调解兴衰与当代中国法院政治功能的变迁——以《最高人民法院工作报告》(1981年-2010年)为对象

上世纪80年代以来,中国调解制度经历了"着重调解———自愿调解———调解优先"的过程。在着重调解阶段,法院具有动员人们参与有中国特色社会主义建设和法律现代化的进程,消解经济发展带来的民众脱离政治依附性的离心力的政治功能;在自愿调解阶段,法院具有进一步强化中国特色社会主义建设和法律现代化这一基本方向的政治功能;在调解优先阶段,法院具有重新恢复民众对于社会现代化和法律现代化信心的政治动员功能。     

当代马华报刊文本中的华族政治参与意识表达

本文通过对《星洲日报》和《南洋商报》及其他马华主要报刊相关言论和社论的文本分析,揭示了20世纪80-90年代期间马来西亚华人政治参与意识的变化,包括民主政治思想的启蒙,民主政治实践的探索,以及超越种族政治的发展变化过程。     

Explaining the Reversed Gender Gap in Political Consumerism: Personality Traits as Significant Mediators

Research on political consumerism documents a persistent reversed gender gap, as women boycott and buycott products more often than men. Previous efforts to explain the reversed gender gap rely on classical theoretical models developed to illuminate gender differences in political participation in general. Accounting for socio‐economic and situational factors as well as socialization leaves a significant amount of the reversed gender gap unexplained, though. Adhering to recent empirical evidence of personality as an important factor influencing political behavior, we argue that gender differences in personality traits could provide an alternative explanation to account for gender disparities in political consumerism. We use original survey data specially designed to measure political consumerism in Switzerland, which also include the Big Five model of personality. We find empirical evidence that gender differences in personality traits, in particular agreeableness, explain a significant portion of the reversed gender gap in political consumerism.     

法治化城市的内涵及其与现代化的关系

法治化城市建设是落实我依法治国方略的举措;法治化城市的价值意蕴与法治国家具有一致性,其本身就是法治国家的重要组成部分;地方法治化城市建设是因地制宜推进法治国建设有力举措,也为国家法治建设提供经验和参考。法治化城市是法治在地域范围内的具体体现,它是以国家宪法、法律为基础,以保障人权为目的,以制约权力为重点的,适合地方城市实际的治理模式和状态,它通过规范的地方权力运作和普遍的守法意识,实现城市政治文明、经济建设、文化事业、社会秩序、公共服务等方面的全面协调发展。因此,没有法治的城市也不能称之为现代化的城市。法治化城市是城市经济现代化的动力所在,城市政治现代化的根本保证,城市文化现代化的制度基础,有利于促成人的现代化。     

Foreign threat and political party change: Russia and changes in party manifestos

How do political parties react to foreign security threats? There has been very little attention paid in the literature generally to how parties react to international events, particularly how parties react to foreign policy threats. Using data from the Comparative Manifesto Project, we examine how political parties in countries in Europe have reacted to Russian actions in terms of their emphasis on security issues. Based upon our analysis of the manifestoes from 331 parties in 36 countries we find that, generally, interstate threats have no significant effect on the military position adopted by political parties, although these effects vary by party type and by the type of threat. Russian based threats appear to be associated with the Far Left becoming more dovish (which is consistent with what would be expected by the literature) and the Far Right becoming significantly less hawkish.     

The relative weight of character traits in political candidate evaluations: Warmth is more important than competence,leadership and integrity

Decades of research has found that voters’ electoral decisions to a significant degree are affected by character evaluations of candidates. Yet it remains unresolved which specific candidate traits voters find most important. In political science it is often argued that competence-related traits are most influential, whereas work in social psychology suggests that warmth-related traits are more influential. Here we test which character trait is the more influential in global candidate evaluations and vote choice using observational data from the ANES 1984–2008 and an original experiment conducted on a representative sample of English partisan respondents. Across the two studies we find that warmth is more influential than competence, leadership and integrity. Importantly, results hold across a wide range of alternative specifications and robustness analyses. We conclude by discussing theoretical and practical implications of the results.     

EU Simulations and Engagement: Motivating Greater Interest in European Union Politics

While the effects of simulation-based courses on the knowledge of participating students may be marginal in relation to standard lecture and discussion-based courses, this article argues that the greatest leverage is gained by increasing participating students’ level of interest in the subject of study and in politics more broadly. Participants tend to become increasingly absorbed in their roles and in the politics of the institutions at the center of the simulation. To better consider this possibility, we conducted a survey of students participating in the 2015 Mid-Atlantic European Union Simulation and of appropriate control populations. The survey results indeed suggest that, much more than simply acquiring knowledge about the EU, the simulation experience serves to generate more robust interest in the subject of study.     

Development and Consequences of Referendum Campaigns in Switzerland, 1981-1999

Since the early 1990s, new forms of referendum campaigns have emerged in the Swiss political arena. In this paper, we examine how referendum campaigns have transformed in Switzerland, focusing on a number of features: their intensity, duration and inclusiveness (i.e., the variety of actors involved). These features are assumed to change in the long run in response to societal changes and in the short run as a function of variations in elite support. We further argue that public knowledge of ballot issues depends on the characteristics of campaigns. To formally test our hypotheses, we draw on advertisement campaigns in six major Swiss newspapers in the four weeks preceding each ballot from 1981 to 1999 and develop a structural equation model. We indeed find that the duration of referendum campaigns has increased over time, while their inclusiveness has decreased. Most importantly, we find that pub­lic knowledge is strongly related to the characteristics of campaigns.     

社会中的马来西亚国家:意象与实践

本文旨在以第13届国会选举之后马来西亚政治、经济、社会诸领域的状况为主要依据,对作为意象的马来西亚国家和作为实践的马来西亚国家进行考察,进而展开以下两方面的论证:(1)马来西亚国家各组成部分的实践过程如何形塑着马来西亚国家的主导原则与主导功能;(2)马来西亚国家建构与政治制度化的不足及其出路。