There has been an announcement in the UK today that we are about to allow the seizure of passports and driving licences by "bureaucrats" without recourse to courts. This is in order to pursue non-payers of child support. NZ and Oz already allow this. I feel queasy - many working in child support are not even bureaucrats - they work for management agencies for low pay at "arms length". My own analysis is that the "little things", properly exposed, show that our legal bureaucracies are often the problem, not any kind of cure. I was watching some dreadful Argentinian bureaucrat a couple of nights ago who was lauding his department's expansion (International Court of Justice or somesuch) to employ 500 - he couldn't even see that the fact this has taken 5 years and only now is one person in front of the court is the failure. Even at the level of child support non-payment, one wonders why we have no quick systems to deal with antisocial scum and yet have "prioritised" this area. One might say that what we need is access to justice not to current legal systems and delay. There are clear problems with terms like "due process" and its secrecy. It always seems to me (except very rarely) that rationality and transparency have already been booted out of our systems before dialogue - and that dialogue as Molly defined it recently, is already displaced by many tricks including vagueness in law.
On 27 Jan, 04:36, ornamentalmind <[email protected]> wrote: > Yes Neil, and little things like the following: > > http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/01/26/Report_Halliburton_to_pay_559_... > > Report: Halliburton to pay $559 million > Published: Jan. 26, 2009 at 4:50 PM > > WASHINGTON, Jan. 26 (UPI) -- The Haliburton company has agreed to pay > $559 million to settle U.S. charges one of its subsidiaries bribed > Nigerian officials, industry observers say. > > The alleged bribery involved the awarding of contracts for the > construction of a gas plant, The Wall Street Journal reported. > > The Journal said the amount would be the largest paid by a U.S. > company in a bribery investigation, far more than the record $44 > million fine against U.S. oil-field services firm Baker Hughes Inc. in > 2007 for alleged improper payments in Kazakhstan. > > The reported settlement amount would still be less than that collected > from Germany's Siemens AG, which agreed in December to pay $800 > million in U.S. fines. The fines settled bribery investigations > involving alleged payments worldwide to government officials to win > contracts. > > Neither Baker nor Siemens admitted to the allegations as part of the > settlements. > > The U.S. Justice Department declined to comment on the Halliburton > case, and Halliburton, an oil-field services company, declined to say > whether it would admit the charges in the proposed settlement, the > Journal said. > > The report said investigations are continuing in Europe and Nigeria. > > On Jan 26, 6:57 pm, archytas <[email protected]> wrote: > > > I travelled a lot doing "transition economics" for the World Bank and > > others as the Soviet Empire collapsed - this was basically just some > > bull I learned to get me on this particular bandwagon. Once violent > > conflict between groups has subsided, or some vile regime has > > collapsed, what is the best way to make a transition to civil society? > > Do former enemies need to ‘come to terms with their past’ if they are > > to live peacefully? If such a reckoning is required, what are the > > strategies of transition available to the parties? An almost total > > disbeliever in "economics" of any kind, I used to speak on the field > > of transitional justice, which involves the philosophical, legal and > > political investigation of the aftermath of wars, cold and otherwise. > > The history and difficulties associated with the operation of the two > > most important transitional policies: war crime tribunals and truth > > commissions - or the desire amongst the formerly suppressed to avoid > > continuing the "war" through revenge. There is a tension between a > > desire for calm after war or regime collapse and the importance of > > putting human rights violators on trial, the need, as part of a > > political transition, to create a reliable historical record of past > > abuses, the promise and limitations of international criminal law and > > the coherence of forgiveness in politics. > > > There is much work on the difficulties associated with war crime > > tribunals, the dilemmas involved in the operation of truth commissions > > and the possibility of forgetting as a response to mass atrocity - we > > often say we can forgive but not forget, but frankly our memories and > > history are generally pathetic. Generally, if we need a 'new way', > > how do we go about ensuring, as far as we can, that we don't just let > > old default squabbles ruin any chance we have? --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups ""Minds Eye"" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/Minds-Eye?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
