‘Living Rights’, rights claims,performative citizenship and young people – the right to vote in the Scottish independence referendum

This paper examines the rights claims-making that young people engaged in during the 2014 Scottish independence referendum when the right to vote was extended to 16- and 17-year-olds for the first time in the UK. Understanding citizenship and rights claims-making as performative, we draw on the novel idea of ‘living rights’ to explore how young people ‘shape what these rights are – and become – in the social world’. They are co-existent and situated within the everyday lives of young people, and transcend the traditional idea that rights are merely those that are enshrined in domestic and/or international law. We explore the complex and contested nature of rights claims that were made by young people as ‘active citizens’ in the lead up to the referendum to illustrate how the rights claims-making by young people is bound up with the performativity of citizenship that entails identity construction, political subjectivity (that challenges adult-centric approaches) and social justice.     

Vote Oswego: Developing and Assessing the Campaign-as-Course Model

College campuses have taken on increased responsibility for mobilizing young voters. Despite the discipline’s commitment to civic engagement, political science departments play a minimal role in this programming. This article outlines a course structure—including learning objectives, course outline, and assessments—that treats a campus-wide voter mobilization drive as the basis of an applied political science course. Transforming a campus voter mobilization program into a political science practicum offers advanced skill-building for students seeking political careers and links learning objectives to real world activities. Participants report gains in both knowledge of campaigns and grassroots campaign skills. We argue this type of course particularly benefits students attending colleges and universities in geographic areas that receive little attention from political campaigns as well as those students for whom the traditional route of gaining political experience—an unpaid, off-campus internship—is impractical or even impossible.     

Incumbency,internal processes and renomination in Indian parties

This paper analyses a critical aspect of the internal functioning of five major Indian political parties, namely the nomination of candidates for parliamentary elections, focusing on the pattern of renomination of former candidates and incumbents. The data are analysed against the literature on the structure and functioning of Indian parties, and interview material on the process of nomination in the 2009 and 2004 elections. From the perspective of a six-fold typology of centralisation of nomination processes drawn from the comparative literature, it is found that all the parties analysed are in either the second-most centralised, or even most centralised categories, and that for the three major national parties, Congress, Bharatiya Janata Party and Communist Party of India (Marxist), past performance plays a role in nominations, the majority of incumbents being renominated in the post-1989 period.     

论WTO决策机制

WTO的决策机制是指WTO对有关事项诸如条文的解释、修改、义务的豁免以及接受新成员、贸易争端的解决等作出决定的机制。WTO的决策机制十分重要,因为它直接涉及到与这些事项相关的各成员的权利与义务。从WTO决策机制与国家主权、协商一致机制和投票表决机制三个方面进行了分析,并指出了WTO决策机制的缺陷与不足,旨在为WTO决策机制的改进与完善作出努力。     

Confused or competent? How voters use the STV ballot paper

STV is often extolled because it allows voters to express a nuanced choice, but is criticised for being too confusing. In practice the system is little used, but evidence from where it is indicates much depends on how voters choose to use it. STV was used for the first time in Scottish local elections in 2007, providing valuable new evidence on how voters respond to the system. We use survey data to examine the incidence of various indicators of apparent failure by Scottish voters to exploit STV, and compare both the levels and patterns of incidence with equivalent data for Ireland. We find little sign of confusion in either country, but significant evidence of ballot order effects in Scotland.     

试议我国宪法解释程序

研究并制定宪法解释程序对于建设法治社会来说是必要的和重要的。目前我国宪法解释程序存在着许多亟需解决的问题,应尽快制定《宪法解释程序法》,并且扩大宪法解释案的提案主体,建立宪法专家参与制度,明确规定宪法解释案的表决原则以及书面表达形式。     

Party convergence and vote switching: Explaining mainstream party decline across Europe

How can one explain the significant vote losses of mainstream parties across Europe in recent years? In this article, it is argued that mainstream party convergence is an important determinant of the recent political and electoral volatility in European party systems. More specifically, it is hypothesised that as mainstream parties converge on the left-right scale, voters will switch from supporting a mainstream party to a non-mainstream party in the next election as they look for an alternative that better represents their ideological views. To test these theoretical expectations, data is combined from the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems and the Manifestos Project for nearly 15,000 vote choices of individual voters in 30 elections in 16 West and East European countries from 2001 until 2013. The findings have important implications for understanding the recent rise of non-mainstream parties, the changing nature of party systems and the increasing complexity of cabinet formation across Europe.     

So far away from me? The effect of geographical distance on representation

Legislators face numerous trade-offs with regard to how to spend their time. One factor is, however, beyond their control: the distance between their constituency and the legislature. A more distant constituency implies increased travel, which decreases the time available for activities within the legislature itself, while also raising the possibility of centre–periphery dynamics in representation. Previous work has found that as distance between constituency and legislature increases, so does constituency focus, but it has not established why this is. This article explores the impact of geographical remoteness on representational activity, analysing a dataset of parliamentary activity in the British House of Commons (2005–2015), showing that the more remote an MP’s constituency, the less likely that MP is to attend votes, while being more likely to sign Early Day Motions. The article further shows that this is most likely driven by a centre–periphery dynamic rather than simply being a response to longer travel time.     

有限责任公司股权转让制度之重构

有限责任公司股权转让制度在我国现行《公司法》中作了基本的规定,但该规定无论在转让实质要件上、规制对象上,还是在转让形式要件上均存在不足之处,应予重构。     

A Question of Authority: Religion and Cultural Conflict in the 2004 Election

In this study I adopt a view of cultural conflict that extends beyond the usual set of controversial “moral” issues like abortion and gay rights to include symbolic issues related to patriotism and group affect. Using a set of survey items asking about respondents’ preferences in child-rearing, I create a measure of individuals’ orientations toward authority that proves to be a potent predictor of attitudes on cultural issues, affect toward social groups, party identification, and vote choice. This authority effect persists even in the presence of extensive multivariate controls for demographic and religious variables. I find that both authority measures and religion measures shape political attitudes, suggesting the need for a multi-faceted approach to understanding cultural conflict.