Aggregate consumption,interest rates and inflation in LDCS: An error correction model

This article explores the relationship between the real interest rate and the consumption‐saving decisions in LDCs following the Error Correction Methodology. The model also includes an income term, the inflation rate and a term for inflation uncertainty. The main conclusion drawn from this exercise is that, for low‐inflation countries there is a positive and stronger interest rate effect on saving while this effect is less clear (and not significant) for most high‐inflation countries. Also, the results show that for at least half of the countries in the sample, an EC model with a unit elasticity restriction seems to be an adequate representation of the data.     

Class‐Biased Electoral Participation: The Youth Vote in Chile

There is no other country where the division between the old and young electorate is as striking as in Chile. For older voters, turnout exceeded, on average, 90 percent in 2009; for those aged less than 30, it fell below 30 percent. Using individual survey data from 2006, 2008, and 2010, this article studies the current socioeconomic composition of the Chilean young electorate. First, it shows that the young electorate is class‐biased. Income is highly correlated with both registration and turnout even after controlling for education. Second, it presents evidence that class bias for the whole electorate has been increasing over time, due to generational replacement. The results are not promising for Chile's democracy in the years to come, since equal participation is worsening over time.     

Do Bilinguals Respond More Favorably to Candidate Advertisements in English or in Spanish?

Candidates for political office in the United States can appeal to constituents in either English or in Spanish. We investigate the consequences of this choice in a series of survey experiments conducted on large, diverse samples of both monolingual and bilingual Americans. We take advantage of parallel advertisements produced in both English and Spanish by real candidates for national office—one presidential and two congressional. Because our design holds constant candidates’ policy positions, we can attribute the effects on vote choice directly to the choice of language over and above other candidate attributes. In two of our three experiments, the Spanish-language advertisements increased candidates’ electoral support by 5 percentage points among bilinguals. We find the opposite pattern of results among English-speaking monolingual Americans, who respond very negatively to Spanish-language advertisements. Our results shed light on the strategic calculus of candidates who must appeal to multiple linguistic communities at once.     

The European 2030 climate and energy package: do domestic strategy adaptations precede EU policy change?

The European Union’s 2030 climate and energy package introduced fundamental changes compared to its 2020 predecessor. These changes included a stronger focus on the internal market and an increased emphasis on technology-neutral decarbonization while simultaneously de-emphasizing the renewables target. This article investigates whether changes in domestic policy strategies of leading member states in European climate policy preceded the observed changes in EU policy. Disaggregating strategic change into changes in different elements (goals, objectives, instrumental logic), allows us to go beyond analyzing the relative prioritization of different goals, and to analyze how policy requirements for reaching those goals were dynamically redefined over time. To this end, we introduce a new method, which based on insights from social network analysis, enables us to systematically trace those strategic chances. We find that shifts in national strategies of the investigated member states preceded the shift in EU policy. In particular, countries reframed their understanding of supply security, and pushed for the internal electricity market also as a security measure to balance fluctuating renewables. Hence, the increasing focus on markets and market integration in the European 2030 package echoed the increasingly central role of the internal market for electricity supply security in national strategies. These findings also highlight that countries dynamically redefined their goals relative to the different phases of the energy transition.

     

Explaining the Politics of Recognition of Ethnic Diversity and Indigenous Peoples' Rights in Oaxaca, Mexico

A 'politics of recognition'– a process of political reform intended to recognise formally cultural diversity and indigenous peoples' rights – has developed in Mexico, both at the federal and at the state levels, since the early 1990s. The case of the state of Oaxaca stands out in this respect – the local constitution and nearly a dozen secondary laws were reformed during the 1990s, resulting in the conformation of the most comprehensive multicultural framework in Mexico. In this article, I attempt to explain the emergence and the particular development of Oaxaca's unique politics of recognition. Following an explanatory framework proposed by Donna Lee Van Cott, I conclude that the recognition agenda emerged in Oaxaca as legitimacy and governability was put under strain. In addition, I conclude that the (by Mexican standards) rapid and broad fashion in which it developed can be explained on the bases of the severity of the threats to governability and of the capacity of indigenous actors to influence the decision‐making process and form alliances with key political actors – i.e. the state governors.