Democratic Representation and the Property Franchise in Australian Local Government

Australia remains one of the last liberal democracies to retain a property franchise at the local government level. This particular feature is both the result of historical particularities and contemporary political arrangements. This article analyses the property franchise in the City of Melbourne, the capital of the Australian State of Victoria, based on democratic theory and an empirical study. It illustrates the tensions between the democratic principles of representation and political equality in defining structures for representation at the local government level. The authors suggest that a more nuanced interpretation of representation can be adopted at a local level based on territorial residency rather than legal citizenship. Despite this, based on analysis of both electoral and non‐electoral mechanisms, the property franchises are found to be anachronistic and indefensible from a democratic perspective and unrelated to the status of capital city. The article concludes that, at a local level, deliberative democracy holds the promise to better represent various interests, including property interests.     

Racial Resentment,Electoral Loss,and Satisfaction with Democracy Among Whites in the United States: 2004–2016

Political Behavior - Satisfaction with democracy is a critical supporting element of any democratic process, though a robust literature demonstrates that such satisfaction is contingent on numerous...     

The “Miracle” Revisited: The De-radicalization of Korean Political Culture

The radicalism that spawned the 1987 democratic revolution was a product of civic unity across class lines. Lacking the raw power of President Park, Presidents Chun and Roh had no choice but to seek a degree of democratic legitimacy. That same weakness was reflected in their relative surrender of Blue House power over Korean chaebols. Thus there were two winners in the political transformation of those years: minjung power (the Korean equivalent of Philippine “people power”) and corporatism, now largely freed from Parkian restraints. With the subsequent dissolution of minjung unity, however, corporatism emerged as the real winner of the “democratic” revolution. That victory was consummated by the neoliberal reforms mandated by the IMF in return for a mammoth bailout package after the Crash. There was little effective resistance to this IMFism, for the reform spirit of 1987 had perished long before.     

Trial by Development: Senian “Concurrence” in the New Asian Developmentalism*

Building on the development theory of Amartya Sen, this study takes the Asian Crisis as a window on the politics of globalization. It follows from Sen's axiom of “development as freedom” that just and sustainable development is best achieved where economic and political priorities are pursued simultaneously. This is the foundation for the “concurrence” model that I adopt in the light of three test cases: the Philippines, Indonesia, and Korea. Sen's model provides what amounts to an Asian Third Way, circumventing the East/West schism that the Crash exposed and exacerbated: made-in-Singapore “Asian values” vs. made-in-America globalization. The new Asian developmentalism is torn between the distinctly Asian antipodes of Senism and Sino-capitalism, which is to say development with or without freedom. The outcome of this trial-by-development will define the meaning of globalization for decades to come.     

Perceptions of police-juvenile contact predicts self-reported offending in adolescent males

ABSTRACT

Evidence suggests that positive experiences with the police can foster attitudes of respect towards the justice system that can reduce an adolescents’ propensity to commit later illegal behaviors. To advance prior work, we tested whether this association might be stronger for those adolescents who associate with deviant peers. Additionally, we tested whether the link between attitudes towards police and the justice system, and the influence of peer delinquency, would be weaker for those with elevated callous–unemotional (CU) traits. These predictions were examined in a prospective study using a sample (N?=?1,216) of adolescent males who were followed prospectively for 2 years following their first official contact with the juvenile justice system. Positive experiences with the police following the youth’s first arrest were associated with less self-reported delinquency 2 years later, which was partially mediated by reductions in adolescents’ cynicism about the legal system. However, this link was only significant for youth with low levels of peer delinquency. Although CU traits were related to less positive perceptions of experiences with the police and greater cynicism about the justice system, CU traits did not moderate the associations among experiences, attitudes, and later illegal behavior nor did they moderate the influence of peer delinquency.     

Soviet Electric Power After Chernobyl': Economic Consequences and Options

A review of the role of nuclear power in Soviet electricity production and of economic and design factors that may have contributed to the accident at the Chernobyl' Atomic Power Station sets the stage for analysis of its economic and other impacts on the USSR and Eastern Europe. The paper outlines methods for estimating direct costs stemming from lost generating capacity, agricultural output, and plant infrastructure; clean-up and relocation; and medical care. Longer-term costs in the form of environmental and public health problems, reexamination of energy development strategies, and effects on international trade will be greater but more difficult to determine. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: 027, 124, 723.     

The Impact of Elite Polarization on Partisan Ambivalence and Indifference

Considerable evidence documents the impact that elite polarization has had on the influence of partisanship on vote choice and attitudes. Yet, much of the electorate remains moderate. This paper seeks to shed some light on this paradox. Examining trends from 1952 to 2004 demonstrates that the electorate is now more opinionated about the parties than in the recent past, but that a significant portion of the increase is in the form of negative statements about an individual’s party—there are fewer indifferent individuals, but the electorate is not overwhelmingly more one-sided, instead there has been an increase in both the proportion of one-sided and ambivalent individuals. It is next examined if the intensity of one’s ideological and partisan self-identification influences how they respond to elite polarization. The results suggest that non-ideologues and pure independents are more likely to be indifferent; all other groups have shown a decline in the likelihood of being indifferent and an increase in ambivalence. The results demonstrate that the public is responding to the increased clarity in elite positions in the form of an increased number of opinions, but for many the increase results from a mix of positive and negative reactions.