Republican Leaders Research Articles

Following the leaders: Asymmetric party messaging in the U.S. Congress

AbstractToday, rank‐and‐file members are increasingly removed from the legislative process and often rely on congressional leaders for information to discuss major legislative decisions with constituents. As a result, preparing constituent communication materials has become an institutionalized responsibility for party and committee leaders, leading to a partisan discussion of legislation. Using a mixed‐methods approach of computational text analysis and elite interviews, I demonstrate how members of Congress use leader‐led, partisan messages for constituent communication. Echoing prior work on asymmetric partisanship, I find that Republican leaders are more likely to encourage party‐centric messaging, and rank‐and‐file Republicans, particularly in the House, are more likely to adopt party messaging. The findings illustrate the institutional power of party leaders in a centralized Congress, as well as the role that constituent communication plays in encouraging and maintaining asymmetric polarization.

Antifascist Atlantic: Anticolonial imaginations and the Spanish Civil War

ABSTRACT The Spanish Civil War (1936–1939) is a conflict widely characterized as international in its scale and Spanish or European in its causes, without much attention given to the conflict’s colonial implications. However, there are reasons to argue that the conflict, at the level of both causes and consequences, was connected to issues of Spanish imperialism in Latin America and North Africa as it was to the strictly European factors at play. In this essay, I privilege a perspective from the Global South rather than a Euro-Spanish understanding of this conflict. To that end, I write about the writings of Langston Hughes and Nicolás Guillén during the Spanish Civil War, both through their contact with well-known Republican leaders and with each other. Through these dialogues, Hughes and Guillén theorize the possibility of a Global North antifascism that, taken to its logical conclusion, becomes coherent and allied with Global South anticolonialism.

Was Gerry Adams a transformational leader?

ABSTRACT Gerry Adams was the foremost Irish Republican leader in The Troubles (1968–1998). This paper analyses the extent to which he was a transformational leader, shifting Republicanism from armed struggle to politics. The paper analyses three texts by Adams at milestone points in the conflict. The first (1976) at the height of the armed campaign; the second (1986) as political engagement was increasing; and the third (2003), after the conflict had formally concluded. The paper uses four criteria to signify transformational leadership. The paper argues that, while Adams does not meet all four transformational leadership criteria equally, he transformed his organisation.

Лидерство в арабском мире: от революций к переосмыслению

Leadership as a phenomenon of timeless significance has always been a subject of research interest. It is a special form of social process inherent in all social groups. In this sense, it is characterized primarily by mutual influence of the members of these groups, with one or several of them exerting a disproportionally larger influence on the choices and actions of the other parts of group. At the same time, personal qualities including leadership style and political motivation remain the central concept of political leadership theory. The emergence of new challenges and new requirements for leaders makes it necessary to consider the tools of influence they possess and employ as well as their ability to adapt to the changing internal and external environment. This article focuses on the leaders of the Arab states who came to power in different periods and represented different types of leadership. In the times of national liberation movements, these were revolutionaries, who overthrew outmoded regimes, promised their people a bright future and built it in their own way. At present, the “redefining” leaders (mostly represented by Gulf monarchs) attract the most attention. They have proved to be highly sensitive to the demands of the time, offering their own ways of responding to them. Both monarchs and republican leaders sometimes share similar cultural and historical identities that influence their methods of governance. For example, the Bedouin theme, which emphasizes the ruler’s closeness to his people and his task to take care of his tribesmen, has been accentuated by the Gulf monarchs and by some revolutionary leaders. The author believes that leaders capable of “redefining” are not necessarily a product of democratic systems. In authoritarian regimes, a new generation of rulers has also contributed to the revision of a number of well-established dogmas concerning the goals of social and national development. However, methods, as well as certain management practices used in the Arab monarchies, have been shaped by a mix of elements associated both with modernity and traditionalism.

ECHOES OF THE «PRAGUE SPRING» OF 1968 IN TRANSCARPATHIA: ACCORDING TO THE MATERIALS OF THE STATE ARCHIVE OF THE TRANSCARPATHIAN REGION

The article highlights the question of the reaction of the party and Soviet leadership, as well as the population of the Transcarpathian region to the events in Czechoslovakia in 1968. The study is based on the materials of the State Archive of the Transcarpathian Region, which were not previously published. We note that the archive did not include the main documents - the materials of the 3rd plenum of the regional committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine, which considered the issue of events in Czechoslovakia. This happened at the level of acquisition of the fund in October 1990. In total, 25 cases P-1 have been withdrawn from the description of 6 funds. Some materials are preserved in the «Soviet» fund R-195. We are talking about the certificates and information that the party and Soviet leadership sent to the republican center, as well as letters from the chairman of the regional executive committee of the Transcarpathian regional council V. Rusin and the head of the culture department of the Transcarpathian regional executive committee V. Kerechanin to the first secretary of the Transcarpathian regional committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine Yu. Ilnitsky. The Soviet leadership saw the events in Czechoslovakia as a direct threat to the socialist system. Therefore, the propagandists were entrusted with the task of «correctly» conveying the party's policy for members of the CPSU, as well as broad segments of the population. For this, special information letters were sent in the region of the Ukrainian SSR. Researchers have identified at least two propaganda campaigns to interpret the «Prague Spring»: the first (summer 1968) – aimed at supporting the official position of the USSR on the events in Czechoslovakia; the second – in August 1968 – from the «popular» discussion of the TASS message about «fraternal assistance» – the introduction of troops of the Warsaw Pact Organization into Czechoslovakia. Under special supervision was the Transcarpathian region – the territory that in 1920-1930. was an integral part of Czechoslovakia. Here, state security agencies especially closely monitored the reaction of the population to events in Czechoslovakia. A significant number of the recorded 1,182 cases of critical statements and assessments of the situation from «anti-Soviet positions», were in Transcarpathia. The leadership of the region was entrusted with a number of tasks: through the exchange of delegations through party, Soviet, Komsomol, trade union bodies, public organizations, cultural and sports societies, journalists to communicate with the leadership of the East Slovak region, to receive the necessary information from them regarding the development of events in Czechoslovakia; inform the senior republican leadership; restrict access to information that came from Czechoslovakia through radio, television, the press; propaganda processing of ordinary members of the CPSU and the population of the Transcarpathian region.

Race, Corruption, and Southern Republicanism

AbstractWhile Republicans enjoyed unified control of the national government during the 1920s, scandals involving executive patronage and GOP state bosses in the South dogged the national party throughout the decade. The Republican Party in the South had been a set of “rotten boroughs” for decades, used by national politicians—especially presidents—for the sole purpose of controlling delegates at the Republican National Convention. This patronage-for-delegates arrangement was generally understood among political elites, but the murder-suicide involving a U.S. postmaster in Georgia in April 1928 brought the Southern GOP’s patronage practices to national light. This forced Republican leaders in an election year to call for a Senate investigation. Chaired by Sen. Smith W. Brookhart (R-IA), the committee investigation lasted for eighteen months, covered portions of two Republican presidential administrations, and showed how state GOP leaders in Georgia, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Texas engaged in office selling. The fallout would be a thorn in the side of President Herbert Hoover, who tried to clean up the corrupt GOP organizations in the South—and build an electorally-viable Republican Party in the ex-Confederate states—but largely failed.

Honest agreement or behind-the-scenes political games? New contributions to the research of Milošević-Tuđman talks in Karađorđevo and Tikveš in 1991.

During the 1980s of 20th century, socialist Yugoslavia faced various social problems, which disintegrated the fragile tissue of Tito's state-political legacy. In the early 1990s, when the unstoppable phase of dissolution of this country began, national-chauvinist quasi-elites surfaced, with the aim of realizing their great-nation ambitions in a period of general unrest. Although in this whirlwind of social events the possibility of military intervention by the JNA was used as an indispensable threat factor, the behind-the-scenes political agreements of republican leaders were often much more effective in achieving certain goals. Sometimes conducted in public, and sometimes secretly, such negotiations violated the authority of state bodies and made their existence meaningless. In this context, one can certainly observe the most famous separate negotiations from the beginning of the 1990s on the territory of the disintegrating Yugoslavia, conducted between Slobodan Milosevic and Franjo Tudjman. Although due to the lack of transcripts we have no insight into the details of these talks, many close associates of the Serbian and Croatian presidents, as well as participants in various political sessions, clearly indicate the presence of a high degree of mutual agreement on the division of Bosnia and Herzegovina. However, today, three decades after Karadjordjev and Tikves, there is a reasonable suspicion that it was just a double political game of Slobodan Milosevic, who entered into such talks with Croatian President Franjo Tudjman, not to divide Bosnia and Herzegovina with him but to confront him with the Bosniaks and thus weaken the front against Serbian hegemony in Yugoslavia. In this paper, the author sought to shed light on these events through statements by Tudjman and Milosevic, and addresses by their close associates and participants in numerous political talks, and thus help to take a more relevant view of Bosnia and Herzegovina's positioning in Serbian and Croatian politics in the early 1990s. year of the 20th century.

Conjuring Up a King

Conjuring Up a King

Association Between Partisan Affiliation of State Governments and State Mortality Rates Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Increasing polarization of states reached a high point during the COVID-19 pandemic, when the party affiliation of elected officials often predicted their policy response. The health consequences of these divisions are unclear. Prior studies compared mortality rates based on presidential voting patterns, but few considered the partisan orientation of state officials. This study examined whether the partisan orientation of governors or legislatures was associated with mortality outcomes during the COVID-19 pandemic. Data on deaths and the partisan orientation of governors and legislators were obtained from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Conference of State Legislatures, respectively. Linear regression was used to measure the association between Republican representation (percentage of seats held) in legislatures and (1) age-adjusted, all-cause mortality rates (AAMRs) in 2015-2021 and (2) excess death rates during three phases of the COVID-19 pandemic, controlling for median household income, the prevalence of four risk factors (obesity, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, heart attack, stroke), and state policy orientation. Associations between excess death rates and the governor's party were also examined. States with Republican governors or greater Republican representation in legislatures experienced higher AAMRs during 2015-2021, lower excess death rates during Phase 1 of the COVID-19 pandemic (weeks ending March 28, 2020, through June 13, 2020), and higher excess death rates in Phases 2 and 3 (weeks ending June 20, 2020, through April 30, 2022; p < 0.05). Most associations lost statistical significance after adjustment for control variables. Mortality was higher in states with Republican governors and greater Republican legislative representation before and during much of the pandemic. Observed associations could be explained by the adverse effects of policy choices, reverse causality (e.g., popularity of Republican candidates in states with lower socioeconomic and health status), or unmeasured factors that predominate in states with Republican leaders.

“¡Vivan las tribus!”: persecution, resistance and anarchist agency in the Popular Army during the Spanish Civil War (1936-9)

ABSTRACT The anarchist participation in the Popular Army during the Spanish Civil War has largely been subsumed into wider narratives regarding the modernising impulses of the Republican state on the one hand, and the resistance to statist collaboration mounted within the libertarian movement on the other. In this dichotomy, the anarchists who participated in militarisation are either seen as latecomers to the far-sighted, pan-antifascist project spearheaded by the Republican leadership, or else as passive spectators to the brutal dismantling of the revolutionary project. The weakness of this narrative is that it largely neglects not only the varied motives for accepting militarisation, but also the considerable agency exerted by anarchists at the front in resisting anti-libertarian persecution, while constructing a new identity as the vanguard of antifascism. Drawing on a combination of syndicalist reports, oral testimonies and anarchist press materials, this paper rejects the accepted vision of the front as a space of lethargic defeat. Rather, it reinterprets it as a space in which the anarchists instrumentalised their traditions and practices, alongside their inviolable moral authority achieved through their antifascist war experience, to establish a libertarian subculture within the Popular Army.

Growing crisis of the us federal finances system USA: default delayed but not cancelled

The article analyzes the course and results of the US budget crisis caused by the need to raise the ceiling of public debt, which reached $31.4 trillion by the beginning of 2023. It is emphasized that this budget crisis is the second crisis of its kind after 2011. The article draws major historical parallels between the 2011 and 2023 budget crises. It is noted that both crises arose as a result of the victory of the Republican Party in the 2010 and 2022 midterm elections, which allowed the Republican leadership of the US House of Representatives to draw up plans to sharply decrease the growth rate of the leverage on the American economy. Both in 2011 and 2023, in the House of Representatives Republicans were opposed by the Democratic administrations of B. Obama and J. Biden. It is mentioned that they invariably advocated an "automatic" increase of the ceiling of the public debt, while Republicans demanded budget reforms, insisting on dramatic reduction in expenses on federal budget. According to the author, the inertia of uncontrolled growth of budget defi cits and an increase in the pyramid of debt obligations is deeply rooted in the United States, and at the same time the politicians of both ruling parties seek to shift the solution of the country’s acute fi scal problems to subsequent administrations and congresses of new convocations. By 2033, the federal government’s gross debt is expected to be $50.0 trillion, the ratio of gross debt to GDP will have reached nearly 130.0 %, and the amount of paid interest will be comparable to the size of military budgets.

Поляризация американских элит (На основе анализа программных заявлений кандидатов во время президентских выборов 2020 г.)

The article is devoted to the study of political polarization in the United States through the prism of the influence of various groups of American elites on this process. Empirically analyzing the campaign messages of Joseph Biden, Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders, which were spread by their electoral staff during the 2020 presidential campaign, and using the methods of network and LDA analysis, the authors attempt to determine to what extent the Democratic and Republican leaders tend to use tools that polarize society and whether the nature of the influence of these parties on the American society differs. Having documented the presence of all types of political polarization in the United States, the authors show that both Republicans and Democrats significantly add to polarization because, on the one hand, they fuel emotional tension in the society, and on the other hand, they deny legitimacy to the principles of their opponents. The analysis carried out in the article clearly demonstrates that all groups of the American political elites, regardless of party affiliation, are nearly equally susceptible to affective and positional polarization, including those whose political activity is usually assessed as depolarizing. All this refutes the widespread notion that the Republican Party, which exploits the Us vs. Them dichotomy for narrow political purposes, is primarily responsible for the polarization in the country, indicating that something bigger, rather than the rise of right-wing populism or the increased popularity of nativist movements, explains the crisis processes that have been unfolding in the recent years in the United States, as well as in other old democracies.

High Hopes, Lost Illusions: General Islamic Congress in Jerusalem (1931)

The significance of the research topic is due to the relevance of the problem of the caliphate in the social and political life of the modern Arab-Muslim world. The purpose of this research project is to analyze the causes and consequences of the emergence of caliphate movements, which were the reaction of the Muslim world to the destruction of the Ottoman Empire and the liquidation of the institution of the caliphate in 1924 by the republican leadership of Turkey. At the same time, the authors focus on the General Islamic Congress in Jerusalem (1931) as a concrete example of the socio-political discussions of Muslims about the unity of the Ummah and the future fate of the caliphate. Based on the materials of historical sources, the authors identified contradictions in the diversity of ideological and value views of the caliphatists in the main areas of Islamic world - in the Middle East, North Africa and South Asia, analyzed methodological, spiritual and political obstacles that stood in the way of the ideologists of caliphatism by the example of contradictions in the activities of the Mufti of Jerusalem Amin al-Husseini (c. 1895-1974), who advocated the independent statehood of Arab Palestine, and the leader of Indian Muslims Shaukat Ali (1873-1938), who advocated the internationalization of the cause of the revival of the caliphate. The authors prove that “Islamic internationalism” in the 1930s began to acquire more and more national, ethno-culturally conditioned forms, which was due to the distrust of caliphatism on the part of the British colonial officials and the political elites of Turkey and Egypt in the geopolitical conditions that changed after the First World War. In addition, the importance of studying higher Muslim education for the characterization of the political, value, religious and philosophical positions of the caliphists and their opponents is revealed.

The effect of electronic program applications amidst the politics of administrative burden

E-government innovations are known to help reengineer and improve organizational processes in ways that can reduce administrative burden. At the same time, however, research has shown that burdens are often deliberately created and used as a means through which politics play out. We connect these literatures and argue that the positive effect of e-government will likely vary under different political leadership. We examine this argument in the context of the U.S. welfare administration, where federal programs, such as Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), are implemented by the states. Using panel data for all U.S. states, we model the impact of varying adoptions of electronic application portals on program take-up for Medicaid and SNAP. In line with expectations, we find stronger effects of electronic program applications on enrollment under Democratic leadership and weaker effects under Republican leadership, and findings hold across both programs, Medicaid and SNAP.

Mr. Flake Gets Out of Washington: The Jeremiadic Martyrdom of Jeff Flake

Donald Trump’s election in 2016 triggered an identity crisis for many Republican Party leaders. One such Republican – Sen. Jeff Flake – framed this crisis as a test of conservative principles and challenged Trumpism in the American jeremiadic tradition. Flake employed the rhetoric of martyrdom to explain his opposition to his party’s president and justify his retirement from public office. We analyze Flake’s construction of rhetorical martyrdom within the American jeremiad. Flake’s rhetoric is carefully constructed political communication that purposely serves as a reformative guidepost for current and future political actors navigating intraparty conflict and political pressures.

Updating amidst Disagreement: New Experimental Evidence on Partisan Cues

Abstract In this era of hyper-polarization and partisan animosity, do people incorporate the viewpoints of their political opponents? Perhaps not. An important body of research, in fact, finds that the provision of information about opponents’ policy views leads survey respondents to reflexively adopt the opposite position. In this paper, we demonstrate that such findings arise from incomplete experimental designs and a particular measurement strategy. In a series of experiments that vary information about both parties’ positions simultaneously and that solicit continuous, rather than discrete, policy positions, we find that partisans update their beliefs in accordance with the positions of Republican and Democratic leaders alike. Partisans are not perennially determined to disagree. Rather, they are often willing to incorporate opposing viewpoints about a wide range of policy issues.

Gathering the Nation in the Village: Intellectuals and the Cultural Politics of Nationality in the Late Soviet Period

AbstractThis article analyzes the activities of three Soviet intellectuals–the Ukrainian artist Ivan Honchar, the Russian writer Vladimir Soloukhin, and the Gagauz poet Dmitri Kara Çoban–who launched independent projects to collect and preserve artifacts of pre‐Soviet peasant culture in the 1960s. Reacting against representations of their national culture in state museums that they considered inauthentic and incomplete, these three collectors were part of a broader movement of intellectuals in the post‐Stalin period who sought to return to the village as the original source of “authentic” national culture. State responses to these intellectual initiatives were determined not by clearly articulated policies made in Moscow, but through the “cultural politics of nationality”–the interaction of intellectuals, republican leaders and central authorities. Demonstrating the enduring impact of these three independent collecting projects on Soviet and post‐Soviet thought about the nation, this article argues that changing conceptions of the nation in the post‐Stalin period are best understood as the result of a nationalities process involving intellectuals, republican leaders and central authorities, rather than an explicitly defined nationalities policy.

РИТОРИКА ПОДДЕРЖАНИЯ ОСОБОГО СТАТУСА РЕСПУБЛИК РОССИЙСКОЙ ФЕДЕРАЦИИ В УСЛОВИЯХ ЦЕНТРАЛИЗАЦИИ

The article answers the question of how the heads of republics characterise the status of the subjects of the federation they lead in the conditions of centralisation. Based on the idea of the importance of rhetorical representation of the status of a subject of the federation and using quantitative content analysis of the speeches of the heads of the republics dedicated to the days of the constitution and the days of the republic in the period from 2000 to 2021, the authors show that 1) even during the centralisation of the political system in Russia, republican leaders find suitable rhetorical tools that allow them to emphasise the special status of their regions; 2) they utilise communication opportunities with the local community to articulate their stance on issues important for evaluating the status of the republics.

Катон Младший, Сенека Младший, Плиний Младший: конфликт между нормой и реальностью

the article is devoted to three politicians and intellectuals – the republican leader Cato of Utica, Neroʼs tutor Seneca and Trajanʼs friend Pliny the Younger. An uncompromising fighter against tyranny, Cato chose to commit suicide rather than accept the dictatorship of Caesar. The conformist Seneca, who consciously accepted autocracy and dreamed of the rule of an ideal princeps, was forced to commit suicide under the compulsion of his unworthy pupil, emperor Nero. Pliny the Younger made a brilliant political career and, having survived the despotic regime of Domitian, created the image of «the best princeps» in the «Panegyric» dedicated to Trajan.

Feminists Against Authoritarianism

Feminists Against Authoritarianism Meaghan Winter (bio) Last summer, soon after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, Kansans turned out in record numbers to reject a ballot amendment that would have stripped the right to abortion from the state's constitution. The overwhelming "no" vote—59 to 41 percent—was followed by similarly promising results in the midterm elections. In November, voters in Michigan, California, and Vermont affirmed the right to legal abortion, and Kentuckians and Montanans rejected anti-abortion amendments. Support for abortion rights helped Democrats win up and down the ballot. Across the country, Americans asserted what advocates have known for years: if voters could decide, abortion would be legal. These victories have been much celebrated—and for good reason. The amendments that enshrined legal abortion are helping women and pregnant people access lifesaving healthcare. They also demonstrate that Democrats can loudly endorse abortion rights and win. The unequivocal results from Kansas, Michigan, and Kentucky should theoretically offer cautionary tales for anti-abortion politicians: you'd think it would be difficult for an elected official to criminalize abortion and keep his seat. But the way we lost Roe illustrates the limits of such wins. Back in 2011, Mississippi voters resoundingly—58 to 42 percent—rejected a state-wide ballot amendment that would have defined personhood from the moment of conception. But the Republican legislature kept discussing bills designed to ban abortion and passing laws that made it more difficult for physicians to perform the procedure. In 2018, the state legislature passed a law banning abortion after fifteen weeks. Even though lower courts uniformly decided that the ban was unconstitutional, the Supreme Court took the case, and in June last year, the new conservative majority upheld the Mississippi law and overturned Roe. Three days later, the Mississippi attorney general certified the state's trigger law, banning abortion in the state. The implications are clear: minority rule is a major obstacle to ensuring abortion rights. [End Page 49] As Lisa Corrigan, an expert on social movements and Professor of Communication and Director of the Gender Studies Program at the University of Arkansas, said last year, "There are no minority rights when the minority rules. Restrictions on voting rights and erosion of freedom of speech are essential to state rule. . . . The political minority is where the authoritarian impulses find expression." In other words, when officials can act without public approval, they can further disenfranchise people who already have less power, including women and Black voters. Many Republican state lawmakers across the country are embracing openly undemocratic rhetoric and policy, including endorsing voter suppression laws. And since the 1990s, Republican operatives have become more strategic about gerrymandering political maps. These strategies, which they accelerated in 2010 and 2020 (pivotal redistricting years), have given white, rural voters and their chosen lawmakers disproportionate power in Congress and state legislatures, incentivizing Republican leadership in states like Mississippi to favor fringe partisans when they set their agendas. In states such as Florida and Ohio, it is now functionally impossible for voters to swing control of the state legislature from Republicans, at least in the near future. Meanwhile, in November, Democrats lost control of the House—and any possibility of codifying Roe in Congress—by seven seats, after Florida drew maps that enabled Republicans to pick up four new congressional seats and the Supreme Court blocked orders from lower courts to force Alabama, Georgia, and Louisiana to draw new majority-Black districts to satisfy the Voting Rights Act. At the same time, the Republican Party (with the assistance of the Federalist Society) has filled the federal judiciary and Supreme Court with unelected ideologues who hold lifetime appointments. Unless national Democratic leaders make dramatic changes to the Court and its authority, including expanding the number of justices, those judges are poised to spend decades setting national precedents by upholding laws enacted by semi-autocratic state governments. With these problems in mind, I want to highlight another ballot amendment as a cause for hope. In 2018, Michigan voters approved an initiative that reformed the redistricting process so that citizens—not political officials and their operatives—controlled the map-drawing process. Previously, Michigan was one of the most gerrymandered states...