Are opinion leaders better represented?

Few studies have analysed the effect of political engagement on legislators’ responsiveness. This article focuses on opinion leaders defined as citizens who regularly discuss politics and who attempt to persuade others to change their viewpoint. It investigates whether opinion leaders are better represented compared to other voters. Taking advantage of the Swiss institution of direct democracy, the article combines roll-call votes and information from popular votes to compare the voting behaviour of legislators and citizens on exactly the same policy proposals. It thus overcomes limitations pertaining to the lack of identical information on elites’ and citizens’ preferences that is common in the literature. The findings show that opinion leaders are better represented than the rest of the electorate in those instances where both sub-groups disagree, and that issue salience does not increase responsiveness to rank-and-file voters. These findings have important implications for understanding unequal representation.     

Mediated political masculinities: the commander-in-chief vs. the new man

The media play a very influential role in our perceptions of our political leaders, irrespective of where in the world they appear. Since the latter part of the twentieth century, our leaders’ personalities came to play an increasing role in their appeal, in particularly their gendered performances. As Barack Obama's presidency draws to the end of its second term, this paper will examine the representation of his persona in the context of the election in 2008 when he became the first Black US president. Much has been written of him being the first Black president of the USA, however, if we explore his campaign through a gendered lens, we can see that he is equally revolutionary. This contrasts with the gendered construction of male political leaders in other parts of the world, particularly that of Vladimir Putin in Russia. Building on work carried out in relation to the mediatisation and personalisation of politics in the last 50 years, this article shows how gendered performances can be seen to mirror changes in society.     

缅甸华裔精英与知名侨领概述

缅甸的华裔精英为缅甸的国家独立和民族解放作出了巨大的贡献 ,但知名侨领与华裔精英不同 ,他们不参与或很少参与缅甸政治 ,而在促进华人社区发展和中缅友好交往方面起着积极作用。他们有爱国的优良传统 ,表现在热心慈善事业、办报、办学、支持祖国革命、向国内投资、促进中缅友好关系。     

Institutionalising participatory and deliberative procedures: The origins of the first permanent citizens’ assembly

In the context of public disaffection towards representative democracies, political leaders are increasingly establishing citizens’ assemblies to foster participatory governance. These deliberative fora composed of randomly selected citizens have attracted much scholarly attention regarding their theoretical foundations and internal functioning. Nevertheless, we lack research that scrutinizes the reasons why political leaders create such new institutions. This article fills this gap by analysing a specific case: the first permanent randomly selected citizens’ assembly that will work in collaboration with a parliament in the long-term (Ostbelgien, Belgium). This case is analysed through a framework that pays close attention to the context in which it developed, the profiles of political elites that supported its creation, as well as the multiple objectives it was vested with. The findings reveal that initiators of citizens’ assemblies fundamentally conceive them as a way to strengthen a polity's identity, to save the electoral model of democracy, and to restore the legitimacy of traditional political leaders. Our analysis of this particular conception lead us to argue for the need of developing context-sentive approaches to participatory and deliberative procedures, as well as to discuss whether we should consider the latter as mere elites’ legitimation tools.     

Revolutionary Pathways: Leaders and the International Impacts of Domestic Revolutions

How much and in what ways do individual leaders matter for international politics? This article sheds new light on these questions by considering the consequences of domestic revolutions in international relations. We argue that revolutions have international effects due to two separate pathways, one associated with the event and one associated with the new leader’s administration. In the first pathway, a revolutionary event disrupts established relationships and perceptions, creating uncertainty both within the state and abroad. In the second pathway, revolutions put individuals into office who are more willing to challenge the status quo and who have publicly committed to a sustained shift in policies during their administration. These two distinct pathways suggest that the important question about revolutions is not whether leaders or events matter most but rather the conditions under which they matter. Consequently, we studied these pathways on three phenomena: international economic sanctions, domestic economic growth, and interstate alliances. We find that revolutionary events have a short-term negative effect on domestic economic growth, while revolutionary leaders have a long-term effect on the probability that a revolutionary state is targeted for sanctions. Both the revolutionary leader and the revolution’s immediate events alter the state’s international alliances. Our findings suggest that no single level of analysis completely dominates, and the answer depends on the outcome of interest.     

Abd-el-Krim al-Khattabi: The Unknown Mentor of Che Guevara

Abd-el-Krim al-Khattabi's guerilla tactics are said to have influenced several renowned revolutionaries, such as Ho Chi Minh and Mao Zedong. There is evidence that Che Guevara equally employed at least some of the tactics and methods, which were devised by the Rifis. After all, Alberto Bayo, the much respected guerilla trainer of Che, had fought during his military career for a relatively long period of time against the Rifis. Castro, yet another role model for Che, mentions in his biography that he read about the battle of Annual, one of the most successful attacks against the Spanish initiated by Abd-el-Krim in 1921. There are also claims that Che had met Abd-el-Krim in 1959 in Cairo. Castro does not mention that he had discussed with Che anything about his readings on the Rif War, but he clearly states that Bayo used to teach in his camp guerilla methods that he had encountered during his assignments in Morocco. However, neither Bayo nor Che (or their biographers) mention that any of the tactics imparted during the training were from the time of Abd-el-Krim's struggle. The only person praised by both men is the Nicaraguan rebel leader Augusto César Sandino. This article compares the tactical teachings of Bayo as well as the operational methods used by Che during his battles in Cuba with the methods applied by the Rifis under Abd-el-Krim's leadership, and highlights a number of tactical similarities. It also finds that the guerilla tactics applied by Sandino have little in common with the methods described by Bayo.     

Organizing to rule: structure,agent, and explaining presidential management styles in Africa

Recent studies of comparative presidentialism have emphasized the importance of informal relationships between presidents and other political actors in explaining how presidents build governing coalitions. What has generally been under-investigated in the literature is how the characteristics of “presidents as agents” impact how they interact with other political actors – in particular, how presidents relate to their cabinets in terms of turnover and inclusiveness. We hypothesize that presidents who were former rebel leaders will behave very differently from presidents that do not have such backgrounds. To test our hypotheses, we collected data from 36 countries that are classified either as presidential or semi-presidential systems in Africa with 93 individual presidential administrations from 1990 to 2009. We found that presidents who were former rebel leaders were less likely to have major cabinet turnovers than other presidents. However, former rebel leaders did not have less politically inclusive cabinets (at least in partisan terms) but did have less ethnically inclusive cabinets than presidents with other backgrounds. The results suggest that agent characteristics, that is, the previous experiences of the president as a decision maker, are as important as the structural constraints he or she faces.     

Global political leadership in the twenty-first century: problems and prospects

While issues of political leadership have recently powerfully reclaimed ground in international political science, global political leadership has remained strikingly understudied. This article starts with a reconstruction of the diffusive leadership debate in international relations and eventually arrives at the fundamental distinction between structural leadership, relating to the material power capabilities of an actor, and behavioural leadership which refers to the concrete actions of a possible leader. It then inquires what collective actors – from major states via international organizations to transnational movements – could possibly exert global political leadership (structural, behavioural, or both). Overall, the major states would appear to hold the most favourable position, though their relative superiority in terms of material capabilities alone does not turn them into genuine leaders. The most radical visions, such as global leadership by transnational networks of civil society, are also the most vulnerable empirically. Given their explicit focus on ‘real change’, they correspond however more closely to established notions of genuine leadership than the order- and stability-oriented agendas of most other players.     

受贿罪问题探讨

受贿罪是我国目前多发而且社会危害性非常严重的犯罪之一。在分析了国内和国外相关法律规定和学者观点的基础上,认为受贿罪侵犯的犯罪客体是国家工作人员职务的廉洁性,犯罪对象为多种利益,既包括财产、财产性利益,也包括非财产性利益。在此基础上,作者还认为性贿赂也可以成为受贿罪的犯罪对象,因为性贿赂与普通的财物相比具有更严重的社会危害性,无论是国内立法还是国外刑法理论和法律规定都有类似规定,认定性贿赂为受贿罪的内容符合我国立法本意。受贿罪的犯罪主体为国家工作人员。除此之外,离退休的国家工作人员因为存在着"职务上的便利条件",也可以成为该罪主体,符合司法实践和我国刑法理论,也与我国国情相适应。     

求真务实是领导干部应具备的基本品格

求真务实,是构建社会主义和谐社会、践行“三个代表”重要思想和树立科学发展观的理论基石。领导干部只有大力弘扬求真务实精神,大兴求真务实之风,才能扎实有效地履行好党和人民所赋予的责任。