Party debate over Europe in national election campaigns: Electoral disunity and party cohesion

Few political parties are willing to lead the public debate on how the European Union should develop and parties rarely publicly discuss issues on the EU agenda. This is probably one of the most important democratic problems in the contemporary EU. When and why parties are willing (or not willing) to discuss European cooperation is therefore an essential issue in which political science should engage. Previous research has shown that parties that are internally divided on EU issues downplay these issues in order to avoid internal disputes. At the same time, parties that have severe intraparty conflicts over the issue are unable to contain the debate. Thus, parties that are unified in their position on EU issues and parties that are heavily split speak about the EU, but others do not. Also, earlier research has shown that political parties downplay issues in response to internal divisions among their supporters. It is argued in this article that the focus should not be solely on intraparty conflict or whether or not a party's voters are hesitant or disunited, but rather on how these factors interact in order to better understand how parties act strategically regarding EU issues. Using a new dataset that relies on quantitative content analysis of quality newspapers during the national election campaigns in the period 1983–2010 in France, Germany, the United Kingdom and Sweden, it is found that parties that have a high degree of internal dissent on European issues, while at the same time having an equally divided electorate, are the parties that are most present in the public debate. Hence, it is the interaction between these two important factors that explains much of the variation in the amount of attention paid to European issues in national election campaigns.     

New Executives from Inside or Outside? The Effect of Executive Replacement on Organizational Change

This article investigates how executive succession influences the comprehensiveness of structural changes pursued by public organizations. Executive successions are important events for organizations that provide salient opportunities for introducing organizational change, yet little research has analyzed this relationship. The author argues that the less familiarity a new executive has with the organization and the field in which it works, the more likely it is that comprehensive organizational change will take place. Empirical results from quantitative analyses of executive succession events in Danish municipalities from 1984 to 2000 confirm this. Interestingly, the degree to which new practices are legitimized moderates the findings. Inside successors are more likely to conduct comprehensive structural changes after new practices receive normative and regulatory legitimacy. The article contributes to the literature on executive succession by highlighting how it is an antecedent to different types of organizational change. Contributions to practitioner and public management research are discussed.     

Practicing a Virtuous Politics: Bill Bolling and the Atlanta Community Food Bank

Bill Bolling created the Atlanta Community Food Bank (ACFB) in 1979 and, as its executive director from then until 2015, transformed a fledgling effort in a church basement into the “equivalent of a $100 million company.” This article tells the story of how Bolling built the ACFB from scratch, arguing that his accomplishments can be traced to his effectiveness as a political leader. The article explains how Bolling practiced a virtuous politics in building informal sources of power and in developing and applying political skills on behalf of the ACFB. In the process, the article challenges the traditional critical scholarly view of political leadership, offering Bolling as a case illustration of an emerging theory of a benevolent and effective form of political leadership.     

Cutting the bars: thoughts on ‘prisoners and escapees’ in Bangladesh

The idea that problems in governance have deep roots in social structure has been revisited by Geof Wood in a recent article in this journal. His article takes a position in relation to an ongoing debate about how to improve public administration and management in Bangladesh, a debate that seems to be almost as ‘imprisoned’ in incompatible values and premises as, he argues, are the various Bangladeshi actors in society. But behind this debate are some very practical issues about how the administration there might be persuaded to work better. Key to his contribution is the idea of ‘room for manoeuvre’ or conditions for ‘escape’. This article argues that embedded institutions and values matter but that behaviour is also responsive to opportunity. ‘Old’ values can be put together into new institutional complexes if given a chance. The key to successful institutional change is effectiveness. ‘Escape’ is not only, or even primarily, a matter of changing values but of responding to circumstances and changing institutions—cutting the bars. A close look at institutional and organizational reform in any country, including the UK, shows that, whatever moral language and posture inform the reform agenda, it is constructive compromise that produces the structure that works. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE: A PERSPECTIVE*

Abstract: The Australian diplomatic service receives a fair degree of criticism, some misconceived, but some directed constructively at improving its economy and efficiency. The traditional objectives of Australian overseas representation are not questioned; rather the debate centres on the vast range of choice in the ways in which these broad objectives can be met—on such matters as how elaborately the task of overseas representation should be performed, where, and how large, overseas missions should be, how the diplomatic service should be staffed, and whether the pattern of coordination between the diplomatic service and other parts of the public service is appropriate. The complex issues involved in these areas of debate form part of the background against which the everyday work of the diplomatic service is set. This work includes political and economic reporting, the usual consular business, and “one-off” occasions ranging from the preparation of major bilateral treaties to war or revolution. Language and cultural differences make the carrying out of these tasks more difficult. Recruits to the diplomatic service are usually graduates in their mid-twenties with strong university qualifications, which are supplemented by formal training and by experience in different posts abroad and in Australia. The trend to greater specialization of diplomatic staff suggests a need for closer contact between the foreign service and other parts of the Australian Public Service, universities and the private sector. The past few years have been a period of questioning and criticism in all parts of the public sector, including the diplomatic service. At the same time the role played by the diplomatic service has grown more difficult. It is time that discussion focused on the key question—the need for comprehensive representation of Australia overseas—rather than on those who service this representation.     

Due Processes of Governance: Terror, the Rule of Law, and the Limits of Institutional Design

The George W. Bush administration was more aggressive than most in asserting independent executive competence pursuant to the president's joint roles as commander in chief of the armed forces and as head of the executive branch. One of its legacies is that the rule of law is an unsettled matter, both intellectually and practically. While constitutional reform to provide a framework for law-based governance under emergency conditions may be required, it is unlikely to occur. Analysis should consider how to improve the design and operation of microstructures within the executive branch. This article surveys options for instituting design changes but concludes that no such option is compelling, given the requirements of good lawyering about contentious issues within the executive branch. It recommends systematic deliberation about "best practices" in executive branch lawyering—with the ambition of articulating a practical theory on the due processes of governance that encompasses the special circumstances of emergency conditions.     

Can the Democrats Win Again?

After losing two successive elections, debate has raged within the Democratic party over how to win back power without comprising the principles which the party has long stood for. This article explores the reasons why the Democrats were unable to defeat George W. Bush in 2004, despite the numerous problems of the incumbent' first term, and asks what lessons the Democrats can learn from their defeat. The second half of the article focuses on what issues and policies the Democrats should concentrate and what strategies the party should adopt in order to improve its image and broaden its popular appeal ahead of the 2008 election.     

China's domestic strategic debate and confusion over the South China Sea issue

The article looks at China's strategic debate and confusion over the South China Sea (SCS) issue and explores why it has occurred. This article recognizes that China has not yet decided whether the SCS issue should be included among China's core national interests. Additionally, China has not quite figured out whether the priorities should be placed on the SCS claims or the Sino-US relationship. In addition, China has not worked out exactly what the Nine-Dash Line (NDL) means. It contends that identity is a key factor in informing a state's strategic concerns and policy objectives regarding the SCS. This article argues that China's dual identities force China to strike a middle ground, which causes domestic strategic debate and confusion. In the final analysis, this article tries to determine what salient implications a prevailing identity of China as a rising power would yield for its SCS policies.     

New deal issues and the American electorate, 1952–1988

As each presidential election passes into the history books, debate renews over the status of the New Deal Party System. This article addresses part of that debate by examining changes in the electorate's assessment of New Deal issues. Despite the vast literature on realignment, there have been few efforts to see whether issues associated with the New Deal still shape the political attitudes of the American electorate. Using the NES's openended like/dislike questions on parties and candidates from 1952 to 1988, I show that New Deal issues remain central to the partisan attitudes of the public. These findings show that the agenda of the New Deal remains an integral part of how the American public thinks about their candidates and parties. There, of course, has been much change over the last four decades, but these results suggest, in general, that at least parts of the New Deal Party System remain intact.     

Public Service Motivation and Interpersonal Citizenship Behavior in Public Organizations: Testing a Preliminary Model

ABSTRACT

A good deal of research has demonstrated how public service motivation (PSM) facilitates desirable organizational attitudes and behaviors such as job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and work effort. Other research has demonstrated that PSM predicts higher levels of social capital and altruistic behavior in society. Between these two strands of PSM research, there is a gap in knowledge about whether PSM matters to citizenship behavior internal to the organization. This article tests the direct and indirect relationship between individual levels of PSM and interpersonal citizenship behavior using a structural equation model. We also account for the effect of organizational environment by incorporating a measure of co-worker support. We find that PSM has a direct and positive effect on interpersonal citizenship behavior in public organizations, even when accounting for the significant role of co-worker support.     

Citizenship as a weapon

The focus of this article is on citizenship in its juridical sense. Other theorists, especially communitarians and civic republicans, have attempted to expand the idea of citizenship to include a social/political sense; they advocate expanding citizenship beyond its juridical confines to include civic participation as one of the hallmarks of citizenship. A new stage of expansion has begun; it is represented by those who want to make citizenship more multiple and flexible, to see citizenship in a more ethical/normative sense. These expansionist approaches do not jettison the juridical sense of citizenship. In fact, they build upon it. Therefore, these conceptions of citizenship become problematic to the extent that the juridical building block becomes problematic. Thus, the first task is to problematize this juridical sense of citizenship. This article explores a different critical path than the ones typically taken. It pushes the envelope by thinking about citizenship as a weapon. While more exposés of administrative and political abuses involving citizenship claims and issues are needed, this analysis unearths deeper, more fundamental problems with the concept of citizenship. Minimally, it pushes the debate beyond how inclusive or expansive citizenship should be made. It calls for a radical reappraisal of citizenship by recognizing citizenship as a weapon.     

The Rule of Law in the Fight against Terrorism

What is the role of legal limits on executive power, if any, when citizens demand more security from terrorism, and allowing executive officials legal flexibility of action appears necessary to achieve it? We develop a game‐theoretic model to show that when the executive faces increased electoral incentives to provide security and has legal flexibility to choose any policy it finds optimal, security from terrorism can actually decrease. In contrast, when the executive faces increased electoral incentives to provide security and there is an explicit legal limit on executive counterterrorism activities, security from terrorism increases. We also show that the executive achieves the objective of terrorism prevention more effectively when there are some limitations on its counterterrorism powers. The article provides a security rationale for legal limits on executive power and has implications for understanding how to design the institutional structure of liberal governments when the social objective is terrorism prevention.     

The Concept of Subsidiarity and the Debate on European Cooperation: Pitfalls and Possibilities1

This article explores whether and how subsidiarity can serve as an instructive aid to discussion and clarification of the current and future structure and functioning of the European Community. W e argue that the debate over the principle of subsidiarity may be undermined or cut off prematurely in at least three ways. First, if the debate is conducted with a view to arriving at a fairly fixed, detailed and instrumental understanding of the allocation of responsibilities and tasks between different levels of government. Second, if the principle of subsidiarity is mainly used as an instrument of political expediency and opportunism to further organizational or self interests. Third, if the principle is linked to and interpreted as an endorsement and justification of existing (entrenched) political and social doctrines. In a concluding last section we consider how the principle of subsidiarity may contribute to constructive discussion.     

Parliamentary questions and oversight in the European Union

Delegation in the European Union (EU) involves a series of principal‐agent problems, and the various chains of delegation involve voters, parties, parliaments, governments, the European Commission and the European Parliament. While the literature has focused on how government parties attempt to monitor EU affairs through committees in national parliaments and through Council committees at the EU level, much less is known about the strategies opposition parties use to reduce informational deficits regarding European issues. This article argues that the European Parliament (EP) offers opposition parties an arena to pursue executive oversight through the use of written parliamentary questions. Using a novel dataset on parliamentary questions in the EP, this article examines why Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) ask questions of specific Commissioners. It transpires that MEPs from national opposition parties are more likely to ask questions of Commissioners. Questions provide these parties with inexpensive access to executive scrutiny. This finding has implications for the study of parliamentary delegation and party politics inside federal legislatures such as the EP.     

Artificial Morality. Concepts,Issues and Challenges

Artificial morality is an emerging field in artificial intelligence which explores whether and how artificial systems can be furnished with moral capacities. Since this will have a deep impact on our lives it is important to discuss the possibility of artificial morality and its implications for individuals and society. Starting with some examples of artificial morality, the article turns to conceptual issues that are important for delineating the possibility and scope of artificial morality, in particular, what an artificial moral agent is; how morality should be understood in the context of artificial morality; and how human and artificial morality compare. Outlined next is how moral capacities can be implemented in artificial systems in general and in more detail with respect to an elder care system. On the basis of these findings some of the arguments that can be found in public discourse about artificial morality will be reviewed and the prospects and challenges of artificial morality are discussed.     

Seeing eye to eye: organizational behaviour,brokering and building trust in Tanzania

The focus of this article is organizational behaviour in and around the private sector in Tanzania at a time of transition through liberalization and the promotion of private sector activity; how the private sector has re‐emerged in the very recent past; how it operates as a group or, more accurately, as a set of groups, and the relationships between its component parts and with other development organizations (notably public actors: the state and aid donors). Within this framework our interest is in how organizational behaviour is mediated and trust is built through the brokering of relations between different organizations which intersect the public and private (and what this means for the public sphere). The article assesses the usefulness of a three‐level framework for analysing organizational and institutional transformation, shows that some tentative but modest change is occurring, and that a range of incomplete but positive political processes are happening. We show that institutional development is the weak link in these processes. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Toward a new institutional strategy framework for political marketing

The present literature on political marketing strategy has provided important knowledge about how the material context of technologies, polls or competitors influences strategy formulation. However, less attention has been directed to the constraints facing a political organization from the social context related to habits, norms or social conventions. This article thus aims at bringing organizational new institutional theory into the field of political marketing strategy. Accordingly, it is investigated how political organizations when initiating marketing strategies act or react toward institutionalized demands in their environment, such as issues or ideas that are considered socially appropriate. As such, a strategy framework consisting of a phase model and a typology is developed. The phase model is drawn from extant literature within organizational new institutional theory stating that decision makers will (1) scan information from their environment, (2) interpret this incoming information in available cognitive categories and (3), finally, select a strategy premised on their cognitive interpretations. On this ground, we build a novel typology that specifies which political marketing strategy decision makers will select under different cognitive framings of their environment. Here, we delineate four ideal type political marketing strategies—conformity, decoupling, defense and entrepreneurial—that correspond to how organizational decision makers interpret their institutional surroundings. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Policy Advocacy in Hard Times: The Impact of Economic Performance on Gendering Executive Attention

Securing executive attention for new policy demands is notoriously difficult as governmental agendas are crowded by established or ‘core’ policy issues. This article investigates whether it is harder for new and costly policy issues to reach the government agenda when the economy is performing badly. It examines whether, and the extent to which, costly gender equality issues regarding women’s access to the labour market, equal treatment at work and care activities, are more likely to achieve executive attention when the economy is performing well. Using the Comparative Policy Agendas database, a systematic, quantitative analysis is conducted of when and why policies promoting sex equality in the division of labour reach executive agendas. The findings confirm that advocacy for costly gender equality measures is easier to make in times of economic growth. It is also found that female representation in parliament strengthens advocacy for executive attention and reduces friction on policy agenda change.