Children's acquisition of political opinions

This paper reports and discusses the results of a survey of English and Welsh schoolchildren aged 11–18, conducted in March–May 2003, covering their attitudes to and knowledge of politics, politicians and political issues. It concentrates in particular on the way these attitudes develop as pupils get older, and also discusses the sources of information on which young people depend, and which may be the key to developing this neglected political ‘market’. It finds that pupils are unenthused by politics, but not ‘apathetic’. Both knowledge and interest increase as pupils grow older; however, negative or cynical attitudes to politicians and to political parties seem to grow at the same time. Yet young people also hold positive attitudes to the electoral process in general, though many do not accept that they will have a ‘duty to vote’ when old enough. The media, though distrusted, is the principal source of information, though it is clear that the family is highly influential; schools seem less influential. Copyright © 2004 Henry Stewart Publications     

Analysing political ideas and political action

Abstract

This paper examines the relevance of Boltanski and Thévenot's newly translated book, On justification, to the analysis of political ideas and political action. While situating the work of the authors within its initial intellectual context, namely the ‘economics of conventions’, it shows that one of the key contributions of the ‘sociology of justification’ lies in the answers it brings to two fundamental, as yet unresolved, questions in political science and political sociology: first, how is it possible to identify those ideas which are politically relevant? Second, how is it possible to capture the dynamics of public ideas? After outlining the sources of the quandaries faced within political science and political sociology as regards these two questions, the conceptual framework of Boltanski and Thévenot is presented and explained, and research perspectives suggested. This article argues that On justification provides a highly engaging, stimulating and empirically useful contribution to current debates in social and political theory around the dynamics of political arguments and ideas.     

The role of political parties: An analysis based on transaction costs

This paper explores the proposition that political parties reduce the ‘transaction costs’ of electoral participation. Political parties provide a low cost signal of a candidate's policies and personal characteristics and, in this way, reduce voters' information costs. With reference to ‘transaction cost economics’, political parties offer an ‘implicit contract’ between voters and politicians and thereby reduce the scope for opportunism by politicians. This impact on transaction costs is important in any evaluation of public policy towards political parties.     

A cultural political economy of crisis recovery: (trans-)national imaginaries of ‘BRIC’ and subaltern groups in China

Abstract

This paper explores crisis recovery from a cultural political economy (CPE) perspective. It examines the role of (trans-)national forces in constructing BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, China) as drivers for recovery. First, it comments on some ‘cultural economy’ studies and indicates the value of a CPE approach. Second, it examines the ‘BRIC’ as a symbolic condensation of ‘hope’ knowledge and shows how this signifier evolved in three overlapping moments referring to its role as investor, consumer and lender. Third, it considers the material basis of the appeal of BRIC discourses, especially the credibility acquired through BRIC stimulus packages in the global financial crisis. Fourth, it indicates how China's ‘gold standard’ stimulus package has intensified some deep-rooted political tensions and harmed subaltern groups. Finally, it reflects on how CPE can contribute to studies of crisis and recovery.     

The effect of being conflict non-avoidant: linking conflict framing and political participation

Abstract

The news media’s ability to mobilise citizens to participate politically by emphasising elite conflict in politics is not well understood. This article argues that citizens may gain knowledge when exposed to conflict news framing. It further theorises that whether they translate their knowledge into political participation is conditioned by their orientation towards conflict. Individuals who avoid conflict participate less frequently than individuals who do not. The proposed moderated mediation process was tested using a content analysis of news media coverage and a three-wave panel survey (n?=?2,061). Results show that the effect of exposure to conflict news framing on (changes in) political participation is positively mediated by knowledge. This mediation effect is moderated by conflict avoidance, where the effect is more positive among conflict non-avoiders than conflict avoiders. This study shows that understanding the news media’s mobilising effect on political participation requires attention to both news content and individual motivational factors.     

Framing and reframing R2P—a responsibility to protect humanity from evil

ABSTRACT

This article takes issue with de-politicised and moralistic conceptions of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) and, inspired by the political theory of Hannah Arendt, develops a ‘re-politicised’ and ‘de-moralised’ account of R2P. It argues that by relying on a link between a moral responsibility to ‘save strangers’ and practical political action, R2P turns a blind eye to the political interest of powerful actors. And by trying to transform R2P into a ‘blueprint’, ‘roadmap’ or ‘emergency plan’ for political action, many commentators try to render obsolete political deliberation and practical judgement on a case-by-case basis. The present article argues that it is necessary to develop a more realistic view of R2P’s role and potential in world politics. R2P, it is argued, has an important discursive function and considerable potential to influence and guide international decision-making processes. Drawing on Arendt’s conception of ‘evil’ as a crime against humanity itself, this article reframes R2P as a ‘responsibility to protect humanity from evil’. An Arendtian understanding of mass atrocities as crimes against our common humanity (i.e. as evils) facilitates the development of a re-politicised and de-moralised account of R2P: This account recognises its discursive role, it actively seeks to generate political interest for action in the face of harrowing mass atrocities but also acts as a leash on intervention in less severe cases.

Abbreviation R2P: Responsibility to Protect; UN: United Nations; NATO: North Atlantic Treaty Organisation; ICISS: International Committee on Intervention and State Sovereignty     

Liberal equality: political not erinaceous

Ronald Dworkin’s Justice for Hedgehogs defends liberal political morality on the basis of a rich account of dignity as constitutive of living well. This article raises the Rawlsian concern that making political morality dependent on ethics threatens citizens’ political autonomy. Thereafter, it addresses whether the abandonment of (erinaceous) ethical foundations signals the demise of Dworkin’s liberalism and explores the possibility of laundering his conception so as to facilitate a marriage between the political philosophies of Rawls and Dworkin. The article finishes by rebutting some objections Dworkin raises against Rawls’s account of public reason.     

What Mr. Spock told the earthlings: the aims of political philosophy,action-guidingness and fact-dependency

Abstract

Recently, G. A. Cohen introduced an influential distinction between fact-sensitive and fact-insensitive principles arguing that all basic normative principles are of the latter type. David Miller rejects this claim submitting that the validity of basic normative political principles depends on some general propositions about human nature and societies; for example, that men’s generosity is ‘confined’ and that nature has made ‘scanty provision’ for his wants. Miller ties this view of the nature of basic political principles to the view that political philosophy ought to guide people engaged in real-world politics and claims plausibly that in order to fulfil this purpose, political philosophy must be informed by social science. I argue that Miller neither succeeds in showing that basic principles can be fact-sensitive, nor establishes any connection between the Cohen-Miller disagreement on fact-sensitivity, on the one hand, and the nature and aims of political philosophy, on the other hand.     

Political citizenship and local political participation for disabled people

The theme of this article is political citizenship among people with disabilities. Political citizenship on the basis of gender and ethnicity has received attention internationally. However, there has been little attention on political citizenship of persons with disabilities. The article sheds light on political representation at the local level in Norway. The data used are from a survey sent to 767 political representatives in local politics and 50 administrative representatives. Our study shows that disabled people are under-represented in local political assemblies, and thus, their political citizenship is not fully acknowledged. We apply Fraser (N. Fraser, 1997. Justice Interruptus. Critical Reflections on the ‘Postsocialist’ Condition. New York and London: Routledge) concepts of redistribution and recognition to analyse the lack of representation of disabled people. According to the dimension of redistribution, the analysis shows that neither the physical conditions nor the organization of the different meetings is particularly well adapted for disabled people. The dimension of recognition shows that disabled representatives are expected to be more occupied with issues concerning disability than other representatives. The analysis also shows that over time it has become more important for elected disabled representatives to put issues concerning disability on the agenda.     

Political science,political ideas and rhetoric

The article reviews ‘ideational’ analysis and theory in political science. It argues that this is an important area of research limited by lack of a clear sense of what ideas in politics are and of how to analyse them as directly as possible. It is argued that political science should learn from the ‘rhetorical turn’ in various areas of the social sciences, developing ways, appropriate to political science, of analysing the language, rhetoric and argumentation of political and policy discourse in its governmental contexts. Such an approach rests on a strong sense of the dynamic, contested and creative nature of political activity.     

The ‘dialectical’ theory of conservatism

ABSTRACT

Recently, James Alexander has proposed a ‘dialectical definition’ of conservatism which, he believes, goes beyond ‘dispositional’ definitions, such as those proposed by Brennan and Hamlin, and by Martin Beckstein, which are ‘incomplete’.¹ Alexander argues that, by focusing on conservative responses to ‘ruptures’ of continuity, his expanded account exposes the ‘fundamentally contradictory’ nature of conservative thought.² This article offers a critique of Alexander’s ‘dialectical definition’ of conservatism, highlighting its inconsistency with the ideological content long agreed by conservative political thinkers, and with the historical realities of conservative political practice. But it also shows that there is a valuable and rightful place for a political ‘dialectic’ as part of a theory of conservatism that is more consistent with the history of conservative thought and practice. It is a dialectic with many historical precedents in political theory, two of which are examined in detail: (1) the earliest, found in Plato’s Statesman; and (2) an innovative and particularly useful formulation of it to be found in the political philosophy of R. G. Collingwood.     

Where do electronic markets come from? Regulation and the transformation of financial exchanges

Abstract

The practices of high-frequency trading (HFT) are dependent on automated financial markets, especially those produced by securities exchanges electronically interconnected with competing exchanges. How did this infrastructural and organizational state of affairs come to be? Employing the conceptual distinction between fixed-role and switch-role markets, we analyse the discourse surrounding the design and eventual approval of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Regulation of Exchanges and Alternative Trading Systems (Reg ATS). We find that the disruption of the exchange industry at the hands of automated markets was produced through an interweaving of both technological and political change. This processual redefinition of the ‘exchange’, in addition, may provide a suggestive precedent for understanding contemporary regulatory crises generated by other digital marketplace platforms.     

In pursuit of happiness: Life satisfaction drives political support

It is argued in this article that citizens in democracies use their subjective well-being (SWB) as an evaluative criterion when deciding how willing they are to support and comply with government dictates (political system support). When life is satisfactory, government authorities are rewarded with support, when it is not, citizens punish authorities by withholding their support. To make sense of the relationship, it is suggested that citizens act as if they have signed a happiness contract with ‘those in power’. In support of this argument, comparative survey data shows that SWB predicts attitudes on political system support across country contexts and under strong control conditions. Establishing that the relationship is causal, panel data documents that attitudes on political system support can be undermined following the termination of a close personal relationship, and that the causal effect is mediated via changes in SWB. Finally, as predicted, the happiness-support relationship is weaker among individuals who are high on spirituality/religiousness and attribute blame for external events to both worldly and non-worldly powers.     

Strategic postures of political marketing: an exploratory operationalization

• In contrast to most political marketing theories which imply that such concepts as ‘voter‐orientation’ or ‘voter‐centric political management’ are trivial and uni‐dimensional, this article will take its starting point from an alternative perspective.
• It draws on the concept of political marketing ‘postures’, i.e. a multi‐faceted conceptual entity, based on varied dimensions of political marketing orientations. The main duality consists of the constructs of ‘leading’ and ‘following’, with an auxiliary (and complementary) dimension of ‘relationship building’.
• This article provides an exploratory methodology to operationalize this concept, which will also be initially tested empiricially, using expert judgements as well as electorate's perceptions.
• Changing postures will be exemplified within a longitudinal application of the concept to perceptions of Tony Blair as Prime Minister.

Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Politically Significant Events and Their Effect on the Image of Political Parties

Abstract

This article begins by arguing that the image of a political party is of strategic importance in its pursuit of electoral success. More specifically, it is argued that important influences on party image are ‘politically relevant’ events. The paper then develops a conceptual model of how the images of political parties are influenced by such events. It considers internal and external factors that influence the power of a given event to affect party image. Next, the process of image transfer itself is discussed along with the factors that influence the way credit/ blame is apportioned from an event. Then, ways of dealing with ‘negative’ events are considered. The overall model is used to analyse a specific political event (the Iraq war) and assess its likely impact on party image. The article concludes by assessing the model's efficacy and limitations in analysing the case used and with events per se. Finally, future research ideas prompted by the paper are discussed.     

Views from the periphery: Changing the political agenda for women in the republic of Ireland and in Scotland

The representation of women as Members of Parliament in the Republic of Ireland and in Scotland is low by European standards. It is argued that two separate political events ‐ the election of Mary Robinson as Ireland's first woman president and pressures for constitutional change in Scotland ‐ could provide the opportunity to change the political agenda for women in these two countries. We record the response of the political parties to the demands for greater representation of women through ‘promotional’, ‘active intervention’ and ‘status quo’ strategies.     

„Politische Führung“ als politikwissenschaftliches Problem

‘Political leadership’ is one of the classic subjects of political science research on an international scale. Recently, in modern western democracies, ‘leadership’ has gained additional importance as a political function to evaluate governments and political leaders and is seen as rather independent of the policy dimension of leadership. Despite this increased relevance of ‘political leadership’, it has remained among the most neglected major issues in political science, particularly within research in the German-speaking world. This article discusses a wide range of recent approaches to studying ‘political leadership’. It then argues in favour of an ‘interactionist’ approach which takes into account both of the crucial empirical variables which influence the leadership process, the institutional, societal, and personal factors as well as political circumstances, and the normative expectations towards political leadership in modern established democracies.     

Semi-peripheral Islamophobias: the political diversity of anti-Muslim discourses in Poland

ABSTRACT

Bobako’s paper examines two genres of Polish Islamophobic discourse, a liberal and a nationalist one, and links their specificity to the semi-peripheral position of Poland. It argues that the liberal endorsement of Islamophobia is a way to confirm symbolically Poland’s belonging to ‘the West’ and its commitment to the normative project of European modernity, with its affirmation of individualism, human rights, sexual freedom and secularism. On the other hand, Bobako shows that the Islamophobia of the resurgent nationalist forces in Poland is, paradoxically, the outcome of a rejection of this very project, which is perceived as a threat to national political sovereignty and cultural autonomy. She connects this rejection to Poland’s post-Communist trajectory of economic marginalization and instability, providing a context for the widespread dissatisfaction with Poland’s place in the European Union.     

Animal ethics and the political

Some of the most important contributions to animal ethics over the past decade or so have come from political, as opposed to moral, philosophers. As such, some have argued that there been a ‘political turn’ in the field. If there has been such a turn, it needs to be shown that there is something which unites these contributions, and which sets them apart from previous work. We find that some of the features which have been claimed to be shared commitments of the turn are contested by key theorists working in the field. We also find that the originality of the turn can be exaggerated, with many of their ideas found in more traditional animal ethics. Nonetheless, we identify one unifying and distinctive feature of these contributions: the focus on justice; and specifically, the exploration of how political institutions, structures and processes might be transformed so as to secure justice for both human and nonhuman animals.     

Mapping the Nexus of Transitional Justice and Peacebuilding

ABSTRACT

This article explores the convergences and divergence between transitional justice and peacebuilding, by considering some of the recent developments in scholarship and practice. It examines the notion of ‘peace’ in transitional justice and the idea of ‘justice’ in peacebuilding. It highlights that transitional justice and peacebuilding often engage with similar or related ideas, though the scholarship in each field has developed largely in parallel to each other, and often without any significant engagement between the fields of inquiry. The article also notes that both fields share other commonalities, insofar as they often neglect questions of capital (political, social, economic) and at times, gender. It is suggested that trying to locate the nexus in the first place draws attention to where peace and justice have actually got to be produced in order for there not to be conflict and violence. This in turn demonstrates that locally, ‘peace’ and ‘justice’ do not always look like the ‘peace’ and ‘justice’ drawn up by international donors and peacebuilders; and, despite the ‘turn to the local’ in international relations, it is surprising just how many local and everyday dynamics are (dis)missed as sources of peace and justice, or potential avenues of addressing the past.