Political Drivers Research Articles

Digging deeper: Unpacking the subnational political drivers of Chinese extractive investment in Latin America

There is a long scholarly tradition that argues that political variables figure prominently in international corporations’ decisions to invest abroad. Most of this literature has focused on the national political determinants of investment allocation. Yet, in some sectors, the bulk of this investment is local. Chief among these sectors are extractive industries where assets are endowed to different local jurisdictions. How do political factors shape extractive foreign direct investment (EFDI) in local jurisdictions? We focus on Latin America, a region of the world that is rich in natural resources, and that has recently attracted a sizable amount of Chinese investment. Drawing on a novel dataset on subnational Chinese EFDI in Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico (2002–2018), and using a logistic model with time series cross-national data we find that multilevel partisan alignment is a strong determinant of Chinese EFDI. In highly decentralized countries, Chinese EFDI is primarily targeted to subnational districts ruled by governors who are politically aligned with presidents. We illustrate the logics of this allocation with two case studies. Our findings make a valuable contribution to three growing fields of study: the subnational determinants of foreign investments, multilevel governance, and the political factors driving Chinese investments in developing countries.

Who is responsible for migrant integration? Contextual political drivers of governance actors’ responsibility frames in small and medium European localities

ABSTRACT This article develops a comparative analysis of ‘responsibility frames’ of migrant integration – i.e. cognitive understandings about who should be responsible for migrant integration – held by actors involved in local integration governance across 36, rigorously selected, European small and medium towns and applies multilevel regression analysis to examine potential contextual and political drivers of the emergence of such frames. Our findings contribute to the existing literature on local integration frames indicating that, first, overall, frames that see integration as a responsibility of ‘migrants only’ prevail over other frames. Second, integration frames are localised, meaning that municipalities provide distinct contexts for the social construction of migrant integration. Third, political factors are crucial at both the individual and contextual level: not only elected local policymakers’ frames depend on their political party affiliation but also frames held by bureaucrats and non-public actors depend on the political affiliation of the local executive of their locality.

Palestinian Lone Assailants, 2015–2023: Suicide, Legitimacy Communities and Duped Attackers

The article explores the main social, political and technological drivers that shaped the phenomenon of Palestinian lone assailants from 2015 to early 2023. The unprecedented number of attacks during this period provides a wealth of evidence based on Palestinian and Israeli media sources as well as new archival materials that allows for a comprehensive analysis of the phenomenon. The evidenced drivers include the emergence of a young generation with new social and political perspectives; the impact of social media on the assailants’ sources of legitimacy and modes of operation; the notable prominence of personal motivations, and; the covert strategies Palestinian organizations are utilizing to deal with these shifts.

Climate Science, the Military-Industrial Complex, and the Political Economy of Knowledge-Making: Beyond the Capitalist Ontology of Nature?

Climate science is one of the main political drivers of today's world, informing critical scholars and social movements alike. Yet, many scholars associate it with projects of domination (the Cold War, capitalism, imperialism) while relying on it to elaborate a critique of capital. This article proposes a new historical account of climate science. Drawing from archival findings, interpreted with historical sociology combined with the critique of political economy, the article shows that a conflict developed at the National Academy of Sciences during the Vietnam War, between scientists who wanted atmospheric research to be under the auspices of NATO, as proposed by the "father of the H-bomb" Edward Teller, and others who favored global cooperation, led by meteorologist Jule Charney. The resolution of this conflict had consequences for both the institutional framework and the content of what is today understood as climate science. It is argued that this conflict was part of the social movements of the time, and had momentous consequences for knowledge-making by rejecting the association of atmospheric science with the military-industrial complex, an essential component of capitalist accumulation. Most notably, it resulted in the conceptualization of the atmosphere as a commons, which undermines its treatment as a sink, private property, or commodity, and qualifies it as a potential informer of the allocation of resources in an emancipated society. Therefore, the article sheds light on the resonance between climate science and current social movements and critical scholars: the constitution of climate science was in mediation with a worldview that was critical of aspects of the capitalist political economy and its ontology of nature.

The Political Drivers of Horizontal Governance Relations in Small Localities: Evidence from a Cross-Country and Cross-Locality Study Across Seven Western European Countries

The Political Drivers of Horizontal Governance Relations in Small Localities: Evidence from a Cross-Country and Cross-Locality Study Across Seven Western European Countries

Disaster, risk and conducting human security research in Southeast Asia

PurposeTyphoons, storm surges and sea-level rise pose major risks to life and livelihoods in Southeast Asia and demand state-level action. However, the prominence and frequency of these symptomatic disasters often divert attention from underlying systemic and situational issues. The purpose of this paper is a normative and conceptual one. It makes the case for a grounded and disaggregated human security approach for decoding complex relationships of risk, power, politics, inequality and mistrust that underpin problems we seek to address.Design/methodology/approachThis paper’s approach situates the emergence of the human security paradigm and its connections to human development, sustainable economic growth and rights-based protections in historical context. It then draws on observations across the region over a number of years combined with a review of relevant research to detail how the vulnerability and exposure to disaster of at-risk communities extend beyond random or natural events. Having established that a focus on the immediate characteristics of disaster limits our frames of reference and the utility of subsequent responses, it proceeds to analyse the political, environmental and economic drivers amplifying exposure to disaster in Southeast Asia.FindingsThe findings reveal that the vulnerability and insecurity experienced by at-risk communities are not wholly random or exclusively the result of natural, unavoidable events. Exposure to disasters is also shaped by various situational factors, including habitat loss, dispossession, displacement, marginalisation and limited opportunities. Incorporating a more holistic human security perspective can bring into focus the less visible forces and interests that amplify vulnerability to hazard risk for affected individuals and communities in the region.Originality/valueThis is an original paper that underscores the conceptual and methodological importance of a grounded and disaggregated human security approach to grasp the disaster-prone territories of risk in contemporary Southeast Asia and for advancing appropriate responses.

A Policy Analysis of the Temporary Protection Statute for Venezuelans in Colombia: Normalising Exceptionality using Humanitarian Discourses

Abstract The Venezuelan crisis has led to over three million people crossing into Colombia. One strategy to address this situation is the Temporary Protection Statute (TPS), aimed at granting migrants legal status and responsibilities without providing them refugee status. Critics argue that portraying this solution as humanitarian might undermine its role as a protective measure. Additionally, there is a lack of understanding of the TPS as a political tool and the problems it aims to tackle. Using a Post-structural Policy Analysis (PPA), this article unpacks the TPS as a political device and the driving forces behind its development. Through text analysis and qualitative semi-structured interviews, the PPA reveals how the TPS in Colombia can be seen as a multifaceted legal and political tool bridging short-term humanitarian needs (primarily protection, healthcare, and labour market access) and long-term development practices (such as integration through ensuring economic, social, and environmental rights), within a complex political landscape hindering long-term solutions. Its legal text epitomises political drivers and discourses shaping migration governance and international protection. This study also shows PPA’s effectiveness in revealing these political factors and the policy-problem-making justifying the TPS as a solution, and offers case-based insights to enhance comparative migration studies.

Political Drivers of State Fiscal Cyclicality

This study examines political factors influencing US state fiscal policy cyclicality. US states largely pursue procyclical fiscal policy, despite the federal government operating countercyclically. Institutional factors, such as balanced-budget rules, have been examined as influences on state cyclicality, with little prior focus on political factors. This article examines the impacts of electoral competitiveness, political polarization, and legislative turnover on state cyclicality. The combination of polarization and turnover is associated with procyclical policy, while the effect of competition on cyclicality is conditional on year from election. Both effects vary during economic upturns compared to downturns. State institutional design implications are considered.

Foodborne bacterial pathogens: genome-based approaches for enduring and emerging threats in a complex and changing world.

Foodborne illnesses pose a substantial health and economic burden, presenting challenges in prevention due to the diverse microbial hazards that can enter and spread within food systems. Various factors, including natural, political and commercial drivers, influence food production and distribution. The risks of foodborne illness will continue to evolve in step with these drivers and with changes to food systems. For example, climate impacts on water availability for agriculture, changes in food sustainability targets and evolving customer preferences can all have an impact on the ecology of foodborne pathogens and the agrifood niches that can carry microorganisms. Whole-genome and metagenome sequencing, combined with microbial surveillance schemes and insights from the food system, can provide authorities and businesses with transformative information to address risks and implement new food safety interventions across the food chain. In this Review, we describe how genome-based approaches have advanced our understanding of the evolution and spread of enduring bacterial foodborne hazards as well as their role in identifying emerging foodborne hazards. Furthermore, foodborne hazards exist in complex microbial communities across the entire food chain, and consideration of these co-existing organisms is essential to understanding the entire ecology supporting pathogen persistence and transmission in an evolving food system.

Developments and implications of tourism information technology: a horizon 2050 paper

Purpose This study aims to provide an overview of the development of tourism information technology from a macro perspective of the chronological lineage of tourism and information technology from its origins to the present. This study also explores the progression of tourism information technology, its implications and its future directions based on a macro environmental analysis framework comprising political, economic, social, technological, environmental and legal perspectives. Design/methodology/approach This study serves as a valuable connection between theoretical knowledge and practical application, combining the experiences of academic researchers and industry practitioners to thoroughly examine the progress and developments in tourism information technology. This research also identifies critical points in the domain to provide a unified and comprehensive explanation that aligns with the current research findings. Findings This research reveals the continuous timeline of tourism and information technology development. It discusses the origins, progress and interactions of tourism and information technology, revealing the structural political, economic, social, technological, environmental and legal drivers of tourism information technology. This paper also presents suggestions for future agendas on the basis of a compendium and outlook of influences and implications for the domain. Originality/value Findings of this study set the foundation for a comprehensive analysis of the transformative influence of information technology on tourism and provide a contextual framework and insightful future agenda guide for subsequent academic and industry exploration and analysis of tourism information technology.

Inventing traditional authority: Lhomwe chiefs in Malawi

ABSTRACT Chiefs in Malawi exercise significant authority based on legitimacy derived from the position's purportedly deep historical origins. But, does such legitimacy confer when a new chieftaincy is created from scratch? I address this question within the context of an ongoing cultural revival of the Lhomwe ethnic group in Malawi, which has included the appointment of many new Lhomwe chiefs and the creation of a Lhomwe paramount chieftaincy. Using a combination of in-depth interviews and original survey data, I explore the political drivers, mechanisms and implications of the this newly created Lhomwe chieftaincy. I find that its creation was driven by top-down, elite-led action rather than citizen demands, and that the newly appointed chiefs enjoy the most support among urban-based backers of the political party responsible for their appointments. This research contributes to historical work on the colonial-era creation of chieftaincies, but does so using a contemporary case of cultural engineering.

Measuring the impact of institutional and territorial drivers for an efficient and smooth Mobility as a Service (MaaS) implementation: a global analysis

Urban mobility plays a key role for the promotion of the socio-economic development of a country. Particularly, MaaS platforms are important for those daily journeys made by travellers that must be in a place by a certain time. Although, MaaS is the natural evolution of older supply models, it has a revolutionary impact on people’s lives. MaaS can optimize resources, urban space, reduce time spent travelling, lower costs and pollution. The present study aims at estimating the impact of a set of political and territorial drivers on MaaS implementation. The research is carried out using a composite set of indicators – 70 MaaS platforms in over 30 countries – for measuring how MaaS platforms perform in different territories. Results demonstrate a positive relationship between policies incentivising mobility services and business performance on those territories, and string territorial differences across the regions analysed.

Different Shades of Green: An Analysis of the Occupational Health and Safety Risks Faced by Wind Farm Workers

The growth of the wind power sector has been marked by environmental, economic, and political drivers. Its starring role is also visible in the emergence of the so-called “green jobs”. Notwithstanding, its evolution ought not to compromise issues related to occupational risks. This exploratory study examines psychosocial risks in the operation and maintenance of onshore wind turbines in a leading Portuguese company. We conducted interviews with main stakeholders (human resources, OHS professionals, and team leaders); developed an “activity diary” for the operation and maintenance technicians to describe their activity and perceived impacts on health, complemented with collective interviews; and applied the Work and Health Survey. The results revealed the following particular risks and health impacts: working under adverse weather conditions, working at heights and in confined spaces, spending long work hours inside of the nacelles to achieve an optimum balance between favourable wind slots to intervene and avoiding additional trips up and down the wind turbines without lifts (70–120 m), and the feeling of early ageing. At a time when these workers are striving for recognition of their profession as a “rapid wear profession”, it is a pivotal moment to discuss these results to guarantee sustainable conditions for future generations of workers.

Scientific Study of Islam for Its Understanding and Dialogue of Cultures

Heightened interest in modern Islam, its philosophy, and its culture is substantiated by the complex transformations in Islamic countries and Muslim regions of post-Soviet Russia. Some countries see a rise in the political role of Islam: religion has become a driver of international politics, and adaptation of the Muslim world to the global transformational processes of the century is still on the agenda. Some argue that the scholarly study of religion is ineffective for solving global issues. Muslim scholars take a dim view of non-Muslims attempting to study Islam. Russian academic approach lies in between Western and Muslim religious sciences; thus, new Russian works on Islam not only promote religious studies but also strengthen Russia as an international actor. Doctor of Philosophy, professor Taufik Ibragim is one of the eminent researchers of Islam. In 2009, he was a co-author of the biography of Muhammad. In 2015, he published a much-talked-about work on religious pluralism in the Quran. T. Ibragim’s works conflate encyclopedic knowledge and academic scrutiny with clarity and are of interest to both specialist audiences and general readers. In 2022, he published the book Names of God according to Islam, in which he attempted to translate Muslim concepts into the language of another monotheistic religion. The nature of God—personal and/ or impersonal—is subject to heated discussions, and T. Ibragim gives his interpretations of Quranic verses. The introduction presents an overview of the characteristics of God in the Quran and also gives the first comprehensive index of the names of God. The methodology, systematization, structure, and content of the book make it significant for Russian Islamic and Oriental studies. It will be helpful for theologists, Arabic and Islam scholars, as well as students. T. Ibragim’s works shed light on one of the most numerous and dynamic world religions and let everyone look into the hidden treasures of Islamic tradition.

Understanding supply-side climate policies: towards an interdisciplinary framework

Once marginal in climate governance, supply-side policies which seek to restrict the production of climate warming fossil fuels are now gaining greater prominence. From national level bans and phase out policies to divestment campaigns and the creation of ‘climate clubs’ such as the Beyond Oil and Gas Alliance, an increasing number of such policies are being adopted by governments, cities and financial actors around the world. But why would states voluntarily relinquish potentially profitable reserves of fossil fuels? How can we account for the rise of supply-side policies, the form they take and the sites in which they are being adopted? What conditions and contexts are most conducive to the adoption and sustainability of ‘first mover’ bans and phase out policies? This paper seeks to build an interdisciplinary account fusing insights from diverse theoretical traditions from international political economy, political science, sociology and the literature on socio-technical transitions in order to capture the interaction of political, economic and socio-cultural drivers in national and international settings which can provide the basis of a more integrated and multi-dimensional understanding of supply-side policies. Such an account, we suggest, helps to understand the origins and evolution of supply-side policies and, more critically, the conditions which might enable the expansion of supply-side climate policies to new sites.

Endogenous State Capacity

Canonical studies of the origins of state capacity have focused on macro-historical or structural explanations. I review recent research in historical political economy that showcases the role of politics—agents, their constraints, and their motivations—in the evolution of state capacity. Findings from both developed and developing countries emphasize how elite conflict, principal–agent dilemmas, and ethnic and racial differences have shaped agents’ preferences for capacity. These new studies demonstrate that state capacity can be strategically manipulated by political and economic elites, and that the various dimensions of state capacity—extractive, coercive, legal—do not necessarily move together. Refocusing our attention on the political drivers of state capacity has also shed light on why there are such stark subnational variations in the development of state capacity, particularly within large polities like India, China, and the United States. The findings point to the need for more nuanced conceptualization and measurement of state capacity.

Addressing cultural and political drivers of vaccine hesitancy: Considerations for the African and Asian contexts

Addressing cultural and political drivers of vaccine hesitancy: Considerations for the African and Asian contexts

Capturing planning: Politics of land based accumulation in Tehran

This paper contributes to the literature on the relationships between the state and other actors around the politics of the extraction of value from urban developments by focusing on one planning institution in the Tehran metropolitan area, the Tehran Point 5 Committee (TPC). Drawing from studies on state capture, the paper shows how this planning institution, initially established to make spatial plans flexible and implementable through deliberating on zoning relief requests, has been captured by strong political actors and their networks of front companies. By collecting and analyzing quantitative and qualitative data on the decisions of this institution from 2009 to 2019 and the corresponding spatial pattern of the projects with granted zoning relief, I examine how these actors cluster around the TPC to shape, expand, and exploit opportunities from urban development to their benefit while harming the public good. I argue that the explanatory frameworks of neoliberalism, elite informality, and corruption fail to adequately account for the political drivers that undergird the operation of this institution. The paper draws attention to the susceptibility of the planning systems, in particular those components with discretionary powers, to be a target of state capture under circumstances of political distortions, due to the role they can play in extracting and distributing significant economic returns from urban development.

Socio-economic and Political Drivers of Renewable Natural Resource Conflicts among Crop Farmers in Southeast Nigeria

Socio-economic and Political Drivers of Renewable Natural Resource Conflicts among Crop Farmers in Southeast Nigeria

Notes toward a Demographic History of the Jews

As an essential prerequisite to the genealogical study of Jews, some elements of Jewish demographic history are provided in a long-term transnational perspective. Data and estimates from a vast array of sources are combined to draw a profile of Jewish populations globally, noting changes in geographical distribution, vital processes (marriages, births and deaths), international migrations, and changes in Jewish identification. Jews often anticipated the transition from higher to lower levels of mortality and fertility, or else joined large-scale migration flows that reflected shifting constraints and opportunities locally and globally. Cultural drivers typical of the Jewish minority interacted with socioeconomic and political drivers coming from the encompassing majority. The main centers of Jewish presence globally repeatedly shifted, entailing the intake within Jewish communities of demographic patterns from significantly different environments. During the 20th century, two main events reshaped the demography of the Jews globally: the Shoah (destruction) of two thirds of all Jews in Europe during World War II, and the independence of the State of Israel in 1948. Mass immigration and significant convergence followed among Jews of different geographical origins. Israel’s Jewish population grew to constitute a large share—and in the longer run—a potential majority of all Jews worldwide. Since the 19th century, and with increasing visibility during the 20th and the 21st, Jews also tended to assimilate in the respective Diaspora environments, leading to a blurring of identificational boundaries and sometimes to a numerical erosion of the Jewish population. This article concludes with some implications for Jewish genealogical studies, stressing the need for contextualization to enhance their value for personal memory and for analytic work.