The Structuring of Political Cleavages in Post-Communist Societies: the Case of the Czech Republic and Slovakia

Although sharing institutions for over seventy years, and transition pathways from communism, the two successor states of the former Czechoslovakia have faced distinct challenges in state-building and divergent economic fortunes. The aim of this paper is to investigate the extent to which these differing social economic problems have influenced the ideological bases of party politics and mass electoral behaviour in the two societies. Using data from national samples of the population of each country conducted in the spring of 1994, our analysis points to the existence of distinct issue cleavages dominating party competition in the two states: in the Czech Republic, partisanship relates mainly to issues of distribution and attitudes towards the West; in Slovakia, by contrast, these issues are only secondarily important in shaping voters' choice of party, while the main focus concerns the ethnic rights of Hungarians. The distinctive nature of the issue bases to politics in the two countries suggests one reason for the greater degree of political conflict evident in Slovak politics since the split and, more generally, provides evidence of the role of social conditions in shaping new political systems.     

Political Trust, Ideology, and Public Support for Government Spending

This article analyzes the relationship between political trust, ideology, and public support for government spending. We argue that the political trust heuristic is activated when individuals are asked to sacrifice ideological as well as material interests. Aggregate- and individual-level analysis shows that the effects of political trust on support for government spending are moderated by ideology. Consistent with the unbalanced ideological costs imposed by requests for increased government spending, we find that the effects of political trust are significantly more pronounced among conservatives than among liberals. The analysis further demonstrates that ideology conditions the effects of political trust on attitudes toward both distributive and redistributive spending. Our findings suggest that political trust has policy consequences across a much broader range of policy issues than previously thought.     

Indian peasant uprisings: Myth and reality

A.R. Desai (ed.), Peasant Struggles in India, Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1979. Pp.xxv + 772; Rs. 140.

Sunil Sen, Peasant Movements in India: Mid‐Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Calcutta: K.P. Bagchi, 1982. Pp.275; Rs.75.

D.N. Dhanagare, Peasant Movements in India: 1920–1950, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1983. Pp.xii + 254; £12.

This review of some important recent works on peasant movements in India examines four major questions concerning (a) the social locus of rebellions, (b) the role of capitalism and imperialism, (c) the part played by existing state power, and (d) the role of parties or organisations. It is argued that while there is no unchanging social base the disproportionately high degree of tribal participation in armed rebellion may provide some clue to the relative lack of similar participation among the mainstream peasantry, that capitalist imperialism is a multi faceted phenomenon impinging on the peasantry in many ways, that existing state power plays a major part in rebellions, and that a party or organisation is a necessary precondition for any trans‐local or trans‐tribal movement. It concludes by suggesting that varieties of mobilisation within the framework of parliamentary politics should be studied in order to assess the really significant role of the peasantry in the political evolution of post‐independence India.     

Urban Faciality and Thanatos

This essay explores the politics of memorialization and the relationship between grief, death, gesture and public space in the performances of Pia Lindman in New York City between 2002 and 2005.     

Inter-parliamentary relations in the United Kingdom: devolution’s undiscovered country?

Since 1997, the United Kingdom’s territorial constitution has undergone an immense process of change and has resulted in the establishment of separate legislatures and governments for the peoples of Scotland, Wales and, when Stormont is operational, Northern Ireland. These changes have spawned a whole series of relationships between the institutions of the devolved UK, at executive, legislature and civil service levels. However, while intergovernmental relations has been the subject of repeated debate, there has been little attempt to document and examine the way in which the UK’s four legislatures interact with one another, post-devolution. To the extent that these interactions, otherwise known as inter-parliamentary relations (IPR), have been the subject of scrutiny, it has been largely to bemoan their modest state and/or to suggest that stronger, albeit occasionally rather unelaborated, mechanisms be established. This article seeks to correct this deficit and provide a first step towards a clearer understanding of IPR in the UK, post-devolution. The article breaks the different levels of IPR down into three main strands: (1) parliament-parliament, (2) committee-committee and (3) official-official, and suggests that the main interactions that take place at each of these levels. Following this audit, the article concludes by highlighting the role that shared policy competence (a field that is set to grow with the UK’s withdrawal from the European Union) has played in driving IPR in the UK, post-devolution, and suggests some steps that may be taken to enhance IPR in the future.     

The Relationship Between School Engagement and Delinquency in Late Childhood and Early Adolescence

Engagement in school is crucial for academic success and school completion. Surprisingly little research has focused on the relationship between student engagement and delinquency. This study examines whether engagement predicts subsequent school and general misconduct among 4,890 inner-city Chicago elementary school students (mean age: 11 years and 4 months; 43.3% boys; 66.5% black; 28.8% Latino). To improve upon prior research in this area, we distinguish three types of engagement (emotional, behavioral, and cognitive), examine whether the relationship between engagement and misconduct is bidirectional (misconduct also impairs engagement), and control for possible common causes of low engagement and misconduct, including peer and family relationships and relatively stable indicators of risk-proneness. Emotional and behavioral engagement predict decreases in school and general delinquency. However, cognitive engagement is associated with increases in these outcomes. School and general delinquency predict decreased engagement only in the cognitive domain. Suggestions for future research and implications for policy are discussed.