thereby fostering a climate of impunity for criminal activity.     

CRIME AND POVERTY: A SEARCH‐THEORETIC APPROACH*

Numerous studies document that criminal activity is positively related to unemployment and negatively related to educational attainment levels within given communities. We study this phenomenon in the context of a search‐equilibrium model, in which agents choose between formal employment and pursuing crime‐related activities (theft). Prior to their “occupational choices,” agents undertake costly schooling, raising their productivity. Crime acts, in essence, as a tax on human capital by affecting the probability that a worker's earnings (possessions) are subsequently appropriated. There are multiple equilibria. High crime, low levels of educational attainment, long spells of unemployment, and poverty are correlated across them.     

宽严相济刑事政策视野下的无被害人犯罪

我国的无被害人犯罪与其他国家相比,在刑法中规定的较少,但随着法学理论研究的不断成熟和现实考察的不断深入,社会的越轨行为呈现出多样化和新型化趋势,由此引发了人们对"无被害人犯罪"相关行为的犯罪化与非犯罪化的广泛讨论。通过论证,得出处理"无被害人犯罪"问题应秉承宽严相济的刑事政策,并在该政策的指导下,对我国有关"无被害人犯罪"问题所涉及的聚众淫乱罪和"高利贷"问题的刑事立法提出薄见,以期使其在刑法规制上更加富有弹性。     

Criminal behaviour and youth in the labour market: the case of the pernicious minimum wage

This paper empirically tests the relationship between variations in Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) index crime rates for teenagers 16–19 years of age with changes in the real minimum wage adjusted for industry coverage in the United States for the period 1960–1987. The analysis reveals that there exists a positive relationship between changes in the real minimum wage and teenage criminal homicide, forcible rape, and motor vehicle theft crime rates. These findings are consistent with the empirical evidence concerning the impacts of the minimum wage on youth labour market opportunities and also with the theoretical ad empirical evidence regarding the incidence of criminal activity made as an occupational choice decision formulated under risk and uncertainty. However, the results indicate no impact of the minimum wage on the other teenage UCR index crime rates as found by Hashimoto (1987). The evidence also suggests that variations in real criminal justice expenditures per capita reduce teenage propety crime rates over time. Thus, there exists weak empirical evidence suggesting that policymakers should not only concern themselves with the traditionally known impacts of the minimum wage on youth labour market activities but also with the added social costs these impacts have on the incidence of youth criminal behavior. Matters of data exigencies and issues pertaining to the direction of future research are also discussed.     

Capital punishment and deterrence: a portfolio approach

Econometric studies of the deterrence effect of capital punishment have developed models of the supply of criminal homicides which include a variable to measure the probability of capital punishment. The present study, in contrast, employs a portfolio approach in which a model is developed realting changes in the rate of homicides across states to changes in the rate of a portfolio of all reported criminal offences. The effects of executions on changes in homicide rates are measured by changes in the nature of the relationship between homicide and the portfolio and abnormal variations in the residual of a model developed in the absence of executions. Using data from 1983–1988 across states and the District of Columbia, both the nature of the relationship and the residual variation are found to be uniquely altered in a manner consistent with the deterrence hypothesis. The results of the present study provide insight into why some studies of capital punishment may have failed to find appropriate disturbances in the rate of homicide. Disturbances may be observed only after accounting for changes in the crime portfolio. That is, those conditions that cause crime rates to rise in general may induce increases in the homicide rate that overwhelm the negative effect produced by executions.     

未成年犯罪嫌疑人适用逮捕问题研究

未成年人犯罪已被全世界列为继吸毒贩毒和环境污染之后的第三大社会公害。从全国检察机关的统计数据看,未成年人犯罪案件的数量和比例呈逐年上升趋势,未成年人犯罪案件的不断增多已成为令人担忧的重大社会问题。青少年是祖国的未来,同时也是祖国的希望,因而很有必要对未成年人犯罪问题进行调查,探究其违法犯罪的原因,建立一套科学合理的刑事逮捕措施,以求帮助未成年犯罪人员矫正犯罪,重新改造自我。