Does multiple office-holding generate an electoral bonus? Evidence from Belgian national and local elections

Traditionally, scholars have assumed that multiple office-holding (i.e. the combination of a local and national directly elected political mandate) leads to an enhanced electoral performance. Although the prospect of electoral benefits for such a mandate combination seems plausible, it remains unclear whether accumulating a national and local mandate does indeed provide an additional boost compared to holding either one prior to the election. Previous studies have only offered limited support for this assumption. For instance, they have focused exclusively on French national elections. This article, however, scrutinises whether dual mandate-holding pays off individually, for the candidate, as well as collectively, for the list as a whole in both Belgian national and local elections. The results here strongly suggest that cumul des mandats does not yield an additional electoral reward compared to single office-holders, contradicting both theoretical presumptions and normative beliefs.     

The paradox of collective action: Linking interest aggregation and interest articulation in EU legislative lobbying

Olson's logic of collective action predicts that business interest associations face fewer collective action problems than citizen action groups. This article challenges this assumption by arguing that forming an organization comes with different collective action problems than voicing a joint policy position. This leads us to examine an important paradox: Citizen groups face challenges in establishing themselves as organizations but find it relatively easy to position themselves on policy issues, whereas the reverse is true for business associations. We study this paradox empirically based on interviews with spokespersons of interest organizations active in the European Union and find support for our hypotheses. Our findings demonstrate that citizen groups position themselves on policy issues more easily than business interests and that this competitive advantage is amplified when policy issues attract the attention of the media.     

Confucius Meets Weber or “Managerialism Takes All”? Comparing Civil Servant Values in China and the Netherlands

ABSTRACT

This article assesses the validity of normative claims on how civil servant values in East Asian and Western European administrations differ. By triangulating quantitative and qualitative survey data from a sample of Chinese (n = 508) and Dutch (n = 238) civil servants, we aim to answer two main research questions: “How and why do ideal-type and real-life rankings of civil servant values differ between Chinese and Dutch civil servants?” and “Do differences reflect administrative traditions of both countries?” Our findings demonstrate that similarities exceed differences between value rankings. Surprisingly, ideal-type value rankings are more similar than real-life rankings, with only a few idiosyncratic differences reflecting administrative traditions. Chinese civil servants perceive institutional and systemic factors as reasons for incongruence between ideal-type and real-life rankings, whereas Dutch civil servants emphasize meso-level factors such as organizational public management reforms. We theorize on our results and we provide suggestions for future research.     

The Time Has Come for a Treaty to Ban Weapons in Space

An arms race in space among the major powers would be immensely dangerous,destabilizing,and expensive.Russia,which has a long history in space technology dating back to Sputnik in 1957,does not have the resources or the political will to sustain such a race today.But China and the United States do.     

An analytical evaluation of eight on-site oral fluid drug screening devices using laboratory confirmation results from oral fluid

A decaying cadaver emits volatile organic compounds that are used by necrophilous and necrophagous insects in order to find their brood substrate. Although volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that are released by carcasses have been identified, little is known about the specific compounds that are used by these insects while searching for a brood substrate. Therefore, we have investigated the chemical ecology involved in the attraction of the necrophagous hide beetle Dermestes maculatus, which feeds as an adult and larva upon decomposing carcasses. Our aims have been to identify the responsible compounds in the odours of the carcass that are important for the attraction of the beetles. Furthermore, we have studied sex- and age-related differences in beetle attraction and tested whether the hide beetle can distinguish between various stages of decomposition by means of the emitted odours. Headspace collection of volatiles released from piglet carcasses (bloated stage, post-bloating stage, advanced decay and dry remains), coupled gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS), gas chromatography with electroantennographic detection (GC-EAD) and bioassays were conducted to identify the volatiles responsible for the attraction of the beetles. Freshly emerged male beetles were attracted by the odour of piglets in the post-bloating stage (9 days after death; T(mean) = 27 °C) and the EAD-active compound benzyl butyrate. Statistical analysis revealed a higher relative proportion of benzyl butyrate in the odour bouquet of the post-bloating stage in comparison with the other stages. We therefore conclude that this compound plays an important role in the attraction of hide beetles to carcass odour. This underlines the potential use of D. maculatus for the estimation of the post mortem interval. The decomposition stage at which the female beetles are attracted to the odour of a cadaver remains unknown, as does the nature of this attraction. Pheromones (sexual or aggregation pheromones) might play an essential role correlated with their attraction to carrion and consequently with their attraction to the substrate for mating and ovipositioning.     

Crime Story: The role of crime and immigration in the anti-immigration vote

Some scholars have found that mass immigration fuels the success of anti-immigration parties, whereas others have found that it does not. In this paper, we propose a reason for these contradictory results. We advance a set of hypotheses that revolves around a commonly ignored factor, crime. To test these hypotheses, we examine a setting where an anti-immigration party, the LPF, participated in simultaneous elections in all Dutch municipalities, which form a single constituency. According to our results, the impact of immigration rates on the individual vote for the LPF only manifests itself among those voters who are very ‘tough on crime’. In addition, we demonstrate that high local crime rates make an anti-immigration vote more likely, but only among voters who are very ‘tough on immigration’. This suggests that immigration and crime rates do not make all citizens more likely to cast an anti-immigration vote, but only those who perceive a link between the two issues. Thus, if one wishes to reduce anti-immigration leaders’ electoral support, countering their criminalization of immigrants may be a more fruitful strategy than trying to stop immigration – if at all possible.     

Protective Factors at School: Reciprocal Effects Among Adolescents’ Perceptions of the School Environment,Engagement in Learning,and Hope

Although some research suggests that schools can be a source of protective factors for students, the processes by which school environments impact students’ behavior, performance and adjustment over time are not clear. Guided by both self-determination theory and hope theory, this article evaluated reciprocal effects among adolescent perceptions of the school environment, engagement in learning, hope, and academic achievement. Using a sample of 423 students (M age 15.72 years; 46.7% female; 77.6% white; 30.9% eligible for FRPL) from five small secondary schools in the upper Midwest, students’ perceptions of the school environment were linked to engagement in learning, which, in turn, was linked to change in academic achievement and hope over the span of 1 year. Evidence was found for reciprocal links between earlier levels of engagement and hope and later perceptions of the environment. These results suggest that the school environment represents a potential leverage point for educational reform, and interventions that target students’ perceptions of autonomy, teacher/peer support, and goal orientation may be able to promote engagement, hope, and academic achievement. In addition, such changes may create a positive feedback loop in which change in academic performance and adjustment accelerate over time.     

Risk adjustment and risk equalization: what needs to be done?

In this paper, we first deal with the rationale of risk adjustment and risk equalization in health insurance markets. Then we discuss the state of the art concerning the application of risk adjustment and risk equalization in practice. Finally, we focus on: What needs to be done?     

How do established voters react to new parties? The case of Italy, 1985–2008

The Italian party system largely collapsed in the early 1990s, providing us with a natural experimental situation in which voters were confronted with new parties – indeed, with an entirely new party system. How did they react? This paper develops a number of expectations on the basis of existing theory and tests these expectations using a dataset consisting of election studies conducted in Italy between 1985 and 2008. We find that a new party system causes confusion as to where parties stand in left-right terms, making it difficult for voters to make their choices on the basis of ideological cues. The confusion is greatest among older voters – those already set in their habits of voting, but only the very oldest cohorts (containing voters over 60 years old) are significantly debilitated.