Abstract
(a) Central institutions/Institutions centrales
63.4976 AGUILAR, Susana —
The Spanish Catholic church (SCC) is a multi-issue interest group with a heterogeneous political record: unlike finance and education, two key areas covered by the 1979 agreements with the Vatican, moral policies must be negotiated with the public authorities. Responding to the liberalization of abortion and approval of same-sex marriage by the Rodriguez Zapatero government, the SCC, in contrast with other churches in similar political circumstances, has embarked on a confrontation strategy in alliance with conservative Catholic groups and like-minded political parties. Its monopoly position in a society that still defines itself as predominantly Catholic (sociological argument), the inextricable link between Catholicism and national identity (historical argument) and its privileged relationship with the state, as a result of the 1979 agreements with the Vatican and its partially-established constitutional status (institutional argument) help to understand this strategy. [R, abr.]
63.4977 AHLQVIST, Toni —
This essay opens a perspective of potential governmentality on state transformation. It is argued that potential governmentality is a process of building a visionary script of an emergent governmental form linked to the creation of a new politico-economic path in a state. The essay discusses the idea of potential governmentality as a heuristic, elaborates the idea of state vigor as a generic form of governmentality and presents a case study in the context of the Finnish state. The essay charts a particular form of state transformation in the context of diffusing geoeconomic calculation. [R] [See Abstr. 63.4806]
63.4978 ALEXIADOU, Despina —
Conventional wisdom argues that single-party majority governments are best able to implement reforms because there are fewer veto actors within the government that can block the reforms. However, these accounts fail to consider the veto power of societal actors and particularly of trade unions, which can stall reform even in the presence of a unified executive. This paper argues that controversial reforms require broad societal and, consequently, political consensus, which are easier to achieve under minority governments or governments of broad coalitions. Evidence from 22 OECD parliamentary democracies over 35 years shows that minority and large coalition governments have been more successful in reducing social security contributions and pensions than narrower majority governments. This is especially true in countries where trade unions are militant and often resort to industrial action. [R, abr.]
63.4979 AMBROSIO, Thomas; VANDROVEC, Geoffrey —
This paper examines how the Kremlin has represented Russia's geographic and geopolitical position in the post-Soviet era. It analyzes presidential addresses to the Federal Assembly from 2000 to 2011, a period encompassing V. Putin's first two terms as president and the single term of D. Medvedev. In addition to exploring general trends evident in these speeches, this paper also provides in-depth analyses of three major themes: Russia's civilizational identity, the state of the international system and Russia's role within it, and global economics. We find that the legacies of the Cold War-era perceptions of threat, as well as dissatisfaction with the Cold War's resolution, remain salient in these speeches. However, there is some movement toward a broadening of Russia's cognitive map. [R]
63.4980 AMOS, Merris —
In this article, the UK's Human Rights Act is considered as a legal transplant of the European Convention on Human Rights to the domestic system. Existing literature concerning legal transplants is applied to determine whether the problems experienced by the HRA are partly due to its status as a transplant. While the Act has not been a failure, the literature can explain some of the issues that have arisen. In particular, the UK experience demonstrates that for longevity and legitimacy, building a national human rights instrument requires more than a simple transplant from the international legal system to the national. [R]
63.4981 ARBAN, Erika —
The principle of subsidiarity, one of the most important in EU law and entrenched in the EU treaties, has recently entered the constitutional discourse in Canada thanks to some Supreme Court decisions regarding division of powers. After a brief overview of the intellectual history of subsidiarity, this article offers a comparison of how subsidiarity has been dealt with by the Supreme Court of Canada and by the European Court of Justice. The ultimate goal is to see what lessons Canada can draw from the EU's longstanding experience with subsidiarity, particularly in the ambit of social policy. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5194]
63.4982 ARMITAGE, Faith —
This article is concerned with disruption by MPs in the British House of Commons between 1990 and 2010. Disorder in the “Thatcherite” parliaments of the 1980s has been the subject of parliamentary and academic investigation, but the phenomenon since then has gone unexamined. This article introduces a distinction between non-tolerated and tolerated disorder. Non-tolerated disorder has been relatively rare in the House of Commons between 1990 and 2010, and can mainly be attributed to a handful of parliamentary “mavericks”. Tolerated disorder, which forms an accepted part of the Commons’ culture, is also explored, and recent changes to the House are examined for their potential effects on the phenomenon. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4845]
63.4983 AZZOPARDI, Rose Marie —
This paper investigates the Maltese labor market within the context of the Europeanization process. It explains the EU's labor market policies and presents studies in the field. The main focus is the case study of Malta, which evaluates formal and informal structures of the economy and uses the dynamics of the interaction of ideas, interests and institutions to analyze whether and how Europeanization of the Maltese labor market has occurred. The findings indicate that different changes have occurred in the legislative framework, language and values about work, but resistance and continuity are evident in other areas such as flexicurity, undeclared work and a high level of female labor market inactivity. [R] [See Abstr. 63.4985]
63.4984 BAKVIS, Herman —
The articles in this issue suggest that intergovernmental governance takes a different form in Canada and the EU, raising questions about the transference of practices and institutions from one to the other. In both systems, non-hierarchical modes of governance provide coordination in social policy. Hierarchy also plays a role, though not in a manner that one might expect. In the EU, hierarchy is tempered by members’ direct participation in policy formulation. In Canada, hierarchy is important, but within rather than between governments, resulting in executive dominance of the intergovernmental process at the expense of devolving power to civil society and sub-provincial governments. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5194]
63.4985 BALKIR, Canan; BOLUKBASI, H. Tolga; ERTUGAL, Ebru —
This article provides the framework for some case studies on the dynamics of Europeanization in South European political economies. It summarizes the key features of the common template each case study adopts. Following a discussion on political economy as conceptualized in this issue, the article elaborates the defining attributes of the Europeanization research program by focusing on its theoretical core, research design and method of conceptualizing and operationalizing domestic continuity and change, centering on the troika of “ideas,” “interests” and “institutions” in unpacking the dynamics therein. [R] [Introduction to a thematic issue on “‘Europeanization and the Southern periphery’ in retrospect: another decade of dynamism, asymmetry, and fragmentation?,” edited by the authors. See Abstr. 63.4983, 4995, 4997, 5127, 5142, 5156, and the authors’ conclusion Abstr. 63.4986]
63.4986 BALKIR, Canan; BOLUKBASI, H. Tolga; ERTUGAL, Ebru —
This article presents the comparative findings of six case studies of continuity and change in Southern European political economies which make use of the Europeanization research program. It summarizes the varied EU level inputs, frameworks or agendas in the different policy areas that each case study focuses on. It gauges the magnitude and direction of domestic change at the level of policy and governance in each political economy. In order to show how the case studies unpack the relationship between the EU input and domestic change in public policies, the article explains how the prevalent ideas, dominant interests and structuring institutions co-determine the nature of domestic change in political economies. [R] [See Abstr. 63.4985]
63.4987 BAYART, Jean-François —
What is the reason for the extreme weakness of the Malian state, which France has just brought back from the brink of collapse? Is Mali a viable state? Are the Malian peoples co-existing in the country inescapably doomed to conflict? The author recognizes that Mali is indeed an artificial state … but so is just about every other country in the world! In fact, Mali's problems stem from its hidden past of slavery, the socialist policies implemented after independence and the free-market reforms blindly imposed by the IMF in the 1990s. Other important factors include the return in 2011 of the Tuareg who served in Gadhafi's army, the rise of drug trafficking in th region and corruption among politicians. These ills, both old and new, continue to plague the country. [R] [Part of a series of articles on “Mali”. See also Abstr. 63.5877, 5881, 5896]
63.4988 BECHET-GOLOVKO, Karine —
Much like the majority of Russian politicians, the Russian head of state is not de facto subjected to political responsibility, according to which he should report to and be sanctioned by his electors. The clan logic that actually rules in Russia profoundly deforms the logic of Russian institutions and affects the principal source of power, the executive's relations in particular. In this perspective, the judicial elements that set up a diarchy within the executive do no more than establish an institutional framework of power distortion. These deformations are then progressively shaped in the course of the Russian political/constitutional practice, and, in some respect, have become institutionalized around two clans which share power and constitute the actual core of the diarchy.
63.4989 BENDIEK, Annegret; PORTER, Andrew L. —
This article outlines the challenges facing the promotion of safety on the internet, traces the institutional structures for European cyber-security policy, identifies the key principles of organization, and compares roughly these European developments to US cyber-security strategy, policy, and organizations. European cyber-security policy is formulated and implemented in a multi-level and multi-stakeholder structure. Not only is there a separation between domestic and foreign policy, but also politically relevant divisions of competences and responsibilities for legislative and executive powers, as well as private and public spheres. As cyber-security policy is a regulatory area that shapes the informational self-determination of citizens, any regulatory action — even every institutional development — must seek to achieve a balance between security and individual liberties. [R]
63.4990 BERG, Linda; SPEHAR, Andrea —
Sweden was one of the only three Member States to immediately open its doors to citizens from the EU accession countries of 2004 and 2007. Sweden has also been one of the few EU countries to actively promote greater liberalization of labor migration policy for third-country nationals (TCNs) within the EU, and the new Swedish Immigration Law of 2008 dramatically liberalized the TCN labor migration policy and made it more employer-driven. To understand why Sweden has supported increased labor mobility, we need to complement existing explanations by analyzing the preferences of the political parties. A two-dimensional analysis focusing on economy and culture provides an understanding of why so-called unholy coalitions of parties in support of liberal labor policies have emerged in Sweden during the 2000s. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5138]
63.4991 BESSNER, Daniel; LORBER, Eric —
Under what conditions will [US] civilian principals punish military leaders for shirking? In order to inductively derive a theory of civil-military punishment, we examine two cases of military shirking where there is little doubt that insubordination occurred. The first case is Douglas MacArthur's insubordination under Harry Truman during the Korean War, and the second is Colin Powell's scuttling of Bill Clinton's plan to allow homosexuals to serve openly in the military in late 1992 and early 1993. This analysis indicates that two factors are linked to civil-military punishment: (1) the salience of the issue at stake determines whether he or she decides to punish shirking; (2) whether or not the civilian has the military's support to pursue punishment. [R, abr.]
63.4992 BEYERS, Jan; BURSENS, Peter —
This paper disentangles the impact of various dimensions of European integration on different aspects of the Belgian federal polity. We discern two opposite trends. While the institutional embeddedness of Belgium as an EU member state results in domestic centralizing tendencies and cooperative political practices, economic integration stimulates political pressures for regional autonomy, contributing to further divergence and hollowing out of the federal level. We argue that the EU clearly affects territorial politics in Belgium, but, as the European causes are multidimensional, that also the effects, albeit substantial, will be diverse. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5039]
63.4993 BIEBER, Florian —
This article argues for re-conceptualizing the study of power-sharing in post-conflict state-building. In Southeastern Europe, as elsewhere, power-sharing has become the most widely employed approach to accommodate the competing demands of ethno-national groups. As a result, the Southeastern European cases of power-sharing have been important for the larger study of power-sharing and post-conflict statebuilding. This article argues that in order to draw meaningful conclusions from these cases, the study of power-sharing needs to become more multi-dimensional, moving away the study of formal institutional rules to include historical context, local debates, the strength of the state and the performance of the formal procedures to derive a more meaningful picture of power-sharing. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4923]
63.4994 BIRKNER, Michael J. —
This article offers a fresh interpretation of D. Eisenhower's legislative presidency. Often viewed as passive or naïve in his dealings with Congress, and as a patsy for Democratic Senate leader L.B. Johnson, Eisenhower was in reality shrewd and effective, as his high level of success on the legislative front attests. Eisenhower used various tools in his leadership kit to accomplish his ends, including regular meetings with legislators of both parties to discuss his program; a willingness to meet the political opposition at least part way toward his objectives; readiness to explain his priorities through regular press conferences and also in private meetings with political barons in the Congress; and a determination to play hardball if necessary, with those who were sought to block his initiatives in whole or part. [R, abr.]
63.4995 BLAVOUKOS, Spyros; CARAMANIS, Constantinos; DEDOULIS, Emmanouil —
The establishment of independent oversight bodies constitutes an important institutional reform in the EU context. Based on technocratic expertise, they aim to curtail the state's policy-making and supervisory role. During the last decade, such bodies have been established in Greece, illustrating the ideational and institutional impact of the Europeanization process. By examining the Greek independent oversight board for accounting and audit practices, we posit that its highly politicized mode of governance has undermined the purpose of its instigation and operation. Although such externally induced institutional reforms entail some ideational and institutional change, their full transformative potential has yet to be realized in Greece. [R] [See Abstr. 63.4985]
63.4996 BÖHMELT, Tobias —
Existing research seems to agree that EU accession conditionality facilitated processes of political and economic transformation for the recent enlargement rounds. However, it remains unclear at which stage of the enlargement process and to what extent candidate countries complied with EU law in the context of accession conditionality. Building upon previous theoretical accounts, the authors argue that candidates’ compliance behavior can be examined more thoroughly when focusing on the credibility of EU conditionality at different phases over the process of accession negotiations, which are characterized by varying degrees of membership probability. The article's main contribution stems from the empirical analysis, which employs generalized additive models on new data of candidate countries’ compliance with EU law under accession conditionality from 1998 to 2009. [R, abr.]
63.4997 BOLUKBASI, H. Tolga; ERTUGAL, Ebru —
This article examines the impact of the EU on Turkish political economy through an analysis of employment policy. Through tracing “institutions,” “ideas” and “interests” representing this policy area, it analyzes the extent to which the accession process, which started with the granting of candidate status at the Helsinki Summit in December 1999, has prompted a transformation in this policy area. It draws on empirical evidence based on semi-structured interviews and other primary sources. It finds that domestic change occurs, however limited and variegated across sub-policy areas, through policy-learning. Moreover, the policy ideas transplanted from the EU gain importance only in interaction with preferences of the coalition of dominant actors. [R] [See Abstr. 63.4985]
63.4998 BORGES PEREIRA, Virgilio; QUEIRÓS, João —
This paper analyzes the development of Portugal's first major housing policy: the “program of economic houses,” the regime's answer to the housing crisis the main Portuguese cities faced by that time. Organized in 1933 around the ideal homeownership of single-family houses in the city periphery, the economic housing program was presented as the state answer to “the housing problems of the Portuguese people,” but was never able to achieve its wide ambitions. Through analysis of legislation, archives and the memories of old residents, this paper reconstitutes the processes of social selection, spatial segregation and moral control that organized everyday life in the largest neighborhood of economic houses in the city of Porto — the Amial neighborhood, built in 1938 and expanded in 1958. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4712]
63.4999 BOSSONG, Raphael —
This contribution analyzes the EU's fight against international terrorism from the perspective of public goods theory. The first part develops an improved conceptualization of collective action problems in this issue area, and presents a typology of related security goods according to different aggregation technologies (weaker links, summation, better shots). The second part embeds this theoretical framework in the European context, and presents an empirical survey of the EU's anti-terrorism efforts. It is argued that the EU has been comparatively effective in responding to “weaker” link vulnerabilities, even if implementation records are uneven and boundaries of security cooperation remain unclear. In contrast, the EU could not effectively aggregate resources and act jointly in the international fight against terrorism. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5000]
63.5000 BOSSONG, Raphael; RHINARD, Mark —
This introduction argues for a new research agenda on European internal security cooperation from the perspective of public goods. We set out our case in three parts. (1) We identify new empirical puzzles and demonstrate significant explanatory gaps in the existing internal security literature which public goods theory could help address. (2) We outline the building blocks of a public goods approach and provide an overview of its application, both existing and potentially, in various areas of regional security and European integration. (3) We present three complementary ways of using public goods theory to analyze internal security in the EU, with the aim of spurring new research questions while accepting some limitations of this theoretical approach. [R] [Introduction to a thematic issue on “EU internal security as a collective action problem,” edited by the authors. See Abstr. 63.4999, 5062, 5100, 5145, 5182, 5632]
63.5001 BOSWELL, John; NIEMEYER, Simon; HENDRIKS, Carolyn M. —
Many governments have embraced the rhetoric of inclusive citizen engagement. Greater public involvement promises to strengthen democratic institutions and improve the quality of policy decisions and services. How do these aspirations sit alongside the reality of Australian federal politics? This article investigates the responses of elite policy actors to the Gillard government's proposal to conduct a citizens’ assembly on climate change in 2010. Drawing on over 200 media articles, the authors identify a series of procedural, institutional and political objections raised by elite commentators against the citizens’ assembly proposal. Many of these objections have little basis in the experience of deliberative designs in practice. Some, however, reflect the challenge of realizing inclusive, deliberative governance in highly politicized contexts. [R]
63.5002 BOUTECA, Nicolas; DEVOS, Carl; MUS, Manu —
We take a look at the discussion on the devolution of social policy. Despite the pressure of strong nationalist movements to decentralize socio-economic matters, the federal welfare state does not erode. In their study up to the early 2000s, Béland and Lecours explain this relative standstill by pointing to the institutionalization of neo-corporatist organizations. These organizations, which are strongly involved in the management of the welfare state, have not split along language lines and prevent the decentralization of socio-economic policies in order to preserve their power. Based on empirical evidence, this paper shows that federal social partners are an important obstacle to social policy decentralization in Belgium while the regional social partners have differing opinions on the devolution debate. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5039]
63.5003 BRAUN, Daniel M. —
This article develops the fractal theory of American constitutionalism, which posits that profound patterns of self-similarity ought to inform our fundamental understanding of the Constitution's inherent structure and elemental coherence. In doing so, this novel theory not only illuminates the very nature of the US Constitution and its contents, but it elucidates how the Constitution operates and provides a foundation for a key method of constitutional interpretation. Finally, the fractal theory of American constitutionalism provides a new methodology for gauging the document's tensile strength and exposing historical fault lines and present structural weaknesses. [R]
63.5004 BRISTOW, Gillian —
This paper adopts a critical regionalist perspective to bring new insights into the drivers of state spatial transformation in sub-national economic development governance in the UK. It demonstrates that multiple forms of state spatiality are emerging in the context of late capitalism which are both territorial and relational. The paper argues that these developments cannot be explained as a simple re-scaling of the geopolitical project of competitiveness. Instead they reflect an array of political forces both in and of space, which are calling into question the functionality of regional state spaces for the governance of economic development. [R] [See Abstr. 63.4806]
63.5005 BROOKS, Risa —
Many analysts have focused on the Tunisian protests and the economic and political grievances that fueled them. Equally central, however, was the role played by the military leadership and the decision to forgo using force to actively suppress the protesters. Contrary to arguments that stress the reflexively apolitical or professional nature of the military, or its leaders’ normative commitment to supporting the protesters, this article explains how the decisions made reflected political calculations and served the military's organizational interests. Although heralded as the savior of the revolution, the Tunisian military acted out of its own organizational self-interest in defecting from the Ben Ali regime. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5061]
63.5006 BROUARD, Sylvain —
Based on an exhaustive database of the parliamentary questions in the French National Assembly between 1988 and 2007, the paper focuses on the dynamics of issue-attention in the parliamentary questions at three levels to show that: the general punctuation hypothesis is valid for the parliamentary question agendas; the comparison between the levels of punctuation of the institutionally unconstrained written question agenda and the institutionally constrained question to government agenda is consistent with the idea that higher institutional friction induces higher punctuation in attention-allocation; and the dynamics of issue-attention in the parliamentary question agendas at the individual level exhibit strong patterns of cognitive friction. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5032]
63.5007 BROUARD, Sylvain, et al. —
The relationship between French MPs and citizens is paradoxical. On the one hand, the French political culture, constitution and history favor a very abstract conception of representation: MPs are supposed to act as trustees and collectively to embody the French Nation. On the other hand, they are deeply involved in their constituencies and express a great level of satisfaction being there. In order to understand how French MPs reconcile the national and local dimensions of their mandate, we describe data gathered through interviews with MPs, [and use] a scale analysis to sum up their local-national orientations, testing the impact of several variables on the territorial focus of MPs: electoral incentives, political ambition, ideological factors and working conditions at the local and the national level. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5032]
63.5008 BROWN, Julian; WILSON, Stuart —
This article uses a dispute between a school and the state in contemporary South Africa to examine the complex nature of the relationship between that state and its citizens. This relationship is best understood as a set of shifting arrangements of authority between bureaucratic institutions, political personalities, the judiciary and South Africa's citizens themselves. We suggest that traditional models of the state have underestimated the agency of ordinary citizens and that the dispute we examine reveals how their actions — made possible by the presumption of their equality with the state and its agents — can influence the development of a local or national political order. This article draws upon the detailed documents prepared for the court case that arose from this dispute, as well as upon more recent interviews with teachers at the school. [R, abr.]
63.5009 BROWN, William —
This article critiques the predominant opinion that aid undermines the sovereignty of African states. This claim implies not only that a recipient state's policy autonomy is curtailed by development assistance, but also more fundamentally that the politico-legal independence of the state itself is being challenged. While the former is often the case, the latter is not. Drawing a conceptual and analytical distinction between sovereignty as a right to rule and national control over policy and outcomes, the article develops a more accurate identification of the areas in which aid, as a particular form of external influence, does and does not have an impact on recipient states. It thus provides a new reading of the politics of aid. [R, abr.]
63.5010 BRUNATTI, Andrew D. —
The study of the interdepartmental architecture meant to coordinate intelligence communities has been peripheral at best, especially in the case of smaller states, such as Australia, Canada and New Zealand. Examination of the development of intelligence community management architecture in Australia, Canada and New Zealand reveals that actors in all three communities recognize networks of interdependency between them. However the extent to which they are able to exploit these interdependencies is dependent on larger dynamics in government, supporting the idea that intelligence communities can only be as cohesive as the governments they serve allow them to be. [R, abr.] [Part of a thematic issue on “Intelligence, governance and the ‘interagency’,” edited and introduced by Philip H. J. DAVIES]
63.5011 BRUNCLIK, Milos —
The theory of parliamentary regimes presumes that parliament can express votes of no confidence in government. On the other hand, executive power (government or head of state) is endowed with right to dissolve the parliament. However, these “doomsday devices” are not in balance in many parliamentary regimes, including the Czech Republic. On the basis of a comparative analysis of dissolution provisions in the constitutions of European states, the article argues that the government in the Czech Republic should be given the right to dissolve the lower chamber at least if the latter expresses a vote of no confidence in the former. [R]
63.5012 BUZOGÁNY, Aron —
While the EU's policies towards non-member states are often discussed within frameworks of “high politics,” one of the most important features of the European Neighborhood Policy is its emphasis on the “low politics” of sectoral dialogue in functionally differentiated policy fields. Examining policy-change triggered in Ukraine by the EU's neighborhood policy framework, the essay focuses on environmental policy as a typical “low politics” policy field. The results show that in four sub-fields of environmental policy case-specific constellations of domestic veto-players, policy-specific conditionality and external capacity-building determine domestic policy-change. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5581]
63.5013 CALCULLI, Marina —
This article investigates the relation between military systems and Arab state-building process. It first contends that a structural gap between regime security and national security can be identified in all of the Arab states. In this perspective, post-colonial Arab regimes have built their armies with the primary aim of pursuing regime security. The article distinguishes between states with a politicized societal fragmentation and states with non-politicized or absent fragmentation, contending that the linkage between regime security and army's structure is particularly evident in the former, for power asabiyya (solidarity group) plays a central role in defining conscription rules and military careers. A behavioral analysis of Syrian civil-military relations during the 2011 civil war finally elucidates the relationship between the endurance of al-Assad regime and the role played by the Alawi asabiyya in the military apparatus. [R] [See Abstr. 63.4928]
63.5014 CAMPOS-SERRANO, Alicia —
Recent economic and socio-political dynamics in the territories that form Equatorial Guinea are related, in different ways, to the extraction of hydrocarbons from its Exclusive Economic Zone since the mid-1990s. These transformations are strongly mediated by specific social groups, especially the family that has held power since 1968, and transnational oil companies, whose relationships are central to the exclusive political configuration in the country. The article analyzes this particular form of extraversion of power as part of a broader history of the region, in which the role of the state's sovereignty as articulated during decolonization is shown to be instrumental in the allocation of rights and the political economy of oil today. The article also discusses the spaces that the new political economy of oil has opened for alternative transnational connections around the country. [R]
63.5015 CÁRDENES, Agustin —
The history of the building of the Argentine presidential regime coincides with that of the consolidation of the state of Argentina. But the revolutionary movement which is launching the establishment of a new political authority today does not imply that a modern government is being consolidated. The “chief of staff” created by the constitutional reform of 1994 does not have the necessary institutional means for unloading the presidency of administrative tasks. The political crisis of 2001 shows the impossibility of having an Argentine “cohabitation” with the presidency.
63.5016 CARSON, Jamie L.; MADONNA, Anthony; OWENS, Mark —
Given significant differences between the House and Senate's amending processes, one would anticipate the Senate majority party to be far less successful when voting on the floor. However, recent work has demonstrated that majority party success on the Senate floor is remarkably similar to the House's. We argue that an overlooked explanation for majority party success stems from its ability to control intra-party amending activity through coordination between members of the majority party. Utilizing a new data-set consisting of all amendments receiving recorded roll-call votes in the Senate from 1865–1945, we demonstrate that majority party extremists refrain from offering amendments despite the relative open-floor setting. Nevertheless, chamber majorities cannot restrict minority legislators from offering amendments designed to force them to cast uncomfortable votes and delay the legislative process. [R]
63.5017 CERNA, Lucie —
Intra-EU mobility of high-skilled workers is quite low, and member states have targeted high-skilled third-country nationals (TCNs), both through national policies and the EU's recent Blue Card scheme. However, the Blue Card Directive, despite its scope for unionized regulation, allows member states to decide how many high-skilled TCNs they want to admit, if any. The article argues that tensions between openness and closure to migration exist at both member state and EU level. These tensions are resolved through considerable diversity in the conditions and rights accorded to Blue Card holders across member states. Drawing on new empirical data, the article analyses first results of the transposition of the Blue Card Directive. It examines how far, in what form, and with what implications, diversity continues regarding the principle of mobility for these migrants across member states. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5138]
63.5018 CHAISTY, Paul —
The Russian State Duma has been the target of business interests since its inception in 1993. Using an original dataset, this article examines the economic sectors that have been most prominent over this period, and it considers different explanations — organizational, financial and reputational — for variation in their preponderance over time. It also assesses the effects of the sectoral ties of deputies on legislative activity. Through the analysis of 100 laws that were the focus of lobbying campaigns in the first four Dumas, it finds that the sectoral ties of deputies are a powerful predictor of several aspects of legislative behavior. [R]
63.5019 CHAMBERS, Paul —
In contemporary Thailand, achieving effective civilian control of the armed forces is a daunting challenge. The country's long series of military coups are one outcome of the operational independence generally enjoyed by the military. In most cases, these military interventions have sought to support the political ambitions of the palace and its networks. For almost a decade, Thai politics has been polarized by reactions to the electoral success of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and his perceived threat to military and royal power. The military has thus acted as arch-royalist “protector,” helping itself to enhance its political status in a monarchy-led parallel state. This paper examines how and why the armed forces continue to remain powerful in Thailand and what prospects exist for diminishing this clout in the messy aftermath of the 2006 coup. [R]
63.5020 CHANIKA, Emmie; LWANDA, John L.; MUULA, Adamson S. —
Many Malawian politicians have exploited religious and cultural discourses, encouraging the discourse of the “God-fearing Malawi nation” while also acknowledging the country as a secular state. This discourse resonates with a patriarchal, conservative political dispensation. This paper traces the evolution of the “God-fearing nation” discourse in Malawian politics. It posits that the government used the “gay rights issue” as a strategy to disorient human rights activists and donors. Gay rights were de-linked from other civil rights, forcing a binary approach toward gay rights, which were seen by government supporters as “anti-Christian,” “anti-Malawian” concepts. The debate with donors enabled the government to claim “sovereign autonomy” and galvanize the population into an anti-aid mentality (better no aid than aid that supports homosexuality). [R, abr.]
63.5021 CHASQUETTI, Daniel —
Since the return to democracy, Uruguayan presidents have built cabinets of varying natures (majority and minority coalitions, majority and minority parties). Most studies on presidential government assume that the partisan composition of a cabinet is a good predictor of the performance of a government's legislative program. I test this hypothesis using Cox and McCubbins’ party cartel theory. The results confirm that six of the eight presidential cabinets’ legislative performances were consistent with theoretical expectations, while two were deviant cases. This article also provides a theoretical explanation for these two outliers, highlighting the importance of legislative parties, the presidential style of government, and preferences as regards legislative initiative. [R] [See Abstr. 63.4610]
63.5022 CHONG Liu —
The accident's impact on global expansion of nuclear power may be modest. China is among those who will continue to build and operate plants, and should be a leader in finding ways to do so safely and securely. [R]
63.5023 CHU Yun-Han —
Over the last two decades, Taiwan has weathered the Asian financial crisis of 1997–1998 and the sub-prime loan crisis of 2008–2009, each time emerging relatively unscathed. Many of the elements that constitute Taiwan's economic resilience have been fostered through entrenched institutional arrangements and established policy orientations over a long period. Taiwan managed to retain the bulk of these long-running sources of economic resilience despite the tremendous external pressures exerted by neo-liberal policy advocates to dismantle these “outdated” policy thinking and practices in the name of reform during the decade-long interval between the two crises. Taiwan was able to cope with the 2008–2009 global financial crisis thanks also to a more enabling regional environment created through stronger cooperation among Asian economies and under a new awakening among the East Asian policy-makers. [R, abr.]
63.5024 CLAVERO, Bartolomé —
On 10 June 2011, a constitutional reform has renamed the first title of the Constitution of Mexico. It now reads: “On human rights and their guarantees”. The Mexican Constitution had never used the phrase human rights and, even less, sought to protect them by means of constitutional guarantees. By the reform, international human rights law become constitutional law in Mexico. The Constitution refers to rights enshrined in human rights treaties to which Mexico is party. The Federal Supreme Court expands the reference to any treaty containing provisions on rights, e.g. the International Labor Organization Convention Concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples’ in Independent Countries. The author inquires whether human rights instruments containing any kind of binding clauses are included, although not being treaties, e.g. the UN Declarations on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. [R]
63.5025 CLEMENS, Austin C.; CRESPIN, Michael H.; FINOCCHIARO, Charles J. —
This research note replicates A. Leigh's analysis of pork-barreling in Australian politics [“Bringing home the bacon: an empirical analysis of the extent and effects of pork-barreling in Australian politics,” Public Choice 137(1–2), Oct. 2008: 279–299; Abstr. 59.3852] and tests the validity of his findings using geographic techniques. This note addresses an aspect of pork-barreling that has been overlooked in most previous scholarship. It argues that distributive politics is, at its core, a geographic, constituency-centered process. It is therefore essential to reconsider the conventional models and take geography into account in both substantive and statistical terms. To that end, we replicate several of Leigh's results using a relatively new technique, Geographically Weighted Regression, and reveal substantial spatial heterogeneity in the coefficients. Our findings highlight the importance of political geography and have important implications for studies of legislative politics and elections. [R, abr.]
63.5026 CLEMENT-WILZ, Laure —
The analysis of the Berlusconi case before the Italian Constitutional Court may be viewed as an effective warranty of engaging the responsibility of the Prime Minister. In terms of violation of the common law, the Court has censured the Lodo Alfano. Concerning “ministerial” violations, it has fulfilled its arbiter role by endorsing the recourses in case of conflict between power sources. These judgments are by themselves an important guarantee for the system.
63.5027 COHEN, David B.; O'SULLIVAN, Terrence M. —
We examine the establishment, evolution, and political and legislative history of the White House homeland security machinery born out of the 9/11 [2001] attacks, as well as the more recent B. Obama administration restructuring. We scrutinize how the reorganization may change the priorities of the executive branch and the needs of homeland security, broadly writ, in a context of competing bureaucratic political and functional dynamics. We conclude that the recent integration/reorganization was a step in the wrong direction given the demonstrably rising threats to life and property from naturally occurring disaster risk, the realities of bureaucratic policy preferences for “high politics” terrorism security over natural disaster and accidents, and the divergent, often competing demands of the “homeland” security portfolio versus traditional national security and counter-terrorism. [R]
63.5028 COHEN, Hillel —
The participation of the Palestinian Authority's (PA's) security agencies in the armed struggle against Israel in the second Palestinian uprising (2000–2005) is analyzed as a response to the demand of Palestinian society, thus as a unique case of armed forces which, in the lack of political directive, became more attentive to public opinion. The article shows how Palestinian public discourse in the late 1990s-early 2000s, that was shaped by the Islamic movement of Hamas, portrayed the PA's security officials as traitors. Members of the PA security agencies (mainly Fatah members) sought to reposition themselves in the “national camp,” and this motivated them to raise their weapons against Israeli targets. They [thus] removed the mental burden of turning their weapons against fellow Palestinians, one of the major sources for their image as collaborators. [R, abr.]
63.5029 COHN, Lindsay P. —
Contemporary operations require the US military to work with [many] private contractors. The official reasoning is that private contractors are more cost-effective than military personnel, as contractors can be hired and paid for specific jobs, while military personnel must be maintained year-round at a high cost. [However], many service-members bring back stories of contractor failure or misconduct. Is it in fact more efficient to use contractors on a battlefield? How can multi-agency operations be made most effective? This article determines the conditions under which contractors will “work” for the military. Theory indicates that they will do so if the likelihood of being caught and punished for shirking is high. I examine the relations between military personnel deployed in Iraq and the contractors accompanying them through a questionnaire and targeted interviews. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4861]
63.5030 CONGLETON, Roger D.; ZHANG Yongjing —
This paper explores the extent to which human capital improves the economic policy competence of US presidents. Several recent studies have used international data to test similar hypotheses. However, international studies suffer from a variety of comparability issues, not all of which can be avoided through fixed effects and error-correction. The US results developed in this paper suggest that both career paths and education have significant effects on a president's economic policy judgment, particularly in the period after the Civil War. However, the paper also suggests that more than good economic management skills are required to win national elections. [R]
63.5031 COSTA, Olivier —
The papers in this issue show that citizens and MPs are not necessarily attached to a “general” conception of representation, in which MPs represent the French Nation as a whole, with no reference to a territory or to specific interest groups. Second, they demonstrate that MPs are not perceived as an aristocracy agreeing on values and interests beyond political cleavages. Third, they prove that the representation gap between citizens and MPs is usually exaggerated and that electors are quite aware of the difficulties of being a deputy. Finally, they also establish that the weakness of the French Parliament and its submission to the executive are often exaggerated. French MPs are nevertheless strongly focused on their constituencies and not enthusiastic about an eventual empowerment of their assembly. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5032]
63.5032 COSTA, Olivier —
The Fifth Republic's constitution, adopted in 1958, was deliberately designed to weaken parliament. This trend was reinforced by the constant empowerment of the president and the bipolarization of political life. For this reason, but also due to some of its specificities, French political science did not pay much attention to parliament and its members. The papers gathered in this issue cover the main aspects of parliamentary representation in France, deliver the fundamental information and tackle the central questions about it. They use a wide range of data, methods and theoretical approaches. They deal with MPs’ conceptions and practices of their mandate, their opinions on the French regime, their activities in the constituency, values, contribution to law-making and the use of parliamentary questions, as well as their perception by the citizens. [R, abr.] [Introduction to a thematic issue of the same title, edited and concluded, pp. 278–283, by the author. See Abstr. 63.5006, 5007, 5031, 5033, 5196, 5281, 5430, 5460]
63.5033 COSTA, Olivier; SCHNATTERER, Tinette; SQUARCIONI, Laure —
The French constitutional law of 2008 is, with the modification of 47 articles, the most important revision of the Constitution of the Fifth Republic, at least in quantitative terms. Surprisingly, there have been few attempts to evaluate the effects of the reform, whose official aim was to improve the status of the role of the (traditionally weak) French parliament. This contribution analyzes how MPs judge this reform and its effects, especially on the role of the parliament and its everyday work. We use the data of the LEGIPAR research project (September 2009-January 2011): 227 MPs answered closed and open questions about their perception of parliamentary work in interviews. The data of the project DEPASTRA (2005–2006) allow for a comparison with MPs’ positions before the constitutional revision of 2008. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5032]
63.5034 CRESPIN, Michael H.; FINOCCHIARO, Charles J. —
We examine the connection between pork-barrel projects and the election returns of members of the US Congress. While previous researchers have uncovered little evidence of a direct link, we refine the perspective that pork has electoral implications by advancing the argument that its effects differ across geographic and partisan contexts. Our empirical analysis focuses on the Senate — which has largely escaped attention — and utilizes a measure of pork that includes only those projects inserted by legislators as line items in appropriation bills from 1996 to 2004. We find a direct relationship between pork and electoral performance, albeit one that is conditioned upon ideological congruence, constituency size, and the political ideology of the legislator. [R, abr.]
63.5035 CRUELLS, Marta; COLL-PLANAS, Gerard —
The state members of the EU have witnessed the emergence of equality policies which target discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation and gender identity. These are usually based on the single-issue model focusing exclusively on discrimination suffered by LGBT people. However, there are other approaches to this issue which take into account the interaction of different axes of inequality: e.g., the multiple and intersectional discrimination models. This article analyzes the implications of these three models from a theoretical and empirical perspective, pointing out their respective advantages and disadvantages. [R]
63.5036 CURTIS, Devon —
It is not surprising that peace-building programs and initiatives have focused on state reconstruction and governance. The peace-building as state-building template, however, faces severe limitations in Africa. Key questions and tensions emerge over issues of legitimacy, sovereignty, effectiveness and agency, which cannot be resolved though standard approaches to peace-building. This article shows that, while the call for state-building serves important purposes for external and internal audiences, the practice of state-building is a contested project born out of specific historical circumstances. International state-building practices are subjected to a thorough reworking as they play out in different African locales, with a variety of consequences. State-building therefore cannot constitute a clear pathway to peace, even when promoted by African institutions such as the African Union. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5857]
63.5037 D'ARCY, Michelle —
This paper argues that while democratization has been important in generating pressure for reform, alliances with actors outside the state — such as donors and non-state service-providers — have been the critical enabling factor allowing weak states to overcome their capacity constraints and respond. Two illustrative case studies show how variation in alliance opportunities has led to differences in outcomes, both between social sectors and across countries. An inter-sector comparison of health and education policy in Tanzania shows how a difference in donor policy preferences between sectors — donors having converged behind the principle of universal primary education but not universal healthcare — has led to variation in alliance opportunities and hence policy outcomes. A “least likely” case of healthcare reform in Lesotho shows how an alliance with a non-state provider has made difficult reforms possible. [R, abr.]
63.5038 DEHMEL, Niels; JESSE, Eckhard —
The 2013 parliamentary elections will be held under a new electoral law, passed against the votes of the Die Linke parliamentary group. The new electoral law is constitutional, although it still contains weaknesses, as the number of members of parliament might increase. Surplus seats — the real problem of the electoral system — continue to exist, but they will be compensated. Furthermore, the rules have become more complicated and are not transparent enough. The new electoral law is only a temporary solution. A clear and sustainable foundation is still needed. An appropriate alternative would be the return to the single-vote-system of 1949. [R]
63.5039 DESCHOUWER, Kris; REUCHAMPS, Min —
Despite the agreement on the sixth state reform, four key issues remain for Belgium's future: decision-making, distribution of powers, intergovernmental relations and the role of the parties. Drawing on past and present investigations of this topic, [the editors] present the state of the federation and set the stage for the remaining papers. [R] [Introduction to a thematic issue on “The future of Belgian federalism,” edited by the authors. See Abstr. 63.4992, 5002, 5299, 5447, and the conclusion Abstr. 63.5179]
63.5040 DINGLI, Sophia —
The failed-state thesis has been a matter for discussion in the IR academy for more than two decades. However, the soundness of this analytic framework has been questioned. This article critically engages this debate by examining the ability of the thesis to provide insight into the practice of statecraft in the case of Yemen. It argues that as a result of its rigid and Eurocentric approach, the failed-state thesis is unable to recognize the strategies employed by states like Yemen to ensure their survival, which include the purposeful production of chaos. [R]
63.5041 DIXIT, Priya —
Nepal's enactment of anti-terrorism legislation in 2001 helped establish its new “counterterrorist” identity, while affixing the “terrorist” label to Maoist rebels that the state was fighting. This allowed regional and global actors to view the Nepali state's actions against Maoist rebels as “counterterrorist”. The period of November 2001 when the first Nepali anti-terrorism legislation was established and the February 2005 takeover of the state by the (then) king are the main focus of this paper. The goal is to note how the label of “terrorism” was used in Nepal to legitimate “counterterrorism” operations by the state. The article argues that the state's use of the “war on terror” rhetoric specifically during these two events legitimized repressive actions against its own citizens as countering “terrorism”. [R, abr.]
63.5042 DONNARUMMA, Maria Rosaria —
Despite two dozen reforms, the French political system remains semi-presidential and an untenable hybrid between a holistic parliamentary regime and an outright presidential system. It is thus a paradox that the Fifth Republic, which is suspicious of judicial checks and balances, has given such a prominent role to the Constitutional Council, which has managed during the years of “cohabitation” to allay the conflicts between the President on one hand, and the Prime Minister and Parliament on the other hand.
63.5043 DORSCH, Michael —
This paper provides a public choice analysis of the 2008 banking bailout in the US. The paper introduces heterogeneity of congressional districts into the common agency problem in special interest politics. District heterogeneity implies district-specific electoral constraints on legislators’ ability to collect rents from, and cast dissonant votes in support of, special interests. An empirical analysis examines legislative voting on the initial bailout proposal, using campaign contributions to legislators from special interest groups and the importance of financial services for employment within congressional districts as the main explanatory variables. The empirical analysis corrects for possible endogeneity bias, using valid instruments, and considers several intuitive sub-sample estimations as alternative methods for addressing the endogeneity issue. The paper provides empirical evidence that campaign contributions from the financial services sector influenced legislative voting on the banking bailout. [R]
63.5044 DOVERS, Stephen —
This paper identifies major shifts in the Australian environmental policy agenda over the past fifty years, and discusses the possible causes of and variables affecting agenda-change. The issue of what comprises “environment” policy is discussed, with reference to overlaps and intersections with other policy sectors such as agriculture, public health, energy and regional affairs. While the diversity of the environment policy domain complicates any analysis of trends, there have been two persistent trends of (1) an expansion from a more narrowly to a more broadly defined suite of issue (from environment to sustainable development) and incorporation of environment into natural resource-management, and (2) an increasing diversity of policy instruments being used. Consistent with the wide variety of issues confronted, pragmatism and convenience are often as influential as political ideology or underlying trajectories. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5057]
63.5045 DUPUY, Claire —
The regionalization of public policy is one of the most remarkable transformations European states have undergone since the 1970s. Through an examination of this particular development, the article explores theories of interregional competition in two very different cases: education policy in France, a decentralized unitary state where regional governments are entrusted with limited policy competences in this field, and Germany, a federal state where regions have exclusive responsibility over secondary education. In both cases, interregional competition lends itself neither to a race to the bottom nor a race to the top, but rather to a race to the middle. Regional governments aim, in fact, to demonstrate that they adopt similar policies to other regions so as to avoid being blamed by both the electorate and the central state. [R]
63.5046 ECCLESTON, Richard —
This paper applies concepts developed in the Policy Agendas Project (PAP) literature to an analysis of Australian tax policy over the postwar period. It argues that a major turning point in the Australian tax policy agenda occurred during the second term of the R. Hawke Government (1984–1987). Beyond this turning point, and despite the fierce partisan conflict concerning tax policy over the past two decades, there has been remarkably little difference between Australia's two major parties at the level of substantive policy content. Australian tax policy agenda over the postwar period can be characterized by remarkable policy continuity punctuated by a period of change in the mid 1980s when structural change in the international political economy precipitated unprecedented domestic liberalization. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5057]
63.5047 ECCLESTON, Richard; WARREN, Neil; WOOLLEY, Timothy —
There is growing concern that intergovernmental financial relations in the Australian federation are becoming increasingly acrimonious and dysfunctional. This paper argues that it is necessary to analyze State funding as a whole, including the critical relationship between State-level taxation and its reform and the broader Commonwealth Grants Commission regime, if we are to establish a system of State funding which is financially sustainable, promotes economic efficiency and is broadly congruent with established norms of Australian federalism. Commonwealth leadership is required to achieve this goal. We conclude with a case study concerning resource taxation which demonstrates how the Commonwealth could provide leadership using a “bundled” approach to policy reform. Such an approach has the potential to alleviate wider intergovernmental conflicts which currently afflict Australian federalism. [R]
63.5048 EDWARDSSON, Eva; WOCKELBERG, Helena —
This article presents data from a study in which national bureaucrats working in the fields of taxation and food law in Sweden and Denmark are asked which legal sources and methods of interpretation they use when implementing EU law. National agencies and authorities in the fields of taxation and food law face a “multilayered” or “multiprincipal” reality in which there is room for policy choices. The answers given by the interviewees speak of a plurality of legal sources, a situation where bureaucrats are becoming reluctant lawmakers instructing others on how EU law is to be applied and where bureaucrats find it necessary to found their decisions on what colleagues within the authority or from other Member States have said about how EU law should be applied. [R, abr.]
63.5049 ELLINGTON, Thomas C. —
During the 2008 presidential campaign, B. Obama promised that if elected he would have the most transparent administration in history. This article offers a systematic analysis of whether the Obama administration lived up to this promise so far. A variety of quantitative and qualitative indicators of information policy are examined. These include quantitative evidence collected by the Information Security Oversight Office, as well as qualitative analysis of policies initiated or continued under President Obama. While the administration made great strides toward greater transparency in some areas, its shortcomings in others — notably the prosecution of accused leakers and the assertion of the state secrets privilege in multiple court cases — prevented it from living up to its stated goal. [R]
63.5050 ENSAROĞLU, Yilma Z. —
Turkey currently is witnessing a series of events that are most likely to go down in history as truly important milestones. The country is attempting to tackle the age-old Kurdish question. Thus far, the peace process has given rise to more hope than ever. Yet, it has not been devoid of worries and concerns. Hope arises out of the fact that we are witnessing major progress that was unimaginable until a short time ago. However, the shadow of past experiences makes it difficult to overcome reservations. [R]
63.5051 ERBENTRAUT, Philipp —
With the renewed debate of a possible ban of the NPD gaining steam, this article questions from the perspective of democratic theory whether party bans make sense at all in an open society. Unknowingly, participants in the current dispute reproduce an almost 200-year-old discourse. [Most] contemporary authors are extremely skeptical towards party bans: party bans achieve nothing (futility thesis), party bans are harmful (jeopardy thesis), party bans violate the spirit of democracy (perversity thesis). The contribution of these Vormärz readings to the theory of democracy is an appeal to the citizens to engage the enemies of the constitution in a fierce political dispute rather than wait for legal aid. [R, abr.]
63.5052 FAGAN, Adam —
While it is acknowledged here that state-building and democratization approaches share a similar agency-oriented focus and emphasize elitelevel institutions, it is argued that if conceptualized broadly, a renewed democracy focus may engender a normative shift towards a greater emphasis being placed on socio-economic development and structural realities as dependent variables. Although this is unlikely to fundamentally alter positivist methodological approaches to the assessment of external impact on domestic change in Bosnia or Kosovo, it may at least introduce additional variables for evaluating the critical interaction between institutions and actors. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4923]
63.5053 FAIR, C. Christine —
This essay interrogates popular beliefs about Islamization of the Pakistan army officer corps and the polity from which the army recruits. It first assembles and synthesizes the extant secondary literature on Islamization of Pakistan generally, and the army in particular. To expand what is known about the Pakistan army, this essay presents the results of an ongoing quantitative analysis of district-level officer recruitment (and retirement) data. This ecological study finds that, as recently as 2002, districts that produce army officers are actually more socially liberal and urban than is commonly believed. This essay discusses the implications of the changes in the officer corps and concludes with a call for a robust research agenda on the Pakistan army. [R, abr.]
63.5054 FENG Chongyi —
The creation of a new administrative institution known as the “Stability Preservation Office” at the central level, which is overseen by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Central Committee and has branches at every local level, from streets and townships to enterprises, and has extraordinary powers to override other regular institutions and branches of government, is a clear indication that the Chinese government's efforts to preserve stability are not limited to the conventional business of crime control or public security. This paper traces the origin of the discourse and practice of preserving stability and the rights defense movement in China, investigating the interplay or interaction between the two. [R, abr.]
63.5055 FENG Chongyi —
China is the only major country in the contemporary world to have set up stability preservation offices at all levels of government alongside the normal administrative institutions for social control. These offices are mainly staffed by the existing personnel of the security apparatus, who exercise control over information. Why has the Chinese government pursued this policy? Is stability preservation in China a conventional issue of “law and order”? Are the policy and institutions of stability preservation effective in providing social and political stability? What are the implications of these special arrangements for China and the Chinese communist regime in the long run? [R, abr.]
63.5056 FENG Xingyuan, et al. —
China's central-local relations have been marked by perpetual changes amidst economic restructuring. Fiscal decentralization on the expenditure side has been paralleled by centralization on the revenue side, accompanied by political centralization. This paper contributes to the ongoing debate on “fiscal federalism” by addressing crucial questions regarding China's central-local fiscal relations: (1) to what extent do Chinese central-local fiscal relations conform to fiscal federalism in the Western literature? (2) Are there any problems with existing principles of fiscal federalism and, if so, how to refine them? (3) How are refined principles relevant to the Chinese case and what policies should the Chinese government pursue in the future? Based on an in-depth and critical review of the theories on fiscal federalism, we develop a refined prototype of fiscal federalism. [R, abr.]
63.5057 FENNA, Alan —
This paper surveys Australian economic policy over the last half century, identifying patterns and punctuations in the management of both macro-economic and more structural challenges. It highlights the extent to which the economic policy agenda has been dictated by economic forces, while acknowledging the ideological preferences governments bring to their task. In retrospect, this half-century in Australia has been dominated by macroeconomic turmoil and structural adjustment in the middle decades. Australian governments had to deal simultaneously with the macroeconomic problems of inflation and recession from the mid-1970s to the early 1990s while also facing the need to dismantle the development framework that had been in place since Federation or even earlier. [R] [First article of a thematic issue on “Australian public policy: attention, content and style,” edited and introduced, pp. 82–88, by Keith DOWDING, Andrew HINDMOOR and Aaron MARTIN. See also Abstr. 63.5044, 5046, 5161, 5774]
63.5058 FLIBBERT, Andrew —
The author argues that most of the pathologies in Iraqi political life since 2003, from sectarian mobilization to insurgent violence, are best understood as consequences of forced state failure. [R]
63.5059 FRIEDBERG, Chen —
Efficient parliamentary oversight is dependent primarily on an active committee system, which enables its members to penetrate the surface of government activity and to ensure that the concept of “public accountability” is substantive. The most important committee founded to achieve the oversight task is the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), first instituted in the British Parliament in 1861. This article investigates the Public Accounts Committee activity in the Israeli Parliament during three Knesset terms from a “police-patrol” oversight perspective. It focuses on the committee's ability to oversee the executive branch and its performance. It also analyzes the failures that impair this oversight activity. [R, abr.]
63.5060 FRISCH, Hillel —
After H. Mubarak's ouster, the Egyptian senior command had assumed a guardian role similar to the former Turkish model, despite a shoddy performance in maintaining public order and the questionable loyalty of the lower ranked officers and the ordinary soldiers. Its relative success in managing the transition was due to the willingness of the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafists to negotiate as stakeholders in the system rather than to battle in the streets against the Army. The Muslim Brotherhood's strategy worked. In August 2012, recently elected President M. Morsi subordinated the military by removing the veteran Minister of Defense, the Chief-of-Staff, and other key officers. The military caved in without a whimper. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5061]
63.5061 FRISCH, Hillel —
This special issue on the role of armed forces focuses on what explains the considerable variation in both how these uprisings played themselves out and their political outcomes. At least on three basic dimensions — duration, political intensity and the magnitude of violence — the variation between the six states covered — Egypt, Syria, Libya, Tunisia, Yemen and Bahrain — has been considerable even on a proportionate basis. The range of political outcomes within these six cases has been considerable, ranging from a more or less stable transition to democracy in Tunisia to the Syrian case where there is considerable fear that Syria will break up into sectarian mini-states. [R] [Introduction to a thematic issue on “The role of the military in the Arab tumult,” edited and introduced by the author. See also Abstr. 63.5005, 5060, 5063, 5099, 5118, 5681]
63.5062 GAISBAUER, Helmut P. —
This article discusses evolving patterns of internal security cooperation that start in the realm of international public law and end up more or less entirely in the treaty framework of the EU. By applying the theory of clubs (Buchanan), it shows the fertility as well as limitations of a public goods approach to analyze and explain such instances of differentiated integration and to assess their effectiveness. By way of the comparative analysis of the Schengen regime and the Prüm Treaty, it analyzes five main stages of an internal security club's life circle from the causing obstacle (blocking of a certain policy) to the final incorporation endgame. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5000]
63.5063 GAUB, Florence —
Although seen by many as an unequivocal supporter of M. al-Qaddafi's power basis, the Libyan military's reaction to the 2011 uprising was far from unified: plagued by desertion as well as disintegration, the regime managed to rely only on the hard core of its armed forces. This was mostly a result of the regime's decade-long coup-proofing measures which rendered it in large parts militarily useless. Weakened at the micro level, the Libyan military was incapable of acting at the macro level in any meaningful way. Sitting at the analytical intersection between internal and external features of the armed forces, the Libyan case provides useful insights on the study of the armed forces. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5061]
63.5064 GENOV, Nikolai —
What is specific in the efforts of the Slovenian state institutions to handle the current economic, political, and cultural crisis in the country? The answer is sought in the media representations of the building of a new government in February 2012. The analysis is focused on five major functions of modern states: security provision, regulation of macro-economy, administration, reproduction of human resources, and environmental protection. The source of primary information for the analysis and argumentation is the daily newspaper Delo (Labor). [R, abr.]
63.5065 GIAIMO, Susan —
A primary goal of the [US] Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) is to reduce the number of uninsured by making health insurance more affordable for small businesses and individuals. Toward that end, the PPACA encourages the creation of nonprofit, member-owned health insurance cooperatives to operate inside each state exchange. Co-ops face significant challenges in entering mature insurance markets, but they also possess unique characteristics that may help them survive and thrive. Using Common Ground Healthcare Cooperative in Wisconsin as a case study, this article traces the origins of co-ops in health care reform at national and state levels and analyzes the political and technical challenges and opportunities facing these organizations. [R]
63.5066 GILBERT, Andrew —
I offer an account of why most current research on foreign state-building does not explore the problem of legitimacy, particularly the ability of this problem to shape the practices and effects of international intervention. I point to some of the political and epistemological stakes of this omission by drawing upon my research on how the Office of the High Representative in Bosnia confronted the “democratization paradox” (promoting democracy through undemocratic means) by working to persuade various Bosnian and foreign publics of the necessity and legitimacy of its perspectives and actions. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4923]
63.5067 GOLKAR, Saeid —
The Basij, a massive Iranian paramilitary organization, has played a crucial role in the country's politics, economy, and society at large for the past two decades. While the Basij's increased formal involvement in the Iranian economy was initially meant to guarantee the welfare of its personnel, the Basij has since extended its influence to every sector of the economy, from construction and real estate to the stock market. The expansion of its economic activity has enhanced the Basij's control over society and its influence on domestic politics. This article investigates the history, justifications, and consequences of Basij engagement in business and the economy in post-revolutionary Iran. [R]
63.5068 GOULD, Robert —
Starting from an indication of the problematic nature of the relationship between religion and the state, this paper examines political debates on the headscarf and face veil in three liberal states — Germany, France, and Belgium — between 2003 and 2011. It shows the significant commonalities — despite both the different arrangements between religion and the state and also despite the radically different political, social, and linguistic situations in these countries. The political debates are hostile and assert that fundamental values closely related to national identity, societal values, and human rights are threatened by what the headscarf or face veil represents. The similarity of argumentation shows that the liberalism of each has reached the limits of the “alien religiosity” which politicians say their country can bear. [R, abr.] [Part of a thematic issue on “Islamophobia, European modernity and contemporary illiberalism,” edited and introduced by Natalie J. DOYLE and Irfan AHMAD. See also Abstr. 63.5256, 5309, 5432]
63.5069 GRAY, Doris H. —
In the wake of the popular uprising in Tunisia, secular women's rights activists and Islamists have to come to terms with past privileges and injustices. Despite individual persecution, secular groups generally benefited from state support for women's rights, while most Islamists were jailed, went underground or were in exile abroad for decades. This paper is based on personal interviews conducted in the summer of 2011 with representatives of various women's and human rights organizations and Islamists from the An-Nahda party. As post-revolution events are still unfolding, the paper offers insights into the current state of gender discourse. [R]
63.5070 GWIAZDA, Anna —
This paper examines the role of the EU and the policy preferences of parties in government for the Europeanization of regional policy in Poland. While the importance of the EU is undeniable, the role of political parties is unexplored in the literature. This paper presents a more nuanced approach to the study of policy preferences than the partisan theory proposes. It focuses on strategic origins of policy preferences which dominate in the case of win-win policies such as EU regional policy which is about economic gains for beneficiaries of EU structural and cohesion funds. In this policy case, preferences of domestic political parties have converged towards securing EU funding. The partisan effects on policy outputs are thus less visible in the post-accession stage. [R]
63.5071 HACKELL, Melissa —
Drawing on what A. Norval describes as E. Laclau's “grammar of political analysis,” this article explores the neoliberalization of citizenship in New Zealand. The analysis focuses on how, during the 1990s, pre-existing moral standards of social justice, popular cultural ideals of fairness and equality of opportunity policy discourse were re-articulated to the neoliberal discourse of the citizen as taxpayer. Furthermore, this article illustrates the paradoxical role of contestation in distilling this consensus by exploring how the strategies of New Zealand's major Center-Left and Center-Right Parties to define themselves as distinct from each other in moral terms consolidated a new “inclusive middle” with Left and Right dialects. [R]
63.5072 HALDÉN, Peter —
This article argues that the German Confederation was a form of rule built on early modern republican political theory. It was a “Compound Republic” form of rule constructed to prevent the emergence of a system of sovereign German states as well as a single sovereign German state. Its purpose was maintaining peace and stability in Europe and safeguarding the autonomy of its member polities. Contemporary statesmen, intellectuals and scholars saw these purposes as complementary. A non-sovereign, polycentric and republican organization of the German lands was regarded as a natural and necessary component in a stable Europe free from war and revolutions. This article analyzes the origins, institutions and policies of the German Confederation, with particular regard to how the means of organized violence were organized. [R, abr.]
63.5073 HALL, Matthew E. K.; BLACK, Ryan C. —
Proponents of the “regime politics” approach argue that the US Supreme Court tends to promote the interests of the dominant partisan coalition even while engaging in seemingly countermajoritarian behavior. These scholars suggest that the Court's invalidation of state laws is used to enforce a national consensus against outlier states. We argue that this claim does not withstand empirical analysis. We employ logistic regression analysis to evaluate the relationship between the invalidation of state laws by the Court and the ideological distance between the sitting national government and the state government that enacted the law. Our analysis fails to find support for the regime-enforcement hypothesis; in fact, we find evidence of a negative relationship between ideological distance and invalidation. [R, abr.]
63.5074 HASKEL, Barbara —
The Bologna Process that created the European Higher Education Area is an elaborate Open Method of Coordination (OMC)-type process involving the member states, interested parties, social partners and experts. It is the product of the incentives of the actors who created and who sustain it; it embodies a purpose. Is such a process relevant for policy-making on post-secondary education in the Canadian federal system? One would need to know if there is a compelling vision, objective or anxiety that motivates the key actors. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5194]
63.5075 HEBERER, Thomas —
Analyses of the role, function and behavior of state agencies in China are widely focusing on the central level. This article argues that China's rapid development cannot be explained without understanding the specific role of the local state in policy implementation. The behavior of actors at both the central and the local level is elucidated by the concept of a “developmental state”. It is shown that larger discretion, policy innovations and a rather strict evaluation system are contributing to effective implementation processes. Thus both the central and the local state are figuring as political entrepreneurs capable of successfully adapting institutions to processes of economic and social change. [A]
63.5076 HEDGE, David M. —
This paper documents and assesses the administration's efforts to control the federal bureaucracy. Specifically, evidence from a number of scholarly, journalistic and government accounts is used to identify and assess the G.W. Bush administration's attempt to influence the actions of the nation's regulatory agencies during its eight years in office. While the president's relationship with the defense, intelligence and legal communities are well documented, less is known about the administration's relationship with federal bureaucrats on the domestic, non-security side of government. Yet what evidence is available suggests that the administration spent considerable time and energy on influencing the actions and decisions of those agencies as part of a larger effort by the White House to centralize its authority over the whole of the federal bureaucracy. [R]
63.5077 HESSE, Christian —
The 2011 electoral law has significant structural differences compared to its predecessor, but is minimally invasive regarding the resulting distribution of parliamentary seats. It eliminates the effect of negative weight of votes according to the definition of the Constitutional Court, but it introduces other disruptions of monotonicity. It is hence not clean of inconsistencies and induces differentiations regarding principles of electoral law. The law could easily be improved. Yet, the Constitutional Court has declared the enacted law unconstitutional on 25 July 2012. The Court had modified its previous definition of the effect of negative weight of votes and the degree of admissibility of surplus mandates in such a way that the electoral law 2011 does not fulfill these tightened demands. [R, abr.]
63.5078 HIEDA, Takeshi —
This article explores how the transformation of party systems structures the politics of childcare policy. Political parties contend with each other over childcare and female employment policy on the social-value dimension as well as the redistributive dimension. Assuming that different party policies have distinct impacts on public childcare policy, it is hypothesized that a government's policy position affects changes in public spending for childcare services. Through an analysis of the pooled time-series and cross-section data of 18 advanced industrialized countries from 1980 until 2005 using multivariate regression methods, it is revealed that a government's redistributive left-right policy position interacts with its social liberal-conservative policy position, and that a left-liberal government raises its budget for childcare services while a left-conservative government does not. [R, abr.]
63.5079 HIROI, Taeko; NEIVA, Pedro —
This paper analyzes the relationship between malapportionment and electoral bases of support for Brazilian senators. The conventional wisdom asserts that malapportionment contributes to the “politics of backwardness” — that it facilitates clientelism and hinders issue-based campaigns, reducing electoral competition and producing geographically concentrated patterns of votes. Our study partially confirms, yet partially refutes this wisdom. Our research indicates that malapportionment affects the competitiveness of elections: senators from overrepresented states tend to dominate their key municipalities electorally, whereas senators from underrepresented states tend to share their core municipalities. These findings are consistent with the traditional understanding. However, we find that senators from underrepresented states tend to exhibit geographically concentrated patterns of electoral bases, whereas those from overrepresented areas show much more scattered bases of support. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4610]
63.5080 HO Wing-Chung —
The end of the Deng Xiaoping era in 1997 prompted the Chinese party-state to proceed toward more oligarchic politics. To date, scholars have generally adopted factional politics as a key to understanding the intraparty competition among top leaders who are categorized into different factional groups, such as the princelings, the Shanghai gang, the tuanpai, the mishu party, and the tsinghua clique. One dimension that attracts scant attention, however, is how the emergent bureaucratic market has penetrated and intervened in contemporary factional politics. In question is a small circle of powerful bureaucratic bourgeois [connected to] top political leaders. Using the telecommunication sector as a case in point, the article explores the façade of the vibrant market of family conglomerates and patron-client networks that are also actively involved in jostling for political power. [R]
63.5081 HOLLAND, Alisha C. —
This article examines a highly successful conservative party, the Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA), which held power for close to two decades in El Salvador. The ARENA party used mano dura policies — defined by the introduction of discretionary crimes, diluted due process guarantees, and military participation in policing — to boost its support among constituencies plagued by crime. Two key factors prompted ARENA party strategists to emphasize security. First, a credible electoral threat existed from a leftist party hesitant to resort to harsh security measures. Second, factional divisions drove party strategy. Business elites who formed the core of the ARENA party refused to abandon unpopular economic reforms. Mano dura policies allowed the party to maintain support from traditional elites and their rural bases without reversals to its economic program. [R, abr.]
63.5082 HTUN, Mala; LACALLE, Marina; MICOZZI, Juan Pablo —
Using an original dataset of all the bills submitted to the Argentine Congress between 1983 and 2007, we analyze the relationship between women's presence in Congress and the introduction and approval of bills related to women's rights. Our dataset allows us to compare three periods with varying levels of women's presence in both legislative chambers (the first without quotas, the second with a quota in one chamber, and the third with full quota implementation in both chambers). Our results confirm the necessity of distinguishing between the process of legislative behavior and its outcome. We show that many more women's rights bills were introduced when women held a greater share of seats in both chambers. However, the approval rates of these bills actually declined. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4610]
63.5083 HUEGLIN, Thomas —
Systematic analyses of Canada and the EU as comparable federal systems have been neglected for a variety of methodological reasons. Most importantly, neither body fits the mold of the dominant model of the American federal state. A revised conceptual framework can show, however, that Canada and the EU both provide a similar institutional and procedural environment for policy-making: powers are shared rather than divided; policy directions are determined by executive negotiation rather than parliamentary deliberation; unanimity takes precedence over majority rule; and inter-regional competition is moderated by a commitment to equalization. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5194]
63.5084 IGEL, Ralph; FELDKAMP, Michael F. —
The German Constitution [grants] the President of the German Bundestag police power in the building of the Bundestag. In 1950, tasks concerning order in the Bundestag were assigned to the Hausinspektion, later Hausordnungsdienst (HOD). A year later the protection of parliament was handed over to a division of the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA). As a result, personnel in the HOD was increased by hiring police officers but it was not until 1960 that those officers formally became part of the Federal Police civil-service law. When R. Süssmuth became President of the Bundestag in 1989, she renamed the department Polizei- und Sicherungsdienst (police and security service), acknowledging the Bundestag's police enforcement authorities and showing them her due respect. [R, abr.]
63.5085 IGREJA, Victor —
This article explores the contradictory processes that arise from projects of democratic decentralization in the contexts of those post-civil war, emergent pluralistic democracies and ruling elites that typically strive to officially maintain essentialist forms of national unity, identity and commemorations. These contradictions significantly shape projects of democratization and decentralization in post-conflict countries, even though they have not been thoroughly accounted for in the expert literature. In Mozambique, these contradictions were analyzed through the unrelenting attempts by the main Mozambican opposition party, Renamo, to inscribe officially in the country's landscape their own version of the post-independence civil war (1976–1992). The overall analyses demonstrate how conflicts over memories of violence paradoxically hamper and constitute political pluralism, democratization and decentralization in post-civil war Mozambique. [R, abr.]
63.5086 ILIE, Cornelia —
Gender-related asymmetries in parliamentary power balance tend to emerge in disorderly parliamentary behavior and/or disruptive discourse practices. This article focuses on the way in which the rules, procedures and practices of parliamentary interaction are being transgressed in mixed-gender encounters. The results indicate that a range of five context-specific master suppression techniques are used by both female and male MPs to enact and reinforce their own power position and, at the same time, to challenge and undermine the opponent's authority and credibility. A micro-level analysis of gender-related disruptive discourse practices in the UK Parliament and the Swedish Riksdag shows how different parliaments, with different rhetorical styles and traditions, often exhibit different forms and manifestations of rule-violation, on the one hand, and different reactions to disorderly discursive behavior, on the other. [R] [See Abstr. 63.4845]
63.5087 ISUMONAH, V. Adefemi; EGWAIKHIDE, Festus O. —
Which region gains more from Nigeria's wealth is a subject of heated debate between northerners and southerners. While the former believe that the southern region gets more because it plays host to most of the economic activities of Nigeria, the latter believe that the northern region has through its many years of control of federal power. This study uses the regional distribution of the benefits of student enrollments in federal universities to provide some insights. The choice of university education combines two features of being a benefit and key to certain other benefits the federal government dispenses. The conclusion is that the greater beneficiary of federal expenditures on education is southern Nigeria, which also likely has greater access to other benefits that come with educational qualifications. [R, abr.]
63.5088 JAICHAND, Vinodh; ANDRADE SAMPAIO, Alexandre —
In June 2011, the license to build Belo Monte — an electric-power-generating dam — was granted. Since the 1970s, the project has encountered great opposition. Indigenous peoples and others who would adversely be affected by the construction were supported by national and international NGOs that tried to halt the project through numerous strategic paths, one of which was by filing a case before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. In April 2011, the Commission granted an injunction in favor of the indigenous peoples of the Xingu River Basin, requesting the government to stop construction. However, Brazil argued that these peoples would not be affected and disregarded the request. This article [examines] indigenous peoples’ substantive and procedural rights, [and] assesses the possible adverse impacts on the indigenous peoples. [R, abr.]
63.5089 JEFFERY, Renee —
From 1998 to 2003, the Solomon Islands found itself in the grip of a violent civil conflict. In the aftermath, two dominant approaches to post-conflict justice emerged. The first favored a “rule-of-law” approach according to which large numbers of militants on both sides were arrested and, in many cases, imprisoned. The “reconciliation” approach favored local, grassroots, traditional and indigenous justice processes, routinely implemented by community groups, women's organizations and the churches. In the absence of a planned transitional justice process, these two approaches have come into serious tension, with proponents of each accusing the other of hampering their efforts. It examines those tensions and analyzes the extent to which the Solomon Islands’ Truth and Reconciliation Commission, designed in part to provide a bridge between the approaches, has been able to quell this new set of tensions. [R, abr.]
63.5090 JOHNSON, Rachel E. —
The article focuses on the most common form of institutionally punished disruption seen in South Africa's National Assembly since 1994: orders for individual MPs to withdraw from the chamber. The shifting dynamics of such “set-piece” dramatizations of opposition and their relationship with the established analyses of political opposition in post-apartheid South Africa, especially “dominant party democracy” theory are explored. There have been two main styles of disruptive performance in the National Assembly since 1994: (1) performances of perceived political marginalization; and (2) performances that paradoxically lay claim to uphold parliamentary democracy through rule-breaking, which are termed performances of procedure-as-democracy. The article examines how opposition politicians have justified disruption and unpicks the symbolism of prominent incidents. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4845]
63.5091 JONES, Rhys; PYKETT, Jessica; WHITEHEAD, Mark —
A suite of “behavior change” policies has become evident in UK public policies, informed by insights from the psychological and behavioral sciences. We use Foucaultian conceptions of governmentality and psychological techniques of governance — along with interview and documentary research on contemporary public policy — to examine how such policies re-imagine and address the limitations of neoliberalism, as well as the rationality of subjects. In addressing individuals’ irrationality, such policies reframe contemporary forms of neoliberal governance by potentially: re-centering power within the state apparatus; undermining the significance of rational choice; and creating a new breed of passive subject. [R]
63.5092 KANGAS, Anni —
In the summer of 2011, the Russian state initiated a project to significantly expand the size of its capital, Moscow, developing it into a polycentric urban formation and a “global city”. This article approaches the global city as a circulating form of governmentality by analyzing discussions prompted by the plan for Big Moscow. It proposes that the logic of optimization at work implies that it can be characterized as a neoliberal reform. The focus is on how neoliberalism becomes particularized in the context of the analyzed discussions as it gains backing from constellations of authoritarian politics or historically rooted forms of cultural understanding. This provides a paradigmatic example of how the productive entwinement of seemingly disparate governmental techniques is a necessary effect of the installation and functioning of the neoliberal regime. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4806]
63.5093 KEIL, Soeren —
The Western Balkans have seen rapid changes since the end of the violent conflicts in the 1990s. The EU has been one of the main drivers for change, focusing on the political, economic and social transformation of the region to prepare the countries for membership in the Union. This introduction to the special issue clarifies the key terms and their interaction in the Western Balkans. EU enlargement has never before been this complex and inter-connected with processes of state-building and democratization. The focus on conditionality as the main tool of the EU in the region has had positive and negative effects. The paper discusses the concept of EU Member State-Building, its potential and its pitfalls. [R, abr.] [Introduction to a thematic issue of the same title, edited by the author. See also Abstr. 63.5094, 5634, 5653, 5794, 5898, 5967, 6011]
63.5094 KERANEN, Outi —
The post-conflict space in Bosnia and Herzegovina has been marked by a multiplicity of state-building projects: in addition to the much-analyzed internationally-led state-building process, parallel Bosniak, Bosnian Serb and Bosnian Croat state-building trajectories exist. They undermine and challenge the international state-building venture by appropriating and adapting the liberal state-building processes. This is carried out through the institutions and processes of governance put in place by international state-builders to subvert the state-building trajectory. Focusing on the local appropriation of processes and institutions of governance, the paper maps out the repertoires of contention entailing boycotts, walkouts, protests and refusals to co-operate, to explain how local contention vis-à-vis the international state-building trajectory is carried out. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5093]
63.5095 KHAN, Karim —
Institutional change is an interactive process that results from the social interactions of economic actors. Several perspectives like ideology, efficiency, or distribution etc. are relevant in studying institutional change. In this paper, the distributive consideration is analyzed and an argument is made in favor of this approach by providing evidence from Pakistan's Islamization policy. Our analysis shows that Zia's Islamization program was motivated by his search for legitimacy, and his rent-seeking interests. Domestic legitimacy was achieved through the introduction of Islamic clauses in the constitution as it was a popular demand in a state which was already established through a religious rhetoric. The Islamization program also helped in attaining international legitimacy. [R, abr.]
63.5096 KING, James D.; RIDDLESPERGER, James W., Jr. —
Recent [US] presidents find greater proportions of their executive nominations encountering substantial opposition in the Senate. What accounts for failed nominations to senior-level executive positions? We examine 297 cabinet and other senior-level nominations between 1969 and 2012, testing multivariate models of the effects of the partisan and ideological composition of the Senate, the president's public approval and electoral mandate, and characteristics of the nominee. The analysis demonstrates that allegations of illegal or unethical behavior by the nominee and concerns over policy preferences best explain the Senate's response to executive nominations. Unlike legislative outcomes, confirmation outcomes are the products of nominee-centered factors with presidency-centered factors and Congress-centered factors having little impact on Senate decisions. [R]
63.5097 KITAOKA, Shinichi —
The second Abe administration, inaugurated in December 2012, has been called a repudiation of the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) rather than a strong endorsement of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). However, in the intervening months, public support has risen. Going forward, the Abe administration faces three serious challenges: the economy, security and foreign policy, and a strategy to win in the Upper House elections expected in July 2013. This article analyzes each of these challenges and explores possible courses that the administration could take. [R]
63.5098 KLUTH, Michael; LYNGGAARD, Kennet —
The 2008 global financial crisis produced very different responses in Ireland and Denmark. While both countries embraced depositor guarantee schemes and recapitalization programs, these were designed and adopted in significantly different ways. Crucially, the Irish state initially assumed full responsibility for sector losses and only later defined terms for industry contributions. In Denmark, a negotiated settlement from the outset transferred most of the risk associated with banking failures collectively to the banking sector. The article assesses two explanations for these different responses: (1) variations in domestic exposure to the financial industry, notably its relative size, dominant business models and exposure to real estate markets and (2) variations in institutional features, notably banking sector preferences and legacies of collective action. [R, abr.]
63.5099 KNIGHTS, Michael —
President A. Saleh's solution to “the civil-military problematic” was to build powerful praetorian units and place his relatives in command of them, a counter-productive approach that ultimately increased the risk that Saleh faced. During Yemen's Arab Spring uprisings, sections of the armed forces not controlled by Saleh's siblings and cousins sought to ride the wave of popular revolt and emerge as a cohesive power-base in the post-Saleh period. To achieve these aims the military establishment made a conscious effort to let the tribes and civil society activists lead the assault on the Saleh government. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5061]
63.5100 KRAHMANN, Elke —
Climate change has become one of the greatest threats to environmental security. Accordingly, the EU's 6th Environment Action Program (2010) lists tackling climate change as its first priority. A key aim of the EU has been to cut CO2 emissions, a major factor in climate change, by 8% until 2012 and 20% until 2020. The European Commission has proposed the encouragement of private consumer market for green products and services as one of several solutions to this problem. However, existing research suggests that the market-share of these products has been only 3%, although 30% of individuals favor environmental and ethical goods. This article uses Public Goods Theory to explain why the contribution of the green consumer market to fighting climate change has been and possibly may remain limited without further public intervention. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5000]
63.5101 KRAMON, Eric; POSNER, Daniel N. —
Papers in the burgeoning empirical literature on distributive politics often focus their analysis on the pattern of distribution of a single patronage good — for example, cash-transfers, roads, education spending, electrification, or targeted grants. Yet because governments can favor constituencies through the targeting of multiple public and private goods, drawing general conclusions about distributive politics by investigating just one (or even a few) good(s) can be misleading. We demonstrate the severity of this problem by investigating a particular manifestation of distributive politics — ethnic favoritism — in a particular setting — Africa — and show that the conclusions one draws about who benefits from government allocation decisions can vary markedly depending on the outcome one happens to study. Our findings suggest the need for caution in making general claims about who benefits from distributive politics. [R, abr.]
63.5102 KROPF, Martha; VERCELLOTTI, Timothy; KIMBALL, David C. —
Studies of representative bureaucracy argue that public administrators hold attitudes that are generally representative of the public and will implement policy in accordance with those attitudes. However, studies of representative bureaucracy generally have not considered the partisanship of local administrators. Many local election officials affiliate with a political party, and there is concern that partisan officials will manipulate election procedures to help their party. The authors analyze a survey of local election officials about their attitudes toward provisional voting. [R, abr.]
63.5103 KRUK, Dzmitry —
The response of Belarus to the global economic crisis [2008—] was shaped by a number of distinctive features of the Belarusian economy and of the economic policies implemented before the crisis. The specifics of anti-crisis management in Belarus resulted in a distribution of output losses for a number of subsequent periods and delayed recession. The scenario of stabilization policies in Belarus can therefore be regarded as ineffective. The core reasons for this are an inappropriate choice of policy instruments and delayed exit from stabilization policy. It is argued that this policy mix has long-term implications, including worsening economic growth prospects. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5130]
63.5104 KUO Cheng-tian —
The history of state-religion relations in Taiwan [since] 1945 can be divided into three stages. During the first stage (1945 to 1987), the Leninist state, for the first time in Chinese history, effectively exercised tight control over religion. In the second stage, from 1987 to 2000, the democratizing state gradually withdrew its control over religion while most religious groups tended to refrain from involvement in politics. [Since] 2000, the democratic state and various religions have developed constructive relations involving checks and balances, and this has maximized religious freedom, helped eradicate religious discrimination, and expanded the democratic participation of religious groups in politics. This paper combines theories of the state in political economy and religious market theory to explain these changes in religion-state relations and their impact on religious freedom. [R, abr.]
63.5105 KUREKOVÁ, Lucia —
This article analyzes the role of welfare systems in shaping migration patterns in Central and Eastern Europe. It argues that states have played a crucial role in affecting migration by creating and widening opportunities for potential and actual migrants through welfare system policies. This explains why CEE countries where social spending figures have been lower, unemployment benefit schemes less extensive and where labor market mismatches remained unaddressed, experienced greater out-migration. The article contributes to our understanding of how sending countries’ institutional factors affect out-migration by investigating the role of sending states’ institutions. [R]
63.5106 KWON Hyeong-ki —
The dynamic changes of the Irish social partnership challenge the prevailing theories of comparative political economy. Unlike neoliberal and Marxist accounts of national economies converging toward a neoliberal free market, Ireland developed a social concertation model under globalization. However, despite this development, the institutionalist arguments cannot account for the dynamics of path-breaking adjustments and why two similar crises in the late 1980s and 2008–2011 resulted in different outcomes. To better account for the endogenous process of institutional changes, this article, taking a pragmatic view, emphasizes changes in the actors’ ideas and actions in the process of experiencing an institution, unlike the rationalist and institutionalist assumption of repetition of the same practices and perception. [R, abr.]
63.5107 LAFFAILLE, Franck —
The Italian doctrine has yet to decide on the role attributed to the President of the Republic within the institutions defined by the 1947 Constitution. The President's control of the government's and the parliament's norms is sometimes similar to a veto power. This would tend to make the President a co-actor in the legislative process, thus implying that the traditional parliamentary system is being abandoned for the benefit of a President elected by universal suffrage. At the same time, the interventionism of the Head of State entails the introduction of presidential elements in the framework of a parliamentary system.
63.5108 LAFOREST, Rachel —
This article compares how the role and place of civil society groups in multilevel governance have evolved in Canada and the EU. It argues that, while the scope for engagement of organizations in the EU has broadened, it has been increasingly narrowed in Canada, to the extent that the policy process may be undermined. The article concludes with some insights from the EU experience in order to revive policy coordination in Canada as a governance technique. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5194]
63.5109 LAMONT, Christopher K.; BOUJNEH, Héla —
In January 2011, the overthrowal of President Z. Ben Ali left Tunisia confronted with the task of addressing the dual legacy of Ben Ali's violent crackdown on protesters in the weeks preceding his ouster and decades of widespread human rights abuses. In the immediate aftermath, interim governments launched a number of improvised efforts to deal with the past. These efforts included investigative commissions, compensation, vetting of former regime officials, and criminal trials. This article argues that although Tunisia's national consultation on transitional justice can be heralded as a novel consultative initiative to transmit transitional justice demands into transitional justice legislation, it has also served to highlight contested visions of the post-Ben Ali state and contested memories of Tunisia's secularist and Islamist political traditions. [R, abr.]
63.5110 LAMOUROUX, Sophie —
The outcome of the French reform of the territorial authorities was that the mountain gave birth to a mouse, or rather, the legislative mountain gave birth to a judicial mouse. The objectives were ambitious: cutting spending, cutting red tape and increasing democracy on the local level. The Constitutional Council's reading of the legal text involves the ungrateful organization of a complex phenomenon, i.e., decentralization.
63.5111 LANGBEIN, Julia —
Russia is usually considered as being obstructive to European integration in the EU's Eastern neighborhood, while the EU is portrayed as being the key promoter of convergence with EU rules. Thus, strong economic dependence on Russia and EU active leverage should account for cross-policy variation in convergence with EU rules. By comparing convergence in Ukraine's telecommunications and food safety regulations, I show that active leverage exerted by Western European multinationals rather than by the EU accounts for divergent outcomes. Further, Russia's “bad guy” image does not hold if we stop treating Russia as a unitary actor but distinguish between passive and active leverage exerted by Russian government policies, the Russian market and Russian multinationals investing in the Eastern neighborhood countries on domestic policy choices. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5581]
63.5112 LEACH, Jim —
The 2010 Citizens United ruling has been widely reviewed from the lens of legal precedent. I suggest the need to examine the logic and effects of the ruling from a historical, philosophical, and linguistic perspective. I challenge the Court's basis for providing inanimate entities First Amendment protection to “invest” in politics by equating corporations with individuals and money with speech. Citizens United employs parallel logic to the syllogism embedded in the most repugnant ruling the Court ever made, the 1857 Dred Scott decision. To justify slavery, the Court in Dred Scott defined a class of human beings as private property. To magnify corporate power a century-and-a-half later, it defines a class of private property (corporations) as people. The effect is to undercut the democratic basis of American governance. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5914]
63.5113 LEIJON, Karin; KARLSSON, Christer —
It has been widely recognized that national courts play a significant role in the process of European integration. By asking the ECJ for preliminary rulings, national courts contributed to promoting legal integration. Although previous research has recognized the importance of national courts, we still have only limited empirical knowledge on how they act. This article examines whether national courts act as promoters of legal integration or defenders of the national interest. It provides a systematic investigation of: (1) what type of cases they refer to the ECJ, and (2) what types of opinions they attach with preliminary references. The article utilizes data from all 67 cases referred to the ECJ during the period 1995–2009. [R, abr.]
63.5114 LEONARDY, Uwe —
In the imminent approach of the ban on Land debts, the territorial reform of the Länder will be brought to the political agenda with increasing urgency. The analysis quotes the relevant procedural rules in the nineteen most important federations of the world in a comparative manner and examines the rules they attach to the whole and its parts in territorial reforms. The role of the whole is nowhere as weak as in Germany despite its significance for the territorial structure and the relative equilibrium in it; this fact blocks renewals of the federal system and for this reason, a new and adumbrated procedural model is necessary, properly balancing the said roles. [R, abr.]
63.5115 LINDSAY, Colin; DUTTON, Matthew —
The coalition government has implemented welfare-to-work policies strengthening the UK's Work First model of activating claimants of disability or incapacity benefits (IBs). These reforms abolished the Condition Management Program (CMP) established under the preceding government's Pathways to Work (PtW) initiative to assist people on IBs to cope with health problems. We argue that IB claimants face complex health limitations, and a renewal of CMP provision will be necessary if they are to be assisted towards improved health and employability. Accordingly, we review the impacts of the PtW CMPs operating between 2003 and 2011, in order to identify good practice and lessons for future policy. [R]
63.5116 LJUBOJEVIĆ, Ana —
Fifteen years after the end of the conflict in the former Yugoslavia, discourses about the present and future are based upon revised and reconstructed narratives about the past. Therefore, the relationships between transitional justice, political ideologies and historical narratives are still contested and vague. Recent history in Serbia and Croatia is determined more by each nationality's collective emotional memory than by common factual history. This paper analyzes the impact transitional justice mechanisms have on historical narratives and the creation of collective memory about the war. [R, abr.]
63.5117 LLANOS, Mariana; BARREIRO LEMOS, Leany —
This article studies the processes of nomination and appointment to the Supreme Federal Tribunal in Brazil made by Presidents Sarney through Lula da Silva. It shows that in relations with the Senate, presidential anticipation prevails over presidential dominance. Brazilian presidents are successful appointers because they invest great effort in the moment of selection, when potential candidates are tested in the juridical and political communities. As a consequence, a uniform Senate approval of candidates coexists with a differential pattern of candidate recruitment. Sometimes presidents can select close candidates from their government; sometimes first-choice candidates are ruled out for lack of consensus. The type of coalition the president heads and the number of vacancies available affect the president's chances of imposing a candidate. [R, abr.]
63.5118 LOUËR, Laurence —
The Bahraini security forces fulfilled their task of defending the regime without any qualms during the uprising that occurred in February and March 2011. The regime's coup-proofing strategy has been efficient. It is notably based on the exclusion of the Shias from the security apparatus in a country where the ruling dynasty comes from the Sunni minority and where the opposition is dominated by Shia Islamic movements. However, the recruitment pattern of the Bahraini security forces also results from the general civil-military relations characteristic of all the Gulf states. The increasingly tense factionalism inside the regime is likely to have an impact on the security forces. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5061]
63.5119 LYNCH, Michael S.; MADONNA, Anthony J. —
[US] Congressional votes are recorded only if a member formally requests a roll-call vote, and that request is supported by one-fifth of those present. Many votes pass viva voce and are never recorded. We examine changing patterns of unrecorded voting, analyze the causes of these changes, and consider the implications of these changes for congressional scholars. Using landmark legislation from the 39th (1865–1867) to the 104th Congress (1995–1996), we analyze whether bills receive a recorded or unrecorded final passage vote. While the likelihood that a landmark law receives a recorded final passage vote fluctuates over time, electoral pressures consistently influence members’ decisions to record their votes. [R, abr.]
63.5120 MARIER, Patrik —
Both Canada and the EU have been active in developing pension policies despite the lack of formal mandates to do so. While the Canadian government used its fiscal powers to expand its role in pension programs when pension emerged as a policy issue, the EU has been strongly limited by its lack of resources, institutional complexities, and the maturity of public pension programs in its member states. The EU experience generates interesting lessons for Canadian policy-makers who are dealing with increasingly complex pension issues. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5194]
63.5121 MARON, Asa —
This paper examines the Israeli workfare program as a neoliberal state project and its contested implications for Israeli citizenship. Israeli workfare attempted to reconfigure the relations between state, market and beneficiaries of Income Support Allowance by redefining their duties of citizenship as independent, self-sufficient providers. Using private case-managers and employment coaches, the state urged them to comply with the imperative of labor market participation as the principal duty of Israeli citizenship. This paper focuses on emerging street-level relations between privatized agents of reform, who enforced the new civic duty, and program participants, who resisted this new imposed “social contract,” and insisted that the state maintain some social responsibility. This paper suggests that entrenched legacies of citizenship may be utilized to resist the compulsion of market citizenship. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5215]
63.5122 MARRIAGE, Zoë —
Northern development policies in African countries affected by war are shaped by security concerns and have neoliberal and realist elements. The neoliberal economic policy purports to be inclusive, but when it meets non-compliance, realist ambitions are pursued through the use or strategic oversight of force. The liberalization of mining in Katanga, Democratic Republic of Congo, was promoted through northern policy and was exclusive in strengthening unaccountable domestic governance. This marginalized the majority of the population politically and economically and reinforced the international political economy. Consequently, northern intervention has increased insecurity in Congo, and is potentially destabilizing in contravening reciprocity in international relations. [R]
63.5123 MARSH, Kevin P. —
This study examines the decision-making process of the G.W. Bush administration which led to the decision in late 2006 to order the Iraq troop surge. It analyzes whether the bureaucratic politics model of foreign policy decision-making can accurately explain the events of the case. The study tests the explanatory power and descriptive accuracy of the bureaucratic politics model, while also attaining a more textured, academic understanding of the decision-making process leading to the troop surge. The decision to order the troop surge in Iraq continues to impact US strategy in Iraq, Afghanistan, and overall military doctrine. The author contributes to the development and refinement of the bureaucratic politics model of foreign policy decision-making. [R]
63.5124 MATI, Jacob Mwathi —
How do social movements force fundamental constitutional changes in a polity? This article argues that it is the “disruptive power” of movements that make them a force of change. By analyzing waves of contemporary Kenyan struggles for constitutional and state reform, the article explains why it was only after 20 years of struggle, and in the aftermath of a major social conflict — the 2008 post-election violence — that constitutional reforms were successful. It further argues that it was the collective threats and fears posed by the post-election violence that forced an elite consensus necessary to deliver a new constitution in Kenya in 2010. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5424]
63.5125 MAZZA, Mauro —
The article examines the new trends of Hungarian constitutionalism, realized in the new Fundamental Law, and raising some questions with regard to the hierarchy of sources of law. Especially the cardinal laws have been the subject of criticisms both within the Hungarian doctrine that by experts in constitutional law and international organizations in the Western world. In order to better understand the role of cardinal laws is useful to consider the system of pre-existing organic laws of Hungary. Furthermore, it is also interesting to consider, on the one hand, the first cardinal laws approved, and, on the other hand, the orientations of the Hungarian Constitutional Court on organic laws prior to the adoption of the new Fundamental Law. [R, abr.]
63.5126 MILLAR, Heather —
This article examines the alignment of different governance arrangements and alternative accountability mechanisms in international development policy-making in Canada and the EU, with a particular focus on relationships between governments and NGOs. The Canadian case illustrates an entrepreneurial mode of governance that aligns with fiscal auditing and performance-management mechanisms, while the networked governance model of the EU relies more heavily on accountability instruments of public reporting and deliberation. The article concludes that the European accountability regime likely provides policy-makers with more opportunities for social policy learning but would be difficult to implement in Canada given the underlying action logic of the federal government. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5194]
63.5127 MORENO, Luis —
In contemporary times, Spain offers a good example of a very compressed transition to post-industrial socio-economic structures, passing from peripheral to core status within the EU and the international economic order. The article reviews developments and outcomes in Spain since 2000 by paying attention to the impact of the EU on Spain's welfare political economy. The adoption of EU recommendations in labor activation policies and the increase in female participation in the formal labor market are singled out as highly relevant for policy change. The explanatory account of welfare development focuses on continuity and change by considering the analytical constellation of ideas, interests and institutions. [R] [See Abstr. 63.4985]
63.5128 MORENO, Luis; OBYDENKOVA, Anastassia —
The article contributes to the understanding of the dynamics of federalism in Russia and Spain. It traces the dynamics of decentralization in both states and addresses a puzzle on reversible (Russia) and irreversible (Spain) outcomes of territorial reforms and regime transition. Among other explanatory factors, this article argues that the role of the political parties as mediating actors — proactive or reactive — has been crucial in shaping institutional building in both countries. Concluding remarks envisage some scenarios of further territorial developments in comparative perspective. [R]
63.5129 MULEC, Breda —
This article refers to the European level of governance and the national level, in order to show the complexity of the administrative systems that affect the (in)efficient use of European funds. Specific examples of inefficiency are presented with reference to the Slovenian administrative system in the implementation of these programs, which affect the use of European funds. The examples are analyzed with the help of indicators of the EU Cohesion Policy inefficiency, such as the indicator of irrational bureaucratic behavior and complex procedures. [R, abr.]
63.5130 MYANT, Martin; DRAHOKOUPIL, Jan; LESAY, Ivan —
The financial and economic crisis in the Central and East European countries raised the profile of economic policy themes that relate to the role of taxation and state spending. The key policy differences related to public budgets and support for a demand stimulus. Responses fall broadly into two categories that we link to a social-democratic and a neoliberal response, indicating that the policy responses were linked to the party affiliation of the government on the left-right spectrum. There are differences in timing and in severity, but every country has at some point moved towards a policy of balancing the budget by making cuts. In all cases there were cuts in benefits for marginal groups in society and a switch towards indirect rather than direct taxes. [R, abr.] [First of a series of articles on “Policy paradigms and forms of development in and after the crisis,” in a thematic issue on “Transition economies after the crisis of 2008: actors and policies,” edited and introduced, pp. 373–382, by Martin MYANT and Jan DRAHOKOUPIL. See also Abstr. 63.5103, 5151, 5423, 5960]
63.5131 NABBS-KELLER, Greta —
The effects of domestic politics on the conduct of Indonesia's foreign policy continue to attract scholarly attention. Relatively less attention, however, has been given to the Foreign Ministry, the principal institutional actor responsible for foreign policy-formulation and management of Indonesia's external relations. This article argues that this neglect is a mistake: institutional changes within the Foreign Ministry, together with the emergence of new ideas, have played a key role in transforming the country's foreign policy. It was principally within the Foreign Ministry that significant attempts were made to change Indonesia's national self-image so that it better reflected the values of the reformasi experience. This article explores how democratic norms have been internalized in both the organization of the foreign policy bureaucracy and in the conceptualization of Indonesia's external identity. [R]
63.5132 NAVRACSICS, Tibor —
As the highest representative body in Hungary, the Hungarian Parliament has exclusive constituent authority. If the Constitutional Court interprets the constitution contrary to the constituent assembly intentions, the latter can change the constitution. This is what the Hungarian Parliament has now done by amending the constitution with rules on the jurisdiction of courts and on higher education. Many of the new rules are in line with legal practice in other European countries; some may even serve as a model. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5172]
63.5133 NICHOLLS, Kate —
The author looks at policy responses to labor market challenges in Ireland, Portugal, and Greece between 1990 and 2008, focusing in particular on work-life balance, higher education, and immigration policies. [R]
63.5134 NICHOLLS, Keith; PICOU, J. Steven —
We explore the impact Hurricane Katrina on citizens’ trust in government. Of primary interest is the relationship between poor governmental performance in the aftermath of the storm and low levels of political trust. In addition, levels of trust are related to respondents’ predictions regarding the time it will take their communities to recover. Relationships are investigated through an analysis of data from a survey of residents in the Katrina-affected areas of Louisiana and Mississippi [US]. For this initial exploration, bivariate analysis is used to elaborate relationships between measures of trust in government and the experiences and attitudes of survey respondents. [R, abr.]
63.5135 NYKÄNEN, Johanna —
In 2009, the Turkish government launched a novel initiative to tackle the Kurdish question. The initiative soon ran into deadlock, only to be untangled towards the end of 2012 when a new policy was announced. This comparative paper adopts M Barnett's trinity of identity, narratives and frames to show how a cultural space within which a peaceful engagement with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) would be deemed legitimate and desirable was carved out. Comparisons between the two policies reveal that the framing of policy narratives can have a formative impact on their outcomes. The paper demonstrates how the governing quality of firmness fluctuated between different connotations and references, finally leading back to a deep-rooted tradition in Turkish governance. [R]
63.5136 ORNSTON, Darius —
This article documents and explains the surprising capacity of several Continental European countries to adapt to rapid, innovation-based competition. Critics and proponents alike suggest that these economies rely on incremental upmarket movement in low- and medium-technology industries. Several historically low-technology Nordic countries, however, have recently assumed leading positions in industries such as biotechnology, software, and telecommunications. The article resolves this puzzle by arguing that these countries have adapted institutionalized cooperation among organized economic actors to invest in new supply-side resources, including venture capital, skill formation, and research. This pattern of “creative corporatism” has very different implications for economic adjustment, facilitating movement into new high-technology industries. The article supports the argument by analyzing institutional change and economic restructuring in Finland, a critical case where high-technology competition is least likely. [R, abr.]
63.5137 ORSINI, Michael —
In the last decade, autism has become one of the most hotly contested health policy issues in North America and beyond. In Canada, this culminated in 2004 with a much-publicized Supreme Court decision — Auton v. British Columbia — that pitted parents of autistic children against the BC government, which was unwilling to cover the costs of behavioral treatment for autistic children. In contrast to parent-led advocacy groups, there has been a flurry of civil society activity waged by autistic self-advocates who decry the focus on curing autistic people and press instead for the recognition of neurological difference. Drawing on interviews with advocates in Canada and the US, this article highlights these contending perspectives and argues that both pose fundamental challenges to how we view the redistributive aims of the welfare state in Canada and beyond. [R, abr.]
63.5138 PAUL, Regine —
This article contends that the strategic use of the internal mobility regime by member states, as a justification for selective recruitment of labor from outside the EU, deserves more analytical attention. It examines how labor migration policies (LMP) in the UK, France and Germany make use of the EU free-movement framework in current legislation, and how associated policy rationales are justified. In an interpretive policy analysis of legislative documents and decision-makers’ meaning-making, the article identifies the logics, tools and rationales which link LMP to EU free movement. These links are highly selective and serve common as well as nationally distinct governance goals. Across all three cases, LMPs ascribe various degrees of relevance to EU internal labor supply, depending on the different skill levels of migrants targeted in respective policies. [R, abr.] [First article of a thematic issue on “Migration, mobility and rights regulation in the EU,” edited and introduced, pp. 113–121, by Emma CARMEL and the author. See also Abstr. 63.4990, 5017, 5217, 5506]
63.5139 PELLEGRINA, Lucia Dalla; GAROUPA, Nuno —
This article explores the extent to which political variables can explain the behavior of constitutional judges in Italy when dealing with conflicts between the central government and regions. Two competing hypotheses are tested. One hypothesis argues that one should expect some alignment between the political preferences of the judges and the success of the central government primarily due to the appointment mechanism. The other hypothesis suggests that there should be no systematic alignment between the political preferences of the judges and the success of the central government. Unlike previous literature, the empirical results presented in this article seem to confirm that when the Rapporteur and the court's majority are allegedly affiliated with the Prime Minister's coalition, the odds of success of the Prime Minister go up. [R]
63.5140 PERESS, Michael —
I develop a survey-based measure of district ideology for the House of Representatives. I use this index to document and study ways in which patterns of candidate positioning depart from perfect representation. These findings help distinguish between competing theories of candidate positioning. My findings present evidence against theories that attribute divergence to the preferences of voters and the locations of primary constituencies. My findings are potentially consistent with the policy-motivation and resource theories, which attribute divergence to the polarization of political elites. [R]
63.5141 PLÖHN, Jürgen —
In the very first vote on a motion of no confidence tabled by the parliamentary opposition, W. Brandt's first cabinet was defeated on the floor, but remained in office due to the specific provision of the German constitution. During 1972, Brandt's cabinet acted without an approved budget and from April to December without a parliamentary majority. In legislative matters an overall far-reaching consensus can be recognized. But in detail, different majorities became relevant, sometimes with an advantage for the parliamentary opposition. In foreign policy as well as welfare policy, initiatives of the opposition successfully challenged the ruling minority. With respect to the maintenance of power, Brandt's strategy was clearly successful; with regard to political decisions, the vulnerability of a minority cabinet became evident. [R, abr.]
63.5142 QUAGLIA, Lucia —
This research asks to what extent, how and why two key domains of domestic political economy — macroeconomic policies and financial services regulation — have been Europeanized in Italy over the last decade. The impacts of EMU and EU financial services regulation are assessed by tracing the change in interests, ideas and institutions in these policy areas and identifying the causal mechanisms through which change came about (or was resisted). The degree of Europeanization and its effects have been uneven across different elements of the political economy and some distinctive national features have remained. [R] [See Abstr. 63.4985]
63.5143 RACINE, Louis —
Eight years after his first election to the presidency, Mahmud Ahmadinejad has come a long way, from hero of the Iranian regime's most conservative forces and cherished man of the Supreme Leader, to a rebel in his own faction. What have been the main causes of this spectacular shift, and how is this situation representative of the subtle balance inside today's Iran political system? [R]
63.5144 RELYEA, Harold C. —
Presidents make use of temporary national study commissions for various reasons. At a pivotal moment, C. Coolidge established such a panel in 1925 — the President's Aircraft Board — to stifle a critic, seize the initiative for an emerging and important policy area, and prompt Congress to enact legislation reflecting his preferences for that policy area. The circumstances underlying the creation of that panel, its operations and recommendations, and its legacy are profiled in this overview. [R]
63.5145 RHINARD, Mark; HOLLIS, Simon; BOIN, Arjen —
In recent years, the EU has taken a number of steps towards improving civil protection cooperation in Europe. European leaders’ declarations have been accompanied by a flourish of policy activity, the building of new structures, and even treaty changes. On the surface, this little-known area of European integration appears to be proceeding with great success. A closer look, however, reveals significant gaps between member states’ general expressions of enthusiasm and problematic cooperation in practice. We draw upon public goods theory to explain why this might be the case; more specifically, we identify likely game-theoretic obstacles to cooperation in different areas of the civil protection field. We evaluate our theoretical propositions by examining the current state of cooperation in marine pollution response, chemical contamination management, and flood response. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5000]
63.5146 RICH, Jessica A. J. —
How does the state ensure the implementation of national policies in a context of decentralized political authority? This article identifies a new strategy utilized by national bureaucrats to regulate the behavior of subnational politicians: mobilizing civil society as government watchdog and political advocate. In the context of decentralized governance, in which local politicians administer most social sector programs, reform-minded bureaucrats often find that they have little control over the implementation of their progressive policies. In Brazil's AIDS policy sector, however, bureaucrats have ensured the successful implementation of their policies by developing allies outside government. These state actors — here called activist bureaucrats — have been largely overlooked in the English-language literature, yet they form a new layer of politics in Latin America. [R]
63.5147 RICHARD, Hélène —
The privatization of the apartments for the benefit of their legal occupants has made the once Soviet residential buildings into multi-owner properties (or condominiums). This article explores the appropriation of a new legal and economic model of building management by ordinary people living in Moscow. In line of literature that places the emphasis on the historical and social forces driving the economic exchanges, we note that some individuals are more likely to seize the new model. We [use a] comparative case study of two women from different social milieu [who] got involved in their building's affairs. These cases function as a magnifying prism of ordinary situations. We take them as a original way to study social construction of condominiums in post-communist Russia. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4712]
63.5148 RIEDE, Matthias; SCHELLER, Henrik —
The parliamentary investigate committee is very often seen as nothing more than an instrument of the opposition to scandalize the government and the majority in parliament. The analysis focuses on the print media coverage of all investigations by the Bundestag‘s investigate committees from 1990 to 2011. Most of these committees were indeed used as an instrument for scandalizing the government's majority. Nevertheless, there are also cases which show the course of atypical scandals, since the scandalized persons themselves tried to use the committee as a forum for self-defense. Necessary preconditions for a “successful” creation of scandals are always the prominence of the witnesses and the publicity of hearings. [R, abr.]
63.5149 RIETJENS, Sebastiaan; SOETERS, Joseph; VAN FENEMA, Paul C. —
Uruzgan Province is widely seen as one of the few areas where positive developments occurred in Afghanistan's south. A major reason for this success is believed to be the comprehensive approach that was adopted to address the complex and multifaceted nature of problems. This article analyzes the coordination between the Dutch military and the wide variety of civil actors that took place during the period 2006–2010 in Uruzgan, as this was a key element within the comprehensive approach. Making use of inter-organizational network theory, the article identifies and analyzes three dimensions of civil-military coordination: interdependence, (in)coherence of logics and conditions for coordination. Based on these dimensions the article develops a strategic compass that guides military forces in establishing and managing their relationships with civil actors. [R] [See Abstr. 63.4861]
63.5150 RINCÓN CASTILLO, Elita Luisa —
This study analyzes the historical route for evolution of the nation-state in Latin America from the mid-19th c., through the20th c., to the first decade of the 21st c. The paper structures Latin American political history into four types of states: the liberal-oligarchic state of the 19th c. and the 20th c.; the national-popular state, the authoritarian-bureaucratic state and the neoliberal state of the 20th c.; in the first decade of the 21st c., the possible formation of a post-neoliberal state, resulting from the political turn to the left. The nation-state continues to be an important actor in globalization and the worldwide political economy. Far from disappearing, it tends to fortify itself and transform its regulatory functions. The complex nature of the Latin American socioeconomic problem requires an economic model and/or coherent development, appropriate programs and a high degree of administrative effectiveness, as well as an organic interconnection among economic and social policies. The new role of the state in Latin America's economy and society should be redefined. [R]
63.5151 ROBINSON, Neil —
Russia's recovery from the deep economic crisis it experienced in 2008–2009 did not deliver clear political dividends for the Russian leadership. This is because of the context in which the crisis occurred and the way that the leadership, particularly President D. Medvedev, and many of its critics described the crisis. The oil-fueled boom that preceded the crisis had the effect of deepening it. Economic recovery based on rising energy prices looks like a failure, rather than a success, and highlights the underlying structural problems of the Russian economy. Arguments about the need for modernization from within government exacerbated this perception. This seems to have weakened the connection between approval for the leadership and economic growth, a staple of pre-crisis politics. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5130]
63.5152 ROSEN, Jeffrey —
As [US] Chief Justice, J. Roberts pledged to try to persuade his colleagues to consider the bipartisan legitimacy of the Court rather than their own ideological agendas. [Following] a series of high-profile decisions by polarized, 5–4 votes, in the health-care decision, however, Roberts did precisely what he said he would do, casting a tie-breaking vote to uphold the Affordable Care Act because he thought the bipartisan legitimacy of the Court required it. But the reaction to the decision — which Democrats approved and Republicans did not — suggests that Roberts's task of preserving the Court's bipartisan legitimacy is more complicated than he may have imagined, and that his success in the future will depend on the willingness of his colleagues to embrace his vision. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5914]
63.5153 ROSÉN, Frederik —
This article suggests an agenda for juridical civil-military relations by considering how recent developments in human rights law in Europe breed new forms of juridical civil-military relations. The argument is that the human-rights-driven recasting of legal authority over military affairs from military justice systems to civilian justice systems entwines these systems. Furthermore, insofar as the theories and studies of civil-military relations have not yet addressed the juridical dimension of civil-military relations as a subject of its own right, this entwining calls for a new subject in the study of civil-military relations, straddling the institutional entwining as well as the sociological dimension of practical cooperation. [R] [See Abstr. 63.4861]
63.5154 ROSSERA, Andrew —
This article reviews the literature on human rights violations in Indonesia during the post-New Order period, evaluates the explanations it provides, drawing on insights from R. Robison's Indonesia: The Rise of Capital [Sydney, 1986] and his subsequent book with V. Hadiz, Reorganizing Power in Indonesia: The Politics of Oligarchy in an Age of Markets [London, 2004]. This literature either gives insufficient attention to the nature of the Indonesian state or does so in a way that obscures the interests of the country's powerful politico-business oligarchy. Future research thus needs to examine the role of these factors, taking into account the way in which the oligarchy's interests vis-à-vis human rights are mediated by the type of right and the structure of the economy. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5935]
63.5155 ROUTRAY, Bibbu Prasad —
India's arms acquisition and technology absorption process remains skewed. It undermines the preferences of the armed forces and remains overly tilted in favor of the civilian technologists. The combination of a policy of autarky, distrust of the military, and the avowed objective of building an indigenous technology base and establishing self-reliance in military preparedness — these factors have together prevented the graduation to a structured acquisition process. The technologists continue to [recreate] a regime known for its delays and cost over-runs rather than for providing an efficient system of delivery. The success of the technologists belonging to the Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO), India's primary military Research & Development (R&D) agency, in one field — that of missile technology and missile defense — perpetuate this distortion in the system as a whole. [R, abr.]
63.5156 ROYO, Sebastián —
This article examines the integration experience of Portugal in the EU in order to study how it has affected the country's fiscal policies in the decade prior to the global financial crisis, from 1999 to 2008. It focuses on three main variables to account for the difficulties that Portugal experienced in complying with the Stability and Growth Pact: institutions, ideas, and interests. The paper closes with some lessons from the Portuguese experience. The examination shows that, to be successful, economic reform has to be a domestic process led by domestic actors willing to carry it out. [R] [See Abstr. 63.4985]
63.5157 RUBLI, Sandra —
Focusing on political parties, this article highlights divergent conceptualizations of key elements of transitional justice that are part of the current contestation of the dealing-with-the-past process in Burundi. It looks beyond claims that there is a lack of political will to comply with a certain global transitional justice paradigm. Transitional justice is [here] conceived of as a political process of negotiated values and power relations that attempts to constitute the future based on lessons from the past. This paper argues that political parties in Burundi use transitional justice not only as a strategy to protect partisan interests or target political opponents, but also as an instrument to promote their political struggles in the course of molding a new, post-conflict society and state. [R]
63.5158 RÜTTERS, Peter —
There has been repeated criticism of the political parties dominating the election of the Federal President as being detrimental to his reputation and dignity. Therefore, as an alternative to the election by the partydominated Federal Assembly (Bundesversammlung), the critics propose to elect the President directly, to give him more independent legitimacy and to strengthen his position within the political system not least against the political parties. Today, reviewing fifteen presidential elections, it can be found that though won by narrow margins, the outcomes were always determined by the majority-proportions prevailing in Parliament. However, this did not make Presidents to puppets on the strings of the majority-holding parties. Likewise, the presidential elections during the Weimar Republic give little reason to prefer a direct election. [R, abr.]
63.5159 RUZIEV, Kobil; MAJIDOV, Toshtemir —
Kazakhstan, the Kyrgyz Republic and Uzbekistan are neighboring countries in post-Soviet Central Asia which share similar culture and language. Their economic structures were similar under central planning: they provided the agricultural basis to the Soviet economy. But, since independence, these economies have grown structurally more heterogeneous due to variations in the implementation of market-oriented reforms, the degree of integration into the global economy and natural resource endowment. This article demonstrates how this heterogeneity can explain the differing effects of the recent Global Financial Crisis on these countries’ economies in general and in the banking sector in particular. [R]
63.5160 SÁENZ ROYO, Eva —
This article calls into question some of the stereotypes about [Spanish] intergovernmental relations. Some of them do not correspond to daily life and developments since several years ago. On the one hand, against the continuing complaints by the [regions], this study justifies what they are and what they should be and work similarly to other federal systems. [R, abr.]
63.5161 SANDERS, Will —
This paper identifies two periods of punctuated change in the content and style of Australian Indigenous policy in the last fifty years. It also identifies a third period in which attention to Indigenous policy was heightened through the nationalization of land issues already well-established on the agendas of sub-national jurisdictions. The paper relates all three periods to the changing federal institutions of Australian Indigenous policy, with the Commonwealth slowly exploring its post-1967 role as a national government in Indigenous affairs. The paper identifies some more conceptual bases of changing policy agendas, through ideas of the competing principles of equality, choice and guardianship and the generational moral dynamics of Indigenous affairs. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5057]
63.5162 SAURUGGER, Sabine —
This contribution critically analyzes the strengths and pitfalls of constructivist public policy approaches in EU studies and develops avenues for further research. Four conceptual frameworks are discussed: (1) sociological institutionalism; (2) discursive institutionalism; (3) approaches based on socialization and learning;, and (4) actor-centered constructivism. When the constructivist turn in IR “hit” European integration theories, the large epistemological tent under which constructivists gathered centered schematically around two puzzles: how ideas, norms and world views were established; and how and why they mattered. Recently, actor strategies and economic rationality have been reintroduced into constructivist accounts. This actor-centered constructivism is based on the idea that in order to understand how actors think and how their ideas count in policy-making, one must take into account the way actors use ideas strategically. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5657]
63.5163 SCHULZE, Corina —
This article demonstrates women's substantive impact on government by examining the earmark requests of the US House Representatives. Women representatives are hypothesized to make more funding requests for women's issues than male representatives. Through use of OLS statistical analysis, women's issue earmark requests, as reported by the 111th congressional House members for the fiscal year 2010, serve as the dependent variable. Gender is a significant predictor of earmark requests even when controlling for the ideology, partisanship, and racial minority status of a House member. This finding is evidence of women's substantive representation in the form of earmark requests. [R]
63.5164 SCHWANDNER-SIEVERS, Stephane; STRÖHLE, Isabel —
By using “political will” as the framing concept, this article explores what ethnographic research can offer to the political sciences and to policy-making in understanding opportunities and failures, including the subversion, obstruction and unintended consequences of post-war statebuilding processes under international tutelage such as the one in Kosovo. The article challenges the external actors’ assumptions of an absence or “lack of political will” as normative and ethnocentric; indeed a grounded engagement with internal social and political dynamics suggests the existence of a domestic political will that might not conform to international expectations. The article argues that an ethnographic approach to the study of post-conflict state-building is best suited to reveal the, to outsiders, often hidden scripts and signifiers that underpin such an internally relevant and negotiated “political will”. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4923]
63.5165 SEDELIUS, Thomas; MASHTALER, Olga —
Semi-presidentialism has emerged as the most common regime type in Central and Eastern Europe and among the post-Soviet states. An often identified peril of semi-presidentialism is the risk of intra-executive struggles between the president and the prime minister. This study analyzes the trend and issues of intra-executive conflicts in eight semi-presidential (premier-presidential and president-parliamentary) countries in Central and Eastern Europe: Bulgaria, Croatia, Lithuania, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Russia, and Ukraine. By utilizing expert survey data as well as indicators derived from documentary and literature analysis, 76 instances of intra-executive (president-cabinet) pairs between 1991 and 2011 are examined. The results show that intra-executive conflict has been a frequent phenomenon under both types of semi-presidentialism, and one that has persisted at similar levels throughout the post-communist era. [R, abr.]
63.5166 SEVERIANO TEIXEIRA, Nuno —
As in all previous crises, economic recession and budget crisis have affected the financing capacity of the state and reflected on the welfare state. The political debate and the reform of public policies have centered on the social function of the state. What appears to be new is that, at least in Portugal, the debate has widened and spread to the sovereign functions of the state and, therefore, to its very foundational core. The paper argues that, even though there has not been growth in sovereignty-related expenditure, there is room for a reform of the sovereign functions, namely in the scope of national defense and armed forces. The paper concludes proposing some principles and methods for the reform. [R] [First of a series of articles on “The reform of the state”. See also Abstr. 63.4651, 4707, 5544]
63.5167 SHIN Tan Yee; ASLAM, Mohamed —
Under the traditions of the Westminster system, prime ministers and ministers give countless public speeches each year, while their loyal public service quietly and anonymously carries out the daily business of public administration. Current practice suggests that this traditional picture no longer holds true. In the 21st c., bureaucratic leaders are prepared to give public speeches on their own authority — adopting a “public face” as contributors to public debate. This article examines the extent to which key bureaucratic leaders in Canada have adopted an independent public face through public speeches, and how the Canadian experience compares to other Westminster jurisdictions. It argues that contemporary Canadian practice has taken a middle road between independent policy advocacy and quiet anonymity. [R]
63.5168 SIEBERER, Ulrich —
Parliaments often elect holders of important extra-parliamentary offices such as heads of state, constitutional judges, heads of audit institutions and ombudsmen. What drives the behavior of parliamentary actors and the outcome of such elections? This article explains actor behavior theoretically, drawing on spatial factors, principal-agent arguments about the importance of nonspatial candidate characteristics and signaling arguments about competitive considerations beyond the specific election. Empirically, it provides the first comparative analysis of such elections outside the US Senate using original data on 100 elections for four external offices in 14 Western European parliaments. The findings show that spatial variables, nonspatial candidate characteristics and features of the competitive context systematically affect the election outcome. [R, abr.]
63.5169 SIMMONS, Julie M. —
This article compares the role of citizens in public reporting exercises of Canada's National Child Benefit and health care service delivery to that of the EU's Open Method of Coordination (OMC) for social protection and social inclusion. It finds that the institutional infrastructure providing for coordination across social policy areas and possible roles for non-governmental actors in policy development is more extensive in the OMC than in the “new modes of governance” in Canada. However, there are obstacles to developing such infrastructure in Canada, given the different histories and political contexts of the European community and the functioning of federalism in Canada. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5194]
63.5170 SIRRS, Owen L. —
In 2011, intelligence reform became a timely and pertinent topic in Egypt with the overthrow of President H. Mubarak by mass demonstrations. Yet two outstanding questions persist: can Egyptian intelligence be reformed? What would intelligence reform entail in the Egyptian context? An examination of historical Egyptian intelligence reforms suggests that “reform” in the Egyptian context usually means greater efficiency and centralization at the expense of public oversight and accountability. Prospects for fundamental intelligence reform are further hampered by Egypt's authoritarian traditions, its relatively weak legislature and judiciary, lack of an empowered civil society, censorship and an apparent official addiction to secrecy. [R]
63.5171 SNEGAROFF, Thomas —
B. Obama's 2012 re-election has prompted numerous optimistic reactions: after a less-ambitious-than-expected first term, the man in the White house will now finally “change America,” as many observers wanted to believe. The reality, however, is more complex. He still has to deal with a recalcitrant Congress. And yet the House of Representatives is held, at least until 2014, by a Republican Party hostile to the President, and the Democrat majority in the Senate is fragile. Added to that, the economic crisis means Washington has little room for maneuver. The exhausting debate around the fiscal cliff in early 2013 set the tone: Mr. Obama's second term will be no easier that his first. [R, abr.]
63.5172 SÓLYOM, László —
The recent amendments to Hungary's Constitution are about more than just the content of specific provisions or “formal corrections”. Since the electoral victory of the Fidesz party in 2010, it has been possible to observe the instrumentalization of the constitution to serve everyday political objectives. The constitutional amendments, especially the curtailment of the Constitutional Court's powers, have one goal: the parliamentary majority claims for itself the right to have the last word on issues of constitutionality. This system resembles the socialist past. [R] [First of a series of articles on “Power and law in Hungary”. See also Abstr. 63.5132, 5188, 5381, 6013]
63.5173 SOUTHWELL, Priscilla L. —
This research examines recent electoral reform in French politics, and whether such reforms have served to minimize the overall impact of the earlier passage of gender parity law in 2000. As such, this is a study of how party elites often take steps to thwart any changes in the status quo that will endanger their own existing advantage or position. Specifically, we examine the increase in the number of two-round plurality districts for the Senate and the change from nationwide to regional districts for elections to the EP. Analysis of the 2001, 2004, 2008 and 2011 Senate elections suggests that the plurality method resulted in fewer women being elected to office, as compared with those Senate districts that used a closed-list proportional method. [R, abr.]
63.5174 SPEARS, Ian S. —
Power-sharing and inclusion continue to inform contemporary approaches to conflict-resolution and post-conflict governance in Africa. But aside from power-sharing efforts in relatively well-institutionalized countries such as South Africa and Rhodesia/Zimbabwe, most efforts at formal inclusion have been short-lived. Indeed, many high-profile experiences in power-sharing governments have been failures. African governments and opposition groups do engage in inclusion, but, owing to the non-institutionalized nature of African politics, it is almost always directed toward more limited short-term objectives such as regime survival or material reward that comes with participation in peace processes. Surveying Africa's experience with power-sharing, this article argues that inclusion continues to be a fragile basis on which to build peace. [R]
63.5175 STEINMETZ, Hélène —
Does public action contribute to the rise and decline of historical forms of working-class property-ownership? This article, focusing on the political construction of housing markets, deals specifically with a state policy implemented at the beginning of the 1970s in France by the Ministry of Equipment, meant to arouse a new offer of low-price house known as “chalandonnettes”. At the end of the 1960s, the idea that a centralized and direct state is necessary to regulate the development of suburban housing is taken as granted by the civil servants of central administration. However, as power relations change in the housing field during the 1970s, this kind of public intervention on housing market tends to lose its legitimacy and gives way to a more indirect way of encouraging working-class property-ownership. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4712]
63.5176 STONE, Geoffrey R. —
How does the [US] Supreme Court serve the “common good”? What is the Court's responsibility, as the ultimate interpreter of the Constitution, in our constitutional system of government? This essay explores that question with an eye on the recent performance of the Court in highly controversial and divisive cases. What explains the Court's decisions in cases involving such issues as campaign finance regulation, gun control, abortion, affirmative action, health care reform, voting rights, and even the 2000 presidential election? This essay argues that there is a right and a wrong way for the Supreme Court to interpret and apply the Constitution; and whereas the Warren Court properly understood its responsibilities, the Court in more recent decades has adopted a less legitimate and more troubling mode of constitutional interpretation. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5914]
63.5177 STROHMEIER, Gerd —
In July 2012, the German Constitutional Court again ruled unconstitutional parts of the (2011 revised) electoral law. The article illustrates the ruling of the constitutional court and its consequences. It discusses and assesses the new electoral reform initiated ad implemented by the CDU/CSU, SPD, FDP and Bündnis 90/Die Grünen. It also discusses and assesses the alternative model for electoral reform initiated by Die Linke in a comparative perspective. [R]
63.5178 STROSCHEIN, Sherrill —
I outline some of these common pathologies of hierarchies to demonstrate how they might produce particular responses of resistance from within a population, particularly from within a population divided along identity lines. These patterns can be used to facilitate better approaches by internationals to state-building contexts, particularly in post-conflict settings like the Balkans. Kosovo will be briefly used as an illustrative example of some of these themes. By embracing the promise of more decentralized and horizontal hybrid approaches to governance, and by incorporating some of the already-existing informal practices on the ground, internationals can take a more effective approach to statebuilding projects. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4923]
63.5179 SWENDEN, Wilfried —
This article summarizes the main arguments of the special issue. It also probes into the deficiencies of the Belgian federal system and argues that the most recent crisis of Belgian federalism (2007–2011) is not the result of rising socio-economic differences between Flanders and Wallonia, but the consequence of building a bipolar federation on to a split party system. The article concludes by identifying some potential road-maps (federal reform, confederalism, and the referendum) for the future. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5039]
63.5180 TABARELLI, Marco —
The paper analyzes the consequences of European integration processes upon the judicial systems of the so-called “parliamentary sovereignty regimes,” focusing on the British and Swedish judiciaries. The aim is to understand if the influences coming from European integration, favoring the expansion of domestic judicial power, have prevailed, or the traditional distrust of such countries in judicial power has prevented the empowerment of the domestic courts. The influences on the judicial systems are evaluated distinguishing judicial capacity, judicial attitudes and judicial independence. The paper argues that the political relevance of judges has strongly increased. However, while European integration has deeply transformed the formal means at disposal of judges, because of political and judicial culture the changes in actual judges’ behavior have been much more limited. [R, abr.]
63.5181 TEZCÜR, Güneş Murat —
The developments in early 2013 generated expectations that the almost three-decades-old armed conflict between the Turkish state and PKK would eventually come to an end. This article adopts a skeptical position and identifies two principal factors that make a peaceful settlement a distant possibility. First, the current military situation is a stalemate that is not ripe for peace. The costs of the conflict remain highly tolerable for both sides. Next, huge differences separate what the Turkish government is willing to deliver and what the Kurdish insurgency is willing to accept for disarmament. In particular, the PKK has no incentive to accept disarmament and demobilization given current geopolitical dynamics conducive to Kurdish self-rule. [R]
63.5182 THIELEMANN, Eiko; ARMSTRONG, Carolyn —
Recent developments in EU asylum cooperation raise important questions about the nature of cooperation and the potential problems facing collective action in the realm of EU internal security. The Schengen/Dublin system's highly inequitable distribution of costs and benefits among the participating states begs the question as to why those states that are likely to face a disproportionate “burden” under the system would have agreed to it. This article answers this question by drawing on a public goods framework. We argue that a simple focus on free-riding and exploitation dynamics, as emphasized in the traditional collective action literature, falls short as an explanation and instead demonstrates how more recent theoretical contributions to the public goods literature can offer new insights into the origin and evolution in cooperation in this sensitive policy area. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5000]
63.5183 TIAN Guang, et al.
China's reform and opening up has entered a new stage of building a moderately prosperous society, developing socialism with Chinese characteristics and building an innovative country. However, in the process of reform and opening up, there have been many unavoidable problems. In the first decade of the new century, some contradictions hidden in Chinese economic and social institutions have gradually emerged. What is worth pondering is that the appearance of these contradictions results from some misleading theories and erroneous ideas. In addition, some man-made mistakes have aggravated the chaos during the economic and social transformation. It is necessary to rethink the ideological misconceptions and to create a proper development concept, to maintain and implement the “Twelfth Five-Year Plan”. [R]
63.5184 TIGDAR, Emel Elif —
This article assesses the impact of Europeanization on the minority-protection policies in Latvia. The diffusion of European norms into EU and the declaration of the Copenhagen Criteria in 1993 marked the respect for minority rights as a condition for EU membership, which is defined as part of the acquis communautaire of the EU. I ask “which domestic factors lead to Europeanization of minority policies” to analyze the impact of Europeanization on the minority policies in Latvia. Utilizing the data from EU official documents and reports from the year of official candidacy to accession, I explore the influence of the “position governments” and the “veto-players” on the Europeanization process of minority protection rights in Latvia. [R]
63.5185 TOBIN, Thomas —
The topic of presidential succession has evoked considerable scholarly debate. Scholars have issued reports [2003/2009/2011] responding to the legacy of 11 September [2001] and the subsequent specter of potential terrorist action as well as the hidden ills of presidential disability. Each report addresses part of the narrative of presidential succession, but none addresses the full panoply of problems that could hinder the president in exercising power. Following the Constitutional Convention, the problems of presidential succession have festered throughout American history. These issues have incorporated a scholarly debate formerly focused on incapacity to one with an emphasis on physical security following an expansion in executive power, the dawning of the nuclear age, and growth of catastrophic terror activity. [R, abr.]
63.5186 TODOROVA, Mariette —
The participation of the French Conseil d'Etat in legislation is far from recent. But the constitutional reform of 2008 gives it a new consultative function inspired by the 1849 law, whereby the Conseil d'Etat may offer advice either on legislative proposals from the government or from Parliament, thus giving it an intermediary role between the two institutions that is quite innovative in the context of the Fifth Republic.
63.5187 TOSHKOV, Dimiter —
Policy-making is embedded in politics, but an increasing number of issues, like obesity, tobacco control, or road safety, do not map well on the major dimensions of political conflict. This article analyzes the enactment of restrictions on smoking in bars and restaurants in 29 European countries — a conflictual issue which does not fit easily traditional party ideologies. Indeed, the comparative empirical analyses demonstrate that government ideological positions are not associated with the strictness and the timing of adoption of the smoking bans. On the other hand, economic factors like the scale of tobacco production in a country, smoking prevalence in society and public support for tough anti-smoking policy are all significantly related to the time it takes for a country to adopt smoking bans, and to the comprehensiveness and enforcement of these restrictions. [R, abr.]
63.5188 TÓTH, Gábor Attila —
Since its election victory in 2010, the Fidesz party, under Prime Minister V. Orbán, has been remodeling not only Hungary's political system, but also its constitutional system. The new Constitution does not integrate Hungarian citizens beyond the limits of political, religious, or social differences. Rather, it polarizes and excludes parts of the population. The Constitution embodies a political thought based on the logic of friend or foe. The institutional structure formed with the help of the Constitution is tailored to a one-party state. Moreover, the recent constitutional amendments show: the rule of law over politics has been replaced by the rule of politics over law. The construction of an authoritarian regime is underway. The Hungarian opposition and European institutions are now called upon. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5172]
63.5189 TRÄGER, Hendrik —
In February 2013, the German-Swiss tax agreement failed due to the vote of the German Bundesrat. Historically, the blocking of the ratification of a bilateral agreement is a very rare case. Why did the Bundesrat vote against the agreement? Possible causes are federal disputes and factual reasons. Or did the coming election of the Bundestag in September 2013 affect the decision of the governments of the Länder? What is necessary for negotiating bilateral treaties whose ratification is dependent on a consent in the Bundesrat? [R]
63.5190 TSOURAPAS, Gerasimos —
Employing a Gramscian framework, this analysis argues that economic liberalization in Tunisia under Z. Ben Ali allowed for a deeper penetration of state power into society, introducing novel modes of control during a climate of economic uncertainty which, labeled an “economic miracle,” was to be defended at all costs. It examines two institutions central to the reform process — the Tunisian Solidarity Bank and the National Solidary Fund — making the argument that, by associating the ‘miracle’ discourse with a variety of pre-existing narratives, the regime ensured compliance, invalidated dissent and prolonged its repressive grip on power. [R]
63.5191 UANG, Randy Sunwin —
Crime and violence have made public security a major concern to voters throughout Latin America. Existing research predicts that such widespread concerns should make public security a consistently successful issue in presidential election campaigns. Yet recent empirical reality in Latin America has been more varied. This study argues that success on public security is not so automatic. Human rights concerns combine with low trust in security forces to make success on security contingent on the correct conditions. Two key conditions affect the use of the issue: the degree to which security threats are organized and the degree to which recent repression has occurred. Then, winning votes depends on two further conditions: having a civilian background and a campaign that balances security with other issues. [R, abr.]
63.5192 VAN DER WAAL, Jeroen; DE KOSTER, Willem; VAN OORSCHOT, Wim —
Analyzing the 2008 wave of the European Social Survey, this study assesses whether an elaborate institutional theory is able to explain why levels of welfare chauvinism differ among welfare regimes. As expected, native populations in liberal and conservative welfare regimes prove more reluctant to distributing welfare services to immigrants than those in social-democratic ones. Adding country-level data, it is demonstrated that neither differences in the selectivity nor differences in employment protection and unemployment levels can explain these varying levels of welfare chauvinism. Instead, regime differences in welfare chauvinism can be fully attributed to their differences in income inequality. [R]
63.5193 VAN PUYVELDE, Damien —
This article explores the role of US public interest groups in the promotion of government transparency, as part of a broader agenda on civil liberties. Drawing on a set of declassified documents, and extensive oral testimony from protagonists, it is argued that such groups occupy a significant position as facilitators of intelligence accountability in the US. Public interest groups represent a tradition of pluralism that lies at the heart of the American conception of democracy. A survey of the tactics deployed by interest groups to support liberal democratic principles demonstrates that these groups always rely on government institutions to carry out their oversight function. By virtue of this, public interest groups support intelligence accountability rather than hold to account the US government and its intelligence agencies. [R]
63.5194 VERDUN, Amy; WOOD, Donna E. —
In Canada and the EU, social policy models are evolving in very different ways. Should Canada, with its current emphasis on decentralization, look to the EU for governance techniques that may be more likely to improve the functioning of the welfare state? [R] [First article of a thematic issue, “Comparing modes of governance in Canada and the European Union: social policy in multilevel systems,” edited and introduced by Denis SAINT-MARTIN and Evert LINDQUIST. See also Abstr. 63.4981, 4984, 5074, 5083, 5108, 5120, 5126, 5169, 5203, 5643]
63.5195 VERKOREN, Willemijn; KAMPHUIS, Bertine —
State-building is considered the solution to Afghanistan's ills. Statebuilding efforts largely aim to mirror Afghanistan to a market democracy. However, a market democracy is the outcome of specific historical and geo-graphical circumstances, and cannot be replicated easily. This article explores four models of state-formation: the Western, developmental, rentier and predatory state. Afghanistan can be characterized as a weak rentier state, subsisting on aid. Generally, the structural consequences of such aid rentierism are underestimated. “State building” in this context cannot be successful. More aid “ownership” and a strengthening of the Afghan bureaucracy will simply consolidate aid rentierism rather than reverse-engineer a market democracy. A greater focus on economic policy is required to direct Afghanistan's rulers towards a more viable path of state-formation. In this regard, the “developmental state” offers some insights. [R]
63.5196 VIGOUR, Cécile —
[Despite] research insisting on the weakness of the French Parliament compared with the executive, very little empirical research has been done into the work of deputies in the French National Assembly, or into the institution's role in policy- and law-making. This article first analyzes the characteristics and drivers of French MPs’ involvement in law-making rather than in other parliamentary activities, either in the Parliament or in their constituency. Second, it takes an original approach by comparing MPs’ perceptions of their activities with those of their electorate through the use of mixed-method analyses (open and closed questionnaires with 230 MPs; thirteen focus groups with ordinary citizens). This is indeed a crucial issue in order to better understand the causes fueling citizens’ criticism of their representatives. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5032]
63.5197 VILLELLAS, Ana —
The restart of peace talks between the Government and the PKK [Kurdistan Workers Party] has brought renewed optimism about the possibility to settle a nearly three-decade conflict, one of the oldest ongoing armed conflicts in the world and one with a major impact on neighboring countries. These new efforts can be understood as part of the rapprochement process started in the mid 2000s. While it comes after a tremendous peak in violence, there seem to be very positive signs of the seriousness of this new stage. However, there are also doubts on its strength, structure, and direction. [R]
63.5198 VLANDAS, Tim —
In-work benefits have been introduced in a number of Bismarckian welfare regimes in a context of austerity, despite being targeted at politically weak constituents and representing a deviation from prevailing welfare institutions. This article addresses this puzzle by looking at the introduction in 2008 of an in-work benefit scheme in France, the Active Income of Solidarity. The analysis reveals that this reform was the result of a cross-cutting alliance between the conservative party and employers, as well as parts of the Socialist Party and the union movement. The alliance was possible thanks to actors’ multiple interpretations of the reform. The reform was difficult to oppose given its support by experts and public opinion and because it entailed an increase in revenues for low-income workers. [R]
63.5199 VOIZARD, Karl-Henri —
In parliamentary systems the legitimacy of the govenment stems from the confidence linking it to the executive or to Parliament, failing which the government must resign. In the case of the Swiss Federal Council (Government) however, there is no mechanism enabling Parliament to sanction the Council. The retreat of parliamentary power in Switzerland benefits the executive.
63.5200 WAHLERT, Matthew H. —
Frequently, analyses of the presidency of Jimmy Carter — whether complimentary or negative — focus on his active involvement in every aspect of policy and governance. Positive reflections praise Carter for his attention to detail and hands-on approach while criticisms fixate on him as a micromanager. This paper challenges this conventional scholarship on Carter and offer a plausible alternative narrative. To be sure, Carter very much personally directed the minutest details of some policy questions; however, other significant issues were ignored and decisions avoided. An explanation for such dichotomous behavior, furthermore, can be explained using I. Janis and L. Mann's psychological framework of decision-making [Decision Making: A Psychological Analysis of Conflict, Choice, and Commitment, New York, 1977]. [R, abr.]
63.5201 WAILL, Pierre Édouard —
This article analyzes the implementation gap of social rights for disadvantaged people by focusing on the processing of priority applicants for the enforceable right to housing (DALO) in France. Behind the homogenizing legal label DALO, distinctions must be made between different types of applicants, whose social characteristics and trajectories determine both the type of accommodation proposed by the local officials and their contrasted expectations in terms of housing. This explains why accomodations proposed to homeless people who manage to assert their rights are predominantly located in the poorest areas, when they are not simply directed to emergency shelters. Depending on their backgrounds and expectations they may be satisfied, resigned or refuse the offer. Lastly, this paper shows the limitations and the unintended effects of the effort to “optimize” social housing policy through the individual recourse to justice, as it increasingly targets policy on the most disadvantaged people and contributes to the concentration of poverty in certain urban areas. [R]
63.5202 WESTERBERG, Anders Ivarsson —
This article [asks]: in what way has gender equality policy in Sweden been institutionalized? In what way have initiatives and governance processes at the central political level led to institutionalization? Empirically, the article accounts for an ongoing study of the governing and organization of the gender equality politics 1972–2001. The study shows that the policy area has to a large extent been ad hoc governed and also has been treated as a symbolic issue in order to create legitimacy for other political questions. The policy has been semi-institutionalized; we can see a de-institutionalization in recent years. It has been institutionalized in a legal/formal sense, but not in a cognitive sense following the theory of sociological institutionalism. [R]
63.5203 WOOD, Donna E. —
This article assesses the performance of Canada's employment policy governance regime post-1996 by explicitly comparing Canadian approaches to those used in the EU through the Open Method of Coordination (OMC). It concludes that Canada has moved so far along the decentralization continuum — with 13 provincial systems as well as a federal-only system in place — that coordination, coherence, mutual learning and information sharing on a pan-Canadian basis have been lost. While EU OMC approaches hold promise, to be realized, stakeholders would need to become more engaged in the policy domain and provinces, rather than the federal government, must take the initiative for enhanced coordination. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5194]
63.5204 WU Xiaogang; CHENG Jinhua —
The article brings class back into empirical analyses of access to civil and administrative justice, focusing on the linkage between the emergence of the new middle class and legal developments in China. We define six classes — the elite class, the old middle class, the new middle class, the self-employed getihu, the working class, and farmers — and then examine class differentials in choosing legal resolutions to civil and administrative disputes, both actual and hypothetical ones. The ruling elites, in alliance with the new middle class, could be the major political agents in promoting the rule of law in China. [R, abr.]
63.5205 YARZA, Fernando Simón —
The constitutional principle of equality is one of the foundations of the modern democratic state. In Europe, its legal evolution still gives rise to controversy and this makes difficult a correct interpretation of its historical meaning. This article investigates the origins and development of the principle of equality. Its purpose in doing so is two-fold: (1) it seeks to define the main stages of the principle's development in Europe; (2) it analyzes the challenges derived from the contemporary tasks that the principle must perform, in particularly, containing laws within the limits of reasonableness, and by ensuring that it operates both negatively, as a limit, and, positively, as a concrete goal of the state. These two dimensions configure a highly abstract principle of equality. [R]
63.5206 YK, Brian Sang —
Kenya's 2010 Constitution has inaugurated into the Kenyan legal framework, among other things, express constitutional recognition of the right to a clean and healthy environment. The constitutionalization of this right and the establishment of liberal provisions for the institution of judicial proceedings in the event of its infraction bear significant implications for public enforcement of environmental rights in Kenya. Hitherto, this was based on the restrictive interpretation of locus standi premised on the principles of common law. This article focuses primarily on public interest environmental litigation in Kenya. It analyzes judicial treatment of public interest action for environmental claims in the past and proffers some insights on the prospects for such action under Kenya's new constitutional order. [R, abr.]
63.5207 YOUNG, Nathan; COUTINHO, Aline —
This article compares the political strategies used by conservative governments in Australia (J. Howard) and Canada (S. Harper) to manage public impressions of climate change and climate-change policy. These cases are significant in part because both governments acted against the weight of domestic public opinion. While many studies of political resistance to climate-change mitigation focus on the role of denial, skepticism, and counter-claims, our comparison finds a significant role for what we call “affirmation techniques,” namely the rhetorical acceptance of the consensus position on climate change followed by concerted attempts to control precisely what acceptance means. We draw on recent theoretical work on anti-reflexivity and the sociology of ignorance to explain the political effectiveness of these strategies. [R]
63.5208 YU Hong —
This paper provides a historical overview of China's telecommunications development since market reform. Using Sichuan and Guangdong Provinces for comparison, the paper delineates two stages of telecom reform and explores how telecommunications networks foster domestic regional and social inequalities within the general process of development. [R]
63.5209 ZHOU Jinghao —
China's remarkable economic success is accompanied by environmental degradation. [Despite] some profound environmental changes, China's environmental problems are still severe. Nevertheless, scholars around the world have different perspectives on the major causes of China's environmental degradation, the domestic and global implications of environmental degradation, and how China should cope with its environmental issues. This paper re-assesses China's environmental problems and analyzes its main causes in a global context, and argues that the current environmental degradation of China is actually an unavoidable result of China's modernization during globalization. Coping with China's environmental problems is a comprehensive project, and it may take a long time to accomplish the project's goal. Either ignorance of environmental problems or unrealistic expectations could damage the battle fighting China's environmental degradation. [R]
63.5210
Articles by Fanny JACQUELOT; Natalie FRICERO; Agnès ROBLOTTROIZIER; Mathieu DISANT; Antoine BOTTON; Olivier LE BOT.
(b) State, regional and local institutions/Institutions locales et régionales
63.5211 ALLÈS, Christèle —
As part of a reform of the water sector, the first attempt at public-private partnership (PPP) in Lebanon took place from 2003 to 2007 in Tripoli. A subsidiary of the multinational company Suez-environnement was contracted to manage the drinking water service in the Tripoli Water Authority area. The objective of the contract was to improve domestic water supply services in Tripoli while modernizing the public administration, which, until then, was unable to ensure proper service. This contribution [examines] the interactions between the private firm and local elites during this time, in a context deeply marked by clientelism and cronyism. This case study brings politics back into the analysis to understand how the introduction of a private actor affects clientelist networks. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5215]
63.5212 ARNALL, Alex, et al. —
This article examines the problems of elite capture in community-driven development (CDD). Drawing on two case studies of NGO intervention in rural Mozambique, the authors consider two important variables — (1) the diverse and complex contributions of local elites to CDD in different locations and (2) the roles that non-elites play in monitoring and controlling leader activities — to argue that donors should be cautious about automatically assuming the prevalence of malevolent patrimonialism and its ill-effects in their projects. This is because the “checks and balances” on elite behavior that exist within locally defined and historically rooted forms of community-based governance are likely to be more effective than those introduced by the external intervener. [R]
63.5213 BAEKGAARD, Martin —
Do politicians’ preferences matter more under some conditions than under others? Using register data and survey responses from politicians and administrators in Danish municipalities, the article examines whether the impact of such preferences on public policy depends on the way the administration is organized, the assumption being that administrative organization defines what kind of information politicians are presented with. The article shows that politicians’ preferences have a considerable impact on public spending in municipalities using traditional sector-based models but no impact in municipalities using executive board models. The main implication of the findings is that the choice of administrative organization has considerable consequences for politicians’ possibilities of influencing public policy. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5250]
63.5214 BERGH, Sylvia I. —
This contribution uses the National Initiative for Human Development in Morocco to show the effects of “inclusive” neoliberal local governance reforms on local state-society relations and the redeployment of state power. This initiative, launched by the king in 2005, is designed to improve socio-economic conditions in targeted poor areas through new participatory local governance mechanisms. The article argues that these mechanisms in fact serve to strengthen the power of the appointed representatives of the Ministry of the Interior, especially at the province level, at the expense of local governments. Second, by instrumentalizing local associations to access INDH funds, local councilors base their legitimacy increasingly on their renewed alliance with the king through the INDH and the clientelist relations it allows them to maintain, rather than on their status as political representatives. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5215]
63.5215 BERGH, Sylvia I. —
The contributions to this collection examine how state power is being re-articulated but also challenged at sub-national levels in Morocco, Egypt, Jordan, Israel, Lebanon and Turkey. They explore the effects of neoliberal economic and local governance reforms such as decentralization, public-private partnerships, and outsourcing in the area of public service delivery, poverty alleviation and labor market reforms on local patronage networks, public accountability and state-society relations. The findings show that such reforms are often subordinated to established patterns of political contestation among actors who seize on the opportunities that reforms offer to advance their political agendas. This introduction presents the key themes and findings, and the global and regional background on neoliberal theories, research and practice. [R, abr.] [Introduction to a series of articles on “Neoliberal reforms and the reconfiguration of state power in the Southern Mediterranean: implications for local governance”. See Abstr. 63.5121, 5211, 5214, 5218, 5231, 5235, 5244]
63.5216 BERRY, William D., et al. —
We modify W.D. Berry et al.'s [“Measuring citizen and government ideology in the US states,” ibid 10(2), Summer 2010: 117–135; Abstr. 60.7602] congressional-delegation-based measure of state government ideology to construct a new measure — the state-legislative-based state government ideology measure — by relying on B. Shor and N. McCarty's [“The ideological mapping of American legislatures,” American Political Science review 105(3), Aug. 2011: 530–551; Abstr. 61.7756] National Political Awareness Test common space estimates of the ideal points of US state legislators. We conduct tests of convergent and construct validity for the two measures. We find that they correlate highly in each year for which the state-legislative-based indicator is available (1995–2008), and when observations are pooled across all years. [R, abr.]
63.5217 CAMPOMORI, Francesca; CAPONIO, Tiziana —
After the federal reform of 2001, Italian regions have gained greater autonomy in matters of social policy, including immigrant integration. In this paper, we assess frames of immigrant integration in eight Italian regions — Piedmont, Veneto and Emilia-Romagna in the North, Umbria, Marche and Abruzzi in the Center, Basilicata and Calabria in the South — against the EU equal treatment and mobility rights-based regime. Through a diachronic analysis of the regions’ official documents on immigrants’ integration approved in the period 2000–2010, we consider: (1) the policy priorities identified and the measures funded and (2) the implementation structures. The analysis points out how the frames of immigrant integration emerging at a regional level shape different geographies of social inclusion, sometimes openly in contradiction with the EU discourse on equal treatment and mobility rights. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5138]
63.5218 CLARK, Janine A. —
Using the case of international donors’ municipal strengthening and poverty-alleviation projects in Jordanian municipalities, this article traces how local elites adapt to and adapt neo-liberal reforms to local dynamics and agendas. It demonstrates how economic reforms at the municipal level are not driving forces in and of themselves, but are subordinated to established patterns of political contestation among local actors who seize on the opportunities that reforms offer to advance their political agendas. The article is based on interviews gathered in 2010 and 2012. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5215]
63.5219 CONTEH, Charles —
Regional development policy governance in Canada is intertwined with the successful navigation of institutional boundaries between levels of government as well as with non-state actors and community groups. This article examines these transitions over the past two decades, with a focus on a federal agency's management of regional development policy in the province of New Brunswick. The discussion examines how the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA) adapted to the shifts towards collaborative governance while seeking to preserve its organizational mandate and distinct identity as a federal agency. Regional development policy governance could be enhanced by paying attention to three considerations: the strategies of various levels of jurisdiction involved in joint policy action; the ideas and resources of non-governmental agencies; and the various stages of evolving governance arrangements in joint policy actions. [R]
63.5220 COWELL-MEYERS, Kimberly; LANGBEIN, Laura —
Scholars and advocates frequently rank the American states in terms of the favorability of their policy positions on a range of issues, including “women-friendliness”. We examine if this is an identifiable dimension among 32 policies selected by women's interest organizations as important “women-friendly” planks and adopted by 50 states. We identify 8 policies that cohere empirically in the adoption pattern of states. Our list suggests that if women-friendly policy has a coherent theoretical meaning, its focus is on women's self-determination, and not on family and children, or even equity in the workplace. [R]
63.5221 DECKER, Frank —
The direct election of Land premiers cannot be justified by claiming that such a change would lead to more democracy or re-establish the separation of powers. A more appropriate argument in favor of such a change to a presidential form of government can be based on the assertion that the existing procedures of popular legislation in the Länder tend to dovetail poorly with a parliamentary system based on a fusion of executive and legislative powers. At the same time the establishment of a form of government at the Land level that differs from the system used at the federal tier would serve to highlight the independence of Land politics. Any implementation of such a reform would have to bear in mind the institutional path dependence. [R, abr.]
63.5222 DUNAEVA, Elena —
In the 1990s, Russia and Iran successfully laid the foundations for interaction and expanded their spheres of cooperation. At the beginning of the 21st c., their relations developed unevenly. These fluctuations depended on the combination of global and regional factors, as well as on the internal circumstances in each country. Russia's participation in international sanctions has aroused discontent in Iran. Despite this, the political establishments of both countries continue to demonstrate an interest in developing bilateral relations and to reaffirm their shared geopolitical interests. This paper analyzes foreign policy documents and the latest research by Russian and Iranian scholars. It [asks]: To what extent and in what areas do the interests of Russia and Iran coincide, and what is the foundation for their potential future development?. [R]
63.5223 ELINDER, Mikael; JORDAHL, Henrik —
It is surprising that many social scientists have preferred to explain government outsourcing by the pursuit of economic efficiency. We investigate political explanations of government outsourcing using a Swedish data-set in which outsourcing varies between municipalities and over time, as well as between services. Our identification strategy focuses on two services with similar contracting problems and local market conditions: preschools and primary schools. We study a period in which Swedish municipalities had full discretion in the provision of preschools, while their influence on the private provision of primary education was limited by a national voucher system. The comparison of preschools with primary schools in a difference-in-differences model suggests that the political color of the ruling majority influences outsourcing, which is consistent with the Citizen Candidate model of representative democracy. [R, abr.]
63.5224 FISHER, Samuel H., III; HERRICK, Rebekah —
Internet surveys of the general population have been growing in use over the last few years because they are less expensive, faster, and greener than most other survey modes. However, they have been used less frequently to survey elites, and little is known about the representativeness of their results. This article uses an experiment where half of a sample of [US] state legislators are given an internet survey and half a mail survey, and then the response rate, representativeness of respondents, and similarity of responses are compared. The results indicate that mail and internet surveys generate fairly representative samples, albeit with few biases, and similar responses; however, mail surveys generate a significantly higher response rate than internet surveys. [R]
63.5225 FRANKLIN, Daniel; RICHEY, Sean; YONK, Ryan M. —
Based on prior research on political business cycles, we investigate the manipulation of state budgets in battleground states. The state-based winner-take-all Electoral College system in the US makes certain states extremely politicized during presidential elections. We hypothesize that budgets will target specific groups of swing voters in these battleground states. We test the impact of competitive state status in presidential elections on state budgets from 1982 to 2005 by creating a cross-sectional time-series regression model of state budget priorities. While controlling for known determinants of budgets, we find strong support for our hypothesis. [R]
63.5226 GILBERT, Pierre —
The growing differentiation within the working classes is expressed in particular by a divide between unstable populations on social-housing estates and stable home-owner populations in areas of private detached housing. By promoting access to home-ownership within social-housing estates, urban regeneration policy is likely to modify the processes at the origin of this residential divide. This article, based on a monograph of a district in Lyon, France, [shows] that, instead of the expected arrival of the middle classes, the new home-owners taking advantage of access schemes come from stable working-class populations. Although urban renewal slowed down the centrifugal processes that [had] led to the departure of stable population groups, the cohabitation of these groups with the most unstable population groups did not result in closer social relations between the two. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4712]
63.5227 GODSÄTER, Andréas —
Advancing sustainable development has become a new concern in African regional governance. In the Lake Victoria Region (LVR) in East Africa, innovative regional institutions have been created under the East African Community to deal with environmental problems collectively. Civil society organizations (CSOs) are increasingly taking part in these regional processes. However, the role of civil society in regional governance in Africa has been neglected in most regionalism studies, which tend to be state-centric. There is a great need for empirical data on regional civil society as well as for new theoretical tools. Civil society can constitute a dynamic force at the regional level, but the involvement of CSOs in regional institutions is complex and to varying degrees takes place on the latter's terms. [R, abr.]
63.5228 HANSEN, Morten Balle; OPSTRUP, Niels; VILLADSEN, Andres Ryom —
The article examines how the background and career of municipal top managers have changed from 1970 to 2008 and whether the 2007 structural reform has had an impact on recent developments. The managers’ profiles is an indicator of the shorting and promotion “rules” of the career system in municipal administrations and how these “rules” have changed over time. Four archetypes of municipal top managers and managers are studied and compared: city managers, social managers, technical managers and managers with responsibility for children and cultural services. The analysis illustrates how the career system in municipal administrations has evolved during the 30 year period where New Public Management was introduced and how the 2007 structural reform has influenced the new managers’ profiles. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5250]
63.5229 JANKOWSKI, Michael, et al. —
The new electoral law in the city-state of Hamburg has gained a lot of criticism from scientists and politicians alike. The law was held responsible for the decrease of 6.2 per cent in the voter turnout in the 2011 election. Yet, this connection has not been proven scientifically. On the basis of interviews with some 3,000 voters and 500 non-voters, only very little evidence for the criticism of the electoral law becomes apparent. The decrease in voter turnout was mainly caused by other factors. In particular, the weak party front-runners, boring election campaigns, and the predictable result of the election had a negative impact. If at all, the electoral law had only a marginal influence. Therefore, apart from minor adjustments, no comprehensive reform is needed. [R]
63.5230 JUNG, Otmar —
It is not an uncommon practice in German legislative dealings — generally referred to as “indirect referendum” — for a Land diet to adopt a petition for a referendum thus avoiding a vote. An in-depth look at the most recent case of such an adoption, in the Land of Brandenburg in 2013, shows the flaws of this practice, especially with regard to the political and debate culture, are obvious. Foremost, the adoption by the diet deprives the opponents of the opportunity and the constitutional privilege of a formal hearing of their arguments. In addition, this trimming of the direct democratic procedure is especially undemocratic when the opponents of the issue at hand appear to be ahead in opinion polls. [R, abr.]
63.5231 KADIRBEYOĞLU, Zeynep; SÜMER, Bilgesu —
This research examines the extent to which neoliberal reforms have reshaped local government in Turkey. Two middle-sized provincial municipalities have been chosen in order to offer a comparative perspective. An important element of neoliberal reforms is the privatization of municipal services such as garbage collection and transportation through contracting out. This contribution describes the changes in the way municipal services are provided and how these changes reshape local power structures and labor relations, and public accountability in particular. It concludes that the two municipalities acquired new institutional capacities to shape their own developmental pathways but still to a large extent the paradigms within which the municipalities operate are being determined and constrained by the rules and regulations set out by the central government. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5215]
63.5232 KAPA, Motlamelle Anthony —
In the majority of emerging African democracies, two structures of government exist in juxtaposition, the elected and the hereditary. When governments have to make policy decisions that affect the overall governance set-up such as devolution of state power, the process becomes very complex, especially when they attempt to [include] the views of citizens in their diversity. This article demonstrates this complexity by examining the local government policy-formulation and implementation processes in Lesotho. I use primary data generated from interviews with purposively selected respondents in the four councils in the Maseru administrative district of Lesotho and relevant government documents. I describe the local government policy process, focusing on the nature and role of the participation of Area Chiefs in two stages of this policy. [R, abr.]
63.5233 LAMBERT, Anne —
How do local authorities of small periurban towns come to adopt national housing policy in order to influence their built environment and population — be it in favor of home-ownership or mixed-income regulations? Based on the study of a growing residential community outside of Lyon known to vote left-wing since 1983, we tackle the question of diversity policies. Our analysis on the sociopolitical and institutional logics underlying the construction of housing developments reveals their ambiguity: the larger “American style” residences aim to attract middle class families from urban areas, while affordable housing quotas are imposed in new programs in order to meet the needs of the local modest households. Nevertheless, local policies are strongly influenced by real estate developers, especially in periods of economic crisis. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4712]
63.5234 MECHTEL, Mario; POTRAFKE, Niklas —
We examine how electoral motives influence active labor market policies that promote (short-term) job-creation. Such policies reduce measures of unemployment. Using German Land data for the period 1985 to 2004, we show that election-motivated politicians pushed job-promotion schemes before elections. [R]
63.5235 MENZA, Mohamed Fahmy —
This paper focuses on the socio-structural reconfiguration that has been taking place in [Cairo's] popular communities with the crystallization of neoliberal policies. Based on fieldwork in the popular quarters of Misr al-Qadima, the paper examines the socio-economic and political roles of the “lesser notables,” those middle patrons and clients that existed on the lower levels of the Egyptian polity within the ranks of the now dissolved National Democratic Party (NDP) and the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), as intermediaries in the realm of state-society relations. By drawing linkages between the micro-level features of the popular polities of Cairo and the macro-level realities of the Egyptian polity at large, the paper reflects on the influence of neoliberal reforms on the scope and magnitude of political patronage in Cairo. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5215]
63.5236 MOONEY, Christopher Z. —
The cross-sectional variation among state legislative leaders’ formal powers provides a unique opportunity to test a variety of hypotheses of the American legislative process that involve the causes and effects of these powers. But to date, measures of these powers have been developed primarily for single years or biennia, limiting their applicability, especially for drawing causal conclusions. I develop an index of state House speakers’ formal powers for each biennia from 1981 to 2010 (for even-year-election states) and from 1982 to 2009 (for odd-year-election states). [R]
63.5237 OLSEN, Asmus Leth —
Does the local political leadership, in the form of absolute majority, affect the administration's role in agenda-setting? The question is analyzed with a survey among 700 local councilors from 80 Danish municipalities. With a multi-level model, the presence of an absolute majority at the municipal level is linked to how councilors perceive the administration's influence on the agenda. Different empirical models are proposed in order to test if a causal effect of an absolute majority can be isolated from both observable and unobservable differences between municipalities. The analyses indicate that the administration has less influence on the agenda in municipalities with an absolute majority, due to lower perceived engagement from the administration and increased agenda-setting influence for the mayor. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.5250]
63.5238 PARINANDI, Srinivas —
I evaluate whether a [US] state's level of bureaucratic discretionary authority with respect to welfare policy makes that state more or less likely to participate in policy diffusion with other states that share similar levels of bureaucratic discretionary authority. Using data on levels of access to welfare services in the late Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) era (1976–1990), I find that bureaucrats across states who are granted high-discretionary authority engage in policy diffusion with one another. [R, abr.]
63.5239 PICKERING, Paula M. —
Internationally-led local governance reforms provide a window into understanding the challenges of state-building at a level of government that matters concretely to the everyday lives of the Western Balkan peoples. Field work is critical for understanding the processes of reform and the influence that international and domestic actors have on them. Over the time of the project, I have increased my collaboration with domestic scholars in order to gain a deeper understanding of local peoples’ ideas about and impact on local governance reforms. I am currently partnering with Bosnian scholars to design, gather, and analyze different types of qualitative and quantitative data on an index of local government performance we developed together. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 63.4923]
63.5240 REI, Fernando; BORGES CUNHA, Kamyla; PÉREZ, Natalia Vera —
In the first decade of the 21st c., especially in Europe, international environment-related activities carried out by sub-national governments have attracted the interest of political representatives and academics. This article analyzes the role of sub-national governments in global environmental governance through a study of the Network of Regional Governments for Sustainable Development (nrg4SD), with particular attention to the role of the Spanish autonomous communities that are at its heart. [R]
63.5241 REINERS, Markus —
When setting up the Land of Saxony more than 20 years ago, it was modeled on a decentralized structure. Based on changed conditions and as the state has attained a high degree of self-confidence, it is now more concerned with the effects of centralization. Therefore, the Saxon government wants to devise a new organization for the administration. Moreover they aspire to merge the three regional governing bodies into one. This efforts are laid out as a ten-year process. It is questionable what can be attributed to these measures and whether the government is pursuing the right course. Moreover it is important to know whether the project is enforceable. To assess this other federal states are also taken into account. [R, abr.]
63.5242 RENZ, Bettina; SULLIVAN, Jonathan —
This article examines how Russian regional governors are using the social media platform Twitter and the potential implications this has for government-society relations. Analyzing a large sample of tweets generated by regional governors, the article provides an empirical assessment of the content, purpose and uses of Twitter by these officials, which vary significantly across different governors. While some uses suggest potential for increasing the responsiveness of politics in Russia's regions, others appear to propagate a similar diet of news management and online propaganda. [R]
63.5243 REUS, Andreas; MÜHLHAUSEN, Peter —
A budget which has passed the parliamentary process can be corrected by a supplementary budget or by order of the secretary of finance on his sole discretion. This authorization refers to obvious errors in the unpublished parts of the budget and is enacted annually. The correction rules and the joint rules of procedure of the ministries apply to the budget law and the Gesamtplan (summarized budget plan), whereas the authorization does not cover substantial changes in the material content of law. Drawing on the legal practice of the Federal Constitutional Court, it is clear that the subject and content of parliamentary deliberations provide the necessary precision to determine how far the authorization goes to correct law errors for the specific case. [R]
63.5244 SAADI, Mohamed Said —
This paper assesses the water privatization dynamics in Casablanca from a socio-economic and political perspective. It presents three main findings. (1) The privatization of public water and sanitation in Casablanca took place under the tight control of the central government (the makhzen). While the delegated management was intended to improve water delivery, the outcomes after ten years are disappointing. (2) The public accountability of local elected officials came under strain due mainly to the power imbalances between a weak local delegating authority and a delegate with global power. (3) Casablanca's inhabitants have resorted to social protests to make their voice heard and claim their human right to water. [R] [See Abstr. 63.5215]
63.5245 SABET, Daniel M. —
Since the mid-1990s, public officials have promoted reforms aimed at professionalizing the Mexican police force. Although significant progress has been made over the last 15 years, daily news reports of corruption and police inefficiency suggest that the improvements have not gone far enough. This article reflects on the failure of the reforms and their backers to produce more professional policing bodies, through a comparative analysis of the reforms implemented in four Mexican municipalities. The causes of the failure point to a combination of formal and informal rules which create incentives that impede the development of a merit-based promotion system, the institutionalization of initiaitves for municipal police reform and horizontal accountability. [R]
63.5246 STEWART, Ellen —
Academic research on health policy divergence across the UK since devolution has characterized Scotland's approach as “professionalistic” or “collaborative”. This article argues that more nuanced studies of particular policy areas are needed, and offers an exploration of the Scottish approach to public involvement as an example. An analysis of policy documents since devolution reveals the shifting significance of public involvement, and the introduction of new instruments for its accomplishment. The Scottish National Party's vision of “a mutual National Health Service” is presented as a complex, even contradictory, project, which warrants further empirical attention both within and beyond the context of four-system comparisons. [R]
63.5247 TEPE, Markus; VANHUYSSE, Pieter —
In times of an alleged waning of political business cycles and partisan policy-making, vote-seeking policy-makers can be expected to shift the use of political manipulation mechanisms towards other policy domains in which the macro-institutional environment allows them greater leverage. Public employment generally, and police employment specifically, are a promising domain for such tactics. Timing the hiring of police officers during election periods may increase votes, as these are “street-visible” jobs dealing with politically salient issues. Law-and-order competence signaling makes police hiring especially attractive for conservative parties. Testing these electioneering and partisanship hypotheses in the German states between 1992 and 2010, we find that socio-economic variables such as population density strongly determine police employment. [R, abr.]
63.5248 UNGER, Johann Wolfgang —
This article examines the change in name of the devolved governing body of Scotland from the Scottish Executive (1999–2007) to the Scottish Government (2007-present) following the majority result for the Scottish National Party in the 2007 Scottish Parliament elections. In the wider European political landscape, this is unusual: while ministries, departments and even political parties change their names relatively frequently, the same cannot be said for top-level political institutions. This paper investigates this discursive act of “rebranding” from a discourse-historical perspective. In addition to critical analysis of various texts about the act of rebranding itself (media reports, political speeches and parliamentary debates, policy documents), the historical, cultural and political contexts are examined in relation to the wider significance of this move for top-down Scottish national identity-construction. [R]
63.5249 VICENTE, Cristina; BENITO, Bernardino; BASTIDA, Francisco —
We analyze the effect of municipal financial transparency on the magnitude of political budget cycles. Our sample covers the largest Spanish municipalities in the period 1999–2009. While the impact of transparency on the electoral cycle has been studied at the international and regional level, there is no empirical evidence of its effect at the local level. Using the financial transparency index made by Transparency International Spain, we show that municipalities with lower levels of financial transparency present an electoral cycle in total spending, whereas such an electoral impact on total spending does not appear in high transparent municipalities. Furthermore, the magnitude of cycles in capital spending and taxes does not vary among low-transparency municipalities and high-transparency municipalities. [R]
63.5250 VILLADSEN, Anders Ryom —
Why do municipalities carry out structural changes? This question is illuminated in an investigation of the wave of structural downsizings in Danish municipalities in the 1980s and 1990s. Base on an institutional framework, it is suggested that the downsizing should be interpreted as reactions to broader changes in the dominant institutional logics of the field. Results of longitudinal quantitative analyses support this theory. Structural downsizings became more likely after a new logic was institutionalized and the structural changes gained legitimacy in the field. It is also suggested that municipal directors were important change agents, and that municipalities that hired new directors with a background outside municipalities were more likely to conduct more comprehensive organizational changes. [R] [First of a series of articles on “Municipal staff [in Denmark]”. See also Abstr. 63.5213, 5228, 5237]
63.5251 WILLIAMS, Iestyn —
Agencies designed to inform the distribution of public resources between competing healthcare programs are now commonplace across the developed world. While cost-effectiveness analysis (CEA) has become integral to prescriptions for such decisions, its influence in practice remains modest especially at local decision-making levels. Explanations focus on evidence and interests and therefore overlook the role played by institutions in determining the use of CEA. Case studies from the English National Health Service indicate that institutions are critical to understanding the technology coverage function and the role of evidence, analysis and deliberation in this. [R]
63.5252 WILSON, Gary N.; ALCANTARA, Christopher —
Over the past three decades, Inuit economic development corporations (IEDCs) have played an important role in preparing the Inuit regions of Nunavik in northern Québec and the Inuvialuit Settlement Region in the Northwest Territories for self-government. In addition to building vital capacity through the provision of services, programs and economic opportunities, IEDCs have also represented their respective regions in self-government negotiations with other levels of government. This corporate-led governance approach, which we call Inuit corporate governance, provides Aboriginal groups such as the Inuit with a de facto form of self-government and the opportunity to develop economic and political capacity in advance of adopting a more comprehensive and formal self-government arrangement. It also challenges existing assumptions about the relationship between Aboriginal peoples and the liberal-capitalist order that underpins the Canadian state. [R]