To Denounce,or Not To Denounce: Survey Experiments on Diplomatic Quarrels

Despite widespread concern over heated diplomatic debates and growing interest in public diplomacy, it is still incompletely understood what type of message is more effective for gaining support from foreign public, or the international society, in situations where disputing countries compete in diplomatic campaigns. This study, through multiple survey experiments, uncovers the effect of being silent, issuing positive justification, and negative accusation, in interaction with the opponent’s strategy. We demonstrate that negative verbal attacks “work” and undermine the target’s popularity as they do in electoral campaigns. Unlike domestic electoral campaigns, however, negative diplomacy has little “backlash” and persuades people to support the attacker. Consequently, mutual verbal fights make neither party more popular than the other. Nevertheless, this does not discourage disputants from waging verbal fights due to the structure similar to the one-shot prisoner’s dilemma. We also find that positive messages are highly context-dependent—that is, their effects greatly depend on the opponent’s strategy and value proximity between the messenger and the receiver.     

Campaigning on behalf of the party? Party constraints on candidate campaign personalisation

This article analyses what makes political candidates run a party‐focused or personalised election campaign. Prior work shows that candidates face incentives from voters and the media to personalise their campaign rhetoric and promises at the expense of party policy. This has raised concerns about the capacity of parties to govern effectively and voters’ ability to hold individual politicians accountable. This article builds on the literature on party organisation and considers the possible constraints candidates face from their party in personalising their election campaigns. Specifically, it is argued that party control over the candidate nomination process and campaign financing constrains most political candidates in following electoral incentives for campaign personalisation. Using candidate survey data from the 2009 EP election campaign in 27 countries, the article shows how candidates from parties in which party officials exerted greater control over the nomination process and campaign finances were less likely to engage in personalised campaigning at the expense of the party programme. The findings imply that most parties, as central gatekeepers and resource suppliers, hold important control mechanisms for countering the electoral pressure for personalisation and advance our understanding of the incentives and constraints candidates face when communicating with voters. The article discusses how recent democratic reforms, paradoxically, might induce candidate personalisation with potential negative democratic consequences.     

南京大屠杀遇难人口的构成——以南京市常住人口为中心

在南京大屠杀期间,侵华日军在南京城乡地区进行了大规模的屠杀.南京大屠杀刚结束,金陵大学美国社会学教授史密斯以社会救济为主要目的对南京及周边县城进行了十分广泛的社会调查;战后国民政府为了调查战争损失和东京与南京法庭的战犯审判进行了专题调查.两次调查结果显示:在南京市常住人口中,97%以上遇难者是平民,男性遇难者比例远远高于女性.其中乡区女性遇害比例则高于城区.遇难者中80%-90%是20至60岁的青壮年,而在乡区60岁以上老人死亡比例超过了20%.随着大量第一手资料的不断整理出版,将会极大地推动南京大屠杀研究的深入.     

Can Vendors Buy Influence? The Relationship Between Campaign Contributions and Government Contracts

Over the past 30 years, research on government contracting has identified three major influences that help explain variation in contracting decisions—managerial, organizational, and political. This study looks to advance the political influence literature by introducing a factor that has received limited attention—vendor influence. This study specifically focuses on contract transactions at the U.S. federal government to determine if vendors influence the contract award. Traditionally, political influence is studied at the macro or meso levels. This study shifts the unit of analysis to the micro level which requires a change in measurement of political influence. The study uses vendor campaign contributions to capture political influence on this new level of focus.