Italy's Mediterranean role

ABSTRACT

Three main drivers underlie states’ intent to expand gas supply: energy security, geopolitics and climate goals. Such considerations also drive Greece’s expansive gas policy, but come with significant caveats. First, pipeline politics entails geopolitical costs and inflated anticipated gains. Second, while gas supply has yielded energy security for Greece, its cost-effectiveness is contentious. Third, the gas option obscures the transition to smart, clean energy sources and systems. A rational actor model within a rationalist-weak cognitivist framework can account for Greece’s gas policy. Yet, its limited success points to the need for a clean energy policy promising higher climate, energy and geopolitical gains.     

The Geography of U.S. Terrorist Incidents, 1970–2004

This paper describes the spatio-temporal trends in terrorist incidents in the United States, from 1970 through 2004. Utilizing the Global Terrorism Database (GTD) and ancillary data, we examine both the frequency of incidents and their characteristics: location, target type, attack type, weapon type, and perpetrator group. While the frequency of terrorist incidents has declined since the 1970s, there still is significant activity nationwide. Instead of urban-rural or West Coast-East Coast divisions, the pattern is a more complex mosaic based on group identity, target, and weapon type. We conclude that there is an explicit geography of terrorism, one that is quite decentralized and highly localized.     

Gender inequality in Russia's rural formal economy

Gender inequality in Russia's rural formal economy is examined using quantitative and qualitative data. Rural women continue to be underrepresented in farm managerial positions, and gendered income differences remain the norm. Rural women are underrepresented because they continue to have responsibility for most of the housework and child care. The traditional division of labor inside the household continues to dominate, thereby affecting women's career trajectories and earning potential. Value change about gendered roles in the formal economy has been minimal.     

An empirical analysis of municipal choice in Portugal

Processes of European integration and growing consumer scrutiny of public services have served to place the spotlight on the traditional French model of public/private interaction in the urban services domain. This article discusses recent debates within France of the institutionalised approach to local public/private partnership, and presents case study evidence from three urban agglomerations of a possible divergence from this approach. Drawing on the work of French academic, Dominique Lorrain, whose historical institutionalist accounts of the French model are perhaps the most comprehensive and best known, the article develops two hypotheses of institutional change, one from the historical institutionalist perspective of institutional stability and persistence, and the other from an explicitly sociological perspective, which emphasises the legitimating benefits of following appropriate rules of conduct. It argues that further studying the French model as an institution offers valuable empirical insight into processes of institutional change and persistence.     

Democratization by decree: the case of Bhutan

The small Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan is one of the most recent recruits to the world's democratic nations after more than a century of rule by the Wangchuck dynasty. The first national democratic elections were held in 2007 and 2008 and mark the formal transition from authoritarian rule, albeit of an enlightened nature, to democracy. But most conventional explanations of democratic transition are unconvincing when applied to the Bhutanese experience. This article reviews these explanations and demonstrates their lack of fit with structures and events in Bhutan. The two causal factors which do seem to explain the democratic transition are the strong state and transformational leadership. This is an unusual combination which not only challenges orthodoxy but also extends our understanding of the ways in which democratization can occur, a paradoxical way where, without any elite or popular pressure, monarchical powers are directed towards enabling democratization.     

A tale of culture-bound regime evolution: the centennial democratic trend and its recent reversal

Using a new measure of “comprehensive democracy,” our analysis traces the global democratic trend over the last 116 years, from 1900 until 2016, looking in particular at the centennial trend’s cultural zoning. As it turns out, democracy has been proceeding and continues to differentiate the world’s nations in a strongly culture-bound manner: high levels of democracy remain a distinctive feature of nations in which emancipative values have grown strong over the generations. By the same token, backsliding and autocratization are limited to cultures with under-developed emancipative values. In line with this finding, public support for democracy neither favours democratization, nor does it prevent autocratization in disjunction from emancipative values. On the contrary, public support for democracy shows such pro-democratic effects if – and only if – it co-exists in close association with emancipative values. The reason is that – in disconnect from emancipative values – support for democracy frequently reverts its meaning, indicating the exact opposite of what intuition suggests: namely, support for autocracy. In conclusion, the prospects for democracy are bleak where emancipative values remain weak.     

A Critical Evaluation of Nuclear Power and Renewable Electricity in Asia

This article judges modern nuclear power and renewable electricity technologies according to six criteria: cost; fuel availability; land degradation; water use; climate change; and safety/security. It concludes that when these criteria are taken into consideration, renewable electricity technologies present policy makers with a superior alternative for minimising the risk of fuel interruptions and shortages, helping improve the fragile transmission network and reducing environmental harm. These more environmentally-friendly generators cost less to construct, produce power in smaller increments and need not rely on continuous government subsidies. They generate little to no waste, have fewer greenhouse gas emissions per unit of electricity produced and do not substantially contribute to the risk of accidents. In contrast, the costs for nuclear plant construction, fuel, reprocessing, storage, decommissioning and further research are expected to rise. Modern nuclear reactors are prone to accidents, failures, shortages of high quality uranium ore may be imminent and the thermoelectric fuel cycle of nuclear plants consumes and degrades vast quantities of water. Greenhouse gas emissions associated with the nuclear lifecycle are notable and reactors and waste storage sites can degrade land and the natural environment. Thus, the article concludes that any effective response to electricity demand in an Asia facing climate change should promote the rapid expansion of renewable technologies and a more limited use of nuclear power.     

Place-Based Policy in Climate Change: Flexible and Path-Dependent Elements

The idea of place-based policy, the collaborative management of issues specific to a geographic area, has been widely used in the context of climate change. The outstanding features of more coherence across countries or the ability to address complex environmental aspects in an interdisciplinary and interdepartmental way made it an attractive tool for governments. Often emphasized is also the flexibility of placed-based approaches (PBAs) in terms of adapting to changes and tailoring policy accordingly. However, every policy within an administration also carries the burden of being path. This bares the question of how much flexibility PBAs need regarding environmental issues and how much consistency would be necessary to succeed. The article explores these questions and develops a framework with four adaption options based on cases in the field of carbon tax and carbon emission policy in British Columbia (Canada), New Zealand, Oregon (USA), and Quebec (Canada).     

Notes on contributors

This article investigates the political impact of the introduction of state subsidies to political parties. The arguments for and against subsidising political parties are outlined. Different models of party subsidies, and their regulatory frameworks, are discussed. We find little evidence of a cross‐national impact of the introduction of party subsidies. The subsidies cannot explain the decline in party membership. Nor is there evidence to suggest that the subsidies were introduced as a response to membership decline. There is no support for the allegation that party subsidies lead to the petrification of party systems. The subsidies have not meant that other income sources have lost their significance for political parties.     

近期非洲政局突变及对党的执政能力建设的启示

近期非洲多国由于民生危机、专权腐败、内政僵化和外交失败等原因,导致执政几十年且长期保持稳定的强人政治风云突变。非洲多国政局突变给我们的启示是：党的执政地位不是与生俱来的,也不是一劳永逸的。中国共产党作为马克思主义执政党,只有立党为公、执政为民,着力保障和改善民生,严治贪腐,促进社会的公平正义和民主进步,才能保证党的执政地位稳坐的船！