Changing knowledge and perceptions of African indigenous vegetables: the role of community-based nutritional outreach

African indigenous vegetables (AIVs) have potential to sustainably address malnutrition, a growing problem in sub-Saharan Africa. Their consumption is however, limited by poor perceptions and lack of awareness of nutritional benefits. There is limited evidence of the effectiveness of community-focused information dissemination approaches in influencing participants’ perceptions and uptake of innovations in AIVs to address malnutrition. This article aims to fill this knowledge gap, using a case study focusing on pastoral communities in Monduli district in northern Tanzania. Target communities participated in a community-based nutritional outreach facilitated by the Good Seed Initiative (GSI), held at Monduli district hospital in September 2014. The results provide evidence of the achievements of the GSI intervention, and the effectiveness of alternative information dissemination approaches.     

Identifying the Causes of Issue Attention and Policy Change: Evidence from U.S. Offshore Oil and Natural Gas Drilling Policy, 2008

The flow of attention in the policy process is dynamic and disruptive. While we know changes in issue attention often result in policy change, the causal mechanisms underlying the different stages of the attention allocation process remain unclear. This article uses Punctuated Equilibrium Theory to examine an underdeveloped aspect of issue attention within policy‐making institutions: how specific policy indicators influence the entry and exit of issues on policy‐making agendas. Partisan issue attention in the House of Representatives is used to analyze a significant change to U.S. offshore oil and natural gas drilling policy in 2008. The results highlight how historically high gasoline prices precipitated a shift in attention to offshore drilling and subsequent policy change. Moreover, gasoline prices Granger‐cause attention to energy policy in partisan speeches over time. The analysis further reveals how competing policy frames and a salient focusing event shaped congressional and public discourse, leading to subsequent changes in attention. Taken together, the findings broaden our understanding of the policy process by identifying the specific forces behind the entry and exit of issues on the policy‐making agenda.     

Congressional Attention and Opportunity Structures: The Select Energy Independence and Global Warming Committee

This article examines the role that overlapping committee jurisdictions play in fostering or hindering attention to environmental and energy issues in the U.S. Congress. The Select Energy Independence and Global Warming Committee, created by House Democrats in 2007 , and its chairman Rep. Ed Markey took advantage of opportunities within the existing jurisdictional arrangement to increase attention to these issues despite lacking any legislative authority. Data from the 110th and 111th Congresses show that the Select Committee held more hearings on climate change and alternative energy, and on environmental and energy policy generally, than any other committee. The committee also increased the range of sources informing debate on these issues by calling different witnesses than other committees. These findings have important implications for the relationship between institutional structure and agendas and for Congress' policy‐making role on energy and the environment.     

Projecting the Arena of Inclusion: The Case of South Korea in Pursuing a Phased Inclusive Growth Process

South Korea created a mechanism that fuels inclusive growth, a process that coevolves economic growth and social well‐being. This study attempts to elaborate on the context and preconditions for development that would manifest salience policy implications for moving up the industrial value chain and attain inclusive growth. We contend against the view of simplified growth cum equity that is used to elucidate the success of Korea's socioeconomic development (economic miracles). Our findings informed us that there were intense measures taken throughout different phases of Korea's industrial development. In addition, we observed in many occasions intense negotiations between the state, firms, and civil society for social welfare and a better working environment. This led to a pursuit for inclusive growth in the post catching‐up phase that blended together many inclusive agendas, realizing growth that coevolved industrial upgrading and social welfare. This article seeks to explain how Korea populated its arena of inclusion in the process of pursuing rapid industrialization. The overview of different phases of development provides normative principles that are useful as a guide for other economies which aspire to attain similar development.     

The Formal Delegation of Regulatory Decisions in the Telecommunication Sector: An Explanation Using Classification Trees

Research on regulation has traditionally focused on studying the delegation of regulatory competencies from political principals to an independent regulatory agency. In this article, we argue that this delegation is nuanced by different factors that affect whether a specific regulatory decision is formally delegated. We examine and explain formal delegation patterns at the level of individual regulatory decisions in twelve countries located in Europe, Latin America, and South Asia. The data were gathered by coding the twelve countries' telecommunications legislation. The data analysis was undertaken using a classification tree model—a nonparametric model. We found that the maturity of the market has the greatest effect on the formal delegation of regulatory decisions, but this effect is also influenced by the other theoretical factors considered, particularly the level of political constraints and the type of regulation.     

The Space Between: Demonization of Opponents and Policy Divergence

Prior research on policy conflicts indicates a tendency among policy actors to misperceive the influence of actors engaged in policy debates based on the degree of distance between their relative policy positions. This research develops a measure for assessing the degree and direction of the misperception effect. This measure is then utilized as a dependent variable to assess the relationship between theoretically relevant factors and the degree to which actors will exaggerate the influence of their opponents and allies. The research uses original survey data of policy actors engaged in the debate over hydraulic fracturing in New York. The results indicate misperceptions of relative influence are prevalent and most associated with the experience of a policy loss and holding relatively extreme policy beliefs. The findings provide new insight into factors that influence the demonization of political opponents. These insights are timely in the context of polarized debates over environmental and energy policy in the United States.     

The İsmailağa community and its relationship with the AK party

This article aims to demonstrate the importance of the relationship between the Naqshbandi Ismaila?a community and the AK Party (Adalet ve Kalk?nma Partisi, “Justice and Development Party”) government. As one of the most widespread Sufi brotherhoods in the world, the strength of the Naqshbandiyya lies in its characteristic combination of strict adherence to religious law and active involvement in social and political affairs. The ?smaila?a community, one of five main Naqshbandi communities in Turkey, is highly conservative and traditional, historically dominated by elders who have remained aloof from any power struggles within the Turkish government. While the AK Party has developed ties with religious orders in recent years, including the Ismaila?a, some voices within the Ismaila?a community have become critical of this relationship, leading to a rift within the community. In addition, since 2013, and especially after the attempted coup of July 2016, the AK Party has lost the support of its old ally, the Fethullah Gülen movement. This article examines the relationship between the AK Party and religious movements in Turkey as reflected via its relationship with Ismaila?a, and assesses whether the Fethullah Gülen movement can be replaced as a party ally by the Ismaila?a community.     

Between Christian and multicultural democracy: religious legacies and minority politics

The article presents a comparative analysis of the religious underpinnings of 19 liberal democracies in the West and their relevance for contemporary minority politics. The democratic relevance of religion is conceptualised as stemming from actors (churches, religious parties) and from historical and structural factors such as confessional patterns, relationships between state and church and degrees of secularisation in 19 democracies with a Christian background. The article’s historical mapping demonstrates that democratic development has occurred in distinct patterns rooted in the Catholic?Protestant divide. It then demonstrates that there are distinct effects of this divide on minority politics. It is hypothesised that in line with the confessional patterning of democratisation, Catholic countries and actors seem to be more resistant to the pressures arising from religious pluralisation than Protestant ones and that, even after 9/11, there is no cross-national or cross-confessional convergence in these responses.