Gender quotas,candidate background and the election of women: A paradox of gender quotas in open-list proportional representation systems

We study the effects of mandatory (legislated) gender quotas in Poland, a country utilising an open-list proportional representation electoral system. We use a unique data set comprising multiple characteristics of all candidates running in two consecutive elections to the lower chamber of the Polish parliament (the Sejm). The first of them (held in 2007) was the last pre-quota election and the second (held in 2011) the first post-quota one. We show that quotas have an inherently paradoxical nature: they cause a substantial increase in the number of female candidates but the increase is accompanied by a sharp decline in women's electoral performance. This regularity holds even if we account for multiple indicators of candidate background, including previous political experience.     

Nationalism and Cultural Memory in Poland: The European Union Turns East

The eastern expansion of the European Union confronts the process of European integration with the phenomenon of cultural and ethnic nationalism. This paper examines the situation of Poland, using Jan Assmann's theory of cultural memory to reconstruct the historical dimension of Polish nationalism which underlies the current constructions of the Polish nation. Understanding itself as the antemurale Europae christianiae, Poland owns an old tradition of resistance. This tradition allowed this country to survive times of division and oppression but now turns against the European Union.     

Independent Mayors and Local Lists in Large Polish Cities: Towards a Non-partisan Model of Local Government?

The enormous success of local independent lists and independent mayors in Poland suggests it is important to examine their distinctive features, analyse the place they occupy in local politics, and explore the model of local government they encourage. This paper deals with these topics by investigating some extreme cases of non-partisanship at the local level. Research was conducted in three arbitrarily chosen Polish cities governed by independent mayors and dominated by independent lists in the local legislatures. Mixed quantitative and qualitative methods were used: a survey among city councillors; and individual key-informant interviews (IDI). Non-partisans appear to be a separate category of local politicians, different in terms of their views on politics. They explain their non-partisanship using anti-partisan, historical or tactical justifications. It seems that non-partisanship can be a means of institutionalising a particular manner of understanding and engaging in politics. Local lists organised by independent mayors are informal, concentrating on the leader and performing only some of the traditional functions of parties. This paper demonstrates that, due to the vague nature of the links between local politicians and their administration, independent councillors may serve only as a ‘democratic addition’ to a local administration headed by a skilful manager.     

Prince Adam Czartoryski as a liminal figure in the development of modern nationalism in Eastern Europe at the turn of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries

In Polish history, Prince Adam Czartoryski is almost universally regarded as one of the most important Polish statesmen and patriots of the first half of the nineteenth century. In Russian history, on the other hand, he is remembered chiefly as the Foreign Minister of the Russian Empire, and a close personal friend of Tsar Alexander I. How did Czartoryski reconcile his commitment to the Polish nation with his service to the Russian Empire (a state which occupied most of Poland)? This paper will attempt to place Prince Adam's friendship with Alexander, and his service to Imperial Russia, in the broader context of national identity formation in early nineteenth-century eastern Europe. It will be argued that the idea of finding a workable relationship between Poland and Russia, even within the framework of a single state for a “Slavic nation,” was an important and forgotten feature of Polish political thought at the turn of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. By answering the question of precisely how Czartoryski was able to negotiate between the identities of a “Polish patriot” and “Russian statesman,” the paper will shed light on the broader development of national identity in early nineteenth-century Poland and Russia.     

The Impact of Competing Institutional Pressures and Logics on the Use of Performance Measurement in Hybrid Universities

Abstract

This study contributes to the current debate on competing institutional pressures and logics and performance measurement practices in hybrid universities and examines how shifts in logics have affected performance measurement practices at the organizational and individual levels. It draws upon the theoretical lenses of institutional theory and adopts a longitudinal case study methodology based on participant observations and retrospective interviews. The findings show that universities and academic workers are affected by external pressures related to higher education that include government regulations and control of the state (state pressure), the expectations of the professional norms and collegiality of the academic community (academic pressures), and the need to comply with international standards and market mechanisms (market pressures). Academic workers operate in an organizational context in which conflicting conditions from both academic and business logics co-exist. The results indicate that institutional pressures and logics related to the higher education field and organizational context shape the use of universities’ performance measurement practices and result in diverse solutions. While previous literature has focused mainly on competing logics and the tensions they may generate, this study shows that, in a university context, potentially conflicting logics may co-exist and create robust combinations.     

Multinational cooperation: building capabilities in small air forces

European air power is represented by a variety of air forces, each equipped with different capabilities and facing different limitations. Developing the former and making up for the latter requires resources and finances and is not always possible within a national capacity. It may be particularly problematic for smaller air forces, especially with the trend of shrinking defence budgets and increasing costs of the newest technological achievements. This article investigates the idea of multinational cooperation in Europe as a way to make up for these shortfalls and build collective European capabilities. In doing so, it focuses on two states, namely Poland and Sweden as examples of small air forces. By choosing these countries as case studies it also provides an opportunity to investigate the different forms of multinational involvement existing within and outside a major military alliance, namely NATO. The article explores the participation of the Polish and Swedish Air Forces in several multinational initiatives and investigates how such involvement increases (or not) their capabilities.     

Applying the 16 Y-chromosome STRs in the population of central Poland

Haplotype and allele frequencies for the panel of 16 Y-chromosome STR loci, namely DYS19, DYS385, DYS389I, DYS389II, DYS390, DYS391, DYS392, DYS393, DYS437, DYS438, DYS439, DYS448, DYS456, DYS458, DYS635 and Y GATA-H4 were determined in a population sample of 200 unrelated males from the central region of Poland. The 191 different haplotypes were identified, of which 182 haplotypes were unique and 9 were duplicated. None of observed haplotypes appears more than twice in the investigated population. The haplotype discrimination capacity was 0.955, and combined gene diversity was 0.9999. The analysed set of 16 Y-STRs is very useful in forensic practise to identify males and trace paternal lineages.     

Nationalist discourse and the ultra-conservative press in contemporary Poland: a case study of Nasz Dziennik

After the democratic transition to post-Communist Poland, ultraconservative groups found themselves legitimately able to propagate a nationalist ideology. They focused on an idea of ‘national identity’ that clearly and restrictively defined the boundaries of the national community. In the late 1990s a far-right movement supported by a radical faction of the Roman Catholic Church gained wide public support and, eventually, political legitimization. The fears of those for whom the transition of the socio-economic system did not bring a change for the better have been exploited by activists and institutions that consistently point to various foreign ‘threats’ (external and internal) against Poland’s political and economic independence and against national integrity. Starnawski analyses forms of anti-pluralist backlash as strategies undertaken by the ultra-conservative media. Provided is a case study of Nasz Dziennik, one of the major Polish newspapers to disseminate a far-right discourse that combines a concept of ‘national identity’ with radical Catholicism. Such nationalistoriented media use rhetoric that claims to be representative of the dominant group, and attempt to provide the audience with a restrictive sense of identity that is based on the construction of elements that are considered foreign and threatening to a sense of nationhood, a mobilization of the audience against foreign ‘threats’, and the exclusion or marginalization of elements depicted as incongruous with collective identity, especially the cultures of national and ethnic minorities (both ‘native’ minorities and recent immigrants), minority religions and alternative cultures, as well as liberal advocates of diversity. Since Polish society is in large part culturally homogeneous, its members are more often exposed to stereotyped images of minority groups than they are to face-to-face contact with members of minorities. Therefore, Starnawski argues, exploring the contemporary nationalist discourse in ‘pluralizing’ societies such as Poland is no less essential for the diagnosis of anti-democratic obstacles than studying the actual conditions of minority groups themselves. The future of social and cultural pluralism in Poland heavily depends on the majority’s awareness of diversity and its ability to promote attitudes of openness to and understanding of cultural differences on the one hand, and a readiness to extend the notion of ‘Polishness’ to a wide range of cultural and social categories on the other.     

毛泽东晚年探索发生逆转的客观因素论析

从1956年开始,毛泽东鉴于苏联的经验教训,开始探索一条适合中国情况的社会主义建设道路。在探索过程中,提出了许多有价值的思想,取得了不少成就,但从1957年开始,其探索发生了逆转。     

Social(ist) engineering. Taming the devils of the Polish Bieszczady

This article explores the background of social engineering in the Bieszczady in the 1950s and 1960s, when a revolutionary political leadership ventured to impose a new socialist order in an area ravaged by war and ethnic cleansing. The article addresses two questions: first, what were the conditions that resulted in the failure of socialist engineering in the Bieszczady, and second, what were the consequences of this failure for relationships at the local level? One thesis put forward is that the relative weakness of the Polish state vis-à-vis the local setting left plenty of room for local residents to develop a dynamic social order of their own.