CRIMES AS PUBLIC WRONGS

ABSTRACT Despite the notion's prominence, scholarship has yet to offer a viable account of the view that crimes constitute public wrongs. Despite numerous attempts, some scholars are now doubting whether a viable account is forthcoming whereas others are reeling back expectations for what the concept itself can offer. This article vindicates crime's public character while asserting the relevance of political theory in doing so. After critiquing prior attempts and clarifying expectations, the article offers a novel account, relying on both key doctrinal features and a deliberative democratic framework through which to interpret their public significance. In doing so, it demonstrates how this framework explains the public nature of censure, and ultimately argues that crimes are public wrongs not because such actions themselves necessarily wrong or harm the public, but instead because they are the type of wrong that the public has a stake in addressing. This gives rise to an understanding of sentencing as public decision-making within which citizens and their representatives decide how best to use public power to manage public interests.

“All this Regulatory Uncertainty in the Air”: The Indispensability of Public Hearings in Guarding and Guiding Public Deliberation

The field of Environmental Communication has often critiqued the shortcomings of public hearings, noting their limitations in bringing about effective and equitable public decision making. While this work has been significant, it has tended to limit the deliberative field to public hearings themselves, sometimes going so far as to assume that public hearings are the only spaces in which significant deliberations occur. Using a field analysis of the “No Coal Plant” campaign in Surry County, Virginia (2008–2013), the authors illuminate some limitations of existing literature. Their analysis suggests that while public hearings can be extremely limiting, even “failed” public hearings can play a critical role in constituting, organizing, and pacing formal and informal deliberative spaces, which are necessary for communities as they manage the stresses and strains of the decision-making process.

The Dayton controversies – public decision-making between parliamentary democracy and partitocracy

In Bosnia and Herzegovina, the pluralization of society and the state began during 1990. This is the time when political parties are formed and the first multi-party parliamentary elections are held. Due to the strong influence and domination of the ethnic principle, political parties were formed in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1990 in two basic forms: as ethnic or people's (national) parties, and as civic (multiethnic) parties. In almost all election cycles from the beginning of the pluralization of Bosnian society until today, ethnic political parties have won the elections. Ethnic political parties have appropriated a monopoly in the promotion of national interests since the 1990 election campaign, guided by the idea of protecting the national interests of “their“ peoples. The continued rule of ethnic parties without a coalition political agenda and agreement has strengthened ethnic pluralism in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Thus, instead of democratic decision-making and competition between the majority and the opposition, the representative bodies in Bosnia and Herzegovina have become an arena and a place of mutual competition and confrontation between the parties that make up the parliamentary majority. The lack of the necessary democratic consensus between the ruling ethnic political parties at the state level was compensated and compensated by the High Representative of the International Community (OHR), who, on the basis of the Bonn powers, promulgated certain laws. Hundreds of laws in Bosnia and Herzegovina have been promulgated by high representatives. This prevented blockages in the work of the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina. In the absence of the necessary consensus of the ruling ethnic parties, it is not possible to develop or strengthen the power of parliaments as the highest representative body of the people and citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Instead of parliamentary democracy, classical partitocracy is at work. The situation is similar at the entity level, and at the cantonal level in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina entity. All this, along with heterogeneous and complicated decision-making procedures and processes, ultimately reflects on the adoption of laws and decisions of importance to society and the state. Complicated forms of decision-making and the existence of a famous mechanism for the protection of vital national interests are some of the obstacles to the development of the state and society. All of these are some of the essential problems, but also the controversies that follow the decision-making processes in the representative bodies in the country. This is especially true of the adoption of important and significant public policies aimed at solving socio-political problems. Only decision-making at the level of local self-government units (municipalities and cities) can serve as a positive example. In general, the local level of government has so far proved to be the most efficient level of government in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The basis for strengthening the democratic decision-making capacities of the representative bodies of the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina is contained in the application of the democratic principle on which parliamentary democracy is established and functions. Applying almost all basic and general scientific research methods, as well as the method of analysis (content) of relevant documentation as a method of data acquisition, will identify key problems and controversies of public decision-making and policy making in Bosnia and Herzegovina, in the period after the Dayton Peace Agreement. today. A conclusion will be drawn on the need to establish a parliamentary majority based on the coalition agreement and the political program of that coalition, which significantly affects the public decision-making processes and the adoption of the necessary state public policy. Bosnia and Herzegovina is required to reconstruct public decisions in the direction of strengthening state public decisions and policies and building European standards, in order to more efficiently compose them with the requirements and directives of the European Union.

Stakeholder Engagement Dalam Perancangan Indikator Kinerja Pengawasan Obat

Indikator kinerja memegang peranan penting dalam sistem akuntabilitas pemerintah serta pengambilan kebijakan terkait perencanaan, alokasi sumber daya, serta tata kelola yang lebih baik. Sistem pengawasan obat bersifat strategis dan merupakan salah satu agenda reformasi pembangunan nasional karena tidak hanya mendukung aspek kesehatan tetapi juga ketahanan bangsa. Hasil review terhadap indikator kinerja sistem pengawasan obat beredar pada periode 2015-2019 dinilai kurang sensitif menggambarkan kinerja mengingat tantangan untuk mencapai target tersebut masih cukup banyak. Dalam upaya peningkatan tata kelola pemerintahan, keterlibatan publik dapat membangun kepercayaan kepada pemerintah serta membangun kohesi sosial. Penelitian ini berupaya mengeksplorasi peran publik dalam perancangan indikator kinerja pembangunan di bidang pengawasan obat. Melalui pendekatan kualitatif, diperoleh kesimpulan bahwa tipologi keterlibatan publik dalam penetapan indikator kinerja pengawasan obat telah berada pada level 3 (tiga) yaitu participation in public decision making, yang merupakan bentuk partisipasi lebih intens antara organisasi publik dan warga sebagai pemangku kepentingan dimana masing-masing pihak memiliki peran dalam pengambilan keputusan dan pengaruh atas keputusan yang ditetapkan. Melalui keterlibatan publik, setidaknya diperoleh beberapa dampak positif yaitu antara lain mendukung terwujudnya prinsip transparansi dan akuntabilitas, serta memperkaya perspektif dan argumentasi atas indikator kinerja yang disusun sehingga menjadikannya lebih berkualitas dan kinerja lembaga pemerintah lebih berpeluang diterima masyarakat.

The Best Principle is the best principle

The Precautionary Principle represents an attempt to avoid the issues and difficulties in establishing the best course of action. It is closely associated with the methodological confusions arising from ‘the risk approach’ and the fallacy of ‘science-based policy’. The only principle relevant to responsible, coherent and transparent public decision making is the Best Principle