Understanding Of Politics Research Articles

The political economy of income inequality: Exploring the impact of associational and organizational rights

ABSTRACT The literature on income inequality, which has traditionally focused on economic factors, broadened over the past few years to include political phenomena. The inadequacy of economic factors alone in explaining inequalities has led researchers to examine political drivers. This emerging research line highlights prominent political factors and can significantly enhance academic and political understanding of inequality. This study places specific importance on associational and organizational rights (AOR), which have not been previously studied but are expected to have significant potential effects on income distribution. Accordingly, the work’s primary aim is to examine the impact of AOR on income inequality in 35 OECD countries from 2006 to 2021. Moreover, the study focuses on the critical economic factors of economic growth, unemployment, government expenditure, and trade openness. The study’s findings indicate that AOR -specifically union and civil society freedoms- can reduce income inequality, thus presenting policymakers with a win-win opportunity. While unemployment emerges as a significant force exacerbating inequality from an economic perspective, government expenditure and trade openness act as mitigating factors against inequality. However, the study does not find a significant effect on economic growth.

Policies, politics or participation? Exploring the political understanding of non-voters in the 2022 North Rhine-Westphalian election

AbstractAbstention has long been treated as a residual category in electoral research. However, a research interest in understanding non-voters emerged in the 1990s following declines in turnout in the 1980s. Existing research on non-voters largely focusses on socio-economic attributes (e.g. education), demographic characteristics (e.g. age) and political attitudes (e.g. political apathy) to explain abstention. This study explores how non-voters understand politics and the political process. It draws inspiration from studies of political culture, such as those by Fuchs (2002) and Rohe (1984), and uses data from eight focus group discussions conducted with 52 total participants who reported not voting during the 2022 North Rhine-Westphalian state elections. The analysis reveals that participants focus primarily on the output dimension of the political process and that input dimensions are secondary. At the same time, participants report a lack of representation by political decision-makers and display limited political knowledge.

Democracy by the “Other”: How Ethiopian Diaspora Communities in Virginia Engage in Political Participation

In November 2021, Glen Youngkin, a Republican candidate, won the election for governor of Virginia. For many Virginians, his win was a surprise, especially since President Donald Trump had endorsed him. For Ethiopian communities, the election results were the outcome of months of lobbying and organizing due to their dissatisfaction with the Democratic Party leadership. This development highlights the direct consequences of US foreign policy on its domestic political environment, especially regarding issues ethnic communities care about and how they can influence democratic processes. In this line, this study investigates the relationships between host and homeland political rhetoric and the importance of understanding the political power of diaspora-based conflict communities. Using narrative inquiry, I analyzed the reasons behind the 2020 voting trends among Ethiopian communities in Virginia. For Ethiopian Americans, the ongoing war in the Tigray region, as well as the mainstream media and US government's framing of who is the victim and who is the perpetrator, demonstrates an unwillingness to engage with Ethiopian scholars and practitioners as well as a lack of historical and political understanding coming from the US government. In this polarized time, Americans cannot ignore the direct impact of foreign policy on domestic institutions and how immigrants contribute, through voting, to the election of public servants, including presidents and states representatives.

Bertrand Russell's Philosophy of International Relations

Abstract: Bertrand Russell wrote widely on international relations, especially on preventing war and creating a sustainable peace. However, it is an open question whether his works should be taken seriously by professionals in the field. This paper says "yes" and argues that Russell made two important contributions to international relations theory. First, he uniquely combines different levels of inquiry, connecting insights into the structure of international politics with detailed analyses of human agents. Second, he does not just analyze international relations; he also advances normative goals—something international relations theory is often reluctant to do. The two contributions are connected: Russell's normative goals are nurtured by how he combines his insights into both individuals and the structure of international relations. As a result, his particular understanding of international politics creates a unique vision for how we can improve the field—and the real world.

Impact of a program on ethics of public servants in the municipality of Rionegro in Colombia

The research addresses the importance of ethics in public administration, focusing on public servants in the municipality of Rionegro, Colombia. Ethics is presented as an essential element to promote transparency and combat corruption in public management. Despite the fact that the 1991 Constitution establishes ethical principles, their application in practice remains a challenge, with a high level of immorality in public service. The study highlights the diversity of professional profiles in public servants, which hinders consistent ethical management. In addition, it mentions that many civil servants lack political training and understanding of the importance of their role, which contributes to corruption. Ethics, according to the authors, is a key tool for strengthening institutions and regaining public trust. The research evaluated the impact of a professional ethics training program on public servants, finding significant improvements in their ethical knowledge and behavior. It concludes that, although ethics will not solve all corruption problems, it is an indispensable component for strengthening accountability and justice in public administration. It underscores the need to implement continuous training programs that promote ethical values as part of a strategy to improve efficiency and transparency in public institutions.

Looking beyond “the tool itself”: Towards a political systems understanding of e-participation

In this paper, we argue that e-participation research is at a crossroads as its theories and empirical scope are increasingly detached from the contemporary relationship between information technology and political participation. We illustrate this challenge through two developments: (1) the dissolving boundaries between online and offline spheres of political participation and (2) the growing dissociation between ICTs and democracy. In light of these developments, we present a potential path forward for the field, inspired by the so-called "systemic turn" in research on deliberative democracy and democratic innovations. We argue for a perspective that emphasises the relationship between e-participation and the political system in which it is enacted. This allows us, in our conclusion, In our conclusion, this allows us to present alternative potential directions for future research within the field.

Legitimacy work of employer brand managers: how to find approval for employer branding policies and measures within an organisation?

Although organisations rely on employer brands, knowledge regarding management practices used to convince internal stakeholders from such engagements is limited. Consequently, this study examines employer brand manager’s legitimacy work. Building on structuration theory, it details the management actions taken to secure approval and structural reasons justifying an organisation’s engagement with employer brands. Using data from 69 organisations in Austria, this study evaluates how conviction regarding employer branding policies and measures emerged and identifies five key management practices: dramatising, radicalising, distributing, pragmatizing, demonstrating. These practices underscore “contextuality” in legitimacy work, illustrating how managers adapt their strategies to different phases in employer branding. This study contributes to existing literature by clarifying the legitimacy issues in intra-organisational management of employer brands, expanding our understanding of organisational politics and the role of structures in employer brand management. Additionally, it offers practical insights to help employer brand managers navigate the complexities of their roles more effectively and gain support for their initiatives by using pioneer, partner, and follower strategies.

Friedrich Engels’s view on theoretical thinking: innovative application by the Communist Party of Vietnam in the reform process

Marxism-Leninism has become a widespread ideological foundation that is consistently and firmly pursued by the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) in its leadership orientation for national development. This research aims to explore and identify the distinctive issues in Friedrich Engels’ theoretical thinking regarding the formation of theoretical thinking based on practical experience, the close relationship between theoretical and scientific thinking, materialist dialectical thinking and mastering the scientific principles of philosophy. These orientations have become methodological guides for the CPV to apply to its leadership activities. This research was conducted based on the analysis and synthesis of available sources, with the main sources being the Marx-Engels Collected Works and some classical works written independently by Friedrich Engels, along with a synthesis of related studies. The results indicate that Friedrich Engels’ theoretical thinking has been studied, supplemented, developed, and creatively applied by the Communist Party of Vietnam in the renovation process in Vietnam, especially since the CPV initiated the renovation policy in December 1986. To date, Vietnamese socialist theory continues to be supplemented by Friedrich Engels’ theoretical thinking, which in his time had not been able to be experimented, contributing significantly to the development of the CPV’s theoretical understanding of political, economic, cultural, and social leadership, becoming an important guiding tool for the CPV to firmly lead the implementation of the renovation policy. Friedrich Engels’ theoretical thinking also holds important value in the struggle against erroneous, eclectic, dogmatic, and mechanical views on human perception and practical action.

Music gonna teach: Decolonising IR through a musical exploration of knowledge

Abstract There is a growing body of literature calling for the decolonisation of International Relations (IR) theory. This literature, which includes perspectives from the Global South, Indigenous, and feminist approaches, has explained how the colonial thought and White supremacy of early IR scholars like Wilson, Reinsch, and Schmitt shaped the contemporary field and is still reflected in mainstream understandings of core concepts like peace, sovereignty, and security. The need to decolonise IR is well established, but the way to do so is not always clear. This paper explores how engaging with the global politics of Afro-Caribbean Rebel Music serves the decolonisation effort. We can understand Rebel Music as a form of knowledge that emerged in dialogue with, and continues to reproduce ideas embedded in, global and anti-colonial Black approaches to IR theory. Textually and sonically, Rebel Music critiques the nation-state as the primary agent of peace, security, and identity, imagines a transnational Black identity, and is one of the primary forms in which we can hear the voice of the marginalised communicate their understanding of world politics. Engaging with Rebel Music is thus one avenue to decolonising contemporary IR.

Special section introduction: epistemic politics in international and comparative political economy

ABSTRACT Economic orthodoxy has faced multiple challenges over recent years, ranging from the global financial crisis and economic populism to the Covid-19 pandemic and the spectre of stagflation. This has generated significant policy innovations, like quantitative easing and the furlough schemes, while heterodox economic ideas (briefly) gained notoriety. Yet these shifts have frequently been grafted onto pre-existing institutional and discursive templates, anchored by the assumption that they represent a temporary deviation from ‘normal’ equilibrium conditions. To make sense of these dynamics of crisis, change and continuity, this special section showcases an ‘epistemic politics’ approach that foregrounds the political life of economic knowledge. It is framed around three questions. What has been the role of economic knowledge and expertise in shaping policy and regulation over the past decade? To what extent have dominant economic ideas, theories and models been impacted by political conflicts and emergent issues? How have policy makers navigated economic crises and uncertainty through cognitive and discursive practices? This introductory paper sets out the ambition for the special section by defining our understanding of epistemic politics, before detailing the threefold contribution it makes to wider scholarship in IPE and CPE. It concludes with an overview of the five papers.

The Psychological and Social Underpinnings of Political Belief Development

In this study we will, examine the complicated psychological and social forces that produce political attitudes. The paper reveals the twofold nature of the cognitive processes; how emotive and cognitive biases influence reasoning about politics. The findings reveal that one of the common types of directional motivated reasoning is one in which the pre-held belief impacts the treatment of political information, which in turn results in biased assessment of political personalities and issues. Other than that, this research discusses the role of conversation and deliberation in the promotion of reflective political opinions. Discussion with others persuades a person to express an opinion and to listen to others that develop one's thinking of political matters. The paper also discusses the emotions, such as anxiety and anger, associated with political judgment, maintaining that such emotions distort and occlude any lucid judgment about political performance. It also reveals that scientific curiosity acts to offset such one-sidedness: "The more scientifically curious anyone is, the more open they will be to information that runs counter to pre-existing points of view, allowing them to reason more impartially." Findings underpin views that a critical thinking-open discussion environment will be highly instrumental in raising political awareness and understanding. The present study bequeaths an important understanding of the psychological mechanisms underlying the construction of political opinion and the social processes that can help consolidate or contest these opinions. Controlling these factors sets up a better ability to confront polarization and misinformation in modern political discourses

Does Soft Power Look Different in Multinational Federations? International Education and Soft Power Politics in Canada/Quebec

Abstract While the study of soft power has gained significant scholarly attention, an understanding of soft power politics in diverse state models, and multinational federations specifically, is lacking. This study remedies this gap by exploring the connection between soft power and multinational federalism in the Canadian context, highlighting the tensions between the Canadian federal “majority” nation and Quebec's “minority” nation. Relying on the international education policy sphere and its soft power potential, the study extends the discussion of soft power beyond the typical unitary nation-state lens, elucidating the interaction of multiple (and contrasting) soft power rationales within one country. The study reveals that soft power politics can be exerted as much domestically as externally and can be pursued in a discorded fashion within a nation-state. Clearly, there is a need for a more nuanced understanding of soft power, which considers its contested manifestation, and the context-specific ways it is utilized.

Athens or Rome? A New Perspective on the Political Philosophy of H. Arendt

Hannah Arendt is widely known as a philosopher who attempted to rehabilitate the ancient Greek conception of politics. According to established readings of The Human Condition, Arendt is generally regarded as a ‘Graecophile’ whose thought is underwritten by ‘Athenian nostalgia’. Arendt’s sympathies for the Greeks are hard to deny: she did indeed turn to the Athenian understanding of politics in an attempt to crystallise in it the core elements of authentic politics. However, this interpretation is excessively one-sided. In Arendt’s view, the greatest contribution to the understanding of politics was offered by the Romans, not the Greeks. The Romans were much better at dealing with the problem of stability, continuity and order of politics. In Arendt’s view, an exclusive focus on action, spontaneity and extraordinary deeds threatens to destabilise the life of the political community. By introducing concepts such as tradition, authority, the sacredness of foundation, the law (lex), as well as the political significance of promise and forgiveness, the Romans opened up a dimension of political sedimentation which was alien to the Greeks. Political sedimentation provides safeguards, without which a sustainable political existence would become impossible.

Ambivalent citizenship: political cynicism, community engagement and belonging among youth in Brazil

ABSTRACT This article interrogates the role of urban peripheries in creating political imaginaries and understandings of citizenship among children and grandchildren of insurgent citizens in urban Northeast Brazil. The analysis draws on data collected through 10 ethnographically informed focus groups with youth between 18 and 35. The article argues that, contrary to beliefs that young people are apathetic about politics or enthusiastic to engage in progressive social movements, youth have an ambivalent relationship with the state, informed by everyday encounters with precarious infrastructure, awareness of previous forms of collective action that determines their civic engagement, and feelings of belonging to home communities. The article suggests revisiting the concept of insurgent citizenship considering new socio-political changes that framed the lives of young people living in urban peripheries in the past two decades in Brazil and proposes ambivalence as a productive theoretical angle to make sense of ruptures and discontinuities in political practices.

Some sound, some fury, signifying very little: Frantz Fanon and psychological scholarship in South Africa

Frantz Fanon has been an inspirational staple to a political, social, and economic understanding of South Africa for nearly 50 years. How, though, has South African psychology wrestled with, and appropriated, Fanon over the course of this time span? A review and analysis of all published references to Fanon in the South African Journal of Psychology, over a period of 40+ years, reveal a disappointingly superficial engagement with Fanonian theory, and a glaring neglect of clinical, research, and educational implications of Fanon’s praxis. Recommendations for a recommitted engagement with Fanon’s writings are provided.

The multivocality of the nation: political imagination and transformation in the emergence of African Nationalism

At key moments in history, political understanding and action are irrevocably transformed. What makes such moments of transformation possible? This article examines the emergence of African nationalism in South Africa, following the multivocal appeal to African nationhood made by proto-nationalist leaders and intellectuals. In doing so I examine how new political imagination can reconfigure the structure of political relations and create powerful new possibilities for political organizing and action. African proto-nationalist leaders were ‘intermediary intellectuals’ who used African nationhood to speak to three different political logics of their key audiences: a ‘progressive nationhood’ to their white colonial audience, a ‘unifying nationhood’ to their missionary-educated African audience, and a ‘traditional nationhood’ to their rural African audience. African nationhood thus had a multivocal appeal which allowed proto-nationalist leaders to bring otherwise divided audiences to support a common political project. By bridging these divided communities, proto-nationalist leaders were able to combine resources and strategies from once separated domains into novel forms of political power. Transformation in political understanding was thus a critical enabler of innovation in organization and action because it built a political project where new connections between African and colonial worlds were made politically ‘thinkable’. Speaking to the scholarship on political repertoires and the sociology of anti-colonial intellectuals, this study has broader implications for the role political ideas play in political transformation.

Cognitive support for political partisans' understanding of policy data.

Political partisanship might lead educated adults-even the highly numerate-to reason selectively about numbers that are relevant to and support their ideology ("motivated numeracy"). In this pre-registered study, we sought to examine the replicability of motivated numeracy, and investigate whether cognitive support (number lines) that improves the reasoning of children might also improve the reasoning of political partisans. To test this, we asked 1000 adults about their political ideology and asked them to interpret fictional data, in a table or number-line format, about ideology relevant (i.e., the effect of gun control on crime) or irrelevant (i.e., the effect of skin cream on rash) issues. We failed to replicate motivated numeracy when political identity was used but observed motivated numeracy when prior attitude was used. Moreover, data presented on number lines elicited 75 percent greater accuracy than data presented in tables, regardless of whether the information was ideology-relevant, or whether data supported, was neutral to, or contradicted participants' political outlooks. Findings imply that political partisans require cognitive support to be more objective about policy data.

The Issue of Safety Amongst Undergraduate Students of the University of Delhi

In this paper we investigate what are the connotations of safety for students and in what way is college a safe space. In the questionnaire administered, there was no specific question on safety. However, the response to our first question—What does entering college mean to you?—saw a significant percentage (68%) of female students associating entry into college with entry into a safe space. Students’ expectations from college —as revealed in their responses to other questions—go beyond physical safety, not only do they draw attention to the multidimensionality and complexity of the concept, but in doing so they mark out and identify within the safe environs of college, temporally and spatially fluid islands of unsafety. Their responses problematized the notion of safety, thus alerting us to a political (including gendered) and expansive understanding of safety. In this expansion safety emerges as a cluster concept incorporating dimensions of gender, equality, justice, freedom and democracy. This paper makes two arguments, first that the college experience contributes to the students’ understanding of safety in its multidimensionality. The connotations of safety include both the physical and the socio-psychological dimensions. Second that in the articulation of this learning a student develops a critical understanding of social, political, and economic structures of power.

Towards a geographical political economy understanding of platformization

In the last ten years digital platforms have emerged as an important theme in academic discourse and various subdisciplines of geography and adjacent research areas. Whether in the fields of social media, urban transport, industry cloud services or gig work, platformization is therein often discussed as a more-than-economic phenomenon engaging in a conflictive relationship with public interest, sovereignty, regulation and the state. However, while the concept of the platform has become ubiquitous, the integration of and dialogue between various broadened definitions are less often practiced. In our short paper, we argue that for further addressing this intricate relation between platforms, power and sovereignty an engagement with the platform concept and its integration through a political economy understanding is key for two reasons: Firstly, an overarching concept of platformization transcending the political/economy binary is necessary to be able to problematize the reification of normalized economic practices lying at the heart of the phenomenon. Secondly, there is a pragmatic reason for developing a geographical political economy perspective on platformization as it can serve as a common ground for an engaged pluralism within and beyond the discipline of economic geography. Based on a systematization of existing definitions this paper therefore combines insights from political economy perspectives, urban platform research and research on platform labor to propose a working definition stimulating a reflection on the platform discourse thus far and strengthening strategical-relational thinking on platform power in future research.

Political Participation Among Scheduled Castes: A Study on West Godavari District, Andhra Pradesh

Political Participation Among Scheduled Castes: A Study on West Godavari District, Andhra Pradesh “One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors”. ―Plato “Plato had no perception of the uniqueness of every individual, of his incommensurability with others, of each individual as forming a class of his own. He had no recognition of the infinite diversity of active tendencies, and the combination of tendencies of which an individual is capable.” ― Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, Annihilation of Caste KONDAPALLI SRINIVASU, M.A. Research Scholar Department of Political Science and Public Administration Andhra University, Visakhapatnam PETETI PREMANANDAM M.A., B.L., B.Lisc., PGDSM., Ph.D. Professor and Head of the Department Department of Political Science and Public Administration Andhra University, Visakhapatnam ABSTRACT India's democracy is the largest among countries in the world. The National Election Commission Report of India listed 900 million eligible voters, 468 million male and 432 million female. These Indian voters were spread over 29 states. A notable element of the 2019, 17th Lok Sabha Election was the participation of 15 million first-time voters aged 18–19. Only 14.39 percent of the 2019 Parliament was female, with 78 MPs. In comparison, 85.61 percent of the group was male (464). General Elections 2019, the National Election Planner, reports 3,66,61,315 Andhra Pradesh voters. According to NEP data, AP has 18,123,437 men, 18,474,714 women, and 3,745 others as voters. The Electoral Roll 2019 contains 56,908 services and 2,511 abroad Indian electors. Female voters grew by 3,51,277, or 1.93 percent. Andhra Pradesh has 539,804 18–19-year-old voters. Political engagement and understanding are essential to any political system. These tools make voters efficient and link them to politics. The International Encyclopaedia of Social Sciences defines political involvement as the main way a democracy grants or revokes consent and holds power accountable to the people. It includes voting, acquiring information, discussing and persuading, attending meetings, donating, and communicating with representatives. Democracy and political participation are linked. Participation lets citizens express their interests. It fosters national stability and organization. It maximizes benefits for most people. Scholars define political participation differently depending on how they understand the different sorts of political activity. Growth generally requires involvement. The UNDP's "Human Development Report 1993" lists four interconnected forms of involvement: family, economic, socio-cultural, and political.