Left-libertarian Ecopolitics and the Contradictions of Naturalistic Ethics: The Teleology Issue in Social Ecology

As a forum for the conception of an inclusive democracy, Democracy & Nature has been marked by a major split between supporters of the autonomy/democracy project and social ecologists. One of the major issues in this dispute has been the question of the objectivity of naturalistic ethics. Taking a critical look at social ecology's dialectical naturalism, this article draws on political philosophy-Hegel's critique of naturalism, Kant's distinction between human purposefulness and organic purposiveness, and Adorno's critical appropriation of Kant-to make the case that grounding left-libertarian ecopolitics in an 'objective' naturalism is an inherently contradictory project. In doing this, it seeks to make the related point that, rather than being relativistic and individualistic and thus complicit with the neoliberal apologetics of postmodernism, such a stance is an essential aspect of the left-libertarian critique of postmodernism.     

Suspect/Foil Identification in Actual Crimes and in the Laboratory: A Reality Monitoring Analysis

Four reality monitoring variables were used to discriminate suspect from foil identifications in 183 actual criminal cases. Four hundred sixty-one identification attempts based on five and six-person lineups were analyzed. These identification attempts resulted in 238 suspect identifications and 68 foil identifications. Confidence, automatic processing, eliminative processing and feature use comprised the set of reality monitoring variables. Thirty-five verbal confidence phrases taken from police reports were assigned numerical values on a 10-point confidence scale. Automatic processing identifications were those that occurred “immediately” or “without hesitation.” Eliminative processing identifications occurred when witnesses compared or eliminated persons in the lineups. Confidence, automatic processing and eliminative processing were significant predictors, but feature use was not. Confidence was the most effective discriminator. In cases that involved substantial evidence extrinsic to the identification 43% of the suspect identifications were made with high confidence, whereas only 10% of the foil identifications were made with high confidence. The results of a laboratory study using the same predictors generally paralleled the archival results. Forensic implications are discussed.     

Proportional representation and attitudes about politics: results from New Zealand

PR systems often are credited with producing more equitable outcomes between political parties and encouraging wider social group representation than majoritarian systems. Theory suggests that this should instill greater trust, efficacy, and faith in the political system. We assume that citizens disadvantaged by majoritarian rules (political minorities) will have a relatively greater shift toward positive attitudes about democracy following a transition from a majoritarian system to proportional representation. We employ panel data from the 1993–1996 New Zealand Election Study (NZES) to test hypotheses about the effects of electoral system change on attitudes about governmental responsiveness, trust in government, and political efficacy. We find that there is a general shift in mass opinion toward more positive attitudes on some measures of efficacy and responsiveness. Political minorities display a greater shift toward feelings of efficacy than other voters.     

Social Protest and Policy Attitudes: The Case of the 2006 Immigrant Rallies

Do protests sway public opinion? If so, why and how? To address these questions, we examine the impact of the 2006 immigration protests on immigration policy preferences. We use the 2006 Latino National Survey coupled with protest data to examine whether temporal and spatial exposure to the protests are associated with policy preferences. Our findings lend evidence that protest activity influences Latinos’ immigration policy preferences. However, the findings suggest the effect of protest on immigration policy preferences is not uniform across the population, but rather contingent on generational status and the intensity of protest activity at the local level.     

Coalition government and satisfaction with democracy: An analysis of New Zealand's reaction to proportional representation

Abstract. Following approval of a referendum in 1993, New Zealand replaced its first–past–the–post electoral system with proportional representation (PR). Although support for PR was initially high, less than a third expressed support for the new system a year and a half after its implementation. We examine two explanations for this decline. One theory assumes that dissatisfaction with the new system is the result of a growing alienation with politics, exacerbated by an unpopular coalition government that voters neither expected nor desired. Another theory assumes that evaluations of the new system are mediated by a preference for coalition or single party government. Our results indicate that a preference for single party government, guided primarily by partisan self–interest, has the largest impact. Nevertheless, negative evaluations of the performance of the coalition government helped contribute to a loss in support for PR suggesting that government performance can affect citizen's evaluation of political institutions, particularly when systems undergo radical change.     

Voters and coalition governments

Coalition governments are the norm in parliamentary democracies. Yet, despite the predominance of this type of government, political scientists have only recently started to investigate how voters approach elections when a coalition government is the likely outcome. Such elections present additional uncertainty and complexity for voters compared with elections in plurality systems, where party choice translates more directly into a choice of government. These factors have lead to the assumption that strategic voting is unlikely to occur in systems that produce coalition governments. In this introductory article to the special issue on Voters and Coalition Governments, we consider whether voters have the capacity to anticipate specific coalition outcomes and propose a framework for understanding the conditions that lead to strategic voting in both plurality and proportional systems.     

Strategic coalition voting: Evidence from New Zealand

Whereas the classic literature on strategic voting has focused on the dilemma faced by voters who prefer a candidate for whom they expect has little chance of winning a seat, we consider the dilemma faced by voters in PR systems who do not expect their preferred party to be in government. We develop hypotheses relating to strategic voting over multi-party governments that we test using the New Zealand Election Study (NZES) campaign study of 2002. We find evidence that expectations play a role in structuring vote choice. While there is clear evidence of wishful thinking there is also evidence that voters respond to expectations about government formation. These expectations may mobilize voters and lead them to defect from their first preference.     

主观性很重要——重新思考俄罗斯与西方关系

在后苏联时代,俄罗斯外交政策的典型特征是情境性前后矛盾的重复出现,即立场的不对称变化以及与参与政策形成巨大反差的行为。这种不合逻辑的外交政策行为突出表现在2008年俄格冲突、北约东扩和美国计划在西欧部署导弹防御系统的过程中。传统理性主义国际关系理论都是以行为体为中心,都假设行为体的政策偏好不是易变的,所以对俄罗斯这种让人困惑的外交政策行为时缺乏解释力。外交政策受到行为体对世界的主观解读和情绪的影响。俄罗斯不被西方尊重的感觉导致了两者的冲突,俄罗斯的"愤怒"是不被尊重的感觉导致的情绪化判断,是为了显示自身的重要性而非起破坏作用。分析俄罗斯外交政策中的主观性因素,为更好地理解俄罗斯与西方关系提供了一个新的理论和分析的角度。