Attitudes towards highly skilled and low‐skilled immigration in Europe: A survey experiment in 15 European countries

To what extent do economic concerns drive anti‐migrant attitudes? Key theoretical arguments extract two central motives: increased labour market competition and the fiscal burden linked to the influx of migrants. This article provides new evidence regarding the impact of material self‐interest on attitudes towards immigrants. It reports the results of a survey experiment embedded in representative surveys in 15 European countries before and after the European refugee crisis in 2014. As anticipated by the fiscal burden argument, it is found that rich natives prefer highly skilled over low‐skilled migration more than low‐income respondents do. Moreover, the study shows that these tax concerns among the wealthy are stronger if fiscal exposure to migration is high. No support is found for the labour market competition argument predicting that natives will be most opposed to migrants with similar skills. The results suggest that highly skilled migrants are preferred over low‐skilled migrants irrespective of natives’ skill levels.     

Rethinking the Tunisian miracle: a party politics view

Five years on from the Tunisian revolution, Tunisia stands as the sole success story of the Arab Spring. The country since then has managed to adopt a pluralist and democratic constitution, and held three free and fair elections. Accordingly, in the eyes of several observers, Tunisia is now in the process of consolidating its new democracy. However, the reality on the ground seems much gloomier, as most recent opinion surveys suggest that there is a significant degree of dissatisfaction, not only with political parties and Parliament but also with the very institution of democracy. Nevertheless, what accounts for this change? After the collapse of the long-lasting and oppressive Ben Ali regime, how, just in five years, has Tunisians’ confidence in the democratic process changed? This article accounts for this state of affairs from a party politics view, arguing that political parties, which are the main protagonists of the consolidation process, fail to fulfill their role of acquiring legitimacy for the new regime. While party–state relations seem to be stabilized due to the inclusiveness of the constitution-making process, both inter-party relationships and the relationship between parties and society suffer from numerous flaws which, in turn, hamper the democratic consolidation process.     

Progressivism in British Politics: Some Revisionist Themes

This article argues that a return to the history of progressive political thought can help us to think afresh about what a renewed centre‐left politics might look like today. The article identifies some significant aspects of this history that attracted little attention in earlier debates over the British progressive tradition—in particular, debates about social ownership, nationalism and distributism. This revisionist history of British progressivism points the way towards some common ideological ground that could provide a starting point for a new dialogue between different ‘progressive’ political parties and interests.     

Demonisation and electoral support for populist radical right parties: A temporary effect

Since the 1980s, Western Europe has experienced the surge of populist radical right parties. In an attempt to ward off these electoral newcomers, established parties have pursued strategies of disengagement, such as exclusion and de-legitimisation. This study examines the electoral effects of an excessive form of de-legitimisation, which we label ‘demonisation’. We estimate the effects of demonisation on electoral support for the Dutch Freedom Party (PVV) and its predecessor Groep Wilders. Time series analyses show that demonisation has a negative effect on electoral support, but only for Groep Wilders. Once the populist radical right party has made a successful entry into the party system, demonisation does not have its intended consequences.     

Stepping in the same river twice: Stability amidst change in Eastern European party competition

Party competition in Eastern Europe faces a seeming paradox. On the one hand, research finds increased political volatility in these countries, while, on the other, some authors demonstrate inherent ideological stability in the region. This research note presents a new methodological approach to adjudicating between these two findings, and suggests that while political organisations come and go, the ideological structure of party competition in Eastern Europe is strikingly steady. By developing a number of different measures of the dimensional structure of party competition, the consistency of the measures across countries, as well as their relative stability within countries over time, is demonstrated. The findings speak to current developments in Eastern Europe, and have implications beyond the region. The conclusion that even volatile party systems can be underpinned by stable ideological oppositions points to two different types of party system structure: one related to parties as organisations, and the other related to parties as expressions of political divides.     

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.     

整体性基层党建何以可能:空间治理的工作路径

城市基层党建存在社会参与不足、合作治理乏力的现实困境.基层党组织如何通过空间治理路径促进整体性党建发展,实现共建共治共享社会治理格局是当前基层党建创新的重要议题.通过构建"结构—过程—绩效"分析框架,从上海市J街道党建空间治理实践入手,探究空间治理实现整体性党建的实现机制.从而发现,党组织、政府组织和社会主体的多元行动...     

共产国际、联共(布)与中共早期主要领导人的更替

中共成立后至1931年间,其主要领导人发生了几次大的更替。它们都是在共产国际与联共(布)的掌控下完成的。莫斯科在取舍中共主要领导人时,更多的是顺从自己的理论指向或自身利益的需要。按照莫斯科的意图来取舍中共的主要领导人,给中国革命事业和中共党的自身建设带来了两个主要弊端:一是共产国际、联共(布)的理论指向和自身利益不一定符合中国革命的利益;二是这样做的结果使中共主要领导人的更替完全围绕着莫斯科的意图来进行,党不能独立自主地选择自己的领导核心。两个弊端给中共领导的革命事业以及自身建设带来了不利影响。     

充分发挥群团组织在我国社会建设中的作用——以工会组织为例

群团组织是党联系群众的桥梁和纽带,在推进社会建设中发挥着重要而独特的作用。党的十八大以来,以习近平同志为核心的党中央高度重视社会建设。本研究以工会组织为例分析指出,群团组织参与社会建设有利于发挥党在推进社会建设中的统领作用,有利于落实以人民为中心的社会建设理念,有利于贯彻依法治国方略、提高社会建设的法治化水平。群团组织参与社会建设的主要任务,包括在保障和改善民生中发挥补充作用、促进共同富裕的实现,在维权和化解矛盾中发挥协商协调作用、推进社会公平正义等。基于此,研究建议要以改革创新精神提升群团组织参与社会建设的能力：强化维权服务职责,增强参与的主动性和时效性;加快智慧工会建设,创新参与方式;努力维护劳动领域政治安全,牢牢把握住工会参与的底线;加强基层工会建设,壮大参与力量。