Party Politics and Governance in Grenada: An Analysis of the New National Party (1984–2012)

Abstract

This article examines party politics and governance in post-revolutionary Grenada, using the case of the New National Party (NNP). The central question is what does the evolution of the NNP suggests about governance and democracy in post-invasion Grenada? The article traces four phases of the NNP since its formation in 1984: (1) externally imposed marriage of convenience; (2) intra-party conflict and splintering; (3) rebranding, consolidation and dominance; and (4) electoral defeat. The article contends that Grenada has transitioned to formal democracy and the NNP is a significant actor. Yet, despite this transition, Grenada has not become the showcase of democracy that the US said it would in 1984.     

Regulating religious authority for political gains: al-Sisi’s manipulation of al-Azhar in Egypt

The shedding of blood is a serious matter in Islamic law; disregard for human life negates the very essence of just rule. By standing by General al-Sisi as he suppressed the Muslim Brotherhood, the popular legitimacy of al-Azhar – the oldest seat of Islamic learning – was called into question. This article shows how the al-Sisi government skilfully deployed the two other state-controlled religious establishments, the Ministry of Awqaf (Religious Endowments) and Dar-ul-Ifta, to boost al-Azhar’s popular legitimacy in this context. Existing scholarship highlights the importance of competition within the Egyptian religious sphere to explain how the Egyptian state co-opts the al-Azhari official establishment. This article instead shows how the state, equally skilfully, uses state institutions to boost al-Azhar’s popular legitimacy – albeit to ensure that it remains useful for the purposes of political legitimisation. Political authority and religious authority in Egypt thus remain closely entangled.     

Leadership Styles,Workplace Politics and Moral Identity of Ugandan Public Procurement Staff

The study predicts the moral identity of Ugandan public procurement staff using situational factors like leadership styles, social interactions, organizational politics and personal isomorphism, largely ignored in documented empirical literature. This study builds upon previous studies which assert that much remains to be learned about moral identity. Data were collected from staff handling the public procurement function in 105 randomly selected procuring and disposing entities (PDEs). Data relating to the study constructs were collected using self-administered questionnaires and an interview guide. The study established that workplace factors singularly and/or interactively predict moral identity of procurement staff in PDEs in Uganda. These findings have both policy and managerial implications which we discuss and present in this article.     

加强政务微博建设的若干思考

政务微博作为了解民意、汇集民智和官民沟通互动的重要平台,对于进一步推进现代政府转型和民主政治建设具有积极的意义。     

Marriage and household in the Belgrade elite at the beginning of the 20th century: The Novaković family

Building on Ahmad ibn Yusuf b. al-Qadi al-Timbuktawi's treatise entitled Hatk al-Sitr Amma Alayhi Sudani Tunis min al-Kufr (Piercing the Veil: Being an Account of the Infidel Religions of the Blacks of Tunis) this paper examines the implications of the Hausa non-Muslim Bori cult practice in Ottoman Tunis on enslaved West Africans' retentions of religious and family values from their original homelands. Specifically, the paper traces and analyses the evolution of Bori cult practice in the Tunisian milieu and places it in its proper historical and diasporic contexts. To this end, the paper goes beyond questions that are not central to al-Timbuktawi's condemnation of the enslaved West African community of Tunis, but which nonetheless attracts the attention of scholars interested in the diasporic and historical significance of Bori cult practice in the Maghreb.     

Street politics in Damascus: Kinship and other social categories as bases of political action, 1830–1841

The study examines popular politics in Damascus during the 1830s with a focus on kinship and other social categories that served as bases for political action. It is based on a close reading of one text, an anonymous Arabic chronicle known as ‘Historical Memoirs’ (Mudhakkirāt tārīkhiyya), which is analysed as a repertoire of contemporary social and political concepts. This analysis reveals an ideology of ‘localist’ resistance against the centralising state and its ‘loyalist’ allies in Damascus. Kinship played an important role in this struggle on the social plane (e.g. by using family networks for political ends) as well as on the cultural plane (e.g. through the use of kinship metaphors or through criticism of kinship ties in politics). It is concluded that the function of kinship in Damascene politics can only be understood in the context of other social categories such as factionalism, religious affiliation, class and ethnicity.     

Portfolio Allocation within Parties: The Role of Regional Party Branches

One of the most persistent findings in coalition research is the proportionality rule (‘Gamson's Law’) that guides the allocation of portfolios between parties. This article tests the assumption that a similar rule is at work within parties. More specifically, it examines the allocation of ministerial posts to regional party branches in 25 post-war cabinets in Austria between 1945 and 2008. Drawing on the literature on party organisations, three types of resources (membership, vote and population shares) are identified, all of which account for a substantial part of the variation in the shares of cabinet seats awarded to each party branch. The analysis thus bears out the proportionality proposition to a significant degree. Furthermore, it is shown that there is considerable cross-party variation in the allocation patterns, which reflects differences in the organisational structure of the parties.     

Strategic Behaviour in Parliament

Most research on roll call votes considers each voting decision by members of parliament (MPs) as an independent observation. Only recently have scholars (for example, Clinton, 2012, American Journal of Political Science, 56, 355–372; Clinton & Meirowitz, 2004, American Journal of Political Science, 48, 675–689) started to assess how knowledge about the sequence of votes may help us to understand the legislative process in more detail. Many of these analyses are, however, predicated on quite important assumptions regarding the forward-looking capacities of MPs. In this paper, this more recent literature is drawn on and brought to bear on an analysis of two bills adopted in the Swiss parliament. Having detailed information available on MPs’ preferences over various options voted upon, it is possible to test whether MPs behave strategically, and to what degree they are capable of anticipating the way forward through the agenda tree. Evidence is found that MPs behave strategically, but their foresight is not as perfect as one would expect from theoretical models.     

The Time Path of Legislative Party Switching and the Dynamics of Political Competition: The Italian Case (1996–2011)

Political competition is more realistically described as a dynamic process rather than as a series of static stages in which parties compete over policy and government formation. This paper focuses on legislative party switching as the main manifestation of this endogenously evolving process, linking individual switching behaviour to policy and office incentives that are assumed to evolve throughout the life of the entire legislature. Using a new data set tracking the timing of MPs’ changes in party affiliations between 1996 and 2011 in Italy, it is found that switching is mainly motivated by policy reasons and that it is more likely during government formation periods and budget negotiations. These results are a consequence of the interplay between MPs’ ambition and the alternation of key phases in the legislative cycle.     

Politics-as-usual on trial: regional anti-corruption campaigns in Indonesia

Abstract

This article explores to what extent to local pro-reform actors matter in Indonesia through the prism of anti-corruption campaigns in the country's regions. I argue that the rash of anti-corruption campaigns and related trials involving legislative members, especially from mid-2004 onward, can be attributed neither to the resources lavished on anti-corruption organizations based in Jakarta, nor to the popularity of President Yudhoyono's anti-corruption rhetoric. Instead, it can be traced to a particular anti-corruption campaign that began in earnest in 2002 in Padang, West Sumatra. Using a multi-dimensional approach, a small group of activists relentlessly pursued their newly elected provincial legislators to be accountable to their democratic mandates and as important, to respect the rule of law pursuant to new national anti-corruption legislation. The guilty verdicts of May 2004 galvanized similar groups across the country to investigate their respective legislative bodies. This exemplary case of societal accountability also demonstrated the leverage activists can gain over local politicians when they forge coalitions with other elite actors, especially those in Jakarta. I further explore two anti-corruption cases in the province of West Kalimantan to place post-Padang developments in their proper perspective. If hopes were raised that regional anti-corruption movements–based on the Padang model–might accomplish more than sensational trials but help consolidate democracy at the regional level by holding elected officials accountable, these two examples show how fleeting these expectations might be. The trials that took place but which produced no convictions resulted from the fallout of local political tussles, and not from local civil society organizations galvanized by the ideals of transparency and good governance.