Performing the demos: towards a processive theory of global democracy

Debates on global democracy have tended to focus on the possibility of a global democratic entity based on the feasibility of institutional structures that, however inadvertently, take state-based conceptualizations of democracy as their reference point. More recently, however, some theorists have argued for a more ‘performative’ approach that focuses on the demos rather than the kratos and the capacity of political actors to ‘perform’ a role as members of a global demos (List and Koenig-Archibugi 2010 List, C. and Koenig-Archibugi, M., 2010. Can there be a global demos? an Agency-Based approach. Philosophy and public affairs, 38 (1), 76–110.10.1111/papa.2010.38.issue-1[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). While advancing global democracy debates, this ‘performative’ approach leans towards an overly mechanical, static account of performativity that defines democratic behaviour in terms of the functional requirements of political systems. Based on the ‘realist turn’ in contemporary political theory, this article argues for an alternative account of performativity. When coupled with a theory of political complexity, this implies a more processive theory of global democracy that is focused more on what it means for a demos to ‘perform’ democratically than the development of specific institutional configurations. A processive theory of global democracy concentrates more on the emergence of multilevel democratic practices that supplement existing state-based democratic procedures rather than conceiving global democracy as a new, fixed institutional configuration to replace existing democratic structures. Understood in these terms, the debate on the possibility or impossibility of global democracy, which takes as its reference point existing state-based institutional structures, deflects attention from the more pertinent and substantive matter of whether particular initiatives and processes in specific contexts are more or less democratic in global terms.     

EU Cohesion Policy Implementation and Administrative Capacities: Insights from Italian Regions

In this article we explain Italy’s partial persisting difficulties in EU cohesion policy implementation by focusing on one specific variable: regional administrative capacity. In line with research findings based on the national level (Tosun, 2014 Tosun, J. (2014), Absorption of regional funds. A comparative analysis, Journal of Common Market Studies, Vol.52, No.2, pp.371–387. doi: 10.1111/jcms.12088[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), our working hypothesis is that administrative capacity is the most important explanatory factor of EU cohesion policy implementation also at the regional level. In the article, by adopting a ‘most similar research cases’ design approach, we test the hypothesis with reference to two Italian regions: Campania and Puglia. In addition, we seek to adequately define the concept of ‘administrative capacity’ and operationalize it properly. In the concluding section, we consider the competitive advantage of our definition and operationalization of the notion of administrative capacity also with reference to other policy sectors beyond cohesion policy.     

Political independence in America,III: In search of closet partisans

This study uses the 1980 NES questions on partisanship to investigate the question of the attributes of closet partisans, using a typology of partisans and independents developed from an alternative (PST) set of survey items to the usual ones. The study explores the application of four criteria to those learners most suspected of being undercover partisans. What is found is that those learners who are most like strong partisans on the criteria of political involvement and partisan commitment are nonetheless least like strong partisans on two further criteria: independence attitudes and affective response to the substantive content of elections. Thus, theAmerican Voter analysis, which assumes leaners are Independents, and the Wolfinger et al. critique ofThe American Voter, which concludes that leaners are partisans, both turn out to be oversimplifications of political reality.This is a revision of a paper, Political Independence in America III: On Detecting Closet Partisans, presented at the annual meeting of the Western Political Science Association, San Francisco, March 10–13, 1988.     

The courts,interest groups,and public opinion about abortion

Public preferences about the availability of abortion under various circumstances have remained fairly stable over time. Yet a standard CBS/New York Times abortion question indicates that a significant shift in opinion occurred during the 1980s, whereby the public became increasingly supportive of legalized abortion as it is now. These very different patterns of public opinion about abortion suggest that the public perceived a shift in the abortion status quo, toward more restricted access, over time, and became more supportive of current abortion policy.A model of support for legalized abortion as it is now is developed that incorporates the influences of court activities and interest-group behavior. The analysis indicates that the public reacted directly to the activities of the courts, becoming more supportive of current abortion policy in response to media coverage of court cases that challenged the abortion status quo and Supreme Court nominations and confirmations. Although absolute preferences remained largely unchanged, it appears the public perceived an increasing threat to the status quo and became correspondingly less enamored with further restrictions on the availability of abortion.     

Campaign Intensity and Voting Correctly in Senate Elections

Starting from the premise that campaigns ought to have informational benefits for voters this study examines the characteristics of Senate electoral campaigns and their ability to facilitate “correct voting” as first described by Lau and Redlawsk (1997) Lau, Richard R. &; Redlawsk, David P. (1997) Voting correctly. American Political Science Review, 91(3), pp. 585–599. doi: 10.2307/2952076[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]. Here, the political values and beliefs of voters are measured from the 1990 and 1992 Senate Election Studies to assess how far such beliefs match to their state's Senate candidates. The variation within Senate campaigns allows for a wider range of hypotheses to be tested about the conditions under which voting correctly occurs compared with prior studies that have focused on presidential elections. The findings are important in that they show a lower incidence of correct voting in Senate elections than in presidential races. However, this is moderated by individual knowledge, ideological sophistication, and a higher level of campaign intensity, all of which increase correct voting. The implications lend support to the normative value of campaigns in American politics.     

Psychodynamics,symbolism, and socialization: “object relations” perspectives on personality,ideology, and political perception

Psychodynamic aspects of the perceptual process by which individuals relate to the distal symbolism of the political environment are explored through a conjunction of object relations theory and intensive analysis methodology. Drawing upon the joint theoretical perspective that object relations theory and the transference postulate bring to bear on personality and perception, a psychodynamic account of the attributional interface that exists between political symbols aspublic objects, on the one hand, andprivate symbolic meanings, on the other, is advanced and the dynamics at play demonstrated through detailed consideration of selected specimen cases. The individual dynamics demonstrated in each of the cases were found to obtain as well in the cases of others holding similar political views; moreover, certain of these group-wide personality patterns were discovered to have predictive significance in distinguishing radical ideologues from individuals subscribing to more moderate political views. Finally, the implications for a psychodynamic theory of political perception and socialization are considered.A revised and abbreviated version of a paper presented before the panel on Intensive Analysis in Political Psychology at the annual meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association, Chicago, April 20–22, 1978, under the title, Personality, Perception, and Political Ideology: Psychodynamic Aspects of Political Socialization and Symbolism.     

Impersonal influence: Effects of representations of public opinion on political attitudes

Many phenomena of interest to political scientists involve what may be termed impersonal influence; that is, influence that derives from individuals' perceptions of others' attitudes, beliefs, or experiences. Others in this case refers not to the close friends and acquaintances that concerned the authors of classics such asThe People's Choice andPersonal Influence, but rather to the anonymous others outside an individual's realm of personal contacts. Modern mass media facilitate the influence of anonymous others by devoting considerable time and attention to portraying trends in mass opinion. This study explores the rationale for theories of impersonal influence, synthesizing existing research findings falling under this general theoretical framework, and investigating its psychological underpinnings using experiments embedded in representative surveys.     

The effects of primary season debates on public opinion

This paper concerns the effects of primary season presidential debates on public opinion. Using a quasi-experimental design, we investigate one of the Democratic debates conducted during the 1988 campaign. We attempt to link the actual statements of the candidates with the reactions of our subjects. We find that viewers' opinions of the candidates changed dramatically after watching the debate, and that these changes are related to subjects' assessments of the candidates' images and debating styles (rather than their presentations of substantive issue positions). We speculate on some of the reasons for our findings, and discuss the differences between primary season and general election debates.     

The debate on World Dynamics: A response to Nordhaus

In a recent paper published in the Economic Journal, Professor William D. Nordhaus of Yale University reviewed World Dynamics by Jay W. Forrester. In his criticism, Nordhaus signals three serious problems and several additional questionable assumptions of sufficient importance to undermine the usefulness of Forrester's book. However, a careful examination of his analysis shows that each point made by Nordhaus rests on a misunderstanding of World Dynamics, a misuse of empirical data, or an inability to analyze properly the dynamic behavior of the model by static equilibrium methods.The three serious problems raised by Nordhaus concern the assumptions that connect industrialization to net birth rates in World Dynamics, the representation of technology and production within the world model, and the impact of prices on global resource use. The analysis presented here refutes the Nordhaus arguments and shows that World Dynamics is consistent with his references to real-world data on population, production, and capital accumulation.This paper is a response to William D. Nordhaus, World Dynamics: Measurement Without Data, published in the Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, December 1973. An earlier, unpublished, version of the Nordhaus paper, bearing the same title, was widely circulated hand-tohand within the United States, Canada, and Europe. A response to the original Nordhaus paper (System Dynamics Group Memorandum D-1736-4) was written in February 1973 and is available from Jay W. Forrester, Alfred P. Sloan School of Management, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Mass. 02139. The present paper, a revised version of the earlier response, deals with several new or modified arguments contained in the Economic Journal article by Nordhaus.     

The social policy of the firm

The welfare state concept hides an important aspect of modern industrial societies. In capitalist countries welfare is provided through a mixture of public and private initiatives. The author suggests that the concept welfare economy more fully captures the economic interpenetration of public and private sectors. The growth of fringe benefits illustrates the extent to which private enterprise performs the welfare function.Government increasingly intervenes through processes of mandating, stimulating, regulating, and supporting, using private enterprise as the vehicle for delivery of welfare services. Government's traditionally conceived role as welfare service provider is also changed through recognition that it is both an employer and purchaser, significantly impacting society's original income distribution.An earlier version of this essay was presented as a lecture at the University of Melbourne and published in Ronald F. Henderson, The Welfare Stakes: Strategies for Australian Social Policy, Melbourne: Institute of Applied Economics and Social Research, 1981.     

Born Weak,Growing Strong: Anti‐Government Protests as a Signal of Rebel Strength in the Context of Civil Wars

All rebel organizations start weak, but how do they grow and achieve favorable conflict outcomes? We present a theoretical model that allows for rebel organizations to gain support beyond their “core” and build their bargaining power during fighting. We highlight that rebel organizations need to win over crucial parts of society to generate the necessary support that allows them to attain favorable civil conflict outcomes. We find empirical support for the argument that low‐income individuals who initially fight the government (rebel organizations) have to convince middle‐class individuals to turn out against the government to gain government concessions. Empirically, we demonstrate that government concessions in the form of peace agreements and the onset of negotiations become more likely when protest occurs in the context of civil conflicts.

Replication Materials

The data, code, and any additional materials required to replicate all analyses in this article are available on the American Journal of Political Science Dataverse within the Harvard Dataverse Network, at: http://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/MYDZNF .

     

Beyond the Running Tally: Partisan Bias in Political Perceptions

I examine the impact of long-term partisan loyalties on perceptions of specific political figures and events. In contrast to the notion of partisanship as a simple running tally of political assessments, I show that party identification is a pervasive dynamic force shaping citizens' perceptions of, and reactions to, the political world. My analysis employs panel data to isolate the impact of partisan bias in the context of a Bayesian model of opinion change; I also present more straightforward evidence of contrasts in Democrats' and Republicans' perceptions of objective politically relevant events. I conclude that partisan bias in political perceptions plays a crucial role in perpetuating and reinforcing sharp differences in opinion between Democrats and Republicans. This conclusion handsomely validates the emphasis placed by the authors of The American Voter on the role of enduring partisan commitments in shaping attitudes toward political objects.     

Trade Winds: NAFTA and the Rational Public

The sharp increase in suppport for the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) poses a challenge to many of our conceptions of public opinion. Most large shifts in public opinion follow major events. Based on models estimated from the September to November NBC News/ Wall Street Journal surveys, I show this was not the case with respect to public opinion on NAFTA. Instead, the increase in support for the pact reflected a slower response to a public debate over the merits of free trade versus protectionism. As the debate proceeded, large segments of the public— including the least interested—developed more highly constrained belief systems. By the end of the public discourse, the most and least interested citizens both linked attitudes on the merits of trade to their positions on NAFTA and to their evaluations of the elites on each side of the issue. People made up their minds on NAFTA on the basis of arguments about trade, not about their own self-interest. The NAFTA case suggests that there may be a rational public at the individual level after all, even among people who may not usually be interested in public affairs.     

Is an Early Start the Best Start?: Evaluating the Effectiveness of a Political Science Summer Bridge Program

Summer bridge programs are supposed to connect a graduating high school senior’s summer to their first semester in college, easing the transition away from home and into a university setting. Although research is plentiful on the programs, assessments regarding the overall effectiveness of such programs have been mixed (e.g., Cabrera, Miner, and Milem 2013 Cabrera, Nolan, Danielle Miner, and Jeffrey Milem. 2013. “Can A Summer Bridge Program Impact First-Year Persistence And Performance?: A Case Study Of The New Start Summer Program.” Research in Higher Education 54(5): 481–498.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; Douglas and Attewell 2014 Douglas, Daniel, and Paul Attewell. 2014. “The Bridge and the Troll Underneath: Summer Bridge Programs and Degree Completion.” American Journal of Education 121(1): 87–109.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; Grayson 2003 Grayson, J. Paul. 2003. “The Consequences of Early Adjustment to University.” Higher Education 46(4): 411–429.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). As Cabrera, Miner, and Milem (2013 Cabrera, Nolan, Danielle Miner, and Jeffrey Milem. 2013. “Can A Summer Bridge Program Impact First-Year Persistence And Performance?: A Case Study Of The New Start Summer Program.” Research in Higher Education 54(5): 481–498.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) note, many of the studies collect data from participants in a one-time satisfaction survey and/or do not have an equivalent group of students who did not participate in the program from which to compare effectiveness. Our proposed study mitigates these flaws by employing a nonequivalent-groups quasi-experiment (NEG). Our bridge program—called Early Start (ES)— tapped into social, emotional, and academic engagement, as we sought to integrate the students into the university and school communities while holding high expectations and actively involving them in their own learning (Tinto 2004 Tinto, Vincent. 2004. Student Retention and Graduation-Facing the Truth, Living with the Consequences. Washington, DC: The Pell Institute for the Study of Opportunity in Higher Education. [Google Scholar]). Results suggest that not only were students enrolled in our program better socially and emotionally integrated into the university during their first year but they also scored better on content-based political science questions at the end of the fall semester, compared to their non-Early Start peers. Finally, aggregated data indicate an increase in retention for Early Start participants.     

Mobile Trust,Enacted Relationships: Social Capital in a State-Level Policy Network

ABSTRACT

What holds a policy network together? Our previous work on policy networks and “network systems” (Rethemeyer 2005 Rethemeyer , R. Karl. 2005 . “Conceptualizing and Measuring Collaborative Networks.” . Public Administration Review 64 ( 6 ): 62 – 66 . [Google Scholar]; 2007a,b; Rethemeyer and Hatmaker 2008 Rethemeyer , R. Karl and Deneen M. Hatmaker. 2008 . “Network Management Reconsidered: An Inquiry into Management of Network Structures in Public Sector Service Provision.” Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory 18 : 617 – 646 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) suggests that personal social capital, organizational social capital, and resource dependence are complementary bases for cohesion in policy networks. In this article we take up the challenge issued by Ibarra, Kilduff, and Tsai (2005 Ibarra , Herminia , Martin Kilduff , and Wenpin Tsai. 2005 . “Zooming In and Out: Connecting Individuals and Collectivities at the Frontiers of Organizational Network Research.” . Organization Science 16 ( 4 ): 359 – 371 .[Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], 359) to “bring the individual back in” to network studies by examining the dynamics between individual and organizational social capital (a process that has not been fully developed in the literature) and to tighten the connection between social capital and resource dependence. Although researchers acknowledge that personal social capital contributes to organizational social capital (Knoke 1999 ——— . 1999 . “Organizational Networks and Corporate Social Capital.” Pp. 17 – 42 in R. T. A. J. Leenders and S. M. Gabbay , eds., Corporate Social Capital and Liability . Boston : Kluwer Academic Publishers . [Google Scholar]; Burt 1992 Burt , Ronald S. 1992 . Structural Holes . Cambridge , MA : Harvard University Press . [Google Scholar]), to our knowledge, no studies have examined how it contributes in a longitudinal, interorganizational policy network study.In this paper we present findings from a longitudinal case study of an adult basic education policy network between 1998 (“Wave 1”) and 2005 (“Wave 2”) in a state we have pseudonymed “Newstatia.” Using the theoretical framework from the first section and the case findings in section three, we weave together social capital and resource dependence to present the concept of “enacted interorganizational relationships.”     

Issue Framing and Engagement: Rhetorical Strategy in Public Policy Debates

Conventional wisdom and scholarly research indicate that to win a policy debate political actors should frame the issue strategically—that is, selectively highlight considerations that mobilize public opinion behind their policy position. Engaging the opponent in a dialogue (i.e., focusing on the same considerations) is portrayed as a suboptimal strategy because political actors forfeit the ability to structure the debate. Using over 40 public opinion polls and a detailed content analysis of news stories, I examine the use of framing and engagement strategies during the 1993–94 debate over health care reform. The analysis shows that engagement was more effective at increasing support for reform than framing. This study is the first to document the role of engagement in a policy debate, and it extends work showing that this strategy is more common in election campaigns than scholars once suspected.

Interrogating “Urban Citizenship” vis-à-vis Undocumented Migration

This article critically interrogates the emerging literature on cities and citizenship, with specific reference to undocumented, “illegal”, or irregular migrant status. It first identifies and discusses three major approaches in the cities and citizenship literature, namely: normative, rescaling, and agency-centered approaches. It then interrogates this literature through the lens of migrant legal status and entertains a normative vision of urban citizenship in which a person would become a “citizen” not by explicit consent of fellow citizens, but merely by presence and residence in a place. While the immediate possibilities for such an unbounded, “grounded” citizenship are small, the article takes lessons from this model and discusses a fourth approach to cities and citizenship which explores the contemporary creation of urban “citizenship” policies for undocumented migrants in the United States. It concludes by discussing four brief examples of these local policies: (1) the contemporary struggle to reinstate local noncitizen voting, (2) the increasing acceptance of matrículas consulares as a valid form of identification for undocumented Mexican residents, and the debates over whether or not states should (3) issue driver licenses to undocumented migrants and (4) allow undocumented students to pay in-state tuition for public colleges and universities.

Global cities are spaces where the very meaning, content and extent of citizenship are being made and transformed. (Isin, 2000 Isin, E. 2000. Democracy, Citizenship and the Global City, New York: Routledge.  [Google Scholar], p. 6)

… It's ridiculous that becoming a citizen in the US is a problem. I've been here for 17 years! This is my home. You need to make a difference where you live! (Undocumented resident of Los Angeles1 ^?1 I interviewed this individual as part of my research on undocumented migrants and residents in Los Angeles who, somewhat paradoxically, have been participating in campaign politics and “get out the vote” drives run by their labor unions. For a thorough discussion and analysis of this field work, see Varsanyi (2005 Varsanyi. 2005. The paradox of contemporary immigrant political mobilization: organized labor, undocumented migrants, and electoral participation in Los Angeles. Antipode, 37(4): 775–795. [Crossref] [Google Scholar]). Quotation translated from Spanish. View all notes)     

Between science and politics: assessing the risks of dioxins in Canada and the United States

Conclusions The history of U.S. and Canadian risk assessments for dioxin is an increasingly familiar tale of debates within the scientific community played out in the political arena. Uncertainty among scientists creates the possibility of large disparities between different governments' policies. However, the pattern of differences that emerges reflects the context in which science policy decisions are made within each agency and within each country. The political environment has implications not just for how mandated science is received, but for how it is conducted.Many features of the dioxin case are consistent with observations by others. In the cases of formaldehyde, alachlor, alar, and amaranth, EPA relied on mathematical models to assess the risks of potential carcinogens, while Health and Welfare Canada relied on the more traditional safety factor approach.³⁵ This body of evidence is suggestive of national styles of transscience. Features of the U.S. style include explicit rationales for regulatory decisions, reliance on consistent and explicit risk assessment principles, and public debate over scientific aspects of public policy. The Canadian style is exemplified by closed decisionmaking, case-by-case review, and the absence of public discussion of the scientific basis for government decisions.The differences between FDA and EPA in this case study suggest an important caveat, however. The U.S. style is most clearly reflected in the implementation of the non-discretionary environmental, health and safety statutes passed by the U.S. Congress since 1970. More closed and traditional styles of regulatory decisionmaking may survive within the U.S. as vestiges of a more deferential past.Even less than pure science, trans-science is not a universal enterprise. When scientists do reach agreement, it can be a powerful force that can even overcome political and national differences (Haas, 1989). However, when science is uncertain, as is typically the case in assessing the risks of toxic chemicals, there is more room for political factors to shape the way different countries interpret science in making policy decisions.