The Electoral Fate of Ethnoregionalist Parties in Western Europe: A Boolean Test of Extant Explanations

In this study I argue that we need to rethink some theoretical and empirical considerations related to our understanding of ethnoregionalist (ETR) parties in Western Europe. Research has stressed the strong impact of structural attributes of political systems, mostly electoral systems with proportional representation (PR), on the electoral success of ETR parties. From applying Boolean analysis to compare 12 ETR parties with varied levels of electoral success, it is claimed that the emphasis on type of electoral system as the determinant factor present in the relevant literature on small and regional parties is unjustified and that the presence of a distinctive local language, understood as a facilitating factor to translate regional demands and protest into political influence, is the most critical variable to avoid electoral failure. Moreover, most causal factors are linked through a structure of 'elective affinity' (social and political determinants as lying in closely related bundles) according to the specificity of ethnoregionalist politics. This finding not only sheds light on the fate of ETR parties but may also apply to other ideologically eclectic political parties.     

Taking It Out on the Body? A Phenomenological Study of Young Adults’ Gendered Experiences of Depression and Antidepressant Use

In this article, we use in-depth interviews with young adults in Sweden to explore the gendered and embodied experiences of depression and antidepressant use. Building upon previous phenomenological research, we analyse being depressed and on antidepressants as altered embodied states, in which corporealization—experiencing the body as a material object—is central. Feminist interventions by Toril Moi and Iris Marion Young inform our analysis of embodiment as gendered. The bodily facets of depression include the weight of the anxious body in crying and not sleeping, as well as the weakened or distorted relationship between body, mind and world in brooding thoughts and hopelessness. These experiences of corporealization are not expressed in gendered terms but, when acted out in depression, they do appear to be gendered. The female body becomes “the first battleground”—as the socially endorsed object upon which to act destructively. In contrast, male behaviour is not expressed as self-destructive, but projects in the world are emphasized at the cost of (bodily) well-being. Although antidepressants lift the corporeal weight of anxiety and low mood, they install a new, and in some respects more profound, corporealization of the body. This is expressed as feeling and caring less and being like a thing or machine. It can be understood in terms of an increased distance from the world—not articulated in gendered terms. As a way of existing in the world, the medicated state bears strong similarities to the depressed state from which it was originally an effort to escape. Thus, taking medication can be seen as yet another way of acting on the body as object. Furthermore, it could be suggested from our findings that when the body is not felt—when there is a breakdown of the meaningful relationship between the body and the world—the experience is less gendered.     

Recognition of Gendered Experiences of Harm at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia: The Promise and the Pitfalls

Forty years after the beginning of the Khmer Rouge regime, the recent Trial Chamber judgment in case 002/01 before Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) has provided legal recognition of the devastating violence of the forced population movements. However, despite the undoubted significance of the judgment, it represents a missed opportunity to more fully reflect issues of gender. The article argues that in order to capture the plurality of gendered experiences it is necessary to foreground a social understanding of harm. Drawing on civil party oral testimony, the article begins to surface gendered experiences of the social harms of familial separation and starvation of family members, harms that have often remained silenced in international criminal law. In doing so it seeks to contribute to emerging feminist discourse on broader gendered harms and illustrates the need for further scrutiny of the approach of the ECCC.     

Islam,médias,mise en place du Sénat et article 37 de la Constitution: changement de paradigme au Burkina Faso (1991–2014)?

Abstract

In the context of socio-political liberalisation, which has been happening since 1991, together with the competition between the different religions in the public arena in Burkina Faso, the visibility of Islam has increased considerably with the creation of Islamic media and the growing use of the Internet. This article examines the impact of the growing mediatisation of Islam on the agency and the content of the discourse of Muslim elites in Burkina Faso. This has led to the emergence of new, very mediatised religious figures who have gained authority in the public arena. However, the multiplication of the Islamic message is not accompanied by greater politicisation. Their agency resides rather in their relative capacity to invest in the public arena to defend their vision of society governed by Islamic moral norms. The debate surrounding the introduction of the Senate and the revision of Article 37 of the Constitution between 2011 and 2014 has shown the lacklustre agency of the Muslim leaders.     

Do street traders have the ‘right to the city’? The politics of street trader organisations in inner city Johannesburg,post-Operation Clean Sweep

Street trader organisations are paradoxical objects of study. Their claims resist being analysed through the ‘right to the city’ lens, so contested are rights to inner city spaces between multiple users, not all of them in dominant socioeconomic positions; and so ambiguous is the figure of the street trader, oppressed but also appropriating public space for profit, increasingly claiming, in neoliberalising cities, an entrepreneurial identity. In the aftermath of the 2013 ‘Operation Clean Sweep’ (in which the City of Johannesburg unsuccessfully attempted to evict street traders from its inner city), this paper unpacks the politics of street trader organisations: how they organise their constituencies, frame their claims, forge unlikely alliances and enter into disempowering conflicts in engagements with a divisive municipality.     

Do Nasty and Pleasant Surprises Regarding Tax Revenue Explain Spending Drifts? The Case of the Swiss Cantons

This article aims to explain the difference between the expenditure reported in governmental end-of-the-year budgets and the amounts previously forecasted in the approved beginning-of-the-year budgets. We measure how political, financial, and institutional variables affect this spending drift. We focus on two much-debated factors, namely, tax revenue budgeting errors and the stringency of fiscal rules. Our econometric approach uses a panel based on the 26 Swiss cantons covering the period of 1980 to 2011. Results suggest that stringent fiscal rules discourage budget overruns, whereas underestimating tax revenue—i.e., a budgetary “pleasant surprise”—offers the opportunity for some overspending.     

From research integrity to research relevance to advance forensic science

Research is essential for any field to move forward. It allows us to expand our body of knowledge and enables any discipline to advance its application and meet its overall purpose. This is of course also essential for forensic science, a fundamentally research-based discipline, to develop and validate detection or examination methods and gather data and establish frameworks to understand forensic traces and their value to relevant stakeholders, such as law enforcement and the courts.     

Intimate partner violence against women. Does violence decrease after the entry of the alleged offender into the criminal justice system?

Intimate partner violence(IPV)is simultaneously assumed as a serious crime and a major public health issue,having recurrences as one of its main characteristics and,consequently,re-entries of some alleged offenders in the criminal justice system(CJS).The main goal of this study is to assess if in cases of female victims of IPV,violence decreases after the first entry of the alleged offender in the CJS.A retrospective study was performed based on the analysis of police reports of alleged cases of IPV during a 4-year period.The final sample(n=1488)was divided into two groups according to the number of entries in the CJS(single or multiple)followed by a comparative approach.Results suggest that violence decreases after the first entry of alleged offenders in the CJS.Re-entries were found in only 15.5%of the cases but they were accountable for 3.3 times more crimes on average.Besides,victims of recidivism presented more injuries and required more medical care.Thus,a small group of alleged offenders seems to be more violent and accountable for most of the IPV crimes registered in the CJS suggesting that regardless of legal sanctions aiming to deter violence,these measures may not be enough for a certain group of offenders.This study sustains the need for a predictive model to quantify the risk of repeated IPV cases within the Portuguese population.