Defending popular sovereignty: discursive conflict in French and Swedish parliamentary debates on immigrant voting rights (1968-2017)

ABSTRACT

Through a discourse analysis of French and Swedish legislative debates from 1968 to 2017, this article examines how actors challenge and reinforce dominant ideas about the link between nationality and political rights. We argue that the broader political culture influences which discursive strategies – or ‘frames’ – are more likely to structure parliamentary debates in different national contexts. However, our analysis also shows that legislators sometimes develop new discursive frames in which they reinterpret dominant norms to make them consistent with their views. Through this incremental process of reinterpretation and reformulation of dominant ideas, debates over non-citizen voting rights have chipped away at the link between nationality and political rights. Our findings suggest that initiatives to enfranchise non-citizens trigger lower levels of conflict when they can be framed as a policy tool for immigrant integration rather than as a matter of popular sovereignty.     

National protest agenda and the dimensionality of party politics: Evidence from four East-Central European democracies

Contemporary democracies show considerable differences in the issue composition of their protest politics, which tends to remain relatively stable over time. In countries like Germany or the Czech Republic, the vast majority of protests have been mobilised around sociocultural issues, such as human rights, peace, nuclear power or the environment, and only a tiny portion of protest has focused on economic issues. At the opposite extreme, protest in France or Poland usually has a strongly economic character and voices demands relating to material redistribution and social policy. What lies behind the cross-country differences in national protest agendas? In this article, the national protest agenda depends on what issues mainstream political parties are contesting: the content and strength of the master-issue dimension. In reference to the literature on the multidimensional political space and niche political parties, one should expect that there is a substitutive effect; where the stronger a specific master-issue dimension is in party politics, the less salient that issue dimension is in protest politics. This substitutive effect results from the tendency of electoral politics to reduce political conflict to a single-dimension equilibrium, which decreases the importance of other issues and relegates the contest over secondary, niche issues to the realm of policy-seeking strategies, with protest being a common type of this political strategy. In party systems where single-dimension equilibrium does not exist and the master-issue dimension is weaker, the same dynamics result in a more convergent relationship between party and protest politics and a greater similarity between the protest- and party-system agendas. To investigate this theory, the national protest agendas in four countries are examined. The Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia show four combinations of two crucial factors that are not available in the old Western democracies: the content and the strength of the master-issue dimension. The study draws on an original dataset of protest events organised in the four countries between 1993 and 2010, and on qualitative and quantitative data on issue dimensions of party politics obtained from studies on party politics and expert surveys. The results show that in the Czech Republic, where the master-issue dimension has remained strongly economic, protest has been predominantly sociocultural. In Poland between 1993 and 2001 and Hungary between 1993 and 2006, the master-issue dimensions are strongly sociocultural, while protest is predominantly economic. There is no single-dimension equilibrium in party politics in Slovakia or in post-2001 Poland and mainstream parties compete on both economic and sociocultural issues. Consequently, the substitutive dynamics between party and protest politics is weaker and the issue agendas in party and protest arenas are here more alike.     

The Urban Environment and its Influences on Insurgent Campaigns

For a long time, insurgency was a rural affair. The growing modernization of the modern world, however, shifts conflicts to the cities and requires us to explore the logics of armed struggle in urban environments. This article explores how the urban environment shapes armed conflicts, and argues that insurgents face severe practical constraints when acting in the cities. The urban environment offers the insurgents alternative ways of financing and of operating while close state control impedes them in pursuing a classic strategy of insurgency. Although state control cannot prevent attacks as such, it particularly hampers insurgents in relating to the population and organizing opposition. However, without massive and active support, armed struggle will remain sectarian and, thus, fail to achieve major political changes. This article argues that urban insurgents face a paradoxical relationship with society. While urban insurgents become independent of social support on an operational level, they depend more than ever on spontaneous massive and active social support on a strategic level.     

新民事诉讼法中检察机关抗诉权的扩张——兼论检察机关在民事诉讼中的定位

新民事诉讼法扩大了检察机关的民事抗诉权,提升了检察机关在民事诉讼中的地位.但检察机关在我国民事诉讼中的作用仍旧比较模糊,缺乏清晰的目标引导.为解决此问题,应当避免检察机关在民事诉讼中抗诉权的盲目扩张,必须细化其权力行使的方式,引导其进行角色的转换,吸纳其作为诉讼主体参与到特定诉讼中,使检察机关真正融入到民事诉讼中.     

社会转型期的群众文化建设：“下里巴人”的重建

在社会转型阶段,群众文化艺术形式发生了深刻的变化,形成了多元混合的格局：既有传统的＂下里巴人＂——民族民间传统文化艺术形式,又有新的＂下里巴人＂——市场经济条件下的大众文化艺术形式,还有主流价值观的＂下里巴人＂——代表先进文化前进方向的主导文化艺术形式。现阶段的群众文化建设,面临三种形态的＂下里巴人＂相互分割,发展不平衡以及群众文化工作与群众文化脱节,群众文化活动式微等困境。应根据文化大发展大繁荣的时代需要和群众生活方式变化的实际情况,通过文化空间、文化内容、城乡文化、民族文化的整合,实施对＂下里巴人＂的重建,实现群众文化的转型和繁荣。     

论监督型民事抗诉制度的回归及路线

我国民事抗诉制度始终身处救济型的定位,既有悖于检察机关的法律监督者身份,也使抗诉的现实功用一路下滑,终至角色尴尬、权能虚化的境地。为从根本上逆转这一颓势,改革应以监督型抗诉替代救济型抗诉为基本方向,实施策略则是在纯粹的法律监督导向下重塑抗诉制度。如此,抗诉的事由首先将被限于程序违法和国家利益、社会公共利益受损;其后,检察机关理当自主地行使监督权,拥有独立提起抗诉和迳行启动再审审理的能力和权力;最后,检察机关的参与造成了再审审理的对象及主体结构上的特殊,有必要另设与之相宜的独立抗诉再审程序。     

近年来高校推进马克思主义大众化研究述评

党的十七大报告明确提出“推动当代中国马克思主义大众化”这一科学命题之后，教育部专门设立人文社会科学研究专项任务项目（马克思主义大众化），学者们对高校推进马克思主义大众化进行了广泛而深入的探讨和研究，取得了丰硕的成果，全面梳理和研究这些成果，有着极其重要的理论意义和现实价值。     

校园流行文化在大学生思想政治教育工作中的作用探析

校园流行文化渗透到大学生的日常生活,对大学生的思维方式、行为方式和价值观念产生了积极和消极的影响,这就要求我们要辨析校园流行文化的表现形式和发展趋势,激发其积极影响,抑制其消极影响,发挥其在大学生思想政治教育中正能量的作用.     

内地民事抗诉制度与香港司法制度的区际冲突

香港回归前后,内地民事抗诉制度开始进入香港司法界的视野。由于香港普通法强调判决的终局性,民事抗诉制度(以及整个审判监督制度)曾经影响到内地民事判决在香港的承认与执行。然而,随着内地与香港在司法制度上的交流与互动,香港司法界时民事抗诉制度的认识开始产生新的思维。2006年7月,内地与香港签署了相关文件,表明到目前为止,抗诉制度并没有成为两地相互认可和执行民事判决的障碍。但将来的发展,还有待于进一步现察。     

当代中国大众文化问题的思考

由于思想解放运动的开展 ,海外大众文化的传入 ,市场取向的经济体制改革等原因 ,当代中国产生了大众文化。这种新型文化的迅猛发展 ,舒缓了大众的身心压力 ,提高了生活质量 ,开辟了新的教育渠道 ,促进了市场经济的发展 ,但同时也导致了新的文化失衡和人文精神的失落。因此 ,要通过明确大众文化的价值体系 ,坚持综合创新的原则 ,进一步规范文化市场等措施 ,引导和促进大众文化的进一步健康发展