S. Moscovici: masses and politics

Conditions of Democracy in German Austria and Hungary, 1918–1919

Russian parties and the political internet

We start the chapter by comparing the relationship between trade unions and political parties in Central Eastern European and Western European Countries. We point to the fact that unions did not build the stable and long-term relationships with political parties as can be observed in the Western democracies. Through the combined analysis of the historical and symbolic background of the transition to a democratic civil society and free-market economy with the political preferences of the working class, trade union membership rates and public opinion polls we argue that the links between trade unions and political parties become even less stable with time. In particular, Polish trade unions never had a chance to become long-term intermediaries between society and political parties, making Poland an exception from the traditional models observed in other democracies. Almost the same is true for Lithuania. Despite the seemingly proactive and visible workings of many Lithuanian trade unions, they are still considered to be relatively weak and conformist. In Slovenia on the other hand trade unions, despite their declining membership, remain important and powerful actors in policy-making due to the neo-corporatist system. Consequently, we have to look into the replacement of traditional labour force representation in the democratic policy process.

Are all immigrants in the United States willing and able to integrate successfully within a liberal democratic polity? This research question guides the three papers included in the present dissertation. To explore this question I designed and implemented a multi-city survey in the United States (the American Cities Survey) which contains representative immigrant, black, white, Latino and Asian samples drawn independently for each locality. Based on the findings of the American Cities Survey, which include multiple attitudinal, cultural background and political behavior measures at the individual level, along with socioeconomic and demographic measures in six distinct local institutional environments, I argue that all voting eligible immigrants and immigrant communities-regardless of their native origin and their ancestral religious affiliation-- are willing and able to integrate politically so long as political institutions and contexts (especially local ones) provide them with the same exposure to the political system and institutions, and opportunities to participate in politics as the ones provided to all other citizens. I thereby challenge both the academic and popular perceptions that certain immigrant groups have anti-democratic and anti-liberal attitudes due to their shared cultural characteristics (i.e. religious affiliation or political socialization in a non-democratic polity) that persist even after migrating to a liberal democratic polity and are passed on to the second generation. I discover that the notion that Latinos vote less than similarly situated blacks and whites has persisted overtime for two reasons: first, simply because a greater proportion of Latinos have settled in localities where institutions tend to inhibit political competition and depress turnout, biasing representative national samples; second, because the smallest geographical unit one can study with existing survey and Census (CPS) data does not allow for exploration of political behavior at the individual level beyond the state. This is problematic for studying groups like Latinos, because 50 percent of their population is concentrated in three states and less than ten cities. I find that the results found at the national level are not replicable at the local level and Latino political participation varies by city. In localities where institutions provide incentives for political party competition the probability of a citizen of Latino origin voting is equal to that of blacks and whites of similar age, income and education. In other words, the evidence presented here suggests that the correlation found at the national level between Latino immigrant group membership and apolitical attitudes and behavior is of a contingent, perhaps even spurious nature, artifice of geographical concentration of members of this group in local institutional environments that depress political activity. The theoretical framework and findings of this dissertation reveal that immigrant political attitudes and behavior towards the host country's political system is shaped mostly by individual experiences with this system, and not by prior or inherited cultural or religious beliefs from their (or their ancestor's) country of origin.

Call for Papers: How attractive are political parties and trade unions to young people?

Trade unions in Poland have not built the stable and long–term relations with political parties as are observed in Western democracies. By analysing the historical and symbolic background of the transformation to a democratic civil society and free market economy, political preferences of working class, trade union membership rates, and public opinion polls, we argue that, in case of Poland, the initial links between political parties and trade unions weakened over time. Polish trade unions never had a chance to become a long–term intermediary between society and political parties, making the Polish case study a double exception from the traditional models.

How has Decentralized Democracy Impacted on the Socioeconomic Well-Being of Workers and the General Public in Indonesia

<p><em>The article analyses theoretical foundations of the development of an inclusive society in Ukraine. It demonstrates significance of theoretical investigations by D. Acemoglu and J.A. Robinson</em> <em>into the development of inclusive political and economic institutions as established practices of an inclusive society. The article investigates methodological possibilities of a mono-causal </em><em>«</em><em>simple theory</em><em>»</em><em> approach, which D. Acemoglu</em><em> and J.A. Robinson use to clarify the main contours of economic and political development of different countries from the Neolithic revolution till now. The key idea of the two US scientists is that all the roots of poverty can be traced to politics and political processes. These topics form the subject of their analysis.</em></p> <p><em>We note that D. </em><em>Acemoglu</em><em> and J.A. Robinson maintain institutional point of view and argue that societies’ growth requires effective institutions. Inclusive institutions, such as property rights, access to markets, equality before the law, access to infrastructure, support for economic and social mobility, and investment in human capital are needed for economic development. By contrast, extractive institutions enable the appropriation of rent by privileged groups in society, i.e. the elites. These institutions only redistribute resources rather than supporting development. They discriminate and expropriate.</em></p> <p><em>D. Acemoglu and J.A. Robinson consider political institutions fundamental to economic growth. They divide these into inclusive and extractive institutions as well. For D. Acemoglu and J.A. Robinson, politics is the process of a society choosing the rules governing its activities, and political institutions are the key determinant in the result of the struggle for economic gain – the prosperity of a nation, groups or specific individuals. Political institutions determine who has power in society and what power can be used for.</em></p> <p><em>Inclusive political institutions are characterised by plurality – various interest groups affecting political decisions. Under such conditions, the control over life in the country cannot be concentrated within a narrow group. However, D. Acemoglu and J.A. Robinson also caution that sufficient centralization is required to prevent chaos in a wide plurality. Extractive political institutions allow a narrow circle of elites to concentrate political power and subordinate economic institutions to the task of collecting resources from the rest of society.</em></p> <p><em>The article emphasises the importance of D. Acemoglu and J.A. Robinson’s conclusion regarding the synergies between political and economic institutions. Inclusive political institutions with their wide distribution of power do not allow the usurping of power over economic institutions; and equitable distribution of resources encourages strengthening of inclusive political institutions (“inclusive society”). Such synergies are also inherent in extractive institutions.</em></p> <p><em>Four types of institutions create four possible institutional combinations. However, two combinations are typically reproduced: inclusive political and economic institutions, and extractive political and economic institutions. If there is a need to go beyond the bounds of extractive political and economic institutions, such opportunities arise at critical junctures, created by shock situations.</em></p> <p><em>The article emphasises the cautious nature of D. Acemoglu and J.A. Robinson’s conclusions regarding the ways of changing political institutions in society from extractive to inclusive ones, and their confidence in the contingent nature of history, which might create or not create inclusive political institutions. However, even in the context of contingency, inclusive political and economic institutions, if they appeared, would be more likely to be reproduced in history, forming a virtuous circle. There is also a vicious circle of extractive institutions.</em></p> <p><em>The article also considers the ignorance hypothesis approach as the foundation of the influence of western political elites. According to D. Acemoglu and J.A. Robinson, western politicians are convinced that the roots of the poverty problem lie in the lack of knowledge about generating prosperity among the poor countries’ elites. D. Acemoglu and J.A. Robinson emphasise that the overall perspective chosen by international organisations is false because they do not recognise the key role of political institutions.</em></p> <p><em>It is noted that D. Acemoglu and J.A. Robinson do not provide a programmatic answer to the question of how to create inclusive political institutions, instead emphasising that there is no recipe for the development of such institutions. There are factors that can contribute to their appearance: a significant level of centralisation that will not allow social movements that are trying to change the existing regime out of the boundaries of the law; availability of a broad coalition; civil society institutions that are able to coordinate the demands of the population so that  the </em><em>opposition movements</em><em> would not be easily crushed by existing elites or used by another group to establish their control over extractive political institutions.</em></p> <p><em>We conclude that under the conditions of contingency, the responsibility of the political elites for their chosen development strategies and tactics grows immeasurably. History is not a destiny: a vicious circle can be broken. The elections awaiting Ukraine can become the breakthrough to a prosperous inclusive society.</em></p>

Gender inequality is a pervasive global phenomenon, particularly in parliamentary representation and the political realm as a whole. Previous scholarship looked for explanations in the countries’ national development levels, political regimes and electoral systems. Some scholars searched for answers at the domestic level within societies’ religious and cultural value systems. This dissertation departs from prior research by looking beyond the national domestic level into individual party-level explanations for women’s political leadership, broadly defined to include their station within parties’ decision-making inner structures. A core assumption in this thesis is that political institutions, mainly political parties, are the main vehicles – forklifts -for women’s ascendance to political leadership. This dissertation attempts to identify what party-level characteristics enhance or impede women’s leadership in political parties, and how these characteristics vary across different parties. The theory advanced in this dissertation is that party-level characteristics, especially their religiosities and secularisms, influence women’s chances in assuming leadership positions within parties’ inner structures. I argue that the root of the problematic of women’s leadership lies in party variation in religiosity, which can explain variation in women’s shares in parties’ executive and legislative bodies. This is premised on a multivocal understanding of religions implying that there is a continuum of multiple religiosities and secularisms. Religiosity of political parties refers to the religious components on their political platforms or the extent to which religion penetrates their political agendas. The core argument in this dissertation is that as religiosity in party platforms increases women’s leadership is more likely to fall. This implies that in parties with more extensive religious goals women’s leadership is likely to prove stunted. It is my contention that parties with extremist religiosity are less accommodating to women’s demands for leadership than parties with more secular and civil platforms. The theory of party variation in religiosity and women’s leadership is explored indepth and tested in Lebanon as a single country case-study. Political parties are the unit of analysis and women’s leadership in political parties is the main dependent variable. Female nominations for national parliamentary and local municipal councils are other dependent variables. Other party-level characteristics are explored as explanatory variables besides religiosity, notably, institutionalization as indicated by democratic procedures in leadership transitions and decentralized decision-making, pluralism in religious affiliation of members, and the size of female membership.

One of the most neglected areas of the European integration process is the role that trade union confederations may play after the full establishment of the Economic and Monetary Union. gradual establishment of the four freedoms enshrined in the Single European Act would require a transformation of the present strategies of trade union confederations toward more flexibility and towards the ability to take part in different levels of the European integration process. Iberian Trade Unionism highlights the emerging patterns of cooperation between national, subnational, and supranational actors and the impact on these different levels. Unlike most literature on the study of democratization and Europeanization, Iberian Trade Unionism aims to break the dominant focus on political parties and political institutions by raising awareness of the importance of interest groups such as trade union confederations in contributing to a strengthening of democratic governance. central thesis is that both Portuguese and Spanish trade unions are becoming increasingly part of a transnational European strategy which shapes the internal organizations toward professionalism and democratization. Part 1, Contextualizing Iberian Trade Union Strategies, deals with the operations of both Portuguese and Spanish trade union confederations. Part 2, The National Systems of Interest Intermediation and Trade Union Confederation Strategies, analyzes the transformation of the national systems of intermediation in the 1990s which were affected by a decline in steering power of Spanish and Portuguese political systems vis-a-vis global and European political and economic processes. Part 3, Subnational and Transnational Policies of Iberian Trade Union Confederations, deals with policies and strategies. last chapter treats the integration of Iberian trade union confederations in the institutions of the European Union as well as the ITUCs and is based on original research done in Madrid, Lisbon, and Brussels. This timely look at interest groups and lobbying in the European Union will appeal to scholars studying European integration and the role of interest groups in it, and to students of Spain, Portugal, or southern Europe.

10 | International Union Rights | 23/3 FOCUS | TURKEY Legal Barriers to Freedom of Association and Collective Bargaining Turkey’s current legal protection of trade union rights remains a long way from compliance with international norms. Labourers are divided into ‘workers’ and ‘public officers’. The Law on Trade Unions and Collective Bargaining (Law 6356) regulates the trade union rights and freedoms of workers. The Law on Trade Unions and Collective Bargaining of Public Officers (Law 4688) regulates the trade union rights and freedoms of the public officers but provides public officers very limited rights of association, collective bargaining and strike. Besides, the parties to the collective bargaining under Law 4688 do not have to reach an agreement and the final decision is given by the Government. If the parties disagree, the public officers have no right to strike. This legal rule - enacted in 2012 - provides no rights to association, collective bargaining or strike for public officers to protect their interests. Therefore, the following analysis of these rights will focus on the Law on Trade Unions and Collective Bargaining (Law 6356). Freedom of Association: only sector-based unions can be formed The right to form a trade union and freedom of association are assured in Article 51 of the Turkish Constitution. However, Law 6356 was enacted with a limited scope in contrast with international norms. Article 3 says that a ‘trade union is formed to operate in a certain sector’. This regulation contradicts Article 2 of Convention 87 of the ILO Convention 87 which accepts the ‘liberty’ principle on the matter of the freedom of association. Additionally, the ILO Committee on Freedom of Association (CFA) assessed Article 2 of Convention 87 and stated that workers can form a trade union with reference to the sector, profession or regional and other criteria. Moreover, Law 6356 Article 2 does not allow trade unions to organise themselves under umbrella organisations like federations or others, other than confederations. This is also in contradiction with the liberty principle in Article 7 of Convention 87. Collective Bargaining Rights The most important discrepancy in Law 6356 is that while it only permits the formation of trade unions in the sectors, the collective bargaining system is organised on the basis of the workplace or business. Apart from the workplace and business in the collective bargaining, it was not defined on the scale of country, industry and sector (Articles 33-4). This certainly violates ILO norms (Convention 98, Article 4). One of the most important obstacles in Turkey for trade union association and collective bargaining is the legal restrictions and thresholds to have authority for collective bargaining. There are two major problems in Turkey in the system of authorisation. The first obstacle is having the majority in the country and then in the workplace and business, as the law requires. The prerequisite for collective bargaining rights is union membership of 1 percent of workers in respective sector in the country. After the trade union achieves this condition, if more than half of the workers working in the same workplace become members of this trade union, collective bargaining can be signed for the workers in this workplace. If the company has more than one workplace or branches, the union must also organise 40 percent of all the workers in all these workplaces. If a trade union cannot ensure these conditions, it has no authority for collective bargaining. For instance, according to the data from July 2016, there are almost 3,079,761 workers work in Sector 10 (Education and Commerce Offices). A trade union in this sector has to have at least 30,790 members working in this sector for a collective bargaining in any workplace. Otherwise, even if all 20,000 workers from a single workplace of 20,000 workers are in membership this trade union still has no legal power for collective bargaining. The second is that collective bargaining power is given by the Ministry of Labour and Social Security – a political institution. The processes determining if a trade union meets those thresholds are controversial. These are implemented by the Ministry. If an employer or another trade union in the same sector objects to the processes to be performed by...

Slovenia: Between Bipolarity and Broad Coalition-Building

Direct elections and trust in state and political institutions: Evidence from Indonesia's election reform

Despite the rapid spread of precarity, temporary unemployment, and the phenomenon of ‘working poor’ all over Europe, the social and political institutions in European welfare states have not really recognized the precarious figure, who lives and works in atypical times and gains atypical incomes. The traditional welfare state system is built for people with steady jobs, not for those who experience uncertainty of work, income, and welfare on a daily basis. The same goes for political parties: the precarious figure and the new kind of worker subjectivity do not easily fit the confines of traditional leftist representative politics and trade unions centred around the Fordist, industrial mode of production. For some right-wing political parties, especially for those with strong market-liberal and neoliberal tendencies, a precarious workforce is instead a welcome phenomenon, since it provides a flexible labour force and accelerates the rupture in the traditional trade unions. However, even in these parties, the precarious figure is not seen as a positive political subject, but instead as a necessary outcome of the restructuring and polarization of the labour markets.

Although the national trade union movements in Europe face very similar challenges, considerable differences can be observed in their responses to these challenges and in the results achieved (Crouch/Traxler 1995). During the 1980s the Austrian trade unions' record in this respect was relatively good. In particular, they achieved positive developments in real wages and employment. Between 1979 and 1989 real pay in Austria rose by more than 1.1% a year, a rate higher than in most other OECD countries (Guger 1991); the rate of unemployment, meanwhile, was comparatively low (annual average of 3%). An important factor in these successes has been the formal corporatist arrangement which gives the trade unions a consultative role in all economic and social policy fields. It is an arrangement dependent on two fundamental features, namely, the specific organisational structure of the participating organisations and a political culture peculiar to Austria (Traxler 1992). In organisational terms, the principle of the single trade union confederation is strictly adhered to. All the 14 existing trade unions in Austria (four public service unions, nine private sector manual workers' unions and one trade union for private sector white-collar workers - the GPA) belong to the Austrian Trade Union Confederation (ÖGB). Even though the principle of industrial unionism is not fully established, this organisational structure does provide the high degree of centralisation and concentration required by corporatism.. The political culture peculiar to Austria has been an important factor in establishing the legitimacy of social partnership and of the policy pursued by the trade unions. Until the early 1980s Austria was divided into two political "camps": social democracy on the one hand and the Christian-conservative camp on the other. Though the ÖGB,has been, formally speaking, situated "above" all political parties, it managed to internalise the situation of political cleavage by the informal creation of political factions. In this way it was able to enlist in both camps ideologically grounded support for and solidarity with the technocratic policy which it pursued at several removes from its members' immediate interests. That this recipe for success ran up against limits is clear from trends in membership figures. During the eighties the ÖCB suffered an above-average drop in membership (compared with other countries); union density fell from 56.2% to 46.2% (OECD 1994). One important cause of this development is the erosion of the political camps. As a result of the structural changes which are affecting the whole nature and experience of work, collective aspirations are gradually being replaced by individualistic trends, thus making it increasingly difficult for the trade unions to maintain their legitimacy. At political level evidence of such trends is provided by the number of floating voters and the growing fragmentation and competition within the party system, making corporatist cooperation between the large organisations and the political parties (i.e. those currently in government) increasingly difficult. Another factor which has further helped to weaken corporatism is that, with the internationalisation of the economy, price policy, a traditional tool of policy implementation, has become obsolete. The effects of EU accession (in particular the need to meet the fiscal policy convergence criteria laid down at Maastricht), and the opening up of eastern Europe with its reservoir of cheap labour, are placing an increasing strain on corporatism in general and on the trade unions in particular. This article sets out to consider the most important areas of problem which together constitute this challenge. In relation to each area, we examine the nature of the trade unions' responses, assessing the extent to which they have altered their policies and their structures to adapt to the changing circumstances.