Abstract
(a) Central institutions /Institutions centrales
67.1743 ADENEY, Katharine —
Pakistan has had a chequered democratic history but elections in 2013 marked a second turnover in power, and the first transition in Pakistan's history from one freely elected government to another. How do we best categorize (and therefore understand) political developments in Pakistan? Is it now safe to categorize it as an electoral democracy or is it still a hybrid case of democracy? Using the Pakistani case as an example, this article argues that hybrid regimes deserve consideration as a separate case (rather than as a diminished subtype of democracy or authoritarianism), but must be categorized along a multidimensional continuum to understand the dynamics of power within the political system. [R]
67.1744 ADHIKARI, Krishna P.; GELLNER, David N. —
This article explores the politicization of ethnicity in Nepal since 1990. In particular, it looks at how ideas of indigeneity have become increasingly powerful, leading to Nepal becoming the first and — to date — only Asian country to have signed ILO Convention number 169. The rise of ethnic politics, and in particular the reactive rise of a new kind of ethnicity on the part of the “dominant” groups — Bahuns (Brahmans) and Chhetris (Kshatriyas) — is the key to understanding why the first Constituent Assembly in Nepal ran out of time and collapsed at the end of May 2012. [R, abr.]
67.1745 ALLEN, John R. —
This article focuses on the lessons learned from American and coalition experience in dealing with extremist groups such as al-Qaeda and the so-called Islamic State or ISIS. It also deals more generally with extremist networks, which increasingly have the capacity to function as non-state actors, not only threatening the existence of a growing number of fragile states but increasingly acting as proto-states themselves. I raise issues that should be considered as the US and its allies and partners gird themselves for the long-term struggle against violent extremism. I also address the challenges faced after long years of war, the general considerations in forming a coalition, the means for establishing and implementing a strategy, and thoughts on a way ahead in a negatively trending security environment. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.2385]
67.1746 BAILARD, Catie Snow —
The clear financial benefits accrued to owners of television stations as a result of the Citizens United v. Federal Elections Commission (FEC) decision opens the door to an important question: Is it possible to identify variation in how media outlets covered the Supreme Court decision that correlates with the degree to which those outlets’ parent companies profited from the resulting increase in campaign spending? Answering this question provides an important and much-too-uncommon opportunity to systematically test for bias in news coverage. Replicating the method used by Gilens and Hertzman (2000) in their own test of coverage of the 1996 Telecommunications Act, this analysis reveals that newspapers belonging to media corporations that own more television stations covered the Citizens United ruling more favorably than those with few or no television stations. [R, abr.]
67.1747 BALLARD-ROSA, Cameron; MARTIN, Lucy; SCHEVE, Kenneth —
In recent decades inequality in the US has increased dramatically, but policy responses in terms of redistribution have been limited. One set of explanations for this puzzle focuses on whether and why redistributive preferences are muted in the presence of high inequality. While much recent research has focused on citizens’ preferences over government spending, we argue that preferences over taxation are a central piece of this puzzle. This article implements an experimental conjoint survey design to measure American income tax preferences across six income brackets. We find that preferences do not vary substantially from current tax policies, and support for taxing the rich is highly inelastic. We show that both economic and fairness concerns affect individual tax preferences and find that conflict is primarily over taxing high incomes. [R, abr.]
67.1748 BANERJEE, Vasabjit; RICH, Timothy S. —
Why does Mexico's mixed legislative system diverge from Duverger's Law? Rather than rehash cultural and historical explanations, we suggest two institutional factors — a fused ballot and compulsory voting laws — may explain this divergence. Cross-national evidence controlling for these factors suggests Mexico is not an outlier and that the fused ballot encourages multiparty district competition. The results also suggest ways reforms could bring competition closer toward Duvergerian expectations. [R]
67.1749 BARROS CORREIA GOMES, Fábio de; REZENDE MARTINS, Ricardo Chaves de —
The analysis of Congress's role in defining public policy matters to the debate on the characterization of legislatures in a spectrum that ranges from the “transformative” to the “arena” type (according to N. Polsby's typology). This paper, related to the Brazilian case, considers definitions relevant to the areas of education and health. On education, this study presents an analysis of the content of legislative proposals and two case studies, which discuss policy definitions of funding and quality assessment. On health, this article presents an analysis of related legislative proposals and especially those that resulted in funding rules. These studies suggest that Congress in Brazil has an important part to play in defining public policies, acting either as a transforming agent or as an arena for debates. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1755]
67.1750 BASSI, Anna —
In parliamentary democracies, political parties bargain over cabinet portfolios when forming coalition governments. While most of the theoretical literature predicts that only minimal winning coalitions form in equilibrium, the empirical evidence shows that minority and surplus coalitions are about as frequent. I bridge the gap between the theoretical predictions and the empirical evidence by developing a non-cooperative bargaining model in which parties are both office-seeking and policy-pursuing. Party bargaining over cabinet portfolios determines the government policy. When parties coalesce with other parties, they take into account not only the expected cabinet portfolio-allocation but also how this allocation would affect the government coalition policy. The model predicts in equilibrium the formation of minimal-winning as well as minority and surplus coalitions as a function of a party's size, ideal policies, and relative preference for policy versus office. [R, abr.]
67.1751 BASTA, Karlo; BUSTIKOVA, Lenka —
This article explains the dissolution of the Czechoslovak federation. It shows that the breakdown in bargaining between Slovakia and the federal center in Prague resulted from the federal institutional framework, differences in fiscal policy preferences and elite patronage incentives to monopolize the spoils of state property sell-offs. Relatively less developed minority regions often seek greater autonomy in order to redress their economic backwardness through interventionist economic and social policies. Due to its veto powers, Slovakia was able to block central legislation, setting the stage for the divorce. At the same time, the federal government in the center was committed to a laissez-faire strategy of governance, which precluded any significant accommodation of the periphery. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1528]
67.1752 BECHER, Michael; BROUARD, Sylvain; GUINAUDEAU, Isabelle —
Do prime ministers pay an electoral penalty for using procedural force to pass laws? Influential theories of parliamentary governance and legislative bargaining assume that the use of the confidence vote procedure entails an electoral cost, but evidence has been scarce. This article provides the first estimates of how prime ministers’ public approval responds to their use of the confidence vote. Analyzing time series data from France 1979–2008, it is found that prime ministers experience a considerable drop in approval after their use of the confidence vote that is not accounted for by standard economic and political covariates. The effect size is similar to a 1 per cent decline in economic growth. The findings help explain French prime ministers’ selective use of the confidence vote procedure. [R, abr.]
67.1753 BEHNKE, Nathalie; KROPP, Sabine —
This introductory article offers an analytical framework for investigating federal reforms. By looking through the lens of institutional theory, it provides an avenue for grasping the basic mechanisms at work in reform processes. It is argued that the German case, which comprises three distinct reform steps stretching out over more than one decade, represents an especially suitable example for understanding the general logics of federal reform. As a “prototype” of sequential, asynchronous reforms, it allows for generating theoretical insights beyond the findings of a single case study. Layering, sequencing, and the linkage of different arenas are the most relevant aspects to be considered when examining federal reforms. Finally, it is established how the contributions to this Special Issue refer to the analytical categories worked out in this introduction. [R, abr.] [First article of a thematic issue on “Ten years of federalism reform in Germany”, edited by the author. See also Abstr. 67.1754, 1782, 1783, 1810, 1811, 1816, 1852]
67.1754 BENZ, Arthur —
In order to understand reform in German federalism, this article applies the framework of “dynamic institutionalism”. It explains change as a result of a particular pattern of constitutional policy emerging in a sequential evolution of institutions and responding to changing state-society relations. Historical legacies found expression in negotiations predominated by bargaining among governments, guided by legalist approaches of lawyers and court decisions and influenced by specialists in public administration. In this context, societal change affected the agenda but had limited impact on processes and outcomes. In consequence, the reform ended with many detailed constitutional amendments not amounting to substantial change. In a comparative perspective, German federalism may have its strengths, but its reform should not be regarded as a role model for other federations. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1753]
67.1755 BERNARDES, Cristiane Brum; LESTON-BANDEIRA, Cristina; JOÃO BRAGA, Ricardo de —
This special issue focuses on the Brazilian Parliament's lower chamber, the Chamber of Deputies. Its core concern is with its representative role, in the way it articulates policy-making capacity and interaction between citizens and parliament. In this Introduction we outline an historical and systemic profile of the Brazilian parliament before presenting our analytical framework. Our theoretical framework makes use of N. Polsby's typology on Arena and Transformative legislatures, to situate our study of the wider representative role of the Chamber of Deputies. We finish by presenting the volume's substantive chapters. [R] [Introduction to a thematic issue of the same title. See also Abstr. 67.1749, 1756, 1788, 1804, 1843, 1851, 1853]
67.1756 BERNARDES, Cristiane Brum; LESTON-BANDEIRA, Cristina; JOÄO BRAGA, Ricardo de —
This special issue has discussed the wider representative role of the Brazilian Parliament's lower chamber, the Chamber of Deputies, through an analysis that has integrated the way it processes policy with how it communicates with citizens. Adopting as an overarching framework N. Polsby's typology on Arena vs. Transformative legislatures, the articles have discussed the institutionalization process of the Chamber of Deputies, its role within the political process and its relationship with other political institutions, the policy-making process, new communication and information technologies used by the Chamber of Deputies and its capacity to promote interaction between citizens and parliament. The findings show that policy-making and communication capacities have grown insofar as democracy lasts. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1755]
67.1757 BERSCH, Katherine; PRAÇA, Sérgio; TAYLOR, Matthew M. —
Responding to recent articles in Governance highlighting the need for improved measurement of bureaucratic characteristics, this article describes efforts to map Brazil's federal agencies on three dimensions — capacity, autonomy, and partisan dominance — derived from data on more than 326,000 civil servants. The article provides a “proof of concept” about the utility of agency-level measures of these variables, demonstrating how they relate to an output common to all agencies: corruption. The article provides a first step in the direction of building a comparative research program that offers objective evaluation of bureaucracies within nation-states, with the intent of better disentangling their impact on governance outcomes. [R]
67.1758 BEUMAN, Lydia M. —
Semi-presidentialism is usually considered a problematic choice for new democracies. It is widely believed that the existence of a president and a prime minister at the helm of the state introduces competing incentives into the system, leading to conflict and democratic instability. According to this logic, the ideological distance between the president and prime minister explains the intensity of conflict: the greater the ideological gap between the two leaders, the more conflict is expected. Countries where the executive is unified, so the argument goes, are less likely to experience democratic instability because the president and prime minister are from the same party. This argument was tested in Timor-Leste where its semi-presidential system generated three different political forms of government: cohabitation, divided government, and unified majority government. [R, abr.]
67.1759 BHATIA, Gautam —
The religious freedom clauses of the Indian Constitution attempt to mediate between the competing claims of individuals, religious groups and the state, in a manner that is born out of specific historical circumstances. This article examines the controversial questions of whether, and to what extent, the Constitution grants individuals (specifically, dissenters) rights against the religious communities to which they belong. Taking as its point of departure a landmark Supreme Court judgment that struck down an anti-excommunication law, the article argues that the Indian Constitution is committed to an “anti-exclusion principle”: that is, group rights and group integrity are guaranteed to the extent — and only to the extent — that religious groups do not block individuals’ access to the basic public goods required to sustain a dignified life. [R, abr.]
67.1760 BOLIN, Niklas; LARUE, Thomas —
In contrast to the theory of deparliamentarization amongst parliamentary democracies, this article points to the Riksdag's use of so-called resolutions (tillkännagivanden) to the government as a sign of growing reparliamentarization. Resolutions in the Swedish context are constitutionally non-binding but politically coercing. From his first study of a hitherto uncharted parliamentary instrument some preliminary conclusions materialize: resolutions are more complex nowadays than 15–20 years ago requiring more effort from the government. Parliament's use of resolutions has, broadly pictured, evolved from unanimous or bipartisan demands on often technical issues to an increasingly politicized tool of reining-in minority governments. [R, abr.]
67.1761 BORZ, Gabriela —
What are the main reasons behind the regulation of political parties by contemporary constitutional practices? This article presents a framework for analysis which identifies types of justifications and actors involved in the process of regulation and their further influence on the outcomes of constitutionalization. The empirical focus is on the revelatory case of Luxembourg, which amended the constitution for the sole reason of giving parties constitutional status. The analysis suggests that the constitutional regulation of political parties depends on their current interests and power status. Additionally, the paper draws attention to the involvement of external actors and to the changing nature of contemporary constitutionalism. [R]
67.1762 BOYD, Christina L. —
Scholars have long sought to resolve whether and to what degree political actor diversity influences the outputs of political institutions like legislatures, administrative agencies, and courts. When it comes to the judiciary, diverse judges may greatly affect outcomes. Despite this potential, no consensus exists for whether judicial diversity affects behavior in trial courts — that is, the stage where the vast majority of litigants interact with the judicial branch. After addressing the research design limitations in previous trial court-diversity studies, the results here indicate that a trial judge's sex and race have very large effects on his or her decision-making. These results have important implications for how we view diversity throughout the judiciary and are particularly timely given the [US President B.] Obama Administration's over 200 female and minority appointments to the federal trial courts. [R]
67.1763 BRACK, Nathalie; COSTA, Olivier; KERROUCHE, Éric —
This article summarizes the contributions of this special issue on MPs’ local work in Belgium, France and Germany. In so doing, it highlights four elements to be taken into account when studying constituency representation: the MPs’ incentives related to personal vote and the electoral system but also other motivations; the content of the MPs’ activities on the ground; the impact of the district's characteristics; and, finally, the influence of the MPs’ career path and institutional position. It proposes further avenues for future research. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1764]
67.1764 BRACK, Nathalie; COSTA, Olivier; KERROUCHE, Éric —
This article introduces the special issue on constituency representation in France, Belgium and Germany. (1) It proposes a brief state of the art to show that the literature on European parliamentary systems concentrates on the legislators’ activities in the house but remains limited regarding activities outside Parliament. This lack of comprehensive knowledge is problematic, considering the centrality of political representation in modern democracies but the current context of declining trust and confidence in representative institutions. (2) It describes the data from the CITREP and IMPLOC(BEL) projects as well as the original methodology used by the articles. This special issue takes a new approach and combines different types of data and methods to analyze the concrete practices of parliamentarians on the ground. (3) It explains the main research questions, hypothesis and variables to be tested. [R, abr.] [Introduction of a thematic issue on “Constituency representation in France, Belgium and Germany”, edited by the authors. See also Abstr. 67.1765, 1778, 1848, and concluded by the authors, Abstr. 67.1763].
67.1765 BRACK, Nathalie; PILET, Jean-Benoit —
Literature on parliamentary systems has concentrated on what MPs do inside parliament on the one hand and on the impact of the electoral system on MPs’ behavior on the other hand. This aim of this article is twofold. (1) It provides a more comprehensive description of the activities of Belgian MPs on the basis of a mixed-method approach, using data from a survey, interviews as well as field observations. (2) It addresses four other factors that could have an influence on MPs relations to the district, besides the electoral system: the level at which they are elected (regional vs. federal), the accumulation of mandates, the distinction between older and newer parties, and MPs seniority. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1764]
67.1766 BRASFIELD, James —
For a century, Missouri [US] was a bellwether state in presidential elections, always picking the winner. Since 2008, it has been experiencing a partisan divide along urban/rural lines with President B. Obama losing the state twice. The battle over Medicaid expansion found a Democratic governor unable to convince a Republican legislative majority to support ACA-based expansion. The more highly partisan legislative environment has rendered traditional bargaining and negotiations impossible on the controversial question of Medicaid expansion. Despite supportive advocacy by hospitals and the business community, the Republican legislative leaders have opposed any movement on Medicaid expansion over the past four years. There will be a new occupant in the governor's mansion in 2017, which may create a fork in the road. [R, abr.]
67.1767 BRAUN, Arthur —
The US Senate filibuster system is the set of delaying or stall tactics used by senatorial minorities to frustrate or to defer draft legislation. Whereas in most parliamentary regimes, obstruction is the battle of a whole group, filibustering is characterized by its personalization, which reveals the Senate's individualist, anti-majoritarian essence and the supremacy of the right to debate. The practice is, however, highly controversial due to its undesirable effects. Among other things, its critics argue that a qualified majority is needed to overcome a filibuster and thus unblock the law-making process. Some reforms have been instigated to strike a proper balance.
67.1768 BRILLAT, Manuela —
The major constitutional reform promoted by M. Renzi's government provides for substantial changes in Italy's political life. If approved by referendum in late 2016, the text will, in particular, formally suppress the “perfect bicameralism” model and establish a new representation system for territorial bodies. The text contains important inconsistencies on all these points. Consequentially, the reform, which was initially presented as a “revolution”, will rather rekindle ancient concerns and create a situation very much akin to that of the post-war years. The Leopard's dictum that “everything must change so that everything can stay the same” has become an ironic maxim applicable to this reform.
67.1769 BUEHLER, Matt —
Under what conditions do citizens of developing countries view judges as neutral and fair or biased and arbitrary? This study addresses this topic through an original, nationally representative survey from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Conducted in Morocco, the survey is the first of its kind to gauge attitudes about how a citizen's informal influence facilities getting favorable rulings from judges. It finds that 82 percent of respondents believe that citizens with “connections” — known as wasta in Arabic — get favorable rulings. Yet some citizens more strongly value informal influence, especially rural individuals, women, and ethnic minorities. The survey shows that believing in informal influence considerably lowers citizen trust in the authoritarian regime's courts and institutions, which some scholars consider an asset for democratization. [R, abr.]
67.1770 BURNHAM, Peter —
This article places analysis of operational independence within a context of broader debates that took place in the Bank of England in the 1970s focused on how it might achieve greater prominence and authority. A clear alternative to operational independence emerged in the form of an “externalization” strategy designed to loosen constraints on the Bank and enhance its role in the formulation and direction of national economic policy. Contrary to accounts which suggest that operational independence benefited the Bank, this article argues that it was devised to reduce its remit. After 2007, the Bank was able to “capitalize on crisis” and develop a broader view of its operations including an externalization dimension to increase its visibility in public discourse and foster its role as commentator on broader government policy. [R]
67.1771 CAMERON, Charles M.; KASTELLEC, Jonathan P —
We conduct a theoretical and empirical re-evaluation of move-the-median (MTM) models of [US] Supreme Court nominations — the one theory of appointment politics that connects presidential selection and senatorial confirmation decisions. We develop a theoretical framework that encompasses the major extant models, formalizing the tradeoff between concerns about the location of the new median justice versus concerns about the ideology of the nominee herself. We then use advances in measurement and scaling to place presidents, senators, justices, and nominees on the same scale, allowing us to test predictions that hold across all model variants. We find very little support for MTM theory. [R, abr.]
67.1772 CAMMELLI, Marco —
In Italy, the “crisis of politics” has given rise to a phenomenon that could be called “the illusion of administrating without a public administration”. There are several examples of implementation of public policies carried out by unexpected actors. Although the growing trend towards the intervention of private companies in important public services is very significant, the major problem is represented by the interference of the Italian legislative authority in the administrative sphere. There is a need for a new model of collaboration between the legislature and public administration, that should allow greater autonomy to the latter.
67.1773 CAPANO, Giliberto; PRITONI, Andrea —
The Renzi government is currently under scrutiny by many scholars of Italian politics. Their main focus is either on the Prime Minister's leadership and communication skills or on government legislative activity with a particular emphasis on the relationship between the government and parliament. However, these studies still lack an analysis of the Renzi government with regard to the quality of its main policy measures. Has the Renzi government produced innovative and coherent policy reforms? This article focuses on three policy sectors: education, the labour market, and public administration. We compare the Renzi cabinet with two other Italian governments that are generally considered very effective in decision-making: the first Prodi government (1996–1998) and the second Berlusconi government (2001–2005). [R, abr.]
67.1774 CARNES, Nicholas; HANSEN, Eric R. —
If politicians in the US were paid better, would more middle- and working-class people become politicians? Reformers often argue that the low salaries paid in state and local governments make holding office economically infeasible for lower-income citizens and contribute to the enduring numerical under-representation of the working class in our political institutions. Of course, raising politicians’ salaries could also make political office more attractive to affluent professionals, increasing competition for office and ultimately discouraging lower-income citizens from running and winning. We test these hypotheses using data on the salaries and economic backgrounds of state legislators. Contrary to the notion that paying politicians more promotes economic diversity, we find that the descriptive representation of the working class is the same or worse in states that pay legislators higher salaries. [R, abr.]
67.1775 CARSTENSEN, Martin B. —
How may we understand the occurrence of gradual but significant change following economic crisis? Theories of gradual institutional transformation have so far shied away from dealing with institutional change during and following crisis, leaving the issue to more traditional critical juncture models. This paper suggests that in more abrupt processes of change characteristic of economic crisis, rule makers may also reinterpret the meaning of rules and redeploy them under significantly altered circumstances leading to gradual change. The paper suggests that the concept of bricolage is useful for understanding how policymakers create new institutional setups through the re-ordering of existing institutional elements. The empirical relevance of these arguments is demonstrated with a study of post-crisis special bank insolvency policies in Denmark and the US. [R, abr.]
67.1776 CLARKE, Andrew J.; LOWANDE, Kenneth S. —
Though considerable research focuses on formal institutions in [US] Congress, scholars have long acknowledged that much of what guides legislative behavior is unwritten. To advance this area, we leverage a tool that allows appropriators to redirect billions of dollars from mandatory programs to discretionary projects. Changes in mandatory program spending — known as “CHIMPs” — show that existing institutions are often maintained by the strategic action of legislators. In the case of CHIMPs, we find their use is largely a response to formal constraints and that they are preserved through avoidance of minimum reform coalitions. This highlights that the legislative process — and budgetary outcomes in particular — cannot be understood without attention to procedures which remain “off the books”. [R]
67.1777 COPELAND, Paul —
This article analyzes the UK's engagement with, and the subsequent impact of, the European Employment Strategy (EES). It provides an example of the process of Europeanization under the Open Method of Coordination (OMC) in a Euroskeptic centralized polity. Under New Labour (1997–2010), the UK actively engaged to upload its preferences to the European political arena. At the national level, the UK experienced a process of Europeanization that was most evident in the cognitive and procedural dimensions. By contrast, during the coalition government the UK strategically withdrew from the EU governance process and reversed the procedural and cognitive shifts that had occurred under its predecessor. During the coalition government the UK therefore experienced a process of de-Europeanization. The findings highlight the limitations of OMC-inspired Europeanization in a setting such as the UK. [R, abr.]
67.1778 COSTA, Olivier; POYET, Corentin —
This article investigates the district work of members of the French MPs, namely their contacts with citizens and other kinds of actors on the ground. Our results show the MPs’ constituency work is somewhat disconnected from the national political debate. They are close to their constituents and meet them regularly in surgeries or during local celebrations and events. Issues discussed are mainly oriented towards individual and local needs (housing, employment, etc.). A multivariate analysis highlights the different patterns of district work. This article suggests that district features and the MPs’ individual characteristics shape their behavior in their constituency. By exploring the concrete practices of French MPs at home, this article offers new insights into parliamentary representation and into the different logics that underlie district work. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1764]
67.1779 CREWE, Emma —
Ethnographic approaches are beginning to percolate through political science, but are often taken up as a “method”, rather than an approach to methodology and theory. I describe my experience of doing ethnography in the Houses of Lords and Commons. Through the themes of whipping and gender, I explain how theory and method were interwoven and how reflexivity improves rigor. Dealing with the methodological challenge of disjunctions and contradictions is explored through the case studies of constituency work, law-making and ceremonies. Finally, I remark on how ethnographic approaches to ethics entail attention to process and relationships rather than compliance with rules. [R]
67.1780 DAHLGAARD, Jens Olav —
Using close election outcomes, we identify a personal effect of incumbency on the probability of seeking election, and seeking and winning office in subsequent elections for elected officials in an Open List Proportional System. In many cases Danish local elections create an as-if random distribution of candidates that are elected or not, which is an ideal setting for a Regression Discontinuity design. The incumbency advantage has been studied to a great extent, though primarily in pluralist electoral systems, while more recent studies have extended the scope to Proportional Representation systems. This study adds to this budding literature by showing an advantage in a new context and focusing on candidate-level electoral returns under conditions where candidates are arguably least likely to benefit from incumbency. [R]
67.1781 DAVIES, Jonathan S., et al. —
This article questions the widely held notions of Russian exceptionalism as regards its state-society relations, arguing that the conceptual tools used to study governance in other regions and contexts are applicable in Russia, opening the potential for fruitful comparisons and dialogue. Our analytical framework for studying Russian governance emphasizes the concept of networking. We posit that even in contemporary hybrid authoritarian regimes the state is dependent on interactive governance arrangements involving civil society actors. The article applies the analytical framework to an initial synthesis of findings from studies of Russian governance, reported elsewhere in the symposium. [R] [First article of a symposium on “Network governance in Russia”. See also Abstr. 67.1797, 1864, 1884]
67.1782 DETTERBECK, Klaus —
The article analyzes the role of the German political parties as actors of federal change. Parties perceive federal processes through their own organizational lenses, giving priority to electoral logics, programmatic ideas or territorial interests. Each of the three reform steps in the German case was shaped by a specific blend of the three logics. Looking at the sequences of reform, the analysis shows that parties have remained central for organizing federal processes but have become less capable of arriving at cohesive and unified party positions. There have been struggles over which of the strategies was to prevail both within individual parties and across the party divide. The territorial power balances within parties, the timing of the reform, and the policy issues in question are important framing conditions for the choice of particular party strategies. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1753]
67.1783 DOSE, Nicolai; REUS, Iris —
The Federalism Reform I (2006) transferred some additional legal competences to the German Länder to provide them with more autonomy. Our analysis is guided by the question as to how fragmentation and uniformity concerning the content of the new Länder laws can be explained. To this end, we develop a theoretical framework based on a short review of the literature on the field. Subsequently, the framework is tested empirically on the basis of four selected legislative competences. Our results show that differences in party positions and problem pressures result in the fragmentation of laws. This applies also to competition under budgetary constraints, whereas competition superimposes the first two factors. Uniformity was influenced by similar party positions, and particularly by networks of experts. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1753]
67.1784 DOWNES, Alexander B.; O'ROURKE, Lindsey A. —
States frequently employ overt and covert foreign-imposed regime change (FIRC) to pursue their foreign policy interests. Yet there is little scholarship on the question of whether FIRCs improve relations between the states involved. In fact, most FIRCs either fail to reduce — or increase — the likelihood of militarized disputes between interveners and targets. Fundamentally, FIRC entails a principal-agent problem: foreign-imposed leaders rule over states with interests different from those of the intervener. [R, abr.]
67.1785 EGAR, William T. —
Existing research on [US] congressional parties tends to focus almost exclusively on the majority party. I argue that the inattention to the House minority party hampers our understanding of the construction of the roll-call record and, consequently, our understanding of the sources of polarization in congressional voting. Employing an original data set of House members’ requests for recorded votes between 1995 and 2010, I demonstrate that votes demanded by the minority party are disproportionately divisive and partisan and make Congress appear considerably more polarized based on commonly used measures. Moreover, minority-requested votes make vulnerable members of the majority appear more partisan and ideologically extreme. [R]
67.1786 ELSTON, Thomas —
Public service bargains (PSBs) define rewards, competencies, and loyalties for civil servants. They involve both explicit and tacit agreements with politicians. The article suggests that these two kinds of bargain may not be closely coordinated with one another, and can become “loosely coupled”, operating and evolving with relative independence. This is particularly likely when there is conflict between rational-actor preferences and institutional expectations about political-administrative behavior. Such a trade-off can be managed by “decoupling” the explicit and tacit PSB, so that they operate differently in public and in private. Loose coupling results in inconsistent PSBs that are resistant to change, whereas decoupling highlights the compliance costs that actors face when securing cultural legitimacy for their bargains. [R, abr.]
67.1787 EVANS, Kevin; MARSHALL, Bryan —
The authors analyze “signing statements” from J.F. Kennedy to G.W. Bush and find that presidents are more likely to give credit to members of Congress for legislative accomplishments when political conditions make bill passage difficult. They show that presidents strategically share credit with key coalition members, party leaders, co-partisans, and senators in order to support their coalition and party-building needs in Congress. [R]
67.1788 FARIA, Cristiano; REHBEIN, Malena —
This article analyzes the implementation of an open parliament policy at the Chamber of Deputies, in accordance with the guidelines of the Open Government Partnership international program (OGP), regarding the action plan of the Opening Parliament Work Group in particular. We evaluate two blocks of initiatives for open parliaments executed by the Chamber in the last few years — digital participation in the legislative process and Transparency 2.0 — in order to observe their impasses and results obtained. We first study the e-Democracy portal and [then] focus on open data, collaborative activities to use those data (hackathons) and the creation of the Hacker Lab, a permanent space dedicated to open parliament practices. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1755]
67.1789 FARNSWORTH, Eric —
Patience for an economic rebound and the favorable fruits of reform have begun to wane in Mexico. President Peña Nieto's political honeymoon has long since expired. [R]
67.1790 FLOM, Hernán; POST, Alison E. —
Democratization originally inspired hope that new regimes would privilege human rights. However, progressive reforms to the criminal code have been insufficient to stem dramatic increases in incarceration rates, and developing democracies have made little headway reforming their ineffective police forces. How can we explain the stability and enforcement of punitive criminal justice policies and the erosion of police reforms? We offer a novel theoretical explanation of these contrasting patterns through a comparison of these two policy areas in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Incentives to avoid blame for salient crimes discourage politicians from repealing punitive criminal justice policies and incentivize judges to enforce them. Responsibility for failed police reforms, however, is harder to assign, giving the police and their allies opportunities to undermine them. [R]
67.1791 GAMBOA, Ricardo; MORALES, Mauricio —
In 2015, a center-left government introduced an electoral reform that replaced the binomial electoral system governing parliamentary elections since 1989 with a more proportional system. This article provides an account of the reform process, describes the new electoral law, and discusses the factors explaining the reform. We argue, first, that it was possible, due to the incentives the government provided, to secure the support of an ample majority of parliamentarians; also, a new and favorable political scenario had emerged, in which the support of the main right-wing parties was not necessary for the reform to pass. Second, we maintain that the reform sought mainly to resolve problems affecting the parties of the governing coalition related to negotiations of coalition lists for elections. [R, abr.]
67.1792 GARAND, James C.; XU, Ping; DAVIS, Belinda C. —
We explore the relationship between Americans’ attitudes toward immigrants and immigration and their attitudes toward welfare. Using data from the Cumulative American National Election Study from 1992 to 2012, we find ample evidence of the influence of immigration attitudes on both individuals’ attitudes toward welfare recipients and their attitudes toward increased welfare spending. These immigration effects persist even in the face of statistical controls for attitudes toward African Americans and attitudes toward the poor; indeed, in our models, the magnitude of the effects of immigration attitudes surpasses the magnitude of effects of attitudes toward blacks. Further, our findings of immigration effects withstand a range of robustness tests. Our results point to the possible “immigrationalization” of Americans’ welfare attitudes. [R, abr.]
67.1793 GAUTIER, Louis —
In the context of a resurgence of terrorism, Europe is now facing a complex geostrategic environment at the heart of which a clear continuum between issues of security and defense is emerging. Confronted with this worrying situation, the temptation towards nationalist withdrawal is particularly strong. Elaborating collective security is, however, more pressing than ever, and if it is to succeed, must be founded on pragmatic solutions. [R]
67.1794 GIANNITI, Luigi —
The question of bicameralism was one of the most controversial during the drafting of the Italian Constitution of 1947. The constituent power finally opted for “perfect bicameralism”, although, in practice, since the difference between both Chambers was not clearly determined, the Italian Parliament's experience has been that of procedural bicameralism de facto. This event immediately highlighted the need to reform the Senate and there have thus been several constitutional changes that attempt to reorganize Italy's parliamentary system. If the major constitutional reform promoted by M. Renzi's government is approved by referendum in October 2016, the “perfect bicameralism” model will be formally suppressed.
67.1795 GODFERY, Morgan —
Drawing on the work of Matike Mai Aotearoa [“The report on constitutional transformation”, 2016], The Independent Iwi Working Group on Constitutional Transformation (the Working Group), this article argues that there is an evolving “New Zealand” constitutionalism, one that offers a constitutional understanding grounded in the Maori constitutional system. The article analyzes the Maori constitutional system, explains the key features of New Zealand's existing constitution and concludes with an argument that the existing constitution can evolve — and, through the political process, ought to evolve — according to the constitutional models that the Working Group recommends. This article deploys legal research methods, is concerned with identifying legal rules and norms. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1507]
67.1796 GVOSDEV, Nikolas K. —
D. Trump's unexpected victory in the 2016 US presidential election will bring to the Oval Office a person with no past political experience. Having run on a foreign policy platform that, at times, challenged the established bipartisan orthodoxy in Washington, he must also deal with a Congress which is likely to wish to exercise a close check on the new administration. Given the chill between the Republican party's foreign policy establishment and the President-elect and [he] will need to get Senatorial confirmation for his nominees to the top executive [positions], it raises the possibility that the new team will continue to shift the focal point of decision-making away from the national security bureaucracy and the Cabinet in favor of the “palace” of advisors and White House staff surrounding the president. [R, abr.]
67.1797 HANDÅ MYHRE, Marthe; BERG-NORDLIE, Mikkel —
This article investigates positions on network governance-type arrangements in Russian non-oppositional media. State-based actors articulated a discourse of mutual dependency, akin to observations in liberal parliamentary democracies. The state described itself as possessing necessary funding and competence to regulate and coordinate, while non-state actors were described as possessing resources necessary to fulfil state policy. Non-state actors occasionally cast doubt on the state's competence to regulate, but fears of state cooptation were rarely articulated. The hegemonic discourse on mutual dependency, and the state as an active network manager, mirrors the observed growth of state-controlled arenas for civil society inclusion in Russia. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1781]
67.1798 HEO, Inhye —
This paper analyzes the legislative gridlock revealed in the process of the South Korean government's efforts to pass the Bill of Financial Consumer Protection, beginning in July 2012, from the perspective of overlapping political conflicts among multi-scalar actors. Research shows that the government's desire to reform financial supervisory governance created two cleavages among the multi-scalar actors because of their long-held political interest in the Bill. The conflict intensified as the cleavages overlapped and were presented as one big issue in the history of Korea's financial supervision, which directly facilitated the gridlock. This paper identifies academic implications to advance the study of gridlock and its policy implications, including the need to develop an inter-scalar mediator, which has negative effects on the quality of democracy. [R, abr.]
67.1799 HICKS, William D.; McKEE, Seth C.; SMITH, Daniel A. —
We examine state legislator behavior on restrictive voter-identification (ID) bills from 2005 to 2013. Partisan polarization of state lawmakers on voter ID laws is well known, but we know very little with respect to other determinants driving this political division. A major shortcoming of research evaluating the passage of voter ID bills stems from using the state legislature as the unit of analysis. We use the state legislator as our unit of analysis, and cover the entire period when restrictive voter ID laws became a frequent agenda item in state legislatures. Beyond the obviously significant effect of party affiliation, we find a notable relationship between the racial composition of a member's district, region, and electoral competition and the likelihood that a state lawmaker supports a voter ID bill. [R, abr.]
67.1800 HINKLE, Rachael K.; NELSON, Michael J. —
Theories of legislative policy-diffusion are well formed and extensively tested, but scholars know far less about the diffusion of legal policy and reasoning. The [period since the 1980s] had been marked by considerable changes in both technology and the institutional structure of state supreme courts. We explore the effect of these changes by explaining modern translegal judicial communication in the US. Relying on an original dataset encompassing every citation in every legal decision made by all 52 state supreme courts in 2010, we explore the effect of the proximity of two states and the prestige of the cited court on how frequently state high courts use one another's precedents. We find evidence that both proximity and prestige increase cross-state citations. [R, abr.]
67.1801 HJORTH, Frederik —
Political actors are often assigned roles requiring them to enforce rules without giving in-groups special treatment. But are such institutional roles likely to be successful? Here, I exploit a special case of exogenously assigned intergroup relations: debates in the Danish Parliament, in which Parliament chairmen drawn from parliamentary parties enforce speaking time. Analyzing 5,756 speeches scraped from online transcripts, I provide evidence that speech lengths are biased in favor of the presiding chairman's party. On average, speakers of the same party as the presiding chairman give 5 percent longer speeches and are 5 percent more likely to exceed the speaking time limit. [R]
67.1802 IZAZA ESPINOSA, Carolina Isaza Espinosa; REDONDO ZAMBRANO, Erika —
This article analyzes the dominant public values in Colombian public administrations during the period 1990–2015. The research question is: How did values change during the different governments of this period? And what public administration approaches do they reflect? The method is a content-analysis based on identifying public values on the national planning documents of each government and it combines quantitative and qualitative techniques. Findings reveal a mixture of different approaches to public administration for the Colombian governments of this period, with some clear tendencies towards the latest approaches on public administration in academic literature. [R]
67.1803 JO Jinhee —
Observing substantial variations in Senate confirmation durations, existing studies have tried to explain when the Senate takes more or less time to confirm presidential nominees. However, they have largely ignored the president's incentives to nominate someone who he expects will be delayed and do not specify conditions under which delay occurs. To improve on existing literature, I develop a dynamic model of presidential appointments in which the Senate decides whether to delay as well as whether to confirm the nominee. The model shows that the president rationally chooses a nominee who he expects the Senate will delay if the status quo belongs to a certain interval in a one-dimensional policy space. Moreover, the president sometimes chooses a nominee who may fail to gain confirmation after a delay. [R, abr.]
67.1804 JOÃO BRAGA, Ricardo de; REHBEIN SATHLER, André; CAMPOS DA ROCHA MIRANDA, Roberto —
This article analyzes the institutional development of the Brazilian Chamber of Deputies (BCD) from 1826 to the present. Legislature careers, internal organization, the current system for filling positions within the committees and electoral rules are studied. The process of development of the BCD should be understood in light of the dynamics of the Brazilian political system, which has undergone significant ruptures of regime, and also in light of the nearly permanent fragility of the democracy, especially of its representative components. It is subject to external influences from other parts of the political system, which diminish its autonomy and self-determination. The BCD has evolved along with Brazilian democracy and still needs to establish itself as a decisive and permanent actor in driving public policies and communication with voters. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1755]
67.1805 KADRITZKE, Niels —
One year after A. Tsipras's re-election, Greece is still standing on feet of clay. According to the author, this is due not only to the country's economic situation, but also (and to a greater extent) to the political weakness of the Syriza government. He won the election by virtue of the promise of reducing the severe austerity program, but, in reality, the need for austerity is compelling. Thus, the trust in the government has plummeted.
67.1806 KMIECIAK, lbigniew —
The article shows the differences between the concept of the rule of law and Rechtsstaat, concluding a gradual development of a universal idea of a state ruled by law. This kind of a state is not created by means of a “decree”. Building it is a process that requires great effort and takes years, not without obstacles and turbulences. Analyzing the dispute concerning the Constitutional Court, the author underlines that it is rooted in the collision of law and policy. The result has been regarded as a specific test of maturity of Polish democracy and its institutions. At the same time, he advocates full use of the mechanisms of accountability for abuses of power. [R, abr.]
67.1807 KOLLMAN, Kelly —
Why did the Netherlands become the first country to allow same-sex couples to marry? I argue that in addition to social and political factors that have been well-highlighted in the literature, the desire of Dutch activists and policy élites to burnish their international reputation as a social policy and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights pioneer played a critical role in motivating the government to adopt this controversial policy. In making this argument, the article addresses the often neglected topic of policy invention. I utilize the concept of regional policy community drawn from federalism studies to illustrate that such communities do not just facilitate the diffusion of new innovations across its constituent states, but they can also inspire pioneering states to experiment with new policy models in the first place. [R]
67.1808 KOLPINSKAYA, Ekaterina —
This article focuses on what drives Members of the UK House of Commons to raise issues on concern for Jewish and Muslim minority groups in relatively low-cost parliamentary activity, i.e., Parliamentary Questions for written answers (WPQs). Drawing on the suggested positive relationship between descriptive and substantive minority representation, it uses content and statistical analysis to examine if having a Jewish or Muslim background impacts on the frequency and the probability of MPs’ engagement with minority issues, and how this effect compares to that from institutional predictors, namely the party parliamentary status and the minority presence in a constituency. The findings demonstrate that a religious minority background has a limited impact on MPs’ engagement with minority issues in WPQs, being inferior to that of institutional predictors. [R, abr.]
67.1809 KONCAID, John —
This study examines accommodations of “national” minorities in the context of territorial neutrality and territorial democracy in American federalism and critiques Kymlicka's criticism of the United States as the foe of peripheral nationalism. Aside from the imagined nationalism of the white American South, peripheral nationalism has not been politically viable in the United States. Territorial democracy permitted territorially based cultural pluralism that facilitated immigrant assimilation while asymmetrical territorial governance arrangements accommodated “national” minorities not necessarily desiring statehood. Secession, therefore, is not a credible threat in American federalism. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1528]
67.1810 KORIOTH, Stefan —
This paper analyzes the implementation of new debt rules and the function of the new Stabilitätsrat since its establishment in 2011. The new rules are explained and the effect of the new limit for public debt is examined. Furthermore, the composition, tasks and procedures of the Stabilitätsrat are described and evaluated. Finally, its activity is judged with individual examples. I show that for the new rules of Art.109 §3, Art.115 and Art.143d GG to be successful, a normative commitment and corresponding political discipline not to incur new debts is required. The Stabilitätsrat alone is insufficient as an institutional framework to encourage budgetary discipline. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1753]
67.1811 KROPP, Sabine; BEHNKE, Nathalie —
This article explains the zigzag of the stepwise federalism reform in Germany by accessing the theoretical concept of institutional incongruity. It is argued that the existing imbalance between competencies, policy problems and fiscal resources was further exacerbated as actors adopted inconsistent institutional “layers” during the sequential reform. Two case studies on higher education and unemployment policy reveal that actors finally reverted to joint decision-making and revived ideas of solidarity in order to remedy inconsistent reform results, although “disentanglement” and competition had been the leitmotivs underlying the first reform step. The article confirms that institutional congruity is hardly attainable in federations. Reform attempts aiming at disentangling responsibilities and fiscal resources encounter insuperable difficulties, because policy issues more than ever transcend the borders of single territorial units and need joint financing. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1753]
67.1812 KYRIAKOU, Nikolas; SKOUTARIS, Nikos —
The principle of bicommunality has been advanced as a founding feature of state-building in Cyprus. This article provides a systematic account of the different variations of the bicommunal principle enshrined in the Constitution of the Republic of Cyprus and in the Annan Plan as the most comprehensive proposal for the reunification of the island. In order to achieve its scope, the article focuses on the provisions concerning state institutions and citizenship. It argues that, in all those constitutional structures, state-building is not linked with nation-building. In fact, the acceptance of bicommunalism as a fundamental principle of the united Cyprus proves that the main concern has been the accommodation of the political tensions resulting from a divided society. [R]
67.1813 LEPONT, Ulrike —
This article analyzes the policy experts that have been the most consulted by US policy-makers on health care reforms since the 1970s. It shows that since then, these actors, despite being attached to various NGOs, have represented a recruiting ground of advisors and appointees from which US policy-makers can choose. The article argues that this specific system of expertise, coined “peri-administration”, is in the US political system a resource in many aspects similar to European high civil service. Highlighting it meets the recent efforts to reconceptualize the US government by taking into account actors located outside of federal institutions. [R]
67.1814 LIM Sang Hun; ENDO, Chikako —
Focusing on the South Korean case, this paper analyzes the developmental path of the social economy in light of two factors: the degree of state involvement in the social economy, and social economy organizations’ (SEOs) political power. Based on these two factors, we develop four ideal types of the social economy: (1) a quasi-governmental social economy, (2) government-SEO partnership, (3) a marketized social economy, and (4) an autonomous social economy. The Korean case shows a path where politically strong SEOs and a strong interventionist state incubate the social economy. However, it also presents SEOs’ struggle to maintain their political influence to develop as an independent sector, without being occupied by the government or market. [R, abr.]
67.1815 LIN Jih-wen —
Why did Taiwan's legislators adopt constitutional revisions in 1997 but fail to do so in 2015? Taiwan's two largest parties held diverse views concerning whether the appointment of the premier should be confirmed by the parliament, yet this difference existed at the time of both reform efforts. The real puzzle is why the consensus reached in 2015 did not result in constitutional amendments. This essay proposes that whether a constitutional reform can change the status quo is strongly affected by the separability of issue preferences. Accordingly, what must be compared is the package of issues rather than the individual issues themselves. Most likely, the decline of authoritarianism and growing consolidation of democratization has reduced room for party cooperation. [R, abr.]
67.1816 LORENZ, Astrid —
The article explores why a high formal hurdle for constitutional amendments (constitutional rigidity) as it is present in Germany does not automatically lead to a lower number of amendments when compared with low-rigidity countries and why Germany's amendment rate is so much higher than that of some other federations. It theorizes that the frequency of interactions between stable, interdependent actors influences their willingness to compromise. Thus analyses of constitutional politics must expand the focus to longer time-horizons and to the parliamentary and federal context. Case studies on constitutional politics in two parliamentary federations, Germany and Canada, confirm that actors cope differently with the problem of multiple veto-players in constitutional politics. In the long run, two distinct patterns of constitutional politics have emerged. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1753]
67.1817 MABOUDI, Tofigh; NADI, Ghazal P. —
Drawing on empirical evidence from online citizen feedback on the 2012 Egyptian Constitution, we demonstrate that despite normative skepticism about implications of participatory constitution making, citizen participation matters. Using data of more than 650,000 online votes and comments on the constitution, we find that draft provisions with higher public approval are less likely to change and those with lower approval are more likely to change. We also find that Articles related to rights and freedoms are more likely to change based on online public input. Finally, following the boycott of the Constituent Assembly by non-Islamists, changes in draft Articles based on public feedback drop sharply. These findings highlight the conditions under which participatory constitution making becomes more effective. [R, abr.]
67.1818 MacDONALD, Jason A.; McGRATH, Robert J. —
Research stresses that congressional committees increase their oversight of the bureaucracy during divided government. We extend this research by developing an explanation, rooted in a more dynamic view of policymaking, for why [US] Congress would sometimes conduct vigorous oversight under unified control as well. In short, committees seem to engage in what we call “retrospective oversight” and take advantage of newly friendly executive administration to refocus existing policy made under a past opposition president. We assess our perspective using two separate sources of data on oversight hearings spanning more than 60 years and find support for our claims regarding retrospective oversight. [R]
67.1819 MADONNA, Anthony J.; MONOGAN, James E., III; VINING, Richard L., Jr. —
Recent studies speculate that focusing on Supreme Court nominees affects presidential success beyond the confirmation process, but this has not been established systematically. We develop and test a hypothesis stating that presidents who get into a battle to promote a controversial Supreme Court nominee will see delays and failures in their efforts to promote their legislative agenda in the Senate and fill lower level judicial vacancies. We test our theory using data on presidential policy agenda items from 1967 to 2010 and lower level judicial nominations from 1977 to 2010. We find that increased efforts in promoting confirmation reduce the likelihood of timely Senate approval of important policy proposals and nominees to federal district courts. [R, abr.]
67.1820 McCARTHY, Stephen; UN Kheang —
Cambodian leaders have confounded the efforts of the international community to promote rule of law. Comprehending the rule of law as it is understood by the ruling elites offers better insight into the trajectory of legal development and the obstacles to Western ideals for legal reform. This article situates Cambodia within the context of illiberal democracy and examines how a thin rule of law has evolved, focusing on defamation law as a legal and political strategy of control. While the international community has pressed Cambodia to carry out liberal legal reforms for some time, the article will outline the obstacles facing reformers and the competing desires of Cambodian leaders embedded in the patronage based political order. [R, abr.]
67.1821 McCROSSAN, Michael; LADNER, Kiera L. —
This paper examines judicial reasoning in the area of Aboriginal title, paying particular attention to the Supreme Court of Canada's Tsilhqot'in Nation (2014) decision. While the decision has been heralded as a ‘game-changer’ within media circles and legal commentaries for its recognition of a claim to title under section 35(1) of the Constitution Act, 1982, the authors argue that the decision does not depart substantially from prior judicial logics predicated upon the production of Crown sovereignty and the denial of Indigenous legal orders. In fact, the authors argue that the decision displays a clear judicial orientation towards the present jurisdictional divisions of Canadian federalism which not only serves to eliminate Indigenous legal orders and territorial responsibilities, but also provides federal and provincial governments with enhanced powers of ‘incursion’ into Aboriginal title lands. [R]
67.1822 MILLER, Paul D. —
It is unlikely a “third party” will arise to threaten the two-party duopoly that has governed American politics since 1828. It is, however, possible that a new political movement will arise within the Republican Party, stake out new ideological terrain, and make a bid for control of the party apparatus. Today, the two parties have failed to address the increasing fragmentation of American public life. They have, in fact, contributed to fragmentation by appealing to identity politics and by attempting to use the national government as a tool of legal and judicial force against their opponents. A new political movement centered on federalism offers the hope of allowing cultural pluralism to flourish within an overarching political unity. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1917]
67.1823 MILLS, Russell W.; KALAF-HUGHES, Nicole; MacDONALD, Jason A. —
When allocating distributive benefits, bureaucrats must balance their own policy preferences with requests from members of Congress. The elimination of earmarking may provide agency personnel with greater discretion in the allocation of distributive benefits. Using a novel data-set of congressional letters written in support of their community's air traffic control towers, we estimate a model that explores the Federal Aviation Administration's decision to issue national interest exemptions to continue operations at towers slated for closure as a result of budget sequestration. Our analysis suggests that members of Congress do not enjoy the influence they possessed under earmarking when using a new method, letter-marking, to influence how agencies distribute benefits. [R]
67.1824 MOO, Rennie J.; SHIN Gi-Wook —
We explore a new framework for higher education official development assistance (ODA) with a focus on the transnational bridging benefits of social capital. We first explain why and how a transnational social capital approach can improve the current focus on human resources and local bridges in higher education development. We then illustrate its merits by examining, (1) the transnational bridging potential of social capital formed by foreign students currently studying in Korea; and (2) the actual transnational social capital contributions of foreign professionals who returned home after completing a Korean higher education ODA program. In doing so, we direct particular attention to the value of transnational social capital in promoting development cooperation and public diplomacy. [R, abr.]
67.1825 NASH, Kate —
I compare the political rhetoric of Podemos and the [British] Tories. Ideologically opposed, both parties use populist rhetoric and both thematize human rights as central to their populism. The article compares the parties’ uses of human rights along three dimensions: Who are human rights for? What are human rights? And how should they be achieved in practice? Podemos from the Left is challenging European legal constitutionalism in the name of social justice, the Tories from the Right in the name of security: both parties construct European elites (and in Podemos‘s case, national elites too) as a danger to democracy. Demonstrating what it means to take seriously the theoretical consequences of social constructivism — human rights are necessarily political — the article proposes a framework for the analysis of explicitly politicized human rights. [R, abr.]
67.1826 NATHAN, Noah L. —
African democracies are increasingly urban. While ethnicity is generally correlated with vote-choice, recent research suggests there may be less ethnic voting in cities. But I show that voting for ethnically affiliated parties is as common in some neighborhoods in urban Ghana as in rural areas, while virtually non-existent in other neighborhoods elsewhere within the same city. This intra-urban variation is not explained by differences in the salience of ethnic identities or other individual-level characteristics of voters themselves. Instead, it is influenced by the diversity and wealth of the local neighborhoods in which parties and voters interact. These neighborhood characteristics change otherwise similar voters’ expectations of the benefits they will receive from an ethnically affiliated party when living in different places, producing intra-urban differences in the importance of ethnicity for vote-choice. [R]
67.1827 O'LEARY, Brendan —
Northern Ireland and Scotland could and should stay within the EU while remaining inside the UK. This proposal need not prevent, and may facilitate, England and Wales in leaving the EU, and it is in accordance with the respective preferences of the peoples of the two Unions who voted in the advisory referendum held on 23 June 2016. Prime Minister May and her Cabinet should address carefully the question of whether to trigger Article 50, or instead to give notice that only parts of the UK — England and Wales — will be leaving the EU. The price of enforcing the entirety of the UK's exit from the EU may be lasting damage to the two Unions that make up the UK of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. [R]
67.1828 OLAVARRÍA-GAMB, Mauricio; DOCKENDORFF, Andrés —
This article addresses the question of whether politicians are willing to overcome patronage by creating a merit-based recruitment and selection system of the senior civil servants with the purpose of making public administration more effective. To answer the question the paper analyzes the Chilean administrative reform of 2003. It concludes that the reform created a hybrid system of appointment of top civil servants: one with elements of meritocracy but restricted to the members of the political coalition in power. Information came from 67 interviews to key actors, official documents, academic literature and the press. [R]
67.1829 OSTERMANN, Falk —
This paper investigates changes in the French parliament's role in the control of military missions, introduced by the 2008 constitutional reform, and examines their effects on practices of parliamentary control and legislative-executive interactions. The paper analyzes how the constitutional changes have developed; the attitudes of parliamentarians towards control; the knowledges they relate to legislative-executive relations; and the post-reform practice of parliamentary control of French military missions. Although legislative-executive relations with regard to military missions have been recalibrated and formalized, they have not fundamentally challenged the executive's lead. Reasons include a strong belief in the need for effectiveness, acceptance of the institutional order, and a foreign policy culture of executive leadership. French parliamentarians value their new powers, but mostly do not seek their further extension. [R] [See Abstr. 67.2461]
67.1830 PANSARDI, Pamela; VERCESI, Michelangelo —
We investigate whether and how political parties function as gatekeepers in determining gender differentiations in committee appointments by using the Italian parliamentary committee system from 1994 to 2013 as a case study. Committee membership provides individual MPs with direct influence in a specific policy area as well as with visibility and expertise, thus affecting MPs’ political careers. Accordingly, to study women's appointments to committees’ positions is eventually to say something about women's chances to have an actual effect in the political process. After presenting the theoretical framework, three hypotheses are proposed. Our findings show that women tend to be appointed to committees dealing with stereotypically “feminine” and “less prestigious” issues, and that left-wing parties reproduce this pattern less than right-wing parties. [R, abr.]
67.1831 PARMET, Wendy E. —
This essay argues that it matters for the fate of [US] health policies challenged in court whether courts consider health merely as a policy goal subordinate to law, or as a legal norm warranting legal weight and consideration. This article demonstrates that courts have traditionally treated health as a legal norm. However, this norm appears to have weakened in recent years, a trend evident in the Supreme Court's first two decisions concerning the Affordable Care Act, NFIB v. Sebelius and Burwell v. Hobby Lobby. However, in its more recent Affordable Care Act decision, King v. Burwell, the health legal norm is once again evident. Whether the Court will continue to treat health as a legal norm will prove critical to the deference and weight it grants health policies in the future. [R]
67.1832 PAVLÍNEK, Petr —
Using the case study of Slovakia, this article considers the role of the state in the rapid growth of the automotive industry in integrated peripheral markets of the global automotive industry. Although this growth has been mainly driven by the investment strategies of automotive lead firms, the state has played an important role by accommodating the strategic needs of foreign capital through neoliberal economic policies. In addition to secondary sources, the empirical research is based on a 2010 survey of 299 Slovak-based automotive firms. [R, abr.]
67.1833 PRICHARD, Wilson; HASSAN, Mirza —
This paper explains the persistence of a tax system characterized by low revenue collection and extensive informality in Bangladesh. It combines analysis of long-term formal and informal institutions and of micro-level incentives shaping negotiation of short-term reform. The system is unusually informal, discretionary, and corrupt, but remains resistant to change because it delivers low and predictable tax rates to business, extensive opportunities for corruption to the tax administration, and an important vehicle for fundraising by political leaders and rent-distribution to their elite supporters. We then explore the dynamics of micro-level reform and external pressure within the constraints of this overarching political bargain. [R] [Part of a thematic issue on “The politics of taxation”, edited and introduced, pp. 1685–1688, by Christian von HALDENWANG and Armin von SCHILLER. See Abstr. 67.1842]
67.1834 PURKELIS, Lukas —
This article provides a step towards a more comprehensive understanding of committee chair allocation and the roles they perform in coalition cabinets. Analyzing the data from the Baltic states it explores the influence of two factors: parliamentary party group size and its ideological position. It demonstrates that both factors play an important role in committee chair allocation process. It also shows that the size of a party group influences committee chair roles: committee chairs from bigger parties are more likely to be matched up with a minister from a same party, while committee chairs from the junior coalition partners are more likely to be used for oversight. [R, abr.]
67.1835 RĂDULESCU, Magdalena; BĂNICĂ, Logica; DRUICĂ, Elena —
The economic literature has focused on the traditional factors impacting FDI (such as fiscal factors), while the non-traditional factors (such as institutional factors) have been less analyzed. This paper presents an econometric analysis using Least Squares Method for emphasizing the political institutional factors, economic institutional factors and the quality of labor force factors impacting on FDI attracted in Bulgaria and Romania. We used yearly data series from 1999 to 2014, provided by the World Bank. [R, abr.]
67.1836 RICE, Douglas R. —
Majority opinions are the most important output of the US Supreme Court, not only disposing the instant case but also providing guidance for other institutions, lower courts, and litigants. The authoring of dissenting opinions, though, is frequently regarded as deleterious to the Court's institutional legitimacy and the efficacy of the majority opinion. Leveraging the content of all Court opinions between 1979 and 2009, I argue dissenting justices use dissenting opinions to strategically alter the issue dimensions addressed in the majority opinion. An examination of the effect of separate opinion content on majority opinions indicates dissenting opinions yield majority opinions addressing a greater number of topics, and I provide evidence that the dynamic is driven by the strategic behavior of dissenting justices seeking to realign the Court. [R]
67.1837 ROGERS, Chris; CLARKE, Chris —
The article provides [a] political economy account of the regulation of peer-to-peer (P2P) lending in the UK, drawing on interviews with platforms representing the market at the beginning of the regulatory process. The article links the regulation of P2P lending with debates about regulatory capture. It challenges conventional understandings of its consequences by showing how the regulation of P2P lending displays characteristics of regulatory capture but appears to have realized several aspects of regulators’ visions for a “socially useful finance”, rather than facilitating the kind of rent-seeking behavior that has been identified in the case of other areas of finance. P2P lending represents one of the latest forms of consumer and small business finance that works towards so-called “financial inclusion”, with ambiguous social outcomes that necessitate further critical investigation. [R, abr.]
67.1838 ROHRER, Annediese —
In Austria, the irrational (and sometimes bipolar) approach of the majority of the population towards politics and its representatives is visible in the electorate's fluctuation between servility and contempt. The reason is that the decisive factor for the development of domestic policies has been the long-lasting need to form coalition governments between the Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ) and the Austrian People's Party (VPÖ). J. Haider's FPÖ (Freedom Party of Austria) has spread mistrust and resentment and, since 1999, has benefited politically and electorally from these feelings. Political parties have not succeeded to improve Austria's self-esteem.
67.1839 RÖTH, Leonce, et al. —
This article integrates ideology into a game-theoretical model of center-periphery bargains. Ideological differences between national and subnational elites constitute a major obstacle for the accommodation of autonomy claims. While reforms bringing about decentralization are often analyzed systematically as well as through case studies, cases where, despite claims to autonomy, decentralization does not occur have been largely neglected by scholars of territorial politics. Turkey is such a “negative case”. We argue that ideological distance prevents national parties from accommodating peripheral authority claims. We test our expectation with a mixed-methods approach that combines quantitative analysis of party positions with in-depth qualitative analysis of party documents showing how the different ideological positions of national and Kurdish parties affect decentralization demand and national response in Turkey between 1987 and 2015. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1528]
67.1840 RUSSELL, Meg, et al. —
Real-world changes, and recent research, suggest that Westminster's influence is significant and growing. This raises new questions about which non-government actors are influential, and we explore this through analyzing 4,361 amendments proposed to 12 government bills. Assessing non-government amendment “success” presents challenges, however, since many such proposals are clearly not sincere attempts at legislative change. We thus make two substantive contributions. First, we quantitatively assess the influence of different groups at Westminster, showing both non-government influence and cross-party working to be more extensive than traditionally assumed. Second, we link predictions about opposition and backbench parliamentarians’ motivations to the legislative amendment process, proposing a typology of motivations for such amendments, with wider application. Overall, we argue that understanding non-government parliamentarians’ diverse motivations shows that they “fail” far less often than commonly assumed. [R, abr.]
67.1841 SAKAKI, Alexandra; LUKNER, Kerstin —
Focusing on Japan, this paper explores whether powers and competences in the political system are likely to be recalibrated in favor of the executive when the environment is perceived as increasingly threatening. It shows that the executive has been significantly strengthened during the past two decades of political reforms, though a closer look reveals that only the most recent efforts are motivated by security concerns. Case studies on military deployments and arms exports do not expose any clear trend towards curbing parliament's formal control powers, but they indicate two related mechanisms that affect executive-legislative relations: (1) the executive has sought to ensure faster decision-making in security policy, which may limit the Diet's ability to scrutinize policies in depth; (2) the level of contestation over security policy issues has been decreasing. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.2461]
67.1842 SCHILLER, Armin von —
This paper explores the relationship between socio-political institutions and tax composition in developing countries. It argues that strong business organisations and stable political party systems reduce the uncertainty of fiscal contracts for economic elites. The decrease in uncertainty leads elites to accept a larger share of the tax burden, which governments then collect using progressive tax types more intensively. To illustrate this claim, I provide evidence from a comparative analysis of the Peruvian and the Colombian tax history between 1970 and 2010. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1833]
67.1843 SCHNEIDER, Maurício; BIEDZICKI DE MARQUES, Ana Alice —
Despite presidential preponderance upon Congress, changes in environmental laws are seen by public opinion as congressmen-versus-presidency conflicts. Controversial bills are viewed as threats to the environment, or opportunities to development, depending on one's point of view. Common sense tends to consider bills proposed by the Executive as initiatives to protect the environment, while the Legislature's bias would be to [relax] legal restrictions on the use of natural resources, thus leaving to Congress the onus of a “grey” or negative agenda. We examine all environmental bills introduced in the Chamber of Deputies, their goals and main subjects, in order to compare Executive and Legislative roles and partialities in writing Brazilian environmental law. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1755]
67.1844 SEBURANGA, Jean Leonard; GATESIRE, Theodette —
Data on voter turnout and choice at the Rwanda's 2003 and 2015 constitutional referenda were acquired and analyzed. The results revealed contrasting changes in voter turnout between diaspora and in-country electorate. Arguably, at home, lack of freedom on the part of registered voters to make independent choices may explain the 9.3 percent and 5.2 percent increase in voter turnout and “yes” vote, respectively. On the other hand, while the repressive arm of the regime can reach Rwandan citizens both at home and abroad so as to compel them not oppose its political agenda, voters in diaspora enjoy some level of relaxation, especially those staying in Western democracies, which could explain the 37.8 percent drop in voter turnout. [R, abr.]
67.1845 SELCHOW, Sabine —
Under US President B. Obama, the words “resilience” and “resilient” have been applied beyond the odd occasion in the National Security Strategy (NSS) document. Through a systematic analysis of the NSS 2010, the research [examines] if there was anything in this linguistic phenomenon of interest to scholars in political studies. The article shows how the document constructs “resilience” and “resilient” in a distinct way as symbolic tools with a high degree of semantic openness, a particular positive connotation and deontic meaning. The use of the two words in the NSS 2010 can be seen as an exercise in “occupying” them with ideologically loaded meanings, which can be interpreted as the actualization of both words as “political keywords”. [R, abr.]
67.1846 SELIM, George —
As the struggle against violent extremism continues 15 years after 9/11 [2001], practitioners of counterterrorism note that law enforcement and military approaches alone cannot break the cycle of violence, and new threats emerge as existing threats are defeated. This article provides an overview of post-9/11 [2001] efforts related to countering violent extremism (CVE), or the prevention, intervention, and rehabilitative efforts to provide a noncoercive, nonkinetic pathway toward preventing recruitment and radicalization to extreme violence. Specifically, it explores the spread of the ISIS ideology and the B. Obama administration's CVE efforts, and provides an overview of subsequent articles in this series that expand on particular CVE approaches. [R] [See Abstr. 67.2385]
67.1847 SEN, Maya; SPANIEL, William —
Why are judicial nominees allowed to refuse to answer questions about important issues that could come before the courts? We address this question by examining the information environment surrounding judicial nominations. Using the [US] Supreme Court as our example, we formulate a model that departs from the existing literature by incorporating the fact that the Senate often does not know what type of candidate the President is trying to appoint. Our model shows when the President and Senate are ideologically divergent, low information about nominees’ views results in the Senate occasionally rejecting acceptable nominees. However, when the President and Senate are ideologically close, the President benefits from leaving the process opaque — that is, allowing his nominees to avoid answering tough questions. [R, abr.]
67.1848 SIEFKEN, Sven T. —
German MPs spend a substantial amount of time in their home districts. Based on observation and interview data, this article aims to understand both the motivation and the effects of district work in Germany. The institutional setting of the German political system provides various incentives for MPs to conduct district work. What results from them is investigated by analyzing the activities in the district, MPs different communication styles, their casework, their party events and the influence of mandate types on MP behavior. Discussing how the activities in the district and those in parliament are related shows how crucial this link is for understanding modern representative democracies. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1764]
67.1849 SIGMAN, Carole —
Since V. Putin arrived in office in 2000, how has the Russian central government been regaining footing in strategic sectors which largely ran out of its control after the collapse of the USSR? This article shows that, thanks to the oil-rent resources, central authorities try to cope with the legacy of social relations which de facto marginalized them in the 1990s. Yet, the main point is the way they impose themselves as dominant actors through the so-called “vertical power”. The article strives to understand, by focusing on the field of higher education, how new authority relations and modes of control and influence are established by this political regime. [R]
67.1850 SMIRNOVA, Maria; THORNHILL, Chris —
This article promotes a distinctive sociological interpretation of the Russian Constitution. Much literature on Russian constitutional law is defined by the claim that the Constitution has little factual reality and limited foundation in society. This article challenges this view on two grounds. It argues that there are two deep-lying social processes that underlie the Constitution, and condition its evolution: the Constitution is shaped (1) by the importance of constitutional law for the stabilization of governance structures; (2) by the resultant relative autonomy of judicial practices, which means that legal exchanges (especially litigation) have formative impact on the constitutional order. On both grounds, the Russian Constitution is locked into cycles of societal norm construction. [R, abr.]
67.1851 SOUZA PINTO, Julio Roberto de —
This paper examines the Legislature's role in defining public policies in Brazil before and after the 1988 Constitution. It shows that the main social rights were institutionalized during the dictatorships of G. Vargas (1930–1934, 1937–1945) and the military (1964–1985), periods during which Congress was either closed or worked only decoratively. Although strengthened by the 1988 Constitution, Congress continues to play a secondary role in relation to the president, a position that in recent years it has been forced to share with the Supreme Court. Finally, it indicates that Congress, thus emptied of power, has turned its energies to expand its own privileges, causing popular outrage. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1755]
67.1852 STECKER, Christian —
When the reform of German federalism was enacted in 2006, the right of the second chamber, Bundesrat, to veto large parts of national legislation had long been identified as a dysfunctional element of the federal system. The need to compromise with an often opposition-controlled Bundesrat was perceived as hurting democratic principles and worsening Germany's policy performance. Hence, a variety of constitutional amendments was adopted in 2006 to curb the veto threat. This paper sketches how the expansion of the Bundesrat veto emerged and how the reform tried to reduce it. Covering all federal legislation between 1978 and 2016 this paper then analyzes the actual effects of the reform. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1753]
67.1853 TEIXEIRA DE BARROS, Antonio; BERNARDES, Cristiane Brum; REHBEIN, Malena —
This paper examines how new technologies are employed by the Brazilian Chamber of Deputies to stimulate experiences of digital engagement. It also evaluates how new technologies are put in practice by the institution, considering its potentialities and limitations in mediating the relationship between the parliament and the citizens. This analysis is anchored in concepts put forth by N. Polsby about arena parliaments and transformative parliaments, in order to evaluate which of these models of engagement tools have greater potential. The study concludes that the use of digital technologies by the Brazilian Parliament is very diverse, with a variety of tools that allow for the interaction and engagement of citizens, although these tools have the greatest potential for the arena parliament model. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1755]
67.1854 THORLAKSON, Lori —
Federal systems create political competition at multiple territorial levels. While models of vertical bargaining conceptualize federal-subnational relations as occurring between parties with exogenously defined interests, federalism also structures forms of interdependence between the federal and subnational levels. Political competition in multi-level systems is marked by interdependence between the federal and subnational levels through barometer and second order voting effects. Findings of a more ‘autonomous’ form of political competition at the subnational level, through state-level economic voting, are less common. This article examines Germany, a highly interdependent federation, to assess how voting in Land elections responds to Land level economic performance and whether political and institutional factors affect this. I find evidence that in Land level elections, voting for the federally incumbent party is responsive to federal economic performance. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1528]
67.1855 TRANTIDIS, Aris —
How does clientelism affect policy-making? Can patrons in government discard groups of clients in order to pursue reforms in conditions of crisis? The article argues that clientelism goes beyond the exchange of votes and may permeate organizations with the capacity for collective action such as labor unions. This merger gives rise to a clientelist-collective system that changes both patron-client relations and the context of collective action with important implications for the design of economic policy. [R, abr.]
67.1856 TURNER, Ian R. —
The lion's share of policy in the US is made by administrative agencies. Agencies not only make policy choices, they must also implement policy effectively. Oversight institutions play an integral role in the policy-making process by monitoring, through review of agency policy actions, both policy-making tasks. Through analysis of a formal model I develop a theory of policy-making between agencies and courts and show that review can impact agency effort choices even when bureaucratic subversion is not a concern. At times the court has no impact on this effort and the agency is unconstrained. However, when the agency's effort dictates whether or not the court defers to the agency's actions judicial review does affect effort decisions. In this setting, review can either strengthen or, counter-intuitively, weaken agency effort incentives. [R, abr.]
67.1857 WEBER, Till; PARSONS, Craig —
M. Ostrogorski once denounced political parties for burying diverse concerns of pluralistic societies under monolithic electoral options. E.E. Schattschneider celebrated them for the same reason: organizing choice and ‘responsible party government’ amid pluralistic complexity. Comparativists have found both dynamics in European legislatures. We use comparativists’ tools to explore the dynamics and normative quality of party unity in the different terrain of the US Congress. We find similar cycles of unity in roll-call voting, but in the American context — with more loosely organized parties, especially historically but still today — Ostrogorskian stifling of dissent operates against a less Schattschneiderian background. In comparative perspective, Congressional parties muffle divisive issues more effectively than they deliver governance, with tenuous implications for representation. [R, abr.]
67.1858 WEINSCHENK, Aaron; PANAGOPOULOS, Costas —
We ask whether and how US presidential nominating conventions matter in contemporary US elections. Using individual-level panel data, we find evidence that the conventions exert important effects on the electorate by influencing post-convention intentions to participate in electoral politics, knowledge about the candidates, and candidate favorability ratings, even after controlling for pre-convention intentions, knowledge, and candidate ratings. We conclude that conventions remain important campaign events that play a role in facilitating democratic processes in America. [R]
67.1859 WONG, Mathew Y. H. —
This essay analyzes three attempts at political reform in post-handover Hong Kong by adapting game-theory models in studies of democratization. By modeling the strategic interactions and preferences of Beijing and the local democratic forces, the outcome of the political reform efforts are explained. As a conditioning factor in the model, it is argued that the strong strength of civil society in 2005 and 2015 ruled out any possible negotiation between the Beijing and the democrats, resulting in deadlocks and the eventual rejection of the proposals. In contrast, the weaker and apolitical nature of civil society in 2010 allowed moderate democrats to reach an agreement with Beijing over a proposed reform. [R, abr.]
67.1860 WORTHY, Ben; HAZELL, Robert —
The UK's FOI Act came into force in 2005. Three linked research projects were conducted to evaluate its overall impact and assess to what extent FOI has met its objectives across central and local government and Parliament. They conclude that FOI has met its “core” objectives, making central government more transparent and accountable. However, it has not improved decision-making, public understanding, participation or trust. Nor has FOI significantly changed how government works, despite politicians’ fears of a chilling effect. The article concludes with a look at the key issues that will shape the future of FOI. [R]
67.1861 ZDEB, Aleksandra —
The asymmetrical, federal construction of Bosnia and Herzegovina has been contested by all groups, but it has particularly influenced a significant element of Croat politics in BiH — their need to create “their own” entity. Not being able to form a separate territorial unit, Croats created parallel institutions following the Herzeg-Bosnia pattern: in 2000, and 2011. This paper analyzes the Croats’ autonomist and secessionist politics in Bosnia and Herzegovina with special emphasis on the formation of parallel structures as a replacement strategy derived from the Croat inability to bring about a constitutional unit of their own. The problem is analyzed from the perspective of center-periphery dynamics in Bosnia and answers the question as to why territorial autonomy has been an impossible goal for Croats. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1528]
67.1862 ZENG Jinghan —
The rise of big data has brought with it enormous possibilities, for better or worse. In China, the government has been enthusiastically preparing for the coming of the era of big data. This article examines how the authoritarian regime in China has been employing big data to improve its governance and to move towards a “Big Brother 2.0” model. The regime has combined cooptation with coercive control to exploit digital technology, in order to maximize its utility and thus maintain authoritarian rule. Moreover, existing debates on digital technology largely focus on the changing power structures between state and society, but neglect power structures within regimes and their implications for authoritarianism. The use of massive digital data may backfire against the authoritarian regime as it may change the power structure within the state. [R, abr.]
(b) State, regional and local institutions/Institutions locales et régionales
67.1863 AALEN, Lovise; MURIAAS, Ragnhild Louise —
Although many African governments introduced provisions for subnational elections in the early 1990s, there is variation in the extent to which these reforms were implemented and sustained. Our inductive analysis of three post-conflict cases — Angola, Ethiopia and South Africa — suggests that one factor explaining this variation is elite discontinuity when an insurgent group wins power in the aftermath of conflict. Systems of subnational elections adopted by new governments with an extensive social base derived from an insurgency, as in South Africa and Ethiopia, have proved relatively robust. The identified causal mechanism is that, for the new governments in the first two cases, subnational elections served as opportunities to mobilize party support and to consolidate control by sidelining local elites aligned with the previous regime. [R, abr.]
67.1864 AASLAND, Aadne; BERG-NORDLIE, Mikkel; BOGDA-NOVA, Elena —
The article examines the role of civil society in Russian governance networks, focusing on power relations between state and non-state actors. The analysis is based on empirical evidence from concrete governance networks in two major cities, St. Petersburg and Samara, that handle complex social issues — integration of migrants, drug prevention, and child protection. Power asymmetries are reflected in tight state control of governance networks’ agenda, membership, and opportunity to affect policy. The governance networks are first and foremost advisory bodies with very limited decision-making authority. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1781]
67.1865 ANDERSON, Paul —
This article examines the political context, campaign, election results and outcomes of the 2016 Scottish Parliament election. The Scottish National Party (SNP) secured its third electoral victory, yet failed to achieve a widely predicted majority. With just two MSPs short of a majority, the SNP has ruled out any formal coalition with the opposition and will instead govern as a minority administration. The composition of the parliament's opposition also changed significantly. The Scottish Conservatives increased their share of the constituency and regional votes, and became, for the first time, the largest opposition party in the chamber. Scottish Labour suffered a severe electoral drubbing, losing 13 of its seats. The election was also important for the Scottish Liberal Democrats and Scottish Green Party. The latter increased its vote share and number of seats, leapfrogging the Lib Dems to become the fourth largest party in the chamber. [R]
67.1866 BARGH, Maria —
I outline the existing legislative options available and rationale for Maori representation in local government. I suggest that the arguments and rationale against Maori representation have been exacerbated by a lack of clarity around local government's duties and obligations stemming from the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi. I [then] explore more recent arguments by Maori for representation and involvement in local government decision-making on the basis of being mana whenua, which means to have territorial authority and power associated with the possession and occupation of tribal land. This argument foregrounds specific iwi (tribes) as holding territorial authority and therefore rights to representation and involvement in decision-making sourced in tikanga Maori (Maori law), over and above other Maori who live in that area. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1507]
67.1867 BERTOLDI, Francesco —
Preceded by a string of institutional crises and sustained political wrangling, the Northern Ireland Assembly election held in May 2016 cemented the grip of the Democratic Unionist Party and Sinn Féin over the province's power-sharing institutions, while certifying the impasse of their intra-bloc rivals. Eighteen years after the Good Friday Agreement, the electoral campaign continued to feature emotionally charged ethnic appeals. Nonetheless, socioeconomic issues were at the fore of the political debate, contributing to the limited yet significant advance of non-sectarian actors. Beneath the surface of a mainly unaltered Assembly makeup and unchanged ethno-political geography, the vote resulted in a decline in support for the traditional governing parties, particularly in the nationalist camp. The formation of an officially recognized Opposition has opened uncharted political waters. [R, abr.]
67.1868 BIFULCO, Lavinia —
The paper investigates the territorialization process with a twofold aim: to focus on the territory as the medium of the current relation between citizenship and governance; and to analyze the problems and opportunities created by governance and territorialization. After outlining an interpretative frame for territorialization in Europe, the paper concentrates on the Italian case and on two policy instruments: Area Social Plans and Neighborhood Contracts. Light is shed on how moves towards innovations intertwine with dynamics of fragmentation, thereby creating the complexity of territorialization in Italy. [R]
67.1869 BLUNKETT, David; FLINDERS, Matthew; PROSSER, Brenton —
The Cities and Local Government Devolution Bill was introduced into the House of Lords as Bill No. 1 in the 2015–2016 parliamentary session. The Bill forms a critical element of the government's high-profile policy of devolving powers and responsibilities to local areas within England. The transition from first-generation “city deals” to second-generation “devolution deals” within five years provides a sense of the pace and development of the reform agenda but there is also something missing: an understanding of the specific type of devolution on offer; how an explosion of bilateral new “deals” will be offset against the obvious risks of fragmentation and complexity; and [how] the democratic roots might be put in place to counterbalance the economic thrust and make the reform agenda sustainable. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1891]
67.1870 BURNETT, Craig M.; KOGAN, Vladimir —
By conditioning their support for political incumbents on observed performance outcomes, voters can motivate elected officials to represent their interests faithfully while in office. Whether elections serve this function in subnational US government remains unclear, however, because much of the existing research on retrospective voting in these contexts focuses on outcomes that are not obviously salient to voters or over which the relevant government officials have limited influence. We examine one outcome — the quality of local roads — that is both salient and unquestionably under the control of city government. Our analysis leverages within-city variation in the number of pothole complaints in one of America's largest cities and shows that such variation can explain neighborhood-level differences in support for incumbents in two political offices — mayor and city council — across several electoral cycles. [R]
67.1871 CHRISTENSEN, Helen E.; GRANT, Bligh —
Participatory budgeting (PB), a process whereby governments seek direct input from citizens into financial decisions, is gaining a foothold in the community engagement practices of Australian local governments. Following questions of definition, we survey the theoretical terrain, locating PB within several components of local democracy. We then provide details of six PB processes in New South Wales, Victoria, and Western Australia. We identify several questions for the future of PB in Australian local governments, including the role of deliberative practices as part of the broader work of councils, the issue of the adaptability of councils and leaders, the impacts upon state and local governments, and the role of third parties. [R, abr.]
67.1872 COX, Ed —
This article explores the extent to which devolution within England can address the general malaise that is often described as “the English Question”. It considers how far the devolution genie might be considered out of the lamp. It takes as its basis three broad arguments for devolution — an economic case, a case concerning public service reform and a democratic argument for the decentralization of power — and for each of these three it explores the theoretical underpinnings for the argument, how things are currently playing out in the current political context and what we might expect to see in the future. The article concludes with some suggestions as to how debates about the English Question might play out in the years ahead. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1891]
67.1873 DE BENETTO, Marco Alberto; DE PAOLA, Maria —
We analyze how the presence of an incumbent among candidates at an election affects electoral turnout. We use a rich data set which provides information on the results of Italian municipal elections over the period 1993–2011. We find that the impact of incumbency is heterogeneous across geographical areas: incumbency produces a positive effect on turnout in the South of Italy, whereas we find a negative and statistically significant effect in the North. We speculate that the north-south divergence is related to differences in social capital and in clientelist relationships established by incumbent politicians. Our conjecture finds support when we look separately at municipalities in the lower and upper quartile of the social capital distribution and at municipalities with high or low densities of organized crime. [R]
67.1874 DIAZ-RIOSECO, Diego —
Recent studies on the subnational resource curse contend that subnational rentier units suffer from the same nondemocratic tendency as their national counterparts. However, subnational rentier states worldwide exhibit contrasting political outcomes. Why are some subnational rentier units politically competitive whereas others are not? This article argues that rent-sharing regimes — the fiscal institutions for sharing resource revenues among levels of government — condition political competitiveness at the provincial level. Using novel time-series cross-sectional data on Argentina, a case with several hydrocarbon-rich units with exogenously created rent-sharing regimes, I show that oil creates negative political effects at the provincial level only when these institutions do not share — or share minor amounts of — rents with municipal governments. Conversely, political competition emerges when rent-sharing regimes distribute rents to municipal governments. [R, abr.]
67.1875 DYCKMAN, Caitlin S. —
States need guidance to adopt comprehensive water planning legislation that can affect urban planning and built form. Current state legislation, however, may not yet incorporate emerging water resource paradigms that promote sustainable water management at the state and substate levels. Planners can improve existing state legislation, but need guidance on incorporating the latest thinking on resilience, adaptive capacity, and sustainable commons management. I identify the 26 states with comprehensive water planning legislation, and analyze that legislation using a new assessment tool that builds on the coercive versus cooperative metric (CvCA). I determine where each states’ water planning legislation falls on a coercive versus cooperative spectrum, and the extent to which each state's legislation incorporates sustainable commons management (SCM) and social-ecological resilience (SER) mechanisms and attributes. [R, abr.]
67.1876 ESAU, Michelle V. —
This article explores institutional trust and organizational performance. Amidst the recent attention on how trust is inculcated through public institutions, a focus on what is happening within the context of emerging democracies may yield interesting findings on the development of trust. The City of Cape Town, one of the leading municipalities in South Africa, is identified as a case study through which to explore institutional trust and organizational performance. It illustrates, among others things, that organizational structuring and institutional capacity development are important for generating institutional trust. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1361]
67.1877 GENDŹWIŁ, Adam; SWIANIEWICZ, Pawe —
The article investigates the relationship between the size of municipality and the functioning of local democracy in Poland. It discusses advantages and disadvantages of scale observable in local democratic institutions, and citizens’ political attitudes and behavior. The empirical evidence is based on a survey of citizens conducted in 2015. A set of multilevel regression models is presented in order to account for individualand municipality-level effects. The results generally support the argument that local democracy performs better in smaller municipalities. The negative effects of scale are visible in the case of political interest, citizens’ efficacy, and civic engagement, but no relation between size and local attachment was found in Poland. [R]
67.1878 GIOVANNINI, Arianna —
Traditionally, the debate over English devolution has been framed by mainstream parties, favoring a top-down approach. However, this scenario has recently started to change, particularly in the areas with stronger regional identities such as the North of England. In 2014, the first regionalist party (Yorkshire First) was created, followed by the North East Party and the Northern Party. Such actors overtly challenge the narratives of regionalization that have prevailed so far, and endorse bottom-up regionalism. This article offers the first analysis of these “new regional voices” in the North, and assesses emerging tensions between regionalization and regionalism in the devolution debate. To achieve this, it concentrates on the case of Yorkshire First, drawing on documentary analysis and the results of a membership survey. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1891]
67.1879 GRANT, Bligh; RYAN, Roberta; KELLY, Andrew —
The Abbott Government announced its White Paper review of the Australian Federation on June 28, 2014. Set against this backdrop, discussions of the future of Australian local government may provoke an assumption that its role will be cruelled. However, reflection suggests that such an assumption is misplaced. In particular, when the complexities of regionalism in Australia are considered, the potential role of local government begs revisiting. We argue that local government ought to adopt a forthright position in the current debate, particularly with respect to financial reform. [R]
67.1880 HLYNSDÓTTIR, Eva Marín —
In Iceland there is a growing skepticism towards mayors with executive powers. At the same time there is also a substantial demand of a responsive, community orientated local leader with strong direct access into central government level. In Iceland, mayors are recruited largely through two processes: through hiring following nationwide job postings (manager-mayors) and through political appointment from within the municipal council (political mayors). This paper explores the dilemma these different role expectations create for local leaders and local leadership on the whole and how democratic renewal may both contributes to the creation as well as solving of this dilemma. [R, abr.]
67.1881 JOUEN, Marjorie; LETE, Nicola; HORNUNG, Matthieu —
In the system of European multi-level governance, national positions are not designed or promoted by central governments only: local and regional authorities are involved as well. Cohesion policy and its periodic reforms show it clearly. Based on the German, French, Italian and Belgian examples, the article describes the functioning of the ecosystem associated with this policy, its actors, its discussion and its coordination mechanisms. It analyzes how national positions have been driven or strongly influenced by local and regional authorities during the negotiations on the 2014–2020 programming period. [R] [See Abstr. 67.2312]
67.1882 KENEALY, Daniel —
In November 2014, G. Osborne stood in the impressive great council chamber of Manchester town hall and, flanked by the ten leaders of Greater Manchester's local authorities, announced a devolution deal for the city-region. Greater Manchester would receive a significant package of powers over transport, housing, planning, skills, business support and welfare in exchange for creating new governance structures, including a directly elected mayor for the city-region. This article explores the background to the Devo Manc deal, arguing that it is the product of both a long history of local government collaboration in Greater Manchester and Osborne's desire for a sweeping restructure of English governance. It traces how the key decisions were taken quickly and by a small number of key officials. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1891]
67.1883 KOOP, Royce; KRAEMER, John —
Proponents of both ward and at-large systems agree that these systems of election play a role in shaping who representatives seek to represent and, in so doing, affect the quality of local democracy. Canadian cities employ both ward and at-large systems of election, and therefore provide an opportunity to explore the relationship between elective systems and focus of representation. We draw on data derived from both 52 interviews with and a survey of councilors in Canadian cities to test the proposition that cities’ systems of election influence the representational foci of councilors. We find strong evidence that ward systems are related to a representational focus on geographically defined neighborhoods, whereas councilors in at-large systems report prioritizing representation of their cities as wholes. [R]
67.1884 KROPP, Sabine; SCHUHMANN, Johannes —
This article examines how governance networks and “vertical”, that is, hierarchical or coercive, modes of governance are related to each other [in] the circumstances of increasing authoritarianism in Russia. The empirical data from nine in-depth case studies focusing on negotiations between administrations, NGOs, companies, and experts during environmental impact assessments were collected in the Russian regions of Krasnodar and Irkutsk. The data confirm that regional and federal authorities resort to control and coercion, but also promote cooperation in order to solve policy problems and compensate for the poor performance of formal institutions. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1781]
67.1885 LONGO, Erik; MOBILIO, Giuseppe —
On 1 January 2015 a new institution, the metropolitan city, took its place among the Italian territorial authorities. Despite its incorporation in the Italian Constitution since 2001, the metropolitan city become a reality only when the national government carried out a process of reform and transformation of Italian territorial government by transforming 10 large cities into metropolitan cities and depriving other intermediate governments (regions and provinces) of their fundamental competences. This article critically reviews the activation of metropolitan cities and the reshuffle of Italian territorial authorities. It stresses the way in which this reform marks the shift towards a new phase of Italian regionalism, which is dominated both by a dynamic of recentralizing intergovernmental relations and by the resulting loss for provincial and regional governments. [R]
67.1886 LUCARDI, Adrián —
Can subnational elections contribute to democratization? In autocracies that hold competitive elections at multiple levels of government, subnational executive offices provide opposition parties with access to resources, increase their visibility among voters, and let them gain experience in government. This allows opposition parties to use subnational executives as “springboards” from which to increase their electoral support in future races, and predicts that their electoral support should follow a diffusion process, that is, a party's electoral performance in municipality m at time t should be better if that party already governs some of m‘s neighbors since t1. I evaluate this claim with data from municipal-level elections in Mexico between 1984 and 2000. [R, abr.]
67.1887 MANAF, Halimah Abdul; MARTADHA MOHAMED, Ahmad; LAWTON, Alan —
Increased public participation in government decisions contributes significantly to the enhancement of grass-roots democracy. This article assesses the level of involvement of local citizens in local government decisions in Malaysia. Public participation was assessed using questionnaires on the range and extent of initiatives used by local government. The questionnaires also probed citizens’ perceptions of these initiatives and expectations for greater citizen empowerment. Data were gathered from 206 local citizens randomly selected from six local authorities in the northern region of Malaysia. The findings reveal a desire on the part of local citizens to participate in their local government decision-making process. [R]
67.1888 McLEAN, Iain —
The Scotland and Wales Acts 1978 failed on multiple criteria. Although devolution of powers to Scotland and Wales was a principal policy of the Labour governments in office from 1974 to 1979, it was defeated in a guillotine vote in 1977. That defeat was orchestrated by the leaders of Tyne & Wear County Council, angry that a government of their own party was apparently neglecting their region in favor of Scotland. The project was rescued in two separate bills, but a further rebel amendment inserted a minimum-assent condition in the required referendums. The people of Wales rejected the devolution they were offered. The people of Scotland accepted it, but by a margin that failed to cross the threshold. The resulting vote of confidence brought down the Labour government in March 1979. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1891]
67.1889 MITCHELL, Joshua L.; TONER, Brendan —
In recent years, measures have been taken to ban the use of international legal principles in state courts. While these international laws vary in terms of the specific restrictions they place on state legal practices, many of these laws have been aimed implicitly or explicitly at banning Sharia law practices. While dozens of states have attempted to pass anti-Sharia policies, thus far, only eight have been successful. In this article, we apply a policy diffusion framework to help explain the agenda placement and adoption of these measures. We find that both internal state determinants and external regional diffusion factors influence the interstate agenda placement and adoption of anti-Sharia practices. However, the regional effect is negative, meaning that these policies follow an atypical diffusion pattern. [R, abr.]
67.1890 MONTIN, Stig —
A general change has taken place, from political domination of society towards societies’ domination over politics. This means, for example that the idea of competition in local government activities has become a dominating discourse. One important driver is the EU membership, but also national political reforms. Within this context a Government Commission was appointed to suggest a modernization of the Swedish local government act. The article discusses how the work of the commission was framed and how the commission took position within the interplay between the municipality as politically governed democratic institution and the municipality as an actors and arena for the market. The general conclusion is that the frame of reference support market before politics. [R]
67.1891 MYCOCK, Andrew —
Party political interest in the “English Question” has grown, recently shifting to the decentralization of government within England. The “English Question” is thus defined by two interconnected but distinctive “English Questions”. This article assesses whether, in seeking to find answers for these “English Questions”, the Conservatives and Labor are establishing a more distinctive “politics of England”. It first considers the extent to which the politicization of English identity and civic society have stimulated a more nationally framed political culture and party politics, and then assesses whether constitutional reforms undertaken in Westminster, especially the introduction of EVEL, and regional devolution initiatives within England might facilitate greater party political engagement with an emergent “politics of England”. [R, abr.] [First in article of a thematic issue on “The politics of devolution in England”. See also Abstr. 67.1869, 1872, 1878, 1882, 1888, 1899, 1900]
67.1892 MYERS, William M.; FRIDY, Kevin S. —
Citizens in Ghana have a host of options when it comes to local governance provision as a result of the government's decentralization policies. We undertake to explore and understand how Ghanaians navigate the constellation of local institutions, both formal and traditional, to solve an array of common problems. A four-constituency survey was administered during the summer of 2009 and asked respondents about their experiences interacting with four formal institutions and one traditional institution. We find that formal institutions are by and large working effectively and are enhanced by the presence of a traditional institution. We consider the implications of our results with respect to both democratization and decentralization. [R]
67.1893 PARK Jeeyoung; NORPOTH, Helmut —
As a maker of policy, a president or a governor invites public approval or disapproval for policy decisions. Public reaction is likely to occur for issues of great salience and clear candidate positions. We focus on immigration policy. Illegal immigration has become a hot issue in recent years, especially in Arizona [US]. The state's governor took a clear stance in 2010 by signing a law that gives police sweeping powers to deal with illegal immigration (Arizona SB 1070). Using an aggregate time-series model, we find that this action affected gubernatorial approval ratings. The gain in approval proved enduring enough to turn a losing race for re-election into a victory for Governor Brewer. [R, abr.]
67.1894 PASTOR SELLER, Enrique —
The study produced a typology of the mechanism, organisms and processes of civil participation in the autonomous system of social welfare in Spain. The study also performed a comparative analysis of cases, and assessed the impact, in terms of contributions of the Councils, in the democratic deepening of local public policies in terms of social welfare, and the improvement of the efficiency in managing social services and benefits. The research context was specifically the offer of opportunities for associative and/or individual participation in the implementation, management and assessment of local social policies. [R, abr.]
67.1895 RAVAZZI, Stefania —
Local governments have tried to find new ways by establishing collaborations with a wide range of private actors. Among them big philanthropic organizations are gaining prominence, acting as public policy supporters and policy makers. For this new emerging role, a recent debate on their impact on local policy making has raised in the last years. This paper aims at presenting the findings of a comparative analysis on the impact that some of the world's biggest philanthropic organizations have produced in two Italian urban contexts. In particular, the comparative analysis of these two cases had the aim of testing a major thesis: the impact of philanthropic foundations on local policy making varies in relation to the consolidated mode of governance within which they operate. [R]
67.1896 SHI Yu —
I investigate whether the growth of special districts in the fifty states from 1972 to 2002 can be explained by choices made by local general-purpose governments in response to different degrees of government autonomy in the fiscal, institutional, and political system. Focusing on three dimensions of government autonomy — local government capacity, local government discretion, and local government importance — I find that the growth of certain types of special districts is in part a response to state laws constraining government autonomy of general-purpose governments. The findings also suggest that reliance on special districts by local general-purpose governments would decrease if they had stronger own-source revenue-raising capacities and more diversified tax revenue bases. [R, abr.]
67.1897 SHPAIZMAN, Ilana; SWED, Ori; PEDAHZUR, Ami —
Facing barriers to change, policy entrepreneurs often shift their activities to a more favorable venue. In the new venue they either pressure the system from the outside, leading to policy punctuation, or make incremental changes within the existing system which over time will accumulate to a significant change in the status quo. This article expands our understanding of policy entrepreneurs’ role in the policy process by examining the strategies they use in the incremental path. Specifically, it focuses on one gradual change strategy, conversion — redirection of existing institutions to new purposes. Based on the case of policy entrepreneurs in the Holy Basin of Jerusalem, the findings indicate that when the entrepreneurs shift the venue to the bureaucracy they can establish cooperative relations with the government that will provide them with the needed capacities to exploit the gaps in the existing rules and redirect them to serve their aim. [R, abr.]
67.1898 SWENDEN, Wilfried —
This article assesses the evolution of territorial management in India across time. It shows how India gradually moved away from a relatively “integrationist” territorial strategy at independence towards a more “accommodationist” strategy’ in recent decades. The deepening of democracy, and more recently, liberalization have opened up more room for state political and economic autonomy. However, the limits of an accommodative strategy are clearly exposed in relation to the small but significant border states of the North East which can be seen as “minority nations”. I argue that the flexibility of the Indian constitution which enabled an accommodative response in the context of linguistic reorganization during the early decades after independence contrasts with a more repressive-centric strategy in relation to India's minority nations. [R, abr.] [See Abstr. 67.1528]
67.1899 TOMANEY, John —
This article challenges the narrowly founded but untroubled consensus about the alleged benefits of the Conservative government's devolution program. It suggests that too much attention has been paid to purported benefits and too little regard to the potential risks, and draws attention to international evidence that suggests that the distribution of the benefits of devolution is crucially dependent on its design. It critically examines the case for the currently offered model of devolution and finds the underpinning economic model and limited forms of democratic accountability are likely to produce regressive social outcomes and the reinforcement of existing local elites. It calls for a wider public debate and fuller democratic scrutiny of the model of devolution on offer. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1891]
67.1900 WILLETT, Joanie —
This article considers the devolution deal signed by Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly in the summer of 2015. It asks if the deal constitutes a more sustainable approach to governance, concluding that while there are some factors that help to enhance sustainability, other areas urgently require more attention. These claims are made through an analysis of a model of sustainability which emphasizes the importance of networks and feedback loops envisaging civil society as an adaptive organism. This helps to show that although power is significantly dispersed in some aspects of the “Cornwall Deal”, this latter does little to alter the highly centralized nature of governance across England, or provide spaces where local actors can feed back into central policy. [R] [See Abstr. 67.1891]