乡村精英变迁视角下的村社治理

20世纪80年代以来,我国村社治理结构的转型反映了当代中国政治生活领域中"国家-社会"关系的调整和"民主-自治"的社会治理变迁.在这一过程中,处于乡村社区政治体系边界的乡村精英呈现出向多元化方向的发展.如何使乡村精英在数量和质量上得到保证并充分发挥其在农村中的"守门员"角色,以实现转型社会中所渗透于乡村社区的多种能量间的良性互动,将是乡村治理的一个关键,也是社会主义新农村建设的一个应有之义.     

“三治融合”视域下乡村治理能力提升的三维审视

不同于主要依托村民自治制度展开的传统村治形式,自治、法治、德治相结合的"三治融合"乡村治理方式具有更为丰富的构成要素与更为深刻的价值意蕴。乡村"三治融合"体现了基层民主力量、规范力量与柔性力量的融合,其实践过程即乡村自治能力、法治能力与德治能力的提升过程,其诉求指向涉及参与均衡、权威转化和乡贤培育。从乡村自治能力提升的维度观之,需要推进村民公共参与的均衡化;从乡村法治能力提升的维度观之,需要驱动精英权威向制度权威的转化;从乡村德治能力提升的维度观之,需要挖掘传统乡贤文化精髓并培育新乡贤群体。以上三个通道的打开,可以有效提升乡村治理能力,促进乡村治理现代化和乡村振兴愿景的实现。     

Do politicians anticipate voter control? A comparative study of representatives’ accountability beliefs

Representation literature is rife with the assumption that politicians are responsive to voter preferences because their re-election is contingent upon the approval of those voters, approval that can be won by furthering their desires or, similarly, that can be threatened by ignoring their wishes. Hence, scholars argue that the anticipation of electoral accountability by politicians constitutes a crucial guarantor of (policy) responsiveness; as long as politicians believe that voters are aware of what they do and will take it into account on election day, they are expected to work hard at keeping these voters satisfied. If, on the other hand, politicians were to think what they say and do is inconsequential for citizens’ voting behaviour, they may see leeway to ignore their preferences. In this study, we therefore examine whether politicians anticipate electoral accountability in the first place. In particular, we ask 782 Members of Parliament in Belgium, Germany, Canada and Switzerland in a face-to-face survey about the anticipation of voter control; whether they believe that voters are aware of their behaviour in parliament and their personal policy positions, are able to evaluate the outcomes of their political work, and, finally, whether this knowledge affects their vote choice. We find that a sizable number of MPs believe that voters are aware of what they do and say and take that into account at the ballot box. Still, this general image of rather strong anticipation of voter control hides considerable variation; politicians in party-centred systems (in Belgium and some politicians in Germany that are elected on closed party lists), anticipate less voter control compared to politicians in more candidate-centred systems (Canada and Switzerland). Within these countries, we find that populist politicians are more convinced that voters know about their political actions and take this knowledge into account in elections; it seems that politicians who take pride in being close to voters (and their preferences), also feel more monitored by these voters. Finally, we show that politicians’ views of voter control do not reflect the likelihood that they might be held to account; politicians whose behaviour is more visible and whose policy profile should therefore be better known to voters do not feel the weight of voter control more strongly.     

Deconstructing invisibility: race and politics of visual culture in Brazil

Abstract

This paper aims to discuss race relations and power-building in Brazil. It is well known that the Iberian colonizers developed special ways of imposing their supremacy, dissimulating the skin color standards to provoke some type of beliefs about shade stratification among African descendents, indigenous and mixed-race people. For the first time in South America there are deconstructive projects of that colonial paradigm still alive and strongly embedded in the media landscape. However, new identity politics and attitudes have been emerging amidst this old social cognition. This paper will discuss some speculative thoughts and power-building scenarios on new representations and struggles derived from these lived forms that are emerging in the new racial formations in Latin America. The question is: what will nation-building in the midst of this changing imagery be like? This paper proposes that a civic pedagogy is the only answer to rendering this phenomenon visible.     

Across time and space: Explaining variation in news coverage of the European Union

News about the European Union (EU) looks different in different countries at different points in time. This study investigates explanations for cross‐national and over‐time variation in news media coverage of EU affairs drawing on large‐scale media content analyses of newspapers and television news in the EU‐15 (1999), EU‐25 (2004) and EU‐27 (2009) in relation to European Parliament (EP) elections. The analyses focus in particular on explanatory factors pertaining to media characteristics and the political elites. Results show that national elites play an important role for the coverage of EU matters during EP election campaigns. The more strongly national parties are divided about the EU in combination with overall more negative positions towards the EU, the more visible the news. Also, increases in EU news visibility from one election to the next and the Europeanness of the news are determined by a country's elite positions. The findings are discussed in light of the EU's alleged communication deficit.     

Natural resource rents and elite bargains in Africa: Exploring avenues for future research

This article explores the recent debate over the quality of Africa's growth episode of the past decade, specifically insofar as it pertains to the pitfalls of commodity-dependent growth and the hypothesised ‘resource curse’. In addition, the article focuses on why political and economic institutions are important, and why they are indicators for the likely development impacts of Africa's evident mineral and hydrocarbon wealth. Third, it suggests a useful theoretical framework for understanding these indicators, especially with regard to the differing constraints under which foreign investors operate and interact with host countries. Developing on the latter points, the article looks at the nature of Chinese foreign investment in Africa's extractive industries. Finally, the article suggests an agenda for future research that could better inform development policy for the purpose of promoting high-quality growth in Africa.     

Challenges to the elite exclusion–inclusion dichotomy — reconsidering elite capture in community-based natural resource management

The community-driven, decentralised approach to natural resource management has reached a crossroads. The good governance agenda in the water, forestry, fishery and biodiversity sectors has generated limited success in achieving pro-poor outcomes. In many cases, local elites are to blame for capturing the benefits from the process of democratising decision-making processes. This paper examines two approaches in the literature which both aim to address elite domination, namely elite exclusion and elite inclusion. The former is a deliberate act to reduce the influence of elites by excluding them from the decision-making process in natural resource management. The latter, in contrast, is a conscious strategy to integrate elites into the use of natural resources in an attempt to redistribute the benefits to poor people via the ‘trickle down’ effect. This paper argues that the dichotomy of elite inclusion and exclusion is inadequate in understanding the complex local power dynamics in natural resource management. In particular, the binary division fails to address the multiple locations of elites, overlapping institutions and the paradoxes of ‘controlled’ participatory processes. This paper argues that any strategies to tackle elite capture need to pay attention to the historical, socially embedded and negotiated nature of resource governance arrangements.     

Reassessing the Role of Civil Society Organizations in the Transition to Democracy in Spain

Spain's democratization process has mainly been described as a settlement between political elites in which civil society organizations played little part. Yet the literature on Eastern European democratization sets great store by the role of civil society, both for transition and consolidation. Does this different treatment reflect the approach adopted by analysts or the actual contrasting presence of civil society organizations in the relevant periods? The question prompts this re-examination of the role of civil society organizations in the Spanish transition. It finds that the answer depends in part on definitions of civil society, but mainly on the approach taken by authors in presenting their accounts. It finds that the elite settlement perspective silences or removes agency from the Spanish civil society organizations active in the transition.

An alternative view is developed through an in-depth review of the events following the death of the dictator General Franco in 1975 and a textual analysis of Spain's actual definitive settlement, the 1978 Constitution. The research demonstrates that civil society organizations were responsible for disrupting the dictatorship's intention to maintain an authoritarian regime, leaving it no option but to negotiate with civil society organizations such as political parties and trade unions, which were pursuing their own strategic goals towards co-construction of a socially advanced democracy. The article's approach bridges the gulf between top-down and bottom-up accounts of political change in Spain at the end of the Franco regime.     

独立前缅甸民族主义精英对国家发展道路的探索

独立前缅甸民族主义精英对缅甸独立后的总体发展道路以及国家的政治制度、经济发展战略和具体政策、宗教与政治关系、民族问题与国家结构、对外政策等重大问题进行了比较全面的探索,在此过程中形成的观点和暴露出的特点对缅甸独立后的现代化进程产生了较为深刻的影响。     

士绅阶层衰落化过程中的乡村政治——以20世纪二三十年代的浙江省为例

士绅阶层是影响乡村政治的一支重要政治力量。在晚清科举废除过程中,其作为社会文化重心的独特地位逐渐被动摇。随着民国时期新教育的不断扩张及新知识阶层离乡步伐的加速,乡村士绅出现了严重的侵蚀化现象。优秀分子的离开及乡村管理者的食利倾向使得士绅群体迅速劣质化,整个乡村政治处于破产和崩溃边缘。