WorldWideScience

Sample records for political power structures

  1. Political Participation and Power Relations in Egypt

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Shehata, Mostafa

    2017-01-01

    The political use of media in Egypt post-2011 revolution brought about drastic transformations in political activism and power structures. In the context of communication power theory, this article investigates the effects of newspapers and social network sites on political participation...... and political power relations. The research employed a mixed methodology, comprised of a survey of 527 Egyptian youth and semi-structured interviews of 12 political activists and journalists. The results showed a significant relationship between reading newspapers and youth’s political participation......, but not between using social network sites and political participation. In addition, newspapers and social network sites were platforms for a series of conflicts and coalitions that emerged between pro- and anti-revolution actors. Despite the importance of social network sites as key tools for informing...

  2. The Politics of Terrorism: Power, Legitimacy, and Violence

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Richard A. Couto

    2010-03-01

    Full Text Available This paper examines and juxtaposes discourses about terrorism, violence, and political leadership. It presents generalizations about terrorism—a form of political violence by, for, and against the state—and politics and violence based on the theories of Max Weber and Hannah Arendt. The stark contrasts drawn from these theories include power as non-violent strength (Arendt versus power as violence-dependent (Weber and the struggle for legitimacy between different agents (states and individuals as well as terrorism by, for, and against the state. This reframing of power leads to judging a lack of power where there is violence, and the presence of power where one observes non-violence. An examination of political and criminal violence leads to questions about deliberate and purposeful violence, indirect and structural violence that has political consequences, and their relationship to terrorism. It expands the application of terrorism to include indirect structural violence by indicating its relationship to direct violence, not only in traditionally-viewed terrorist action but in the ignored terror of, for example, inner cities. Terrorism has many forms by many actors. To synthesize the results of these lines of reasoning leads to a conclusion with considerable implications for politics and for political leadership. The politics of terrorism suggest a central counter-terrorist approach: de-politicizing the violence of terrorists whenever possible and using the authority and power of the state to institutionalize it as criminal violence. This, in turn, also means politicizing other forms of violence, such as capital punishment, and their indirect and structural forms, such as the inner city.

  3. Local election: does bureaucracy become one of main political power?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Amin, Muryanto; Musthafa Sembiring, Walid

    2018-03-01

    This writing aims to analyze the emergence of bureaucracy as one of political power in local level after the local election is held in Indonesia. Due to information authorization, media network, and stable structure, the bureaucracy soon transforms into political power which can compete with the other political power at the local level. In Medan local election in 2010 and 2015 has evidently proven the power of bureaucracy network in winning the bureaucrat-background candidates. As methods of the research, the researcher held a Focus-Group Discussion (FGD) and had an in-depth interview with ten bureaucracy elites in Medan and local political elites. The observation and Focus-Group Discussion (FGD) are analyzed using qualitative analysis technique typology. The result states that the bureaucracy network in Medan has been used in a massive way as the political power of winning. The structure of bureaucracy – from the top to the low – is involved in the winning. The most governmental programs were applied to attract the mass’ sympathy toward the candidates. The bureaucratic proximity to media network is also used to do a campaign in a massive way. The conclusion of the research is that bureaucracy emerges as a new, massive, effective local political power in the local election.

  4. POLITICAL TRADITIONS: THE CONCEPT AND STRUCTURE

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Наталья Алексеевна Мамина

    2013-05-01

    Full Text Available The article refers to the theoretical aspects of the study of the political traditions phenomenon. The influence of traditional components of the political culture on the current political process is recognized in contemporary literature, but political traditions rarely become the original subject of a scientific research, which explains the vagueness of their interpretation and the need of their system understanding.The author analyzes existing interpretations of the concept "tradition", on which formulates the definition of "political traditions" as (1 a form of fixation for meaningful content of the nation’s socio-political experience and as (2 a mechanism of political-cultural continuity.The author identifies mental, behavioral and institutional levels in the structure of political traditions. Mental level consists of political symbols, myths and stereotypes, which form the image of political reality and authority, and values and norms, which affect the motivation of political behavior. Behavioral level includes models of behavior and patterns of action, such as political habits and rituals. Institutional level reflects historical features of interaction between branches of power and relations between the state and society.The author pays attention to the influence of structural elements of political traditions on the political consciousness and behavior of individuals and social groups. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.12731/2218-7405-2013-4-25

  5. Political power beyond the State: problematics of government. 1992.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rose, Nikolas; Miller, Peter

    2010-01-01

    This paper sets out an approach to the analysis of political power in terms of problematics of government. It argues against an overvaluation of the 'problem of the State' in political debate and social theory. A number of conceptual tools are suggested for the analysis of the many and varied alliances between political and other authorities that seek to govern economic activity, social life and individual conduct. Modern political rationalities and governmental technologies are shown to be intrinsically linked to developments in knowledge and to the powers of expertise. The characteristics of liberal problematics of government are investigated, and it is argued that they are dependent upon technologies for 'governing at a distance', seeking to create locales, entities and persons able to operate a regulated autonomy. The analysis is exemplified through an investigation of welfarism as a mode of 'social' government. The paper concludes with a brief consideration of neo-liberalism which demonstrates that the analytical language structured by the philosophical opposition of state and civil society is unable to comprehend contemporary transformations in modes of exercise of political power.(1).

  6. The politics of nuclear power

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Elliott, D.

    1978-01-01

    The contents of the book are: introduction; (part 1, the economy of nuclear power) nuclear power and the growth of state corporatism, ownership and control - the power of the multi-nationals, economic and political goals - profit or control, trade union policy and nuclear power; (part 2, nuclear power and employment) nuclear power and workers' health and safety, employment and trade union rights, jobs, energy and industrial strategy, the alternative energy option; (part 3, political strategies) the anti-nuclear movement, trade unions and nuclear power; further reading; UK organisations. (U.K.)

  7. Tracking Politics with POWER

    Science.gov (United States)

    Moreira, Silvio; Batista, David S.; Carvalho, Paula; Couto, Francisco M.; Silva, Mario J.

    2013-01-01

    Purpose: POWER is an ontology of political processes and entities. It is designed for tracking politicians, political organizations and elections, both in mainstream and social media. The aim of this paper is to propose a data model to describe political agents and their relations over time. Design/methodology/approach: The authors propose a data…

  8. Nuclear power in British politics

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Pocock, R.F.

    1987-01-01

    The paper concerns the subject of nuclear power in British politics in 1986. The policies of the major political parties towards nuclear power are briefly outlined, along with public attitudes to nuclear energy, Chernobyl, and the rise of the anti-nuclear campaigners. (UK)

  9. Post-Structuralism and Politics: towards Postmodern Balkan Studies

    OpenAIRE

    Sanja LAZAREVIC RADAK

    2015-01-01

    Although post-structuralism, on the first sight, lacks political dimension, its application to social problems expose the potential of political engagement. First, it comes from interviving linguistics and humanities, that inspired new understanding of the relationship between structure and power. While emerging from cultural studies and therefore from synthesis of history and literary criticism, studies on the Balkan, point out a role of mental images, stereotypes, discourses and therefore, ...

  10. POLITICAL POWER IN THE PRISM OF POLITICAL ANALYSIS (EXPERIENCE REVIEW OF CURRENT RESEARCH DIRECTIONS

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    A. N. Kuryukin

    2010-01-01

    Full Text Available The broad theoretical material considered relevant areas of the study of political power. Reveals the patterns of occurrence and development of a strictly scientific views on political power as a phenomenon and a social process. Determined the current trends of development of theoreticalunderstanding of political power in relation to the stages of its evolution. The most urgent technological model of exercising political power.

  11. Power to the People: An Inverse Role in Nigeria’s Politics and Governance

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Onyemekara Emecheta Kingsley Onyemekara

    2016-12-01

    Full Text Available An attempt to contextualize the political power structure in Nigeria exposes an orientation and practice that directly negates the democratic norm of power belonging to the people. Today, power belongs entirely to government officials who use it to advance the course of their political and economic interests. The people are thus, subjected to the point and path of complete alienation from the demands and benefits of their democratic citizenship. Given the weakness of the rule of law and institutions of check in Nigeria, established statutes and legislation have not been able to stand tall to relevance in dislodging the hegemony of the ruling elites as is evident in our case study-Imo State. This has since 1999, propped up a telling political effect, which also spirals to the arena of development, and quakes the stability of the state, and the nation at large. The paper examines the current domiciliation of political power, its potential effect on the people, and on service delivery in the country. A case is made for recovery of power for the people and reasserting the law as a balancing force and as means of providing check against breach of constitutionally prescribed political power structure and configuration.

  12. The cleavable matter: Discursive orders in Swedish nuclear power politics 1972-1980

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Lindquist, P.

    1997-09-01

    This study applies a qualitative discourse-theoretical method to analyse the central argumentation in the parliamentary debate on nuclear power in Sweden during 1972-1980, reconstructed from official documents such as governmental and parliamentary bills, committee reports, parliamentary debate protocols, and official commission reports. Particular concern is directed to the process in which various discursive orders emerging within the political debate tend to have a structuring influence on the political argumentation regarding what can be said, by whom this can be said, and how this can be said. It is argued that these discursive orders have a profound, and in a systems theoretical sense self-dynamic influence, going beyond the original intentions of the political actors, on how the energy policy issue is interpreted and constructed. It is argued, furthermore, that these discursive orders actively exploit the political context of meaning by deliberately instrumentalising and incorporating competing argumentative elements into their own cognitive structure. In other words, the dominant political system incorporates the arguments of the political opposition and of the environmental and anti nuclear movements in order to consolidate its political power. The discourse theoretical analysis of the Swedish nuclear power debate in that sense unveils a deep resistance against a true political discourse, in the sense of Habermas, as a rational and domination-free process of reaching mutual understanding. 152 refs

  13. Political Participation and Power Relations in Egypt: The Scope of Newspapers and Social Network Sites

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mostafa Shehata

    2017-05-01

    Full Text Available The political use of media in Egypt post-2011 revolution brought about drastic transformations in political activism and power structures. In the context of communication power theory, this article investigates the effects of newspapers and social network sites on political participation and political power relations. The research employed a mixed methodology, comprised of a survey of 527 Egyptian youth and semi-structured interviews of 12 political activists and journalists. The results showed a significant relationship between reading newspapers and youth’s political participation, but not between using social network sites and political participation. In addition, newspapers and social network sites were platforms for a series of conflicts and coalitions that emerged between pro- and anti-revolution actors. Despite the importance of social network sites as key tools for informing and mobilizing the public, they eventually failed to empower new political actors, and this was because old actors, supported by newspapers and other mainstream media, managed to obstruct the new actors’ progress.

  14. Socio-political structure of Tokat at the bases of the local elections

    OpenAIRE

    D. Ali Arslan; Mehmet Karataş; Sadettin Baştürk; Gülten Arslan

    2013-01-01

    The major ofjective of this study was to examine and discuss the political structure of Tokat and its place in the general political structure of Turkish society by using methods and techniques of political sociology. Structural-functionalist approach was used as the theoretical base. In the other words the formation of political power in Tokat and the overall operation and changing regularities were investigated. Both the province of Tokat and Tokat city center selected as the sampling group...

  15. New social movements and political process: The politics of hydroelectric power in Switzerland

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lehmann, Luzia M.

    This dissertation analyzes the mobilization and impact of the ecology movement mobilizing against and challenging hydroelectric power plants in the Alps. It argues that the political process model is the most fruitful framework for such a study, linking a political system's structural constraints and opportunities to movement action via organizational resources. The mobilization process resulting in movement impact is conceived as an interactive process among social movements, authorities, other opponents, and potential counter movements. The case study method is then used to analyze three action campaigns launched against hydro power plants in Graubunden since the 1970s: Ilanz I and II, Greina, and Curciusa. In terms of the movement's narrow goal of preventing a plant, Ilanz I and II is a failure, Greina a success, and Curciusa ambiguous. Yet the author defines movement impact more broadly, including procedural, reactive and proactive substantive impact, and structural impact, changes in the alliance/conflict system, and social learning. Based on the evidence from the case studies, these factors affect movement outcome positively: visibility in the media and framing the debate, adjusting the target level and movement repertoire to the opportunity structure and the spatial concentration of the issue, proactivity, and organizational resources with a well developed division of labor, internal communication, and a non-partisan alliance system at all levels. There are two main conceptual contributions. First, the author analyzes the political opportunity structure at all levels of the federal polity--the national, cantonal, and communal--as well as the interplay among the levels. The fact that the cantonal and communal levels exhibit more elements of closure than the national level helps explain differences in movements' organizational resources, movement repertoire, targeting of movement action, and thus movement impact. Second, the author develops the spatial

  16. Resource rents, power, and political stability

    OpenAIRE

    Kjetil Bjorvatn; Mohammad Reza Farzanegan

    2014-01-01

    We study the association between resource rents and political stability, highlighting the importance of the distribution of political power as a mediating factor. We present a simple theoretical model showing that increased rents are likely to be positively associated with the stability of a powerful incumbent while destabilizing a less powerful incumbent. Our empirical analysis confirms this prediction: Using panel data for more than 120 countries from 1984-2009, our results show that rents ...

  17. Nuclear power and political conflict

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kitschelt, H.

    1979-01-01

    The paper is limited to the first phase of conflict up to 1977. The various forms of controversy on the issue of nuclear energy are examined. The conflict is explained as being the result of relevant research and (energy) infrastructure policies. The first task of such an investigation is to analyse the depoliticization of nuclear energy policy which took place over a period of nearly 20 years (1955-1973/4). This depoliticization and non-decisionmaking on the social consequences of nuclear energy have laid the foundations for the development of the conflict which occured in the first cycle of the nuclear energy conflict. The second task is to highlight the social structure of the opposition movement, its forms of struggle, and the response of the state apparatus, The crisis of the nuclear power policy has led to a more or less distinct paralysis of the state apparatus because the political and industrial decisionmaking processes in this area were not designed to cope with social conflicts. In fact, their very structure had excluded the possibility of political opposition to a specific technology. (orig./HP) [de

  18. The politics of researching global health politics

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rushton, Simon

    2015-01-01

    In this comment, I build on Shiffman’s call for the global health community to more deeply investigate structural and productive power. I highlight two challenges we must grapple with as social scientists carrying out the types of investigation that Shiffman proposes: the politics of challenging the powerful; and the need to investigate types of expertise that have traditionally been thought of as ‘outside’ global health. In doing so, I argue that moving forward with the agenda Shiffman sets out requires social scientists interested in the global politics of health to be reflexive about our own exercise of structural and productive power and the fact that researching global health politics is itself a political undertaking. PMID:25905482

  19. State Structure and Political Regime Structure

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Paul – Iulian Nedelcu

    2012-05-01

    Full Text Available The political regime is the concrete form of organization and functioning of political system andtherefore, the regime means the concrete way of organize, institutionalize and function a political systemand of the exercise of political power by a social-political force in a social community or global socialistem. The political regime is not limited to institutions and state bodies, but it covers the entire politicalsystem. Form of expression in social practice plan is the result of balance of forces between classes ofcitizens, organizations, between them and civil society and politics.Designates the concrete form ofgovernment formation and organization, of state bodies, in aspect of their characteristics and principles, therelations between them and other state bodies, and also as the relationship between them and otherinstitutionalized forms of political systems. Instead, the political regime is an explicit realization ofaxiological operations, a specific hierarchy of values, in general and political values, in particular. Even ifsome elements of the political regime overlap to some extent and in some respects, those of form orstructure of guvernamnt state, thus they dissolve his identity, distinct quality of being specific traits of thepolitical regime.

  20. Socio-political structure of Mersin at the basis of the results of the local elections

    OpenAIRE

    D. Ali Arslan

    2012-01-01

    It was aimed to investigate the political structure of Mersin and its place in the general political structure of Turkey by using methods and techniques of political sociology. Structural-functionalist was used as the theoretical base. To achieve this goal, the results of the Turkish local elections in last 50 years (were examined. First of all, the formation of political power in Turkey and the overall operation and changing regularities at the bases of the local elections were evaluated. Se...

  1. The politics of power: Electricity reform in India

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Joseph, Kelli L.

    2010-01-01

    Ongoing theft, corruption, and an artificially decreased pricing structure have made it nearly impossible for the state utilities in India to improve power service. As a result, industrial consumers across India exit the state-run system and rely on their own on-site power generation in order to ensure a consistent and reliable source of electricity. The 2003 Electricity Act encourages further power production from these captive plants through its open access clause. By encouraging the growth of these captive power plants, politicians in India set up a dual-track economy, whereby state-run and market-run production exist side-by-side. This strategy allows politicians to encourage private sector involvement in the electricity market, without jeopardizing the support of key political constituencies at the state level.

  2. Reform despite politics? The political economy of power sector reform in Fiji, 1996–2013

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Dornan, Matthew

    2014-01-01

    Attempts to reform the electricity sector in developing countries have achieved mixed results, despite the implementation of similar reforms in many developed countries, and concerted effort by donors to transfer reform models. In many cases, political obstacles have prevented full and effective implementation of donor-promoted reforms. This paper examines the political economy of power sector reform in Fiji from 1996 to 2013. Reform has been pursued with political motives in a context of clientelism. Policy inconsistency and reversal is explained by the political instability of ethnic-based politics in Fiji. Modest success has been achieved in recent years despite these challenges, with Fiji now considered a model of power sector reform for other Small Islands Developing States (SIDS) in the Pacific. The experience demonstrates that reform is possible within difficult political environments, but it is challenging, takes time and is not guaranteed. The way in which political motives have driven and shaped reform efforts also highlights the need for studies of power sector reform to direct greater attention toward political drivers behind reform. - Highlights: • This is the first study of power sector reform in Fiji or other Small Island Developing States (SIDS) of the Pacific. • The clientelist nature of politics in Fiji is found to have both driven and shaped reform efforts. • There has been modest success in recent years despite these obstacles, with Fiji now considered a model for other SIDS. • The experience demonstrates that reform is possible within difficult political environments, but it is challenging, takes time and is not guaranteed

  3. Power, privilege and disadvantage: Intersectionality theory and political representation

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Eline Severs

    2017-06-01

    Full Text Available This article critically reviews the extant literature on social group representation and clarifies the advantages of intersectionality theory for studying political representation. It argues that the merit of intersectionality theory can be found in its ontology of power. Intersectionality theory is founded on a relational conception of political power that locates the constitution of power relations within social interactions, such as political representation. As such, intersectionality theory pushes scholarship beyond studying representation inequalities —that are linked to presumably stable societal positions— to also consider the ways in which political representation (recreates positions of privilege and disadvantage.

  4. Economic, Political and Communicative power in the neoliberal societies

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Laura Bergés-Saura, Ph. D.

    2010-01-01

    Full Text Available The article analyses the relations between the economic, political and communicative powers in the socioeconomic model of neoliberal capitalism. Firstly, it examines the transformations in the economic power, to analyse later the various mechanisms linking this changing economic power to the media performance. Among these mechanisms, the article analyses the control of ownership and other external financial sources; the origin of commercial income; and business management techniques, while simultaneously investigating the relations between these variables and the transformations in the economic sphere. Following the political economy tradition, the article addresses the implications that the concentration of economic, political and communicative power have on democracy and freedom, taking into account the evolution of the socioeconomic and political system in the last decades.

  5. Knowledge, politics and power in global health

    Science.gov (United States)

    Brown, Garrett Wallace

    2015-01-01

    This article agrees with recent arguments suggesting that normative and epistemic power is rife within global health policy and provides further examples of such. However, in doing so, it is argued that it is equally important to recognize that global health is, and always will be, deeply political and that some form of power is not only necessary for the system to advance, but also to try and control the ways in which power within that system operates. In this regard, a better focus on health politics can both expose illegitimate sources of power, but also provide better recommendations to facilitate deliberations that can, although imperfectly, help legitimate sources of influence and power. PMID:25674575

  6. Representations of Political Power in African Writing | Bayer ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    The intersection of the politics of writing with the writings of politics raises the central question of this essay, namely: how the representation of political power differs in fiction and non-fiction. The authors investigated in this paper, chosen both for the influence of their literary work and their political engagement, are Chinua ...

  7. Privatization and Political Power in Representative Democracy

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Hansen, Morten Balle

    One of the main endeavors within ”New Public Management” (NPM) since the 1980s has been to encourage various forms of privatization in the public sector. In recent years, the involvement of private players in the provision of services in Danish municipalities has thus been increased, which makes...... it important to study the consequences of this development. In the present article, privatization is understood as the use of private service providers to provide services and focus is on what privatization means for the power of local political players. The point of departure is an expectation that a high...... degree of privatization can have far-reaching consequences for the distribution of local political power. This is illustrated empirically by a questionnaire survey of 896 municipal leaders. The main findings are that the local political actors generally have less power in municipalities with high degrees...

  8. The European Union’s normative power in global politics

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Manners, Ian

    2012-01-01

    comparison. Both political and scholarly assessments argue that ‘we are one of the most important, if not the most important, normative powers in the world’ (Barroso in Peterson, 2008: 69) and that ‘Europe has tremendous normative power’ (Moravcsik, 2010: 18). The normative power approach set out here makes...... it possible to explain, understand, and judge the EU in global politics by rethinking the nature of power and actorness in a globalising, multilateralising and multipolarising era. The EU uses normative power in global politics but the question is whether it is more prone than other actors to do so? In areas...... which are core to the ‘European project’, it seems clear that the EU is more disposed to use normative power....

  9. Political Science and Political Geography: Neglected Areas, Areas for Development.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Laponce, J. A.

    1983-01-01

    Since at least the 1950s, political scientists have tended to ignore the possible contributions of political geography to political science because of a move away from considering spatial factors on political structure. Political scientists need to use more information from geography to enhance their understanding of political power and conflict.…

  10. Public and political attitudes to nuclear power in Sweden

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Wikdahl, C.-E.; Swedish Atomic Forum)

    1988-01-01

    The first important decisions about a large nuclear programme in Sweden were taken in the early 1960s without any political opposition at all. The first signs of an anti-nuclear movement were seen in 1972, and at the general election in 1976 nuclear power was for the first time the main political issue. It remained so until 1980, when Parliament, after a referendum, decided to phase out nuclear power not later than the year 2010. After that decision, political interest in nuclear power evaporated, but returned again after the Chernobyl accident in April 1986. Both the decision in Parliament in 1980 and the Government's bill of May 1987 put Sweden in an unique position. Public attitudes and the political situation in Sweden are examined. (author)

  11. Political “genotype” as a structural element of political culture

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    N. V. Karpova

    2016-01-01

    Full Text Available The article is devoted to the issue of genetic foundations of political culture in the context of the socio-political system changes. The author elaborates the concept of “political genotype” as a sustainable structural element of political culture that determines its content and the possibility of permissible variation. In this paper the main forms of existence of political genotype and its functions are also investigated; and “genetic” mechanism of political culture succession is explored.

  12. Wind power in political whirlwind

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Morch, Stein

    2002-01-01

    In Norway, according to this article, shifting fair wind and head wind for wind power have changed to unpredictable political whirlwinds. That is, there is great uncertainty with respect to further development of wind power in Norway as well as in nearby markets such as Sweden, Denmark and the Netherlands. The government, represented by Enova, has announced reduced investment grants, and so the realization of a ''green'' market, at home or across the frontiers, becomes very important. The political goal of producing 3 TWh of wind power per year by 2010 apparently is still valid, but it is difficult to see any robust and convincing clarity when it comes to policy instruments and economical frames that will make it possible to reach that goal. In its directive on renewable energy sources in the energy generation, the EU has quoted a total increase in capacity from 14 percent in 1997 to 22 percent in 2010. This has been shared among the member countries as indicative targets and there is great freedom in the selection of policy instruments. At the end of 2002, the wind power production in Norway is 0.3 TWh/year

  13. Nuclear power: the political challenge

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Adam, G.

    2009-01-01

    A brief overview of the political and economical situation and nuclear energy problems in Europe is given. The author presented his opinion on topic such as need of nuclear power, Kozloduy NPP units 1-4 shutdown, climate change , energy security, environmental problems

  14. Atomic-powered democracy: Policy against politics in the quest for American nuclear energy

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Williams, R.W.

    1993-01-01

    This dissertation focuses on the relationship of American nuclear energy to democracy. It examines whether the nuclear policy processes have furthered the legitimacy-government accountability and citizen participation-which the democratic institutes are based. Nuclear policy and its institutions have placed severe limitations on democratic practices. Contravened democracy is seen most clearly in the decoupling of policy from politics. Decoupling refers to the weakening of institutional linkages between citizens and government, and to the erosion of the norms that ground liberal democracy. Decoupling is manifested in policy centralization, procedural biases, technical rationality, and the spatial displacement of conflict. Decoupling has normative implications: While federal accountability was limited and citizen participation was shackled, other major groups enjoyed privileged access to policy making. The decoupling of nuclear policy from politics arose within the context of US liberal-democratic capitalism. The federal government pursued its own goals of defense and world leadership. Yet, it was not structurally autonomous from the hegemony of the political-economic context. Economically, the Atomic Energy Act did not permit federal agencies to directly invest in power plant construction, and did not authorize them to commercially generate electricity. Private industry was structurally placed to domesticate the atom. Politically, the liberal-democratic system hampered an unquestioning pursuit of atomic energy. Federal institutions have been forced to heed some of the anti-nuclear concerns. The pervasive influence of the US political economy on nuclear policy has come to transgress democracy. Nuclear power's growth faltered during the 1970s. The political and economic constraints on federal actions have limited the means available to revive a becalmed nuclear industry; this has exerted strong pressure on federal institutions to decouple policy from participation

  15. The Porter Douglass Case: Examining the Impact of Power, Politics, and the Press on Academic Decision-Making

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jaeger, Audrey J.; Grantham, Ashley; Lynch, Terry

    2014-01-01

    Mixing political appointments and university operations can prove challenging and, in this case, caused the resignation of three senior officials at State University. Bolman and Deal's four frames provide a structure for analyzing this complex case. The political frame and issues of power and coalitions offer a particularly useful lens to…

  16. Political power and health inequalities in Vieques, Puerto Rico.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Medina, Catherine K; Pellegrini, Lawrence C; Mogro-Wilson, Cristina

    2014-01-01

    The relationship between political power and the various pathways to health inequalities in Vieques, Puerto Rico, is explored. The U.S. Navy used the island for 62 years for bombing and other military exercises. The article focuses on the resulting changes to the island's socioeconomic positioning and the health inequalities over six decades. Secondary data analysis of census data using a revised World Health Organization model is used to examine the relationships of political power, labor markets, employment, material deprivation, social and family networks, and health inequalities. Findings are interpreted through a social justice lens and implications suggest the use of political advocacy for social change.

  17. The Structuring Principle: Political Socialization and Belief Systems

    Science.gov (United States)

    Searing, Donald D.; And Others

    1973-01-01

    Assesses the significance of data on childhood political learning to political theory by testing the structuring principle,'' considered one of the central assumptions of political socialization research. This principle asserts that basic orientations acquired during childhood structure the later learning of specific issue beliefs.'' The…

  18. Does Glocal Political Power Already Exist?

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Lorenzo Ornaghi

    2017-05-01

    Full Text Available Large periods of history are usually characterized by equally important moments of change in scientific knowledge and, in particular, in the understanding of political power. We still need to study in depth whether the former provokes (almost of out necessity the latter, or whether they are “great” because they are favored by the innovation of the paradigms of knowledge. The passage from medieval universalism to the particularism of the modern age represents an extremely interesting analogy when compared to the transformations that are now underway. The example of John of Salisbury’s Policratus, the starting point of this article, is illuminating in our comprehension of the relevance of the interweaving between the persistence of the ancient forms of recognition of power and the search for new forms. The existence of glocal realities is already a fact. Even if it is relatively easy to recognize these realities (a business, a university, a humanitarian association, not a few of the same “parts” which constitute the traditional organization of the State, it is more difficult to define the specific characteristics of the power at their disposal. Moving from the widening gap between “actual” power and “potential” power, the article examines the motives for which the classical definitions of power are always becoming more insufficient in understanding the role now emerging from glocal realities. And, in particular, by looking at how the “command-obedience” relationship is changing also as a consequence of communication networks and information technology, the article analyzes that specific “contamination” within global elements and local elements, which seems to be the main base of glocal political power.

  19. RATIONAL STRUCTURES OF POLITICS IN MONTESQUIEU’S THE SPIRIT OF THE LAWS. PART I: THE KEY ELEMENTS LEGITIMATING THE POWER AND ITS SOURCES

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    MARIUS DUMITRESCU

    2013-05-01

    Full Text Available In The Spirit of the Laws, Montesquieu tried not to discuss about laws, but in fact, about the type of power hiding behind them. Inspired by Plato and Aristotle, he built his own vision on the palingenesis of the political forms and of the principles governing them. Baron de La Brède started from ideas, from spiritual structures, that have the role to create certain social behaviors, and identified three types of government forms, each characterized by its own nature and principle: monarchy, democracy, and despotism. The French philosopher tried to understand, besides the principles ensuring the nature of each government, the key elements legitimating the power and also its sources. The monarchy is seen by Montesquieu as the most suitable regime, for his time, to rule free societies. The aristocracy helps to the maintenance of freedom in royalty by resisting to any attempt of the crown to exceed its constitutional prerogatives. The transition from one form of government to another is done because of the alteration of principles. Democracy is maybe the most exposed to alteration as its excess of freedom leads to the affirmation of the spirit of endless equality that makes everybody wanting to be the equals to the rulers. Montesquieu sees no other solution to replace the degraded forms of political organization than the confederative republic. Such a political organization would answer the need for permanent political flexibility.

  20. Governance and Women's Economic and Political Participation : Power Inequalities, Formal Constraints and Norms

    OpenAIRE

    Milazzo, Annamaria; Goldstein, Markus

    2017-01-01

    What role do institutional constraints and social norms play in determining persistent gender gapsin economic and political participation and have institutional reforms been successful in reducing these gaps? This paper argues that, at the roots of current gender inequalities, there are traditional patriarchal social structures in which power is unequally distributed, with men traditionall...

  1. The cleavable matter: Discursive orders in Swedish nuclear power politics 1972-1980; Det klyvbara aemnet. Diskursiva ordningar i svensk kaernkraftspolitik 1972-1980

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Lindquist, P.

    1997-09-01

    This study applies a qualitative discourse-theoretical method to analyse the central argumentation in the parliamentary debate on nuclear power in Sweden during 1972-1980, reconstructed from official documents such as governmental and parliamentary bills, committee reports, parliamentary debate protocols, and official commission reports. Particular concern is directed to the process in which various discursive orders emerging within the political debate tend to have a structuring influence on the political argumentation regarding what can be said, by whom this can be said, and how this can be said. It is argued that these discursive orders have a profound, and in a systems theoretical sense self-dynamic influence, going beyond the original intentions of the political actors, on how the energy policy issue is interpreted and constructed. It is argued, furthermore, that these discursive orders actively exploit the political context of meaning by deliberately instrumentalising and incorporating competing argumentative elements into their own cognitive structure. In other words, the dominant political system incorporates the arguments of the political opposition and of the environmental and anti nuclear movements in order to consolidate its political power. The discourse theoretical analysis of the Swedish nuclear power debate in that sense unveils a deep resistance against a true political discourse, in the sense of Habermas, as a rational and domination-free process of reaching mutual understanding. 152 refs.

  2. Foucault's contributions for understanding power relations in British classical political economy

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Danielle Guizzo

    2015-05-01

    Full Text Available This paper analyzes the strategic role played by British classical political economy in constructing new technologies of power. Michel Foucault drew attention to a change that political economists promoted concerning the role of the state, which has been overlooked by historians of economic thought. This paper explores the main arguments provided by the most important British political economists of the 18th and 19th centuries on what concerns population management, State's role and economic dynamics in order to examine Foucault's considerations. Although British classical political economy consolidated the mechanism of markets and economic individuality, thus creating a system of truth that changed economic norms and practices, its discourse also established a political conduct that was responsible for creating mechanisms of control that disseminated new forms of power relations.

  3. The Servient Character of Political Power According to St. Thomas Aquinas

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Pawel Tarasiewicz

    2014-06-01

    Full Text Available The author attempts to justify the thesis of the servient character of political power. By his analyses, he arrives at two conclusions. First, the ultimate goal of service fulfilled by political power should be identical with the natural goal of every human being, meaning a life of virtue. Hence, service to the cause of the citizens’ virtue requires that the fundamental duties of power include the protection of public peace, the promotion of actions towards the common good, and striving for a common abundance of worldly possessions. Second, to elect those in political power it is necessary to make sure that aspirants to such are characterized by the appropriate level of virtuous development. Each candidate should be first and foremost a person possessing a high moral quality (virtus boni viri, where prudence and magnanimity appear to be virtues especially fitting power (virtutes boni principis.

  4. A Survey on Power and Political Culture in Kalile va Demne

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    J Dehghanian

    2011-04-01

    Postmodernist thinkers, especially Michel Foucault, make it clear that power and political culture are so complicated and affect private and social life. It is possible to claim that there is a meaningful relationship between people’s deed and power in each society. In this article, we take a look at political culture and power in Kalile va Demne and will analyze its effects on people’s thoughts and deeds.

  5. The Political Context for Transnational Actor Soft Power

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Bertelsen, Rasmus Gjedssø

    2015-01-01

    There is growing awareness and understanding of the role of non-state actors for the smart power of states. However, there is not yet a clear understanding of the impact of the political context and the state for non-state actors and their soft power. We look at American missionary universities...

  6. The Politics of Nuclear Power and Waste Storage in Asia

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Sovacool, Benjamin (National Univ. of Singapore (Singapore)), e-mail: bsovacool@nus.edu.sg

    2010-09-15

    A complex interplay of social, economic, and political factors makes anticipating the scale and scope of nuclear power expansion difficult for both established and aspiring nuclear nations. In response, this article investigates the forms of social, political, and economic organization conducive to nuclear power expansion. We define 'socio-political economy' as the dynamic forces of state and society which influence the nuclear power industry. We begin by developing a theoretical framework of nuclear socio-political economy based primarily upon the evolution of nuclear energy in France (with supplemental insights from the former Soviet Union, United Kingdom, and United States). This emergent framework posits that strong state involvement in guiding economic development, centralization of national energy planning, campaigns to link technological progress to a national revitalization, influence of technocratic ideology on policy decisions, subordination of challenges to political authority, and low levels of civic activism were influential factors in supporting the expansion of nuclear power in France. These six catalysts create conducive conditions in unique ways. First, a history of strong government intervention in guiding the direction of economic development is a requisite condition seemingly because nuclear power is a 'socio--technically inflexible' technology that requires a high degree of supply chain coordination which only the government is capable of unifying. Second, a highly centralized energy sector infuses the requisite control for planning and implementing a sustained expansion of nuclear power in the midst of a politicized environment. Third, the presence of a government strategy that attempts to link technological developments to a national renaissance fosters the formation of a national culture which tolerates risks associated with risk-prone technologies. Fourth, the dominance of a technocratic approach to policymaking appears

  7. The Politics of Nuclear Power and Waste Storage in Asia

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Sovacool, Benjamin

    2010-09-01

    A complex interplay of social, economic, and political factors makes anticipating the scale and scope of nuclear power expansion difficult for both established and aspiring nuclear nations. In response, this article investigates the forms of social, political, and economic organization conducive to nuclear power expansion. We define 'socio-political economy' as the dynamic forces of state and society which influence the nuclear power industry. We begin by developing a theoretical framework of nuclear socio-political economy based primarily upon the evolution of nuclear energy in France (with supplemental insights from the former Soviet Union, United Kingdom, and United States). This emergent framework posits that strong state involvement in guiding economic development, centralization of national energy planning, campaigns to link technological progress to a national revitalization, influence of technocratic ideology on policy decisions, subordination of challenges to political authority, and low levels of civic activism were influential factors in supporting the expansion of nuclear power in France. These six catalysts create conducive conditions in unique ways. First, a history of strong government intervention in guiding the direction of economic development is a requisite condition seemingly because nuclear power is a 'socio--technically inflexible' technology that requires a high degree of supply chain coordination which only the government is capable of unifying. Second, a highly centralized energy sector infuses the requisite control for planning and implementing a sustained expansion of nuclear power in the midst of a politicized environment. Third, the presence of a government strategy that attempts to link technological developments to a national renaissance fosters the formation of a national culture which tolerates risks associated with risk-prone technologies. Fourth, the dominance of a technocratic approach to policymaking appears to provide the

  8. Competitive effects and instruments of power sector reforms. International reform concepts blockade structures, risk distribution. A political economy analysis

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Liebchen, Armin

    2014-01-01

    Power sectors with weak or inadequate competition structures are the rule, despite numerous attempts at reform. But can afford modern economies this defect for a long time? Why can the implementation of competition are blocked so effectively? The author studied international reform experiences and opens up interesting insights that can also reflect on problems of the German energy turnaround: The difficulty of timing and coordination of the reform components, the development of resistance levels of individual interest groups, breach of contract as a rational alternative, causes unwanted price effects, shifting interest situations of major stakeholders, change dynamics impending regulatory risks, pending financing risks, stranded cost-conflict situations for power stations disconnected from the grid and facilities and instruments of a political and regulatory risk management for reforms. With numerous examples, background analyzes and instruments to reform analysis, this book is aimed at investors, policy planners and analysts. [de

  9. Political Market Orientation: A Framework for Understanding Relationship Structures in Political Parties

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Ormrod, Robert P.; Savigny, Heather

    2012-01-01

    This article is motivated by the growing need to integrate the current political science and marketing literature in order to provide a deeper understanding of the behaviour of political actors and their relationships with relevant stakeholder groups. In our article, we demonstrate how Ormrod...... strive for contextual sensitivity. By adopting this approach it is hoped that the fears noted by political scientists that political marketing is solely concerned with applying standard management models to political parties with the resulting emphasis on communication tactics at election time, together......’s conceptual model of political market orientation complements political science models of party organization by drawing attention to the competing interests of stakeholders in shaping party strategy and organizational structure. We treat parties as a multitude of actors rather than as monolithic entities...

  10. Mozart, Hawthorne, and Mario Savio: Aesthetic Power and Political Complicity.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Herbert, T. Walter

    1995-01-01

    Discusses the false dichotomy pitting aesthetic power against political complicity in literary criticism. Considers the sexual politics of the household of Nathaniel Hawthorne in light of this opposition. Suggests how literary works keep warring voices and inner conflicts alive and at odds. (HB)

  11. Political demography: Powerful trends under-attended by demographic science.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Teitelbaum, Michael S

    2015-01-01

    The interconnections between politics and the dramatic demographic changes under way around the world have been neglected by the two research disciplines that could contribute most to their understanding: demography and political science. Instead, this area of 'political demography' has largely been ceded to political activists, pundits, and journalists, leading often to exaggerated or garbled interpretation. The terrain includes some of the most politically sensitive and contested issues: alleged demographically determined shifts in the international balance of power; low fertility, population decline, and demographic ageing; international migration; change in national identity; and compositional shifts in politically sensitive social categories and human rights. Meanwhile many governments and non-governmental actors have actively pursued varieties of 'strategic demography', deploying fertility, mortality, or migration as instruments of domestic or international policy. Political scientists and demographers could and should use their knowledge and analytic techniques to improve understanding and to moderate excessive claims and fears on these topics.

  12. Soft Power: Political Use of A Scientific Concept

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Maksim Vladimirovich Kharkevich

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available The article discusses the use and transformation of the American scientific concept "soft power" in official Russian and US foreign policy rhetoric with the methodological help of Habermas' communicative action theory and its adoption to IR by T. Risse. In mainstream IR the proliferation of the "soft power" concept is viewed in terms of ideological competition among states. The author argues that it is better to view this process as a form of international political deliberations on new forms of power in world politics. The article shows that there's no communicative action of US and Russia based on their tentative discussion of the "soft power" concept. On of reasons might be the lack of interest of both states for the concept as an ideological basis for cooperative actions. For Russia soft power in its classical form might be used towards its near abroad and probably BIC states. In dealings with western states Russian soft power turns into lobbyism and propaganda which is strictly not soft power. US under Obama have basically refuted the concept, having changed it for analytically meaningless "smart power". The conclusion is that communicative action requires prior existence of commutative rationality. This type of rationality is evident among postmodern states - the EU member states - and apparently absent among modern states such as Russia and US.

  13. West Germany: Federal Structure, Political Influence.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Toogood, Alex

    1978-01-01

    Describes the organizational structure of the broadcasting industry in West Germany which is unique because of the federal, public, and political elements involved. Special problems that arise from this framework are discussed, including financing, programing, creative vs technical advances, concepts of production values, and political balance.…

  14. The EU's Normative Power in Changing World Politics

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Manners, Ian

    2009-01-01

    global order: 1) what is the concept of normative power in world politics?; 2) what is an effective EU toolbox for tackling new challenges?; 3) how does the EU go beyond self-perception and rhetoric?; 4) what is the raison d'etre of the EU?; and 5) how might normative power in EU external policies lead...

  15. 12 CFR 1.110 - Taxing powers of a State or political subdivision.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... impact of any possible limitations regarding the State's or political subdivision's taxing powers, as... 12 Banks and Banking 1 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Taxing powers of a State or political subdivision. 1.110 Section 1.110 Banks and Banking COMPTROLLER OF THE CURRENCY, DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY...

  16. Political economy of nuclear power, 1946-1982

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Cohn, S.M.

    1986-01-01

    This dissertation seeks to explain the pattern of nuclear power development in the United States, treating the subject as a case study of how major infrastructural development choices are made in a modern capitalist economy. The main concept adduced in the thesis to organize nuclear history is that of an Official Technology (OT). The latter enjoys strong state support, the promoted image of the coming technology and capture of critical mass advantages. The dissertation analyzes the incentives key political-economic interests had for promoting nuclear power to OT status 1946-1974 and the mechanisms used by these groups to facilitate nuclear expansion. At OT differential, tallying the microeconomic impact of nuclear's capture of OT status is calculated. Included in the differential are the benefits of scale economies, learning curve cost reductions, federal subsidies and regulatory incentives, misleading information environments, and bureaucratic momentum. Nuclear's decline after 1974 is tied to the erosion of this differential by a political challenge to the technology's OT status

  17. Structural elements in achieving legislative tobacco control in NSW, 1955-95: political reflections and implications.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hooker, Claire; Chapman, Simon

    2006-02-01

    To analyse structural factors revealed by politicians that shaped legislation on tobacco control in New South Wales, 1955-95. Parliamentary debates and other records were collected. Open-ended interviews were conducted with 17 Members of Parliament (MPs) who were significantly involved, and then analysed for structural elements. Tobacco industry lobbying had a significant but limited influence on policy making, being exerted largely through social interactions with executives and based on concerns about the economic impact on third parties. MPs saw health advocates' chief functions as (1) generating community concern about the issue and support for control measures, and (2) bringing any new information to political attention, providing pro-control arguments and data through the media. Factors that delayed tobacco control policies included: the conservative stance of Premiers and major parties, commitments to unanimous federal action, and rivalry between parties. Factors that facilitated control policies included: reforms that gave the Legislative Council increased power, the use of parliamentary committees, and backbencher and grass roots support. Tobacco control policy and legislation has been the product of political structures that gave power to those MPs in the least powerful positions--minor parties, Members of the Legislative Council (MLCs), backbenchers, women and party rank and file--rather than to major parties and their executives. Advocates should make the most of their access points to the political process, providing information, arguments and support and demonstrating public opinion in favour of further control.

  18. International Framework and Japan’s Pursuit of Being A Major Political Power

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Meng Xiaoxu

    2016-12-01

    Full Text Available The boom of post-war Japan is deeply affected by the international framework when choosing the development path of the state. The bipolar architecture of the Cold War has made Japan a sovereign state again with the support of the United States. Within the Cold War framework, Japan has come up with the goal of being a political power based on its economic strength. After the end of Cold War, multipolar architecture has become the main trend in the world, and Japan has regarded this trend as its opportunity to realize its political dream, expecting to be more involved in world affairs as well as taking responsibilities within the international order and economic system. Meanwhile, Japan has also made a breakthrough within military power and used this to become a political power. Entering the 21st century, the multipolar architecture has deepened, while emerging nations have risen sharply collectively. Japan has speeded up the process of pursuing a political path accordingly, enhancing its leadership and influence in the regional economy, revising peace constitution to breakthrough military shackles, playing a role in counter-terrorism affairs and international organizations, thus making its dream of being a political power come true. Nevertheless, Japan has faced obstacles both at home and abroad.

  19. The Quality of Accounting Earnings and Change in Political Power Map: Evidence from Indonesia

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Harymawan Iman

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available This study investigates the earnings quality of politically connected firms listed in Indonesian Stock Exchange during 2006-2010. This study compare two definition (Soeharto Dependency Index (SDI and Politically Exposed Person (PEP of political connections to capture the effect of the changes of political power map on the earnings quality of politically connected firms in Indonesia. The finding shows that the quality of accounting earnings of politically connected firms which were formerly closely related to President Soeharto in 1998 are not significantly different to other firms. Furthermore, when this study employ politically exposed person as a proxy of political connections, the findings shows that connected firms have significantly lower quality accounting earnings. Consistent with prior findings, this study shows that change in political power map in Indonesia affect the level of earnings quality of politically connected firms.

  20. Crimillegal Orders: Revisiting Organized Crime’s Political Power

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Markus Schultze-Kraft

    2016-05-01

    Full Text Available Despite its relevance to understanding political change and instability in many parts of the global South, the relationship between organized crime and political order remains understudied. This article introduces the novel concept of “crimillegality” to address this issue. Taking recourse to the conceptions of political order put forward by Weber, Fukuyama and North, Wallis and Weingast, I explain how regular patterns of social exchange and interaction - involving public and private, and state and non-state actors - that span an assumed divide between the realms of legality (“legitimate upper world” and criminality (“illegitimate underworld” influence the character, shape and evolution of political order. I suggest that it is in crimillegal orders that organized criminality acquires political power to its fullest and that oligopolies of coercion and violence are constitutive elements of such orders. The article concludes by presenting some ideas about how the concept of crimillegality could be usefully adopted in the fields of peace building and the mitigation of non-armed conflict violence in Latin America and other parts of the contemporary world.

  1. French power politics for France and for Europe

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1992-11-01

    Economic, politic and organizational factors that govern the developments on the french electric power market are investigated. Three scenarios are then outlined for the french market and the electricity export from France, in the light of EC policies. Two questions are of special importance for the french power market: Will EDFs monopoly be broken, and will the nuclear program be continued? (56 refs., 5 figs., 6 tabs.)

  2. International legal and political issues associated with the export/import of nuclear power plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Manning Muntzing, L.

    1978-01-01

    The benefits of nuclear power can be achieved by most nations only through international commerce that has been shaped by political considerations and implemented through legal instruments. The end product is a structure of legal agreements designed to implement the basic political and commercial decisions that are required for any nation to enter the nuclear power arena. The IAEA Statute, the Non-Proliferation Treaty and regional nuclear agreements have reflected the international political consensus concerning nuclear power. In recent years, however, events have occurred that in all probability will result in additional international arrangements. It is expected that the increase in terrorist activities will result in greater physical protection commitments, that concern for weapons proliferation will result in further definition of sanctions, and that such troublesome issues as double labelling of materials will be discussed by the international community. In areas such as bilateral agreements between nations, commercial arrangements and export licences, this is a period of rethinking, renegotiating, and readjusting. The result is a degree of uncertainty and lack of stability that could so jeopardize the potential for nuclear transfers that the nuclear energy option may not vest. While there always will be questions and issues, it is essential to settle some of the key problems without delay so that nuclear benefits can be realized. (author)

  3. Democratising Political Powers through Locke's Doctrine of ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    The essay contends that whenever there is high-handedness of leaders in a democratic nation, such a state is either a 'despotic family monarchy' which has been disguised as a 'democracy'; or under normal circumstances, there is an abusive use of most, if not all of the primitive (untamed) elements of political power.

  4. Power and Insecurity: The politics of globalisation | van der ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    Globalisation is presented by some as an inevitable force of history. However, it is very much the result of political and policy decisions made by powerful elites to advance their interests. Globalisation is not a benign, neutral process, but ideologically driven in the service of the rich and powerful. This ideology is ...

  5. Lives and Political Field. An Analysis of the Power Structure of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Max Reinhardt

    2011-05-01

    Full Text Available This article discusses methods and results of an explorative study of two generations of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD: the two generations comprise, on the one hand, older and younger members of the postwar generation who witnessed the Second World War as young soldiers or as children, and on the other hand, the generation that was born in the 1950s and has mainly been responsible for shaping policy for some years. The aim of my dissertation was to analyze the ability of the social democratic leadership to represent the full range of party members and (base voters by comparing two generations, using a sample of political leaders and the habitus/field-analysis inspired by Pierre BOURDIEU. The basis of the analysis were partly biographical, partly theme-focused interviews, as well as a range of sources and already published literature regarding the biographies of these political leaders. The following article is based on my dissertation and is focused on a description of selected theoretical implications, on the description of the essential criteria for selecting the sample and on some of the methods used. These are an analysis of the life, life and field effects, the factions and the development of types of political leaders. I will present some results to exemplify the methods used. They show that the ability of the SPD to represent the full range of party members and (base voters and the power structure of the SPD have changed, thus threatening the party’s status as a "Volkspartei." URN: http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs1102197

  6. The political spectacle phenomenon on the political scene of Bosnia and Herzegovina

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Vučetić Vuk

    2013-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper will examine the phenomenon of political spectacle in BiH. Our goal is to recognize the structure of political spectacle in BiH political scene and point out the functions and objectives of this relatively new term in the media and the political sphere. In this regard, we have observed a political spectacle as a method of political communication of the rulers to the ruled. A very important element of the political spectacle is the media. With the media promotion of this method of political communication achieves its full capacity. The final outcome of the political spectacle is reflected in manipulating the public. In this way the politicians try to remain in power as long as they can.

  7. Society as a victim of bearers of economic and political power

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Tanjević Nataša

    2011-01-01

    Full Text Available In the transition countries, politics and economics are so connected and interrelated that many individuals who take high governmental positions or who have economic power abuse their status in order to make huge profits and commit criminal acts without impunity. The aim of this paper is to indicate the basic characteristics of this kind of crime and its negative consequences to the society as a whole. The abuse of economic and political power results in increasing economic inequalities, decreasing chances of entering foreign direct investments, and falling economic growth. Besides, this contributes to creating fertile soil for populism and supporting political elites that are not committed to building rule of law, stable democratic society and fair market economy. As a result, citizens’ confidence in the state and its institutions weakens, while the normative system of values in the society is jeopardized. In this way, the society becomes the victim of irresponsible individuals, and of those who abuse their economic and social power.

  8. Power, trust, and Science of Unitary Human Beings influence political leadership: a celebration of Barrett's power theory.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wright, Barbara W

    2010-01-01

    The importance of nurses' participation in health policy leadership is discussed within the context of Rogers' science of unitary human beings, Barrett's power theory, and one nurse-politician's experience. Nurses have a major role to play in resolving public policy issues that influence the health of people. A brief review of the history of nurses in the political arena is presented. Research related to power and trust is reviewed. Suggested strategies for success in political situations are offered.

  9. Resenha: Power, Interdependence and Nonstate Actors in World Politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Katiuscia Moreno Galhera Espósito

    2011-10-01

    Full Text Available Resenha do livro: Moravcsik, Andrew; Milner, Helen V. (org.. Power, Interdependence and Nonstate Actors in World Politics. New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2009. ISBN 978-0-691-14027-8

  10. Carbon Democracy: Political Power in the Age of Oil

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Mitchell, Timothy; Jaquet, Christophe

    2013-01-01

    How oil undermines democracy, and our ability to address the environmental crisis. This book is a French translation of 'Carbon Democracy: Political Power in the Age of Oil' originally published by Verso Edition (New York, US, ISBN 978-1781681169). Oil is a curse, it is often said, that condemns the countries producing it to an existence defined by war, corruption and enormous inequality. Carbon Democracy tells a more complex story, arguing that no nation escapes the political consequences of our collective dependence on oil. It shapes the body politic both in regions such as the Middle East, which rely upon revenues from oil production, and in the places that have the greatest demand for energy. Timothy Mitchell begins with the history of coal power to tell a radical new story about the rise of democracy. Coal was a source of energy so open to disruption that oligarchies in the West became vulnerable for the first time to mass demands for democracy. In the mid-twentieth century, however, the development of cheap and abundant energy from oil, most notably from the Middle East, offered a means to reduce this vulnerability to democratic pressures. The abundance of oil made it possible for the first time in history to reorganize political life around the management of something now called 'the economy' and the promise of its infinite growth. The politics of the West became dependent on an undemocratic Middle East. In the twenty-first century, the oil-based forms of modern democratic politics have become unsustainable. Foreign intervention and military rule are faltering in the Middle East, while governments everywhere appear incapable of addressing the crises that threaten to end the age of carbon democracy-the disappearance of cheap energy and the carbon-fuelled collapse of the ecological order. In making the production of energy the central force shaping the democratic age, Carbon Democracy rethinks the history of energy, the politics of nature, the theory of

  11. Connections between political intelligence and power maintenance in Niccolo Machiavelli

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Fábio Régio Bento

    2015-07-01

    Full Text Available The Prince, written in 1513 and published in 1531, four years after Niccolo Machiavelli's death (1469-1527, continues to be permanently reproposed, after more than five centuries of its inception, throughout a wide range of translations, not always coherent with the 1513 manuscript. In fact, as noted by Marques (2006, p. 41, Prince's Machiavelli is still presented as a “teacher of evil”. On the contrary to what the common sense affirms, however, the Florentine secretary was not Machiavellian. In this paper, through a direct study of The Prince in the Italian manuscript of 1513 (Machiavelli, 1988, and with the aid of translation from Maria Lucia Cumo (Maquiavel 1996, we shall analyze the connections in The Prince between political intelligence and virtuous maintenance of power, by claiming that The Prince is not an amoral  neither immoral book, but of political morality of the intelligent maintenance of power according to what Machiavelli understands as political virtues.

  12. The Power of Politic and Lobbying Parties in the Australian Accounting Regulation Reform Program

    OpenAIRE

    Suwaldiman, Suwaldiman

    2004-01-01

    This paper argues that Australian accounting regulations seem to be close to the government or political approach in its setting process. CLERP (Corporate Law Economic Reform Program) proposed by government can be viewed as changes made by Federal Government in the structure of setting accounting standards that show a substantial shift in power from the two professional accounting bodies; ICAA (The Institute of Certified Accountants in Australia) and ASCPA (Australian Society of Certified Pra...

  13. The Power Of Politic and Lobbying Parties in the Australian Accounting Regulation Reform Program

    OpenAIRE

    Suwaldiman, Suwaldiman

    2009-01-01

    This paper argues that Australian accounting regulations seem to be close to the government or political approach in its setting process. CLERP (Corporate Law Economic Reform Program) proposed by government can be viewed as changes made by Federal Government in the structure of setting accounting standards that show a substantial shift in power from the two professional accounting bodies; ICAA (The Institute of Certified Accountants in Australia) and ASCPA (Australian Society of Certified Pra...

  14. Indian politics encourages durgas, snubs women.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kishwar, M

    1999-01-01

    This article talks about four Indian women--Sonia Gandhi, Jayalitha, Mayawati, and Mamta Banerjee--in contrast with India's stereotypes in the political realm. India is a land of mind-boggling diversity. Yet stereotypes about India, which reduce the Indian reality to a unidimensional monolith, hold powerful sway. One such powerful stereotype is that Indian women are brutally oppressed, denied a voice in their family and community, and marginalized in politics as in other power structures. Without doubt, there is much truth in this stereotype; but how can the current political scene be explained? A few women are holding the entire political establishment of India at ransom. The machinations of Sonia Gandhi, Jayalalitha, Mayawati, and Mamta Banerjee have caused enormous upheavals in the polity and recently brought about the fall of the BJP government. Powerful politicians dance to the erratic tunes of these women and are shamefully submissive to them.

  15. Political model of social evolution.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Acemoglu, Daron; Egorov, Georgy; Sonin, Konstantin

    2011-12-27

    Almost all democratic societies evolved socially and politically out of authoritarian and nondemocratic regimes. These changes not only altered the allocation of economic resources in society but also the structure of political power. In this paper, we develop a framework for studying the dynamics of political and social change. The society consists of agents that care about current and future social arrangements and economic allocations; allocation of political power determines who has the capacity to implement changes in economic allocations and future allocations of power. The set of available social rules and allocations at any point in time is stochastic. We show that political and social change may happen without any stochastic shocks or as a result of a shock destabilizing an otherwise stable social arrangement. Crucially, the process of social change is contingent (and history-dependent): the timing and sequence of stochastic events determine the long-run equilibrium social arrangements. For example, the extent of democratization may depend on how early uncertainty about the set of feasible reforms in the future is resolved.

  16. How Context Matters? Mobilization, Political Opportunity Structures and Non-Electoral Political Participation in Old and New Democracies

    Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

    Vráblíková, Kateřina

    2014-01-01

    Roč. 47, č. 2 (2014), s. 203-229 ISSN 0010-4140 R&D Projects: GA ČR(CZ) GAP408/12/1474 Institutional support: RVO:68378025 Keywords : Political participation * political opportunity structure * national institutions Subject RIV: AD - Politology ; Political Sciences Impact factor: 2.028, year: 2014

  17. The socio-political economy of nuclear power development in Japan and South Korea

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Valentine, Scott Victor; Sovacool, Benjamin K.

    2010-01-01

    This paper analyzes the socio-cultural, political and economic conditions prevalent during the inception of nuclear power programs in Japan and South Korea in order to identify commonalities which support nuclear power program expansion. The study identifies six factors as having a clear influence on supporting nuclear power development: (1) strong state involvement in guiding economic development; (2) centralization of national energy policymaking and planning; (3) campaigns to link technological progress with national revitalization; (4) influence of technocratic ideology on policy decisions; (5) subordination of challenges to political authority, and (6) low levels of civic activism. The paper postulates that insights from this study can be used to assess the propensity of nations which have the emergent capacity to support nuclear power development to actually embark on such programs. - Research highlights: → The study identifies six factors as having a clear influence on supporting nuclear power development in Japan and South Korea: (1) strong state involvement in guiding economic development; (2) centralization of national energy policymaking and planning; (3) campaigns to link technological progress with national revitalization; (4) influence of technocratic ideology on policy decisions; (5) subordination of challenges to political authority.

  18. Gender, Power And Political Leadership In Nigeria: Problems And ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    women in their struggle for power and political leadership and analyze the problems confronting them in the present day Nigeria. The study relied basically on qualitative methodology and gathered its data from documentary sources like journals, magazines, books, newspapers and internet materials. This paper argues that ...

  19. Teacher's PAT? Multiple-Role Principal-Agent Theory, Education Politics, and Bureaucrat Power

    Science.gov (United States)

    Vanhuysse, Pieter; Sulitzeanu-Kenan, Raanan

    2009-01-01

    This article aims to contribute to current debates about political power and agency relationships in education and other public sectors. In a recent clarion call for a major redirection of political principal-agent theories (PAT), Terry Moe has argued that standard information asymmetries ought no longer to be regarded as the sole foundation of…

  20. Class and Politics in Denmark: Are Both Old and New Politics Structured by Class?

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Harrits, Gitte Sommer; Prieur, Annick; Rosenlund, Lennart

    2010-01-01

    The trend within studies of voting and political attitudes has been to give less attention to class as a structuring dimension and more to post-material values. The basic argument of this article is that this is a false opposition: The adherence to different sets of values is related to social...... background, although in complex ways, which can only be discovered with a multidimensional conception of what class is. This conception may be found in Pierre Bourdieu's analytical approach, which we here apply in an analysis of survey data from a Danish city, Aalborg. Data from a survey of political...... the constructed space of attitudes to a set of indicators based on a two-dimensional conception of social class. On the basis of this analysis the article concludes that the political landscape appears as highly structured by the two principles of social differentiation from Bourdieu’s class model: volume...

  1. Commanding Heights? The Strength of Fragility of Business Power in Global Politics

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Fuchs, D.A.

    2004-01-01

    International relations urgently needs theoretical development that takes into the account the power of non-state actors, in particular business. The present paper aims to prepare the ground for such theoretical development by analysing the political power of business along three dimensions: its

  2. The socio-political economy of nuclear power development in Japan and South Korea

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Valentine, Scott Victor [Graduate School of Public Policy, University of Tokyo, 616 Administration Bureau Building No. 2, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, 113-0033 Tokyo (Japan); Sovacool, Benjamin K. [Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore, 469C Bukit Timah Road, Singapore 259772 (Singapore)

    2010-12-15

    This paper analyzes the socio-cultural, political and economic conditions prevalent during the inception of nuclear power programs in Japan and South Korea in order to identify commonalities which support nuclear power program expansion. The study identifies six factors as having a clear influence on supporting nuclear power development: (1) strong state involvement in guiding economic development; (2) centralization of national energy policymaking and planning; (3) campaigns to link technological progress with national revitalization; (4) influence of technocratic ideology on policy decisions; (5) subordination of challenges to political authority, and (6) low levels of civic activism. The paper postulates that insights from this study can be used to assess the propensity of nations which have the emergent capacity to support nuclear power development to actually embark on such programs. (author)

  3. Networks of power in digital copyright law and policy political salience, expertise and the legislative process

    CERN Document Server

    Farrand, Benjamin

    2014-01-01

    In this book, Benjamin Farrand employs an interdisciplinary approach that combines legal analysis with political theory to explore the development of copyright law in the EU. Farrand utilises Foucault's concept of Networks of Power and Culpepper's Quiet Politics to assess the adoption and enforcement of copyright law in the EU, including the role of industry representative, cross-border licensing, and judicial approaches to territorial restrictions. Focusing in particular on legislative initiatives concerning copyright, digital music and the internet, Networks of Power in Digital Copyright Law and Policy: Political Salience, Expertise and the Legislative Process demonstrates the connection between copyright law and complex network relationships. This book presents an original socio-political theoretical framework for assessing developments in copyright law that will interest researchers and post-graduate students of law and politics, as well as those more particularly concerned with political theory, EU and c...

  4. "Soft Power", Educational Governance and Political Consensus in Brazil

    Science.gov (United States)

    Rambla, Xavier

    2012-01-01

    This article analyses the "soft power" that the Federal Government of Brazil has gained by designing and implementing a very ambitious Plan for the Development of Education. It draws on fieldwork carried out in the country in 2009 and 2010 in order to conduct a discourse analysis of the strategy deployed by the key political agents. The…

  5. Ways, characteristic features and machinery of economic and political power interaction

    OpenAIRE

    F. Shamhalov

    2008-01-01

    History of mankind has given convincing evidence for interaction and interdependence of property and power, economy and politics. Wealth, possession of some kind of material, financial or any other resources provides access to the power levers and they both provide access to the high status in society, authority and popularity. Strivings after power and richness is a driving force and motive to develop human societies. The first priority task of a state is to provide security of the property ...

  6. Power Versus Affiliation in Political Ideology: Robust Linguistic Evidence for Distinct Motivation-Related Signatures.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fetterman, Adam K; Boyd, Ryan L; Robinson, Michael D

    2015-09-01

    Posited motivational differences between liberals and conservatives have historically been controversial. This motivational interface has recently been bridged, but the vast majority of studies have used self-reports of values or motivation. Instead, the present four studies investigated whether two classic social motive themes--power and affiliation--vary by political ideology in objective linguistic analysis terms. Study 1 found that posts to liberal chat rooms scored higher in standardized affiliation than power, whereas the reverse was true of posts to conservative chat rooms. Study 2 replicated this pattern in the context of materials posted to liberal versus conservative political news websites. Studies 3 and 4, finally, replicated a similar interactive (ideology by motive type) pattern in State of the State and State of the Union addresses. Differences in political ideology, these results suggest, are marked by, and likely reflective of, mind-sets favoring affiliation (liberal) or power (conservative). © 2015 by the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc.

  7. Islamic Political Thought between Justice Value and the State Structure

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ahmed As-Sirri

    2013-06-01

    Full Text Available The paper discusses the relationship between state structure and the implementing of justice in the Islamic society. The shift from caliphate system to the system of royal system starting from the Umayyad Dynasty (41-132 AH / 661-750 AD made the issue of social justice highly urgent. The main question discussed was : Is there a relationship between state structure and achieving social justice? To answer this question the paper reviews the relationship between religious authorities and political authorities in the main periods of Islamic history. Based on these relations as well as the intellectual product known as the “Heritage of Islamic Political Thought”, we concluded that the classical structure of Islamic state didn’t assure the implementing of justice. In light of the forgoing idea we could also conclude that the political islamic thought used today in context of “Arab spring” does not support the aspirations of building a modern state that assures the implementing of justice as well as variety of social, cultural and political rights.

  8. The enemy within: Power and politics in the transition to nurse practitioner

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Lorna MacLellan

    Full Text Available Background: The period of transition from registered nurse to nurse practitioner is often challenging. While adjusting to their autonomous role, nurse practitioners need to create and define a distinct role for themselves within practice contexts that may be unfamiliar, sometimes unwelcoming and inhospitable. During this time of transition, nurses need well developed negotiation skills and personal attributes including resilience, tenacity, fortitude and determination. Purpose of the research: The purpose of the research reported in this paper was to explore the transition experiences of 10 newly endorsed nurse practitioners in Australia during their first year of practice. This paper focuses on power, control and political manoeuvring that negatively impacted the ׳nurse practitioners׳ transition. A qualitative approach using a modified version of Carspecken׳s five stage critical ethnography, informed by focused ethnography, was the methodology selected for this study. Methods included observations of practice, journaling, face to face and phone interviews which were recorded, transcribed and analysed thematically. Results: “The enemy within” emerged as a dominant theme highlighting issues of power, powerlessness and politics dominating the participant׳s experiences. Power struggles amongst nurses, both overt and covert, and the deliberate misuse of power were frequently encountered. Many of the participants felt powerless and ill-prepared to negotiate the challenging situations in which they found themselves. Many lacked the skills needed to address the negative behaviours they experienced. Conclusions: This paper reports on the experiences of 10 newly endorsed nurse practitioners during their transition to the nurse practitioner role. The impact of the political climate at the time of this study had an undeniable influence on many of the participants׳ transition experiences. Competition for the limited numbers of

  9. Power and knowledge in international environmental politics: The case of stratospheric ozone depletion

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Litfin, K.T.

    1992-01-01

    Most analyses of science in world politics suffer from the modern misreading of the relationship between knowledge and power. The availability of scientific knowledge to the relevant decision makers was a necessary condition for the negotiation of the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer, but it was far from being a sufficient one. The power of science was a function of the political context in which it was debated, a context which was defined substantially by the discovery of the Antarctic ozone 'hole.' The prominence of knowledge-based power in at least some situations means that conventional materialist notions of power should be expanded to include a more discursive and productive conception of power. Environmental problems are not merely physical events, but informational phenomena. A case study methodology is used to develop an interactive conception of power and knowledge. A detailed study of the Montreal Protocol is offered, as well as less detailed studies of the international policy processes for acid rain and global climate change

  10. Bodies rule! The embodiment of power between fashion and politics

    OpenAIRE

    Giannone, Antonella

    2015-01-01

    This article focuses on the construction of power via the body in the context of the Italian political scene of the last two decades. From a semiotic and fashion-theory perspective,the article interprets local peculiarities through the lens of more general issues concerning the way pop, mass and media culture have been transforming our relation to power, as well as to the high symbolic body of ‘the chief’. Clothing signs, fashion mechanisms and figures connected to fashion imagery have played...

  11. Family, political power and money in the Neoplatonic School of Athens

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Luc Brisson

    2017-07-01

    Full Text Available How was the Neoplatonic School of Athens able to maintain itself for more than a century at Athens, in a hostile environment, while being the target of the opposition of the Christians who were not only in the majority, but also held political power? These are the questions this text seeks to answer. Although it does not promise any earth-shaking discovery, it will try to sketch a clear and precise portrait of the Neoplatonic School of Athens on the family, political and economic level.

  12. Power Politics and the Rule of Law in Post-Dayton Bosnia

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Timothy Donais

    2013-06-01

    Full Text Available Over the past two decades, therule of law has emerged as a key priority within contemporary peacebuildingefforts. Drawing on examples from post-Dayton Bosnia, this article examines theimpact of rule of law reform efforts on broader patterns of power and politicalauthority in peacebuilding contexts. It suggests that in the case of Bosnia,the use of rule of law strategies to restructure political life has largelyfailed. Thus, despite some notable achievements on the rule of law front, thecore dynamics of Bosnia’s political conflict remain intact, and country’s peaceprocess is as fragile as ever. The article concludes by noting that charting acourse between accepting the political status quo and fundamentallytransforming it requires more nuanced approaches that advance the rule of laweven while accepting its limits as an instrument of deep politicaltransformation.

  13. Social Networks and Political Parties in Chile

    OpenAIRE

    Adler Lomnitz, Larissa

    2002-01-01

    This paper describes the origin and evolution of two Chilean political parties (the Radical Party and the Christian Democrat Party) through the analysis of the social networks that originated and composed them. The aim of this study is to propose a model of national political cultures on the basis of the structure of social networks related to power and of the symbol system, which legitimizes it. The structure of social networks, horizontal and vertical, are based on reciprocal or redistribut...

  14. State Democratic Rights as Current Political Power Limit and a New Culture for Social Promotion of Development and Sustainability

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Cátia Rejane Liczbinski Sarreta

    2015-12-01

    Full Text Available The proposed study relates to the democracy and political power considering the implementation of sustainability. Presented as theoretical basis the democratic principle itself, as well as the realization of human and fundamental rights. Exploring the possibility of re (construction of the state and own power and political and social culture of democracy through the promotion of development and sustainability. In a democratic state the appropriate political power embodies the rights of the citizen. A key element that should be considered is education for training social actors capable of promoting the transformation of dominant practices and that take important roles in politics and influence the state and society. The method used is deductive.

  15. What Structures and Mechanisms Promote Women's Political ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    The primary objective of this study was to compare the different structures and mechanisms used in South Africa and Cameroon to promote gender equality and women's empowerment in leadership position. The unit of analysis was parliament, political parties and government. A purposively sample of 120 participants, ...

  16. Religious Soft Power as Accountability Mechanism for Power in World Politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Sherrie Steiner

    2011-10-01

    Full Text Available This case study of the InterFaith Leaders’ Summit(s from 2005 to 2010 expands the concept of “soft power” as an accountability mechanism to include religious soft power. This article explores the theoretical validity of a Faith-Based Accountability Mechanism (FAM as a macro-level explanatory unit. The interfaith leaders exercise public reputational and peer accountability among their constituents in relation to the G8/G20 leaders. The theoretical validity of the dialogue process is not contingent on political leader responsiveness but is ascertained using a complex theoretical standard for assessing the legitimacy of global governance institutions against which observations are then gauged. The InterFaith Dialogue Mechanism is a specific illustration of a FAM that shows increasing compliance with the complex standard between 2005 and 2010. The Dialogue Mechanism FAM is a form of religious soft power that combines soft institution with soft technique. The next stage in the research is to identify specific characteristics of the FAM ideal type.

  17. Chiefs, chieftaincies, chiefdoms, and chiefly confederacies: power in the evolution of political systems

    OpenAIRE

    Earle, Timothy

    2011-01-01

    Chiefdom is a social category, continuous with non-stratified social groups and states. The defining process of chiefdoms is an emergent political economy that mobilized resources used to finance institutions of rule and social stratification. Chiefdoms are highly variable, but they are all about power. This article reviews concepts of chiefs, chiefdoms and chiefly confederacies, and illustrates how Polynesian chiefdoms operated prior to state formation. The chief is a political actor seeking...

  18. ISSUES OF LEGITIMIZING POLITICAL POWER IN THE FIRST HALF OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY: MAX WEBER AND KARL JASPERS

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nicolae IUGA

    2012-12-01

    Full Text Available The issue of legitimizing political power has specific dimensions determined by the historical context. In the period following the First World War, democratic regimes dramatically collapsed due to ample protest movements against the political establishment from different countries, but also as a result of a serious political legitimation crisis, thus making way for the rise of totalitarian regimes of Fascism and Nazism. That time debates on the problem of legitimization political power are symptomatic. Due to the general perception regarding corruption in politics and to the political incapacity to deal with social problems, we can witness a decrease of trust in contemporary democratic regimes.In order to exemplify, in a brief expositive manner, my paper will present the topic of political legitimation approached by Max Weber and Karl Jaspers, in a selection of relevant texts issued by both authors during 1919-1931. The aim of this paper is to highlight the actuality, the validity of Weber’s and Jasper’s statements and also their capacity to give pertinent responses to questions such as: What role do the common values play in the legitimating of power in a democratic society? Are there any kinds of limits regarding the electoral legitimation? How can we make the difference between a legitimate appeal and an illegitimate one, between civism and terrorism?

  19. Political control and perceptions of corruption in Icelandic local government

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Gunnar Helgi Kristinsson

    2015-06-01

    Full Text Available Political control is an important value of democratic governance and without it democratic accountability can hardly mean much. This is why a number of authors have seen politicization of public service appointments and greater control by the centre as a potential counterweight against trends in recent decades towards more networked and less hierarchical organizational forms of directing public policy. It may help to reassert democratic control. The option of strengthening political control, however, has not been much studied with regard to its likely effects on corruption. Power has the potential to corrupt unless adequately controlled and strengthening political power in a networked environment may create a structure of temptation which conventional deterrents to corruption are unable to curb. The impact of strong political leadership on corruption is here studied in the context of Icelandic local government, making use of institutional variations in the office of Mayor, which provide a unique opportunity for testing the effects of strong political control on corruption. The analysis indicates that municipalities with strong political mayors are likely to be associated with perceptions of corruption even when other factors, such as the structure of temptation and deterrents, are accounted for.

  20. Can NHS politics, power and conflict ever be a good thing for nurses?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lees, Carolyn

    2016-07-14

    This article explores how organisational politics, power and conflict have a positive role to play for nurses in NHS organisational change and improvement, rather than always leading to disagreement and dispute.

  1. Russian criminal political victimology: notion, object and prospects of development

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Pavel Aleksandrovich Kabanov

    2015-03-01

    Full Text Available Objective to describe and explain the structure of the modern Russian criminological political victimology as a special intersectoral criminological theory. Methods the research is based on the universal dialectic method of cognition of social reality. Results basing on the normative legal acts scientific literature and law enforcement practice the author proposes a concept of the structure of the modern Russian criminological political victimology as a special sphere of the Russian political criminology. Scientific novelty for the first time in the world victimology the author proposes a new prospective scientific direction studying the victims of political crimes and power abuses comprising several special victimological theories in its structure. Practical value the authorrsquos provisions allow to elaborate the complex system of measures for victimological rehabilitation and victimological prevention of crimes in the political sphere of social life. nbsp

  2. Local power production at the end consumer - legal, political and economical external conditions

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Grinden, Bjoern; Hunnes, Arngrim; Naesje, Paal; Wangensteen, Ivar; Morch, Andrei Z.

    2002-12-01

    The report deals with the external conditions for local power production, suggested as a production close to or at the end consumer. The political, legal and economical frame conditions for such production including rating are discussed. The report shall together with a technical report regarding appropriate technologies for such production (A5712), serve as a basis for case studies and monitors later in the project. Through the case studies it will be uncovered how the external conditions are functioning which will make foundations for recommendations concerning possible alterations in the conditions in order to make the local power production more profitable. In the discussion on the political and legal external conditions the system of today is studied. From the political area the general development is described and a short analysis is made of what to expect from case handling procedures, and some challenges are pointed out At present there is a simplified handling of cases of minor and smaller power plants. In order to obtain a more realistic construction of such plants the requirements of license handling may need sharpening. The tariffing of energy deliverance is studied. The regulations for tariffing and income regulation in the distribution network is mainly designed with the consumer and the central power production in mind. A study is made of how the regulations work, to what extent precessions and additional rules are needed and to what extent alterations in the regulations are needed in order to incorporate the local power production in a rational way. While a local power producer at best, will want a price for power which is sold at the power market of the size of 20 oere/kWh, the power will increase in value further down in the voltage level. At the 230 V level the power price will be of the size of 60 oere/kWh all expenses included and the network rent (during normal precipitation conditions). Therefore the production for own consumption will be met

  3. Fukushima: an epistemic-political mutation

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Rieu, Alain-Marc

    2016-01-01

    While considering that a catastrophe always put a society into question again, and addressing the case of Fukushima, the author first wanders how this disruptive event became a collective experience at the Japan scale and at the World scale, which in turn builds up a field of knowledge which concerns all components of the social system. Thus, he tries to define the associated epistemic mutation which can be addressed through some basic questions: what happened actually? What have we learned? If the tsunami has been the trigger, the catastrophe has been made possible by the institutional system, and is human, social, technological, industrial and political. He outlines the political role played by energy industries in Japan, and notably in all different departments and ministries. The author then examines what can or may happen when such disruptive knowledge emerges, notably for the different powers (central power, media, education and research institutions). The author considers that a virtual dislocation of the power structure can be noticed in Japan since the 1970's, and that the Fukushima catastrophe is an undesired effect of a hierarchical stacking of power and influence poles. In the next part, he addresses the political issue as the whole State apparatus is accused. Finally, the author briefly discusses the philosophical dimension

  4. Finding Political Opportunities: Civil Society, Industrial Power, and the Governance of Nanotechnology in the European Union

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Anna Lamprou

    2016-06-01

    Full Text Available The European Union encourages and institutionalizes participation by environmental, consumer, and labor organizations in the governance of nanotechnology. Interviews with leaders of the civil society organizations (CSOs show that they identified multiple problems with nanotechnology policy but had only limited success in gaining the changes that they sought. CSO leaders explain their lack of success as due to the overwhelming power of industry and the support of the European Commission for new industrial development, including nanotechnology. We analyze the perspectives of CSO leaders about their difficulties to develop the theory of the political opportunity structure in the situation of a highly scientized policy field with strong industrial monitoring. We suggest the need to extend the theory to pay more attention to the strategies that reformers can use to maneuver in and to open a relatively closed political opportunity structure. We argue that formal stakeholder engagement is not very effective and suggest instead the importance of the following: building coalitions with government actors, threatening or mobilizing grassroots mobilization, making the issue salient to the public, and pursuing the full range of institutional repertoires.

  5. Political ideology: its structure, functions, and elective affinities.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jost, John T; Federico, Christopher M; Napier, Jaime L

    2009-01-01

    Ideology has re-emerged as an important topic of inquiry among social, personality, and political psychologists. In this review, we examine recent theory and research concerning the structure, contents, and functions of ideological belief systems. We begin by defining the construct and placing it in historical and philosophical context. We then examine different perspectives on how many (and what types of) dimensions individuals use to organize their political opinions. We investigate (a) how and to what extent individuals acquire the discursive contents associated with various ideologies, and (b) the social-psychological functions that these ideologies serve for those who adopt them. Our review highlights "elective affinities" between situational and dispositional needs of individuals and groups and the structure and contents of specific ideologies. Finally, we consider the consequences of ideology, especially with respect to attitudes, evaluations, and processes of system justification.

  6. The structure of political elite networks in the Republic of Poland in 1993—2013

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Fidrya Efim

    2013-12-01

    Full Text Available To identify the structure of network ties within Polish political elites; to study the features of network ties formation and the impact that both primary and labour socialisation periods and diaspora characteristics have on this process; to describe the structural features of the resultant network structures over different periods of time and analyse the structural dynamics of political elites for the purpose of forecasting major trends in the structural transformation of Polish political elites. In the course of the study, biographical data on the presidents, ministers, advisors, and party leaders of the Republic of Poland was collected and processed. The work follows the network analysis paradigm and identifies the dynamics of the key network parameters: distance, density, transitivity, and compactness. The author analyses the dynamics of representation in the structure of political territorial diaspora elites, business community members, and ‘moral politicians’. The article identifies two periods of formation of political party networks in Poland: the first period (1993—2007 saw a transition from rather weakly integrated systems to high density and cohesion networks as early as the second electoral cycle, after which a gradual decrease in the key indices of network integration was registered. A new peak of network cohesion and integration was reached in 2007—2011; however, the death of some key members of political elites in a plane crash resulted in a decrease in the network integration indices to the level of 2001—2005. On the whole, the network structure of Polish political elite is characterised by unstable dynamics relating to the crisis events of the past. However, it is established that the elites have a pronounced diaspora core and an unstable periphery; the share of businesspeople directly participating in political processes is decreasing, whereas ‘moral politicians’ usually take an active part in the formation of

  7. 2007 Winter meeting - nuclear power in a relationship of tension between politics, society, and the economy

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Anon.

    2007-01-01

    Some 300 interested representatives of the power industry, industry at large, politics, administration, science and research met in Berlin on February 7 and 8, 2007 by invitation of the Deutsches Atomforum e.V. to exchange ideas and experience at the '2007 Winter Meeting'. This year's event was dedicated to the basic conditions underlying the use of nuclear power in Germany, Europe and worldwide. Seven contributions and statements by representatives from politics, industry, and society reflected a broad spectrum of divergent aspects and opinions about the topic of the meeting. Hans-Ulrich Joerges (stern, Berlin) chaired a discussion among Baerbel Hoehn (MP, Alliance 90/The Greens), Dr. Gerd Jaeger (RWE Power AG, Essen), Herbert Reul (MEP, energy policy spokesman of the CDU/CSU group of the European Parliament), and Prof. Dr.-Ing. Ulrich Wagner (Munich Technical University) about current and future aspects of power supply with or without nuclear energy. At the beginning of the year, the '2007 Winter Meeting' offered an interesting start of the debates accompanying this year's climate discussions, the problems associated with gas and oil deliveries from Russia, and the goal to adopt politically a sustainable energy program in the course of the year. (orig.)

  8. Towards a political ontology of state power: a comment on Colin Hay's article.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Jessop, Bob

    2014-09-01

    This article offers some critical realist, strategic-relational comments on Colin Hay's proposal to treat the state as an 'as-if-real' concept. The critique first develops an alternative account of ontology, which is more suited to analyses of the state and state power; it then distinguishes the 'intransitive' properties of the real world as an object of investigation from the 'transitive' features of its scientific investigation and thereby provides a clearer understanding of what is at stake in 'as-if-realism'; and it ends with the suggestion that a concern with the modalities of state power rather than with the state per se offers a more fruitful approach to the genuine issues raised in Hay's article and in his earlier strategic-relational contributions to political analysis. © London School of Economics and Political Science 2014.

  9. The political economy of power generation in Zimbabwe since 1980

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Soederholm, P.

    1999-01-01

    This article presents a historical analysis of the power generation choices in Zimbabwe since independence in 1980; their causes and consequences. In the early 1980s, the electricity supply choices of the country were dictated by a policy of self-sufficiency, and least-cost supply options (e.g. imports and hydropower) were rejected at a not negligible economic cost. At the end of the 1980s, a new political environment and pressures from the World Bank prompted substantial changes towards least-cost alternatives. In the early 1990s, security of supply motives still played an important role and financial constraints were severe. At present, however, there is little evidence that imported power is still as cheap a source of electricity as it was about 15 years ago. This situation together with the ongoing trend towards higher discount rates imply that thermal power, in particular coal-fired power, will dominate future electricity supply investments in Zimbabwe. (author)

  10. Generational Politics: Narratives of Power in Central Asia's Visual Culture

    OpenAIRE

    Khudonazar, Anaita

    2011-01-01

    This dissertation focuses on the visual representation of generational politics as it changed during Imperial, Soviet and Post Soviet periods. It argues that the most important shift in visual representation of power relations between generations in Central Asia took place in the late 1920s when a group of cultural producers, which this dissertation introduces as Transsoveticus, entered the Soviet art and film industries. This dissertation demonstrates ways in which these artists and filmmak...

  11. Politics of environmental regulation: acid rain in Ontario

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Hogarth Wood, G P

    1984-01-01

    This study looks at the case of the Ontario government and Inco Limited in order to explain political responses to the acid rain issue and to generalize about the dynamics of environmental regulation. Existing accounts of the acid rain situation neglect a systematic explanation of the political processes that guide the selection of policy. This reflects a tendency in Canadian public policy analysis generally. Most literature in this field is both apolitical and atheoretical. In addition, most models of public policy focus attention on a narrow range of policy determinants, making the models inappropriate as exclusive guides for public policy analysis. This study follows an approach that assumes that no variable can, a priori, be viewed as the primary determinant of a policy choice. Instead, relevant features of the economic, social, and political environment surrounding the policy process have to be examined in addition to that process itself. Accordingly, a number of potential influences on the acid rain policy outcome in Ontario are explored: the economic structure of Ontario, political-geographic factors, the role of science and technology, political power in the province, political values and attitudes, the institutional structure of Ontario politics, and finally, the policy process itself. This exercise points to the overriding influence of the political system environment, particularly the economic structure of the province, in explaining the policy choice. The findings of this study can be extended to explain regulatory responses to the issue in other political jurisdictions.

  12. Kangkilo Oral Tradition: Reflection of Sufism and Political Powers in Buton Community

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Hamiruddin Udu

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available Kangkilo oral tradition is a form of holiness ritual. The values ?? can realize Islamic ritual and social pieties. However, the pursuit of technology results to facilitate the achievement of material according to human needs has made this tradition endangered. This study aimed to analyze the discourse structure, reflection of Sufism and political powers in function and meaning, and also inheritance strategies of kangkilo in Buton community. Data were collected by using an ethnographic approach and analyzed by using qualitative methods. The results showed that the discourse structure, function, and meaning of kangkilo is unique, different from other oral traditions ever observed. The values contained some Sufism understandings and political policies of powers. From the aspect of the formula, for example, although kangkilo is qualified as a form of oral tradition, but actors of kangkilo still expected to follow the text which has been taught, can not to change the text appropriate to the circumstances that exist around kangkilo actors are, as a formula in oral tradition suggested by experts such as Albert B. Lord. This is related to the presence of kangkilo as a religious ritual. Kangkilo oral tradition is a ritual holiness in Buton influenced by Sufism understanding in MartabatTujuh. By the influence of Sufism in kangkilo, have made this holiness ritual different with the other ritual of purity which is known in the Islamic world. Kangkilo is used also as a marker for people who live in Buton as Butonese. The values in kangkilo are used as values standard for social and cultural development in Buton community. From the aspect of meaning, chastity teachings both theocentric and anthropocentric in kangkilo oral tradition values led the creation of a harmonious of life, both in man's relationship with God, between one people and other people, as well as between the rulers and the people, and between people and nature universe. Given the importance

  13. PARTICULARITIES OF PARLIAMENTARY OVERSIGHT IN DIFFERENT POLITICAL REGIMES

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Silvia-Claudia CĂLIN-MIHALCEA

    2015-07-01

    Full Text Available The quality and intensity of the parliamentary oversight performed over the Government are shaped by several major criteria: political regime, electoral system, structure of the Parliament (unicameral/bicameral, parliamentary culture and tradition. This paper emphasizes some distinctive elements and particular mechanisms of the control exercised over the activities of the executive power, from the point of view of the political regime established in states with modern democracies.

  14. Political and legal aspects of the nuclear power phaseout in Switzerland

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Buehlmann, W.

    1991-01-01

    A survey is given of the present political difficulties and related legal aspects. In Switzerland, nuclear energy abandonment was rejected several times in referendums. The fact that proponents and opponents of nuclear energy use counterbalance each other, however, has led to a factual moratorium with the following consequences: Existing nuclear power plant projects are blocked, radioactive waste disposal is delayed, the total revision of the Atomic Energy Act is deferred. The only thing which is not blocked or delayed is electric power consumption. The referendum of 23 September 1990 had the following outcome: The citizens' initiative 'Stop the construction of nuclear power plants (moratorium)' was adopted. The citizens' initiative 'for nuclear energy abandonment' was rejected. The constitutional energy law was adopted. (orig./HSCH) [de

  15. Dynamic capital structure and political patronage: the case of Malaysia

    OpenAIRE

    Ebrahim, M. Shahid; Girma, Sourafel; Shah, M. Eskandar; Williams, Jonathan

    2014-01-01

    This paper investigates the effect of political patronage on firms' capital structure. The evidence is from Malaysia, a country characterised by relationship-capitalism, and covers 1988 to 2009. Using a system GMM estimator we find firms set leverage targets and adjust towards them following deviations at the rate of 28% per annum. Next, we construct a natural experiment and use a difference-in-differences model to investigate if the strategic financing decisions of politically patronised fir...

  16. Review of Janet Holmes and Maria Stubbe: Power and Politeness in the Workplace: A Sociolinguistic Analysis of Talk at Work

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Lønsmann, Dorte

    2015-01-01

    Review of: Janet Holmes and Maria Stubbe: Power and Politeness in the Workplace. A Sociolinguistic Analysis of Talk at Work. Second edition. London: Routledge, 2015, xv + 200 pp.......Review of: Janet Holmes and Maria Stubbe: Power and Politeness in the Workplace. A Sociolinguistic Analysis of Talk at Work. Second edition. London: Routledge, 2015, xv + 200 pp....

  17. Power, Order, and the Politics of Social Policy in Central and Eastern Europe

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Vanhuysse, Pieter

    2009-01-01

    I discuss the use of power to safeguard political stability by policymakers in four post-communist cases: Hungary and Poland, and Estonia and Latvia. My treatment is in line with traditional path dependency and 'generous' or 'emergency' welfare state interpretations, but adds a more strategic...

  18. Spaghetti Politics: Local Electoral Systems and Alliance Structure in Italy, 1984-2001

    Science.gov (United States)

    Parigi, Paolo; Bearman, Peter S.

    2008-01-01

    This article describes the impact of the Italian electoral reforms of 1993 on the structure of local political alliances. The reform, which moved Italy from a purely proportional representation system to a mixed, largely majoritarian system, was designed to increase transparency, reduce corruption, limit the number of political parties, and create…

  19. Roots of political corruption in ancient history

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Deretić Nataša Lj.

    2016-01-01

    Full Text Available Corruption has always been regarded as a special form of enrichment, based on prohibited and unethical grounds. Hence 'political corruption' could be defined as the immorality of the powerful; as the use of political power for the purpose of getting rich without any legal basis. Immorality of the powerful is the root of all the abuses that occur in the society. Those who are at the top of the pyramid of power have been particularly prominent in acquiring as large a fortune as possible. The phenomenon of 'political corruption' has been known in all societies, from the oldest to modern ones. In the ancient civilization of Mesopotamia, there was an established custom of reciprocity between deliberate gifts and requested services. This phenomenon could be observed with Pericles, who is, among other things, attributed the idea of compensation for participation in state affairs. The phenomenon of 'political corruption' is referred to in Cicero's Rome, where bribery as a form of wealth acquisition without legal basis was formally condemned, but also widespread. Even today we can see that there are powerful persons who persist in the violation or circumvention of rules which guide any structured society: their wealth originates from the enormous acquisition of material things, but also the acquisition of various privileges which they are not entitled to, such as titles, promotions, etc. They are the ones who have brought about the demise of the Latin sentence that the basis of any developed society is: 'To live an honest life, hurt no one, and grant everyone their due.'.

  20. Engendering the Prefigurative: Feminist Praxes That Bridge a Politics of Prefigurement and Survival

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Cynthia S. Lin

    2016-05-01

    Full Text Available Prefigurative politics are typically understood as experiments in living, laboring or provisioning that are alternatives to ‘what is’ and prefigure ‘what could be.’ This paper rethinks prefigurative politics, which scholars have often approached by emphasizing their economic and political structures, not the transformation of social relationships and power in these experiments. Despite this scholarly trend, many collectivities organizing around a politics of survival engage in prefigurative practices. In fact, in the process of resisting domination, they are re-imagining social relationships and power. In this paper, we draw on women of color feminist theory to explore the tensions of practicing principled politics and social justice in the deeply compromised spaces of struggle for those groups that act in the radical in-between of prefigurative politics and the politics of survival. By analyzing a reproductive justice organizing project called ‘We are BRAVE’ as a case study, we re-imagine prefigurative politics through three central elements: relationality, self-determination, and intersectionality.

  1. Development of SC structure modularization in Nuclear Power Plant

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Mun, Taeyoup

    2008-01-01

    New Focus on NPP are Rising Concerns on Global Warming, Potential energy crisis (geo-political), Improved reliability and safety of nuclear power plant, Advent of Generation 3+ NPP technology and Economical Energy Resource. New NPPs are 6 units in Korea and 23 in Asia being built, 32 units being planned in China by 2020 (150 by 2050), 10 units being planned in US by 2020 and IAEA expects $200 billions on NPP construction next 25 years (up to 30% of total world energy). □ SC(Steel Plate Concrete) structure · Steel Plate is used as a Structural Element instead of Reinforcing Bars in RC · SC structure consists of Steel Plate with Headed Studs. Connected by Tie-bars - The Primary Purpose of Tie-bars is to Stiffen and Hold Together the Plates during Construction Process - Headed Studs are Welded to the Inside of Steel Plate for composite action □ Benefits of SC Structure · Shorten Construction Duration for Re bar, Forming and Scaffolding Works · Minimize Site Labors · Improve the Construction Quality · Enable Construction Sites to be kept Clean □ SC Modularization · Fit for Modular Construction for Structural Features · Fit for Modular Construction for Structural Features · Inattentively Effective for Integrated Modules · Pre-fabrication, Pre-assembly and Modularization □ Project Overview · Project Name: Development of SC structure for Modularization in NPP · Project Type: Electric Power Industry R and D (Ministry of Knowledge Economy) · Duration: Sep. 2005 ∼ Aug. 2008 (36 Months) · Research Team and Scopes - Project Management: Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power Company (KHNP) - Development of Code and Standards for SC Structure: Korea Society of Steel Construction (KSSC) Korea Electric Power Research Institute (KEPRI) - Development of SC Structural Analysis and Design: Korea Power Engineering Company (KOPEC) - Development of Construction Techniques for SC Modularization: KHNP, Korea Institute of Nuclear Safety(KINS), KOPEC □ Performance

  2. Spatial Politics in Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead

    OpenAIRE

    Elham Kazemi; Mohsen Hanif

    2017-01-01

    http://dx.doi.org/10.5007/2175-8026.2017v70n1p287 This article examines the notion of spatial politics in Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. The two courtiers enter the politically convulsive world of Hamlet, where no legitimate power structure takes hold of the state. Their regularized political rationality ceases to apply to the world; reality violates the empirical knowledge — emplacements, geographical and spiritual directions, and generally identity — of Rosencrant...

  3. Power politics: National energy strategies of the nuclear newly independent states of Armenia, Lithuania and Ukraine

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sabonis-Chafee, Theresa Marie

    The successor states of Armenia, Lithuania and Ukraine arrived at independence facing extraordinary challenges in their energy sectors. Each state was a net importer, heavily dependent on cheap energy supplies, mostly from Russia. Each state also inherited a nuclear power complex over which it had not previously exercised full control. In the time period 1991--1996, each state attempted to impose coherence on the energy sector, selecting a new course for the pieces it had inherited from a much larger, highly integrated energy structure. Each state attempted to craft national energy policies in the midst of severe supply shocks and price shocks. Each state developed institutions to govern its nuclear power sector. The states' challenges were made even greater by the fact that they had few political or economic structures necessary for energy management, and sought to create those structures at the same time. This dissertation is a systematic, non-quantitative examination of how each state's energy policies developed during the 1991--1996 time period. The theoretical premise of the analysis (drawn from Statist realism) is that systemic variables---regional climate and energy vulnerability---provide the best explanations for the resulting energy policy decisions. The dependent variable is defined as creation and reform of energy institutions. The independent variables include domestic climate, regional climate, energy vulnerability and transnational assistance. All three states adopted rhetoric and legislation declaring energy a strategic sector. The evidence suggests that two of the states, Armenia and Lithuania, which faced tense regional climates and high levels of energy vulnerability, succeeded in actually treating energy strategically, approaching energy as a matter of national security or "high politics." The third state, Ukraine, failed to do so. The evidence presented suggests that the systemic variables (regional climate and energy vulnerability) provided a

  4. Power, politics and rehabilitation in sub-Saharan Africa: from the personal to the political.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Campbell, Catherine

    2011-01-01

    This article discusses the complexities of facilitating community-based rehabilitation in resource-poor contexts in Sub-Saharan Africa. It does so through a reflection on the book Able-Bodied: Scenes from a Curious Life, written by Leslie Swartz, a South African expert on disability in the context of international development. Swartz uses his own personal experiences as son of a disabled father as a springboard for reflections on his long involvement in the often-fraught areas of disability research and activism. He pays particular attention to the way in which emotions shape the struggles around expertise and power that bedevil disability identity politics. In particular, his work highlights how the complex dynamics of race, class and disability undermine the effectiveness of the movement.

  5. Infrastructural relations: Water, political power and the rise of a new 'despotic regime'

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Veronica Strang

    2016-06-01

    Full Text Available It is 60 years since Karl Wittfogel highlighted a key relationship between political power and the ownership and control of water. Subsequent studies have suggested, commensurately, that exclusion from the ownership of essential resources represents a fundamental form of disenfranchisement – a loss of democratic involvement in societal direction. Several areas of theoretical development have illuminated these issues. Anthropologists have explored the recursive relationship between political arrangements and cosmological belief systems. Narrow legal definitions of property have been challenged through the consideration of more diverse ways of owning and controlling resources. Analyses of material culture have shown how it extends human agency, as well as having agentive capacities itself; and explorations of infrastructures have highlighted their role in composing socio-technical and political relations. Such approaches are readily applied to water and the material culture through which it is controlled and used. Drawing on historical and ethnographic research on water in Australia and the UK, this paper traces changing relationships between cosmological beliefs, infrastructure and political arrangements over time. It suggests that a current trend towards privatised, transnational water ownership potentially opens the door to the emergence of new 'despotic regimes'.

  6. A political science approach to the nuclear power debate

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Stott, M.A.

    1981-01-01

    World economic factors particularly since the OPEC oil price rises in 1973 have led governments, east and west, to invest heavily in nuclear power as a way of retaining energy and economic independence. A number of ideological and institutional factors have encouraged this development, which has nevertheless run into serious problems of a technical, economic and social nature. The result has been that large investments have been made in an energy source which is now widely acknowledged not to be the 'technical fix' that would keep the present economic system on the rails, with a resultant effect that is even more destabilising to the world economic system than the problem it was supposed to outflank. Technical and economic difficulties have combined to trigger off widespread political opposition which has used the nuclear power issue as a focus for other wider criticisms of the hierarchical, technocratic ruling elites on either side of the iron curtain. (author)

  7. Adaptation as a political process: adjusting to drought and conflict in Kenya's drylands.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Eriksen, Siri; Lind, Jeremy

    2009-05-01

    In this article, we argue that people's adjustments to multiple shocks and changes, such as conflict and drought, are intrinsically political processes that have uneven outcomes. Strengthening local adaptive capacity is a critical component of adapting to climate change. Based on fieldwork in two areas in Kenya, we investigate how people seek to access livelihood adjustment options and promote particular adaptation interests through forming social relations and political alliances to influence collective decision-making. First, we find that, in the face of drought and conflict, relations are formed among individuals, politicians, customary institutions, and government administration aimed at retaining or strengthening power bases in addition to securing material means of survival. Second, national economic and political structures and processes affect local adaptive capacity in fundamental ways, such as through the unequal allocation of resources across regions, development policy biased against pastoralism, and competition for elected political positions. Third, conflict is part and parcel of the adaptation process, not just an external factor inhibiting local adaptation strategies. Fourth, there are relative winners and losers of adaptation, but whether or not local adjustments to drought and conflict compound existing inequalities depends on power relations at multiple geographic scales that shape how conflicting interests are negotiated locally. Climate change adaptation policies are unlikely to be successful or minimize inequity unless the political dimensions of local adaptation are considered; however, existing power structures and conflicts of interests represent political obstacles to developing such policies.

  8. Spatial Politics in Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead

    OpenAIRE

    Kazemi, Elham; Hanif, Mohsen

    2017-01-01

     http://dx.doi.org/10.5007/2175-8026.2017v70n1p287This article examines the notion of spatial politics in Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. The two courtiers enter the politically convulsive world of Hamlet, where no legitimate power structure takes hold of the state. Their regularized political rationality ceases to apply to the world; reality violates the empirical knowledge — emplacements, geographical and spiritual directions, and generally identity — of Rosencrantz an...

  9. Separation Of Powers In Ghana: The Evolution Of The Political Question Doctrine

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mtendeweka Owen Mhango

    2014-12-01

    Full Text Available In some democracies judiciaries have developed the political question doctrine to jurisprudentially resolve political questions and define their relationship with other branches of government. This doctrine is a function of the principle of the separation of powers and provides that there are certain questions of constitutional law that are constitutionally committed to the elected branches of government for resolution. As a result, such questions are non-justiciable and require the judiciary to abstain from deciding them if doing so would intrude upon the functions of the elected branches of government. This article examines the evolution and current status of the political question doctrine in Ghanaian jurisprudence, which developed from American jurisprudence. It begins by briefly discussing the history of the doctrine and its modern application in America. It then discusses how this doctrine was imported into Ghana and applied by the Ghanaian judiciary. The article argues that while there are differences of opinion around the application of the political question doctrine within Ghana's judiciary, the doctrine is firmly part of Ghanaian constitutional law. The article observes that the difference of opinion among judges is over the proper application of the doctrine rather than on whether it forms part of Ghanaian constitutional law. The article also discusses a related issue of the constitutional status of Directive Principles of State Policy in chapter 6 of the Constitution of Ghana.

  10. Ingredients for Good Health Policy-Making: Incorporating Power and Politics into the Mix

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Yusra Shawar

    2014-05-01

    Full Text Available Eggs, flour, sugar, butter, baking soda, milk, and vanilla extract—all ingredients necessary to make a delicious cake. Similarly, good health policy-making can only be successfully pursued and understood by accounting for all of its basic ingredients, including the role of politics and power. Otherwise, the result is simply not good.

  11. Political legitimacy and approval of political protest and violence among children and adolescents.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Funderburk, C

    1975-06-01

    A question of general theoretical relevance for political socialization research concerns the role played by basic political orientations in structuring specific political opinions. This report investigates the relationship between beliefs in the legitimacy of political objects and approval of political protest and violence among a sample of children and adolescents. The setting for the research was a Florida town. Four aspects of political legitimacy are defined and measured. Measures of approval of political protest and political violence are distinguished conceptually and empirically. Beliefs in political legitimacy are shown to be of considerable importance in structuring opinions about political violence but have little impact on opinions about protest.

  12. Politics drives human functioning, dignity, and quality of life.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Barber, Brian K; Spellings, Carolyn; McNeely, Clea; Page, Paul D; Giacaman, Rita; Arafat, Cairo; Daher, Mahmoud; El Sarraj, Eyad; Mallouh, Mohammed Abu

    2014-12-01

    Too little is known about human functioning amidst chronic adversity. We addressed that need by studying adult Palestinians in the occupied Palestinian territories (oPt), a population that has experienced longstanding economic and political hardships. Fourteen group interviews were conducted in February, 2010 in Arabic by local fieldworkers with 68 participants representing the main stratifications of Palestinian society: gender, region, refugee status, and political affiliation. Interview tasks included each participant: describing someone doing well and not well, free listing domains of functioning, and prioritizing domains to the three most important. Thematic analyses highlighted the dominating role of the political domain of functioning (e.g., political structures, constraints, effects, identity, and activism) and the degree to which political conditions impacted all other realms of functioning (economic, education, family, psychological, etc.). The discussion links the findings to relevant theory and empirical work that has called attention to the need to include the political in frameworks of quality of life. It also emphasized that values, such as justice, rights, dignity and self-determination, that underlie political structures and policies, are key elements of human functioning. This is the case not only in the oPt, but in any society where power imbalances marginalize segments of the population. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  13. What Is Political about Bureaucratic-Collegial Decision-Making?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Childers, Marie E.

    1981-01-01

    A fundamental assumption that bureaucratic, collegial, and political models of administration are independent and distinct is challenged, and process and structure within higher education institutions are differentiated as they describe role and power relationships and lines of authority. Survey results are cited as evidence and implications are…

  14. Politics or Technocracy - What Next for Global Health? Comment on "Navigating Between Stealth Advocacy and Unconscious Dogmatism: The Challenge of Researching the Norms, Politics and Power of Global Health".

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kickbusch, Ilona

    2015-12-12

    Politics play a central part in determining health and development outcomes as Gorik Ooms highlights in his recent commentary. As health becomes more global and more politicized the need grows to better understand the inherently political processes at all levels of governance, such as ideological positions, ideas, value judgments, and power. I agree that global health research should strengthen its contribution to generating such knowledge by drawing more on political science, such research is gaining ground. Even more important is - as Ooms indicates - that global health scholars better understand their own role in the political process. It is time to acknowledge that expert-based technocratic approaches are no less political. We will need to reflect and analyse the role of experts in global health governance to a greater extent and in that context explore the links between politics, expertise and democracy. © 2016 by Kerman University of Medical Sciences.

  15. Politics, Security, Theory

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Wæver, Ole

    2011-01-01

    theory is found to ‘act politically’ through three structural features that systematically shape the political effects of using the theory. The article further discusses – on the basis of the preceding articles in the special issue – three emerging debates around securitization theory: ethics......This article outlines three ways of analysing the ‘politics of securitization’, emphasizing an often-overlooked form of politics practised through theory design. The structure and nature of a theory can have systematic political implications. Analysis of this ‘politics of securitization......’ is distinct from both the study of political practices of securitization and explorations of competing concepts of politics among security theories. It means tracking what kinds of analysis the theory can produce and whether such analysis systematically impacts real-life political struggles. Securitization...

  16. The anti-politics of health reform: household power relations and child health in rural Senegal.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Foley, Ellen E

    2009-04-01

    This article employs ethnographic evidence from rural Senegal to explore two dimensions of health sector reform. First, it makes the case that health reforms intersect with and exacerbate existing social, political, and economic inequalities. Current equity analysis draws attention to the ways that liberal and utilitarian frameworks for health reform fail to achieve distributive justice. The author's data suggest that horizontal power relations within households and small communities are equally important for understanding health disparities and the effects of health reform. Second, the article explores how liberal discourses of health reform, particularly calls for 'state-citizen partnerships' and 'responsiblization', promote depoliticised understandings of health. Discourses associated with health reform paradoxically highlight individual responsibility for health while masking the ways that individual health practice is constrained by structural inequalities.

  17. Power in Practice

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Adler-Nissen, Rebecca; Pouliot, Vincent

    2014-01-01

    , in practice, state representatives translate their skills into actual influence and generate a power politics that eschews structural analysis. We argue that seemingly trivial struggles over diplomatic competence within these three multilateral organizations played a crucial role in the intervention in Libya......How does power work in practice? Much of the “stuff” that state agents and other international actors do, on an everyday basis, remains impenetrable to existing IR theory. This is unfortunate, as the everyday performance of international practices actually helps shape world policy outcomes....... In this article we develop a framework to grasp the concrete workings of power in international politics. The notion of “emergent power” bridges two different understandings of power: as capability or relation. Emergent power refers to the generation and deployment of endogenous resources – social skills...

  18. POLITICAL AND EDUCATIONAL LOGISTICS IN STRUCTURAL ASSESSMENT OF VARIOUS STATES

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Evgeny Aleksandrovich Zhitnov

    2017-11-01

    Full Text Available The aim. The theoretical and methodological foundations of political and educational logistics and also qualimetric models that characterize the role of the educational system in the structural assessment of states will be created. The method or methodology of the paper. The research is based on educational and economic theories and concepts; this study involves a wide range of cross-disciplinary approaches including the tools of pedagogy, political science, economics, economic sociology etc. The results. The results of the work are about making an attempt to create an integral model of assessing the state development level based on a wide range of various informative data, including different indicators. The field of application. The results of the research can be used in pedagogical, economic, political practices where it is required to assess the level of state development both in a separate and integral aspects.

  19. Politics for cities, cities for the political. About possibility (and necessity of radical urban politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Wiktor Marzec

    2010-01-01

    Full Text Available Essay faces the problem of determinacy of global capitalism processes for the reality of urban political life. The city is naturally communitarian form of human life and seems to be the place where radical pro-community politics could be undertaken. Already existing and operating forms of power could fruitfully influence the city social relations. Values and norms of conduct are broadly delegated on the urban space and materiality, thus conscious shaping of city space has severe consequences for community life. If a crisis of the political partly has its roots in metamorphoses of the cities, then also remedies, rising from the urban materiality and reestablishing political subjects, could be thought. City, as most real place of political life could be either reduced to the aggregate of consumers or reestablished as a political community. Due to this is the place where undesired course of action could be stopped, hence precisely here the radical democratic politics can emerge.

  20. From welfare states to welfare sectors: Explaining sectoral differences in occupational pensions with economic and political power of employees.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wiß, Tobias

    2015-12-01

    Studies analysing welfare have previously focused on countries as units. In the course of pension cuts and the increasing importance of occupational welfare, our traditional understanding of a homogeneous welfare state is being challenged. In this article, I distinguish between both economic individual power (employee skills) and political collective power (trade unions), and their relation with different occupational pensions. A combined analysis by both factors is not common, where employee skills and power resources are traditionally treated as separate, rival explanations of public welfare. Combining the 'method of difference' with the 'method of agreement', the article first presents the within-country variety of occupational pensions in Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom and Denmark. Occupational pensions in the same economic sectors across countries are then used as the units of analysis in order to illustrate the plausible determinants of economic individual power and political collective power.

  1. Political Budget Cycles

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Aaskoven, Lasse; Lassen, David Dreyer

    2017-01-01

    The political budget cycle—how elections affect government fiscal policy—is one of the most studied subjects in political economy and political science. The key theoretical question is whether incumbent governments can time or structure public finances in ways that improve their chances of reelec......The political budget cycle—how elections affect government fiscal policy—is one of the most studied subjects in political economy and political science. The key theoretical question is whether incumbent governments can time or structure public finances in ways that improve their chances...... on political budget cycles have recently focused on conditions under which such cycles are likely to obtain. Much recent research focuses on subnational settings, allowing comparisons of governments in similar institutional environments, and a consensus on the presences of cycles in public finances...

  2. Power, Conflict and Natural Resources

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Jaime Macuane, José; Buur, Lars; Monjane, Celso Marcos

    2017-01-01

    This article explores how the present socio-economic crisis in Mozambique is linked to the prospects of natural resource windfalls for the country. Drawing on the political settlement approach, it explores how the distribution of power both within and outside the ruling elite is structured...... and consequently how the underlying political processes have been shaped by the expectations of natural resource windfalls. The article argues that the present socio-economic crisis in Mozambique is not due to national resource assets in themselves. Instead, the political and economic downturn in Mozambique should...... be understood as a manifestation of how the political settlement has been organized and rent mobilization controlled by the ruling elite. To understand how the prospect of rents from natural resource sectors have influenced the political settlement, we have argued that one has to look at the dynamics of power...

  3. Nuclear power in crisis: Politics and planning for the nuclear state

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Blowers, A.; Pepper, D.

    1987-01-01

    The Chernobyl disaster has intensified the whole debate on the nuclear power industry. There is currently great public concern about the way the industry is regulated, about the siting of nuclear facilities, including the dumping of nuclear waste, and about the alleged secretiveness of the industry. This book examines these and many other important aspects of the industry worldwide and provides much important original research. It focuses in particular on the political processes which control the industry, on waste disposal and on the social impact

  4. Catachresis in Côte d’Ivoire: Female Genital Power in Religious Ritual and Political Resistance

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Laura S. Grillo

    2013-05-01

    Full Text Available Ivoirian women vehemently protest the violence and calamity of civil war by deploying an embodied rhetoric of ritual, appealing to the traditional religious concept of “Female Genital Power”. I propose that their imagistic resistance to the postcolonial state represents a catachresis, with a few interesting twists. Most salient is that what women reinscribe onto the political scene is not as a feature of the imperial culture but the concept-metaphors of indigenous religion, and especially the image of Woman as the source of moral and spiritual power from which proceeds all political, religious, and juridical authority. Whereas the logocentrism of the academy, and postcolonial theory in particular, leads to aporia, ritual remands scholars into the situation of the actual world, where women are actively engaged in self-representation that both defies projected depictions of them and rejects their absence from state conceptions of power.

  5. The competing meanings of "biopolitics" in political science. Biological and postmodern approaches to politics.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Liesen, Laurette T; Walsh, Mary Barbara

    2012-01-01

    The term "biopolitics" carries multiple, sometimes competing, meanings in political science. When the term was first used in the United States in the late 1970s, it referred to an emerging subdiscipline that incorporated the theories and data of the life sciences into the study of political behavior and public policy. But by the mid-1990s, biopolitics was adopted by postmodernist scholars at the American Political Science Association's annual meeting who followed Foucault's work in examining the power of the state on individuals. Michel Foucault first used the term biopolitics in the 1970s to denote social and political power over life. Since then, two groups of political scientists have been using this term in very different ways. This paper examines the parallel developments of the term "biopolitics," how two subdisciplines gained (and one lost) control of the term, and what the future holds for its meaning in political science.

  6. Linking Political Systems and War Systems

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Harste, Gorm

    2009-01-01

    Decisive parts of the Western political system have demonstrated a seemingly surprising misinterpretation of military might. As Madelaine Albright has suggested, the mighty perceived themselves as "almighty". Political power seems to have invested in instrumental coercive power relations and found...... military coercion to be the appropriate mean. Using the system theory and the theory of systemic risks displayed by the German sociologist Niklas Luhmann the article demonstrates how military systems due to their own autonomy and autopoiesis do not fit into the idea of political government....... The Clausewitzian ideal of a political system that could continue its power games by means of war was moderated by Clausewitz' own analysis of "friction". How can a political system be so blind towards the possibilities of another system? What are the risks of systemic blind spots? The argument of the paper...

  7. Politics of nuclear power and fuel cycle

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Uddin, R.

    2007-01-01

    It has long been recognized by those involved in the nuclear business that because of its close relationship with 'the bomb', the technology will always be on the verge of controversy. Increasing energy demand will at the same time continue to propel nuclear to the center stage. However, no matter how strong the need for a safe, reliable, green and efficient source of energy-that can possibly be filled by nuclear-due to its large capital cost, potential user countries will not move down the nuclear path seriously without a consistent and long term global nuclear policy. NPT and its recent extension have provided such a framework for the last four decades. Recent political developments have however cast a cloud of uncertainty that will likely hinder countries interested in pursuing peaceful uses of nuclear power. It is imperative that the cloud of uncertainty be lifted expediently and a unified policy be developed that can provide the framework for future development of peaceful uses of nuclear power. Ad-hoc, country specific policies-dictated by proliferation concerns-are more likely to hurt non-proliferation than help. In this paper we will identify current status of nuclear development and its potential in various countries-developed and developing. Different scenarios for a unified global policy will be given and their chances of success will be discussed. It should be recognized that despite the global nature of the treaty and large number of signatories, NPT is essentially a tool in the hands of about twenty or so countries: the haves (five); non-signatories and 10-12 other signatory countries that linger on the boundary with potential aspiration for either nuclear power or even nuclear bomb. Number of countries that have nuclear power plants is now around 30. A second, slightly larger, set of countries that are directly affected by treaties like NPT are the ones in the nuclear supplier group. The list of countries in the third category-the potential aspirants

  8. Contemporary Political Paranoia, a Case of Political Gnosticism

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Antonio Rivera García

    2017-10-01

    Full Text Available This article puts forward the concept of political paranoia as a useful category to understand some contemporary manifestations of the pathologies of power. For this aim an interdisciplinary approach has been used, namely, the knowledge provided by psychoanalysis, political philosophy, theology and literary or aesthetic studies. Freud’s and Lacan’s psychoanalysis allows us to understand why the paranoid subject is a megalomaniac and hyperrational subject who wants to be in control of everything. It is a sovereign subject, who has adapted not only to the Society of Control initially defined by Deleuze, but also to a conception of philosophy that aims for totality. After dealing with the close relationship between paranoia and conspiratorial political theory, the article explains the reason why contemporary political paranoia represents a case of the most radical political theology: political Gnosticism. This term stands for a conception of politics that reduces the Other to the condition of an absolute enemy that needs to be eliminated. Lastly, the article establishes a close link between the cure for political paranoia and the assumption of an ontology of incompleteness

  9. Astronomy and Politics

    Science.gov (United States)

    Steele, John M.

    The relationship between astronomy and politics is a complex but important part of understanding the practice of astronomy throughout history. This chapter explores some of the ways that astronomy, astrology, and politics have interacted, placing particular focus on the way that astronomy and astrology have been used for political purposes by both people in power and people who wish to influence a ruler's policy. Also discussed are the effects that politics has had on the development of astronomy and, in particular, upon the recording and preservation of astronomical knowledge.

  10. FEATURES OF THE SOCIO-POLITICAL PROCESS IN THE UNITED STATES

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Tatyana Evgenevna Beydina

    2017-06-01

    Full Text Available The subject of this article is the study of political and social developments of the USA at the present stage. There are four stages of the American tradition of studying political processes. The first stage is connected with substantiation of the Executive, Legislative and Judicial branches of political system (works of F. Pollack and R. Sili. The second one includes behavioral studies of politics. Besides studying political processes Charles Merriam has studied their similarities and differences. The third stage is characterized by political system studies – the works of T. Parsons, D. Easton, R. Aron, G. Almond and K. Deutsch. The fourth stage is characterized by superpower and the systems democratization problem (S. Huntington, Zb. Bzhezinsky. American social processes were qualified by R. Park, P. Sorokin, E. Giddens. The work is concentrated on the divided explanation of social and political processes of the us and the reflection of unity of American social-political reality. Academic novelty is composed of substantiation of the US social-political process concept and characterization of its features. The US social-political process is characterized by two channels: soft power and aggression. Soft power appears in the US economy dominancy. The main results of the research are features of the socio-political process in the United States. Purpose: the main goal of the research is to systematize the definition of social-political process of the USA and estimate the line of its study within American political tradition. Methodology: in this article have used methods: such as system, comparison and historical analysis, structural-functional analysis. Results: during the research the analysis of the dynamics of social and political processes of the United States had been made. Practical implications it is expedient to apply the received results in the international relation theory and practice.

  11. The politics of power, pleasure and prayer in the Eurovision Song Contest

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Bolman Filip V.

    2007-01-01

    Full Text Available Since the first annual Eurovision Song Contest in 1956, politics and popularity have intersected to influence the ways in which Eurovision songs have reflected the complex forms of European nationalism. With the Eurovision victory of Marija Šerifović’s ′Molitva′ at the 52nd Eurovision in Helsinki the politics of regionalism and nationalism fully enveloped Southeastern Europe, creating the impression that old and new European alignments, from Habsburg nostalgia to an emerging Balkan brotherhood, overwhelmed the criteria that would otherwise mean that the grand prix would go to the best song. Taking Marija Šerifović’s ′Molitva′ 2007 as a point of departure, this article examines the extremely complex set of networks that intersect at the Eurovision Song Contest and the national rituals and competitions that transform the power and pleasure driving European popular song in the twenty-first century.

  12. System dynamics modeling of social/political factors in nuclear power plant operations

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hansen, K.F.; Turek, M.G.; Eubanks, C.K.

    1995-01-01

    The safety and performance of nuclear power plants are a function of many technical factors such as initial design, service and maintenance programs, and utility investment in improvements. Safety and performance are also a function of the social/political influences that affect requirements on personnel, practices and procedures, and resource availability. This paper describes a process for constructing models of the social/political influences on plant operations using the system dynamics technique. The model incorporates representation of internal utility actions and decisions as affected by external factors such as public opinion, intervenor actions, safety and economic regulation, and the financial community. The feedback between external agents and plant performance is explicitly modeled. The resulting model can be used to simulate performance under a variety of different external and internal policy choices. In particular, the model can be used to study means of improving performance in response to externally imposed regulations

  13. Features of Perception of Modern Russian Political Leaders in University Students (A Psychosemantic Research

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Sobkin V.S.

    2015-09-01

    Full Text Available The paper presents outcomes of a research on features of perception of modern Russian political leaders in young people. A technique of multidimensional semantic differential was employed: the subjects were asked to assess 15 objects (political leaders, 'my ideal', 'ideal leader', 'antipathetic person' and 'Myself' according to 33 personality traits using a seven-point scale. The outcomes suggest that the structure of the students' perception of political leaders is quite simple and is based on three modalities: 'morality', 'power' and 'intelligence'. Comparing these outcomes with the research data obtained in 2004 using the same technique allowed the authors to conclude that the students do not assess modern political leaders according to the moral qualities of the latter, but rather perceive them through the qualities of power associated with social manipulation.

  14. Development of SC structure modularization in Nuclear Power Plant

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Mun, Taeyoup [Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power Co., Ltd., Seoul (Korea, Republic of)

    2008-04-15

    New Focus on NPP are Rising Concerns on Global Warming, Potential energy crisis (geo-political), Improved reliability and safety of nuclear power plant, Advent of Generation 3+ NPP technology and Economical Energy Resource. New NPPs are 6 units in Korea and 23 in Asia being built, 32 units being planned in China by 2020 (150 by 2050), 10 units being planned in US by 2020 and IAEA expects $200 billions on NPP construction next 25 years (up to 30% of total world energy). {open_square} SC(Steel Plate Concrete) structure {center_dot} Steel Plate is used as a Structural Element instead of Reinforcing Bars in RC {center_dot} SC structure consists of Steel Plate with Headed Studs. Connected by Tie-bars - The Primary Purpose of Tie-bars is to Stiffen and Hold Together the Plates during Construction Process - Headed Studs are Welded to the Inside of Steel Plate for composite action {open_square} Benefits of SC Structure {center_dot} Shorten Construction Duration for Re bar, Forming and Scaffolding Works {center_dot} Minimize Site Labors {center_dot} Improve the Construction Quality {center_dot} Enable Construction Sites to be kept Clean {open_square} SC Modularization {center_dot} Fit for Modular Construction for Structural Features {center_dot} Fit for Modular Construction for Structural Features {center_dot} Inattentively Effective for Integrated Modules {center_dot} Pre-fabrication, Pre-assembly and Modularization {open_square} Project Overview {center_dot} Project Name: Development of SC structure for Modularization in NPP {center_dot} Project Type: Electric Power Industry R and D (Ministry of Knowledge Economy) {center_dot} Duration: Sep. 2005 {approx} Aug. 2008 (36 Months) {center_dot} Research Team and Scopes - Project Management: Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power Company (KHNP) - Development of Code and Standards for SC Structure: Korea Society of Steel Construction (KSSC) Korea Electric Power Research Institute (KEPRI) - Development of SC Structural Analysis and Design

  15. Governing Education: a revisiting of ‘Political Power beyond the State’ 25 years on

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Lim, Miguel Antonio

    2016-01-01

    that are used in classrooms, management offices, and policy setting agencies. Each of these instruments and calculative devices is pregnant with interest. They bridge the gap between everyday practices and larger governance goals. Yet as the technical sophistication of these instruments increases......This article revisits Political Power Beyond the State: Problematics of Government by sociologist Nikolas Rose and critical accounting scholar Peter Miller. The reach of this influential critique of the nature of power and its exercise ‘beyond the state’ continues to this day, 25 years after...

  16. Wind power a victim of policy and politics

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jaureguy-Naudin, M.

    2010-01-01

    -scale wind power in the EU. As wind-power penetration increases, the impact on the whole electrical system is no longer trivial. The paper is organized in three parts: - The first part discusses the value of wind power as a source for electricity generation and presents an overview of wind-power development at the European level. - The second part presents seven case studies in member states Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain and the UK. It will show the difficulty of accommodating large amounts of wind-power energy and the impact on the overall electrical system. - The last part discusses the main political and economic issues arising from the fact that wind-power development obeys national rationales rather than serving a common European objective. (author)

  17. Politics or Technocracy – What Next for Global Health?; Comment on “Navigating Between Stealth Advocacy and Unconscious Dogmatism: The Challenge of Researching the Norms, Politics and Power of Global Health”

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ilona Kickbusch

    2016-03-01

    Full Text Available Politics play a central part in determining health and development outcomes as Gorik Ooms highlights in his recent commentary. As health becomes more global and more politicized the need grows to better understand the inherently political processes at all levels of governance, such as ideological positions, ideas, value judgments, and power. I agree that global health research should strengthen its contribution to generating such knowledge by drawing more on political science, such research is gaining ground. Even more important is – as Ooms indicates – that global health scholars better understand their own role in the political process. It is time to acknowledge that expert-based technocratic approaches are no less political. We will need to reflect and analyse the role of experts in global health governance to a greater extent and in that context explore the links between politics, expertise and democracy.

  18. The Metastable City and the Politics of Crystallisation: Protesting and Policing in Kampala

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Joschka Philipps

    2016-01-01

    Full Text Available When protests break out in downtown Kampala they tend to transform a fluid urban environment into bounded political camps, and myriad ambiguous concerns into comparatively clear-cut political issues. This article traces this process and conceptualises Kampala’s urban politics as a politics of crystallisation: as attempts to structure highly fluid dynamics into something concrete. The article is based on ethnographic research amongst opposition activists and the police forces. Both seek to activate political boundaries and make people gravitate towards their respective side. But in line with the fluidity of urban everyday life, they also work and collaborate across these boundaries. The national regime and the opposition thus function not as permanent, stable structures, but as processes, as fields of gravity whose emergence is incited and inhibited, financed, and policed. Drawing on Gilbert Simondon’s theory of individuation and AbdouMaliq Simone’s work on urbanity, this analytical framework offers a dynamic reading of urban contentious politics in general, and a reinterpretation of the paradoxes of power in African politics in particular.

  19. Networks in Political Science: Back to the Future

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lazer, David

    2011-01-01

    What are the relational dimensions of politics? Does the way that people and organizations are connected to each other matter? Are our opinions affected by the people with whom we talk? Are legislators affected by lobbyists? Is the capacity of social movements to mobilize affected by the structure of societal networks? Powerful evidence in the…

  20. The political solidarity model of social change: dynamics of self-categorization in intergroup power relations.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Subasic, Emina; Reynolds, Katherine J; Turner, John C

    2008-11-01

    Social and political change involves a challenge to the status quo in intergroup power relations. Traditionally, the social psychology of social change has focused on disadvantaged minority groups collectively challenging the decisions, actions, and policies of those in positions of established authority. In contrast, this article presents a political solidarity model of social change that explores the process by which members of the majority challenge the authority in solidarity with the minority. It is argued that political solidarity as a social change process involves a contest between the authority and the minority over the meaning of a shared (higher order) identity with the majority. When identity ceases to be shared with the authority and becomes shared with the minority, majority challenge to authority in solidarity with the minority becomes possible. The model's contributions to existing social psychological approaches to social change are also discussed.

  1. Politics scenarios for climatic protection V - On the way to structural change, scenarios of greenhouse gas emissions up to the year 2030; Politikszenarien V - auf dem Weg zum Strukturwandel, Treibhausgas-Emissionsszenarien bis zum Jahr 2030

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Hansen, P.; Matthes, F.C. (eds.)

    2010-07-01

    For the project 'Politics scenarios for climate protection V' (Politics scenarios V), two scenarios for the development of greenhouse gas emissions in Germany for the period 2005 to 2030 were developed: (a) a 'With-Measure-scenario'; (b) a 'structural-change-scenario'. In the context of the scenario analyses a detailed evaluation of the respective climatic political and energy political measures is performed regarding to their effects on the development of the greenhouse gas emissions in Germany. Methane, laughing gas, halogenated hydrocarbons, perfluorinated hydrocarbons and sulphur hexafluoride are considered for the source sectors energy, industrial processes, product application, agriculture and waste management are considered. Sector-specific model analyses are used in the development of the scenarios. These model analyses are summarized to consistent and complete quantity structure for the power requirement and the emissions of greenhouse gases. Specific investigations are accomplished for the areas space heating and warm water, electrical devices, industry, trade and services, traffic, power generation from renewable energies and the fossil power generation as well as for the volatile emissions of the energy sector, process-related emissions of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxides. For other selected sources (emissions of halogenated hydrocarbons and sulphur hexafluoride as well as the agriculture) results of other investigations were taken over and processed. In the case of an integration and determination of emissions a system integration module and an emission computation model are used in order to consolidate the detailed sector results to a quantity structure. This quantity structure completely is compatible to the German greenhouse gas inventories (according to the conditions of the inventory report 2008).

  2. Plutonium, power, and politics: international arrangements for the disposition of spent nuclear fuel

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Rochlin, G.I.

    1979-01-01

    In this study, Gene Rochlin, physicist and social scientist, explores the technical, political, and institutional aspects of international nuclear export and fuel-cycle policies. He categorizes existing proposals and suggests ways to develop new ones that better promote both national and international goals. Dr. Rochlin argues neither for nor against the future use of nuclear power or plutonium fuels. Rather, he addresses the question of how international arrangements could be reached that might jointly satisfy the objectives of the several key nations, yet not be too difficult to negotiate. He concludes that a major fault has been the tendency to improvise arrangements for specific technical or industrial operations. As a result, overall social and political goals have become the bargaining points for compromise. Yet, attempts to simultaneously resolve all problems are unlikely to prove fruitful. Dr. Rochlin suggests instead the formation of institutions organized around more-limited social, political, and technical objectives - even at the expense of excluding some nations, or omitting some aspects of the nuclear fuel cycle. Only by so doing, he argues, can immediate agreements be reached that preserve the potential for more-comprehensive future arrangements without sacrificing industrial, environmental, or nonproliferation goals

  3. Partidele româneşti, între politicianism şi politică

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Bogdan Ficeac

    2011-08-01

    Full Text Available The „originality” of the Romanian transition from totalitarianism to democracy represents, in fact, the failure of this process. The power was not transferred from the hands of a leader or of a small group of discretionary leaders to the legal-rational-bureaucratic institutions, but to the large structures of new rich, which control the entire economic and political life of the country, including the political parties. The only way to cure the Romanian political life is to professionalize the politics, to provoke the politicians to live for politics not off politics. This vital goal could be reach by strictly bringing into force the EU rules and practice, especially the EU model of spending the public money.

  4. Russia and Global Climate Politics

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Tynkkynen, Nina

    2014-09-01

    Russia, as the fourth largest greenhouse-gas emitter in the world, and a major supplier of fossil fuels causing these emissions, played a decisive role in the enforcement of the Kyoto Protocol, the main instrument of global climate policy so far. Domestically, serious political measures to combat climate change have yet to be taken. Thus, Russia's performance in global climate politics indicates that goals other than genuinely environmental ones, such as political or economic benefits, are the main motivation of Russia's participation. Also, Russia's national pride and its status as a great power are at stake here. This paper scrutinizes Russia's stance in global climate politics, offering an overview of Russia's engagement in international climate politics and its domestic climate policy. In the second part of the paper, Russia's engagement in global environmental politics is discussed in the context of Russia's world status and the great-power concept. Accordingly, the paper aims to shed light on how and why Russia behaves in global climate politics in the way it does. This may be of interest to actors in international environmental politics in general, and relevant to future climate negotiations in particular. (author)

  5. Power and Politics in the Global Health Landscape: Beliefs, Competition and Negotiation Among Global Advocacy Coalitions in the Policy-Making Process

    Science.gov (United States)

    McDougall, Lori

    2016-01-01

    Background: Advocacy coalitions play an increasingly prominent role within the global health landscape, linking actors and institutions to attract political attention and resources. This paper examines how coalitions negotiate among themselves and exercise hidden forms of power to produce policy on the basis of their beliefs and strategic interests. Methods: This paper examines the beliefs and behaviours of health advocacy coalitions using Sabatier’s Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) as an informal theoretical lens. Coalitions are further explored in relation to the concept of transnational advocacy networks (Keck and Sikkink) and of productive power (Shiffman). The ACF focuses on explaining how policy change takes place when there is conflict concerning goals and technical approaches among different actors. This study uses participant observation methods, self-reported survey results and semi-structured qualitative interviews to trace how a major policy project of the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) era, the Global Strategy for Women’s and Children’s Health, was constructed through negotiations among maternal, newborn, and child health (MNCH) and sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) advocacy coalitions. Results: The Global Strategy represented a new opportunity for high-level political attention. Despite differing policy beliefs, MNCH and SRHR actors collaborated to produce this strategy because of anticipated gains in political attention. While core beliefs did not shift fundamentally and collaboration was primarily a short-term tactical response to a time-bound opportunity, MNCH actors began to focus more on human rights perspectives and SRHR actors adopted greater use of quantifiable indicators and economic argumentation. This shift emphasises the inherent importance of SRHR to maternal and child health survival. Conclusion: As opportunities arise, coalitions respond based on principles and policy beliefs, as well as to perceptions of

  6. Power and Politics in the Global Health Landscape: Beliefs, Competition and Negotiation Among Global Advocacy Coalitions in the Policy-Making Process.

    Science.gov (United States)

    McDougall, Lori

    2016-01-30

    Advocacy coalitions play an increasingly prominent role within the global health landscape, linking actors and institutions to attract political attention and resources. This paper examines how coalitions negotiate among themselves and exercise hidden forms of power to produce policy on the basis of their beliefs and strategic interests. This paper examines the beliefs and behaviours of health advocacy coalitions using Sabatier's Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) as an informal theoretical lens. Coalitions are further explored in relation to the concept of transnational advocacy networks (Keck and Sikkink) and of productive power (Shiffman). The ACF focuses on explaining how policy change takes place when there is conflict concerning goals and technical approaches among different actors. This study uses participant observation methods, self-reported survey results and semi-structured qualitative interviews to trace how a major policy project of the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) era, the Global Strategy for Women's and Children's Health, was constructed through negotiations among maternal, newborn, and child health (MNCH) and sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) advocacy coalitions. The Global Strategy represented a new opportunity for high-level political attention. Despite differing policy beliefs, MNCH and SRHR actors collaborated to produce this strategy because of anticipated gains in political attention. While core beliefs did not shift fundamentally and collaboration was primarily a short-term tactical response to a time-bound opportunity, MNCH actors began to focus more on human rights perspectives and SRHR actors adopted greater use of quantifiable indicators and economic argumentation. This shift emphasises the inherent importance of SRHR to maternal and child health survival. As opportunities arise, coalitions respond based on principles and policy beliefs, as well as to perceptions of advantage. Global health policy-making is an arena of

  7. The virtues of localism and arctic wilderness politics

    Science.gov (United States)

    James N. Gladden

    2007-01-01

    An analysis of co-managing structures and land use issues in three case studies of arctic wilderness politics shows that more formal and informal power sharing by government officials with local people results in less conflict. Greater input and control by nearby communities may also help to protect wilderness ecosystems and traditional values of northern cultures....

  8. Political and legal evolution of ukrainian sovereign bureaucracy

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    О. V. Zabrodina

    2015-02-01

    Proved that the current stage of bureaucracy management structure tour in Ukraine related to the events of late 2004 – early 2005, during which brought to power a new political team that actualized the adaptation bureaucratic structures to European standards. This process is complicated by the intense politicization bureaucratic machine manifestations of social and psychological fatigue from endless changes. This concern fatigue, apathy, aggression in the population. Being long standby time change for the better, people lost faith in the good intentions of the government and resist any changes that are even justified. In fact, at the present stage of state is chance to overcome the effects fusion authoritarian bureaucracy that leads to cultivation among officials slavish obedience, dogmatic thinking, conservatism, social apathy, a decrease in confidence in the political and ruling elite in society.

  9. [Politics and power in gerontological nursing in Brazil].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kletemberg, Denise Faucz; Padilha, Maria Itayra

    2012-10-01

    The objective of the present study was to identify the politic activities implemented by gerontological nursing in Brazil in the period spanning 1970 to 1996, which aimed at making it an effective specialty in elderly care. This descriptive-qualitative study was performed using a historical approach, using thematic oral history. Fourteen nurses, pioneers in the field, took part in the study. The following categories were identified: 1) Political organization of the field; and 2) Relationship between the field and the State. Results identified the following examples of political activities: traveling throughout Brazil, aimed at getting researchers interested in the theme; creating the Scientific Department of Gerontological Nursing; and assuming an effective participation in the creation of public policies in the country. The specialty is aware of the political relevance for its construction and has been making efforts to achieve recognition as a field of knowledge within the multidisciplinary team of elderly care.

  10. Role of the Knowledge in the Political Socialization of Adults

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Bogomir Novak

    1996-12-01

    Full Text Available The author analyses a thesis of the ambivalent structure of the knowledge and the political socialization, the school's knowledge and the political socialisation dilemma in recent circum­ stances. The adults socialize themselves in postsociali­stic transition for a new system of democracy in the independent state of Slovenia. The adults are cleaved between nostalgia for the past and neces­sity of (active adaptation in present. Our political culture has a low level because the knowledge was not consider as a value. A new democratic political culture already arises in the postsocialist countries. The knowledge, which we get through the social relationships and logical, critical thinking, has double structure: it is repetition and creativi­ty, the knowledge for power over extern, physic world and knowledge for human, psycho-social world, partialised and holistic knowledge. The adults, who are included in process of long-life education addes the Jack of school knowledge with learning of contemporary knowledge. In this way they resocialize themselves for accomplish­ ing of the complex tasks of the postsocialist socie­ty.

  11. Modernism and catholic political doctrine

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Henry T. Sardaryan

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available The article studies the perception of Modernism by the Catholic Church as a movement within the clerical structure and philosophy that existed during the 19-20th centuries in the framework of general skepticism and rejection of tradition, prioritization of individualism, formal equality, faith in inevitability of social, scientific and technological progress, rationalization and professionalization. A distinctive feature of this movement is the participation of the priests themselves, especially in France and Italy. The object of research is the Catholic political doctrine during the pontificate of Pius X. Modernist movement in Catholicism, in opinion of many scientists had a decisive impact on the reform direction during the Second Vatican Council, but on closer study of the discourse that took place in the late 19th - early 20th centuries, it becomes obvious that this is not true. The focus of the article is the political doctrine of Catholicism - the issue of state political structure, its relationship with church institutions, status of the individual in societyc. In this regard, the modernists gave priority to necessity of secularization and complete separation of secular and spiritual power. In the article different scientifical methods, ave used such as dialectical, logical, comparative, systematic. The main conclusion of the author is that modernism should be regarded as an unsuccessful attempt to reform the Catholic Church that could have lead to its another schism, rather than a route towards the Second Vatican Council. The desire to change the structure, methods of church mission, its hierarchy and a number of other formal elements – was implemented by church itself for multiple times before. However, revision of the foundations of Christian ethics and its ontology, including its political doctrine, ran into resistance of the Holy See, causing, in essence, a rhetorical question - whether scientific and technical progress should

  12. The State, Television, and Political Power in Brazil.

    Science.gov (United States)

    de Lima, Venicio A.

    1988-01-01

    Using Antonio Gramsci's theory of politics, traces the rise of the Brazilian media giant, TV Globo, and examines how its owner (Roberto Marinho) has become the key mediator between the Brazilian "ruling bloc" and the rest of the country in the construction and maintenance of cultural and political hegemony. (JK)

  13. Structural power flow measurement

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Falter, K.J.; Keltie, R.F.

    1988-12-01

    Previous investigations of structural power flow through beam-like structures resulted in some unexplained anomalies in the calculated data. In order to develop structural power flow measurement as a viable technique for machine tool design, the causes of these anomalies needed to be found. Once found, techniques for eliminating the errors could be developed. Error sources were found in the experimental apparatus itself as well as in the instrumentation. Although flexural waves are the carriers of power in the experimental apparatus, at some frequencies longitudinal waves were excited which were picked up by the accelerometers and altered power measurements. Errors were found in the phase and gain response of the sensors and amplifiers used for measurement. A transfer function correction technique was employed to compensate for these instrumentation errors.

  14. Incorporation of Islamic Institutions into Political Structure of the Golden Horde and post-Golden Horde States »

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Roman Pochekaev

    2016-01-01

    Full Text Available The article is dedicated to basic directions and mechanisms of incorporation of Islamic administrative and legal institutions into the Jochid Ulus. As this state included regions with well developed Islamic traditions, individual manifestations of influence of Islam on political and legal realities of the Golden Horde took place since the first stage of existing of this state. However, only after official conversion of the Jochid ulus to Islam during the reign of Uzbek Khan (in the 1320s Islamic political and juridical institutions became an integral part of state and legal structure of the Golden Horde. Their role substantially increased in the time of crisis of imperial state and legal system after disintegration of the Mongol Empire and then of its successors, the Chinggisid states. Influence of Islamic institutions on political and legal relations of the Golden Horde and post-Golden Horde states became apparent in different aspects. At first, it was participation of representatives of Islamic administration in executive power including tax collection: such functions of them are confirmed by yarliks of khans of the Golden Horde, as well as of the Crimean and Kazan khanates. Secondly, Islamic judges, the qadis were integrated into court system of the Golden Horde and later, within the post-Golden Horde states, they even ousted imperial judges, the jarguchis. Third, powerful representatives of Islamic clergy became participants of qurultays, where the khans were elected, and the ceremony of enthronement was supplemented by the oath of a new khan on Koran under their influence. At last, Islamic clergymen participated actively in diplomatic activity of the post-Golden Horde states and acted as mediators between rivals who pretended for the throne in the Jochid states. No doubts, the rise of influence of Islam and Islamic clergy in political and legal life of the later Golden Horde and post-Golden Horde states could be explained, from one side, by

  15. Political culture of civil society within synergetic paradigm context

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    I. Z. Derzhko

    2014-12-01

    society can be defined as a system separate and independent from the state, interpersonal, family, economic, cultural, religious, political relations and structures that are designed to provide the conditions for self-realization of individuals and groups. Priorities of civil society are in inverse points of the political process - the elections, the formation of the state, where society depend on the prospects for change; renewal of power, improve administrative efficiency of its structures. Political culture permeates the entire set of relationships that develop between political actors, the po­tential impact on the form of government, the structure of its institutions, allowing effectively regulate the relationship between the state and civil society, ensure social consensus. Political culture is a factor that can directly help or hinder democratic political development. This confirms the practice of developed democra­cies, which shows that it is a democratic political culture, is the foundation of stability and dynamic perfor­mance. Understanding the political regime as functional characteristics of the political system, including the methods and techniques of political domination, and the order of the citizen, society and political power, helps to define the connection mode of political culture and its place in it.  In a democracy, trust in government is directly determined by its ability to real dialogue with public opin­ion and its main source - the civil society. Democratic political systems require for their existence a certain type of political culture. The lack of long-term and large-scale practices of democratic institutions and pre­vent the consolidation of a democratic political culture society. The main areas of transformation of political culture are: establishment of a democratic type of political consciousness, the formation of political behavior on democratic principles, establishment of a democratic culture functioning administrative institutions

  16. We Do Not Enjoy Equal Political Rights

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Marie-Antoinette Sossou

    2011-05-01

    Full Text Available This study explores Ghanaian women’s perception and voices about issues of gender equality in terms of exercising their political and decision-making rights in connection with political participation and governance in Ghana. The study uses demographic survey and six different focus group discussions to capture the views of a total of 68 women with different educational, socioeconomical, and occupational backgrounds, in two regions of the Ghana. The findings indicate that even though theoretically the constitution of Ghana gives women equal rights as their male counterparts to actively participate in the governance of their country, in practice, women face issues of gender-based power imbalance and discrimination in addition to other structural, institutional, cultural, and traditional barriers and roadblocks. These barriers expose women as being inferior and second-class citizens compared with their male counterparts in term of participation and inclusion in the governance of their country. The study discusses the social and policy implications of the issues of gender inequality and social exclusion of women in politics and calls for empowerment and organization of women and structural change in the system.

  17. Political boundary conditions for a reliable energy supply

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Majewski, O.

    1994-01-01

    The further course of energy policy in Germany is completely uncertain, especially in the light of the elections to be held in Germany in 1994. At the very last minute, the attempt at finding a long-term energy consensus failed although the positions held by the participants from politics, industry, and other groupings had already come much closer. Against the backdrop of a profound recession and a structural crisis of industry, on the one hand, and increasingly tougher international competition, on the other hand, the parameters of energy policy contribute greatly to the success or failure of future economic development. One of the objectives of the consensus talks had been to maintain an energy mix so as to spread more widely the economic, technical, political, and ecological risks that would be encountered. In particular, a permanent perspective was to be developed for the peaceful uses of nuclear power, on the one hand, by ensuring the politically undisturbed operation of the nuclear power plants currently in operation and, on the other hand, by creating a concrete, sustainable option for the development and operation of an advanced generation of nuclear reactors. (orig.) [de

  18. Nuclear energy and politics in Russian ATWS conditions

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Gagarinski, A.

    1998-01-01

    Relations between politics and nuclear power in the countries of sustainable development has been many times discussed during the short history of nuclear energy, and regularly arising new events, even very important (in Sweden, USA, etc.), just add to the formed understanding of the problem. Russia for 10 years lives in conditions of a transition period, which seems similar to ATWS-type accidents at nuclear power plants. In these conditions the effect of politics on nuclear power and vice versa are seen very clearly, and, more important, change swiftly, which may present interest for the countries with smoother public processes. The role of political processes in nuclear power is obvious and may be reduced to three main factors: change of political system and transition to market economy have placed nuclear power, though still within state sector, in an absolutely new economic condition, which determine its today's situation as 'Survival'; new possibilities of political influence and opposition to nuclear power (mainly struggle against construction of new nuclear fuel cycle objects) on a levels of authority (local, regional, federal); impact of the USSR collapse on the situation in Russian nuclear power was due sooner to temporary weakening of control and regulatory structures, than to the fact, that some fuel cycle elements have found themselves abroad (the factor of uranium resources' loss is unimportant at present). Nuclear safety was chosen to be the subject of Moscow 1996 Summit, initiated with the purpose of Russia coming closer to G7. The Summit has confirmed the thesis on the possibility of nuclear power o play an important role in the world energy demand in accordance with sustainable development goals. successful activities of Russia-USA Commission for economic and technological cooperation, known as 'Gore-Chernomyrdin' Commission, is to a large extent determined by positive nuclear decisions. Eastern direction of Russian nuclear export (Iran, China

  19. Political Communication in Malaysia: A study on the Use of New Media in Politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Pauline Pooi Yin Leong

    2015-10-01

    Full Text Available To gain and retain political power, politicians use the media to persuade the masses to vote and support them, especially during elections. Barisan Nasional (BN has successfully used the media to maintain its power for the past 57 years, making it the longest-serving elected government in the world still currently in office. However, the emergence of the Internet has challenged the status quo. The purpose of the research was to investigate how new media has influenced the political process and communication strategies in Malaysia and its impact on the political landscape. The researcher interviewed 19 respondents: politicians, bloggers and media consultants from both sides of the political divide. The findings showed that new media, especially Web 2.0, has expanded the public sphere and enabled more Malaysians to participate in the democratic process, through information dissemination, mobilisation or crowd-sourcing. However, the cyber-war between BN and the opposition Pakatan Rakyat (PR has caused confusion and disinformation, affecting the quality of democratic decision-making. Nevertheless, new media has enabled more voices to emerge and challenge the political hegemony.

  20. The Political-administrative interface in South African municipalities: Assessing the quality of local democracies

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jaap de Visser

    2010-03-01

    Full Text Available South African municipalities experience serious challenges in dealing wit the interface between politicians and officials. Inappropriate political interference in administrative matters as well as strained relations between key political and administrative officials in the municipalities appear to be the order of the day. Oftentimes, the lack of a separation of powers between legislative and executive authority at local government level is blamed for this. This contribution has attempted to draw the attention away from the conflation of legislative and executive authority in the municipal council while still recognising it as an important background. It is suggested that, instead of spending energy on examining a possible separation of powers in local government, the relevant stakeholders (i.e. national lawmakers, municipalities and supervising provinces should consider smaller institutional changes to the governance makeup of municipalities. Even more importantly, the political and administrative leadership of municipalities and political structures that surround them should be acutely aware of the consequences that inappropriate political leadership has on the functioning of municipalities and therefore on service delivery.

  1. Spiritual Politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Frédéric Rambeau

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available According to Foucault, the uprising of the Iranian people in the seventies reveals how much the political force of Islam is due precisely to the fact that it is not principally located in the field of politics, but in that of ethics. Religion (Shiite Islam appears as the guarantee of real change in the very mode of existence. This spiritual politics is marginalized by Marxism, where it is understood as a discontinuity in relation to proper politics, given that the latter is necessarily linked to a strategic rationalization. By indicating, at this juncture of what is intolerable, the living source and the critical impulse of the Foucauldian ethics, this spiritual politics also leads to recognize in the concept of “subjectivation” a dimension that might escape the circle of freedom as determined by a total immanence to power. This conceptual possibility is highly present in the aporias of the Foucauldian concept of the “relation to oneself”, both as a first condition of governmentality and the ultimate point of resistance against any governmentality. It thus reveals the difficulties in relating political to ethical subjectivation.

  2. Power theories for multi-choice organizations and political rules: Rank-order equivalence

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Roland Pongou

    2014-03-01

    Full Text Available Voting power theories measure the ability of voters to influence the outcome of an election under a given voting rule. In general, each theory gives a different evaluation of power, raising the question of their appropriateness, and calling for the need to identify classes of rules for which different theories agree. We study the ordinal equivalence of the generalizations of the classical power concepts–the influence relation, the Banzhaf power index, and the Shapley–Shubik power index–to multi-choice organizations and political rules. Under such rules, each voter chooses a level of support for a social goal from a finite list of options, and these individual choices are aggregated to determine the collective level of support for this goal. We show that the power theories analyzed do not always yield the same power relationships among voters. Thanks to necessary and/or sufficient conditions, we identify a large class of rules for which ordinal equivalence obtains. Furthermore, we prove that ordinal equivalence obtains for all linear rules allowing a fixed number of individual approval levels if and only if that number does not exceed three. Our findings generalize all the previous results on the ordinal equivalence of the classical power theories, and show that the condition of linearity found to be necessary and sufficient for ordinal equivalence to obtain when voters have at most three options to choose from is no longer sufficient when they can choose from a list of four or more options.

  3. Comparing Political Communication

    OpenAIRE

    Pfetsch, Barbara; Esser, Frank

    2012-01-01

    This chapter describes the maturation of comparative political communications as a sub-discipline and defines its conceptual core. It then lays out the concept of “political communication system”. At the macro-level, this model captures the patterns of interaction between media and politics as social systems; at the micro-level it captures the interactions between media and political actors as individuals or organizations. Comparative research in this tradition focuses on the structure of pol...

  4. The Ghost Is the Machine: How Can We Visibilize the Unseen Norms and Power of Global Health? Comment on "Navigating Between Stealth Advocacy and Unconscious Dogmatism: The Challenge of Researching the Norms, Politics and Power of Global Health".

    Science.gov (United States)

    Forman, Lisa

    2015-12-03

    In his recent commentary, Gorik Ooms argues that "denying that researchers, like all humans, have personal opinions ... drives researchers' personal opinion underground, turning global health science into unconscious dogmatism or stealth advocacy, avoiding the crucial debate about the politics and underlying normative premises of global health." These 'unconscious' dimensions of global health are as Ooms and others suggest, rooted in its unacknowledged normative, political and power aspects. But why would these aspects be either unconscious or unacknowledged? In this commentary, I argue that the 'unconscious' and 'unacknowledged' nature of the norms, politics and power that drive global health is a direct byproduct of the processes through which power operates, and a primary mechanism by which power sustains and reinforces itself. To identify what is unconscious and unacknowledged requires more than broadening the disciplinary base of global health research to those social sciences with deep traditions of thought in the domains of power, politics and norms, albeit that doing so is a fundamental first step. I argue that it also requires individual and institutional commitments to adopt reflexive, humble and above all else, equitable practices within global health research. © 2016 by Kerman University of Medical Sciences.

  5. Environment and political power

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Giovenale, F.

    1992-01-01

    An assessment is made of what should be the desired characteristics of model national and international social-political frameworks optimized to allow the efficacious implementation of regional and global scale environmental restoration and protection strategies such as those being proposed by the United Nations and aimed at global environmentally compatible sustainable growth. Ample reference is made to the socio-economic considerations contained in Murray Bookchin's works on the ecology of freedom and the ecological society. Focus is on the international nature of the most serious environmental problems and on historical and current trends relevant to international cooperation, especially with regards to economic development and technology transfer

  6. „Bio-politics Reflexes” or something about what happens with Bio-politics today

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Viorella Manolache

    2013-04-01

    Full Text Available Under the pressure dictated by Western modernity movements, life finally enters within strategic (long term relationships circuit. The present study establishes that, bio-politics and bio-power denounces the paradigm of politicization of the biological life. Foucault’s late writings confirm the subordination of bio-politics to the technologies of power, which integrate / reduce life to biological continuity of the species, to the objectification of individual body or investigation of self-techniques, that would allow (beyond the corset of the institutional, the (re affirmation of subjectivity as a force or a form of resistance. The present reactivation of the bio model establishes that we cannot evade Foucault’s view, in which, the biology- meeting – politics confirms that, none of the terms no longer retains its original meaning.

  7. Political actors playing games: Theory and experiments

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Kamm, A.

    2015-01-01

    Political actors exert enormous influence over our daily lives. Their influence on economic activities cannot be underestimated. Voters determine the distribution of political power, political candidates choose policy platforms that they intend to enact if elected, and legislators bargain to arrive

  8. Politics and Power in Global Health: The Constituting Role of Conflicts

    Science.gov (United States)

    Askheim, Clemet; Heggen, Kristin; Engebretsen, Eivind

    2016-01-01

    In a recent article, Gorik Ooms has drawn attention to the normative underpinnings of the politics of global health. We claim that Ooms is indirectly submitting to a liberal conception of politics by framing the politics of global health as a question of individual morality. Drawing on the theoretical works of Chantal Mouffe, we introduce a conflictual concept of the political as an alternative to Ooms’ conception. Using controversies surrounding medical treatment of AIDS patients in developing countries as a case we underline the opportunity for political changes, through political articulation of an issue, and collective mobilization based on such an articulation. PMID:26927399

  9. Transnational politics and translocal governance: The politics of corporate responsibility

    OpenAIRE

    Banerjee, S. B.

    2017-01-01

    In this article, I provide a critical analysis of the politics of corporate social responsibility. I argue that corporate social responsibility is a strategy that enables multinational corporations to exercise power in the global political economy. Using the global extractive industries as a context, I focus on conflicts between communities, the state and multinational corporations that arise owing to the negative social and environmental impacts of mining and extraction. In particular, I ana...

  10. Famílias, poder e riqueza: redes políticas no Paraná em 2007 Families, power, and wealth: political networks in the state of Paraná in 2007

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ricardo Costa de Oliveira

    2007-12-01

    Full Text Available A estrutura de poder não é uma abstração, ela se materializa em situações objetivas de posse de riqueza, se reproduz e se consolida graças a redes políticas, sociais e de parentesco. As redes políticas de poder são definidas neste artigo como conexões de interesses envolvendo, basicamente, empresários e cargos políticos no aparelho de Estado, no executivo, legislativo e no judiciário e, também, em outros espaços de poder buscando assegurar vantagens e privilégios para os participantes. Além da ideologia que lhe reforça a legitimidade, as redes podem utilizar artifícios tais como o nepotismo, o clientelismo e a corrupção. O estado do Paraná é apresentado como exemplo de modernidade, de racionalidade, de adesão aos valores e às práticas de um capitalismo regido pelos princípios de impessoalidade e de eficiência. Neste artigo mostraremos que isso é um mito. Para tanto, procederemos à genealogia de famílias que detêm poder e riqueza na atualidade, mas que estão associadas aos interesses dominantes há quase 300 anos. Nomes ilustres da política e da economia compõem uma surpreendente e intricada rede de relações familiares, de parentesco e de privilegiamento que assegura a estrutura do poder nas mais diversas conjunturas econômicas e políticas.The structure of power is not an abstraction; it is materialised in objective situations of possession of wealth, and is reproduced and consolidated thanks to political, social, and kinship networks. Networks of political power are defined in this article as connections of interest which basically involve businesspeople and political offices within the apparatus of the State, in the executive, the legislature, and the judiciary, as well as the other places of power seeking to secure advantages and privileges for their members. In addition to the ideology reinforcing their legitimacy, networks may use artifices like nepotism, clientelism and corruption. The state of Paran

  11. Means of discourse manipulations in political party programs in Spain

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Irina V. Smirnova

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available Thanks to different mass media sources, members of any society are well aware of political developments and events and politicians. Every person has his or her own formed political beliefs and affirmations, interpreters other people's actions during political developments and evaluates events that take place. Political forces, in turn, see a person (a potential elector as an object of external information influence. This lets them use political communication when competing for the power. In the modern democratic society this competition is carried out via parliamentarian debates, politicians' speeches, examining political parties' programs, political agitation and voting. General audience-oriented political discourse implements its function of political information influence. As the goal of any political party's program (as an independent form of text in the system of political discourse is to win the elections and come to power, thus the audience influence function is one of the most fundamental and serve as the basis for the text. The text of a program itself is characterized by its persuasive orientation towards the audience, which reveal itself in such methods as convincing, argumentation, manipulation and evaluation. All the political programs pertain to parties which are at the power or which are in opposition. The main characteristic of oppositional programs is the criticism of the power, vice versa, the dominant party's programs confirm the correctness of their policy. All the political programs are multi-authored. The written form of any political program lets put into practice a detailed text analysis. This article presents the analysis of the texts of two leading Spanish political parties (the Spanish socialist worker's party and the people's party of Spain.

  12. Political psychology.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Stone, Susanna; Johnson, Kate M; Beall, Erica; Meindl, Peter; Smith, Benjamin; Graham, Jesse

    2014-07-01

    Political psychology is a dynamic field of research that offers a unique blend of approaches and methods in the social and cognitive sciences. Political psychologists explore the interactions between macrolevel political structures and microlevel factors such as decision-making processes, motivations, and perceptions. In this article, we provide a broad overview of the field, beginning with a brief history of political psychology research and a summary of the primary methodological approaches in the field. We then give a more detailed account of research on ideology and social justice, two topics experiencing a resurgence of interest in current political psychology. Finally, we cover research on political persuasion and voting behavior. By summarizing these major areas of political psychology research, we hope to highlight the wide variety of theoretical and methodological approaches of cognitive scientists working at the intersection of psychology and political science. WIREs Cogn Sci 2014, 5:373-385. doi: 10.1002/wcs.1293 For further resources related to this article, please visit the WIREs website. The authors have declared no conflicts of interest for this article. © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

  13. The Naturalization of Domination and Legitimate Power in Classical Political Theory

    OpenAIRE

    Eleni Varikas

    2003-01-01

    The reflection developed here deals with one of the greatest political paradoxes of modern political thought: the turning of a political community into a human artifact while basing it on premisses which are pre-political and therefore precede human action. As it reinvented the political as a free space, modernity reinvented the natural as a limit to this human freedom which religion could no longer contain. In such a context, the witch-hunt is a result both of a religious or s...

  14. The Construction of Political Authority in the Governing Councils of the Florentine Republic (1494-1502

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jean-Marc RIVIÈRE

    2011-01-01

    Full Text Available The institutional changes in November-December 1494 upset the balance of power in Florence. After several years of hard struggle between the oligarchy and the middle classes, a modus vivendi is stated, based on a separation between the places where politics is considerated and the places where it is implemented. The election of Piero Soderini to the gonfalonierato for life, November 9, 1502, formalizes this new dichotomy between the centers of power and the heart of the political authority, opening onto a structural imbalance which is a major cause of the fall of the regime in 1512.

  15. 2007 Winter meeting - opening Address: nuclear power in a relationship of tension between politics, society, and the economy

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hohlefelder, Walter

    2007-01-01

    Even more so than last year, energy policy is at the very top of the political agenda. The European Commission presented its strategy paper on 'One Energy Policy for Europe', and another energy summit will be held in Germany to pave the way for an energy concept. As far as nuclear power is concerned, the EU Commission clearly and soberly emphasized today's contribution of nuclear power in the EU and, above all, the chances of further expanding the use of nuclear power in the interest of CO 2 avoidance, security of supply, and competitiveness. This makes a reassessment of nuclear power also a matter of national interest. The repository problem can be solved in Germany, provided there is the political will to do so. The sequence of steps leading to a solution is outlined precisely in the so-called Understanding on Nuclear Power of 2001. According to a ruling by the Lueneburg higher administrative court, Konrad, the repository for low-level radioactive waste, can now be expanded and commissioned. There are no objections to the further exploration of the Gorleben salt dome as a repository for high-level radioactive waste. In the course of the energy summit, an open, unbiased discussion about the reassessment of nuclear power must be started. No facts must be created prematurely, such as shutdowns of nuclear power plants. Applications for transfers of electricity quotas for older nuclear power plants are legitimate and correct. The German Atomic Energy Act contains express provisions for this possibility. There is no way past a basic reassessment of nuclear power. It has to be conducted now. (orig.)

  16. Co-operating of citizens with power structures as an indicator of possibility application of the armed violence by public authorities

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    A. V. Bader

    2016-08-01

    A characteristic feature of a democratic political regime is that security forces operating in the public interest, they don’t take part in the political struggle, thus ensuring its stability. In democracies countries subject to government security forces and their use clearly defined by law. For legal democratic state autonomy security forces is unacceptable. In democracies the citizens do not translate function power structures. The interaction detected in participating in the formation of the staff of the security forces and control over security forces. Said control is implemented through coverage of law enforcement agencies in the independent media, NGO activities, meetings and other mechanisms of direct democracy.

  17. Power, Profits, and Politics: Energy Security and Cooperation in Eurasia

    Science.gov (United States)

    Svyatets, Ekaterina

    This study explores varying outcomes of energy cooperation, defined as diplomatic relations, bilateral trade, and investment in oil and natural gas. Tests of theories pertinent to energy security - broadly speaking, realism, liberalism, and domestic politics---reveal that they alone can offer only a narrow and one-sided explanation, not embracing the complexity of energy issues. Nevertheless, using them as a starting point, this study outlined a structured framework that incorporates three variables---economic potential, geopolitical rivalry, and domestic interest groups---that are applied to the cases of U.S.-Russia, U.S.-Azerbaijan, and Russia-Germany energy ties. This study concludes that if the economic potential (defined by geographic proximity and resource availability) is very high, such as in the case of Russia-Germany, states can overcome geopolitical rivalries and historical enmities in favor of energy cooperation. However, if the economic potential is relatively low (because of geographic obstacles or easily available alternative suppliers, as in the cases of U.S.-Russia and U.S.-Azerbaijan), then geopolitics prevails---for example, to bypass Russia or to limit American access to contracts in Russia when U.S.-Russian relations are strained. In all the cases explored here, domestic interest groups have mixed influence: if they are united along energy issues, they usually successfully achieve their energy policy goals, although the impact of these groups often becomes intertwined with state interests. In other situations, when powerful interest groups are divided or focused on non-energy-related issues (such as ethnic priorities), their influence over energy deals is much lower.

  18. Socio-political structure of Turkey in general elections (since 1950 up to 1980)

    OpenAIRE

    Ali Arslan

    2007-01-01

    This study aims to analyse socio-political structure of Turkish society at the basis of the results of Turkish General elections since 1950 up to 1980. Documentary and historical research techniques will be employed during the study.

  19. Political participation, digital democracy and e-citizenship for the protagonism of adolescents and young people

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Juan Bautista Martínez Rodríguez

    2011-08-01

    Full Text Available This article presents the political, legal and educational for the participation of adolescents and youth in public and political, for it deals with digital citizenship: how adolescents and youth policy reconstruct inhabiting public spaces. We present the e‐Participation and the production of social gaps, cultural and political under the idea that the public is no longer common. Are some suggestions from the theory of communication and power in order to identify those who have power and where to find them. It is suggested to know the mindset of teens and their modes of interpretation that structure and give meaning to the messages circulating on the networks to increase capacity to produce their own messages. The article proposes deliberative policy for media education and the use of social networks.

  20. Marketing campaigns and politics – british experience

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Halida Sarajlić

    2007-12-01

    Full Text Available By gaining political power, individuals and political par¬ties at the same time gain the power to shape not only political but also public life. An accelerated growth of mass media communication has led to the development of various means and techniques of political marketing. This in turn requires certain adjustments to political campaigns and programs, out of which only those adapted to the new communication environment may succeed. Marketing in terms of politics and especially negative comparative advertising, which is becoming increasingly more present and intense in political campaigning, opens a series of ethical questions. Among others, these include whether such advertising in politics is effective, to what extent and what its consequences are. The goal of this paper is to present the main characteristics of political marketing, the effectiveness of the methods and techniques used in the course of elect¬ion campaigning, their consequences and basic differences between political marketing and products and services marketing. A special emphasis will be placed on the presentation of political marketing of Great Britain, which has a long tradition in utilizing marketing methods and techniques in the political arena. Moreover, political moves made by politicians and political parties in Great Britain certainly make a good starting point for shaping an optimal political strategy in other countries, while at the same time taking into account the particulars of a specific political and social environment. Content analysis methodology was used in the preparation of this paper and all the data were gathered from secondary sources.

  1. Social Networks and Political Parties in Chile

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Adler Lomnitz, Larissa

    2002-09-01

    Full Text Available This paper describes the origin and evolution of two Chilean political parties (the Radical Party and the Christian Democrat Party through the analysis of the social networks that originated and composed them. The aim of this study is to propose a model of national political cultures on the basis of the structure of social networks related to power and of the symbol system, which legitimizes it. The structure of social networks, horizontal and vertical, are based on reciprocal or redistributive forms of exchange, on what is being exchanged and on the articulation between networks. In every society there are symmetrical and asymmetrical exchanges, which produce horizontal and vertical networks. These networks interact among themselves to form the social fabric. The dominance of some over others and how they combine, delineate the character of the political culture (authoritarian vs. egalitarian. Chile is a multiparty country within which there are cohorts of horizontal groups of friends, who informally exercise a central control over their members and create invisible boundaries setting them apart from others, in which leadership is under constrains. The result is both a strong presidential system based on an almost fanatic legitimacy, combined with factionalism and a strong parliamentary system.

  2. Multimodality, politics and ideology

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Machin, David; Van Leeuwen, T.

    2016-01-01

    This journal's editorial statement is clear that political discourse should be studied not only as regards parliamentary type politics. In this introduction we argue precisely for the need to pay increasing attention to the way that political ideologies are infused into culture more widely...... of power, requires meanings and identities which can hold them in place. We explain the processes by which critical multimodal discourse analysis can best draw out this ideology as it is realized through different semiotics resources. © John Benjamins Publishing Company....

  3. Political myths and totalitarianism: an anthropological analysis of their causal interrelationship.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Svilicić, Niksa; Maldini, Pero

    2014-06-01

    This paper discusses the key political, anthropological and socio-cultural functions of political myths in the appearance and functioning of totalitarian regimes. A special emphasis is put on structural elements of the myth (mythemes) and the mythic content (narratives) in the processes of artificial construction of a new society (community) based on the myth-inspired ideological postulates. The paper argues that the establishment of totalitarianism marked a certain anthropological devolution. This devolution, in turn, proceeds through the deconstruction of civil society as an organic social sphere and the artificial construction of a new political community based on ideological postulates and political myths. In support of this assertion, it is first shown how the mythical narratives--transformed into political concepts and programs--were the basis of (re)interpretation of the world, society and individual, and essentially determined the nature and functioning of the totalitarian regimes. Then, the specific political myths are analyzed and compared, as well as their content and origin, and particularly their dual function. It in turn is analyzed in the framework of the classical society-community dichotomy, where the (civil) society is founded socio-politically on the social contract, and the (political) community socio-anthropologically on political myth. In a situation of identity and legitimacy crisis, anomie and the weakening of social cohesion--the characteristic conditions of the great economic and political crisis of the early twentieth century that enabled the emergence of totalitarianism--society as a contracting community does not work. A strong need for meaning (at the individual and societal level) affects the citizens' susceptibility to (political) concepts of (re)constitution of (political) community with which they can identify. Right there, totalitarian movements use the cohesive power of the political myth that replaces the rationally based

  4. Data Science and Political Economy: Application to Financial Regulatory Structure

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Sharyn O'Halloran

    2016-11-01

    Full Text Available The development of computational data science techniques in natural language processing and machine learning algorithms to analyze large and complex textual information opens new avenues for studying the interaction between economics and politics. We apply these techniques to analyze the design of financial regulatory structure in the United States since 1950. The analysis focuses on the delegation of discretionary authority to regulatory agencies in promulgating, implementing, and enforcing financial sector laws and overseeing compliance with them. Combining traditional studies with the new machine learning approaches enables us to go beyond the limitations of both methods and offer a more precise interpretation of the determinants of financial regulatory structure.

  5. Political Communication via the Media. ERIC Digest.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Aiex, Nola Kortner; Gottlieb, Stephen S.

    Noting that critics charge that news reporting focuses on the superficial, personal characteristics of candidates and ignores the issues underlying elections, this Digest examines the relationship between the political process and political communication through the media. It addresses the power of advertising, cyberspace political communication,…

  6. political stability and tax power

    OpenAIRE

    Estrada, Fernando

    2013-01-01

    The present study is, in particular, an attempt to test the relationship between tax level and political stability by using some economic control variables and to see the relationship among government effectiveness, corruption, and GDP. For the purpose, we used the Vector Autoregression (VAR) approach in the panel framework, using a country-level panel data from 59 countries for the period 2002 to 2008. The salient features of this model are: (a) simplicity is based on a limited number of var...

  7. Socrates: Platonic Political Ideal

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Christopher P. Long

    2012-08-01

    Full Text Available This essay articulates the differences and suggests the similarities between the practices of Socratic political speaking and those of Platonic political writing. The essay delineates Socratic speaking and Platonic writing as both erotically oriented toward ideals capable of transforming the lives of individuals and their relationships with one another. Besides it shows that in the Protagoras the practices of Socratic political speaking are concerned less with Protagoras than with the individual young man, Hippocrates. In the Phaedo, this ideal of a Socrates is amplified in such a way that Platonic writing itself emerges as capable of doing with readers what Socratic speaking did with those he encountered. Socrates is the Platonic political ideal. The result is a picture of the transformative political power of Socratic speaking and Platonic writing both.

  8. The political elite recruitment in the Baltic: the role of the ethnic factor

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Smirnov Vadim

    2013-11-01

    Full Text Available The role of the ethnic factor in political processes in Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia has been rather significant since these countries’ independence. The author investigates the assumption that after the completion of major Eurointegration procedures, the ethnic factor — which became especially important in the Baltics after independence — relegated to the periphery of political life. After a period of ‘independence-induced euphoria’ faded, Lithuanian, Latvian, and Estonian power groups had to tackle the problem of civil society formation and the development of a political regime based on democratic procedures. In these countries the processes of elite recruitment were largely affected by the factor of ethic homogeneity of the social structure. This article analyses the process of elite group formation in the Baltics through the lens of the ethnic factor. By applying the ethnopolitical approach, the author concludes that the de facto barriers to non-titular population groups entering power structures, which exist in Latvia and Estonia, “freeze” the system of elite recruitment. In the conditions of increasing social unrest, it may have an adverse effect on the overall political stability in these countries. The results obtained can be used for research, educational, and practical purposes. In the field of research and education, they can be employed in further research on the transformation of the elite structure in the Baltics in view of the ethnopolitical factor, including comparative analysis of the elite re-grouping processes, as well as in developing corresponding university courses. As to the practical aspect, the results obtained can be used by the authorities of the Russian Federation in making decisions regarding interaction with the representatives of Lithuanian, Latvian, and Estonian political elites.

  9. International Monetary Power and China’s Response

    OpenAIRE

    Hongyu Lin

    2013-01-01

    International monetary power has become a new area of interest since the outbreak of the global financial crisis in 2008. The USA, the EU and China will pursue global monetary power in the future, and the USD, the EURO and the RMB will become the most important world reserve currencies. The pattern of international monetary power will shift from a unilateral-hegemony structure to a triangle-balance structure. This shift has a very strong influence on changes in the current international polit...

  10. Politics and nursing | Van Niekerk | Health SA Gesondheid

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    Politics implies the art of influencing people, and nurses have the political responsibility to influence the allocation of scarce resources. The concept of power and politics in nursing entails the reform of health issues, socio-political issues such as facilities for effective higher education in nursing, and facilities to enable ...

  11. Understanding Political Will in Groundwater Management: Comparing Yemen and Ethiopia

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Frank van Steenbergen

    2015-02-01

    Full Text Available This paper explores the role of politics in water management, in particular, comparing groundwater management in Yemen and Ethiopia. It tries to understand the precise meaning of the often-quoted term 'political will' in these different contexts and compares the autocratic and oligarchic system in Yemen with the dominant party 'developmental state' in Ethiopia. The links between these political systems and the institutional domain are described as well as the actual management of groundwater on the ground. Whereas the Ethiopian state is characterised by the use of hard power and soft ideational power, the system in Yemen relies at most on soft negotiating power. There is a strong link between the political system, the positioning of different parties and access to power, the role of central and local governments, the propensity to plan and vision, the effectiveness of government organisations, the extent of corruption, the influence of informal governance mechanisms, the scope for private initiative and the political interest in groundwater management and development in general. More important than political will per se is political capacity – the ability to implement and regulate.

  12. Value added structures and coordination structures of the decentral power generation. An actor-centered and institution-centered analyses by means of selected case examples; Wertschoepfungs- und Koordinationsstrukturen der dezentralen Stromerzeugung. Eine akteur- und institutionenzentrierte Analyse anhand ausgewaehlter Fallbeispiele

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Brocke, Tobias

    2012-07-01

    Against the background of energy policy and climate policy decisions, the decentralized power generation has gained in importance in Germany. Previous research activities on this topic mostly concerned with technical, legal, environmental and economic issues as well as potential analyses for certain forms of power generation. In contrast, the contribution under consideration deals with the organizational structures and governance structures of the decentralized power generation at local and regional level. In particular, it concerns the question to what extent the decentralized power generation results in the formation of localized production connections. In addition, it is about the importance of institutional framework as well as the role of regulatory, political and civil society actors who are affected by the distributed power generation.

  13. The power of likes: Social media logic and political communication

    OpenAIRE

    Kalsnes, Bente

    2016-01-01

    Political communication on social media is the topic of this dissertation. The Internet and social media platforms have provided participants in the public sphere with new ways to connect, communicate and distribute information. This study examines how and why the three main actor groups within political communication – political actors, media actors and citizens – connect and interact on social media during the electoral process in Norway in 2013. This hybrid media landscape is characterized...

  14. Political Culture and Covalent Bonding. A Conceptual Model of Political Culture Change

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Camelia Florela Voinea

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available Our class of models aims at explaining the dynamics of political attitude change by means of the dynamic changes in values, beliefs, norms and knowledge with which it is associated. The model constructs a political culture perspective over the relationship between macro and micro levels of a society and polity. The model defines the bonding mechanism as a basic mechanism of the political culture change by taking inspiration from the valence bonding theory in Chemistry, which has inspired the elaboration of the mechanisms and processes underlying the political culture emergence and the political culture control over the relationship between macro-level political entities and the micro-level individual agents. The model introduces operational definitions of the individual agent in political culture terms. The simulation model is used for the study of emergent political culture change phenomena based on individual interactions (emergent or upward causation as well as the ways in which the macro entities and emergent phenomena influence in turn the behaviors of individual agents (downward causation. The model is used in the ongoing research concerning the quality of democracy and political participation of the citizens in the Eastern European societies after the Fall of Berlin Wall. It is particularly aimed at explaining the long-term effect of the communist legacy and of the communist polity concept and organization onto the political mentalities and behaviors of the citizens with respect to democratic institutions and political power. The model has major implications in political socialization, political involvement, political behavior, corruption and polity modeling.

  15. Party Organizational Change: Formal Distribution of Power between National and Regional Levels in Italian Political Parties (1991-2012

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Enrico Calossi

    2015-03-01

    Full Text Available In the last 20 years an increasing number of scholars have centred their attention on the relationships between party national structures and party sub-national branches. A relevant part of the specialized literature has interpreted party change as the by-product of the denationalization of party politics. The aim of this contribution is to investigate to what extent eight relevant Italian parties have followed patterns of organizational change, after the reforms of the municipal, provincial and regional election sys-tems; and the process of devolution of administrative powers begun during the Nineties. By focusing on two analytical dimensions (the level of involvement and the level of autonomy of party regional units, we analyse diachronically continuity and change in party formal organization, through an in-depth analysis of the statutes adopted from 1992 to 2012

  16. The Political Structure at Basra Gulf in the Period of Ali b. Ebu Talib and Yezid b. Muaviye

    OpenAIRE

    Taner YILDIRIM

    2011-01-01

    At this work about the political structure of the Basra Gulf, we dwelled upon the general geography of the district and its political history. The political situation of the district in this period is assessed in a way that comprises especially the period of Hz. Ali the fourth caliph of early islamic period Muaviya, the first Emevi caliph, and his son Yazid in the light of political developments in that period. When we took up Gulf of Basra we saw that the region of the Gulf is a very importa...

  17. Fostering marginalized youths' political participation: longitudinal roles of parental political socialization and youth sociopolitical development.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Diemer, Matthew A

    2012-09-01

    This study examines the roles of parental political socialization and the moral commitment to change social inequalities in predicting marginalized youths' (defined here as lower-SES youth of color) political participation. These issues are examined by applying structural equation modeling to a longitudinal panel of youth. Because tests of measurement invariance suggested racial/ethnic heterogeneity, the structural model was fit separately for three racial/ethnic groups. For each group, parental political socialization: discussion predicted youths' commitment to produce social change and for two groups, longitudinally predicted political participation. This study contributes to the literature by examining civic/political participation among disparate racial/ethnic groups, addresses an open scholarly question (whether youths' commitment to create social change predicts their "traditional" participation), and emphasizes parents' role in fostering marginalized youths' civic and political participation.

  18. University Administration on a Political Model.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Walker, Donald E.

    1979-01-01

    It is suggested that recognizing the university as a political community may lead to better management and organization. The patriarchal role, the president as hero, dispersed power, how the university really functions, and a political model are described. (MLW)

  19. Structural health and the politics of African American masculinity.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Metzl, Jonathan M

    2013-07-01

    This commentary describes ways in which notions of African American men's "health" attained by individual choice-embedded in the notion that African American men should visit doctors or engage in fewer risky behaviors-are at times in tension with larger cultural, economic, and political notions of "health." It argues that efforts to improve the health of Black men must take structural factors into account, and failure to do so circumvents even well-intentioned efforts to improve health outcomes. Using historical examples, the article shows how attempts to identify and intervene into what are now called social determinants of health are strengthened by addressing on-the-ground diagnostic disparities and also the structural violence and racism embedded within definitions of illness and health. And, that, as such, we need to monitor structural barriers to health that exist in institutions ostensibly set up to incarcerate or contain Black men and in institutions ostensibly set up to help them.

  20. Structuring injustice: partisan politics in the making and unmaking of James Madison University's equal opportunity policy.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Robinson, Christine M; Spivey, Sue E

    2011-01-01

    This analysis contributes to LGBT campus climate research on the quality of campus life in higher education in the United States. We argue that public education institutions in different states face divergent impediments to improving campus climate, and that more research is needed identifying structural factors affecting campus climate. Using a social systems analysis of policymaking at one university as a case study, we illustrate how partisan politics and state regulation make Virginia colleges and universities more vulnerable to political scrutiny and control. Finally, we propose a social justice-oriented policy agenda to address structural inequalities.

  1. Political Corruption, Democratic Theory, and Democracy

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Doron Navot

    2014-09-01

    Full Text Available According to recent conceptual proposals, institutional corruption should be understood within the boundaries of the institution and its purpose. Political corruption in democracies, prominent scholars suggest, is characterized by the violation of institutional ideals or behaviors that tend to harm democratic processes and institutions. This paper rejects the idea that compromises, preferences, political agreements, or consent can be the baseline of conceptualization of political corruption. In order to improve the identification of abuse of power, the concept of political corruption should not be related directly to democratic institutions and processes; rather, it should be related to ideals whose content is independent of citizens’ preferences, institutions and processes. More specifically, I articulate the relations between political corruption and the notion of subjection, and include powerful citizens in the category of political corruption. Yet, I also suggest redefining under what conditions agents are culpable for their motivations in promoting private gain. By doing this, we better realize how democratic institutions can be the source of corruption and not just its victims. Such a redefinition, I propose finally, is the basis for the distinction between individual and institutional corruption.

  2. POLITICAL PARTIES AND THEIR ROLE IN SAFEGUARDING THE SUPREMACY OF THE CONSTITUTION

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Silvia-Elena, OLARU

    2014-11-01

    Full Text Available Nowadays, the political scene of the world is stirred by political parties. The separate fronts of the Government, on the one side, and Parliament, on the other, are now obsolete notions, while political parties dominate social life, having become genuine states in state. Therefore, within the contemporary organization of the powers in state, the issues are assessed from a different perspective: traditional structures are maintained, while their functions evolve and transform rapidly. A modern society without political parties is unconceivable. Today, more than ever, political parties deserve their qualification of "engines of political life" and "reasons of the aging of the classical theory of the separation of powers"; at the same time, they must act within the boundaries set by law, namely by observing the principles of a democratic state and the constitutional order. When dealing with the theory of the separation of powers in state, we must keep in mind that, to a large extent, it was developed in a time in which political parties did not exist yet or were not in their modern form. The main problems were of institutional nature and referred to the various bodies, their competencies and the relationships between them. Unfortunately, in societies in transition, where authentic democracy is still developing, political parties - in some countries - perceive governing as a means of obtaining ministerial portfolios at all costs, irrespective of whether they have professionals for the field concerned or not. This often creates a governmental crisis, which usually leads to changing the incumbents and obtaining more positions in the new government. In this context, some of the incumbent parties set up all kinds of obstacles in order to limit the number of parties, and if this limitation fails, they manage to create legal provisions which discriminate among parties with seats in Parliament and those which are not represented, both in local and

  3. The Nuclear Energy Factor In Indian Politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    A. A. Boyko

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available Nuclear energy is a key branch of the world power system. The nuclear energy development is viewed by India as one of the ways to resolve the problem of the energy supply. In 2008 the country gained more opportunities for developing nuclear power sector and solving the national power deficit problem after NSG lifted restrictions on nuclear trade. This resulted in foreign companies emerging on the Indian nuclear market. In 2011 after the major emergency at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in Japan India faced numerous anti-nuclear protests backed by NGOs, including those with foreign funding, and political parties. The article deals with the question of the political role this anti-nuclear opposition plays in India. According to some researchers the protests are organized by the competitors in order to compromise the business of a Russian company Rosatom in India. However, such demonstrations are spread throughout the country and directed against the competitors of Rosatom as well. The article comes to conclusion that the protests are just a reflection of the political fights in India where nuclear energy is a significant political factor.

  4. Women and Politics – The Glass Ceiling

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Irina Zamfirache

    2010-03-01

    Full Text Available The role of women in modern politics is a subject that needs further insight, considering the growthin number of women that nowadays have relevant political positions on the international stage.There are studies today that emphasize the equality issue and all that is gender role related, but ourinterest is to analyze the women representation in power related positions. Due to the fastmodernization of the political environment and the rapid spreading of the feminist way of thought,several authors took interest in the gender differences in politics. The article follows some keydimensions in understanding the gender-role in politics: the glass ceiling, the role of the media indrawing the image of the woman politician, the gender affinity effect. In the end we would like topoint out the differences for men and women in exploiting the opportunities and securing the positions of power.

  5. URBAN POLITICS: KEY APPROACHES

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ledyaeva Ol'ga Mikhaylovna

    2012-10-01

    Full Text Available Several approaches that underlie urban politics are discussed in the paper. They include neo-liberalism, political economy discourse, elitist/pluralist debates, and postmodernism. The neoliberal approach focuses on the limited role of the state and individual responsibility. The legal framework protects both the rights and responsibilities of individuals and regulates the operation of the market. It is the market that fosters individual choices and provides goods and services by virtue of the processes which are flexible, efficient and transparent. The political economy approaches (regulation theory, public choice theory, neo-Marxism explain urban politics via the analysis of national and international economic processes and changes in contemporary capitalism. Changes in national and international economies determine what solutions are possible. The discourse has been influenced by the debate on globalization of capital and labour markets. Modern elitism and neopluralism are represented by theories of "growth machines" and "urban regimes". The former focuses on bargaining alliances between political and business leaders in order to manage the urban system and to promote its growth. The latter develops neopluralist explanations of power within local communities with an emphasis on the fragmented nature of the government where local authorities lack comprehensive governing powers. Postmodernism views the city as the site of the crisis of late capitalism which leads to segregation of neighbourhoods onto prosperous areas and ghettoes. In contrast to the modern city, the postmodern city is not defined by its industrial base; rather, it is determined by its consumerist environment of malls and museums, characterized by revivalist architecture. At the same time, the suburban shopping mall and a motorway network make nonsense of the idea of the city as a unique and well-defined space. These and other approaches encompass a wide spectrum of possibilities

  6. Historical intersections of psychology, religion, and politics in national contexts.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kugelmann, Robert; Belzen, Jacob A

    2009-08-01

    Various types of psychology have come into existence in and have been interacting with a plurality of contexts, contexts that have been radically varying in different states or nations. One important factor in the development of psychology has been the multiple relationships to the Christian religion, whether understood as an institution, a worldview, or a form of personal spirituality. The articles in this issue focus on the intertwinements between institutional religion and national political structures and on their influence on developing forms of psychology in four different national contexts: Spain, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Within these four settings, aspects of the ways in which varying forms of Christian religion coconstituted, facilitated, and shaped psychology, theoretically, practically, and institutionally, are examined. The formative power of the religions was not independent of the relationships between religion and political power, but rather mediated by these.

  7. Political Rationality

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Solhaug, Trond; Kristensen, Niels Nørgaard

    The very idea about democracies is public participation in elections, decision-making and/or public engagement. The democratic participation distributes power among ordinary people and serve to legitimize decisions in public affairs and is a vital characteristic of a political culture.”The term...

  8. The Politics of Universalism

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Simonsen, Karen-Margrethe

    2013-01-01

    This article investigates the political function of human rights in the 16th Century in Spain just after the conquest of America. It claims that the study of this period of early globalization is relevant for the understanding of the function of human rights discourses to day, at the ‘end...... discourses is split down the middle: it serves both as a critique of power and as an extension of power, and the disclosure of this split helps us understand the inner politics of human rights. The article discusses the trial in Valladolid in 1550 when the rights of the barbarian Indians of America were put...... on trial. It focuses mainly on the arguments made by Bartolomé de las Casas and on the reasons why the King allowed las Casas’ fierce critique of the conquest to be published in a period of otherwise severe censorship. The article is inspired by Etienne Balibar’s idea of ‘politics of universalism...

  9. Politics at the interface

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Kannabiran, Gobinaath; Petersen, Marianne Graves

    2010-01-01

    At the birth of participatory design, there was a strong political consciousness surrounding the design of new technology, the design process in particular, establishing a rich set of methods and tools for user-centered design. Today, the term design has extended its scope of concern beyond...... the process of design and into how users interact with the designed product on a day-to-day basis. This paper is an attempt to call to attention the need for a new set of methods, attitudes and approaches, along with the existing, to discuss, analyze and reflect upon the politics at the interface....... By presenting a critical analysis of two design cases, we elicit the importance of such an agenda and the implications for design in doing so. We use the Foucauldian notion of power to analyze the power relationships in these two cases and to articulate the politics at the interface. We conclude by emphasizing...

  10. Nuclear power and the energy crisis. Politics and the atomic industry. [United Kingdom

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Burn, D

    1978-01-01

    An analysis is presented of the politics and economics of the decisions made during the past decade on the development and supply of nuclear power. The subject is treated under the following headings: first competitive reactor - the light water reactor (the paradox of LWR development, competitiveness accepted, the rise of costs - extent and sources, safety of the LWR, peak and collapse 1974 to 76, the LWR outside the United States); AGR to SGHWR (the course of AGR development, sources of the AGR disaster, response to failure - two governments decide, single D and C company, LWR versus SGHWR).

  11. CONSUMPTION AS A SOCIAL STATUS SYMBOL IN STRUCTURALISM

    OpenAIRE

    N. D. Naydenov; T. A. Kirosova

    2014-01-01

    The article looks at the basic theoretical concepts of the political economy of the sign (structuralism, postmodernity) and their development in the theory of power based on the work by J. Baudrillard ‘For a Critique of the Political Economy of the Sign’. The study is focused on consumption as the person’s social status symbol, it compares and contrasts basic concepts of structuralism and neo-liberalism.According to structuralism social structure is reproduced through the reproduction of obje...

  12. [Political psychology].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Resch, Mária; Bella, Tamás

    2013-04-21

    In Hungary one can mostly find references to the psychological processes of politics in the writings of publicists, public opinion pollsters, philosophers, social psychologists, and political analysts. It would be still important if not only legal scientists focusing on political institutions or sociologist-politologists concentrating on social structures could analyse the psychological aspects of political processes; but one could also do so through the application of the methods of political psychology. The authors review the history of political psychology, its position vis-à-vis other fields of science and the essential interfaces through which this field of science, which is still to be discovered in Hungary, connects to other social sciences. As far as its methodology comprising psycho-biographical analyses, questionnaire-based queries, cognitive mapping of interviews and statements are concerned, it is identical with the psychiatric tools of medical sciences. In the next part of this paper, the focus is shifted to the essence and contents of political psychology. Group dynamics properties, voters' attitudes, leaders' personalities and the behavioural patterns demonstrated by them in different political situations, authoritativeness, games, and charisma are all essential components of political psychology, which mostly analyses psychological-psychiatric processes and also involves medical sciences by relying on cognitive and behavioural sciences. This paper describes political psychology, which is basically part of social sciences, still, being an interdisciplinary science, has several ties to medical sciences through psychological and psychiatric aspects.

  13. Spatial Politics in Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Elham Kazemi

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available http://dx.doi.org/10.5007/2175-8026.2017v70n1p287 This article examines the notion of spatial politics in Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. The two courtiers enter the politically convulsive world of Hamlet, where no legitimate power structure takes hold of the state. Their regularized political rationality ceases to apply to the world; reality violates the empirical knowledge — emplacements, geographical and spiritual directions, and generally identity — of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. The previously defined functions of places, or heterotopias (in Foucauldian terms, are in a state of abeyance. Therefore, they are lost in the midst of the unknown sets of spatial relations; any sorts of intentional act evade them; and they die and vanish absurdly in a placeless place.

  14. Young Women's Political Participation in Malawi | IDRC ...

    International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

    IDRC's Democratic Governance, Women's Rights and Gender Equality initiative is ... They continue to be underrepresented in positions of power. ... social, economic, cultural and political situation of rural women in Malawi affects the political ...

  15. Shaping Political Preferences: Information Effects in Political-Administrative Systems

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Blom-Hansen, Jens; Bækgaard, Martin; Serritzlew, Søren

    2016-01-01

    shows that even in a setting where the information is not disclosed by a powerful sender, information may have a stronger impact on political preferences than other well-known determinants such as committee and party affiliation. Our findings speak to learning theories, knowledge perspectives...

  16. Lexis in Political Ideas on Twitter

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Renugah Ramanathan

    2017-10-01

    Full Text Available Ideologies in political discourse have been keen research topics as they provide various views of an issue or event. The prominent aspect of ideology is that it attempts to bridge the political activism to the social world that reflects the authenticity of political figures. This study aims to compare the ideological notions in the political tweets of Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak (henceforth, Najib and Prime Minister Narendra Modi (henceforth, Modi during the election campaigns. The discourse between both the political premiers are compared in relation to their active participation on Twitter in Asia. Data were collected over a period of 3 months during the election campaigns of both the countries which were from February to April 2013 in Malaysia and January to March 2014 in India. The study follows the qualitative research design by employing Fairclough’s three dimensional model in analyzing the lexical choices and the formation of ideas. The presence of various ideologies in the tweets portray the consensual power of the political leaders as the citizens accepts the former’s principles, ideologies and moral values. Hence, this study is significant because the study increases political awareness among citizens and provides insights on how language is employed by both leaders from different political coalition. Besides, this study produces knowledge that helps society to understand how 140 character can be a powerful tool in disseminating ideas during national elections and making election a success.

  17. The Naturalization of Domination and Legitimate Power in Classical Political Theory

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Eleni Varikas

    2003-01-01

    Full Text Available The reflection developed here deals with one of the greatest political paradoxes of modern political thought: the turning of a political community into a human artifact while basing it on premisses which are pre-political and therefore precede human action. As it reinvented the political as a free space, modernity reinvented the natural as a limit to this human freedom which religion could no longer contain. In such a context, the witch-hunt is a result both of a religious or superstitious obscurantism and of a rational enterprise based on efficacy. The political implications of cognitive polytheism, which explode in the plurality of scientific perceptions on human nature and on the nature of things, establish a close connection between the authority of modern “science” as a model for the knowledge of nature and that of a religious and temporal kind. The naturalization of the sexual hierarchy in the modern world is at the same time the archetype and the manifestation of this historical process which dislocates the legitimation of domination from the religious to the natural realm.

  18. Public sphere of politics: between classical grounds and new political actuality

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    O. A. Tretyak

    2016-10-01

    Full Text Available The public sphere of politics as a theoretical concept of modern political science has been discussed in the article. The reasons of the increasing interest to the public sphere is a dominating subject. Studied The phenomenon of the public sphere being a tool of theoretical and methodological definition of the political world’s boundaries has been studied. The value aspects of media activity in the contemporary politics has been investigated. An attempt has been made to establish the potential of political publicity for the qualitative understanding of participatory democracy. The potential of the public sphere in the development of civil society and social capital has been described. The distinction between the public sphere of politics and political communication in the specific conditions of modern transformational societies has been reasonably grounded. The importance of the presence of state power in all spheres of life of the transformational society has been stressed. Such transformation has not been stoped after the liberal market reforms, which had to ensure the existence of a formal representative democracy. The influence of the elite and expert groups being the reason of the absence of really functioning future civil society has been considered. The features of the formation of civil and social activities as a precondition for the democratic political class’ functioning have been studied. The specifics of public political activity being the prerogative of the competent entities’ political broadcasting have been analyzed. The gradual formation of cyber public sphere and its political branch segment has been revealed. Thorough attention has been given to the processes of the public sphere’s politicization which are usual for primarily authoritarian and closed societies.

  19. What do human rights bring to discussions of power and politics in health policy and systems?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Forman, Lisa

    2017-12-13

    Scholarly interrogations of power and politics are not endemic to the disciplines primarily tasked with exploring health policy and planning in the domestic or global domains. Scholars in these domains have come late to investigating power, prompted in part by the growing focus in domestic and global health research on the intersections between governance, globalization and health inequities. Recent prominent reports in this area increasingly point to human rights as important norms capable of responding in part to power differentials that sustain and exacerbate health inequities. Yet human rights law is not traditionally incorporated into health policy scholarship or education, despite offering important normative and strategic frameworks for public and global health, with distinctive contributions in relation to identifying and challenging certain forms of power disparity. This paper overviews two of these reports and how they see power functioning to sustain health inequities. It then turns to investigate what human rights and the right to health in particular may offer in addressing and challenging power in the health policy context.

  20. Life politics, nature and the state: Giddens' sociological theory and The Politics of Climate Change.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Thorpe, Charles; Jacobson, Brynna

    2013-03-01

    Anthony Giddens' The Politics of Climate Change represents a significant shift in the way in which he addresses ecological politics. In this book, he rejects the relevance of environmentalism and demarcates climate-change policy from life politics. Giddens addresses climate change in the technocratic mode of simple rather than reflexive modernization. However, Giddens' earlier sociological theory provides the basis for a more reflexive understanding of climate change. Climate change instantiates how, in high modernity, the existential contradiction of the human relationship with nature returns in new form, expressed in life politics and entangled with the structural contradictions of the capitalist state. The interlinking of existential and structural contradiction is manifested in the tension between life politics and the capitalist nation-state. This tension is key for understanding the failures so far of policy responses to climate change. © London School of Economics and Political Science 2013.

  1. China’s Political Reforms in the Early 21 Century

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nguyen Xuan Сuong

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available Analyzing process of political reforms in the People's Republic of China, the author notes that within the first 20 years of reforms and openness of China economic growth wasn't followed by development of society, political reforms didn't keep up for economic, imperfection of political system constrained economic reforms and development. Owing to this fact the XVI congress of a CPC lifted policy to the level of "political culture" by analogy with "material culture" and "spiritual culture". In the first 20 anniversary of the XXI century with the purpose to finish "comprehensive creation of society "of small prosperity" China has to create "perfect system of socialist market economy", construct "harmonious socialist society". For achievement of these purposes political reforms in China have to provide "improvement of socialist democracy" and "the socialist constitutional state". In the first years of the XXI century they brought a number of significant achievements: political stability, peaceful alternation of generations of the power, essential increase of level of political democracy. The first stage of formation of the constitutional socialist state is passed, ability and level of the management from ruling party increased; party construction amplified. But also at the beginning of the second decade of the XXI century implementation of the legislation, democracy faces many calls, especially intensification of nationalism at the beginning of the century. The Chinese dream will mobilize grandiose powers of unity that China deepened reforms and openness, solved all the political problems, helped a CPC to increase the leading and imperious power. Implementation process of "The Chinese dream" also means aspiration to tops of economy, policy, military science, technologies in the world, to a taking them, reflecting process of formation of the new great power which will succeed the USA. Political reforms with the purpose to achieve "The Chinese dream

  2. Positioning as a Part of Political Marketing

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Natalia Liutko

    2015-11-01

    Full Text Available The political subject is defined as the consumer of goods in the form of political power, political ideas, political leaders, and parties. Political marketing is understood as the identification of political relations and processes with different forms of market exchange and the process of electoral choice as a specific market (the act of purchase and sale. The concept of political positioning appeared as the result of relevant categories of commercial research in the political sphere. Political positioning should be considered as the process of political communication aimed at acquiring by political actor his position in political marketing. It is the most difficult type of political and communication strategic campaigns. This approach allows the candidate (party to compare his image with electorate’s views of desired (acceptable candidate, political party; compare his image with the image of an opponent; explore the pros and cons of alternative positions; and choose those the most advantageous position for a candidate (party.

  3. The power of advice: experts in Chinese climate change politics

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Wuebbeke, Jost

    2010-07-01

    This study examines the role of experts in Chinas climate change policy. With the beginning of the UNFCCC process, many semi-official institutes and universities emerged, dealing with the scientific, economic and political aspects of climate change. The major argument presented here is that experts are important actors in Chinese climate change politics, and that they have been underestimated in research on China. This analysis has two aims: first, applying a science, policy interface model from regime theory, it examines the political impact of various research organizations during different stages of the policy-making process. In the second step, analysis turns to the causes behind the degree of impact. These include the relevance of administrative links, the quality of knowledge, and personal ties. The results show that, in particular, semi-official institutes and certain universities can have a very high impact on political action.(auth)

  4. Political will and collaboration for electric power reform through renewable energy in Africa

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Chineke, Theo Chidiezie; Ezike, Fabian M.

    2010-01-01

    Climate change, in particular rainfall variability, affects rain-dependent agriculture in Africa. The resulting food shortages, in combination with rising population and lack of access to electricity needed for development, require the governments and people of Africa to consider renewable energy sources. One example that has high potential in Africa is solar energy. Many African governments have begun discussions about renewable energy but tangible results have yet to materialize. This research contributes to the governmental efforts by presenting the solar electricity potentials for some African cities. Using photovoltaic geographical information system (PVGIS) data, it is clear that there is enough electricity for urban and rural dwellers if there is political will and if the solar panels are mounted at the suggested optimal angles ranging from 8-34 . The solar irradiation at all sites was higher than the typical daily domestic load requirement of 2324 Wh/m 2 in urban and rural areas. We provide a strong rationale for political will, collaboration and transparent energy policies that will ensure that life is enhanced through the use of environmentally-friendly renewable energy technologies such as solar power. (author)

  5. Power system damping - Structural aspects of controlling active power

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Samuelsson, O.

    1997-04-01

    Environmental and economical aspects make it difficult to build new power lines and to reinforce existing ones. The continued growth in demand for electric power must therefore to a great extent be met by increased loading of available lines. A consequence is that power system damping is reduced, leading to a risk of poorly damped power oscillations between the generators. This thesis proposes the use of controlled active loads to increase damping of such electro-mechanical oscillations. The focus is on structural aspects of controller interaction and of sensor and actuator placement. On-off control based on machine frequency in a single machine infinite bus system is analysed using energy function analysis and phase plane plots. An on-off controller with estimated machine frequency as input has been implemented. At a field test it damped oscillations of a 0.9 MW hydro power generator by controlling a 20kW load. The linear analysis uses two power system models with three and twenty-three machines respectively. Each damper has active power as output and local bus frequency or machine frequency as input. The power system simulator EUROSTAG is used both for generation of the linearized models and for time simulations. Measures of active power mode controllability and phase angle mode observability are obtained from the eigenvectors of the differential-algebraic models. The geographical variation in the network of these quantities is illustrated using the resemblance to bending modes of flexible mechanical structures. Eigenvalue sensitivities are used to determine suitable damper locations. A spring-mass equivalent to an inter-area mode provides analytical expressions, that together with the concept of impedance matching explain the structural behaviour of the power systems. For large gains this is investigated using root locus plots. 64 refs, 99 figs, 20 tabs

  6. [What hinders the political participation of women?].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ramirez, S

    1994-06-01

    Forty years after gaining the right to vote, Colombian women comprise scarcely 8% of persons recently elected to the Colombian Congress. At the municipal and departmental level, women occupy even fewer of the positions. Explanations of women's marginal political participation in terms of stereotypes such as their presumed disinterest or emotionalism reflect androcentric prejudices. Their lack of preparation and social conditioning is also a suspect argument, given that there are no objective forms of measuring preparation for political office, such as examinations or specific requirements. Centers for women's studies have sought explanation in terms of aspects of the social and political organization of society that impede access by women to positions of power. Laws assuring women their political rights have not been sufficient to allow them to participate under equal conditions. The assignment of responsibility for domestic labor exclusively to women is a powerful handicap to their full participation. Moreover, public life has become a costly career in terms of resources, time, and energy. The problem is not that women do not participate in politics, but that they are underrepresented in the centers of power. They comprise half of voters and the majority of members of community and civic associations dealing with problems of everyday life. But the number of women declines as the scale of power increases. Feminists suggest that the problem will not be solved by women assuming the behavior patterns of men. Rather, the governmental and civil elites must overcome norms and practices that perpetuate the subordination of women. Women achieving positions of power should maintain a gender perspective and assist in transforming conditions.

  7. Socio-political structure of samsun at the bases of the results of the local elections since 1960

    OpenAIRE

    D. Ali Arslan

    2006-01-01

    This study aims to analyze socio-political structure of Samsun at the basis of the results of Turkish Local elections since 1963 up to 1984. Also, the place of Samsun in the Turkish political life will be examined, and the similarities-differences with the whole Turkish society will be discussed. Documentary and historical research techniques will be used during the study.

  8. Social-ecological systems, social diversity, and power: insights from anthropology and political ecology

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Michael Fabinyi

    2014-12-01

    Full Text Available A social-ecological system (SES framework increasingly underpins the "resilience paradigm." As with all models, the SES comes with particular biases. We explore these key biases. We critically examine how the SES resilience literature has attempted to define and analyze the social arena. We argue that much SES literature defines people's interests and livelihoods as concerned primarily with the environment, and thereby underplays the role of other motivations and social institutions. We also highlight the SES resilience literature's focus on institutions and organized social units, which misses key aspects of social diversity and power. Our key premise is the importance of inter- and multi-disciplinary perspectives. To illustrate this, we draw attention to the critique of earlier ecological anthropology that remains relevant for current conceptualizations of SESs, focusing on the concepts of social diversity and power. And we discuss insights from social anthropology and political ecology that have responded to this critique to develop different ways of incorporating social diversity and power into human-environment relations. Finally, we discuss how these social science perspectives can help improve the understanding of the "social" in SES resilience research.

  9. Technical and Political Assessment of Nuclear Power In the Middle East and North Africa

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Windsor, Lindsay K.; Kessler, Carol E.

    2007-01-01

    An exceptional number of Middle Eastern and North African nations have recently expressed interest in developing nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. Many of these countries have explored nuclear research in limited ways in the past, but the current focused interest and application of resources towards developing nuclear-generated electricity and nuclear-powered desalination plants is unprecedented. Consequently, questions arise in response to this emerging trend: What instigated this interest? To what end(s) will a nuclear program be applied? Does the country have adequate technical, political, legislative, nonproliferation, and safety infrastructure required for the capability desired? If so, what are the next steps for a country in preparation for a future nuclear program? And if not, what collaboration efforts are possible with the United States or others? This report provides information on the capabilities and interests of 13 countries in the region in nuclear energy programs in light of safety, nonproliferation and security concerns. It also provides information useful for determining potential for offering technical collaboration, financial aid, and/or political support.

  10. Interests versus morality in politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Radojčić Mirjana S.

    2002-01-01

    Full Text Available In this individual project the relationship between interests and moral in politics will be considered, taking into consideration the disintegration of former Yugoslavia and the processes of globalization. The starting thesis of the research is that the main actors of global politics are still guided by the modern principles of real-politics with interests as its basic category and power as its supreme value. In that context the main elements of external politics of USA as the key actor of the processes will be specially considered. In the concluding part of the research author will be argue in favor of the affirmation of a new model of global politics, matching the character and scope of the problems faced by humanity at the turn of the century and the millenium.

  11. Power in health care organizations: contemplations from the first-line management perspective.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Isosaari, Ulla

    2011-01-01

    The aim of this paper is to examine health care organizations' power structures from the first-line management perspective. What liable power structures derive from the theoretical bases of bureaucratic, professional and result based organizations, and what power type do health care organizations represent, according to the empirical data? The paper seeks to perform an analysis using Mintzberg's power configurations of instrument, closed system, meritocracy and political arena. The empirical study was executed at the end of 2005 through a survey in ten Finnish hospital districts in both specialized and primary care. Respondents were all first-line managers in the area and a sample of staff members from internal disease, surgical and psychiatric units, as well as out-patient and primary care units. The number of respondents was 1,197 and the response percentage was 38. The data were analyzed statistically. As a result, it can be seen that a certain kind of organization structure supports the generation of a certain power type. A bureaucratic organization generates an instrument or closed system organization, a professional organization generates meritocracy and also political arena, and a result-based organization has a connection to political arena and meritocracy. First line managers regarded health care organizations as instruments when staff regarded them mainly as meritocracies having features of political arena. Managers felt their position to be limited by rules, whereas staff members regarded their position as having lots of space and influence potential. If the organizations seek innovative and active managers at the unit level, they should change the organizational structure and redistribute the work so that there could be more space for meaningful management. This research adds to the literature and gives helpful suggestions that will be of interest to those in the position of first-line management in health care.

  12. The Doctrine of Caudillism in Spain: Political Legitimacy and Charismatic Power during Francoism

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Enrique Moradiellos García

    2016-11-01

    Full Text Available The article aims to analyze the sources of doctrinal justification of the charismatic power of General Francisco Franco as Caudillo of Spain for almost forty years. Taking into account the various political cultures of the Spanish Right, it shows the Civil War of 1936-39 as the seminal context for the new supreme and sovereign authority assumed by Franco during the conflict and preserved afterwards as a legacy of his military victory. The consequent personal cult to the Caudillo and the theoretical productions on Caudillaje leadership were adapted to changing international circumstances without any diminution of the permanent and supreme authority of Franco.

  13. Deliberative Political Leaders: The Role of Policy Input in Political Leadership

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jennifer Lees-Marshment

    2016-06-01

    Full Text Available This article provides a fresh perspective on political leadership by demonstrating that government ministers take a deliberative approach to decision making. Getting behind the closed doors of government through 51 elite interviews in the UK, US, Australia, Canada and New Zealand, the article demonstrates that modern political leadership is much more collaborative than we usually see from media and public critique. Politicians are commonly perceived to be power-hungry autocratic, elite figures who once they have won power seek to implement their vision. But as previous research has noted, not only is formal power circumscribed by the media, public opinion, and unpredictability of government, more collaborative approaches to leadership are needed given the rise of wicked problems and citizens increasingly demand more say in government decisions and policy making. This article shows that politicians are responding to their challenging environment by accepting they do not know everything and cannot do everything by themselves, and moving towards a leadership style that incorporates public input. It puts forward a new model of Deliberative Political Leadership, where politicians consider input from inside and outside government from a diverse range of sources, evaluate the relative quality of such input, and integrate it into their deliberations on the best way forward before making their final decision. This rare insight into politician’s perspectives provides a refreshing view of governmental leadership in practice and new model for future research.

  14. Political Economy of Finance

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Perotti, E.

    2013-01-01

    This survey reviews how a recent political economy literature helps explaining variation in governance, competition, funding composition and access to credit. Evolution in political institutions can account for financial evolution, and appear critical to explain rapid changes in financial structure,

  15. Peculiar politics of nuclear power

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Green, H.P.

    1982-01-01

    The struggle to regulate the atom has produced compromises that could balance competing social pressures only temporarily. Creating special authorities invited social and political reaction that would ultimately lead to their destruction, but they had to become visibly troublesome to many members of the public before they could be abolished. The same is true of the censorship policy created to protect atomic secrets. If nuclear regulation is to succeed as sound public policy, it must recognize that public policy means everyone. Greene outlines a way out of the current impasse that eliminates some of the regulatory steps allowing excessive intercession and takes steps to improve regulatory credibility

  16. Power, plutonium and politics

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Simpson, J.

    1982-01-01

    Distinctions between civil and military nuclear energy activities in the context of the Anglo-American trading relationship are described. Origins of the civil-military divide, the beginning of the nuclear power industry, and the use of British nuclear power stations for military purposes are discussed together with IAEA safeguards and US policies initiated by the Carter and Reagan administrations. (U.K.)

  17. Political Market Orientation and Strategic Party Postures in Danish Political Parties

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Ormrod, Robert P.; Henneberg, Stephan

    2011-01-01

    Purpose – This paper investigates the relationship between the strategic postures and political market orientation profile of two Danish parties. Profile stability at the organisational level is used as a control variable. Design/methodology/approach – The strategic political postures of two Danish...... are used to control for organisational stability. Findings – The self-typing study revealed that Party A was perceived to follow a Relationship Builder posture, and Party B a Convinced Ideologist posture. However, both market orientation profiles resembled the organisational structures of a Convinced...... in the political sphere. More specifically it empirically links political market orientation as an issue of political marketing implementation on the one hand, and strategic postures of parties as a strategic issue on the other, following a configuration theory logic. Research limitations...

  18. The Politics of Management Knowledge.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Clegg, Stewart R., Ed.; Palmer, Gill, Ed.

    This book recognizes the political nature of management knowledge, as a discourse produced from, and reproducing, power processes within and between organizations. Critical examinations of certain current management theories--lean production, excellence, entrepreneurship--are examples of relations of power that intermingle with relations of…

  19. Reconstructing the political : a study on contemporary Alevi politics from a generative structuralist perspective

    OpenAIRE

    Göker, Emrah

    1999-01-01

    Ankara : The Department of Political Science and Public Administration, Bilkent University, 1999. Thesis (Master's) -- Bilkent University, 1999. Includes bibliographical references. The thesis, fırstly, introduces and engages in a critica! relationship with the sociological theory (namely, generative structuralism) of Pierre Bourdieu, retbinking his understanding of politics as a "field". For this purpose, the theory of ageney within the paradigm of generative structuralism ...

  20. Connecting political economies of energy in South Africa

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Buescher, Bram

    2009-01-01

    The South African energy debate is and will remain a heated one. Given South Africa's history of racial inequality and contemporary concerns around sustainability, much of it rightly focuses on the links between energy, poverty and the environment. Yet, many contributions to the (mainstream) debate seem to have a somewhat one-sided focus that might hamper rather than stimulate the understanding of these links. They either display a strong technical, quantitative bias and/or lean towards rather simplistic ideas about policy processes and dynamics. The article argues that many of these analyses could benefit greatly from a critical focus on the political economy of energy: the political-economic power structures that influence both many energy policies and the issues of energy equality and sustainability. Two major global developments emphasise the importance of this focus: the recent financial crisis and South Africa's role in the increasingly tense geopolitics of energy in Africa. The article concludes with some suggestions on how currently disparate political economies of energy could be better connected.

  1. Connecting political economies of energy in South Africa

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Buescher, Bram [Institute of Social Studies, Kortenaerkade 12, 2518 AX The Hague (Netherlands); Department of Geography, Environmental Management and Energy Studies, University of Johannesburg (South Africa)

    2009-10-15

    The South African energy debate is and will remain a heated one. Given South Africa's history of racial inequality and contemporary concerns around sustainability, much of it rightly focuses on the links between energy, poverty and the environment. Yet, many contributions to the (mainstream) debate seem to have a somewhat one-sided focus that might hamper rather than stimulate the understanding of these links. They either display a strong technical, quantitative bias and/or lean towards rather simplistic ideas about policy processes and dynamics. The article argues that many of these analyses could benefit greatly from a critical focus on the political economy of energy: the political-economic power structures that influence both many energy policies and the issues of energy equality and sustainability. Two major global developments emphasise the importance of this focus: the recent financial crisis and South Africa's role in the increasingly tense geopolitics of energy in Africa. The article concludes with some suggestions on how currently disparate political economies of energy could be better connected. (author)

  2. TYPES OF POLITICAL REGIMES IN THE IRKUTSK REGION

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    И В Орлова

    2017-12-01

    Full Text Available The authors consider contemporary western and Russian classifications of regional political regimes and their applicability for Russia. Based on the analysis of political theories, the authors chose the traditional typology of regional political regimes focusing on the minimalist interpretation of democracy (electoral competition and methods for identifying regional scenarios introduced by V.Ya. Gelman. The authors study the case of the Irkutsk Region as a region with conflicting elites, in which in a short period several regional heads were replaced. Based on the contemporary political history, the authors analyze the regional political regime using the following criteria: democracy/autocracy, consolidation/oligo-poly, compromise/conflict relations within the ruling elite. The results of the analysis prove the existence of checks and balances in the political system of the Irkutsk Region. Such a system restrains strong politicians attempts to monopolize the political power in the region. When any political player gains too much influence, other centers of power unite against him and together return the situation to the status quo. The political regime of the Irkutsk Region ensures a relatively high level of political competition, at the same time it is a part of the uncompetitive political regime of the Russian Federation, therefore it is a ‘hybrid democracy’. The authors’ analysis of intra-elite relations in the region revealed a high predisposition to conflicts with the dominant scenario of ‘war of all against all’.

  3. Playing politics with nuclear is all part of the game

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Shepherd, John [nuclear 24, St George' s Redditch (United Kingdom)

    2018-02-15

    If a week is a long time in politics - a statement attributed to former British prime minister Harold Wilson - then what about a month, or several months - a period relevant for the use of nuclear power? The nuclear industry has long accepted that it can be used as a political football, to be kicked into goal or off the pitch completely depending on the situation at hand. Our industry therefore has power in the political sense too, but with power comes responsibility - nuclear leaders know that only too well and now is as good as time as ever to lead by example.

  4. Playing politics with nuclear is all part of the game

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Shepherd, John

    2018-01-01

    If a week is a long time in politics - a statement attributed to former British prime minister Harold Wilson - then what about a month, or several months - a period relevant for the use of nuclear power? The nuclear industry has long accepted that it can be used as a political football, to be kicked into goal or off the pitch completely depending on the situation at hand. Our industry therefore has power in the political sense too, but with power comes responsibility - nuclear leaders know that only too well and now is as good as time as ever to lead by example.

  5. Structural Analysis of Lexical Bundles in University Lectures of Politics and Chemistry

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Hadi Kashiha

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available Referred to as extended collocations, lexical bundles are considered as a main factor in building fluency in academic discourse; helping to shape meaning and coherence in a text or speech. For decades, lexical bundles have attracted considerable amount of attention in corpus-based research in English for Academic Purposes (EAP. While, the focus of the most of the studies on lexical bundles was to explore the use of these multi-word expressions in academic written registers such as research articles, academic spoken registers such as university lectures have not received that amount of attention from the scholars. In this vein, there is still an open question of how they are structurally different across disciplines. With these concerns in mind, this study aimed to explore how lexical bundles are used structurally in a 50291 words corpus of 8 university lectures across two disciplines: chemistry and politics. To this aim, the most frequent four-word bundles in the corpus were classified according to their grammatical types to see the possible disciplinary variations in their frequency of use as well as the structure involved in their use. Results of the analysis revealed that noun phrase and prepositional phrase fragments were the most common structures in the lectures of the two disciplines, accounting for more than half of the bundles in politics. University lecturers appear to apply a variety of structures in the use of lexical bundles often peculiar to the discipline in order to convey their disciplinary messages.  This would lead to the need to emphasize the instruction of the most common structures in that discipline in a way for the lectures to be as comprehensive as possible for the intended audiences.

  6. TRENDS IN STRUCTURING POWER AND ITS ROLE IN SOCIAL SELF-REGULATION

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ramona O. NICOLESCU

    2013-06-01

    Full Text Available This paper is trying to prove how social normality should start from a prescriptive, judicial reflection of democratic rationality in social-economic relations instead of starting from the generalization of exceptions under the form of normativity.From the point of view of realistic systemic knowledge, “real levels” and “necessary levels”, as well as the rational interaction between them can be determined sufficiently accurate for all social sub-systems, based on present knowledge. The necessary and sufficient condition is that self-regulatory decisions are independent of the speculative groups of the society (i.e. of politics and oligopolies. There are numberless approaches for separating governance from politics but the social power which supports these approaches is still incomparably smaller than the power of those who do not want social normality. Therefore, the study of economy (different economic methods proposed by economists is relevant for understanding social self-regulation and the role of “social power” in this self-regulation.

  7. Tobacco Industry Political Power and Influence in Florida From 1979 to 1999

    OpenAIRE

    Givel, Michael S. Ph.D.; Glantz, Stanton A. Ph.D.

    1999-01-01

    The tobacco industry is a major political and legal force in Florida through campaign contributions, public relations efforts, lobbying and litigation, which at least from the late 1970s, has had a centralized political organization in Florida that defends and promotes its political and economic interests at the local and state levels of government. Although the industry has operated in the open in some political campaigns, it has also operated quietly behind the scenes, often through front g...

  8. 'They did to him whatever they pleased': The exercise of political ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    vis the urgent challenges facing the global community. One such challenge concerns the exercise of political power within the public arena. Throughout his narrative Matthew paints a vivid portrait of the political power brokers of Jesus' world ...

  9. Political tug of war

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Morhart, Alexander

    2011-07-01

    Rapid expansion of the European power grid is essential for the further development of wind and solar energy. The most significant obstacles are not technical, but rather of a political nature. (orig.)

  10. China’s Political Reforms in the Early 21st Century

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nguyen Xuan Сuong

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available Analyzing process of political reforms in the People's Republic of China, the author notes that within the first 20 years of reforms and openness of China economic growth wasn't followed by development of society, political reforms didn't keep up for economic, imperfection of political system constrained economic reforms and development. Owing to this fact the XVI congress of a CPC lifted policy to the level of "political culture" by analogy with "material culture" and "spiritual culture". In the first 20 anniversary of the XXI century with the purpose to finish "comprehensive creation of society "of small prosperity" China has to create "perfect system of socialist market economy", construct "harmonious socialist society". For achievement of these purposes political reforms in China have to provide "improvement of socialist democracy" and "the socialist constitutional state". In the first years of the XXI century they brought a number of significant achievements: political stability, peaceful alternation of generations of the power, essential increase of level of political democracy. The first stage of formation of the constitutional socialist state is passed, ability and level of the management from ruling party increased; party construction amplified. But also at the beginning of the second decade of the XXI century implementation of the legislation, democracy faces many calls, especially intensification of nationalism at the beginning of the century. The Chinese dream will mobilize grandiose powers of unity that China deepened reforms and openness, solved all the political problems, helped a CPC to increase the leading and imperious power. Implementation process of "The Chinese dream" also means aspiration to tops of economy, policy, military science, technologies in the world, to a taking them, reflecting process of formation of the new great power which will succeed the USA. Political reforms with the purpose to achieve "The Chinese dream

  11. Political ecology

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Strohm, H.

    1979-01-01

    Using facts and examples, this didactically structures textbook gives an insight into the extent and consequences of the damage to the environment, with the subjects - fundamentals of ecology; - population and food problems; - the energy problem; - economic growth; scarcity of resources, recycling; - ground, water, and air pollution, - city and traffic problems; - work protection and medical care; - political alternatives and 'soft technologies'. The analysis of the political and economic reasons is combined with social and technical alternatives from which demands to be made and measures to be taken can be derived for individuals, citizens' interest groups, political groups and trade unions. Teaching models intend to help teachers to work on specific problems of ecology. (orig.) [de

  12. The Revival of Confucianism in Modern Chinese Politics

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Overgaard, Signe

    of the phenomenon, this researcher will show that while the domestic legitimization crisis may have been the starting point for utilizing ideas from Confucianism, the purposes have broadened to also include strengthening Chinas soft power image and reinforcing the Chinese Model of Development as well.......In recent years the Chinese government has increasingly employed ideas from Confucian thought in political campaigns and projects. This revival of Confucianism by the Chinese government is a paradox because Confucianism and the social values and structures it stood for has been under heavy attack...... to fill an ideological gap after Communism has lost its appeal as a result of three decades of capitalist driven economic development and political reforms (Chen Ming 2009; Cho and Jeung 2008). Filling an ideological gap however does not seem to be the only purpose. By giving a comprehensive account...

  13. A judicial review of political questions under Islamic law

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Abdulfatai O. Sambo

    2014-06-01

    Full Text Available The contemporary Arab world has witnessed uprisings and turmoil as a result of alleged power-overreaching by political elites. Consequently, people call for democracy with emphasis on constitutionalism, accountability and protection of human rights. Yet, the voice of the judiciary seems not to be heard in championing these values in many Muslim nations despite the clear roles Islam places on the judiciary regarding political matters. This paper therefore analyses the power of judicial review on political questions from the perspective of Islamic jurisprudence. It finds that the power of judicial review and its main institution existed in early Islamic periods after the demise of the Prophet (SAW. The paper concludes that failure to observe judicial review in many contemporary Muslim countries results in the absence of effective checks on the powers of the rulers by the judiciary.

  14. Conception on corruption: 2001-2006: Effect of politization

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Vasović Mirjana

    2007-01-01

    Full Text Available In this article conception of corruption in the case of Serbia is analyzed on the ground of findings of two larger surveys done within the five years span, after the Fifth October (in 2001 and 2006. Analysis of data reveals that conception is formed under the great influence of politization and given divisions in society; thus it depends on the ways how people perceive and estimate actual economic and political processes and their actors. Under these conditions subjectivity of conception is at stake. Depending from what social structure they originate, estimations and attitudes on corruption are reflecting a disappointment in new power as well as opposition pressure on rulling regime, or resistance to changes of economic and political system. Most important differences between conceptions of corruptions could be find among partisans whether of old or new regime, i.e. "losers" and "winners" of transition. These social categories are in high correlation with actual socioeconomic standing and life age. Although toleration toward corruption is descendant, it could be noticed that actual and potential transitional winners (more educated, more wealthy, younger people and supporters of the new regime estimate state of corruption more positively, thus showing the signs of accustoming on it and even including signs of moral cynism. As for the losers, they are showing more sensitivity, what could be seen as an effect of their unfavorable economic position and corresponding resistance to the changes along with sharper critical attitude toward the actual power.

  15. Generating political priority for regulatory interventions targeting obesity prevention: an Australian case study.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Baker, Phillip; Gill, Timothy; Friel, Sharon; Carey, Gemma; Kay, Adrian

    2017-03-01

    Effective obesity prevention requires a synergistic mix of population-level interventions including a strong role for government and the regulation of the marketing, labelling, content and pricing of energy-dense foods and beverages. In this paper we adopt the agenda of the Australian Federal Government (AFG) as a case study to understand the factors generating or hindering political priority for such 'regulatory interventions' between 1990 and 2011. Using a theoretically-guided process tracing method we undertook documentary analysis and conducted 27 interviews with a diversity of actors involved in obesity politics. The analysis was structured by a theoretical framework comprising four dimensions: the power of actors involved; the ideas the actors deploy to interpret and portray the issue; the institutional and political context; and issue characteristics. Despite two periods of sustained political attention, political priority for regulatory interventions did not emerge and was hindered by factors from all four dimensions. Within the public health community, limited cohesion among experts and advocacy groups hampered technical responses and collective action efforts. An initial focus on children (child obesity), framing the determinants of obesity as 'obesogenic environments', and the deployment of 'protecting kids', 'industry demonization' and 'economic costs' frames generated political attention. Institutional norms within government effectively selected out regulatory interventions from consideration. The 'productive power' and activities of the food and advertising industries presented formidable barriers, buttressed by a libertarian/neolibertarian rhetoric emphasizing individual responsibility, a negative view of freedom (as free from 'nanny-state' intervention) and the idea that regulation imposes an unacceptable cost on business. Issue complexity, the absence of a supportive evidence base and a strict 'evidence-based' policy-making approach were used as

  16. Politics, Power, Poverty and Global Health: Systems and Frames

    Science.gov (United States)

    Benatar, Solomon

    2016-01-01

    Striking disparities in access to healthcare and in health outcomes are major characteristics of health across the globe. This inequitable state of global health and how it could be improved has become a highly popularized field of academic study. In a series of articles in this journal the roles of power and politics in global health have been addressed in considerable detail. Three points are added here to this debate. The first is consideration of how the use of definitions and common terms, for example ‘poverty eradication,’ can mask full exposure of the extent of rectification required, with consequent failure to understand what poverty eradication should mean, how this could be achieved and that a new definition is called for. Secondly, a criticism is offered of how the term ‘global health’ is used in a restricted manner to describe activities that focus on an anthropocentric and biomedical conception of health across the world. It is proposed that the discourse on ‘global health’ should be extended beyond conventional boundaries towards an ecocentric conception of global/planetary health in an increasingly interdependent planet characterised by a multitude of interlinked crises. Finally, it is noted that the paucity of workable strategies towards achieving greater equity in sustainable global health is not so much due to lack of understanding of, or insight into, the invisible dimensions of power, but is rather the outcome of seeking solutions from within belief systems and cognitive biases that cannot offer solutions. Hence the need for a new framing perspective for global health that could reshape our thinking and actions. PMID:27694651

  17. Politics, Power, Poverty and Global Health: Systems and Frames.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Benatar, Solomon

    2016-08-06

    Striking disparities in access to healthcare and in health outcomes are major characteristics of health across the globe. This inequitable state of global health and how it could be improved has become a highly popularized field of academic study. In a series of articles in this journal the roles of power and politics in global health have been addressed in considerable detail. Three points are added here to this debate. The first is consideration of how the use of definitions and common terms, for example 'poverty eradication,' can mask full exposure of the extent of rectification required, with consequent failure to understand what poverty eradication should mean, how this could be achieved and that a new definition is called for. Secondly, a criticism is offered of how the term 'global health' is used in a restricted manner to describe activities that focus on an anthropocentric and biomedical conception of health across the world. It is proposed that the discourse on 'global health' should be extended beyond conventional boundaries towards an ecocentric conception of global/planetary health in an increasingly interdependent planet characterised by a multitude of interlinked crises. Finally, it is noted that the paucity of workable strategies towards achieving greater equity in sustainable global health is not so much due to lack of understanding of, or insight into, the invisible dimensions of power, but is rather the outcome of seeking solutions from within belief systems and cognitive biases that cannot offer solutions. Hence the need for a new framing perspective for global health that could reshape our thinking and actions. © 2016 by Kerman University of Medical Sciences.

  18. Power, conflict and consensus building in Africa: Ideology revisited

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    As presently applied in Africa, consensus building seems to be a product of knowledge ... Often international professional negotiators and .... The conflict model views individual or group relationships in all structures of power as a ..... for political parties to win and maintain power, Weber states that 'parties live in the house of ...

  19. Powerlessness of older people in Hong Kong: a political economy analysis.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kam, Ping-kwong

    2003-01-01

    Gerontologists agree that old age can be associated with an increase in powerlessness both in the personal domain and in the social and political fields. This paper is an attempt to understand the concept of powerlessness in old age within a political economy theoretical framework. The paper argues that the powerlessness of older people is not biologically determined. Rather, it is socially constructed. It has its roots in the social, economic, and political structure of society. For this reason, the paper argues that (a) the capitalist economic system discriminates against and marginalizes older people in the labor market. The current unfavorable economic climate will make the economic situation of older people worse. (b) The residual welfare system does not counteract the unfavorable impact of the economic system. Rather, it deprives older people of the necessary financial resources and social service supports that would enable them to lead independent and dignified lives. (c) The authoritarian political system creates adverse conditions that make it very difficult for older people to participate in the decision-making process on issues that affect their lives, as well as on broader political issues that affect the whole of society. It is the interplay among these economic, social, and political forces in Hong Kong that creates the political economy of powerlessness in old age and prevents older people from using their powers to master and control their lives.

  20. Corruption as a Problem of Political Theory and Political Practice

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Anna V. Shashkova

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available The present article is dedicated to the analysis of "corruption" from point of view of political practice and political theory. The present article studies historical examples of corruption: corruption during the era of Alexander the Great, Carthage, Roman Republic. The article gives the evolution of the term "corruption", pointing out current aspects of the term. The article provides positive and negative results of corruption, gives resume. The present article analyses corruption results: economical, political and social. Most important economical consequences of corruption are the following: increase of shadow economy, decrease of tax payments, weakening of the state budget, breach of market competition, decrease of market effectiveness, destabilization of the idea of market economy. Most important social consequences of corruption are the following: great distinction between the declared and real values, which creates a "double standard" of the moral and behavior, distraction of great sums from public and humanitarian development, increase of property disproportion, increase of social tension. The present article names most important political consequences of corruption: shift of ideas from public development to the security of power of oligarchy, decrease of trust to the state, decrease of image of the country at the international arena, increase of its economical and political isolation, decrease of political competition. The present article gives one of the resumes that the globalization process increases corruption. Together with globalization most important role is given to corporations and corporate corruption comes to the front raw.

  1. Some General Considerations Regarding the Implications of the Changing of Electoral System upon the Structure of Political Élites in Romania

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Marcela Monica Stoica

    2011-05-01

    Full Text Available This paper is innovating the theory of elités in the way it was configured by the Central and Eastern European thinking (researches and studies because it is focused on the way the changing of the electoral system influences the structure of political parliamentary elités. This study aims at revealing the connection between the electoral system and the structure of political élites, and it is based on two sociological researches that took place in the Romanian Parliament (Chamber of Deputies in two different chronological and political moments. The first chronological moment was in October 2008 and the second was in November 2009. The political moments are given by the presence of two different types of electoral systems. In the first research, the political élites analyzed belonged to a parliament elected by a proportional representation system (PR on closed lists, and in the second, the elections took place by „uninominal” system. It is shown that the change of electoral system from a period to another does determines the strategy of behavior of the political parliamentary élites and, implicitly, the functioning of parliamentary democracy through the political decisions that shape a certain behavior of élites.

  2. MAPPING CHILDREN'S POLITICS: SPATIAL STORIES, DIALOGIC RELATIONS AND POLITICAL FORMATION.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Elwood, Sarah; Mitchell, Katharyne

    2012-03-01

    This article confronts a persistent challenge in research on children's geographies and politics: the difficulty of recognizing forms of political agency and practice that by definition fall outside of existing political theory. Children are effectively "always already" positioned outside most of the structures and ideals of modernist democratic theory, such as the public sphere and abstracted notions of communicative action or "rational" speech. Recent emphases on embodied tactics of everyday life have offered important ways to recognize children's political agency and practice. However, we argue here that a focus on spatial practices and critical knowledge alone cannot capture the full range of children's politics, and show how representational and dialogic practices remain a critical element of their politics in everyday life. Drawing on de Certeau's notion of spatial stories, and Bakhtin's concept of dialogic relations, we argue that children's representations and dialogues comprise a significant space of their political agency and formation, in which they can make and negotiate social meanings, subjectivities, and relationships. We develop these arguments with evidence from an after-school activity programme we conducted with 10-13 year olds in Seattle, Washington, in which participants explored, mapped, wrote and spoke about the spaces and experiences of their everyday lives. Within these practices, children negotiate autonomy and self-determination, and forward ideas, representations, and expressions of agreement or disagreement that are critical to their formation as political actors.

  3. CHALLENGES FOR TODAY’S RUSSIAN POLITICAL ELITE, AND WAYS TO ADDRESS THEM

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ф И Шарков

    2017-12-01

    Full Text Available The authors aimed to conduct a study of the current state and prospects for the development of elitology in Russia, and to identify the public perception of political leaders, which is necessary for federal and regional elites and for improving the efficiency of the state personnel policy, mechanisms for interaction of elites in the social-political space and, thus, for increasing the transparency of power. The authors rely on the political, historical-legal, formal-legal, and structural-functional analytical approaches. Based on the results of the panel expert surveys conducted during the First All-Russian Elitological Congress “Elitology of Russia: The Current State and Prospects for the Development” (2013, Rostov-on-Don and the Second All-Russian Elitological Congress “Elitology and Strategies for the Development of Contemporary Russia” (2016, Rostov-on-Don, the authors reconstruct the general perception of Russian elites by the expert com-munity, and the dynamics of changes in the elite group; identify the public estimates of today’s regional political elites, and a discrepancy between elitism in the traditional sense and the real political power. The comparison of the results of the panel surveys conducted in 2013 and 2016 allowed to combine the findings in the groups: general perception of the Russian elites and the reliability of information about them; estimates of the dynamics of qualitative changes in the elites; measures to promote the development of inter-elite interaction and leadership. The authors made the following conclusions: both public and expert opinions underestimate the elite capital of the ruling groups; there are system symptoms of oligarchization of the elites that tend to use non-democratic means of holding power; there is an obvious task of changing the approaches to assessing and recruiting elites in the current social-political situation in Russia; in 2017, the Russian society is at the crossroads, and the

  4. Nurses' perceptions of individual and organizational political reasons for horizontal peer bullying.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Katrinli, Alev; Atabay, Gulem; Gunay, Gonca; Cangarli, Burcu Guneri

    2010-09-01

    Nurses are exposed to bullying for various reasons. It has been argued that the reason for bullying can be political, meaning that the behavior occurs to serve the self-interests of the perpetrators. This study aims to identify how nurses perceive the relevance of individual and political reasons for bullying behaviors. In February 2009 a survey was conducted with nurses working in a research and training hospital located in Turkey. The results showed that the aim of influencing promotion, task assignments, performance appraisal, recruitment, dismissal, allocation of equipment and operational means, together with allocation of personal benefits and organizational structure decisions, were perceived as potential political reasons for bullying by nurses. Moreover, the reasons for the various bullying behaviors were perceived as relevant to individual characteristics, namely, the perpetrators' need for power, and their psychological and private life problems.

  5. Structure of Political Success Factors as an Indicator of Political Direction in Electoral System Development

    OpenAIRE

    Panina, Nataliia

    2005-01-01

    The article presents a conceptual model of democratic electoral system development and analysis of empirical data on factors of political success in the electoral situation. Various participants of the electoral process (population, politicians, journalists, government employees, analysts-politologists) evaluated the political success factors; and comparative analysis of these evaluations made it possible to determine the main vectors (“reverse” and “manipulative-mystifying”) affecting deviat...

  6. Studying "The Political" in International Aid to Education: Methodological Considerations

    Science.gov (United States)

    Knutsson, Beniamin; Lindberg, Jonas

    2017-01-01

    The point of departure of this article is an apparent antinomy. On the one hand, there is the powerful argument in political theory on the emergence and consolidation of a post-political condition. On the other hand, research in international and comparative education demonstrates how conflicts and power asymmetries continue to characterize…

  7. Experiments as politics

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Spears, R; Smith, HJ

    The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the political nature of laboratory experiments. Such experiments can be construed as paradigms of power, open to construction and debate, where different agents and interests are involved in a process of struggle over both (re)presentation and substance.

  8. Fan action and political participation on "The Colbert Report"

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Marcus Schulzke

    2012-06-01

    Full Text Available The Colbert Report merges the increasingly popular political satire genre with fan activism. The result is that the fan community helps to construct Colbert's malleable character and demonstrates symbolic power through its willingness to act. The fans are usually a nonpartisan force, acting to produce entertainment rather than substantive political change. However, this can be politically meaningful, as the fans' projects promote collective action, parallel political activities like voting and protesting, and encourage critical thinking about political information.

  9. The political responsibility of Social Work

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Teresa Zamanillo Peral

    2011-06-01

    Full Text Available The intention of this article is to try to recover a critical dialog between the politics and the social work. In this paper it argued that the politics is a dimension of the identity of the social work of which we cannot avoid. In this way, the politics and the social work, are doubly tied. On the one hand, the political power exercise corresponds to every citizen of the polis. And, on the other hand, the social work is narrowly tied to the social politics by means of its object of study. Our arguments it’s construct from a diagnosis of the social reality and professional that is held in this specific relationship. We claim to contribute with elements of analyses that help, not only to understand, but also answering politically as professionals of the social work and as citizen in the society.

  10. A Global Civilian Power? The Future Role of the European Union in International Politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Bedrudin Brljavac

    2011-06-01

    Full Text Available Questions about the future of the European Union as an international actor continue to puzzle students of international relations and particularly students of EU foreign policy. What kind of predictions can we make about the future role of the EU in international politics? While the question is often framed in terms of military versus normative and/or global civilian power Europe, there are indications that ambitions in both directions may very well coincide. However, despite the EU’s development towards deepened defense integration since the 1990s, such developments are by far outweighed by developments pointing in the direction of the EU consolidating its role as a global civilian power. In this article, we analyze the union’s civilian policies and contrast the findings of our analysis with developments in the field of Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP. Based on our analysis of EU enlargement policy, external aid, global environmental policy and the union’s commitment to multilateralism, our conclusion is that the EU’s international role in the next decades will continue to be best described in terms of a global civilian power.

  11. Nuclear power. Its development in the United Kingdom

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Pocock, R.F.

    1977-01-01

    The subject is covered chronologically in chapters, entitled: from war to peace; the Atomic Energy Authority and the first nuclear power station; a civil power programme; Windscale - the need for caution; research for the future; the new (Magnox) power stations; revision of the nuclear power programme; supply of nuclear fuels; nuclear power for ship propulsion; completion of first programme; Dungeness B and second programme, political assessment of (nuclear) industry's structure; reorganization of the industry; nuclear power in the environment; completion of second programme; the energy crisis; decision on third programme. (U.K.)

  12. How Internal Political Efficacy Translates Political Knowledge Into Political Participation

    Science.gov (United States)

    Reichert, Frank

    2016-01-01

    This study presents evidence for the mediation effect of political knowledge through political self-efficacy (i.e. internal political efficacy) in the prediction of political participation. It employs an action theoretic approach—by and large grounded on the Theory of Planned Behaviour—and uses data from the German Longitudinal Election Study to examine whether political knowledge has distinct direct effects on voting, conventional, and/or unconventional political participation. It argues that political knowledge raises internal political efficacy and thereby indirectly increases the chance that a citizen will participate in politics. The results of mediated multiple regression analyses yield evidence that political knowledge indeed translates into internal political efficacy, thus it affects political participation of various kinds indirectly. However, internal political efficacy and intentions to participate politically yield simultaneous direct effects only on conventional political participation. Sequentially mediated effects appear for voting and conventional political participation, with political knowledge being mediated by internal political efficacy and subsequently also by behavioural intentions. The mediation patterns for unconventional political participation are less clear though. The discussion accounts for restrictions of this study and points to questions for answer by future research. PMID:27298633

  13. Electoral democracy, revolutionary politics and political violence: the emergence of Fascism in Italy, 1920-21.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Elazar, D S

    2000-09-01

    This study examines the determination of the Italian Fascists' extra-parliamentary, para-military, violent strategy. What were the effects of the socialists' political strategy, relying on electoral democracy, on the creation and strategy of the Fascist Action Squads? A comparison among Italy's 69 provinces, based on quantitative and qualitative historical evidence reveals a distinct pattern in the Fascists' violence. They attacked mainly provinces where the Socialists enjoyed the greatest electoral support. This pattern was a product of two historical processes: (a) the threat of the Socialist party to the landlords' economic and political hegemony, and (b) the landlords' tradition of militant anti-worker organization which culminated in their alliance with the Fascists. The Fascists' struggle for, and takeover of, political power was not an immanent historical necessity. It was first and foremost an anti-socialist reaction. It was shaped both 'from below', by the political power and radicalism of the PSI and the para-military capacity of the Fascist Squads; and 'from above', by the active support the Fascists received from the landlords and the state. Supported by organized landlords and blessed with the authorities' benevolence, the Squads were able to destroy - physically and politically - the legitimately constituted provincial governments of the Socialists. The alliance with the landlords determined the Squads' almost exclusive attacks on Socialist provincial strongholds that constituted the greatest threat to the landlords' interests, while provinces dominated by the ruling Liberal party were excluded from the Squads' path of 'punitive expeditions'.

  14. Talk "Like a Man": Feminine Style in the Pursuit of Political Power

    OpenAIRE

    Jones, Jennifer Jean

    2017-01-01

    Communication is a key factor in the strategic self-presentation of political leaders and candidates for office. It is especially important for women in US politics who remain numerically underrepresented at all levels of government, particularly in leadership positions. Drawing from theories on self-presentation, social identity, and implicit communication, this dissertation explores the relationship between gender, language, and political leadership. How do female politicians present themse...

  15. Taking evolution seriously in political science.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lewis, Orion; Steinmo, Sven

    2010-09-01

    In this essay, we explore the epistemological and ontological assumptions that have been made to make political science "scientific." We show how political science has generally adopted an ontologically reductionist philosophy of science derived from Newtonian physics and mechanics. This mechanical framework has encountered problems and constraints on its explanatory power, because an emphasis on equilibrium analysis is ill-suited for the study of political change. We outline the primary differences between an evolutionary ontology of social science and the physics-based philosophy commonly employed. Finally, we show how evolutionary thinking adds insight into the study of political phenomena and research questions that are of central importance to the field, such as preference formation.

  16. Eros and politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Helge Rønning

    2015-02-01

    Full Text Available There are many parallels between Henrik Ibsen’s Rosmersholm (1886 and Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson’s Paul Lange og Tora Parsberg (1898. Both dramas have as their protagonist a weak and noble man, who is offered love and an erotic relationship by a strong woman, and who is not able to reciprocate.              At the same time they are plays about how politics demand the ability to act and take a stand in a world where men are supposed to engage politically at the same time as women are supposed to stand in the background. In both dramas the political and the erotic are interwoven in a manner that drives the men into despair because they can neither satisfy the demands of love in the intimate arena nor the demands for power in the public arena of politics.             There are also other parallels between the plays, in relation to the role of the figures, that demand of the protagonists that they take a stand, and drop them and betray them when they do not. Both dramas also end in a final suicide. Though here the two plays differ in that in Ibsen’s play the drama ends in the double suicide of the man and the woman, while in Bjørnson’s it is only the man who sacrifices himself. This implies that the question of strength, power and the erotic are more consistently played out in Ibsen’s drama.

  17. Political priority of global oral health: an analysis of reasons for international neglect.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Benzian, Habib; Hobdell, Martin; Holmgren, Christopher; Yee, Robert; Monse, Bella; Barnard, Johannes T; van Palenstein Helderman, Wim

    2011-06-01

    Global Oral Health suffers from a lack of political attention, particularly in low- and middle-income countries. This paper analyses the reasons for this political neglect through the lens of four areas of political power: the power of the ideas, the power of the issue, the power of the actors, and the power of the political context (using a modified Political Power Framework by Shiffman and Smith. Lancet370 [2007] 1370). The analysis reveals that political priority for global oral health is low, resulting from a set of complex issues deeply rooted in the current global oral health sector, its stakeholders and their remit, the lack of coherence and coalescence; as well as the lack of agreement on the problem, its portrayal and possible solutions. The shortcomings and weaknesses demonstrated in the analysis range from rather basic matters, such as defining the issue in an agreed way, to complex and multi-levelled issues concerning appropriate data collection and agreement on adequate solutions. The political priority of Global Oral Health can only be improved by addressing the underlying reasons that resulted in the wide disconnection between the international health discourse and the small sector of Global Oral Health. We hope that this analysis may serve as a starting point for a long overdue, broad and candid international analysis of political, social, cultural, communication, financial and other factors related to better prioritisation of oral health. Without such an analysis and the resulting concerted action the inequities in Global Oral Health will grow and increasingly impact on health systems, development and, most importantly, human lives. © 2011 FDI World Dental Federation.

  18. Rhetoric Tradition and Democracy: Isocrates’ Role in Ancient Greek Political Idea. Start Point of Western Political Philosophy

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Shokri Mehdi

    2015-07-01

    Full Text Available Political participation and the public education that have always been deployed to support the incipient progress of the civic life are revived in the modern political discourses. It has been believed that the age of pre-Socrates was the age of the Sophists whose acrid fallacy works occupied the political sphere, a malaise in government. However, speaking non-traditionally in the modern pedagogical system, there were some pre-Socratic thinkers and political philosophers/orators who’s works are the backbone of modern discourse on this matter. It will be examined whether any part of the classical rhetoric apparatus can be recovered and put to a good practice in the modern education and modern political participation. This point will be illustrated, furthermore, in this paper by alleging the importance of rhetoric, its role in Ancient Greek Democracy, and its influence on the modern concepts of power and democracy, as a continual element in a historical-political life. The further consideration is whether there was any democratic Polis existed in Ancient Athens and then, if there was, what characteristics it consisted of. Moreover, whether such concept can or should be considered in modern political discourses. In this sense, the liberal, non-dogmatic strain of the sophistry of Isocrates tradition urges us to indicate that the findings of this educational principles are, if not necessary, but adjutant complementary metes to our modern political knowledge of the states. In the end, it is inquired to see comparatively that how the tradition of rhetorical art and the concept of power in the Ancient Greek society have pertained to the modern democratic elements and whether we are able to empower this influential element in modern states.

  19. Privatization by Other Means: Social Power, Tankers and Techno-Assemblages of Water Supply in Amman, Jordan.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mustafa, D.

    2016-12-01

    Combined piped and tanker based water supply systems have become a ubiquitous feature of urban waterscapes in the global South. Jordanian water sector, and Amman in particular has been a recipient of considerable international financial and technical assistance over the past decades. The international assistance has coupled with the Jordanian state's own pro-market ideological stance, and its political compulsions to spawn a techno-social assemblage of water supply that represents a hybrid state and commercial water supply system. I present the results of a field study in Amman, Jordan on water tankers and water users to understand the techno-political underpinnings of the hybrid system and its impact on differential access to water. I explore how Actor Network Theory (ANT) based analysis of tankers, suction pumps and piped water system and their materiality may explain differential access to water. But that exploration is inflected by a larger political ecological concern with questions of power and discourses about citizenship and claim making on the state. I find that ANT based focus on water technologies, while ontologically fertile, and epistemologically innovative, is nevertheless politically barren. Much richer political insights are to be gained from structural and post-structurally based investigations of the discursive and material drivers of the techno-social assemblages of water supply. The technologies don't just neutrally impact water access, but seem to almost intentionally favour the powerful over the powerless. Surely the political agency must not reside in inanimate technologies but in the social actors and structures that fashion those technologies, and configure them such to reinforce geographies of power. I call for a renewed focus on social power and how its impact on lived geographies is mediated by technology.

  20. INSTITUŢIILE PUTERII: FUNCŢIONALITATEA ÎN SISTEMUL POLITIC AL SOCIETĂŢII

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ion SANDU

    2015-11-01

    Full Text Available În acest articol puterea este prezentată ca un fenomen care exprimă obiectivitatea de a adopta legi şi de a asigura exe-cutarea ulterioară a acestora, utilizând metode conexe de convingere şi coerciţie. În societate puterea este clasificată în: socială, politică şi de stat. Prin instituţiile sale, puterea asigură funcţionalitatea diferitelor tipuri de structuri sociale şi organisme, activităţi de coordonare care au loc în interesul său. În calitate de element de bază al sistemului politic, statul, prin puterea legislativă, executivă şi judecătorească, asigură organizarea vieţii sociale în Republica Moldova, moderniza-rea conducerii şi modelarea administraţiei publice a societăţii. Resursele pentru realizarea scopurilor instituţiilor puterii reprezintă capacităţile sale funcţionale, prin intermediul funcţionarilor asupra cărora este exercitată puterea, evident gestio-nată şi controlată îndeosebi prin convingere şi coerciţie. Funcţiile puterii de stat sunt atribuite simultan instituţiilor de stat care le realizează operaţional. În mod evident, într-un sistem democratic puterea este realizată în beneficiul societăţii.INSTITUTIONS OF POWER: THE FUNCTIONALITY IN THE POLITICAL SYSTEM OF SOCIETY In this article, the power is presented a phenomenon, which expresses the objectivity to adopt laws and further execution, using related methods of the persuasion and coercion. The power in society is classified in: social, politic and state. Through its institutions, the power assures the functionality of different kind of social structures and organisms, coordination activities, which are taking place in its interest. As a basic element of the political system, the state, through the law-making, executive and judicial power assure the organization of the social life in the Republic of Moldova, government modernization and public administration field of the society. The resources for realizing the

  1. International Monetary Power and China’s Response

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Hongyu Lin

    2013-12-01

    Full Text Available International monetary power has become a new area of interest since the outbreak of the global financial crisis in 2008. The USA, the EU and China will pursue global monetary power in the future, and the USD, the EURO and the RMB will become the most important world reserve currencies. The pattern of international monetary power will shift from a unilateral-hegemony structure to a triangle-balance structure. This shift has a very strong influence on changes in the current international political system. As the largest emerging economy, China will speed up the globalization of the RMB to meet the challenges of the international monetary system.

  2. Character of the mutual perception of the political system and the environment as a criterion of the political security

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    I. V. Ishchenko

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available Political security is connected with the lack of external and internal threats, or the reduction of their severity. The maintenance of the internal public security should start from the explanation of the nature of the relationship between the political and institutional structures and most active social groups. The author suggests using a mental construct as an indicator of conflict/harmony in this sphere. It has been proposed to implement this idea by comparing the mental constructs of political institutions and social environment. One of the methods to implement this idea has been revealed in the article. This method is based on the search of leading values which are characterizing basic political and institutional structures and social environment. Two components have been described in the mental constructor: rational and irrational. Moreover, the formula, that makes it possible to compare and evaluate the congruence of mental constructs of political and institutional structures and the environment on the basis of the detected values, has been suggested. The advantage of this formula is its flexibility. Consequently, it can describe the features of social and political interaction in all political systems. The regularity has four components. The first component describes the level of implementation of the social environment’s values being a result of certain internal and external policies. It contains a self-assessment of individuals - representatives of the social environment level of its own value system’s implementation. Moreover, the author takes into account the assessment of the political and institutional structures that is given by these individuals. Individuals assess these structures in connection to the actions and decisions aimed at the implementation of public interests and values. The second component of the formula describes the level of implementation and the congruence of values of basic political and institutional

  3. Politics and Power in Global Health: The Constituting Role of Conflicts: Comment on "Navigating Between Stealth Advocacy and Unconscious Dogmatism: The Challenge of Researching the Norms, Politics and Power of Global Health".

    Science.gov (United States)

    Askheim, Clemet; Heggen, Kristin; Engebretsen, Eivind

    2015-10-15

    In a recent article, Gorik Ooms has drawn attention to the normative underpinnings of the politics of global health. We claim that Ooms is indirectly submitting to a liberal conception of politics by framing the politics of global health as a question of individual morality. Drawing on the theoretical works of Chantal Mouffe, we introduce a conflictual concept of the political as an alternative to Ooms' conception. Using controversies surrounding medical treatment of AIDS patients in developing countries as a case we underline the opportunity for political changes, through political articulation of an issue, and collective mobilization based on such an articulation. © 2016 by Kerman University of Medical Sciences.

  4. Essays on the political economy of trade and regulation: biotechnology and conservation

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Shao, Qianqian

    2017-01-01

    Economics and politics interact. Political and economic forces influence the choices of policy instruments, the distribution of economic rent, and the distribution of political power. Politicians balance the interaction of economic rents and political interests in the policy-making process. Some

  5. 'Heated political dynamics exist ...': examining the politics of palliative care in rural British Columbia, Canada.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Crooks, Valorie A; Castleden, Heather; Hanlon, Neil; Schuurman, Nadine

    2011-01-01

    Palliative care is delivered by a number of professional groups and informal providers across a range of settings. This arrangement works well in that it maximizes avenues for providing care, but may also bring about complicated 'politics' due to struggles over control and decision-making power. Thirty-one interviews conducted with formal and informal palliative care providers in a rural region of British Columbia, Canada, are drawn upon as a case study. Three types of politics impacting on palliative care provision are identified: inter-community, inter-site, and inter-professional. Three themes crosscut these politics: ownership, entitlement, and administration. The politics revealed by the interviews, and heretofore underexplored in the palliative literature, have implications for the delivery of palliative care. For example, the outcomes of the politics simultaneously facilitate (e.g. by promoting advocacy for local services) and serve as a barrier to (e.g. by privileging certain communities/care sites/provider) palliative care provision.

  6. Economy and energy politic

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Martin, J.M.

    1992-01-01

    This book, divided into four parts, describes, first, energy consumption and national economy growth. In a second part, the irresistible ascent of coal, natural gas and petroleum international markets is studied. In the third part, energy politic is investigated: exchanges releasing, prices deregulation, contestation of power industry monopoly, energy national market and common energetic politic, single market concept. In the last part, global risks and world-wide regulations are given: demand, energy resources, technical changes, comparative evaluations between fossil, nuclear and renewable energies, environment, investments financing and international cooperation. 23 refs., 14 figs., 16 tabs

  7. Stability and crisis in social and political development

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    S. V. Stavchenko

    2015-03-01

    Determined that the balance and stability on the one hand, and the crisis loss of balance of power between the main actors, leading to instability of institutions, on the other hand, forming two potential «poles» that cause and «energy» of the political process, the vectors of its changes. This process affects the type of the country and its institutional organization. In general, the political crisis dysfunction manifested in political institutions, and is characterized by loss of legitimacy of institutional and substantive elements of the political system. Legitimacy can become leaders, political leaders, political leaders and even the basic law of the country (in the case of revolution, for example. The indicators serve as the political crisis of the political system parameters responsible for the restoration of the political system. Violations of system­parameters mean that in the looming crisis.

  8. Persuasion, Politeness and Relational Models

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jerzy Świątek

    2017-06-01

    Full Text Available Politeness Theory, just like Grice’s Cooperative Principle, points out that pragmatic analysis of language behaviour has to be grounded in extra-linguistic facts of social (or even biological nature. Additionally, despite the slightly misleading label, Politeness Theory provides a sound methodology to explain some persuasive as well as politeness phenomena. In the same vein, the so called Relational Model Theory provides another theoretical framework for the explanation of persuasive phenomena and persuasive language. Both Relational Model Theory and Politeness Theory show that persuasion is also to be understood as a rational response to not-so-rational social and biological needs. In the article an attempt is made to compare the two theories focusing on their explanatory power in reference to language choices aiming at enhancing the persuasive potential of a language message.

  9. Understanding political market orientation

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Ormrod, Robert P.; Henneberg, Stephan C.

    influences of such behavior. The study includes structural equation modeling to investigate several propositions. While the results show that political parties need to focus on several different aspects of market-oriented behavior, especially using an internal and external orientation as cultural antecedents......This article develops a conceptual framework and measurement model of political market orientation that consists of attitudinal and behavioural constructs. The article reports on perceived relationships among different behavioral aspects of political market orientation and the attitudinal......, a more surprising result is the inconclusive effect of a voter orientation on market-oriented behaviours. The article discusses the findings in the context of the existing literature in political marketing and commercial market orientation....

  10. Global Health Warning: Definitions Wield Power Comment on "Navigating Between Stealth Advocacy and Unconscious Dogmatism: The Challenge of Researching the Norms, Politics and Power of Global Health".

    Science.gov (United States)

    Marten, Robert

    2015-12-25

    Gorik Ooms recently made a strong case for considering the centrality of normative premises to analyzing and understanding the underappreciated importance of the nexus of politics, power and process in global health. This critical commentary raises serious questions for the practice and study of global health and global health governance. First and foremost, this commentary underlines the importance of the question of what is global health, and why as well as how does this definition matter? This refocuses discussion on the importance of definitions and how they wield power. It also re-affirms the necessity of a deeper analysis and understanding of power and how it affects and shapes the practice of global health. © 2016 by Kerman University of Medical Sciences.

  11. Melting empires? Climate change and politics in Antarctica since the International Geophysical Year.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Howkins, Adrian

    2011-01-01

    This article examines the relationship between climate change and politics in Antarctica since the International Geophysical Year of 1957-8, paying particular attention to the work of the British Antarctic Survey. Research conducted in Antarctica has played an important role in the understanding of climate change on a global scale. In turn, fears about the consequences of global climate change have radically changed perceptions of Antarctica and profoundly shaped scientific research agendas: a continent that until fifty years ago was perceived largely as an inhospitable wilderness has come to be seen as a dangerously vulnerable environment. This radical shift in perception contrasts with a fundamental continuity in the political power structures of the continent. This article argues that the severity of the threat of climate change has reinforced the privileged political position of the "insider" nations within the Antarctic Treaty System.

  12. The Judicialization of (Separation of Powers Politics: Lessons from Chile La judicialización de la (separación de poderes política: Lecciones de Chile

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Druscilla L. Scribner

    2010-01-01

    Full Text Available Most analyses of the judicialization of politics focus on judicial policy-making and rights creation; however when judicialization of politics unfolds in a separation of powers political context courts are also involved in distributing power. The task of power delineation among branches of government is different from policy-making or rights adjudication. Judicializing political disputes about power gives courts the opportunity to alter the balance of institutional power, to create stronger executives (or legislatures and a stronger (or weaker role for themselves. To illustrate these points, this article examines how the Chilean Constitutional Tribunal (TC adjudicated a specific type of separation of powers conflict between the Legislature and the Executive from 1990-2005. The analysis of the TC doctrine overtime highlights how the TC has shifted the balance of power in the policy-making process and augmented its influence within the political system. La mayoría de los análisis de la judicialización de la política se centran en la creación judicial de políticas y derechos. Sin embargo, cuando la judicialización de la política se desarrolla en un contexto institucional de separación de poder, los tribunales también están involucrados en la distribución de poder. La tarea de delimitación de poder entre los poderes del Estado es diferente de la formulación de políticas o adjudicación de los derechos. Judicialización de las disputas políticas sobre el poder confiere a los tribunales la oportunidad de alterar el equilibrio de poder institucional, para crear ejecutivos (o legislaturas más fuertes y un papel para los tribunales altos más dinámico (o débil. Para ilustrar estos puntos, este artículo examina cómo el Tribunal Constitucional Chileno (TC adjudicó un tipo de conflicto específico entre los poderes legislativo y ejecutivo desde 1990 hasta 2005. Un análisis de la jurisprudencia “ley vs. reglamento” del Tribunal

  13. Corruption, Governance and Political Instability in Nigeria ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    The Nigerian State is a victim of high-level corruption, bad governance, political instability and cyclical legitimacy crisis. In the absence of support from civil society, the effective power of government was eroded and patron-client relationships took a prime role over the formal aspects of politics, such as the rule of law, ...

  14. Global Health Warning: Definitions Wield Power; Comment on “Navigating Between Stealth Advocacy and Unconscious Dogmatism: The Challenge of Researching the Norms, Politics and Power of Global Health”

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Robert Marten

    2016-03-01

    Full Text Available Gorik Ooms recently made a strong case for considering the centrality of normative premises to analyzing and understanding the underappreciated importance of the nexus of politics, power and process in global health. This critical commentary raises serious questions for the practice and study of global health and global health governance. First and foremost, this commentary underlines the importance of the question of what is global health, and why as well as how does this definition matter? This refocuses discussion on the importance of definitions and how they wield power. It also re-affirms the necessity of a deeper analysis and understanding of power and how it affects and shapes the practice of global health.

  15. Feminism: Political Actions and Power Authorities

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Edna Maria Santos Roland

    2000-01-01

    Full Text Available The concept of advocacy encompasses manifold and complex activities and represents many challenges. The principal challenge is political and ethical in nature. Internationalization accelerates the rhythm of work, increasing the demands and the level of requirements on leaderships and generating contradictions between the internationalized sectors of the movement and those who face greater difficulties in linking their everyday actions to the logic produced by the new communication, management and administrative techniques. A core problem is the representativeness of leadership which, in order to be addressed, requires giving up the pre-modern control over bodies and constructing relationships among juridical subjects.

  16. Sex Complexity and Politics in Black Dogs by Ian McEwan

    Science.gov (United States)

    Abbasiyannejad, Mina; Talif, Rosli

    Ian McEwan's Black Dogs (BD) is a story of socio-political conflict during the critical era of the Cold War. Black Dogs is riddled with party (political) domination and its outcomes in society. Europe is still suffering the consequences of the Second World War, perhaps the biggest war of the twentieth century. In the aftermath of such worldwide upheaval, the conflicts that were in tandem with the scramble for political domination emerged in diverse ways, affecting nations and their human populations. Systematic sexual assault during the war years showed that sex was used both for intimidation and humiliation. This study attempts to picture the multidimensional aspects of politics which are practically related to the most intimate human relationship, that is, sex. It pictures how personal is equated with the political and vice versa. The theory of sexual politics is the theoretical framework used to scrutinize power-structure relationship. By reviewing the major conflicts in such a scenario, as the Cold War, and societal restriction, this study concludes that conflict in the macrocosm (world and society) affects the microcosm (individual) in McEwan's Black Dogs. It provides a rather broad picture of politics and sexuality and highlights the stresses of wider society on human dysfunctional relationships. Rape as a tactic of war for a political goal demonstrates another aspect of sex. Reviewing the period in which the story takes place and relating it to the conflicts in society, the study goes beyond simple cause and effect problems among individuals and portrays a holistic view of sexuality and society.

  17. An Audience Study on PTT Gossiping and the Politics of Truth

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Szuping Lin

    2017-10-01

    Full Text Available Through the audience research approach of in-depth interviews with users of the internet PTT Gossiping forum, this papers employs the concept of “politics of truth” to examine the “gossip” culture in the forum as well as the operation of truth/power politics within it. User interviews provide understandings of the meanings, operations, subject positions and social practices of the forum and how they interact with power politics in society. The gossip forum has expanded what gossip culture represents from collective imagination to social practices, renewing the perspectives derived from it, while engaging in a dialogue with the concept of politics of truth.

  18. The Politics of Reflexive Governance: Challenges for Designing Adaptive Management and Transition Management

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jan-Peter Voß

    2011-06-01

    Full Text Available New concepts of governance take account of ambivalence, uncertainty, and distributed power in societal change. They aim for reflexivity regarding the limits of prognostic knowledge and actual control of complex processes of change. Adaptive management and transition management are two examples that evolved from the analysis of social-ecological and sociotechnical systems, respectively. Both feature strategies of collective experimentation and learning. In this paper, we ask how these two designs of reflexive governance consider politics. Based on a framework of different dimensions and levels of politics, we show that they are mainly concerned with problem solving by a focal process, but conflict and asymmetric power relations, as well as the embedding of processes within broader political contexts, are neglected. We suggest two routes for integrating politics into the design of reflexive governance: (1 recognize the politics of learning for sustainable development and develop safeguards against domination and capture by powerful actors, and (2 systematically consider the embedding of governance designs in political contexts and their ongoing dynamics for political fit.

  19. Legal bases for the installation of nuclear power plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Faria, N.M. de

    1980-06-01

    The process of installation of nuclear power plants in the context of the Brazilian legal system is analysed. The structure of the political and administrative system related to the matter and the correspondent legislation are discussed. (A.L.) [pt

  20. Energy-political stagnation or innovation

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kitschelt, H.

    1982-01-01

    The author discusses the enquete report 1980. He makes an inventory for a political and sociological interpretation of the interim report between meaningful innovation and political insignificance as well as intellectual stagnation. The report is considered as an indicator for the transformation of the energy-political arena in the Federal Republic of Germany over the last years. ''Stagnation'' or ''innovation'' of the argumentation patterns in the report of the enquete commission relate to the question whether the analyses in that document are rather a brake or a motor to a shift of political perspectives in energy policy. A progress can be seen in the report regarding political debate about energy-options in the semi-official political spectrum of the Federal Republic of Germany, in as far as differring options of energy-political development are being acknowledged for the first time. At the same time, debate inside the commission directs the attention to issues of institutional policy in the energy sector. Considering the fights within the commission before the report was agreed on, it seems doubtful if its proposals for compromise will prove a sound political basis. The tensions inside the commission are just a first sign of the power conflicts due above all if the recommendations for energy conservation are intransigently carried out. (orig./HSCH) [de

  1. Nuclear power development

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Nealey, S.

    1990-01-01

    The objective of this study is to examine factors and prospects for a resumption in growth of nuclear power in the United States over the next decade. The focus of analysis on the likelihood that current efforts in the United States to develop improved and safer nuclear power reactors will provide a sound technical basis for improved acceptance of nuclear power, and contribute to a social/political climate more conducive to a resumption of nuclear power growth. The acceptability of nuclear power and advanced reactors to five social/political sectors in the U.S. is examined. Three sectors highly relevant to the prospects for a restart of nuclear power plant construction are the financial sector involved in financing nuclear power plant construction, the federal nuclear regulatory sector, and the national political sector. For this analysis, the general public are divided into two groups: those who are knowledgeable about and involved in nuclear power issues, the involved public, and the much larger body of the general public that is relatively uninvolved in the controversy over nuclear power

  2. Women Making Politics in Rural Senegal

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Prag, Ebbe

    Since the Senegalese local elections in 1996, women have increasingly entered the local political arena in rural councils and municipalities. This book addresses the question of how women act politically, what interests they defend and how they influence resource allocation. The author argues...... that structural changes have opened space for resourceful women to enter local politics. However women's mobilisation does not radically break with the clientelist and factional dynamics of Senegalese politics. Women leaders often start their career in party politics as result of co-optation by male political...... leaders, but they do not continue as passive objects of male manipulation. Senegalese female politicians demonstrate that they are capable of taking up political positions using the local women's groups and the Women's Federation as political backyard and support. They create networks that can...

  3. Political Cynicism and Kynicism of Croatian Citizens. Profiles of Political Thinking and Behavior

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nebojša Blanuša

    2015-10-01

    Full Text Available In the last thirty years uneasiness among scholars and political actors has been growing larger as more citizens demonstrate cynical attitudes. These citizens feel that politicians are immoral and incompetent, have less faith in democracy, and show lower levels of political participation. However, Peter Sloterdijk points out that the dominant view of cynicism is simplified. He divides cynical reason into two separate ways of thinking: cynicism and kynicism. The main difference between them is in individual’s reaction to the cleavage between public ideological mask and individual’s idea of social reality. Cynics persist in keeping the ideological mask on and have an “enlightened false consciousness”, while kynics highlight this cleavage, oppose the dominant ideology and point out misuses of political power. This research was conducted with the goal of creating cynicism and kynicism scales. Their validity was tested for two samples – a smaller sample of students and later on the representative sample of Croatian citizens (N=1002. Also, connection of cynical and kynical thought with an array of relevant political attitudes and political behavior was tested. Results indicate that cynicism and kynicism are relatively separated and coherent types of political thought. Kynicism is primarily related to low trust in political institutions, but also to lower support of democracy. Specific combinations of these two types of thought have a highly negative potential for abandoning the democratic way of thinking. This work offers an empirical confirmation for Sloterdijk’s model, and confirms usefulness of it in understanding political thought and behavior of Croatian citizens.

  4. Political Cynicism and Kynicism of Croatian Citizens. Profiles of Political Thinking and Behavior

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Blanuša, Nebojša

    2015-07-01

    Full Text Available In the last thirty years uneasiness among scholars and political actors has been growing larger as more citizens demonstrate cynical attitudes. These citizens feel that politicians are immoral and incompetent, have less faith in democracy, and show lower levels of political participation. However, Peter Sloterdijk points out that the dominant view of cynicism is simplified. He divides cynical reason into two separate ways of thinking: cynicism and kynicism. The main difference between them is in individual’s reaction to the cleavage between public ideological mask and individual’s idea of social reality. Cynics persist in keeping the ideological mask on and have an “enlightened false consciousness”, while kynics highlight this cleavage, oppose the dominant ideology and point out misuses of political power. This research was conducted with the goal of creating cynicism and kynicism scales. Their validity was tested for two samples – a smaller sample of students and later on the representative sample of Croatian citizens (N=1002. Also, connection of cynical and kynical thought with an array of relevant political attitudes and political behavior was tested. Results indicate that cynicism and kynicism are relatively separated and coherent types of political thought. Kynicism is primarily related to low trust in political institutions, but also to lower support of democracy. Specific combinations of these two types of thought have a highly negative potential for abandoning the democratic way of thinking. This work offers an empirical confirmation for Sloterdijk’s model, and confirms usefulness of it in understanding political thought and behavior of Croatian citizens.

  5. Visual persuasion and politics: ideology and symbols of the totalitarian regimes'--case study: hammer and sickle.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Svilicić, Niksa; Maldini, Pero

    2013-06-01

    Unlike all other autocracies, authoritarian regimes are, as the ultimate form of authoritarianism, a distinct phenomenon of the modern era. Caused by the crisis of liberal democracy and industrial capitalism of the early twentieth century, and led by radical populist political movements/parties and their leaders, they established themselves as the regimes which marked one of the greatest degrees of unfreedom. The article analyzes the specific sociostructural, sociocultural and sociopsychological aspects of the formation of totalitarian regimes (particularly communism), as well as their political system, ideological foundations and modus operandi. In doing so, it particularly emphasizes the dissolution of civil society and its substitution by a political society as a key structural determinant, authoritarianism and fear as a sociopsychological basis, and repression as the functional basis of operation for totalitarian regimes. In that context, it analyzes the political, anthropological and visual aspects of the symbols of totalitarian regimes, their archetypal (mythological, religious, ethnic, cultural, historical) meaning, and explains their function (political, anthropological, sociocultural, and sociopsychological) in the development and preservation of totalitarian regimes. Using the example of the hammer and sickle, a typical symbol of communism, it shows a substantial and communicational (particularly visual) dimension of symbol, by breakdown by the elements of semiotics (signum, designatum, interpretant) and its sub-disciplines (semantics, pragmatics, sintactics). On this basis, it tries to show the decisive power of political symbols over the political perceptions and political behavior of individuals and entire social groups, i.e. their manipulative power by meanings assigned to them by totalitarian authorities and forms of their communication, with the goal of preserving the totalitarian regime.

  6. The News Media as a Political Institution

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Ørsten, Mark; Allern, Sigurd

    2011-01-01

    : what new roles, if any, are news organizations and journalists playing in the political system? What are the characteristics of these new roles, and how do news organizations use their newfound political power? We address these questions in the context of an institutional approach to the news coupled...... with Hallin and Mancini's analysis of media systems....

  7. Language as a Symbol of Identity and a Tool of Politics and Power in Pakistan and Bangladesh

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Rácová Anna

    2016-12-01

    Full Text Available This study aims to demonstrate the roles that domestic and foreign languages have played and play as signs of national or religious identity and social prestige and as tools of political and economic power in multilingual Pakistan and Bangladesh. Before the countries gained independence from the British Empire in 1947 and before the formation of the Indian Union and Pakistan (which was divided into Pakistan and Bangladesh in 1971, the role of an official language, remote to the majority of population in Indian subcontinent, had been gradually played by Sanskrit, Persian, and English. After gaining independence, the new countries decided to replace English as the official language with domestic languages. Their efforts encountered many problems and resulted in various solutions. Urdu became the state language in Pakistan, which caused resistance in local ethnolinguistic groups because the language had been imported by refugees from India. This resistance was the strongest in East Pakistan, where a strong national and language awareness eventually contributed to the formation of an independent Bangladesh with Bengali as the state language. Despite struggle for the dominance of domestic languages, English has preserved its prestigious position both in Pakistan and Bangladesh, as a symbol of higher social position, a language of education and science, and a tool of economic and political power.

  8. A judicial review of political questions under Islamic law

    OpenAIRE

    Abdulfatai O. Sambo; Hunud Abia Kadouf

    2014-01-01

    The contemporary Arab world has witnessed uprisings and turmoil as a result of alleged power-overreaching by political elites. Consequently, people call for democracy with emphasis on constitutionalism, accountability and protection of human rights. Yet, the voice of the judiciary seems not to be heard in championing these values in many Muslim nations despite the clear roles Islam places on the judiciary regarding political matters. This paper therefore analyses the power of judicial review ...

  9. The politics of welfare state retrenchment

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Starke, Peter

    2006-01-01

    Welfare state retrenchment is widely seen as a highly unpopular endeavour and, therefore, as politically difficult to pursue. This assumption has underpinned most of the political science research on this issue, notably Paul Pierson's seminal contributions about the 'new politics of the welfare...... state'. Yet, the question remains why and under what circumstances cutbacks take place in highly developed welfare states despite these formidable political obstacles. This article reviews the literature on the politics of retrenchment, namely on the impact of socio-economic problem pressure, political...... parties, political institutions, welfare state structures and ideas. Most authors agree that socio-economic problems - particularly domestic problems - contribute to an atmosphere of 'permanent austerity' which inspires cutbacks. Moreover, according to most scholars, the extent of retrenchment possible...

  10. Medical schools viewed from a political perspective: how political skills can improve education leadership.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Nordquist, Jonas; Grigsby, R Kevin

    2011-12-01

    Political science offers a unique perspective from which to inform education leadership practice. This article views leadership in the health professions through the lens of political science research and offers suggestions for how theories derived from political science can be used to develop education leadership practice. Political science is rarely used in the health professions education literature. This article illuminates how this discipline can generate a more nuanced understanding of leadership in health professions education by offering a terminology, a conceptual framework and insights derived from more than 80 years of empirical work. Previous research supports the premise that successful leaders have a good understanding of political processes. Studies show current health professional education is characterised by the influence of interest groups. At the same time, the need for urgent reform of health professional education is evident. Terminology, concepts and analytical models from political science can be used to develop the political understanding of education leaders and to ultimately support the necessary changes. The analytical concepts of interest and power are applicable to current health professional education. The model presented - analysing the policy process - provides us with a tool to fine-tune our understanding of leadership challenges and hence to communicate, analyse and create strategies that allow health professional education to better meet tomorrow's challenges. © Blackwell Publishing Ltd 2011.

  11. Affairs of power: Restructuring California's electric utility industry, 1968-1998

    Science.gov (United States)

    Myers, William Allan

    This dissertation studies the process of change in the political economy of electric utilities. Following two decades of continual growth during the nation's post-World War Two economic and population boom, the electric power industry confronted increasing challenges to its traditional operating practices and cultural values, nowhere with greater intensity than in California. Pressure for change came from outside forces who opposed utilities' business practices, assailed their traditional vertically-integrated structure, questioned the political assumptions that sustained their monopoly status, and ultimately wrested away access to the once tightly controlled technology of electric generation and transmission. Because managers of both investor-owned and publicly-owned utilities continued to rely upon long-standing economic and technical assumptions derived from deeply held cultural values sustained by decades of business success, they were rendered unable to comprehend and unwilling to accommodate change. Persistent mistrust between the publicly-owned and privately-owned sectors further weakened the industry's ability to work cooperatively in the face of crucial challenges. Thus encumbered by endemic structural jealousy, technological path dependency, and organizational stasis, the industry did not respond with sufficient innovation to new social values and altering economic conditions, ultimately resulting in the discarding of the old political economy of regulated monopolism. Five precepts of economic history are identified as crucial elements of the process of change. First, the tension between protection and entry, and the related issue of access to technology, contributes to creation and modification of the political economy in which economic institutions function. Second, submission to governmental regulatory powers allows certain industries to control entry, restrict access, and protect themselves from the dynamics of competitive change. Third, an

  12. MAPPING CHILDREN’S POLITICS: SPATIAL STORIES, DIALOGIC RELATIONS AND POLITICAL FORMATION

    Science.gov (United States)

    Elwood, Sarah; Mitchell, Katharyne

    2015-01-01

    This article confronts a persistent challenge in research on children’s geographies and politics: the difficulty of recognizing forms of political agency and practice that by definition fall outside of existing political theory. Children are effectively “always already” positioned outside most of the structures and ideals of modernist democratic theory, such as the public sphere and abstracted notions of communicative action or “rational” speech. Recent emphases on embodied tactics of everyday life have offered important ways to recognize children’s political agency and practice. However, we argue here that a focus on spatial practices and critical knowledge alone cannot capture the full range of children’s politics, and show how representational and dialogic practices remain a critical element of their politics in everyday life. Drawing on de Certeau’s notion of spatial stories, and Bakhtin’s concept of dialogic relations, we argue that children’s representations and dialogues comprise a significant space of their political agency and formation, in which they can make and negotiate social meanings, subjectivities, and relationships. We develop these arguments with evidence from an after-school activity programme we conducted with 10–13 year olds in Seattle, Washington, in which participants explored, mapped, wrote and spoke about the spaces and experiences of their everyday lives. Within these practices, children negotiate autonomy and self-determination, and forward ideas, representations, and expressions of agreement or disagreement that are critical to their formation as political actors. PMID:25642017

  13. The Peronist festival: pathways and appropriations between photography, ephemeral architecture and political power

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Franco Marchionni Sánchez

    2016-08-01

    Full Text Available The aim of this paper is analyzing some of the scenarios, photos, and posters used by the Peronist administration and explain their incidence in wine festivals and their imaginary construction after World War II. This proposal examines the relation between photography and ephemeral architecture mediated by political power, as a part of the strategies developed by the Peronist propaganda apparatus to feed the imaginary surrounding the ‘New Argentina.’ At this particular historical moment, the graphic and photographic records taken into account are a gateway to analyze the ephemeral phenomena that cannot be resumed otherwise. The methodological strategy used is qualitative and exploratory, and its design has a flexible nature. Although these testimonies, reflected in the sources described, do not give us back the possibility of being in direct contact to these experiences, they do allow us to access the set of desires, tensions, frustrations, expectations, debates, the achievements and failures, through which the scenic architecture projects were formulated and developed.   Keywords: Photographic Archives; Ephemeral Architecture; Harvest Festival; Power Relationships; Peronism.   Original title: La fiesta peronista: recorridos y apropiaciones entre fotografía, arquitectura efímera y poder político.

  14. Convincing similar and dissimilar others: the power of language abstraction in political communication.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Menegatti, Michela; Rubini, Monica

    2013-05-01

    Three studies examined the production of political messages and their persuasive impact on recipients as a function of speaker-audience similarity. The first two studies found support for the hypothesis that political leaders (Study 1) and party activists (Study 2) formulate more abstract messages when the audience is politically similar to them than when the audience is dissimilar or heterogeneous. The third study examined the persuasive impact of message abstractness versus concreteness. We predicted and found that abstract messages are more effective in convincing an audience whose political positions are similar to the speaker's and concrete messages are more effective in convincing an audience whose political positions differ from the speaker's or are heterogeneous. Implications of these findings for the relation between language and social cognition are discussed.

  15. Some thoughts on power: International context

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Josifidis Kosta

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available This is a polemical essay that enters into broad dialogue with the contemporary literature concerning the dynamic of power. It refers to the appropriate material and results from the research of different theories. It proposes the constitutive position of the power in the international situation. In contrast to some current theories, we emphasize the importance of the politicoeconomical approach, denoting that only the methodology based on the logics of political economy can explain the dynamics of power in the international context. The main thread of this essay is that the international constellation is not a neutral environment, but a framework that is deeply determined by the power-relations. The central idea is that these relations should be explicated by the complex relationships between freedom and order. We analyze the interaction between the politics and economy as the constitutive feature of the structure of international context. This essay is divided into three sections. First, we are treating the meaning of order in an international context, in respect to the political-economic aspects of late capitalism. The notion of this order has a great importance in the economic reflections. The dynamic of the interconnectedness of global capitalism is examined considering the systematic aspects of power. After that we are analyzing different, and selected, aspects of the international sphere including: the spatiality of the world order, that is, the spatial aspects of the international dynamics in the context of globalization, the convergence or divergence between the capitalist and territorial logic, the “legaleconomic nexus” in international “chain”, the processes of the modification of the forms of competition within recent globalization, and the political-economic conflicts in relation to the regime of economic measurement. Starting with these considerations we explain the current debates on “demondialization”, or the

  16. Political influences in plutonium recycling

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Patak, H.N.

    1982-01-01

    The history of plutonium safeguards is one of political error and misunderstandings, as well as a lack of technical knowledge. Although there was widespread support for preventing the proliferation of nuclear explosives, with over 100 nations signing the Nonproliferation Treaty of 1969, India's 1974 nuclear test brought renewed political activity to prevent another such occurrence. Opposition has been directed only at how to pursue this goal, but the status of four major experiments aimed at minimizing weapons proliferation is one of failure, intensified by a weakening of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). If the link between plutonium power and weapons production can be broken through on-site reprocessing, the situation could improve. One course would be for the nuclear power industry to adopt its own system for safe guarding plutonium

  17. Wind power: breakthrough to global dimensions

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Horrighs, W.

    1996-01-01

    The beginning of the 1980s saw the start of wind-turbine manufacture. Soon it had become a booming industrial sector, thanks mainly to the spirit of some young entrepreneurs and political support in many countries. But the wind-power market has assumed global dimensions and major structural changes have to be faced. (author)

  18. Baudrillard vs. Foucault: revolving conceptions of power in foucaultian writings

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Daniel de Oliveira Gomes

    2016-08-01

    Full Text Available This article aims at investigating, specifically, the critical fixation of author Jean Baudrillard against the idea of power as defended by Michel Foucault. The later – an exponent author from post-structuralism, often studied both by Literature and Law specialists – explored the concept of “micro-physical power”, which sees that all the legal or political discourses could not handle any longer all the possible practices of power acted upon the social subjects, broadening the concept of power in several publications and putting it in the dimension of a new approach. Baudrillard, on the other hand, considers power as a doomed value that is to disappear due to the volatility of politics. We tried to analyze the ideas in the discourse of Baudrillard in the book in which he debated with the ideas of Foucault, Oublier Foucault, in which there was an attempt of dismantling the literature by Foucault about power, explaining this literature as, itself, a spiral generator of power.

  19. Perceptions of political leaders.

    Science.gov (United States)

    David Schmitz, J; Murray, Gregg R

    2017-01-01

    Partisan identification is a fundamental force in individual and mass political behavior around the world. Informed by scholarship on human sociality, coalitional psychology, and group behavior, this research argues that partisan identification, like many other group-based behaviors, is influenced by forces of evolution. If correct, then party identifiers should exhibit adaptive behaviors when making group-related political decisions. The authors test this assertion with citizen assessments of the relative physical formidability of competing leaders, an important adaptive factor in leader evaluations. Using original and novel data collected during the contextually different 2008 and 2012 U.S. presidential elections, as well as two distinct measures obtained during both elections, this article presents evidence that partisans overestimate the physical stature of the presidential candidate of their own party compared with the stature of the candidate of the opposition party. These findings suggest that the power of party identification on political behavior may be attributable to the fact that modern political parties address problems similar to the problems groups faced in human ancestral times.

  20. Political Events through Image and Ritual

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mirela Arsith

    2013-07-01

    Full Text Available Governing people, the manifestation of the political power event creates beliefs and ideas - power which represent variables of belief systems or existing rules in any society. Some promote emancipation, freedom and justice, others propagate retaliation, revenge and oppression. All, however, serve the approaches to mobilize and unite people through images and speech. The image is a global view of the person. It comes from personal experience and from the information received from the media and is the synthesis of all we know, true or false, on the subject which it represents. The citizens perceive the politician, the party, the political organization or institution according to the promoted image. The unique form of political discourse in the minds of the audience induces in the mind of the auditory the faith in the ability of the orator to provide optimal solutions to the problems manifested in the society. The charismatic leader acquires much of his power from the fact that it is perceived by many as being simultaneously above others and as others. The charismatic leader knows that energy of the masses is extracted from the emotions, illusions, beliefs, expectations, ideals and dreams; thus energized, people believe they know who to follow and who to devote.

  1. Building a Tower of Babel? Integrating Core Motivations and Features of Social Structure into the Political Psychology of Political Action

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    van Zomeren, Martijn

    The political psychology of political action provides the potential for building bridges between scholars from different fields. The main aim of this article is to set some baby steps toward building two conceptual bridges by bringing together a core motivation approach to political action with core

  2. Inclusion as political mobilisation

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Kjær, Anne Mette; Muwanga, Nansozi

    2016-01-01

    constituencies. Finally, there is relatively weak pressure to push through education quality-enhancing reforms, be it from civil society in general, powerful interest groups, or parliament. At the local level, we find that how a school is situated within local elite networks is important in explaining local...... to implement qualityenhancing policies, first, because the formal and informal governance arrangements allow for a system of decentralised rent management that serves to appease lower level factions. Secondly, the NRM government is caught in the rhetoric of allowing free education in an appeal to rural......Uganda has been successful in broadening access to education. However, this achievement has been undermined by low literacy and numeracy levels and high drop-out rates. A political settlement perspective sheds light on the politics of education reforms. We find that there are weak political drives...

  3. Political significance of knowledge in Southeast Europe.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Slaus, Ivo

    2003-02-01

    The processes of globalization and transition are inevitable, full of dangers and threats, but offer enormous opportunities. Surveys of public opinion show that citizens are not aware of the fact that their countries are governed by the will of the people and a large majority considers that their country and the world are not going in the right direction. Presently, knowledge is becoming a dominant political power. This article outlines a strategy for building a knowledge-based society to minimize dangers, avoid threats, and take advantage of most of the opportunities, bringing a concrete action plan for Croatia, applicable to countries with similar history and socioeconomic structure.

  4. How extractive industries affect health: Political economy underpinnings and pathways.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Schrecker, Ted; Birn, Anne-Emanuelle; Aguilera, Mariajosé

    2018-06-07

    A systematic and theoretically informed analysis of how extractive industries affect health outcomes and health inequities is overdue. Informed by the work of Saskia Sassen on "logics of extraction," we adopt an expansive definition of extractive industries to include (for example) large-scale foreign acquisitions of agricultural land for export production. To ground our analysis in concrete place-based evidence, we begin with a brief review of four case examples of major extractive activities. We then analyze the political economy of extractivism, focusing on the societal structures, processes, and relationships of power that drive and enable extraction. Next, we examine how this global order shapes and interacts with politics, institutions, and policies at the state/national level contextualizing extractive activity. Having provided necessary context, we posit a set of pathways that link the global political economy and national politics and institutional practices surrounding extraction to health outcomes and their distribution. These pathways involve both direct health effects, such as toxic work and environmental exposures and assassination of activists, and indirect effects, including sustained impoverishment, water insecurity, and stress-related ailments. We conclude with some reflections on the need for future research on the health and health equity implications of the global extractive order. Copyright © 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.

  5. The issue of political behaviour in contemporary bio-political discourse

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    A. Y. Kravets

    2016-11-01

    . So, the political and social behavior of «Homo Politicus» depends not only on his biological factors, such as inclination to the biological adaptation, creation of hierarchical structure, social and political domination and subjugation, but also on social factors as well, such as language, culture, morale and so on. In this case, the human brain comes out as a center of formation of political behavior and awareness of «Homo Politicus» himself and his actions.

  6. Positive politics: playing corporate games with personal integrity.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ogborn, S E

    1992-12-01

    The desire for power is personal. Competence and political intelligence are the prerequisites for handling power in a healthy manner. Politics is not a nasty word or a set of behaviors that inevitably turns you into a shady character of whom your mother would be ashamed. You need never divorce your own morality from the situation. The choice to improve your political functioning is yours. You always retain the right to play, and you retain the right to decide when to play. But you are a better manager, a better professional, and a more educated person if you can identify what others are doing and how their behavior will impact you. It is not just for success, it is for survival--success and survival on your own terms.

  7. Dark Triad, Perceptions of Organizational Politics and Counterproductive Work Behaviors: The Moderating Effect of Political Skills

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Muhammad A. Baloch

    2017-11-01

    Full Text Available The aim of this work focuses on the relationship among the Dark Triad (psychopathy, narcissism, and Machiavellianism, perceptions of organizational politics, political skills, and counterproductive work behavior. This study empirically tests the mediating role of perceptions of organizational politics in the relationship between the Dark Triad and counterproductive work behavior. Furthermore, the study investigates the moderating role of political skills in strengthening the link between the Dark Triad and the perceptions of organizational politics. A sample of 149 participants was randomly selected. To analyze the data of the present work, we employed a structural equation model using partial least square and PROCESS. From empirical findings, we imply an inference that perception of organizational politics partially mediates the Dark Triad's influence on the counterproductive work behavior. Moreover, the results identify the moderating role of political skills in strengthening the link between the Dark Triad and the perceptions of organizational politics. Empirical findings suggest important policy implications for the hospitality industry.

  8. Dark Triad, Perceptions of Organizational Politics and Counterproductive Work Behaviors: The Moderating Effect of Political Skills

    Science.gov (United States)

    Baloch, Muhammad A.; Meng, Fanchen; Xu, Zefeng; Cepeda-Carrion, Ignacio; Danish; Bari, Muhammad W.

    2017-01-01

    The aim of this work focuses on the relationship among the Dark Triad (psychopathy, narcissism, and Machiavellianism), perceptions of organizational politics, political skills, and counterproductive work behavior. This study empirically tests the mediating role of perceptions of organizational politics in the relationship between the Dark Triad and counterproductive work behavior. Furthermore, the study investigates the moderating role of political skills in strengthening the link between the Dark Triad and the perceptions of organizational politics. A sample of 149 participants was randomly selected. To analyze the data of the present work, we employed a structural equation model using partial least square and PROCESS. From empirical findings, we imply an inference that perception of organizational politics partially mediates the Dark Triad's influence on the counterproductive work behavior. Moreover, the results identify the moderating role of political skills in strengthening the link between the Dark Triad and the perceptions of organizational politics. Empirical findings suggest important policy implications for the hospitality industry. PMID:29167654

  9. Dark Triad, Perceptions of Organizational Politics and Counterproductive Work Behaviors: The Moderating Effect of Political Skills.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Baloch, Muhammad A; Meng, Fanchen; Xu, Zefeng; Cepeda-Carrion, Ignacio; Danish; Bari, Muhammad W

    2017-01-01

    The aim of this work focuses on the relationship among the Dark Triad (psychopathy, narcissism, and Machiavellianism), perceptions of organizational politics, political skills, and counterproductive work behavior. This study empirically tests the mediating role of perceptions of organizational politics in the relationship between the Dark Triad and counterproductive work behavior. Furthermore, the study investigates the moderating role of political skills in strengthening the link between the Dark Triad and the perceptions of organizational politics. A sample of 149 participants was randomly selected. To analyze the data of the present work, we employed a structural equation model using partial least square and PROCESS. From empirical findings, we imply an inference that perception of organizational politics partially mediates the Dark Triad's influence on the counterproductive work behavior. Moreover, the results identify the moderating role of political skills in strengthening the link between the Dark Triad and the perceptions of organizational politics. Empirical findings suggest important policy implications for the hospitality industry.

  10. Imaginary politics: Climate change and making the future

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Manjana Milkoreit

    2017-11-01

    Full Text Available Climate change places major transformational demands on modern societies. Transformations require the capacity to collectively envision and meaningfully debate realistic and desirable futures. Without such a collective imagination capacity and active deliberation processes, societies lack both the motivation for change and guidance for decision-making in a certain direction of change. Recent arguments that science fiction can play a role in societal transformation processes is not yet supported by theory or empirical evidence. Advancing the argument that fiction can support sustainability transformations, this paper makes four contributions. First, building on the imaginary concept, I introduce and define the idea of socio-climatic imaginaries. Second, I develop a theory of imagination as linked cognitive-social processes that enable the creation of collectively shared visions of future states of the world. This theory addresses the dynamics that bridge imagination processes in the individual mind and collective imagining that informs social and political decision-making. Third, emphasizing the political nature of creating and contesting imaginaries in a society, I introduce the role of power and agency in this theory of collective imagination. I argue that both ideational and structural power concepts are relevant for understanding the potential societal influence of climate fiction. Finally, the paper illuminates these different forms of transformational power and agency with two brief case studies: two climate fiction novels. I contrast a dystopian and utopian science fiction novel – Paolo Bacigalupi’s The Water Knife (2015 and Kim Stanley Robinson's Green Earth (2015. The two books are very similar in their power/agency profile, but the comparison provides initial insights into the different roles of optimistic and pessimistic future visions.

  11. Politics at its end

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Proske, R.

    1992-01-01

    The author sees politics describing towards its end under the impact of the development science, technology and the economy have undergone. One of the signposts on this road of change has been the discovery of nuclear fission, leading to a revolution in the field of science, and developments such as the atomic bomb and, later on, the peaceful uses of nuclear energy, with technological development contributing the safe and economically operating reactors for power generation. In the eyes of the author, politics has little to contribute to solving the biggest problems of the future, which are the population explosion, and the global climate change caused by man-made emissions of trace gases. In order to tackle the climate problem, there is urgent need for a drastic outback in the consumption of fossil fuels, although renewable energy sources have not yet become reality to count on, the hydrogen economy still being just a hope, - so that nuclear power may be gaining second wind. (HP) [de

  12. New technology and organizational innovation: Niagara Mohawk Power Corporation and nuclear power

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Stacey, J.E. Jr.

    1981-01-01

    Questions with regard to organization behavior and decision theory are explored in relation to the decision-making process of a major private electric utility, Niagara Mohawk Power Corp., that chose to innovate with nuclear power. The character of the firm is such, relative to size, service area, organizational structure, and socio-political environment, that its experience is important for the further development of theories of organizational innovation. The research attempts to understand the political, economic, and social constraints that limited the set of solutions available to the utility in its search for a suitable electricity-generating mode from the early 1950's to the early 1960's. Two contrasting models of organizational decision-making behavior are used to interpret case-study findings. The initial model is from the electric-utility literature and consists essentially of an economic or benefit/cost model of organizational decision making. The second model is developed from the organizational theory literature and is more complex in the sense that factors other than economics such as organizational inertia, the corporate structure of the utility, fuel-supply history and fuel diversification, electricity-demand-growth expectations, the financial environment, and the psychological appeal of the new technology had important influences on Niagara Mohawk's decision to build Nine Mile Point One. Findings of the case study tend to support the second model in that economics was a necessary but not sufficient reason for Niagara Mohawk to have innovated with nuclear power plants

  13. Nuclear politics: Exploring the nexus between citizens movements and public policy in Japan

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Tabusa, K.

    1992-01-01

    This dissertation analyzes the relationship between the grass-roots antinuclear movement and nuclear energy policy in Japan. In particular, it seeks to explain the lack of impact of the grass-roots antinuclear movement on Japanese nuclear energy policymaking. To explain the lack of political pressure exerted, the author focuses on the lack of open-quotes political opportunitiesclose quotes for the movement. Past studies on antinuclear movements and nuclear energy policymaking of the Western countries indicate that such opportunities are provided in the processes of parliamentary politics, bureaucratic rivalries, central-local governmental conflicts, and judicial intervention in the resolution of political conflicts. The author's study argues that closed political opportunity structure of the Japanese political system has separated the grass-roots antinuclear movement from the national nuclear energy policymaking process by imposing constraints on the development and achievement of the movement. The research shows that: (1) the nature of party conflicts (balance of power and idealogy) in the Japanese parliament tends to discourage the representation of antinuclear interests by opposition parties; (2) the government has successfully prevented antinuclear groups from interfering with the licensing and regulatory processes; and (3) the local governments and courts have failed to intervene in the nuclear energy conflict on behalf of antinuclear groups. The closed opportunity structure has also led the movement to stress the mobilization of public opinion rather than manipulation of institutional access to the policymaking process as its strategy. In addition to well-publicized protest activities and mass demonstrations, electoral campaigns and litigation have also become activities primarily designed to appeal to the public, which has so far failed to indicate strong support for the antinuclear movement

  14. Theorising Media, Power and Politics in Discourse Theory and Framing Studies

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Dindler, Camilla; Roslyng, Mette Marie

    The development of digital media has profound consequences for social and political interaction and, therefore, a new radical interactivity also influences the way in which media can be theorised and analysed? (Couldry, 2012, p. 2). As pointed out by Hall (2006) and others, media discourse may...... either contribute to or challenge the current status quo. Likewise, media framing studies indicate that the media may play an independent political role in terms of raising, shaping and morally judging issues of civic relevance (Entman, 2004). Framing and discourse theory have overlapping as well...... as different trajectories in empirical studies of mediated political communication. Both perspectives bear upon constructivist and critical thinking concerning the role of media in society (Gitlin 1980) and previous studies of media content have even sometimes conflated the terms discourse and frame...

  15. Political electricity

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Price, Terence.

    1990-01-01

    This book is a non-technical exploration of the political and policy issues that have influenced the development of nuclear power. Part One describes the successes, failures, horse-trading, and infighting that make up nuclear power's history, taking nine counties as examples. Part Two reviews the main problems that now confront us, as seen in mid-June 1990; like all contemporary accounts, the book is unavoidably incomplete. However, by then it was possible to make provisional judgements about two very important recent influences: the political consequences of Chernobyl, and concerns about the greenhouse effect. The story that emerges is of a nuclear industry that has rarely been guilty of dereliction of duty, though it was undeniably complacent in not addressing sooner the causes of the public's entirely reasonable anxieties. The anti-nuclear lobby has been skilled in debate, and sometimes extraordinarily percipient; but less than fair in failing to acknowledge the industry's achievements and its willingness to learn from past mistakes. As for the politicians, the book contains many examples that show how the flames of controversy can be deliberately fanned when there are votes to be gained. The story has few heroes, but within the industry fewer villains than the public has been led to believe. (author)

  16. Peaceful atoms in agriculture and food: how the politics of the Cold War shaped agricultural research using isotopes and radiation in post war divided Germany.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zachmann, Karin

    2015-01-01

    During the Cold War, the super powers advanced nuclear literacy and access to nuclear resources and technology to a first-class power factor. Both national governments and international organizations developed nuclear programs in a variety of areas and promoted the development of nuclear applications in new environments. Research into the use of isotopes and radiation in agriculture, food production, and storage gained major importance as governments tried to promote the possibility of a peaceful use of atomic energy. This study is situated in divided Germany as the intersection of the competing socio-political systems and focuses on the period of the late 1940s and 1950s. It is argued that political interests and international power relations decisively shaped the development of "nuclear agriculture". The aim is to explore whether and how politicians in both parts of the divided country fostered the new field and exerted authority over the scientists. Finally, it examines the ways in which researchers adapted to the altered political conditions and expectations within the two political structures, by now fundamentally different.

  17. Nuclear power prospects

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Staebler, K.

    1994-01-01

    The technical, economic and political prospects of nuclear power are described with regard to ecological aspects. The consensus talks, which failed in spite of the fact that they were stripped of emotional elements and in spite of major concessions on the part of the power industry, are discussed with a view to the political and social conditions. (orig.) [de

  18. Mixing politics and crime

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Munksgaard, Rasmus; Demant, Jakob Johan

    2016-01-01

    Background Dread Pirate Roberts, founder of the first cryptomarket for illicit drugs named Silk Road, articulated libertarian political motives for his ventures. Previous research argues that there is a significant political component present or involved in cryptomarket drug dealing which...... is specifically libertarian. The aim of the paper is to investigate the prevalence of political discourses within discussions of cryptomarket drug dealing, and further to research the potential changes of these over the timespan of the study. Methods We develop a novel operationalization of discourse analytic...... concepts which we combine with topic modelling enabling us to study how politics are articulated on cryptomarket forums. We apply the Structural Topic Model on a corpus extracted from crawls of cryptomarket forums encompassing posts dating from 2011 to 2015. Results The topics discussed on cryptomarket...

  19. Power and Politics in the Global Health Landscape: Beliefs, Competition and Negotiation Among Global Advocacy Coalitions in the Policy-Making Process

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Lori McDougall

    2016-05-01

    Full Text Available Background Advocacy coalitions play an increasingly prominent role within the global health landscape, linking actors and institutions to attract political attention and resources. This paper examines how coalitions negotiate among themselves and exercise hidden forms of power to produce policy on the basis of their beliefs and strategic interests. Methods This paper examines the beliefs and behaviours of health advocacy coalitions using Sabatier’s Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF as an informal theoretical lens. Coalitions are further explored in relation to the concept of transnational advocacy networks (Keck and Sikkink and of productive power (Shiffman. The ACF focuses on explaining how policy change takes place when there is conflict concerning goals and technical approaches among different actors. This study uses participant observation methods, self-reported survey results and semistructured qualitative interviews to trace how a major policy project of the Millennium Development Goal (MDG era, the Global Strategy for Women’s and Children’s Health, was constructed through negotiations among maternal, newborn, and child health (MNCH and sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR advocacy coalitions. Results The Global Strategy represented a new opportunity for high-level political attention. Despite differing policy beliefs, MNCH and SRHR actors collaborated to produce this strategy because of anticipated gains in political attention. While core beliefs did not shift fundamentally and collaboration was primarily a short-term tactical response to a time-bound opportunity, MNCH actors began to focus more on human rights perspectives and SRHR actors adopted greater use of quantifiable indicators and economic argumentation. This shift emphasises the inherent importance of SRHR to maternal and child health survival. Conclusion As opportunities arise, coalitions respond based on principles and policy beliefs, as well as to perceptions

  20. Party-political and electoral system of Uruguay

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Samuel Decresci

    2015-06-01

    Full Text Available The Oriental Republic of Uruguay is seen by many as a pioneer among Latin American nations to modernize its state and its policy. Since the late nineteenth century to the twentieth, Uruguayan political actors operate significant changes such as the separation of church and state, labor regulation, divorce law, women's vote, etc. Because of this and the progressive modernization, it was called the “Switzerland of the Americas”. Today, it still stands out in this area by regularizing abortion, homoaffective marriage, liberalization and access to marijuana. Moreover, noteworthy that such measures were achieved largely because of governance that the executive enjoys in the midst of this political system. Thus, this work aims to analyze such Uruguayan political system. In short, a political system is understood by the government system, the electoral system and the party system. That said, it will be analyzed in the political scenario of the country, their characteristics, party and election rules, political parties, party dynamics and relations between the powers.

  1. Faithless: The politics of new atheism

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Steven Kettell

    2013-11-01

    Full Text Available The emergence of ‘new atheism’ during the course of the last decade helped fuel an upsurge of interest in issues around religion. But scholarly analysis of new atheism, particularly its political dimensions, remains embryonic. This paper addresses this lacuna by examining the politics of new atheism across a variety of themes related to politics. These include the causal factors underpinning its emergence and development, its organisational structure and composition, the political strategies pursued by its proponents, and the various internal tensions and conflicts that these dynamics have produced.

  2. The politics and power in caregiving for identity: insights for Indian residential school truth and reconciliation.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kershaw, Paul; Harkey, Tammy

    2011-01-01

    The authors examine the politics of caregiving for identity to enrich scholarship about power. They report on a qualitative study with Aboriginal mothers who parent in the wake of the Canadian Indian residential schools (IRS). Just as this system disrupted familial caregiving to assimilate Aboriginal Peoples, data show some mothers now strive to organize their caregiving in ways that serve decolonization and community empowerment. Building on their expertise, the authors argue that counter-colonial family policy investments to support such caregiving should factor in any just compensation for the IRS system if its population, and not just individual, costs are to be redressed.

  3. Political electricity: What future for nuclear energy

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Price, T.

    1993-01-01

    Political Electricity first reviews the history of nuclear power development in nine countries (USA, France, Japan, UK, West Germany, Sweden, Italy, Switzerland, Australia). Second the book analyses major issues shaping the future of the industry: nuclear power economincs, nuclear hazards, alternative energy economics, and greenhouse gas constraints

  4. Arms control: moral, political and historical lesson

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Thompson, K.W.

    1990-01-01

    Many of the world's most influential policy-makers and analysts view arms control as a scientific and technological problem. They measure a nation's nuclear power exclusively by megatonnage and throw-weights leaving the intangible elements of military and political power to philosophers and historians. They tend to ignore the human and qualitative aspects of power. This is a book that shift the emphasis to aspects of the nuclear problem which are sometimes overlooked. Basically, these elements are bound up in the moral, political, and historical lessons of the nuclear age. Nonquantitative factors have been central to studies of national defense and military power since the rise of the modern nation state system. However, most students of present-day nuclear weapons tend to stress their revolutionary character. Because they are considered wholly unique, analysts tend to write about them in a historical and apolitical terms. One purpose of the collection of papers in this little volume is to redirect attention to the moral, political, and historical lessons that the nuclear age presents. What most distinguishes the writings of contributors to this volume is their use of certain well-established principles and concepts long acknowledged in military and foreign policy analysis. Thus Father Hehir asks many of the same questions that students of ethics and foreign policy have asked for four hundred years

  5. The end of nuclear power? The conflict of politics, ecology and law

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Strassburg, W.

    1999-01-01

    The German federal government's demand to opt out of the peaceful use of nuclear power is examined under aspects of constitutional law. Constitutional barriers allow the peaceful use of nuclear power to be discontinued without any compensation only in the distant future. A general restriction of the useful life of plants does not constitute a modification of ownership rights but deprivation, i.e., expropriation. In this politically desired opt-out, the government also must bear in mind that the constitution protects not only the property but also the freedom to exercise their profession (Article 12, para. 1, German Basic Law) of all those who have been committed to this industry for decades. Also a national ban on reprocessing with transborder effects violates existing law, counteracting the requirement of a free exchange of goods and services within the single European market. Moreover, the existing reprocessing contracts with foreign companies may be terminated unilaterally only subject to indemnification, as they constitute obligations under international law, unless German customers were to exercise their contractual right to cancel. In addition, it is to be feared that discontinuation of the peaceful uses of nuclear power manifests itself in the absence of provisions for the back end of the fuel cycle. Prolonging the exploration of repositories and, consequently, relying more and more heavily on interim stores, is bound to raise the question of the evidence of spent fuel and waste management in these latter facilities. In the absence of sufficient proof of waste management provisions in interim stores, the accusation could be leveled that it was not certain whether these interim stores were not turning into final stores. (orig.) [de

  6. Educating Voters: Political Education in Norwegian Upper-Secondary Schools

    Science.gov (United States)

    Borhaug, Kjetil

    2008-01-01

    Research on political education in schools suggests that an emphasis on formal structure, constitutional principles, formal citizen rights, and debates on current issues is common. The Norwegian national curriculum on political education envisions a different political education emphasizing that students should be critical of political life and…

  7. The organization of executive power in Spain (1808 -1810. Reflections on an unedited text by Jovellanos

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ignacio Fernández Sarasola

    2011-12-01

    Full Text Available The discovery of an unpublished document written by Jovellanos about the organization of the Presidency of the Junta Central allows for a reassessment of his relevance in the configuration of the executive power during the early years after the War of Independence. After explaining where the document was found, as well as confirming its authorship and when it was written, I will analyze the document’s context. The conclusion of this analysis is that many of the measures relevant to the structure of the Junta Central came from Jovellanos, who wanted said organization to be able to exercise genuine political power, yet to be organized in the most convenient way in order to be able to reflect upon the political and administrative reforms once the Cortes met. Throughout the study, I will show how Jovellanos tried to reflect his political theories on sovereignty and the separation of powers in the structure of the Junta Central, but also how he altered his initial beliefs due to the convulsive political situation in Spain during the War of Independence. Additionally, it will be shown that the blueprint of internal executive power obligated Jovellanos to also define the competencies of the future Regency, of the Juntas Provinciales and even of the monarch himself. This work employs a methodology typical to constitutional history, integrating an analysis of political thought, the contents of law and institutional development. In order to create this document, direct sources have been primarily used, many of which are relatively unknown.

  8. Examining work structure in nuclear power plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Bauman, M.B.; Boulette, M.D.; Van Cott, H.P.

    1985-01-01

    This paper describes the assessment of the work structure of ten nuclear power plants. Work structure factors are those factors that relate to the way in which work at all levels in a plant is organized, staffed, managed, rewarded, and perceived by plant personnel. Questionnaires given to a cross-section of personnel at the plants were the primary source of data collection. Structured ''critical incident'' interviews were conducted to verify the questionnaire results. The study revealed that a variety of work structure factor problem areas do exist in nuclear power plants. The paper highlights a prioritized set of candidate research themes to be considered in EPRI's Work Structure and Performance Research Program

  9. The socio-political economy of nuclear energy in China and India

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Sovacool, Benjamin K. [Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore, 469C Bukit Timah Road Singapore 259772 (Singapore); Valentine, Scott Victor [Graduate School of Public Policy, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033 (Japan)

    2010-09-15

    This article investigates forms of social, political, and economic organization conducive to nuclear power expansion. We begin by developing a theoretical framework of nuclear socio-political economy based primarily upon the evolution of nuclear energy in France. This framework posits that (1) strong state involvement in guiding economic development, (2) centralization of national energy planning, (3) campaigns to link technological progress to a national revitalization, (4) influence of technocratic ideology on policy decisions, (5) subordination of challenges to political authority, and (6) low levels of civic activism are influential factors in supporting development of nuclear power. Accordingly, we seek to verify the causal properties of these six catalysts for nuclear power expansion in two nations - India and China - that are on the brink of becoming major nuclear powers. We validate our framework by confirming the presence of the six catalysts during the initial nuclear power developmental periods in each country. We also apply our framework as a predictive tool by considering how present conditions in the two nations will impact nuclear power development trends. We conclude by highlighting the emergence of a potential seventh catalyst - the influence of greenhouse gas emission abatement policy on nuclear power development. (author)

  10. The socio-political economy of nuclear energy in China and India

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Sovacool, Benjamin K.; Valentine, Scott Victor

    2010-01-01

    This article investigates forms of social, political, and economic organization conducive to nuclear power expansion. We begin by developing a theoretical framework of nuclear socio-political economy based primarily upon the evolution of nuclear energy in France. This framework posits that (1) strong state involvement in guiding economic development, (2) centralization of national energy planning, (3) campaigns to link technological progress to a national revitalization, (4) influence of technocratic ideology on policy decisions, (5) subordination of challenges to political authority, and (6) low levels of civic activism are influential factors in supporting development of nuclear power. Accordingly, we seek to verify the causal properties of these six catalysts for nuclear power expansion in two nations - India and China - that are on the brink of becoming major nuclear powers. We validate our framework by confirming the presence of the six catalysts during the initial nuclear power developmental periods in each country. We also apply our framework as a predictive tool by considering how present conditions in the two nations will impact nuclear power development trends. We conclude by highlighting the emergence of a potential seventh catalyst - the influence of greenhouse gas emission abatement policy on nuclear power development.

  11. Politeness Strategies Used in Text Messaging

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Shahrzad Eshghinejad

    2016-03-01

    Full Text Available One aspect of short message service (SMS communication through a cell phone is use of politeness strategies. As it is extensively argued that females are more polite language users, the present study sought to describe the strategies used by these two groups and to find out whether there is any significant difference between male and female English as a foreign language (EFL learners in the use of positive and negative politeness strategies in sending SMS to their professors, considering that there is an asymmetric power relation and social distance between them. To this end, a corpus of 300 L1 (Persian and L2 (English request messages was compiled. Results of qualitative and quantitative data analysis showed no significant difference between the two groups. Results of the study have implication in politeness research.

  12. FROM CONVENIENT HIBERNATION TO CIRCUMSTANTIAL DESPERATION: HATE SPEECH, PARTY POLITICAL COMMUNICATION AND THE NIGERIA’S 2015 GENERAL ELECTIONS

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mike Omilusi

    2018-02-01

    Full Text Available Until a few months to the 2015 general elections, many political parties that have conveniently hibernated for a better part of their existence, perhaps owing to lack of proper organizational structure or support base, uncoordinated programmes or were registered because of pecuniary gains or admittance of anticipated poor electoral outing, suddenly began to jostle for political space. The main opposition party and the ruling party were either perfecting a merger processes or engulfed in internal wrangling such that communication with the electorate on fundamental issues became inconsequential. In fact, the two dominant parties, the Peoples Democratic Party and All Progressive Congress only produced their presidential candidates less than five months to the election; and the electoral campaign assumed desperate contestation in a climate of prejudice and intolerance. Hate speeches and violence were the hallmarks of their electoral campaigns. The 2015 general elections therefore, offer a unique context to interrogate the place of party political communication in an emerging democracy and specifically how hate campaigns among political gladiators/contending parties could generate violence, and if not tamed, derail democratic consolidation. This essay affirms that hate speech is not only inspired by some social circumstances but also part of a general democratic process. It attests to the fact that Nigerian politicians have become more desperate and daring in taking and retaining political power; and more intolerant of opposition, criticism and efforts at replacing them. Relying extensively on secondary sources with the aid of descriptive and narrative tools, this essay concludes that the political culture of a country determines the behavior and attitude of the population towards the political system and that democratic transition from one administration to another, particularly in emerging democracies, has often been accompanied by violence

  13. On Political Islam in Palestine

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Egor A. Stepkin

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available Abstract: This article deals with analyzing the place and the political Islam occupies on the Palestinian territories. The author tries to prove that despite the “Arab spring” and growing popularity of Islamism in the neighbor Arab countries its popular support among Palestinians is low. The main reason for this is Israeli total control of political, economic and - partially - social processes taking place in the West Bank. Position of the officials in Ramallah who together with Tel-Aviv strictly contain spread of Islamism throughout the West Bank also has a strong suppressing effect. Central Palestinian leadership may be called one of the few secular political establishments that are still in power in the Arab countries. The main explanation for this is the desire to make a positive effect on the international community, which Palestine totally depends on in political and financial terms. Also one should keep in mind secular beliefs of the current political elite in Palestine. President Mahmoud Abbas with his counterparts from FATAH and PLO represent old type of Arab nationalist politicians, almost all of who were stripped from power after the beginning of “Arab spring” in 2011. Finally, Palestinian society itself still feels united by the idea of national liberation from the Israeli occupation. This helps Palestinians to put aside the issue of religious self-identification. According to the surveys, most of Palestinians still rank their national identity number while describing their identity, while religion comes only second (despite the strong stable tendency for growing Islamization of their views. The only Palestinian enclave where political Islam has gained ground is isolated Gaza Strip. However ruling there “Islamic Resistance Movement” (HAMAS, despite declared anti-Zionism and Islamism, in reality show pragmatic readiness for certain coordination of its actions with Israel and central government in Ramallah. Nowadays one can

  14. Political Microcultures: Linking Civic Life and Democratic Discourse

    Science.gov (United States)

    Perrin, Andrew J.

    2005-01-01

    At the core of democratic citizenship is deliberation: citizens' tendency and capacity for debating issues of common importance. This study considers civic organizations--often found to be political mobilizers--as political microcultures: environments for political discourse that structure participants' understanding of the practice of…

  15. Workplace Bullying, Power and Organizational Politics: A study of the Portuguese Banking sector

    OpenAIRE

    Ana Teresa Verdasca

    2011-01-01

    This paper tries to shed light about the political dimension of workplace bullying through the quantitative analysis of work environment factors, like perceptions of organizational politics, work overload and internal competition, and the qualitative analysis of accounts of respondents to a questionnaire launched in the Portuguese banking sector. Our sample is made up of 561 valid responses containing 64 stories of bullying episodes and, in the qualitative data, political behaviours occur ass...

  16. Law, Contestation, and Power in the Global Political Economy: An Introduction.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Edward S. Cohen

    2013-10-01

    Full Text Available The papers included in this collection are part of concerted project to develop a political economy of law in the contemporary global system. Over the past two decades, scholars have noted the expanding role of law, legal institutions, and legal agents that have been part of the process of “globalization,” and have employed a number of frameworks to make sense of this process of legalization. A central theme of our project is that none of these frameworks has provided an adequate political economic analysis of the creation, diffusion, and use of law, and we present an alternative approach to advance the understanding of the turn to law across the many dimensions and sectors of the global system. The papers advance the analysis behind this approach and explore the various ways in which law matters in a variety of areas, including global finance, corporate governance, copyright, diplomacy, and the provision of security. Their goal is to advance our understanding of how law intersects with the mobilization of power in the construction of the contemporary political economy. Los trabajos incluidos en esta colección son parte de un proyecto conjunto para desarrollar una economía política de la ley en el sistema mundial contemporáneo. En las últimas dos décadas, los expertos han señalado el creciente papel de la ley, las instituciones legales, y los agentes judiciales que han sido parte del proceso de "globalización", y han empleado una serie de marcos para dar sentido a este proceso de legalización. Un tema central de nuestro proyecto es que ninguno de estos marcos ha proporcionado un adecuado análisis económico político de la creación, difusión y uso de la ley, y se presenta un enfoque alternativo para avanzar en la comprensión de la vuelta a la ley a través de las muchas dimensiones y sectores del sistema global. Los trabajos avanzan el análisis de este enfoque y exploran las diversas formas en que la ley importa en una variedad

  17. Bangladesh pharmaceutical policy and politics.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Reich, M R

    1994-06-01

    An analysis of the politics of Bangladesh pharmaceutical policy in the 1980s shows how significant health policy reforms in developing countries depend on political conditions both inside and outside the country. Bangladesh's drug policy of 1982 illustrates that governments can sometimes change public policy in ways unfavourable to multinational corporations, while the failed health policy reform of 1990 shows that reforms unfavourable to powerful domestic interest groups can be more difficult to achieve, even contributing to a government's downfall. The case provides evidence of basic changes in how the international agenda for health policy is set, especially the growing role of non-governmental organizations in international agencies and national policy debates. Understanding the political patterns of policy reform in Bangladesh has important implications for strategies to affect health policy in developing countries.

  18. The Routledge Handbook of Scandinavian Politics

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Scandinavian politics today through a series of cutting-edge chapters. It will be a key reference point both for advanced-level students developing knowledge about the subject, as well as researchers producing new material in the area and beyond. It brings geographical scope and depth, with comparative...... chapters contributed by experts across the region. Methodologically and theoretically pluralistic, the handbook is in itself a reflection of the field of political science in Scandinavia and the diversity of the issues covered in the volume. The Routledge Handbook of Scandinavian Politics......The Routledge Handbook of Scandinavian Politics is a comprehensive overview of Scandinavian politics provided by leading experts in the field and covering the polity, the politics and the policy of Scandinavia. Coherently structured with a multi-level thematic approach, it explains and details...

  19. Structural design of nuclear power plant using stiffened steel plate concrete structure

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Moon, Ilhwan; Kim, Sungmin; Mun, Taeyoup; Kim, Keunkyeong; Sun, Wonsang

    2009-01-01

    Nuclear power is an alternative energy source that is conducive to mitigate the environmental strains. The countries having nuclear power plants are encouraging research and development sector to find ways to construct safer and more economically feasible nuclear power plants. Modularization using Steel Plate Concrete(SC) structure has been proposed as a solution to these efforts. A study of structural modules using SC structure has been performed for shortening of construction period and enhancement of structural safety of NPP structures in Korea. As a result of the research, the design code and design techniques based on limit state design method has been developed. The design code has been developed through various structural tests and theoretical studies, and it has been modified by application design of SC structure for NPP buildings. The code consists of unstiffened SC wall design, stiffened SC wall design, Half-SC slab design, stud design, connection design and so on. The stiffened steel plate concrete(SSC) wall is SC structure whose steel plates with ribs are composed on both sides of the concrete wall, and this structure was developed for improved constructability and safety of SC structure. This paper explains a design application of SC structure for a sample building specially devised to reflect all of major structural properties of main buildings of APR1400. In addition, Stiffening effect of SSC structure is evaluated and structural efficiency of SSC structure is verified in comparison with that of unstiffened SC structure. (author)

  20. A new switched power linac structure

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Villa, F.

    1989-03-01

    A new pulse power structure has been described that utilizes an easily accessible rectilinear switch. The new structure is more ''forgiving'' (as far as risetime is concerned) than the radial line transformer, and contains fewer switching structures/unit length. The combination of the new structure with the switch proposed seems to offer interesting possibilities for a future linear collider. 13 refs., 6 figs., 2 tabs

  1. RATU - Nuclear power plant structural safety research programme

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Rintamaa, R.

    1992-07-01

    Studies on the structural materials in nuclear power plants create the experimental data and background information necessary for the structural integrity assessments of mechanical components. The research is carried out by developing experimental fracture mechanics methods including statistical analysis methods of materials property data, and by studying material ageing and, in particular, mechanisms of material deterioration due to neutron irradiation, corrosion and water chemistry. Besides material studies, new testing methods and sensors for measurement of loading and water chemistry parameters have been developed. The monitoring data obtained in real power plants has been used to simulate more precisely the real environment during laboratory tests. The research on structural analysis has focused on extending and verifying the analysis capabilities for structural assessments of nuclear power plants. A widely applicable system including various computational fracture assessment methods has been created with which different structural problems can be solved reliably and effectively. Research on reliability assessment of maintenance in nuclear power plants is directed to practical case studies on components and structures of safety importance, and to the development of models for maintenance related decision support. A systematic analysis of motor-operated valve has been performed

  2. Real imaginaries and political reason for an intercultural hope

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mohammed Noureddine Affaya

    2004-10-01

    Full Text Available In this text, the author attempts to clarify certain aspects of imaginaries in relation to the State and politics, but also in relation to violence and evil, in a context in which the dialectic of identity and otherness continues to be one of the structures of imaginaries. Imaginaries, beyond the exclusive sphere of representations, act on the world and on the evolution of history. But, the world also acts on imaginaries, and it is the periods of crisis that enlarge their manifestations, destined to “serve as a screen against fears.” In this sense, violence, in the face of which different attitudes can be adopted, becomes a symbolic element for interpreting our strengths. To what extent are we witnessing a new way of functioning of political and religious imaginaries? To answer this question, the author discusses intercultural hope “in a world inwhich the will of the power of the tragic interferes with communicational impulses.”

  3. The impact of political news on German students' assessments of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Wilhelm Kempf

    2008-10-01

    Full Text Available Employing the design of a prior experiment by Peleg & Alimi (2005, the present study examines how differently framed texts about the Knesset's approval of the Israeli-Palestinian 'Road Map' influence German students' assessments of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The results of the study confirmed our theoretical hypothesis that information presented in political news reports influences more than just recipients' assessments of the specifically mentioned issues. In addition, it also affects their assessments of issues related only via the structures of the mental models into which they integrate information. Moreover, the influence of political news is not uniform, but rather varies with differences in the mental models recipients have previously formed. These a priori mental models, therefore, can be more powerful predictors of media effects than variables such as recipients' political orientations, their personal views or the relevance they attribute to a conflict.

  4. The idea of civil control in the European political and legal thought

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    T D Sokolova

    2015-12-01

    Full Text Available The article discusses the problem of defining the role and functions of civil control from the political and legal thought perspective and in the context of the possible ways of civil society and state authorities interaction. The demand for external evaluation as a prerequisite for the development of political system and the demand for establishing an effective feedback mechanism within it together with the lack of a unified approach to the interpretation of civil control in the political science and legal doctrines determined the relevance of the study of the established traditions in the interpretation of civil control in social sciences and humanities. Whereas social and power relations always develop within a specific legislative framework, whose maturity and consistency largely determine the state of civil society, it is not possible to evaluate control functions of the public sector otherwise than through the study of the legal framework of the state. Thus, the article describes the evolution of the views on possible formats of social and power relations in the context of transformations of the European social thought and political and legal approaches to the perception of power institutions, building a dialogue between social and political organizations, defining the forms of civic participation in political decision-making and interpretation of civil control.

  5. Political Discourse Analysis Through Solving Problems of Graph Theory

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Monica Patrut

    2010-03-01

    Full Text Available In this article, we show how, using graph theory, we can make a content analysis of political discourse. Assumptions of this analysis are:
    - we have a corpus of speech of each party or candidate;
    - we consider that speech conveys economic, political, socio-cultural values, these taking the form of words or word families;
    - we consider that there are interdependences between the values of a political discourse; they are given by the co-occurrence of two values, as words in the text, within a well defined fragment, or they are determined by the internal logic of political discourse;
    - established links between values in a political speech have associated positive numbers indicating the "power" of those links; these "powers" are defined according to both the number of co-occurrences of values, and the internal logic of the discourse where they occur.
    In this context we intend to highlight the following:
    a which is the dominant value in a political speech;
    b which groups of values have ties between them and have no connection with the rest;
    c which is the order in which political values should be set in order to obtain an equivalent but more synthetic speech compared to the already given one;
    d which are the links between values that form the "core" political speech.
    To solve these problems, we shall use the Political Analyst program. After that, we shall present the concepts necessary to the understanding of the introductory graph theory, useful in understanding the analysis of the software and then the operation of the program. This paper extends the previous paper [6].

  6. The Future of Economic Power

    OpenAIRE

    Malanciuc Bogdan Simion

    2014-01-01

    The importance of power in the development of society is undeniable. The power relations between national economies are more and more important and should be considered in every international economics analysis. Economic power has become the bedrock of both the military and the political power. Today the balance of economic power is shifting. The emerging states (China in the first place) are now demanding a greater role in global politics, challenging the existing international order dominat...

  7. Technical and Political Assessment of Peaceful Nuclear Power Program Prospects in North Africa and the Middle East

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Windsor, Lindsay K.; Kessler, Carol E.

    2007-09-11

    An exceptional number of Middle Eastern and North African nations have recently expressed interest in developing nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. Many of these countries have explored nuclear research in limited ways in the past, but the current focused interest and application of resources towards developing nuclear-generated electricity and nuclear-powered desalination plants is unprecedented. Consequently, questions arise in response to this emerging trend: What instigated this interest? To what end(s) will a nuclear program be applied? Does the country have adequate technical, political, legislative, nonproliferation, and safety infrastructure required for the capability desired? If so, what are the next steps for a country in preparation for a future nuclear program? And if not, what collaboration efforts are possible with the United States or others? This report provides information on the capabilities and interests of 13 countries in the region in nuclear energy programs in light of safety, nonproliferation and security concerns. It also provides information useful for determining potential for offering technical collaboration, financial aid, and/or political support.

  8. Young People and Political Campaigning on the Internet. CIRCLE Fact Sheet.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Levine, Peter; Lopez, Mark Hugo

    2004-01-01

    This fact sheet discusses young people and political campaigning on the Internet. It explains how the Internet has become a powerful force in political campaigns. A survey released by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press on January 11, 2004 found that the Internet is gaining importance as a source of political news, especially for…

  9. Resource power and resource security: the politics of nonfuel minerals trade

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kahn, O.E.

    1985-01-01

    The developed producers, Canada, Australia, and South Africa, and not the developing producers, are the power wielders and major tracers in nonfuel minerals. Specific circumstances allow producers to obtain compliant behavior from consumers. These include: exporter's market share, importer's degree of dependence, the material's being critical to importer's economy, and the trading system's condoning nonmarket goals. These (and other) criteria comprise an analytical device, the strategic trading relationship, which is used to demonstrate developed producer commodity power and developed consumer vulnerability. Consuming country governments rely on the private sector to deal with national enmeshment in strategic trading relationships. Japan excepted, OECD members fail either to address their continued access to nonfuel minerals, or their ability to survive supply disruption with minimum dislocation. Producer power is exemplified by Canada's threat and use of embargo to make her uranium customers tighten their nonproliferation policies. Structural power deters South Africa's ability to head off wholehearted economic pressure is the classic case

  10. POWER AND CULTURE IN THE SOUTH CHINA SEA

    Science.gov (United States)

    2016-02-16

    of Great Power Politics (New York: W.W. Norton , 2001), 19. 10 As quoted in Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, 19. 11 Mearsheimer...century’s defining battleground” by Robert Kaplan , land power is largely irrelevant. As Samuels pointed out, PRC moves in 1974 were the result of a new...University Press, 1995. Mearsheimer, John J. The Tragedy of Great Power Politics. New York: W. W. Norton , 2001. Poling, Gregory. Spratley

  11. Perplexed Particularity in the Clutches of Arrogant Generality?: Political Science as Science of Generality and Political Scientist as Expert for Generality

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Dragutin Lalović

    2008-01-01

    Full Text Available How is one to conduct adequate political-science investigation, presentation and evaluation of the history and present situation of political science in Croatia? The text focuses on a thorough inquiry into the subject of the science of politics – what is politics? – as the prerequisite for a scientifically adequate solution to the uncertainty regarding the professional profile of the Faculty and its attendants – political scientists. In this context, it ooks into the meaning of the definition of political science as “science of generality” and of the political scientist as “expert for generality”. The theoretical and contextual meaning of these definitions is explained (Prpić, 1969, and its assumptions, scope and limitations are valued. The dramatic uncertainty, both theoretical and practical, which Prpić confronted us with, is insurmountable within the historical context of the democratic state, given its characteristic epochal ambivalence. This goes to show that the dilemma between the plural and the singular does not make much sense: political science in the singular is a servant of political power, while political sciences are mere metascientific humanistic critique of the extant world. Consequently, the science of politics is no good either in the singular or the plural. When scientific and professional, it is a danger to political freedom. When humanistic and non-professional, it is impotent and superfluous. The political scientist, in turn, is either “an expert for particularity”, a servant of political power neutral with regard to ethics and values, or else a pretentious missionary. In order to break out of the vicious circle, the science of politics, in a fruitful and irreplaceable duality, must be methodically made to rely on a new principle of community constitution, which is immanent critique and overcoming of the modern democratic state and civil society. In addition, the perception of political science as

  12. The Federal Administrative Court confirms unlawfulness of nuclear power moratorium. Political primacy is only valid in the bounds of justice

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Leidinger, Tobias

    2014-01-01

    With its decision on December 20 th , the Federal Administrative Court (BVwerfG) came to the legally valid conclusion that after the Fukushima nuclear power plant accident, the supervision court order related to the law on nuclear installation by the Hessian Ministry for the Environment, in order to stop operating nuclear power plants Biblis A and B for 3 months or rather not to put in operation again, was unlawful (BVwerfG 7 B 18.13 und 7 B 19.13). Beforehand, the Hessian Administrative Court (Hess. VGH) had already pronounced its judgement on February 27 th 2013. The supervising orders were part of the so-called nuclear power moratorium. They were issued after the resolution of the federal government, at demand of the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU) towards their nearby countries, and were identically executed by the supervisory authority of the other site-countries. Besides Biblis in Hesse, nuclear power plants in Neckarwestheim I and Philippsburg 1, Baden-Wurttemberg, Isar 1 in Bavaria, Unterweser in Lower Saxony, as well as Brunsbuettel in Schleswig-Holstein, were affected. However only RWE took legal action and was now affirmed - after the Hessian VGH verdict- by the highest German administrative court: The nuclear power moratorium - the first step to withdrawal of nuclear power in Germany - was unlawful. The decision taken by the BVerwG - as well as the one by the Hessian VGH - indicates a juridical clear and precise argumentation. The partially polemic and unobjective critic, which the VHG-verdict experienced, did not disguise, just as little as the political conflict concerning the withdrawal from nuclear energy, the view of federal judges, regarding the decision-relevant questions nor did they influence their reply. The political primacy finds its limits in the bounds of justice. Existing rights do not become thus a paper waste because there is a fundamental decision. This takes effectiveness for

  13. Phatic Communication Politness of Greating Arek Culture on Account Instagram: Pragmatic

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Karina Sofiananda Armaza Faraba

    2018-05-01

    Full Text Available Language politeness is the starting point of acceptance in speech events (Sumarlam., 2017:181. There are good intentions are meant or delivered in unfavorable or impolite ways, both in terms of word choice and external factors (intonation, mimic, pantomimic, etc. will be interpreted differently. The data in this research is oral speech in the form of caption or writing contains cultural greetings Arek. It can be seen from the classification of data posting in account instagram @aslisuroboyo. Phatic communication of the Arek culture society consists of rek, arek, ndasmu, koen, cok, ndeng, a, gaes, lur, jembuk, bez. It uses the scale of language politeness from Brown and Levinson skala the speaker and hearer relative power (the scale of social status ratings between speakers and speech partners or commonly referred to as the rank scale of power or power rating and the philanthropic scope of Robin Lakoff is the politeness scale of equality or kesekawanan refers to a friendly attitude and always maintain friendship between one person to another in order to be polite.

  14. ISLAMIC PARTIES AND THE POLITICS OF CONSTITUTIONALISM IN INDONESIA

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mukrimin Mukrimin

    2012-12-01

    Full Text Available This article examines the relationship between religion and the state in Indonesia by exploring how Islam is used by political parties to shape the politics. The study shows that Islamic politics is a complementary in both nationhood and statehood in Indonesia. From the early days of the new-born nation-state, Muslims in Indonesia had played significant role in shaping the nation; nonetheless, they have never dominated the political power. Fragmentation among Muslims themselves and internal political parties is among the reason why religious (Islamic parties failed in bringing religious identity to the state arena. Political subordination-inclusion-ignorance-confrontation is the circular game that features Islamic politics in Indonesia. The debatable issue on shari‘ah law, which is frequently used by Islamic parties, always becomes the core problem of the relation between Islam and the state. Even though Islam has played an important role in colouring the Indonesian politics, its existence remains complementary.

  15. The Egyptian Arab Spring and Political Islam

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ayman Gad El ashkar

    2016-07-01

    Full Text Available This study elaborates and analyzes the phenomenon and concept of political Islam, the reasons of the increased role of the Islamists and their political and reformist tendencies in the light of the Egyptian revolution of Arab Spring, reasons and the main factors that have contributed on their advent into power and their influence in that time, the issue of the application of Islamic Sharia and complex realities about this dilemma. The revolutions of Arab Spring, including the Egyptian revolution, are considered one of the most important and most dangerous events in the XXI century after the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001, not only in the Middle East but throughout the world because of their impact on peace and global security. The growth of the phenomenon of political Islam and the advent of Islamists into power in Egypt has represented one of the most remarkable features of this sudden revolution. No doubt that the issue of the relationship between Islam and the state's political system raises many confusing questions for many people. In this sense the importance of this study will directly identify the fact that the leadership of Islamists in Egypt is not the implementation of Islamic Sharia but their movements and ideology.

  16. Political and Legal Doctrine of Simon Bolivar

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mixail V. Fedorov

    2014-03-01

    Full Text Available Present article is devoted to the legal, political and constitutional ideas of the outstanding leader of war of independence in Latin America Simon Bolivar that was called by his countrymen and contemporaries to be a LIBERATOR. In the present article author discusses complex genesis and evolution of the political and legal doctrine of Simon Bolivar. Review is conducted by author in the context of developing theory and practice of Latin American constitutionalism in the XIX century. Author conceptualized and revealed basic historical patterns of formation and development of Latin American countries during the War of Independence (1810-1826 period. Author conducted comprehensive analysis of the draft constitution which was developed by Simon Bolivar for the newly independent states of Latin America and reveals theoretical and practical problem of choosing Simon Bolivar republican form of government, such as a peculiar institution in the form of principle of the separation of powers, containing the fourth power. Author focuses on the questions of Simon Bolivar’s relationship to the constitutional institute of human rights, idea of relationship between state and church. Article also researches many other political, legal and constitutional ideas of Simon Bolivar, present views of historians, lawyers, political scientists, statesmen and public activists.

  17. SUFFERING FROM ‘POLITICAL EXHAUSTION’: The Dynamics of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU in Indonesia’s Political Arena

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ahmad Mansur

    2009-06-01

    Full Text Available Book Review:Book title:Nahdlatul Ulama and the Struggle for Power within Islam and Politics in IndonesiaAuthor:Robin BushNo. of Pages:xx + 236Year:2009Publisher:The Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore

  18. Space structures, power, and power conditioning; Proceedings of the Meeting, Los Angeles, CA, Jan. 11-13, 1988

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Askew, R.F.

    1988-01-01

    Various papers on space structures, power, and power conditioning are presented. Among the topics discussed are: heterogeneous gas core reaction for space nuclear power, pulsed gas core reactor for burst power, fundamental considerations of gas core reactor systems, oscillating thermionic conversion for high-density space power, thermoelectromagnetic pumps for space nuclear power systems, lightweight electrochemical converter for space power applications, ballistic acceleration by superheated hydrogen, laser-induced current switching in gaseous discharge, electron-beam-controlled semiconductor switches, laser-controlled semiconductor closing and opening switch. Also addressed are: semiconductor-metal eutectic composites for high-power switching, optical probes for the characterization of surface breakdown, 40 kV/20 kA pseudospark switch for laser applications, insulation direction for high-power space systems, state space simulation of spacecraft power systems, structural vibration of space power station systems, minimum-time control of large space structures, novel fusion reaction for space power and propulsion, repetition rate system evaluations, cryogenic silicon photoconductive switches for high-power lasers, multilevel diamondlike carbon capacitor structure, surface breakdown of prestressed insulators, C-Mo and C-Zr alloys for space power systems, magnetic insulation for the space environment

  19. Anxiety and Politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Franz L Neumann

    2017-06-01

    Franz Leopold Neumann (1900-1954 was a political theorist associated with the Frankfurt School. He obtained a doctoral degree in legal studies at the University of Frankfurt with the dissertation „Rechtsphilosophische Einleitung zu einer Abhandlung über das Verhältnis von Staat und Strafe“ (A Legal-Philosophical Introduction to A Treatise on the Relationship between the State and Punishment. Neumann became the German Social Democratic Party’s (SPD main legal advisor at a time when the Nazis and Hitler gained strength in Germany. At the time when Hitler came to power in 1933, the legal office had to be closed and Neumann had to flee from Germany. In London, he in 1936 obtained his second doctoral degree from the London School of Economics with the work “The Governance of the Rule of Law” under the supervision of Harold Laski and Karl Mannheim. Neumann moved to New York in 1936, where he became a member of the Institute of Social Research (also known as the “Frankfurt School” that was then in exile in the USA. In 1942, he started working for the Office of Strategic Service (OSS, where he together with Herbert Marcuse and Otto Kirchheimer analysed Nazi Germany. In 1942, Neumann published his main book is Behemoth: The Structure and Practice of National Socialism, 1933–1944 (2nd, updated edition published in 1944, one of the most profound analyses of Nazi Germany’s political economy and ideology. Franz L. Neumann died in 1954 in a car accident.

  20. Structural Emergency Control for Power Grids

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Vu, Thanh Long; Chatzivasileiadis, Spyros; Chiang, Hsiao-Dong

    2017-01-01

    In this paper, we introduce a structural emergency control to render post-fault dynamics of power systems from the critical fault-cleared state to a stable equilibrium point (EP). Theoretically, this is a new control paradigm that does not rely on any continuous measurement or load shedding......, as in the classical setup. Instead, the grid is made stable by intentionally changing the power network structure, and thereby, discretely relocating the EP and its stability region such that the system is consecutively driven from fault-cleared state through a set of EPs to the desired EP. The proposed control...... is designed by solving convex optimization problems, making it possibly scalable to large-scale power grids. In the practical side, the proposed control can be implemented by exploiting the FACTS devices that will be widely available on the grids, and hence, requiring minor investment....

  1. Socio-political structure of Turkey in general elections since 1980 military intervention up to date (last 23 years)

    OpenAIRE

    D. Ali Arslan; Mustafa Çağlayandereli

    2006-01-01

    This study aims to analyze socio-political structure of Turkish society at the basis of the results of Turkish General elections since 1983 up to date. Documentary and historical research techniques will be employed during the study.

  2. Islam and Politics: the Case of the Islamic State

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Shokri Mehdi

    2016-06-01

    Full Text Available This paper assesses the fundamental relation between the Islamic-political movements and establishment of the Islamic law (Shari’a. I argue against the critiques of western foreign policy and show that the Islamic State (Caliphate is both a result of the historical process of the people of a region and the extreme interpretation of the text and Sunna which emphasizes on the traditional Sharia law and the concept of Jihad by fortifying political Islam qua militant Islam. I argue that the Islamic revival aims to a certain political order which threatens the world security and peace. Moreover, I argue that the structural violation of Human Rights is rooted in the traditional concept of Islamic law or Sharia, which obtains its immunity by an illegitimate power. This traditional Islamic law is the inalienable character of authoritarian/totalitarian regimes. This paper is based on the assumption that the extreme ideological/theoretical interpretation implies the empirical objectives of Militant Islamic community with or without any external influential elements. In this sense, we can address the question: how different interpretations and traditions in executing the Islamic Sharia give the social and political grounds a seed for the emergence of violence and terrorism. At the end, this paper ends with a propose which emphasizes on the role of international cooperation to find a resolution and also on the education as a long-term plan to defeat extremism and terrorism.

  3. Political Regimes in Central Asia: Crisis of Legitimacy, Political Violence and Uncertain Prospects

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mohammad-Reza Djalili

    2005-10-01

    Full Text Available This article analyses the present-day transition and political context of each of the states that comprise the former Soviet region of Central Asia since their independence: the internal changes they have undergone, the creation of their own institutions and regional and international relations. This evolution, especially with regard to the deficiencies in democracy and legitimacy of the majority of the current governments, based, in many cases, on personalist, authoritarian regimes, points to an uncertain future for a region in which, too frequently, its rulers have used all the means at their disposal (persecution of political opposition, disregard for human rights, constraint of the mass media and NGOs, etc. to guarantee their continuance in power. This article also includes an analysis of the most recent events, such as the Andijan (Uzbekistan massacre, the‘revolution’ without changes in Kyrgyzstan, and the authoritarian drift of Turkmenistan, which leads to conclusions filled with uncertainties for future political scenarios.

  4. Aging of concrete structures in nuclear power plants

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Naus, D.J.; Pland, C.B.; Arndt, E.G.

    1991-01-01

    The Structural Aging (SAG) Program, sponsored by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (USNRC) and conducted by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), had the overall objective of providing the USNRC with an improved basis for evaluating nuclear power plant structures for continued service. The program consists of three technical tasks: materials property data base, structural component assessment/repair technology, and quantitative methodology for continued service determinations. Major accomplishments under the SAG Program during the first two years of its planned five-year duration have included: development of a Structural Materials Information Center and formulation of a Structural Aging Assessment Methodology for Concrete Structures in Nuclear Power Plants. 9 refs

  5. CONFLICT AS A WAY OF BEING OF POLITICS. MACHIAVELLIAN CONTRIBUTION TO THINK THE POWER

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ignacio Luis Moretti

    2015-06-01

    Full Text Available The conceptual challenge of thinking politics refers to the attempt - always, by definition, precarious, fragile and destined to failure- to grasp an intrinsically polysemic object and action defies straitjacket or limitation. This article will propose a deliberate code reading; a specific interpretive framework for thinking about politics; understanding the conflict as its hopelessly constitutive category. With this purpose, we will consider the work of Nicholas Machiavelli enjoying fertility to think this troubled specificity of the political.The methodological approach was purely theoretical, through an exercise of exegesis of texts Machiavellian and enhancement of its contemporary political thinking.

  6. The Ownership Structure of Corporations: Political Connections from the Resource Dependence Perspective – A Theorical Essay

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nathanael Kusch Brey

    2011-12-01

    Full Text Available After the 90s, which heralded the era of privatization in Brazil, the government became a shareholder in various private companies. Government participation can interfere in the objectives, strategies and ultimately in the performance and survival of corporations. This paper aims to discuss this phenomenon and the importance of political connections in terms of ownership structure for an organization's survival. The objectives of governments as owners tend to conflict with those of other shareholders, because their goals tend to have more of a social and political element, which can lead to organizational deficiency in the performance of the company. One may come to believe that when a company has the government as a shareholder, its survival is ensured, as suggested by the theory of resource dependence, but this participation may in fact negatively affect the company's performance due to government objectives. This work proposes a way to mitigate the problem while ensuring the benefits of this connection with the government by reducing the stake of government in companies to minimum levels, which would reduce the risk of political interference.

  7. WEBLOGS AS A SUBGENRE OF POLITICAL COMMUNICATION / MARKETING

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    María Jesús Pinar Sanz

    2007-05-01

    Full Text Available The aim of this article is to describe the characteristics of weblogs (usually shortened to blog, but occasionally spelled web log, the latest genre of internet communication that has attained widespread popularity (Herring et al. 2005. I will focus my attention on those weblogs which contain any kind of political message during election campaigns. The paper situates blogs with respect to the dominant forms of digital communication and as a powerful tool for developing future election campaigns in light of their low cost and the speed with which news can be published. The generic variables will be studied in detail, taking into account Swales' general theory of genre (1990 and genre theories applied to electronic communication (Yates and Orlikowski, 1992. Register variables (Halliday, 1989; Martin, 2001 will also be thoroughly studied. The results of this study show the characteristics of weblogs with regards to vocabulary, syntactic structures and the use of pronouns among others. The findings are based on an investigation of 20 politically-oriented weblogs, randomly selected during the 2004 American and 2005 British elections.

  8. Understanding the Structural, Human Resource, Political, and Symbolic Dimensions of Implementing and Sustaining Interprofessional Education.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Farnsworth, Tracy J; Peterson, Teri; Neill, Karen; Neill, Mark; Seikel, John A; Lawson, Jonathan

    2015-01-01

    This study investigated the perceptions of deans and faculty members of the Association of Schools of Allied Health Professions (ASAHP) concerning the degree to which their institutions implement and integrate the structural, human resource, political, and symbolic frames or dimensions of interprofessional education (IPE). The study identified correlations among these frames/dimensions, including their relationship with overall IPE program progress and success. This study utilized a nonexperimental comparative descriptive and correlational survey design. The instrument was developed by the researchers and administered online using a readily accessible data collection process. Data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Content validity and reliability were established prior to full implementation of the survey. Results revealed high levels of interest but lower levels of progress and success in implementing the various frames/dimensions of IPE. Strong correlations existed between the structural, human resource, political, and symbolic dimensions of IPE, and these dimensions individually and collectively predicted overall IPE program progress and success. The differences between interest and performance raised important questions and led to conclusions about leadership effectiveness, organizational clarity, and the process of implementing the organizational change needed for effective IPE at ASAHP institutions.

  9. Effectiveness of political advertising in the electoral process: experience on extraordinary presidential elections – 2014 in Ukraine

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    G. V. Muzychenko

    2014-07-01

    Full Text Available The place and role of political advertising and political agitation in the electoral process as an example of extraordinary presidential elections - 2014in Ukraine are analyzed in the paper. It’s revealed a concept of «political advertising» within the Ukrainian legislation and the peculiarities of the legal regulation of its implementation during the presidential elections in Ukraine. Restrictions relating to forms of political agitation and the volume of financing. It was found that political advertising is a form of agitation and can be financed only with specially crafted by candidate election fund, the size of which, unlike elections to representative bodies of power is not limited. The analysis of the election funds of candidates in terms of establishing relationship between costs and result, which is one of the performance criteria of political advertising effectiveness in the electoral process. For this purpose, analysis of the cost structure of election funds, which are dominated by the cost of the media used. Also examines distribution channels of political advertising and the quality of the TV election advertising products. It is proved that political advertising affects electoral behavior, but direct relationship between the election’s success and amount invested in the political campaign funds are not found. That suggests the expediency consideration of other factors influence the electoral behavior, such as political program of applicants, their political experience, subjective preferences of voters and more.

  10. Nuclear position in power generation sector - under the pressure of anti-global warming and power market reform

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hayashi, Taizo

    2005-01-01

    The future structure surrounding fuel choice in power generation sector should be understood how to evaluate actual and potential merit and demerit both in economic and environmental aspects on nuclear power generation. That is i.e. nuclear can be understood as superior power source without GHGs and on the other hand, as unfavorable power source which might cause some critical dangers due to its hazardous radioactive nuclear waste. On this specific characteristic, this theme on fuel choice surrounding nuclear in power generation sector could be understood as a highly cultural problem as much as economic and political one. For instance, we can observe quite opposite direction with each other on nuclear power development in European countries like France and Finland on one hand and Germany and Sweden on the other hand. Looking at Asian countries, we also observe the very reality of high economic growth with rapid growth of electricity demand like China. What on earth, is it really possible without nuclear power source for such gigantic countries. I will develop my personal idea on nuclear power source based on Japanese experience towards successfully managing nuclear power technologies in the world, consisting of developing countries with growing economies and of advanced ones with rather matured nuclear technology under the pressure of environmentally restricted world order. My basic view point to discuss nuclear power problem has, conclusionally speaking, several aspects; The first one is in the relation with deregulation or liberalization of electricity market, which has been undergoing among such developed countries as OECD member countries i.e. USA, EU, Japan and other countries. Deregulation or liberalization of electricity market seems to be the inevitable process towards more matured market economy among developed countries group, and that process inevitably forces management of power companies towards more near sighted attitude if those companies are

  11. Nationalist movement’s trends in contemporary Nigerian government and politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Shittu, M

    2013-06-01

    Full Text Available This study seeks to understand the contemporary issues in Nigerian Government and Politics through an assessment of the nationalist movement and its persistent and recurrent trends in the contemporary Nigeria, and how these trends continue to affect the present socio-political issues in the country. This is carried out through mobilization of certain variables of political development theory despite its inability to explain the position of indigenous African people in the alien Western political institutions. Based on this, it is revealed that everything went well until that time the ground was made for power politics in which indigenous African people became players.

  12. Brain structural abnormalities and mental health sequelae in South Vietnamese ex-political detainees who survived traumatic head injury and torture.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mollica, Richard F; Lyoo, In Kyoon; Chernoff, Miriam C; Bui, Hoan X; Lavelle, James; Yoon, Sujung J; Kim, Jieun E; Renshaw, Perry F

    2009-11-01

    A pilot study of South Vietnamese ex-political detainees who had been incarcerated in Vietnamese reeducation camps and resettled in the United States disclosed significant mental health problems associated with torture and traumatic head injury (THI). To identify structural brain alterations associated with THI and to investigate whether these deficits are associated with posttraumatic stress disorder and depression. Cross-sectional neuroimaging study. Massachusetts General Hospital and McLean Hospital. A subsample of Vietnamese ex-political detainees (n = 42) and comparison subjects (n = 16) selected from a community study of 337 ex-political detainees and 82 comparison subjects. Scores on the Vietnamese versions of the Hopkins Symptom Checklist-25 (HSCL) and Harvard Trauma Questionnaire for depression and posttraumatic stress disorder, respectively; cerebral regional cortical thickness; and manual volumetric morphometry of the amygdala, hippocampus, and thalamus. Ex-political detainees exposed to THI (n = 16) showed a higher rate of depression (odds ratio, 10.2; 95% confidence interval, 1.2-90.0) than those without THI exposure (n = 26). Ex-political detainees with THI had thinner prefrontotemporal cortices than those without THI exposure (P brain map) in the left dorsolateral prefrontal and bilateral superior temporal cortices, controlling for age, handedness, and number of trauma/torture events (left superior frontal cortex [SFC], P = .006; left middle frontal cortex, P = .01; left superior temporal cortex [STC], P = .007; right STC, P = .01). Trauma/torture events were associated with bilateral amygdala volume loss (left, P = .045; right, P = .003). Cortical thinning associated with THI in the left SFC and bilateral STC was related to HSCL depression scores in THI-exposed (vs non-THI-exposed) ex-political detainees (left SFC, P for interaction = .007; left STC, P for interaction = .03; right STC, P for interaction = .02). Structural deficits in

  13. Western Political Consulting Techniques and Post-Soviet Political Technology in Political Campaigns in Latvia

    OpenAIRE

    Bērziņa, Ieva

    2012-01-01

    Western Political Consulting Techniques and Post-Soviet Political Technology in Political Campaigns in Latvia Ieva Dmitričenko Keywords: political campaignsm political consulting, political technology, parties, marketing, media Political campaigning is an international phenomenon, because there is a free flow of information, knowledge and human resource among practitioners of political campaigning in various countries. As a result political campaigning techniques that have proven to ...

  14. The strategic use of humor in political discourse of Silvio Berlusconi

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Kamila Miłkowska-Samul

    2013-01-01

    Full Text Available The aim of this article is to illustrate some of the mechanisms existing in political discourse which employ emotions and humor as a persuasive means. The study is based on authentic texts produced by Silvio Berlusconi. The importance of emotions and humor in political speech is viewed in the light of changes taking place in public communication due to the development of mass media and Internet, leading to, among others, ever more frequent use of the comical aspect of communication as a method of gaining and maintaining political power. That is why the use of emotions and humor in Berlusconi’s speech is analyzed as a strategic choice and a powerful instrument of political struggle. The article highlights the role of emotions and humor in creating a positive self-image of the politician.

  15. Nuclear power, politics and public opinion

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Allday, C.

    1979-01-01

    Following a brief review of the status of nuclear power, some of the difficulties facing the industry are considered. International and national problems in gaining recognition of the importance of nuclear power in meeting the world's energy requirements are discussed. (author)

  16. CATHOLICS, MUSLIMS, AND GLOBAL POLITICS IN SOUTHEAST ASIA

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Sumanto Al Qurtuby

    2012-07-01

    Full Text Available This article discusses the role of Catholics, Muslims, and civic associations in the global politics of the Philippines and Indonesia. The two countries have shared in common with regard to the geographical feature (both are archipelagic countries, the diversity of societies and cultures, and the history of colonialism, dictatorship, ethno-religious violence, and political movement, to name but a few. In addition to their similarities, both countries also have significant differences in particular pertaining to religious dominance (the Philippines dominated by Catholicism, while Indonesia by Islam and the structure of their societies: while the Philippines is a class-stratified society, Indonesia has long been ideologized by colonial and post-colonial religious and political powers. Apart from their parallels and distinctions, religion—both Catholicism and Islam—has marvellous role, negatively or positively, in global politics and public cultures, indicating its vigor and survival in global political domains. This comparative paper, more specifically, examines the historical dynamics of the interplay between religion, civil society, and political activism by using the Philippines and Indonesia as a case study and point of analysis.[Artikel ini mendiskusikan peran Katolik, Muslim dan asosiasi warga dalam politik global di dua negara; Indonesia dan Filipina. Kedua negara tersebut memiliki kesamaan, baik dalam hal ciri geografis sebagai negara kepulauan, keragaman masyarakat dan budayanya, sejarah kolonialisme, pemerintahan diktator, kekerasan etnik-agama, serta gerakan keagamaan. Terlepas dari kesamaan tersebut, keduanya memiliki perbedaan, utamanya menyangkut agama dominan (di Filipina didominasi oleh Katolik, sementara di Indonesia oleh Islam dan struktur masyarakatnya (Filipina ditandai dengan stratifikasi masyarakat berdasarkan klas sosial, sementara di Indonesia ditandai dengan ideologi agama kolonial, paska-kolonial, politik. Terlepas

  17. Power and process: The politics of electricity sector reform in Uganda

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gore, Christopher David

    In 2007, Uganda had one of the lowest levels of access to electricity in the world. Given the influence of multilateral and bilateral agencies in Uganda; the strong international reputation and domestic influence of its President; the country's historic achievements in public sector and economic reform; and the intimate connection between economic performance, social well-being and access to electricity, the problems with Uganda's electricity sector have proven deeply frustrating and, indeed, puzzling. Following increased scholarly attention to the relationship between political change, policymaking, and public sector reform in sub-Saharan Africa and the developing world generally, this thesis examines the multilevel politics of Uganda's electricity sector reform process. This study contends that explanations for Uganda's electricity sector reform problems generally, and hydroelectric dam construction efforts specifically, must move beyond technical and financial factors. Problems in this sector have also been the result of a model of reform (promoted by the World Bank) that failed adequately to account for the character of political change. Indeed, the model of reform that was promoted and implemented was risky and it was deeply antagonistic to domestic and international civil society organizations. In addition, it was presented as a linear, technical, apolitical exercise. Finally the model was inconsistent with key principles the Bank itself, and public policy literature generally, suggest are needed for success. Based on this analysis, the thesis contends that policymaking and reform must be understood as deeply political processes, which not only define access to services, but also participation in, and exclusion from, national debates. Future approaches to reform and policymaking must anticipate the complex, multilevel, non-linear character of 'second-generation' policy issues like electricity, and the political and institutional capacity needed to increase

  18. Tipping the Balance of Power : Social Media and the Transformation of Political Journalism

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Broersma, Marcel; Graham, Todd; Bruns, Axel; Skogerbø, Eli; Christensen, Christian; Larsson, Anders Olof; Enli, Gunn

    2015-01-01

    The advent of social media in politics has changed the relationship between political journalists and politicians. Especially Twitter has developed into a regular news beat. Journalists use it to build relationships with politicians and quote their tweets in coverage. For many politicians, tweeting

  19. Nuclear enhanced power corrections to DIS structure functions

    OpenAIRE

    Guo, Xiaofeng; Qiu, Jianwei; Zhu, Wei

    2001-01-01

    We calculate nuclear enhanced power corrections to structure functions measured in deeply inelastic lepton-nucleus scattering in Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD). We find that the nuclear medium enhanced power corrections at order of $O(\\alpha_s/Q^2)$ enhance the longitudinal structure function $F_L$, and suppress the transverse structure function $F_1$. We demonstrate that strong nuclear effects in $\\sigma_A/\\sigma_D$ and $R_A/R_D$, recently observed by HERMES Collaboration, can be explained in ...

  20. Politeness Accommodation in E-Mail Requests among Iranian Postgraduate Students of EFL

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Muhammed Parviz

    2012-11-01

    Full Text Available Computer-mediated communication (CMC offers us a chance to understand how social relationships are built and maintained in an environment in which interlocutors not only lack the paralinguistic features that are vital to face-to- face conversation, but are participating in a medium which has had little time to develop rules of conduct. The present study was an attempt to determine politeness accommodation in e-mail messages among Iranian postgraduate students of EFL. One hundred EFL learners, aged 22-26, participated in this study. Four different message types were constructed and sent to the participants, i.e. messages with verbal politeness markers; messages with structural politeness elements (e. g., salutation and closing remarks; messages with both verbal and structural politeness indicators; finally messages with neither verbal nor structural politeness indicators. Further, the messages varied in their degree of politeness; however, their content was the same. Results showed that the participants accommodated significantly to verbal politeness indicators in the body of a message, and to structural politeness indicators of greeting/salutation. When such indicators were included in messages, the participants responded with significantly more polite messages (greeting and body than when the indicators were absent. The results boost our understanding of CMC with reference to politeness markers, and how they are used by Iranian EFL learners.

  1. Political economy of decentralising HIV and AIDS treatment services to primary healthcare facilities in three Nigerian states.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mbachu, Chinyere; Onwujekwe, Obinna; Ezumah, Nkoli; Ajayi, Olayinka; Sanwo, Olusola; Uzochukwu, Benjamin

    2016-09-01

    Decentralisation is defined as the dispersion, distribution or transfer of resources, functions and decision-making power from a central authority to regional and local authorities. It is usually accompanied by assignment of accountability and responsibility for results. Fundamental to understanding decentralisation is learning what motivates central governments to give up power and resources to local governments, and the practical significance of this on their positions regarding decentralisation. This study examined key political and institutional influences on role-players' capacity to support decentralisation of HIV and AIDS treatment services to primary healthcare facilities, and implications for sustainability. In-depth interviews were conducted with 55 purposively selected key informants, drawn from three Nigerian states that were at different stages of decentralising HIV and AIDS treatment services to primary care facilities. Key informants represented different categories of role-players involved in HIV and AIDS control programmes. Thematic framework analysis of data was done. Support for decentralisation of HIV and AIDS treatment services to primary healthcare facilities was substantial among different categories of actors. Political factors such as the local and global agenda for health, political tenure and party affiliations, and institutional factors such as consolidation of decision-making power and improvements in career trajectories, influenced role-players support for decentralisation of HIV and AIDS treatment services. It is feasible and acceptable to decentralise HIV and AIDS treatment services to primary healthcare facilities, to help improve coverage. However, role-players' support largely depends on how well the reform aligns with political structures and current institutional practices.

  2. The Political Nature of Digital Cultural Heritage

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Quincy McCrary

    2011-02-01

    Full Text Available Collecting organizations such as libraries and museums are vehicles for shifting paradigms of knowledge and power. Digital technologies are also implicated with historical transformations in language, society, and culture. To discuss the digital is to engage simultaneously with an impressive array of simulacra, instantaneous communication, ubiquitous media, and global interconnectedness (Cameron & Kenderdine, 2007. Digital cultural heritage can be viewed as a political concept and practice, the relations between communities and heritage institutions as mediated through technologies, the reshaping of social, cultural, and political power in relation to cultural organizations made possible through communication technologies, and the representation and interpretation of digital cultural heritage. The following paper will address each of these concerns, outlining current scholarship on the topic and critically engaging with the content.

  3. The Prediction of Political Competencies by Political Action and Political Media Consumption

    Science.gov (United States)

    Reichert, Frank

    2014-01-01

    Political competencies are often considered a precondition for political action; however, they are not independent of previous political participation, which may also include the frequency and the kind of political media consumption. My research aims at finding out the importance of participation in political activities in the past, as well as…

  4. The politics of universalism. Strategic uses of human rights discourses in early modernity

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Karen-Margrethe Simonsen

    2013-11-01

    Full Text Available This article investigates the political function of human rights in 16th-century Spain just after the conquest of America. It claims that the study of this period of early globalization is relevant for an understanding of the function of human rights discourses today, at the “end” of globalization. Historically speaking, human rights are closely connected with globalization, but at the same time, they raise the question about the foundation of globalization: is there a universal community or only economic and political power-relations? This article argues that the political use of human rights discourses is split down the middle: it serves both as a critique of power and as an extension of power, and the disclosure of this split helps us understand the inner politics of human rights. The article discusses the trial in Valladolid in 1550 when the rights of the barbarian Indians of America were put on trial. It focuses mainly on the arguments made by Bartolomé de las Casas and on the reasons why the King allowed las Casas’ fierce critique of the conquest to be published in a period of otherwise severe censorship. This article is inspired by Etienne Balibar's idea of “politics of universalism,” “political autonomy,” and “equaliberty.”.

  5. Issues in Political Development: Implications for Counsellors ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    Two research questions guided the study. Questionnaire was used for data collection. The data collected were analyzed using mean scores. The findings revealed. that some impediments to political development include; Religious intolerance, poor leadership, structural imbalance, moral decadence, political instability, and ...

  6. Competitive effects and instruments of power sector reforms. International reform concepts blockade structures, risk distribution. A political economy analysis; Wettbewerbseffekte und Instrumente von Stromsektorreformen. Internationale Reformkonzepte, Blockadestrukturen, Risikoverteilung. Eine politoekonomische Analyse

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Liebchen, Armin [Liebchen Consulting, Berlin (Germany)

    2014-07-01

    Power sectors with weak or inadequate competition structures are the rule, despite numerous attempts at reform. But can afford modern economies this defect for a long time? Why can the implementation of competition are blocked so effectively? The author studied international reform experiences and opens up interesting insights that can also reflect on problems of the German energy turnaround: The difficulty of timing and coordination of the reform components, the development of resistance levels of individual interest groups, breach of contract as a rational alternative, causes unwanted price effects, shifting interest situations of major stakeholders, change dynamics impending regulatory risks, pending financing risks, stranded cost-conflict situations for power stations disconnected from the grid and facilities and instruments of a political and regulatory risk management for reforms. With numerous examples, background analyzes and instruments to reform analysis, this book is aimed at investors, policy planners and analysts. [German] Stromsektoren mit schwachen oder unzulaenglichen Wettbewerbsstrukturen sind trotz zahlreicher Reformversuche die Regel. Aber koennen sich moderne Volkswirtschaften diesen Mangel dauerhaft leisten? Warum kann die Einfuehrung von Wettbewerb so wirksam blockiert werden? Der Autor untersucht internationale Reformerfahrungen und eroeffnet interessante Einsichten, die sich auch auf Problemlagen der deutschen Energiewende spiegeln lassen: Die Schwierigkeit des richtigen Timings und der Abstimmung der Reformteile, dem Aufbau von Widerstandslinien einzelner Interessensgruppen, Vertragsbruch als rationaler Alternative, Ursachen unerwuenschter Preiseffekte, sich verschiebenden Interessenslagen wichtiger Akteure, Veraenderungsdynamik drohender Regulierungsrisiken, schwebenden Finanzierungsrisiken, stranded-cost-Konfliktlagen fuer vom Netz genommene Kraftwerke und Moeglichkeiten und Instrumenten eines politisch-regulatorischen Risikomanagements

  7. Change, continuity and power in the Russian political economy in comparative BRICs perspective

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Vasileva, A.

    2017-01-01

    This article-based dissertation explores the development of the Russian political economy over the past 25 years in comparative BRICs perspective. The first half of the thesis describes (article 1) and compares (article 2) the evolution of the macro-configuration of Russia's political economy

  8. Friendly Fire: War-Normalizing Metaphors in the Israeli Political Discourse

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gavriely-Nuri, Dalia

    2009-01-01

    Combining principles of peace education and political discourse analysis, this study dwells on one powerful metaphorical mechanism engaged in by Israeli political leaders: war-normalizing metaphors, a mechanism for framing war as part of human nature and normal life. Six core semantic fields were identified as particularly useful "raw…

  9. Underwater nuclear power plant structure

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Severs, S.; Toll, H.V.

    1982-01-01

    A structure for an underwater nuclear power generating plant comprising a triangular platform formed of tubular leg and truss members upon which are attached one or more large spherical pressure vessels and one or more small cylindrical auxiliary pressure vessels. (author)

  10. Kant and the Critique of the Ethics-First Approach to Politics

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Rostbøll, Christian F.

    2017-01-01

    of an "ethics-first approach to politics," in which political theory is a mere application of moral principles. But what does this ethics-first approach have to do with Kant himself? Very little. This article shows how Kant's approach to political theory at a fundamental level includes political institutions......, power, and coercion as well as disagreement, security, and coordination problems. In contrast to realists, Kant has a fundamental principle, which can explain why and guide how we ought to approach the political question, namely the norm of equal freedom. Yet, Kant's theory does not take the form...

  11. Low Membership in Czech Political Parties: Party Strategy or Structural Determinants?

    Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

    Linek, Lukáš; Pecháček, Š.

    2007-01-01

    Roč. 23, č. 2 (2007), s. 259-275 ISSN 1352-3279 R&D Projects: GA MPS 1J004/04-DP1 Institutional research plan: CEZ:AV0Z70280505 Keywords : political parties * party membership * antiparty sentiments * party organization Subject RIV: AD - Politology ; Political Sciences

  12. Do organizational and political-legal arrangements explain financial wrongdoing?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Prechel, Harland; Zheng, Lu

    2016-12-01

    The 2008 financial crisis was a systemic problem with deep-rooted structural causes that created opportunities to engage in financial malfeasance, a form of corporate wrongdoing. However, few quantitative studies exist on the effects of organizational and political-legal arrangements on financial malfeasance. In this paper, we examine the effects of organizational and political-legal arrangements that emerged in the 1990s in the FIRE sector (i.e., financial, insurance, and real estate) on financial malfeasance. Our historical contextualization demonstrates how changes in the political-legal arrangements facilitate the emergence of new corporate structures and opportunities for financial malfeasance. Our longitudinal quantitative analysis demonstrates that US FIRE sector corporations with a more complex organizational structure, larger size, lower dividend payment, and higher executive compensation are more prone to commit financial malfeasance. © London School of Economics and Political Science 2016.

  13. Structural Power and International Relations Analysis: "Fill your basket, get your preferences"

    OpenAIRE

    Pustovitovskij, Andrej; Kremer, Jan-Frederik

    2011-01-01

    In this article, we will address current deficits of the study of power in IR by introducing a new concept of structural power. After briefly presenting existing concepts of relational power, of structural power as well as of conceptualizing power as the possession of resources (power-as-resources), we will introduce our concept of structural power as an approach suitable for bridging the gap between existing concepts (by strongly focusing on the importance of the structural level). We will s...

  14. Wireless power transfer: control algorithm to transfer the maximum power

    OpenAIRE

    Rojas Urbano, Javier Arturo

    2016-01-01

    This job is developed as part of “Health aware enhanced range wireless power transfer systems", known as ETHER. It is a cooperation project where Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM) and Universidad Politécnica de Cataluña (UPC) research groups are mainly involved. ETHER objective is to develop a wireless power transfer system for medical applications, specifically a pacemaker charger to improve patient’s lifestyle decreasing the number of required operations to replace pacemaker batter...

  15. Gender, Power and Political Leadership in Nigeria: Lessons from ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    The gender problematic is profoundly central to the leadership debate and one of the main elements of positive leadership in gender studies is that of significant inclusion of all gender types especially women in political contests. Unfortunately because of their lack of needed skills that can ensure a high degree of ...

  16. Military and Political Studies

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Alexey I. Podberyozkin

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available Military-political issues is an important area of research work at MGIMO. The difference in this direction from the classical international specialization is that it is at the intersection of several disciplines: military science, military-technical and military-industrial as well as International Relations. A specialist in military and political issues should not only be an expert in the field of international relations and diplomacy, but also have a deep knowledge of military-technical issues to understand the basic trends in the development of scientific and technological progress and its impact on the balance of forces in the world. Global changes in the balance of power and the nature of the conflict, the emergence of new types of weapons are changing the basic methods and approaches to the art of war, which requires a science-based perspective on problem solving and multi-disciplinary approach in achieving the goals. Military and political studies allow us to understand how the development of military technology and military organization of the state affected by the political situation in the world, the national security of the country and its place in the system of international relations. Military-political research has been developing at MGIMO for a few decades. It laid down the basis for a scientific school of political-military studies. Its founding fathers were such prominent scholars of international affairs, as I.G. Usachyov, A.D. Nikonov, A.G. Arbatov, V.G. Baranovsky, V.M. Kulagin, A.N. Nikitin and other well-known experts. Their work covers a wide range of military and political issues, including the topics of arms control and disarmament, international, and especially European security, military policy, NATO, the Western military-political doctrines and their practical application. Now the lead in the development of this research at MGIMO has taken Center for Military-Political Studies, which became a concentration of relevant

  17. (Miscommunication across the Borders: Politics, Media and Public Opinion in Turkey

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Banu Baybars-Hawks

    2015-08-01

    Full Text Available The American sociologist Charles Horton Cooley defined public opinion "as a process of interaction and mutual influence rather than a state of broad agreement" in 1918. On the other hand, according to the American political scientist V.O. Key, public opinion was "opinions held by private persons which governments find it prudent to heed," in 1961. During the 1990s, advances in statistical and demographic analysis helped the development of an understanding of public opinion as the collective view of a defined population, such as a particular demographic or ethnic group. In this view, the influence of public opinion is not restricted to politics and elections. Public opinion is considered a powerful force in many other spheres, such as culture, fashion, literature and the arts, consumer spending, and marketing and public relations.1 Attitudes and values play a crucial role in the development of public opinion. Different variables embedded in the political, social and media structure of the country also have potential to make an impact on public opinion. These dynamics vary from the economics to the judicial system and democratic principles functioning in that country. On the other hand, public opinion has a power to shape politics and media's priorities in reporting. The interaction among politics, public opinion and media of one country can be better analyzed with the findings of public opinion research administered regularly. In Turkey, the research on and analysis of public opinion are most frequent during the election times. Therefore, it seems necessary to measure the public opinion more regularly to test the relationships among political, public and media agendas. Accordingly, the current study seeks to fill this gap. It is argued that in the absence of timely feedback from public surveys, decisions and policies for improving different services and institutions functioning in the country might not achieve their expected goal. The findings of

  18. Safety classification of nuclear power plant systems, structures and components

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    1992-01-01

    The Safety Classification principles used for the systems, structures and components of a nuclear power plant are detailed in the guide. For classification, the nuclear power plant is divided into structural and operational units called systems. Every structure and component under control is included into some system. The Safety Classes are 1, 2 and 3 and the Class EYT (non-nuclear). Instructions how to assign each system, structure and component to an appropriate safety class are given in the guide. The guide applies to new nuclear power plants and to the safety classification of systems, structures and components designed for the refitting of old nuclear power plants. The classification principles and procedures applying to the classification document are also given

  19. Reorganization of the power distribution sector in India

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Dossani, Rafiq

    2004-01-01

    This paper presents the central issues for electricity-sector reform in India, as they grew out of the reform process that began in 1991, and within the context of the sector's organization, regulatory structure, and other institutional characteristics. The paper argues that India's current reform policies will not be sufficient to achieve reliable, efficient power because distribution reform has not been done. Undertaking distribution reform is a difficult path to tread because of the absence of global consensus on best practices and conflicting forces, both economic and political. The paper analyzes alternative institutional structures for reform in the distribution sector. The findings include that the objectives of coverage and efficiency may conflict, that economically efficient reorganization may be politically unachievable and that the small, municipally owned firm may be the best compromise. Since many Indian states are economically and politically diverse from each other, and include both large served and unserved areas, there is scope to vary the organizational structure depending on the state's situation. This paper provides a means to do so. The agenda for policymakers is to identify the situation in their respective states and choose a reorganization path that is the best compromise

  20. Politics of Feminine Abuse: Political Oppression and Masculine Obstinacy in Doris Lessing’s The Good Terrorist

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Pedram Lalbakhsh

    2012-07-01

    Full Text Available This paper studies the male-dominated world of Doris Lessing’s novel The Good Terrorist. Alice Mellings, the protagonist of the novel, is a political activist whose reliance on male figures in the story—the leaders of a subdivision of a political party—ends in disillusionment and frustration. Looking at this novel from a socialist feminist point of view, Alice Mellings is found to be a minor member, exploited and abused, who has to follow the orders and instructions of her inept superiors—all male. While Alice is the one who guarantees the continuation of activism (doing all kinds of jobs needed to keep the squat alive, she is never allowed to have a role in decision making. She is a member whose identity is defined by male superiors and is considered as a half-human whose services are to be enjoyed only. However, the findings of this study prove Alice as one who has her own voice at the end. The novel’s closing is marked with an engendered New Woman who is aware of the political abuse and whose independent unbound identity stands much higher than the political oppression and masculine obstinacy that had imprisoned her for so long. She is a different woman at the end; one who knows her power, believes in it and decides to fight and not to surrender. And this is a new consciousness that Lessing raises: discover your feminine power, have a firm belief in it and use it to win.

  1. The Politics of Innovation in Public Transport. Issues, Settings and Displacements

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Nahuis, R.

    2007-01-01

    The mutual shaping of technology and society, including all kinds of conflicts and power differences, reveals an important political dimension of innovation processes. This thesis aims at understanding and evaluating this dimension. Because the politics of innovation takes place in a variety of

  2. 49 CFR 238.411 - Rear end structures of power car cabs.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-01

    ... 49 Transportation 4 2010-10-01 2010-10-01 false Rear end structures of power car cabs. 238.411... II Passenger Equipment § 238.411 Rear end structures of power car cabs. The rear end structure of the cab of a power car shall be designed to include the following elements, or their structural equivalent...

  3. Political and judicial checks on corruption

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Alt, James E.; Lassen, David Dreyer

    2008-01-01

    This paper investigates the effects of checks and balances on corruption. Within a presidential system, effective separation of powers is achieved under a divided government, with the executive and legislative branches being controlled by different political parties. When government is unified...

  4. [The participation in health councils and its interface with politics culture].

    Science.gov (United States)

    de Oliveira, Lucia Conde; Pinheiro, Roseni

    2010-08-01

    The objective of this paper is to analyse the participation of current health councils in a city in the north-eastern of Brazil and its relationship with local political culture. The following theoretical presumption served as starting point: The practices adopted by health councils initiate a new institution that involves new social actors - the users - in the public sphere. The process of democratisation in the Brazilian society expands this sphere and leads to a confrontation of traditional and democratic political cultures. This is a qualitative research with the following data collection methods: documentary analysis, participant observation and semi-structured interviews. Within the evidence emerged, the dominance of traditional political culture resulted as one of the conditioning elements of participation practices in the Council, expressed in the authoritarianism and cooptation involving municipal managers and representatives of civil society. The majority of counsellors recognises the fragile power of the Council in terms of deliberative and fiscal issues. Despite confirming the frailties of the health councils, it is obvious that their importance in the democratisation of the relationship between State and civil society in the fight for the implementation of the right to health care.

  5. The significance of structural power in Strategic Environmental Assessment

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hansen, Anne Merrild; Kørnøv, Lone; Cashmore, Matthew; Richardson, Tim

    2013-01-01

    This article presents a study of how power dynamics enables and constrains the influence of actors upon decision-making and Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA). Based on structuration theory, a model for studying power dynamics in strategic decision-making processes is developed. The model is used to map and analyse key decision arenas in the decision process of aluminium production in Greenland. The analysis shows that communication lines are an important resource through which actors exercise power and influence decision-making on the location of the aluminium production. The SEA process involved not only reproduction of formal communication and decision competence but also production of alternative informal communication structures in which the SEA had capability to influence. It is concluded, that actors influence strategic decision making, and attention needs to be on not only the formal interactions between SEA process and strategic decision-making process but also on informal interaction and communication between actors as the informal structures, which can be crucial to the outcome of the decision-making process. This article is meant as a supplement to the understanding of power dynamics influence in IA processes and as a contribution to the IA research field with a method to analyse power dynamics in strategic decision-making processes. The article also brings reflections of strengths and weaknesses of using the structuration theory as an approach to power analysis. - Highlights: ► Informal interaction influenced process despite the presence of formalised rules. ► Interdependence of actors influenced SEA effectiveness. ► SEA practitioners successfully exercised power to influence decision-making. ► Power dynamics are properties of actors' interactions in decision-making. ► Power structures can be enabling and not solely limiting.

  6. Identity, identity politics, and neoliberalism

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Wrenn Mary

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available With the intensification of neoliberalism, it is useful to examine how some individuals might cope with the irrationality of the system. Neoliberalism cloaks the execution of the corporate agenda behind rhetorical manipulation that advocates for limited government. The corollary absence of government involvement on behalf of the citizenry writ large disarms the means of social redress for the individual. Democracy funded and fueled by corporate power thereby disenfranchises the individual, provoking some to search for empowerment through identity politics. The argument set forth suggests that individuals construct, reinforce, or escalate allegiance to identities as a coping mechanism, some of which manifest in violent identity politics.

  7. What's Politics Got to Do with It? "Power" as a "Threshold" Concept for Undergraduate Business Students

    Science.gov (United States)

    Williams, Paul D.

    2014-01-01

    Politics courses embedded in business and commerce degree programs have soared in number in recent years. Yet how business students, often compulsorily enrolled in politics courses, learn key politics concepts is an under-researched area. The purpose of this article is to determine where the teaching and learning of political science and business…

  8. Local Politics and Religion in Papua

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Idrus Al Hamid

    2013-08-01

    Full Text Available Local political conflicts become an integral part of Indonesia. Various cause roots are assumed come from a religious dimension, in addition to ethnicity. In cases of Jayapura, Papua, local political dimensions of the conflict was obviously display as factors that religion should be integrating factor, but in fact religion become disintegrating factor. The various power of groups interconnect with a religious impulse that local political tensions grew louder and spread. The aim of this study is to describe analytically about the emergence of a strain on the local level in Jayapura Papua in the field of religion. To elaborate the analysis in this article, the excavation data through in-depth interviews, focus group discussion, and literature studies or documents on issues that occur on local level.

  9. Managing Political Information: A Malaysian Perspective

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jamilah Ahmad

    2010-07-01

    Full Text Available In the development of democratization and the expression of civil and political rights of Malaysian citizens, the pattern of control developed by the regime that is currently in power (Barisan Nasional for the last 50 years in the mass media began to reap the resistance and tend to be ineffective. Malaysian citizens began to demand the Malaysian government to change the pattern of political information management. In addition, the mass media alone is expected to play a more significant role as an intermediary agent in supporting the process of transparency and accountability of government policy. This article shows that the openness of public information is a prerequisite for political democracy in Malaysia to help the government minimize the mis-management of governance policies, especially in finance and resource management.

  10. Politics or Technocracy – What Next for Global Health?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kickbusch, Ilona

    2016-01-01

    Politics play a central part in determining health and development outcomes as Gorik Ooms highlights in his recent commentary. As health becomes more global and more politicized the need grows to better understand the inherently political processes at all levels of governance, such as ideological positions, ideas, value judgments, and power. I agree that global health research should strengthen its contribution to generating such knowledge by drawing more on political science, such research is gaining ground. Even more important is – as Ooms indicates – that global health scholars better understand their own role in the political process. It is time to acknowledge that expert-based technocratic approaches are no less political. We will need to reflect and analyse the role of experts in global health governance to a greater extent and in that context explore the links between politics, expertise and democracy. PMID:26927593

  11. Changing state structures: Outside in

    Science.gov (United States)

    Krasner, Stephen D.

    2011-01-01

    In explaining the development of institutional structures within states, social science analysis has focused on autochthonous factors and paid less attention to the way in which external factors, especially purposive agent-directed as opposed to more general environmental factors, can influence domestic authority structures. For international relations scholarship, this lacunae is particularly troubling or perhaps, just weird. If the international system is anarchical, then political leaders can pursue any policy option. In some cases, the most attractive option would be conventional state to state interactions, diplomacy, or war. In other instances, however, changing the domestic authority structures of other states might be more appealing. In some cases, domestic authority structures have been influenced through bargaining, and in others through power. Power may reflect either explicit agent-oriented decisions or social processes that reflect the practices, values, and norms of more powerful entities. PMID:22198756

  12. THE MAIN DIRECTIONS IN THE STUDY OF POLITICAL ELITES IN THE POST-CLASSICAL ITALIAN POLITICAL SCIENCE

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Кирилл Сергеевич Кондрашев

    2013-07-01

    Full Text Available PurposeDetection the main approaches to the definition of the political elites, their appearance and function in a democracy.Methodology of workThe comparative method, structural and functional method.ResultsMarked changes in the methods of communication elites and masses, the emergence of new types of elites that meet the transforming needs of the masses, changing the structure of the political sphere in terms of postmodernism and globalization.Application of resultsThe results can be applied in the process policy advice.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.12731/2218-7405-2013-5-27

  13. [Balance of power in hospitals].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lameyer, A

    2000-08-01

    It is known that there is a large extent of working dissatisfaction within some professional groups of the health service system. Especially in the hospital sector, many "struggles for power" take place. Unfortunately, these struggles are often only examined with regard to individual points of view without considering the system-oriented background. The following text will reflect the discussion in social sciences as to the distribution of power within the health service system. The double meaning of the distribution of power will be explained and, by means of decisive phenomenons, the development of cost and efficiency structures on the one hand as well as the development of health political processes in decision-making on the other hand will be described. In the section "The Hospital in the 20th Century", the structures that still can be widely found nowadays will be specified and examined as to aspects in behavioural sciences. Finally, as a logical consequence, an urgently needed reorientation from administration towards management will be pointed out.

  14. POLITICAL DISCOURSE – A SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC ANALYSIS

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Miodarka Tepavcevic

    2014-11-01

    Full Text Available The language of politics is commonly studied within discourse analysis, whereby its linguistic features relating to vocabulary, grammar structures, textual and intertextual aspects are investigated using various methodologies. This paper presents an analysis of political discourse from a syntactic-semantic point of view. The corpus studied has been extracted from five. Montenegrin dailies and the analysis attempts to describe the genre as effectuated in the Montenegrin political discourse. As a result, the functions of political language are extrapolated and illustrated and its style is described in terms of intertextuality and other linguistic strategies commonly employed in political discourse. The paper aims to give a contribution to the understanding and linguistic profiling of political language.

  15. Political Polarization in Social Media: Analysis of the "Twitter Political Field" in Japan

    OpenAIRE

    Takikawa, Hiroki; Nagayoshi, Kikuko

    2017-01-01

    There is an ongoing debate about whether the Internet is like a public sphere or an echo chamber. Among many forms of social media, Twitter is one of the most crucial online places for political debate. Most of the previous studies focus on the formal structure of the Twitter political field, such as its homophilic tendency, or otherwise limit the analysis to a few topics. In order to explore whether Twitter functions as an echo chamber in general, however, we have to investigate not only the...

  16. Experts in Political Communication - the Construal of Communication Expertise in Prime Time Television News

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Horsbøl, Anders

    2010-01-01

    A central journalistic counterstrategy to the communicative ‘professionalization' of politics consists in a use of political communication experts who comment on political moves and analyse the strategies behind them. This study investigates how the media uses political communication experts...... on the amount of political communication experts and their professional background. The study situates the analysis within a public sphere perspective on the power relations between politics and media, and discusses implications of the findings for a well functioning public sphere....

  17. Reviews on Rzewski’s Leftist Political Piano Variations: ‘The People United Will Never Be Defeated’

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Deng Liang

    2017-02-01

    Full Text Available ‘The People United Will Never Be Defeated (1975 is an one-hour epic modern piano variations, is one with an exquisite structure as well as a humanistic content. As a political context, this could be a legendary piece as well, in its creation in Chile just before Pinochet's military regime and the music's subsequent meaning for so many leftist political enthusiasts. In his approach the author highlighted the role of music, i.e. the role of cultural power in crating consciousness and attracting masses of people to political causes inspiring them to fight for better future. In addition, the author opened a number of questions on performance of contemporary music on the basis of Rzewski’s own DVD recording, the analyzing of which revealed an interesting phenomenon because when Rzewski played his own music, his playing differentiated from his own score.

  18. Political Crowdfunding as concept of political technologies

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Valeria GOLKA

    2016-09-01

    Full Text Available Political crowdfunding is analyzed as a new concept of political science. The justification of use of crowdfunding technologies not only in business but also in the political sphere is argued. The efficiency, availability, low cost of the new forms of political investment through the development of information and communication technologies are noted. The typology of political crowdfunding is proposed. Political projects promoting domestic crowdfunding platforms are analyzed. Attention is drawn to the problem of legal gaps in the regulation of crowdfunding is studied. The foreign experience of organizing public support (mikroinvestment political projects. It is emphasized that in terms of political theory crowdfunding is based on solidarity. The crowdfunding properties of transforming social capital accumulated by social networks into financial capital are mentioned.

  19. A Study on Salt Attack Protection of Structural and Finishing Materials in Power Plant Structures

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Kim, W.B.; Kweon, K.J.; Suh, Y.P.; Nah, H.S.; Lee, K.J.; Park, D.S.; Jo, Y.K. [Korea Electric Power Research Institute, Taejeon (Korea, Republic of)

    1997-12-31

    This is a final report written by both KEPRI and KICT as a co-operative research titled {sup A} study on Salt Protection of Structural and Finishings in Power Plant Structures{sup .} This study presented the methods to prevent the chloride-induced corrosion of power plant structures through collection and analysis of research datum relating to design, construction and maintenance for the prevention of structural and finishing materials, thru material performance tests for anti-corrosion under many kinds of chloride-induced corrosion environments. As a result, this study proposed the guidelines for design, construction and maintenance of power plant structures due to chloride-induced corrosion. (author). 257 refs., 111 figs., 86 tabs.

  20. A Study on Salt Attack Protection of Structural and Finishing Materials in Power Plant Structures

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Kim, W B; Kweon, K J; Suh, Y P; Nah, H S; Lee, K J; Park, D S; Jo, Y K [Korea Electric Power Research Institute, Taejeon (Korea, Republic of)

    1998-12-31

    This is a final report written by both KEPRI and KICT as a co-operative research titled {sup A} study on Salt Protection of Structural and Finishings in Power Plant Structures{sup .} This study presented the methods to prevent the chloride-induced corrosion of power plant structures through collection and analysis of research datum relating to design, construction and maintenance for the prevention of structural and finishing materials, thru material performance tests for anti-corrosion under many kinds of chloride-induced corrosion environments. As a result, this study proposed the guidelines for design, construction and maintenance of power plant structures due to chloride-induced corrosion. (author). 257 refs., 111 figs., 86 tabs.

  1. SECULARIST AND ISLAMIST CONSTITUTIONAL AND POLITICAL CONCEPCTIONS IN THE MODERN MUSLIM WORLD: THE CASES OF KEMALIST TURKEY AND KHOMEINI’S IRAN

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nikola Gjorshoski

    2017-05-01

    Full Text Available Modern constitutional and political concepts, in a broad sense, represent an expressed codification of the elements of value that structure the relevant society or the particular group that tries to project or channel them through the existing order. The secularism vs. Islamism dichotomy is a part of such a conceptual framework. The author elaborates and compares both ultimate constitutional and political designs, specifying them through the example of Turkey and Iran, as well as to shows the basic characteristics through the prism of their political legitimacy, the organization of power, the human rights and freedoms, as well as the possibility of political activism. The thesis that the author notes develops in the direction of a warning that the extremes contained in the constitutional provisions in the vividly ideologically divided societies can be a source of a conflict and/or can generate instability or suffocation of the pluralism in the political arena.

  2. Space, politics, and the political

    OpenAIRE

    dikec , mustafa

    1987-01-01

    International audience; Introduction Geography and politics'', Gottmann wrote in 1980, ``have long been in search of each other'' (page 11). Debates in the literature suggest not only that they have found each other, but also that the encounter has instigated, notably in the last decade or so, a body of literature seeking to think space politically, and to think politics spatially. This is not to suggest that previous work on space was apolitical, nor to suggest that previous work on politics...

  3. Generations of decay: the political geography of decommissioning

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Blowers, A.

    1990-01-01

    Energy is politics. We rarely find it where we need it, it imposes upon other areas when we move it, and the less control we have over its development and use, the more politically insecure we feel. Nuclear power appears to avoid the traditional politics of energy supply by geographically internalizing much of the fuel cycle. But the problem of waste disposal, including decommissioning, is a major source of political conflict and uncertainty affecting the whole future of the nuclear industry. One of the most politically motivated decisions of the decommissioning era will be in choosing whether the process will be immediate or deferred. Deferred decommissioning is the most likely strategy, and that geographical inertia is the likely outcome. Such inertia is a feature of industrial decline, with each industrial epoch leaving the detritus of past decisions for future generations to discover and deal with. The political basis of the nuclear fuel cycle is its links with considerations of wastes, hazards, longevity, and equity, all matters of public interest and concern. As part of the nuclear fuel cycle, decommissioning will include these considerations too, and it is for this reason that, wherever decommissioning takes place, political questions arise. (author)

  4. Report on aging of nuclear power plant reinforced concrete structures

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Naus, D.J.; Oland, C.B.; Ellingwood, B.R.

    1996-03-01

    The Structural Aging Program provides the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission with potential structural safety issues and acceptance criteria for use in continued service assessments of nuclear power plant safety-related concrete structures. The program was organized under four task areas: Program Management, Materials Property Data Base, Structural Component Assessment/Repair Technology, and Quantitative Methodology for Continued Service Determinations. Under these tasks, over 90 papers and reports were prepared addressing pertinent aspects associated with aging management of nuclear power plant reinforced concrete structures. Contained in this report is a summary of program results in the form of information related to longevity of nuclear power plant reinforced concrete structures, a Structural Materials Information Center presenting data and information on the time variation of concrete materials under the influence of environmental stressors and aging factors, in-service inspection and condition assessments techniques, repair materials and methods, evaluation of nuclear power plant reinforced concrete structures, and a reliability-based methodology for current and future condition assessments. Recommendations for future activities are also provided. 308 refs., 61 figs., 50 tabs

  5. Report on aging of nuclear power plant reinforced concrete structures

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Naus, D.J.; Oland, C.B. [Oak Ridge National Lab., TN (United States); Ellingwood, B.R. [Johns Hopkins Univ., Baltimore, MD (United States). Dept. of Civil Engineering

    1996-03-01

    The Structural Aging Program provides the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission with potential structural safety issues and acceptance criteria for use in continued service assessments of nuclear power plant safety-related concrete structures. The program was organized under four task areas: Program Management, Materials Property Data Base, Structural Component Assessment/Repair Technology, and Quantitative Methodology for Continued Service Determinations. Under these tasks, over 90 papers and reports were prepared addressing pertinent aspects associated with aging management of nuclear power plant reinforced concrete structures. Contained in this report is a summary of program results in the form of information related to longevity of nuclear power plant reinforced concrete structures, a Structural Materials Information Center presenting data and information on the time variation of concrete materials under the influence of environmental stressors and aging factors, in-service inspection and condition assessments techniques, repair materials and methods, evaluation of nuclear power plant reinforced concrete structures, and a reliability-based methodology for current and future condition assessments. Recommendations for future activities are also provided. 308 refs., 61 figs., 50 tabs.

  6. The Acceptance Strategy for Nuclear Power Plant In Indonesia

    Science.gov (United States)

    Suhaemi, Tjipta; Syaukat, Achmad

    2010-06-01

    THE ACCEPTANCE STRATEGY FOR NUCLEAR POWER PLANT IN INDONESIA. Indonesia has planned to build nuclear power plants. Some feasibility studies have been conducted intensively. However, the processes of NPP introduction are still uncertain. National Energy Plan in Indonesia, which has been made by some governmental agencies, does not yet give positive impact to the government decision to construct the nuclear power plant (NPP). This paper discusses the process of NPP introduction in Indonesia, which has been colored with debate of stakeholder and has delayed decision for go-nuclear. The technology paradigm is used to promote NPP as an alternative of reliable energy resources. This paradigm should be complemented with international politic-economic point of view. The international politic-economic point of view shows that structural powers, consisting of security, production, finance, and knowledge structures, within which the NPP is introduced, have dynamic characteristics. The process of NPP introduction in Indonesia contains some infrastructure development (R&D, legislation, regulation, energy planning, site study, public acceptance efforts, etc), but they need a better coherent NPP implementation program and NPP Acceptance Program. Strategic patterns for NPP acceptance described in this paper are made by considering nuclear regulation development and the interest of basic domestic participation. The first NPP program in Indonesia having proven technology and basic domestic participation is and important milestone toward and optimal national energy-mix.

  7. Political epidemiology: strengthening socio-political analysis for mass immunisation - lessons from the smallpox and polio programmes.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Taylor, S

    2009-01-01

    Control and reduction of infectious diseases is a key to attaining the Millennium Development Goals. An important element of this work is the successful immunisation, especially in resource-poor countries. Mass immunisation, most intensively in the case of eradication, depends on a combination of reliable demand (e.g. public willingness to comply with the vaccine protocol) and effective supply (e.g. robust, generally state-led, vaccine delivery). This balance of compliance and enforceability is, quintessentially, socio-political in nature - conditioned by popular perceptions of disease and risk, wider conditions of economic development and poverty, technical aspects of vaccine delivery, and the prevailing international norms regarding power relations between states and peoples. In the past 100 years, three out of six disease eradication programmes have failed. The explanations for failure have focused on biotechnical and managerial or financial issues. Less attention is paid to socio-political aspects. Yet socio-political explanations are key. Eradication is neither inherently prone to failure, nor necessarily doomed in the case of polio. However, eradication, and similar mass immunisation initiatives, which fail to address social and political realities of intervention may be. A comparison of the smallpox and polio eradication programmes illustrates the importance of disease-specific socio-political analysis in programme conceptualisation, design, and management.

  8. Use of the discourse analysis method to study current political practice (by the example of representation of the political leader image

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Frolova Nadezhda

    2016-01-01

    Full Text Available The potentialities in the application of the discourse analysis method to study a political discourse as a current political practice are shown. The authors, using the Foucault methodology, offer a sociological definition for the political discourse. It is the authors’ opinion that the approach mentioned allows investigating a political discourse as a practice for the formation of a certain reality, specific agents, institutions and organizations. A political discourse is a simulative dynamic model of political area where various subdiscourses interact, thus creating their own ideas of policy, symbols and images. Subdiscourses of political leaders become dominating. Inasmuch as a political discourse in a current political system is carried out with the aid of mass media, it could be considered as a media discourse of policy. The authors consider the representation as a basic mechanism for the formation of a political discourse, by the example of the representation of the image of V.V. Putin, the President of the Russian Federation. The representation of a political leader image in a political discourse has a number of peculiarities. It is carried out on the basis of certain principles with the aid of the system of political codes. Empiric investigations allowed making a conclusion that the main symbolic image for the Russian President is an image of a super-hero. It is the authors’ opinion, the image of V.V. Putin as a leader super-hero is determined by the specificity of the Russian political culture within the limits of which a leader is a center of power establishing an authoritarian style of ruling. The authors show the process of the political legitimacy displacement from the institutional level to the personal one by means of mass media. A political leader gains a status of a subject establishing moral, social and value reference points for the whole of the society.

  9. Purchasing power: business and health policy change in Massachusetts.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bergthold, L A

    1988-01-01

    As in many states around the country, health care costs in Massachusetts had risen to an unprecedented proportion of the state budget by the early 1980s. State health policymakers realized that dramatic changes were needed in the political process to break provider control over health policy decisions. This paper presents a case study of policy change in Massachusetts between 1982 and 1988. State officials formulated a strategy to mobilize corporate interests, which were already awakening to the problems of high health care costs, as a countervailing power to the political monopoly of provider interests. Once mobilized, business interests became organized politically and even became dominant at times, controlling both the policy agenda and its process. Ultimately, business came to be viewed as a permanent part of the coalitions and commissions that helped formulate state health policy. Although initially allied with provider interests, business eventually forged a stronger alliance with the state, an alliance that has the potential to force structural change in health care politics in Massachusetts for years to come. The paper raises questions about the consequences of such alliances between public and private power for both the content and the process of health policymaking at the state level.

  10. The struggle is beautiful: on the aesthetics of leftist politics

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Hartle, J.

    2013-01-01

    Aesthetic discourse has always openly or secretly been linked to political projects. According to some main strands of aesthetic discourse modern aesthetics mirrors the structure of social and political emancipation and key elements of aesthetic discourse coincide with the political ontology of the

  11. The politics of Piketty: what political science can learn from, and contribute to, the debate on Capital in the twenty-first century.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hopkin, Jonathan

    2014-12-01

    Thomas Piketty's imposing volume has brought serious economics firmly into the mainstream of public debate on inequality, yet political science has been mostly absent from this debate. This article argues that political science has an essential contribution to make to this debate, and that Piketty's important and powerful book lacks a clear political theory. It develops this argument by first assessing and critiquing the changing nature of political science and its account of contemporary capitalism, and then suggesting how Piketty's thesis can be complemented, extended and challenged by focusing on the ways in which politics and collective action shape the economy and the distribution of income and wealth. Although Capital's principal message is that 'capital is back' and that without political interventions active political interventions will continue to grow, a political economy perspective would suggest another rather more fundamental critique: the very economic forces Piketty describes are embedded in institutional arrangements which can only be properly understood as political phenomena. In a sense capital itself - the central concept of the book - is almost meaningless without proper consideration of its political foundations. Even if the fact of capital accumulation may respond to an economic logic, the process is embedded in a very political logic. The examples of housing policy and the regulation, and failure to regulate, financial markets are used to illustrate these points. © London School of Economics and Political Science 2014.

  12. Power in a startup's relationships with its established partners : Interactions between structural and behavioural power

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Oukes, Tamara; von Raesfeld Meijer, Ariane; Groen, Aard

    2017-01-01

    Power plays a key role in the relationships between startups and established organisations. Yet researchers have devoted little attention to the startup's perspective on power in such relationships. To study startups' view on power, a useful starting point is their structural power, but this also

  13. War Powers Litigation Initiated by Members of Congress Since the Enactment of the War Powers Resolution

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-02-17

    separation of powers . Prominent on the surface of any case held to involve a political question is found a textually demonstrable constitutional...and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia again affirmed. The district court stated as a predicate that the separation of powers doctrine...grave separation of powers issues” and observed that courts traditionally have been reluctant “to intercede in disputes between the political

  14. THE USE OF RELIGIOUS AND POLITICAL RITUALS IN CONTEMPORARY COMMUNICATION

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    IOVAN MARTIAN

    2011-04-01

    Full Text Available This article identifies the main characteristics and trends inthe development of media power in the context of increasing its connection with the otherpowers in the society, especially with the political and ecclesiastic power. The developmentof communication technologies, especially during the last half of a century, has led to theimprovement and increase of the efficiency of communication functions at all levels,regardless of the distances between those who manage communication and the targetpublic. The sacerdotal and political powers of our days have taken over the results ofmass–media development in order to use them intensively in the attainment of their ownmission and strategies, seeking to be as successful as possible. An essential way forfulfilling the goals of political and ecclesiastic power is the intentional use of specificceremonies and rituals in the communication exchanges with the public. The “directors”and “screenwriters” involved in the organization of such spectacles and their mediacoverage all over the planet have so perfected this art that the powers receiving extensivemedia coverage have become seductive celebrities, increasingly capable of manipulation, foran increasingly wider public. The author taps into a comprehensive historical,philosophical, sociological and practical documentation in order to demonstrate theincrease in the functions of audiovisual, verbal and nonverbal communication in our days,and some perverse effects of this evolution.

  15. Brazilian women in politics.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sanders, T G

    1987-01-01

    Women are gradually gaining influence in Brazilian politics, especially since recent advances in the women's movement, but they still play a limited role. There have been journals devoted to feminism and some notable feminists since 1850. In 1932 suffragettes in Brazil gained women the right to vote. Women's associations burgeoned in the 1940s and 1950s, culminating in a peak in number of women in national elected positions in 1965. A repressive military regime reversed the process, which resumed in 1975. 1975 was also significant for the Brazilian women's movement because of the U.N. Women's Year. Several large, influential feminist political action groups were formed, typically by upper class women with leftist views, although some church and union groups from lower classes also appeared. In 1979-1981, the coherence of these groups fell into schism and fragmentation, because of disagreements over the feminist political doctrines and roles, views on legality of abortion, and special interest groups such as lesbians. Another bitter dispute is opposition by leftist women to BEMFAM, the Brazilian Society of Family Welfare, which provides family planning for the poor: leftists oppose BEMFAM because it is supported by funds from "imperialist" countries such as the U.S. There are several types of feminists groups: those that emphasize health, sexuality and violence; those composed of lesbians; those originating from lower classes and unions; publicly instituted organizations. Brazilian law forbids discrimination against women holding public office, but in reality very few women actually do hold office, except for mayors of small towns and a few administrators of the Education and Social Security ministries. Political office in Brazil is gained by clientism, and since women rarely hold powerful positions in business, they are outsiders of the system. Brazilian women have achieved much, considering the low female literacy rate and traditional power system, but their

  16. A modern political education. Nonviolent perspectives

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Claudia SECCI

    2016-09-01

    Full Text Available he article deals with a nonviolent perspective of political education and with some theories that may conjugate these two domains: Nonviolent Culture and Political Education. Methodologically an approach rooted in the theoretical and bibliographical research has been privileged. The discourse investigates the causes of the actual political disaffection, and follows the purpose to highlight the irrevocable role of a structured nonviolent perspective (like Gandhi’s one, in the rehabilitation of politics. Nonviolence does not remove Marxist elements of legitimation in their entirety – as Gramsci’s theory will highlight – provided that they correspond the “conquest of violence” that needs to succeed first and foremost in the “intimate” individual’s awareness. Moreover, the importance of contemporary ecological theories, which embed the nonviolent perspective in a general epistemological view, will be also discussed to reaffirm the crucial significance of the latter. Through this path, different authors, hailing from diverse backgrounds, such as philosophical, pedagogical and anthropological studies, show meaningful affinities and matching points, presenting, in some case, political education in terms of education and training of the “political emotions”. The reflection highlights the relevance of an expanded political participation and experimentation through praxis, as ways of an actual political education, in the belief that emphasizing the pedagogic dimension of political activity, means nothing less than searching for its deepest fundament.

  17. The Importance, Content and Teaching of the Political Geography Course in Social Studies Undergraduate Programs

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ocal, Tulay

    2016-01-01

    Today, big countries and other countries inside their axes have entered power wars in regions where underground and aboveground sources are important. One of the characteristics of countries where these power wars take place is them not being able to understand the current world politics and elements of political geography. These countries cannot…

  18. Explaining ethnic politics in the Baltic States : reviewing the triadic nexus model / Vello Pettai

    Index Scriptorium Estoniae

    Pettai, Vello, 1968-

    2006-01-01

    Rets. rmt.: Dovile Budryte. Taming nationalism? Political community building in the post-soviet Baltic States; David J. Galbreath. Nation-building and minority politics in post-socialist states : interests, influences and identities in Estonia and Latvia; Judith G. Kelley. Ethnic politics in Europe : the power of norms and incentives. Skeemid

  19. Politics in the Postnational Constellation. An Approach to Habermas’s Conception of the State

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Juan Carlos Velasco

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available The steady loss of sovereign power of the national states and the correlative transition to a post-national constellation are, according to Habermas, among the major trends that characterize the current state of affairs in the world in political terms. Against this geopolitical background in which clear guidelines remain to be defined, Habermas outlines a possible political response with a democratic design: he suggests to recover the cosmopolitan project of Kant and to expedite the constitutionalization of the international sphere. One of the biggest challenges in this regard consists in reconciling the need for global governance of common affairs of humanity with demands for democratic participation. The configuration of a post-westphalian democratic practice in accordance with a multi-level structure of international relations could be a plausible solution.

  20. Iranian Political Strategy: Ideology or Pragmatism

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Saada, Julien

    2008-01-01

    Iranian political strategy wants to be presented as a political break, with a Pan-Islamic vocation. Brought about by Ayatollah Khomeyni, this political philosophy has produced the intended effects, as seen with the return of more moderate policies. Khomeyni's death confronted the Islamic Republic with a choice: Hachemi Rasfandjani put Iran back into the international scene by conciliating pragmatism with ideological values. In 2005, M. Ahmadinejad came to power. His declarations concerning the Hebrew State and his position on nuclear weapons pose the question as to whether or not Iran is reverting to an export policy of revolution. It is important to place these elements in the historical context of the Islamic Republic so as to see if Iranian foreign policy is again taking an ideological turn or if it is continuing down the lane of pragmatism

  1. 49 CFR 238.409 - Forward end structures of power car cabs.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-01

    ... 49 Transportation 4 2010-10-01 2010-10-01 false Forward end structures of power car cabs. 238.409... II Passenger Equipment § 238.409 Forward end structures of power car cabs. This section contains requirements for the forward end structure of the cab of a power car. (A conceptual implementation of this end...

  2. Political Transmigrants: Rethinking Hmong Political Activism in America

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nengher N. Vang, Ph.D

    2011-12-01

    Full Text Available Since the initial resettlement of the Hmong in the United States in the mid-1970s, they have maintained strong political and military relationships with the Lao People‘s Democratic Republic (LPDR. Yet, there is little research on that relationship and the involvement of the Hmong in the United States in political developments in Laos. Most works on Hmong political activism have focused on the electoral participation and representation of Hmong Americans in relation to American domestic politics. In this article, using archival, ethnographic, and interview data that I have collected between 2006 and 2009 in Laos, Thailand, and the United States, I describe and analyze the non-domestic or transnational form of Hmong American political expression and participation. I argue that Hmong political activism in America not only was transnational from the outset, but that their transnational involvement in political developments in Laos and their relations with the Lao PDR government also had a significant impact on their ethnic politics. Many Hmong political activists made their entry into ethnic politics through the door of transnational politics, and many were motivated by transnational political issues to participate in domestic American politics. By exploring their transnational involvement in political developments in Laos and their relations with the Lao PDR government, we get a more complete and dynamic understanding of Hmong political activism in the United States than is possible by focusing exclusively on domestic and electoral participation. Examining their transnational politics also allows us to see the transnationality of not only their culture, identity, and community but also that of their political activities and aspirations.

  3. The Politics of Virtue: A New Compact for Leadership in Schools.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sergiovanni, Thomas J.

    1995-01-01

    The politics of division arises from applying formal organizational theories of governance, management, and leadership to schools. Rational-choice theory and cultural pluralism lack the unifying power of civic virtue. Creating a politics of virtue requires that we renew commitments to our nation's democratic legacy. Principals must practice…

  4. Contentious Politics and Participatory Democracy in Brazil

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Brian Wampler

    2014-12-01

    Full Text Available http://dx.doi.org/10.5007/2175-7984.2014v13n28p199 Contentious politics helps individuals and groups with limited political voice to place their ideas and interests on the political agenda. Contentious politics were long thought to occur when politically marginalized group had no other means to advance their political agenda. The June 2013 social mobilization in Brazil caught most political observers by surprise, especially given the creation of a large, wide-spread participatory architecture (national conferences, councils, participatory budgeting. The innovative institutions emerging in Brazil created a policy environment in which millions of citizens have regular access to state policymaking bodies. How does the institutionalization of a broader network of participatory institutions make it easier for citizens to engage in contentious politics? In what ways does this institutionalization make it more difficult for some citizens to engage in contentious politics? In what ways has the vast network of participatory institutions been largely irrelevant to how citizens use contentious politics? This article explore how the institutionalization of an extensive participatory democracy system in Brazil alters the incentive structures that encourage citizens to engage in contentious collective action.

  5. Evaluation of the international limitations and conditions of the Argentinian nuclear politics

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Martin, Hugo R.

    2003-01-01

    It is a broadly accepted fact that the Argentine Republic is one of the few development countries that has reached an advance status in the world in pacific applications of nuclear science and technology. A retrospective vision of the main technical and political aspects that characterized the process to global scale allows to confirm, starting from the theory of the International Relations, that the position reached by the country was the consequence of a coherent effort sustained under the almost exclusive conduction of the National Atomic Energy Commission (CNEA). The Nuclear politics of Argentine in the international concert during the last fifty years, sample a behavior of non adhesion to the juridical treaties commitments that were considered limitative for the initial objectives proposed when President General J. D. Peron created the CNEA in 1950: self-sufficiency and national autonomy. This continuity shows an unusual coherence in the foreign policy of the country maintained by all the governments that exercised the power during five decades. The result of this investigation task has allowed to elaborate a complex, reasonably coherent vision of the consequences that the limitations and conditions on the Argentine nuclear politics had in the three temporary dimensions and in different levels. From the theoretical point of view, the scenario starts from the crisis of the Utopism that revaluate the Classic Realism (H. Morgenthau) after the Second World War. In the next stage K. Waltz's Structural Realism starts when the internationalization process of the nuclear technology begins in the 50. Other theoretical models: Complex Interdependence (R. Keohane and J. Nye) and Peripheric Realism (C. Escude) at local level seem to be the representative models to describe the Argentine political behavior in the nuclear politic and to prove that the main variable in this field was the genuine domain of the scientific and technological knowledge developed in the national

  6. Policy without politics: the limits of social engineering.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Navarro, Vicente

    2003-01-01

    The extent of coverage provided by a country's health services is directly related to the level of development of that country's democratic process (and its power relations). The United States is the only developed country whose government does not guarantee access to health care for its citizens. It is also the developed country with the least representative and most insufficient democratic institutions, owing to the constitutional framework of the political system, the privatization of the electoral process, and the enormous power of corporate interests in both the media and the political process. As international experience shows, without a strong labor-based movement willing to be radical in its protests, a universal health care program will never be accepted by the US establishment.

  7. The Political Structure at Basra Gulf in the Period of Ali b. Ebu Talib and Yezid b. Muaviye

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Taner YILDIRIM

    2011-06-01

    Full Text Available At this work about the political structure of the Basra Gulf, we dwelled upon the general geography of the district and its political history. The political situation of the district in this period is assessed in a way that comprises especially the period of Hz. Ali the fourth caliph of early islamic period Muaviya, the first Emevi caliph, and his son Yazid in the light of political developments in that period. When we took up Gulf of Basra we saw that the region of the Gulf is a very important strategic lacation. So since the most prohestoric period this area have got a lot of civilizations, big wars, social events and contentions. We saw that in the time of the region that we take up, the pozition of the Gulf area have gotten similar events in the past. Consequently, the area of the Gulf have owned most active pozition in that term that we take up. Especially because of the land trade roads, sea trade roads and riwer trade roads, Gulf of Basra have owned a very active junction at all time in the past and we easily guess that it will be protect its status in the future, too

  8. Ross-Cultural Aspects of Metaphorical Framing in Political Discourse

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Tatyana V. Andryukhina

    2016-01-01

    Full Text Available The article examines cross-cultural aspects of metaphorical framing in political discourse. The author notes the importance of conceptual metaphor in framing the conceptual domain of politics, political discourse as a whole, its perception as well as political reality itself. The author shares an opinion that the metaphorical structure of basic concepts of a nation always correlates with its fundamental cultural values. However, the examination of political discourse from the cross-cultural perspective reveals the cases of metaphor uses that don't meet the requirements of cultural coherence and may lead to negative cognitive and communicative consequences. Along with admitting a wide discrepancy between metaphorical models in western and oriental political discourse, the author gives some examples of metaphorical coherence as well as its violation in a number of basic metaphors in American, British and Russian political discourse. To illustrate how cross-cultural factors determine the specific character of metaphorical framing, the article analyses the dynamic character of metaphorical models that can realize diverse scenarios in different national varieties of political discourse. An observation is made about the dependence of metaphoric scenarios in different national varieties of political discourse on the cultural, historical, social and political components of the national cultural cognitive map. The latter is heterogeneous as it is structured by the objectified individual, group, and national verbal and nonverbal experience. This explains, for instance, why there are examples of similarity as well as discrepancy between metaphorical framing in ideologically different party varieties of political discourse within the national political discourse as well as in the rhetoric of politicians belonging to different generations. The observations are illustrated by cross-linguistic data proving the dynamic character of metaphorical models, their

  9. An investigation into the relationship between political activity levels and political market orientation

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Ormrod, Robert P.; Henneberg, Stephan C.

    2010-01-01

    Purpose - The key objective of this research is to investigate the relationship between party member activity-levels and perceptions of their party's political market orientation. Specifically, it aims to scrutinise the differences in the interplay of attitudinal and behavioural aspects of politi......Purpose - The key objective of this research is to investigate the relationship between party member activity-levels and perceptions of their party's political market orientation. Specifically, it aims to scrutinise the differences in the interplay of attitudinal and behavioural aspects...... of political market orientation. Design/methodology/approach - Using a wide variety of respondent groups within the party, the research draws on an existing conceptualisation of political market orientation and empirically test its relationship with party member activity levels. Three models, plus a baseline...... model, are developed and data from 1,156 questionnaires are used to investigate a structural equation model using the partial least square method. Findings - While the baseline model exhibits a robust pattern of positive relationships between the attitudinal and behavioural constructs, the comparative...

  10. Chernobyl: the political fall-out

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Edwards, R.

    1986-01-01

    The attitude to nuclear power of the major political parties in the United Kingdom is examined following the reactor accident at Chernobyl. In particular the Government policy, which is to reaffirm its commitment to nuclear energy, and that of the Labour opposition policy, which may be not to build any more nuclear power stations, are discussed. However, the Labour party policy is still open to debate and may be changed before the next general election. The Scottish and Welsh Nationalist parties and the Greens are all anti-nuclear. (U.K.)

  11. Structuring Knowledge of Subcultural Folk Devils through News Coverage: Social Cognition, Semiotics, and Political Economy

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    J. Patrick Williams

    2011-10-01

    Full Text Available The folk devil concept has been well used in subcultural studies, yet its importance might be better served by distinguishing among multiple conceptual frames through which it is articulated. In this article, I clarify how folk devils are made possible through the interaction of three concepts used by sociologists to study everyday life. The first is the process of social cognition, where producers and consumers of news construct and propagate a shared definition of who subcultural youths are and why they should be the object of fear. The second are the semiotic structures of genre and narrative, which narrow the interpretive process of producers and receivers alike and sustain discourses that limit how subcultural youths can be understood in the news. The third has to do with political economy, where the ideological features of mass mediated news-making keep the news industry in relative control of meaning making. Social cognition, semiotics, and the political economy dialectically produce the phenomenon of the subcultural folk devil and support its objective effects. I review several studies of market and state-controlled media societies and note that, in both types, the objective effects on youths are similar and significant. In studying how subcultural youths are framed in the media output of transitional states and societies, the conceptual value of social cognition, semiotics, and political economy should be recognised.

  12. The effect of political cycles on power investment decisions: Expectations over the repeal and reinstatement of carbon policy mechanisms in Australia

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    ShahNazari, Mahdi; McHugh, Adam; Maybee, Bryan; Whale, Jonathan

    2014-01-01

    Highlights: • Effect of political cycles quantified in power generation investments. • Expected repeal and reinstatement of carbon policy modelled dynamically. • A survey of experts informed the decision making model. • Expectations over reinstatement of policy dampens the effect of expected repeal. - Abstract: Political uncertainty over global greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation policy is likely to defer investment in cleaner technologies. It may also incentivise short-lived, high-cost interim investments while businesses wait for the uncertainty to subside. The range of possible policy responses to the issue has created uncertainty over the future of national mitigation pathways. Given that the electricity sector, globally, is a major emitter of GHGs, this represents a systematic risk to investment in electricity generation assets. This paper uses a real options analysis framework informed by a survey of experts conducted in Australia – used as a proxy to model the degree of the uncertainty – to investigate the optimal timing for investment in the conversion of a coal plant to a combined cycle gas turbine plant using the American-style option valuation method. The effect of market and political uncertainty is studied for the Clean Energy Act 2011 in Australia. Political uncertainty is addressed bi-modally in terms of: (1) uncertainty over the repeal of the carbon pricing policy, and (2) if it is repealed, uncertainty over the reinstatement of the policy, to represent the effect of electoral cycles and the possibility of more stringent future global mitigation efforts. Results of the analysis show that although political uncertainty with respect to GHG mitigation policy may delay investment in the conversion of the coal plant, expectations over the reinstatement of the carbon pricing reduces the amount of option premium to defer the conversion decision

  13. Extending the the behavioral immune system to political psychology: are political conservatism and disgust sensitivity really related?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Tybur, Joshua M; Merriman, Leslie A; Hooper, Ann E Caldwell; McDonald, Melissa M; Navarrete, Carlos David

    2010-10-26

    Previous research suggests that several individual and cultural level attitudes, cognitions, and societal structures may have evolved to mitigate the pathogen threats posed by intergroup interactions. It has been suggested that these anti-pathogen defenses are at the root of conservative political ideology. Here, we test a hypothesis that political conservatism functions as a pathogen-avoidance strategy. Across three studies, we consistently find no relationship between sensitivity to pathogen disgust and multiple measures of political conservatism. These results are contrasted with theoretical perspectives suggesting a relationship between conservatism and pathogen avoidance, and with previous findings of a relationship between conservatism and disgust sensitivity.

  14. Constructing and Contesting City of London Power

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Baker, Andrew; Wigan, Duncan

    2017-01-01

    Existing literature on the City of London has tended to focus on its ‘structural power’, while neglecting political and narrative agency. This paper acts as a corrective by presenting evidence to show that since the financial crash of 2008 the political terrain the City operates on has become more...... contested, crowded and noisier. The contribution develops a middle course between a positive assessment of the role of civil society in relation to global finance, and a more pessimistic reading. We demonstrate how macro-narratives and public story-telling both construct and contest City and financial...... sector power. In a new pattern since the financial crash, NGOs have moved from campaigns of limited duration and narrow focus, to a more sustained presence on macro-structural issues. Adopting a supply–demand framework for assessing governance and regulatory change, we look at the emergence of TheCity...

  15. Theoretical bases of formation of political consciousness of the citizens of Ukraine - as the actual direction of the development of the mainstreaming political sociology

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    K. U. Kublik

    2013-12-01

    Full Text Available Analyzing the political life through political ideology and political culture should pay attention to political consciousness, which presents set of theoretical positions, views, opinions, attitudes, values orientation, etc. that are implemented in the process of implementing functions of political power. Because postulates political ideology are implemented using some mechanism, election campaigns and public opinion, their analysis is undoubtedly one of the major directions of political sociology. At the present stage of creation of the state of Ukraine, formation of the Institute of civil society is important to the study of the mechanism of formation of political consciousness of the nation. On the state of political consciousness influenced by processes not only within the country but also in the international arena. The growing interdependence of countries and peoples, General threat to the existence of humans and the General difficulties on the path of human progress lead to the «globalization» of all the forms of public consciousness, including political. A shift from confrontation to mutual understanding and cooperation means considerable changes in the political consciousness and politics subjects of international cooperation. These are not only the state but also directly peoples, peace­loving democratic mass movements, people of good will on all continents. Consolidation of their efforts is able to resist all forms of hegemony and dictates, any policy which is conducted from a position of strength.

  16. Social movements, public spheres and the European politics of the environment: green power Europe?

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    van der Heijden, H.A.

    2010-01-01

    This book examines how the European environmental movement, as part of an emerging European civil society, has impinged on the problem definitions and solution strategies in the European politics of the environment. Examining core case studies in European environmental policy - biodiversity politics

  17. European Union: Gender and politics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Žunić Natalija

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available Political representation is the central issue in contemporary debates on the level of democracy in political institutions and processes in the European Union. Underrepresentation of particular groups in political institutions, decision-making and policy-making processes is perceived as the problem of justice, legitimacy and effectiveness in democratic societies. In this paper, the author analyzes the gender aspects of democratic decision-making processes and political representation of women in the EU member states. The social, historical and political dimension of women's efforts to obtain and promote their civil status and political rights have been the framework for developing the principle of gender equality as one of the founding EU principles. In the past hundred years, one of the most significant trends in politics has been the expansion of formal political representation of women. Yet, even though it has been more than a hundered years since women won their political rights in the 19th and the 20th century (the right to vote and the right to be voted, gender differences in political rights are still a substantial part of debate. Today, women's political representation is still inadequate and their political capacity and power have not been exercised to a sufficient extent (or proportionally through their actual representation in parliament. In March 2012, the European Commisision published a report on gender equality in different areas of social life; the Eurobarometer survey shows that women are generally underrepresented in politics. In national parliaments, only one out of four MPs is a woman. In the European Parliament, three out of ten parliamentarians are women. The statistics shows a huge discrepancy among the EU Member States in terms of women's representation in parliament (44.7% in Sweden as contrasted to 13.3% in Romania. The prevailing view in many studies is that post-industrial democracies are deficient as they have failed

  18. Politicizing science: conceptions of politics in science and technology studies.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Brown, Mark B

    2015-02-01

    This essay examines five ideal-typical conceptions of politics in science and technology studies. Rather than evaluating these conceptions with reference to a single standard, the essay shows how different conceptions of politics serve distinct purposes: normative critique, two approaches to empirical description, and two views of democracy. I discuss each conception of politics with respect to how well it fulfills its apparent primary purpose, as well as its implications for the purpose of studying a key issue in contemporary democratic societies: the politicization of science. In this respect, the essay goes beyond classifying different conceptions of politics and also recommends the fifth conception as especially conducive to understanding and shaping the processes whereby science becomes a site or object of political activity. The essay also employs several analytical distinctions to help clarify the differences among conceptions of politics: between science as 'political' (adjective) and science as a site of 'politics' (noun), between spatial-conceptions and activity-conceptions of politics, between latent conflicts and actual conflicts, and between politics and power. The essay also makes the methodological argument that the politics of science and technology is best studied with concepts and methods that facilitate dialogue between actors and analysts. The main goal, however, is not to defend a particular view of politics, but to promote conversation on the conceptions of politics that animate research in social studies of science and technology.

  19. The sexual games of the body politic: fantasy and state violence in Northern Ireland.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Aretxaga, B

    2001-03-01

    This article analyzes the practice of strip searching women political prisoners in Northern Ireland as a violent technology of control aimed at breaking the political identity of prisoners. Focusing on a controversial case of a mass strip search carried out in 1992, the article examines the phantasmatic investements pervading this seemingly rational technology of control. Using a psychoanalytic notion of fantasy against the backdrop of a Foucaultian theory of power, this article argues that strip searches constitute a gendered form of political domination driven by, and performed within, a phantasmatic scenario of sexual violence. In this scenario both the political and gender identities of prisoners are re-inscribed with the power of a state acting as a male body politic. The article argues that the phantasmatic support of rational technologies of control betrays the contingent and shifting character of domination as well as its ambiguous effects.

  20. Political Party Funding in Romania - One Step Forward, Two Steps Back?

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    Iulian Georgel Savenco

    2015-05-01

    Full Text Available Within political life, the determining role is given to political parties in their capacity as actors in the electoral campaign and in the race for political power. This is the reason for which we believe that the means of financing political parties and the electoral campaigns in which they partake is an important aspect within the electoral reform, as without an adequate funding their chances of winning the electoral race are drastically reduced. On the other hand, funding of political parties is of great interest as the lack of transparency which usually encircles this process can lead to a dangerous phenomenon, namely corruption. Throughout this article we present the current situation and critically analyze the changes which the Romanian legislature plans to apply to the political party financing law.