Symbolic Policy Research Articles

The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) as a Symbolic Policy in the Broader “Anti-Corruption Movement”: A Case Study of Latin American Prosecutions

The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) is a US law that ostensibly seeks to reduce transnational corruption through penalizing individuals/entities who bribe foreign officials. The purpose of this study is to critically assess the FCPA and examine how it has been applied within Latin America. To do so, we conduct a case study of FCPA bribery prosecutions in Latin America over a 20-year period, 1997–2016. Results show that only twenty-two individuals were prosecuted during this period, with penalties that amount to little more than a “slap on the wrist.” Consequently, the FCPA can be viewed as a symbolic policy in the larger “anti-corruption movement” in that it purports to battle corruption but does not, in fact, do so.

ПОЛИТИКА ПАМЯТИ В ЛЕГИТИМАЦИИ ВЛАСТИ ПОСТСОВЕТСКИХ ГОСУДАРСТВ В КОНТЕКСТЕ ОСНОВНЫХ НАУЧНЫХ ТЕОРИЙ

The formation of political regimes in the republics of the former USSR is helped by the implementation of an active symbolic policy, which contributes to the legitimation of power in the majority of states formed after 1991. The presented article reflects scientific theories and approaches to the phenomenology of symbolic politics considered in the interaction of the political power of new polities and social strata and population groups of these states. The relevance of the chosen topic of the article lies in the study of the algorithm for the implementation of symbolic politics in new conditions that influence the legitimation and strengthening of political power in new states. Field research: political institutions, processes and technologies. The purpose of the article is to present and justify the author’s definition and phenomenology of the symbolic politics of post-Soviet states in line with scientific theories and approaches to understanding the role of states and public policy. The subject of the study is the essential characteristics of symbolic politics in the processes of legitimation of political regimes in the republics of the former USSR. As a result of the research conducted by the author, on the basis of scientific theories and approaches to public policy, the essence of the symbolic policy pursued in the states of the post-Soviet space is substantiated. Problem statement: the constructed collective historical memory and political mythology in the post-Soviet space, implemented by state institutions and non-state actors, provides a solution to the following problems. In particular, the legitimation of political power, the success of the formation of civil identity and the construction of a political nation. The study of successful examples of symbolic policies of new states has a chance of practical application in the Russian Federation.

Социальное самоопределение и региональная самоидентификация студенческой молодежи Забайкальского края

The article deals with the problem of social self-determination of student youth and the influence on this process of regional identification caused by the entry of the TransBaikal Territory into the Far Eastern Federal District. The authors present the results and conclusions of a questionnaire survey of students of Trans-Baikal universities conducted within the framework of a large-scale sociological project “Social Self-Determination of Youth in the Formation of a New Regional Identity (Based on the Materials of the TransBaikal Territory and the Republic of Buryatia)”. The project is based on the idea of the interrelation between two scientific categories – “regional identity” and “social selfdetermination”. Moreover, regional identity is considered not only as a traditionally and historically grounded territorial and cultural identification, but as an artificially created geographical, economically conditioned territorial reality, which originates from November 4, 2018, when the Trans-Baikal Territory and the Republic of Buryatia were transferred from the Siberian Federal District to the Far Eastern Federal District by the Decree of President Vladimir Putin. The authors understand social self-determination as the inclusion of a person in all spheres of society, a person’s awareness and achievement of a stable position in the system of social relations. The components of social self-determination of student youth were identified: socio-professional self-determination, socio-political self-determination and socio-cultural self-determination within the framework of the studied missile defense. The analysis of the survey results allowed the authors to determine: (1) the most typical professional and motivational profiles and strategies of professional self-determination of Trans-Baikal students; (2) political orientations and attitudes of Trans-Baikal student youth in socio-political self-determination; (3) value orientations and life position in socio-cultural self-determination. The authors used the method of “layer proximity” identifying the level of regional identification of students of Trans-Baikal universities. The analysis of the identification profiles of the interviewed students showed that the new regional reality (I am a Far Easterner), artificially created for certain state purposes, has not yet entered the consciousness of the student youth and is not perceived by them as “close” and “native”. But in fact this is a strategic level of regional identity associated with the construction of a new regional image, the positioning of a new territorial entity, the invention of new territorial traditions and the formation of a new symbolic policy.

Gratitude Day: the role of cultural heritage in the construction of a common identity and symbolic policy of the Republic of Kazakhstan

This paper is written on the basis of analysing the speech of the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan, who initiated the Day of Gratitude in 2015. The research explores the official concept of the holiday, examining its key ideas, media content related to the celebration, materials providing insights into the history of the formation of the multiethnic community - the people of Kazakhstan, and oral-historical evidences of various peoples deportation to the territory of the Republic. The use of historical documents and field materials allows for the identification of the cultural foundations of the holiday, resulting from the historical and cultural trauma and collective memory of the Kazakh people. The analysis of sources not only reveals the fundamental basis of the celebratory date but also identifies another important aspect - the influence of traditional hospitality practices that institutionally provided the reception of non-indigenous populations in Kazakhstan. The scientific significance of this work lies in its interdisciplinary historical-anthropological approach, expanding the boundaries of understanding the historical and cultural foundations of the holiday's actualisation. The methodological framework of the article is grounded in the theories of hospitality, memory, empathy, and symbolic politics, allowing for the uncovering of implicit foundations of the examined celebration. Examining the official concept of the Gratitude Day for its interpretation as a holiday elucidating the history and stages of the formation of the republic's multiethnic community. Additionally, it serves as the basis for constructing social and political unity – the people of Kazakhstan. The practical significance of the conducted research lies in the scientifically substantiated identification of the constructive foundations of the Day of Gratitude, obtained from the shared historical destiny of the people of Kazakhstan, as well as in providing an addition to the official concept of the holiday.

Ritual and rhetoric of gender policies at the Indian Institutes of Technology

ABSTRACT This ethnographic study analyzes the barriers women encounter in achieving their goals at Indian Institute of Technology, Madras and Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur. Employing a discursive approach, the study seeks to identify symbols promulgated by various policy actions that legitimize or delegitimize specific gender relations. It draws from feminist theories and Lisa Rosen’s symbolic policy framework to examine the chasms between policy actions and their implicit meanings, situated within the larger sociocultural context. The findings of this study suggest that the campus culture empowers female students by providing opportunities for them to shape their beliefs and also to question internalized ‘common knowledge’ mediated by their families and culture. However, women’s occupations remain centered on the domestic reality. As women aspire to occupy greater positions of power, they are constrained by normative gender roles. Rituals of policy create mystifications about these constraints which, in turn, allow men to wield power and attribute their success to individual merit rather than systemic processes that reinforce structural gender inequities. This study advocates a shift away from the instrumentalization of policies and integrating caste, gender, and class diversity into institutional policies. This shift is essential to reenvision policies shaped by sociohistorical masculine attributes, and characterized by themes of rationalization, detachment, and impartiality.

Symbolic policy in small towns of Zamojszczyzna region, Poland, in the post-socialist period

Abstract Small cities have attracted less attention from researchers of transformation processes, although in some countries they are an important part of the social landscape, as they are in Poland. I present the results of research on the public space and symbolic politics in three small towns in Zamojszczyzna, a region in southeastern Poland. All are characterized by interrupted or disturbed historical continuity due to the extermination of their Jewish communities, which made up the majority of the population until World War II. After 1945, the Jewish past was silenced, while the symbolic space was dominated by the memory of the resistance movement. I show in my text that since the 1990s there have been significant transformations in the aforementioned towns. In some of them, firstly, interest in Jewish heritage and efforts to preserve it are becoming more apparent. Second, there is a noticeable shift from commemorating anti-fascism to promoting the so-called struggle against communism, a reflection of the current politics of remembrance at the central level. I argue that the use of cultural heritage in small towns serves largely to gain recognition. Local authorities often use not only elements of the past that fit into national narratives, but also local traditions or even fictional literary heroes, for this purpose.

Rhythms of the past: the first anniversaries of the Great Patriotic War in Soviet memory politics (1945-1965)

The article describes the first anniversaries of the events of the Great Patriotic War (first of all, Victory Day) from the point of view of the Soviet policy of memory, which is interpreted by the authors as part of a symbolic policy representing the production and maintenance of certain social ideas about the past in order to achieve the stability of the ruling political regime. Special emphasis is placed on the comparative analysis of official programs of events related to the Victory Day in 1945-1965, the 20th anniversary of the beginning of the Great Patriotic War (1961), the first "round" anniversaries of the Battle of Moscow, the Stalingrad and Kursk battles, taking into account ideological, mobilization, status, geopolitical, organizational factors. Based on a significant number of archival and published sources, it is shown how, as we move away from military events for 10-20 years, the instrumental role of anniversaries of key events of the Great Patriotic War has increased, aimed at solving not only domestic political, but also foreign policy tasks. By the mid-1960s, such anniversaries were finally fixed in the memorial calendar and served to consolidate and mobilize Soviet society, contributed to the concentration of symbolic resources at the central and in some cases regional authorities (for example, the case of Stalingrad/Volgograd), and were also used to strengthen the positive image of the USSR abroad.

Who got what they wanted? Investigating the role of institutional agenda setting, costly policies, and status quo bias as explanations to income based unequal responsiveness

ABSTRACT Previous research has shown that elected officials are more responsive to the opinions of high-income citizens than to those of middle and working-class citizens in the United States. This is often explained by the fact that economic elites make campaign contributions to political elites, leading to decision-making that aligns with the preferences of the affluent. This paper examines the opinion-policy link in Swedish politics, where campaign contributions are relatively low. Despite this, the study finds that high-income citizens still receive the most policy responsiveness. Three alternative possible explanations are discussed. Do high-income citizens receive more responsiveness because (a) they are better able to put issues on the political agenda, (b) because they are easier to satisfy and prefer ‘cheaper’ symbolic policy reforms, while low-income citizens prefer more costly policies or (c) because the status quo bias works to the advantage of high-income citizens?

Discovering Symbolic Policy for Building Control using Reinforcement Learning

We propose a learning framework for interpretable HVAC control in buildings using deep reinforcement learning (DRL). Our framework includes a data-driven surrogate environment to emulate building dynamics and a Deep Symbolic Policy for discovering interpretable control policies. We focus on maintaining the temperature within the desired range for occupant comfort. Our results show that the discovered symbolic policies are interpretable and perform well compared to standard DRL algorithms. Additionally, the discovered policies in surrogate models exhibit transferability to physics-based environments with minimal performance degradation.

Russian and Slavic Identities of Contemporary Youth: Value-Sense Correlations and Political Dimensions

The study is aimed at identifying the ideological and value bases and structural and content characteristics of the Slavic identity of the youth in Russia and Eastern Europe. The aim is to identify the ideological and value bases and structural and content characteristics of the Slavic identity of the youth in Russia and Eastern Europe. The object of the study was the youth of the Slavic countries (Bulgaria, Serbia and Russia), who in their everyday life experience constantly encounter these or those images and symbols, which eventually affects their self-identification. In the course of the empirical part of the study, at the first stage formalized interviews were conducted to identify the value and semantic structure of the concept of “Slavic identity”, the system of national and European values, political, ideological and identification orientations. The second part of the empirical study was aimed at identifying the value-semantic structure and correlation of Russian and Slavic identity of Russian youth, the system of its national and European values, political, ideological and identification ones. The main research method was a questionnaire survey containing both closed and open-ended questions, using direct ranking and rating scaling techniques, as well as the method of free associations. The results of the study showed that young people in Eastern Europe are largely oriented towards European values, and despite Euroscepticism over time the EU symbolic policy is bearing fruit, especially among young people in these countries. In the understanding of Russian youth, Slavic identity is more an attribute of culture and history, which is not significant for real life. Therefore, it is obvious that the Slavic identity of both Russian and European youth correlates poorly with their political behavior. Meanwhile, in Russia there is a good potential for work in this direction due to the more pronounced cultural and historical aspects of Slavic identity.

Pedigreed Legends as a Way of Integration of the Political Elite in the XVI Century

The article analyzes the role of pedigreed legends in the formation of political and managerial elites in Russia of the XVI century. The need to recruit, circulate and consolidate the elites at that time led to the formation of the institution of pedigree legends, which allowed the nobility to lengthen and elevate their origin. The article analyzes the pedigree of the legend about the origin of the Ratsha from which many noble families had their origin. The authors conclude that the supreme power actively used pedigreed legends in its symbolic policy.

Некоторые аспекты легитимации политики строительства национально-государственной идентичности

The article discusses some mechanisms of nation-state building legitimization, including the identity, national memory and symbolic policy used by modern states. The application of these mechanisms is demonstrated on the example of the Republic of Belarus. Finally the author makes a conclusion about the imminent by historical standards transition of the nation-building policy of Belarus from the stage that began in 2020 to a new one based on the synthesis of its own and pro-European identity.

Transatlantic cooperation in flux: Europe’s small and cautious steps towards “strategic autonomy”

ABSTRACT The existing, liberal world order is under pressure and transatlantic cooperation on security is challenged. The paper raises the question, why have the European steps and policy initiatives towards addressing the new international threats and challenges to Europe been so limited and cautious. The first argument states it is because the European decision-makers were unable to agree when it came to implementing salient and concrete policies addressing new security threats and building strategic autonomy. The second argument states that the European decision-makers were only able to reach agreement on diffuse and symbolic policy ideas like building “strategic autonomy” for the European Union. The third argument states that the Europeans were able to address some of the new security challenges if it took place within NATO. The analysis shows that the European responses and reactions to the increasing tensions in the Indo-Pacific were subdued. The Europeans were unable to launch any concrete reactions to the American unilateral abrogation of the Iranian nuclear deal, to the unilateral American policy initiatives in the Israel-Palestine conflict or to the US withdrawal from Afghanistan. However, the Europeans increased the level of their defense spending and they also cooperated closely with their transatlantic partner to counter the assertive Russian foreign policy behavior.

Академическая анатомия памяти о «городе русской славы». Рецензия на: Волков Е.В., Журавлева Н.С., Сибиряков И.В. «Ленинграда черноморский брат»: Севастополь в советской культурной памяти. Челябинск: Издательский центр ЮУрГУ, 2021. 499 с.

The monograph under review is a successful attempt to reconstruct the place of Sevastopol in the cultural memory of the Soviet period by means of in-depth analysis of the system of discourse related to the history of this city, “places of memory,” and commemorative practices (with special attention to the celebration of historical anniversaries). The authors managed to create a holistic image of how the main stages in the history of the “City of Russian Glory” together with the related narratives and personalities were included in the general context of the Soviet politics of history and are presented in the collective consciousness. To achieve the purpose of the study, they gave a detailed description of numerous memorial constructions, museum expositions, works of fine art, musical works, scientific and popular-science literature, memoirs and fiction, theatrical productions, documentaries and feature films – all the things that determined general visual and discourse content of the collective memory of the past in the context of the 20th century. The monograph under review is of great significance for Russian memory studies and is recommended to those who are interested in the history of Sevastopol and engaged in memory studies, new cultural history, symbolic policy, and discourse studies. At the same time, despite the variety of the topics raised and the depth of the analysis conducted, there remains a broad heuristic field for new studies devoted to the legendary “City of Russian Glory” in domestic memorial culture and historical memory.

раектории развития постсоветских идентичностей: подходы, модели, тенденции

The problems of the post-Soviet space remain an extremely controversial topic with a high degree of uncertainty of the subject field. However, studies of post-Soviet identity are more conceptualized, and the relevance of the topic in theoretical and practical terms is reflected in a large array of studies. The analysis of this array consists in searching for common logic and differences in the development of identity processes in certain groups of post-Soviet countries. By analyzing the content elements of memory policy and symbolic policy, as well as their structural relationships, it is possible to define models of post-Soviet identity and draw conclusions about their further features. Basing on the analysis of Russian and English-language literature the interpretive models of post-Soviet identities are to be constructed. Visualizing the key messages of the symbolic and memory policy of the post-Soviet countries (tag clouds), as well as analyzing of the expert survey (N 12), the authors highlight the deepening of trends that have developed over three decades of post-Soviet history as well as the regionalization of post-Soviet identities grouped around several models: the model of “national-civilizational community”; “neo-Soviet” model; “geopolitical” or “anti-Imperial” identity; the model of finding a balance between state, ethnic and religious identities; transitional “Caspian” identities; ethno-cultural model. The survey on the post-Soviet identities shows the ongoing process of distancing the societies from the former USSR basing on the new forms of perception of social and political phenomena.

ПРОЕКТ "ПОЕЗД ЕАЭС" КАК ИНСТРУМЕНТ СИМВОЛИЧЕСКОЙ ПОЛИТИКИ И ПОЛИТИЧЕСКОГО МАРКЕТИНГА: К ПОСТАНОВКЕ ПРОБЛЕМЫ

Moscow metro trains dedicated to certain themes or persons constitute a unique cultural and historical phenomenon, whose history illustrates a very important, yet not enough studied issue, namely, branding of Russian urban rail transport as part of the state’s promotional campaigns and symbolic policy of the integration organization with the leading role of the Russian Federation. The author acknowledges the need for studying the role played by the themed “EAEU train”, which was launched in December 2019 to commemorate the 5-year anniversary of signing of the Treaty on the Eurasian Economic Union (29 May 2014), in the Eurasian Economic Union policy and the Eurasian aspects of the Russian symbolic policy. According to the author, such a project can be considered as a means of optimising the informational interaction between Russian authorities and the society within the Eurasian integration project and as a means of making the latter popular. Reffering to the question on the project performance evaluation, the author stresses the need for the special complex politological, sociological and marketing studies that would help to assess its perception by passengers of the Moscow subway and thus determine the effect of the project on the image of Eurasian Economic Union and Eurasian integration per se.

Demographic and sociocultural challenges to cross-border cooperation on the Russian-Kazakhstan border

Integration aspirations of Kazakhstan and Russia seem to many experts to be a solid basis for the development of cooperation in the common border area. However, recent scientific researches have convincingly proved that political and economic integration does not automatically bring the border regions closer together and develop institutions of cooperation between them. Under these conditions, participants in cross-border interactions are forced to rely on the still preserved elements of the common Soviet heritage – economic ties between large enterprises and especially a common culture and values. The purpose of the work is to analyze the nature of the influence of demographic and socio-cultural trends of recent decades on cross-border cooperation between Russian and Kazakh regions. The study showed that the common socio-cultural space of the border area, on the one hand, undoubtedly creates the potential for integration and cross-border cooperation, on the other hand, it inevitably becomes a matter of concern for states seeking to legitimize their rights to border areas through a special linguistic, historical, cultural and symbolic policy aimed at uniting ethnically and culturally diverse populations in political nations. The policy of "Kazakhization", the demographic policy of the Russian and Kazakh authorities, as well as the natural course of demographic processes contributes to the erosion of the common socio-cultural space of the border area. The analysis of expert interviews showed that the basis of "unorganized", "spontaneous" cooperation of the population is still cross-border trade, as well as mutual trips with consumer and tourist purposes. The main beneficiaries of such contacts are the Russian regional centers, especially the millionaire cities, where study and further life are considered as a desirable life trajectory for many young Kazakhstanis and, above all, ethnic Russians. By attracting more and more migrants, the largest Russian cities contribute to further polarization and erosion of the socio-cultural space of the border area, which can significantly reduce the potential for cooperation in the long term.

Considering subnational support of climate change policy in the United States and the implications of symbolic policy acts

ABSTRACT While existing literature points to a number of factors that shape subnational support for climate policy, the extant scholarship has struggled to illustrate a clear and convincing explanation for subnational support of climate policy efforts and whether that support is meaningful. By looking to the United States, where subnational actors have an important role in environmental policy development and implementation, we find that legislators’ ideology and membership in the minority party determines sponsorship of climate bills. Specifically, liberal legislators with the fewest opportunities to signal efficacy to their constituents are the most likely to support subnational climate change policy efforts. Given that the individuals most likely to support climate policy efforts are those without capacity, many support efforts may be more symbolic than substantive.

Beyond symbolic policy making: The Copenhagen School, migration, and the marked-unmarked analogue

This article problematizes the securitization of migration through symbolic policy discourse. Policy as discourse is not innocent. It creates not only instrumental outcomes, but can also signal deeply ideological and profound, symbolic meanings. This study discusses Germany’s controversial ANKER Center policy as a form of such symbolic signaling. Distinguishing between negative and positive securitization, this article then brings into focus the non-linear, non-fixed, political, and social construction of these two forms of securitization in the context of migration. Framed in part by the author’s ongoing field work with migrant organizations and volunteer groups in southern Germany, this article draws specific attention to a discursive marked-unmarked asymmetry. It then applies the sociologists’ method of ‘marking everything’ as a strategy to ‘write against’ securitization’s negative logic—toward a positive, more inclusive migration agenda.

Moving beyond Asocial Minority-Language Policy

This paper exams how asocial symbolic minority-language policy contributes to the social processes of language shift from the perspective of highly threatened languages, such as Scottish Gaelic. In introducing the concept of language shift through Asocial Minority-Language Policy, we argue that symbolic minority-language policy is detrimental to threatened language minorities in that it is ideologically implicated in language shift when it neglects the societal circumstances of minority-language decline. The prioritisation of the symbolic aspect of language policy also hinders a value-for-money approach to official provision for the minority group. This paper calls for a materialist/functionalist approach to minority-language societal regeneration to counter the social irrelevance of symbolic policy. We suggest policy options for moving beyond the symbolic focus on the minority-language condition.