The Marriage of Politics and Marketing

Research into major party behaviour in Britain from a political marketing perspective finds that political marketing is broad in scope and offers fresh analytical tools to explain how political organizations behave. It is nevertheless a marriage between political science and marketing. It borrows the core marketing concepts of product, sales and market-orientation, and techniques such as market intelligence, and adapts them to suit traditional tenets of political science to produce an integrated theoretical framework. A party that takes a product-orientation argues for what it stands for and believes in. A Sales-Orientated party focuses on selling its argument and product to voters. A Market-Orientated party designs its behaviour to provide voter satisfaction. Exploring these three orientations demonstrates that political marketing can be applied to a wide range of behaviour and suggests its potential to be applied to several areas of political studies.     

The Trouble with David Goodhart's Britain

This article argues that David Goodhart's manifesto for 'progressive nationalism' is gravely misconceived, indicative of the entire cohesion and integration agenda. What he talks about as the making of a common culture involves dusting off tired traditions, scaling back individual rights to protect the 'common good', and ultimately retreating onto safe ground for Middle England. Since such measures to strengthen national solidarity are responsive only to the anxieties of the demographic majority, those who are deemed to be most prone to social marginalisation continue to be so. Goodhart, like many in New Labour's orbit, chooses to ignore that belonging is reciprocal.
The article advocates an alternative culture of citizenship - one that widens democratisation, brings individuals them into the political process and thereby engages the 'reciprocity of belonging' that the post-7/7 consensus neglects. To build a cohesive Britain, the first step - but not necessarily the last - is to conceive sustainable routes towards social and political inclusion for all.     

The Politicization of Marriage in Contemporary American Public Policy: The Defense of Marriage Act and the Personal Responsibility Act

The sexuality politics terrain in the United States is currently marked by a complex and contradictory set of developments‐non-traditional family structures are becoming more common, popular opinion is moving in a more tolerant direction, and the lesbian and gay rights movement has enjoyed some victories, but conservative family values and patriarchal heterosexual marriage have been vigorously promoted by influential right-wing social movements and more deeply institutionalized through important public policy initiatives and court decisions. This article considers the theoretical implications of these developments with respect to the conceptual approaches to citizenship and sexuality. It then analyses two major pieces of federal legislation in depth: the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and the Personal Responsibility Act (PRA). DOMA effectively encourages the states to ban same-sex marriages. The PRA is generally considered as a welfare 'reform' law that imposes compulsory 'workfare' schemes and time limits for benefit recipients. It nevertheless has a significant sexual regulation dimension. Both the religious right's campaign against same-sex marriage and the welfare reformers' attack on the rights of single mothers contribute to a reactionary politicization of marriage. In conclusion, the article contends that it is only insofar as lesbian and gay rights issues are understood more broadly as but one aspect of sexual regulation and citizenship rights struggles that we can develop more effective ways of advancing the sexual liberation movement as a whole.     

论“三言”中的婚恋现象

用文本分析归纳的方法对"三言"中的婚恋现象进行分析,结论认为:在当时的社会中,"父母之命,媒妁之言"仍是当时社会的主要婚姻形式;个人意识已经开始起重要作用;自由追求的婚恋中色相起了很大的作用,这对于婚恋具有不利的影响。     

The Future of Memory

Reaction to David Rieff’s book is bound to be mixed. Its particulars are brilliant; its flaws, profuse. In Praise of Forgetting is misleadingly titled, for Rieff focuses primarily on the social functions of memory and its relation to history and forgetfulness. In his view, every event and person, no matter how notable today, will be ultimately forgotten. But in the short run, forgetfulness is benign, leading to reconciliation and peace. Memory, in contrast, is always malignant and distorted, yet so influential as to merge with and erode history. Rieff's assertions are matched against the cases he himself adduces, cases which he describes selectively and with minimal regard for evidence. However tendentious his arguments, the insights and vast erudition to which David Rieff treats his readers are undeniable.     

The Future of Conservatism*

British Conservatism embodies certain basic, though not always compatible, tenets of belief. They have underpinned the Conservative Party, which has been the most successful political party in the history of western Europe. The party was the ‘in’ party in British politics in the 20th Century; the reasons for that success shifted in the 21st century to it principal opponent party. Attempts by Conservative leaders in the first two parliaments of opposition constituted quick‐fix and ultimately doomed approaches to restoring electoral dominance. The party under David Cameron has shifted to a long‐term, grounded approach, learning the lessons of earlier periods of opposition. Though the process remains incomplete, the Conservative Party is placed for the first time in the 21st century to return to being a party of governance.