Constructing national history in political discourse: Coherence and contradiction (Moldova, 2001–2009)

History is one of the many instruments available for the persuasive construction of a nation. In Moldova, the Party of the Communists of the Republic of Moldova (PCRM), in office from 2001 to 2009, advocated for a Soviet-based version of the Moldovan nation. This “Moldovanism” boasted of the existence of a “Moldovan People” and was relied upon to justify the independence of the former Romanian province. Vladimir Voronin, the party's leader and president of the Republic during this period, promoted this “civic” Moldovan nation and created what seemed to be a coherent and ad hoc construction of an independent Moldovan nation.

This paper focuses on communist political discourse during this eight year period. Through the use of Critical Discourse Analysis, this paper focuses on the discursive construction of the Moldovan nation. It is based on Voronin's official speeches and messages from key occasions such as Independence Day and Victory Day.

This paper demonstrates the varied use of history in these speeches which improves understanding of the process of the construction of a nation. Moreover, it demonstrates that this construction, far from being coherent, was also sometimes contradictory. Indeed, discourse was adapted to the immediate context and audience. Finally, the paper explains how an explicitly “civic” discourse can be implicitly and, sometimes even explicitly, “ethnic” and “exclusive”.     

Inter-regional redistribution through infrastructure investment: tactical or programmatic?

In this paper we study the political economy of the inter-regional allocation of investment in infrastructure, in an effort to disentangle tactical and programmatic motives, where tactical politics refers to the discretionary allocation of investment to districts with more ‘political clout’ and programmatic politics refers to the allocation of investment according to certain ‘objective’ criteria (e.g., income level). We use a panel of data from the Spanish electoral districts for the period 1964–2004 to estimate an equation in which investment depends both on economic and political variables. The results show that tactical politics do matter since the districts receiving the most funds are those in which: (i) the incumbent’s vote margin is low, (ii) few votes are needed to win an additional seat in the legislature, (iii) the central and regional governments are controlled by the same party, and (iv) regional parties play a pivotal role in the legislature. However, the results also show that programmatic politics matter, since inter-regional redistribution is shown to increase: (i) with the arrival of democracy and European Union funds, (ii) under leftist governments, and (iii) the weaker the correlation is between ‘political clout’ and regional income.     

Free Movement of Third Country Nationals in the European Union? Main Features,Deficiencies and Challenges of the new Mobility Rights in the Area of Freedom,Security and Justice

The adoption of European Community (EC) Directives in the field of legal migration has been accompanied by the introduction of intra-community mobility rights. This new kind of right is characterised by specific features with regard to free movement rights enjoyed by European Union (EU) citizens. Besides, existing mobility rights for third country nationals (TCNs) raise some important problems with regard to their legal configuration and to their relationship with other fields of Community law. After having addressed these issues, it will be argued that the current regulation of mobility rights for TCNs does not fulfil the requirements of systematic coherence, and does no meet the need to grant a level of free movement that encompasses the evolution of harmonisation in the field of the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice.     

The welfare of the elderly: A systems analysis viewpoint

A methodology is offered to analyze for policy purposes the services offered to the elderly. Best policy is defined as that policy which maximizes the benefit to the elderly, given budgetary and other constraints. To measure the benefit to the elderly, a scale is devised, consisting of a set of states describing the degree of dependency of the elderly. This ordinal scale is converted to a cardinal scale by assigning weights to the states, these weights being an expression of the social-value judgments of the administrators. The change in weights over time, induced by the intervention of services, is the benefit of the services. Mathematical techniques are described for relating benefit to cost, modeling the flow of elderly among institutions, making a sensitivity analysis, and deriving the best policy.     

Regulating Global Financial Markets

This paper discusses the role of regulation in the emergence of a global system of linked financial markets. It traces the origins of the internationalization of financial markets to the emergence of new competitive pressures, rooted in changes in the social structures of savings and investment, breaking down both national systems of financial control and international arrangements for monetary and financial co-ordination. These changes have been accompanied and facilitated by a process of international re-regulation, through informal specialist networks. Although these have facilitated the international diffusion of regulatory standards and practices, and attempted to co-ordinate them, they are greatly hampered by espousing the perspectives of the various markets and firms which it is their task to supervise. Together with their minimalist view of the aims of public legitimation and oversight of financial markets, they have proved inadequate to prevent the destabilizing effects of the new global finance on the world economy.     

Juvenile Justice Advocacy: Practice in a Unique Court

The defense attorney must remember that the Juvenile Court is a court and not a social agency. But the fact that it is a court should not obscure the fact that it is a court with social objectives and social techniques. Thus, he must have the knowledge and ability to suggest alternative treatments to court adjudication.