Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Politca'

Scopo dell’elaborato risulta l’analisi del rapporto tra atto politico e motivazione politica. Partendo da una ricostruzione storica, l’obiettivo del lavoro è mettere in luce i profili problematici ed i riflessi che l’atto politico – tema apparentemente sopito tanto a livello dottrinale, quanto giurisprudenziale - ricomincia, soprattutto grazie a un certo numero di recenti pronunce dei giudici amministrativi, ad avere, fornendo nuovi spunti di riflessione. Proprio questa nuova tendenza giurisprudenziale, diventa l’oggetto di analisi del terzo capitolo. In esso si esamina il repertorio di casistica giurisprudenziale in materia di atti di alta amministrazione. In breve, tale capitolo viene orientato all’esame di tutte quelle tipologie di atti emergenti dalla valutazione caso per caso effettuata dalla giurisprudenza che, nel tempo, sono state fatte rientrare nel novero degli atti di alta amministrazione, al fine di mettere in evidenza la necessità di un riequilibrio della categoria dell’atto di alta amministrazione, che ormai sembra non apparire più rispondente alla ratio della sua previsione, verso l’emersione di una nuova categoria: il provvedimento amministrativo a motivazione politica. In particolare, si sostiene come non si possano ritenere rientranti tra gli atti di alta amministrazione quegli atti a carattere puntuale a motivazione politica, cioè sorretti da ragioni di fiduciarietà politica, quali, ad esempio, le nomine di carattere fiduciario, strettamente informate dalla contingenza politica. Evidentemente, se tale base giustificativa costituisce la ratio sottesa alla legittimità di tali nomine, non si comprende la ragione per cui l’atto di revoca degli incarichi derivanti da tali nomine sia sottoposto ad un sindacato di ragionevolezza cui sfugge la nomina stessa da cui origina. Ed allora non può non ammettersi che anche l’atto di revoca possa essere sorretto da una motivazione politica perché, altrimenti, perderebbe ragione d’essere anche la nomina stessa. La corrispondenza di disciplina tra nomina e revoca si renderebbe necessaria in quanto, in caso contrario, risulterebbero vanificate fin dall’inizio le esigenze garantiste da assicurare ai singoli e si rischierebbe di bloccare il corretto esercizio della funzione di governo. Si propone, allora, la prospettazione della nuova categoria del provvedimento amministrativo a motivazione politica come quella categoria che, contraddistinta dal carattere della fiduciarietà, venga in soccorso agli organi politici per un recupero effettivo del loro ruolo senza impingere con le esigenze di tutela dei singoli. L’ultimo capitolo della tesi, quindi, si incentra su “Il provvedimento a motivazione politica: una nuova categoria della politicità”. Si tenta di ricostruirne il particolare regime di disciplina, mettendo in evidenza i limiti e le deroghe alle previsioni della l. n. 241/1990, nonchè la peculiarietà di ritenere integrato il requisito della motivazione nella forma del “venir meno della fiducia”. Scopo dell’ultima parte del lavoro diviene, quindi, quello di comprendere quale volto assume la politicità degli atti nell’ordinamento contemporaneo. Si ipotizzano, infatti, tre facce della politicità degli atti, dislocate su tre diversi livelli: atto politico, atto di alta amministrazione e provvedimento amministrativo a motivazione politica.

Scopo dell’elaborato risulta l’analisi del rapporto tra atto politico e motivazione politica. Partendo da una ricostruzione storica, l’obiettivo del lavoro è mettere in luce i profili problematici ed i riflessi che l’atto politico – tema apparentemente sopito tanto a livello dottrinale, quanto giurisprudenziale - ricomincia, soprattutto grazie a un certo numero di recenti pronunce dei giudici amministrativi, ad avere, fornendo nuovi spunti di riflessione. Proprio questa nuova tendenza giurisprudenziale, diventa l’oggetto di analisi del terzo capitolo. In esso si esamina il repertorio di casistica giurisprudenziale in materia di atti di alta amministrazione. In breve, tale capitolo viene orientato all’esame di tutte quelle tipologie di atti emergenti dalla valutazione caso per caso effettuata dalla giurisprudenza che, nel tempo, sono state fatte rientrare nel novero degli atti di alta amministrazione, al fine di mettere in evidenza la necessità di un riequilibrio della categoria dell’atto di alta amministrazione, che ormai sembra non apparire più rispondente alla ratio della sua previsione, verso l’emersione di una nuova categoria: il provvedimento amministrativo a motivazione politica. In particolare, si sostiene come non si possano ritenere rientranti tra gli atti di alta amministrazione quegli atti a carattere puntuale a motivazione politica, cioè sorretti da ragioni di fiduciarietà politica, quali, ad esempio, le nomine di carattere fiduciario, strettamente informate dalla contingenza politica. Evidentemente, se tale base giustificativa costituisce la ratio sottesa alla legittimità di tali nomine, non si comprende la ragione per cui l’atto di revoca degli incarichi derivanti da tali nomine sia sottoposto ad un sindacato di ragionevolezza cui sfugge la nomina stessa da cui origina. Ed allora non può non ammettersi che anche l’atto di revoca possa essere sorretto da una motivazione politica perché, altrimenti, perderebbe ragione d’essere anche la nomina stessa. La corrispondenza di disciplina tra nomina e revoca si renderebbe necessaria in quanto, in caso contrario, risulterebbero vanificate fin dall’inizio le esigenze garantiste da assicurare ai singoli e si rischierebbe di bloccare il corretto esercizio della funzione di governo. Si propone, allora, la prospettazione della nuova categoria del provvedimento amministrativo a motivazione politica come quella categoria che, contraddistinta dal carattere della fiduciarietà, venga in soccorso agli organi politici per un recupero effettivo del loro ruolo senza impingere con le esigenze di tutela dei singoli. L’ultimo capitolo della tesi, quindi, si incentra su “Il provvedimento a motivazione politica: una nuova categoria della politicità”. Si tenta di ricostruirne il particolare regime di disciplina, mettendo in evidenza i limiti e le deroghe alle previsioni della l. n. 241/1990, nonchè la peculiarietà di ritenere integrato il requisito della motivazione nella forma del “venir meno della fiducia”. Scopo dell’ultima parte del lavoro diviene, quindi, quello di comprendere quale volto assume la politicità degli atti nell’ordinamento contemporaneo. Si ipotizzano, infatti, tre facce della politicità degli atti, dislocate su tre diversi livelli: atto politico, atto di alta amministrazione e provvedimento amministrativo a motivazione politica.

Résumé des chapitres Dans le premier chapitre, j’ai traité les mouvements altermondialistes émergés à Seattle en 1999. J’en ai décrit le parcours historique, international et italien, en situant les cultures « antagonistes » italiennes dans le contexte plus large des mobilisations mondiales critiques envers la mondialisation. Je les ai mises en relief en les confrontant avec les antécédents italiens des années soixante-dix. Les principaux aspects sociologiques qui caractérisent ces mobilisations sont la structure de socialisation et la mobilisation par le biais des réseaux, basée sur des interrelations faibles mais élastiques, les modalités d’autogestion mêlées aux instances anti-hiérarchiques du mouvement féministe historique, et les affiliations locales comme base des luttes, avec le dépassement des affiliations par classe. J’ai décrit les modalités de gestion de la conflictualité sociale, pratiquée et symbolique, qui caractérise ces mouvements, en analysant surtout le cas italien des manifestations de rue, qui ont eu lieux à Gênes en 2001. La notion de démocratie par le bas, développée au sein du Forum Social, structure une nouvelle idée de citoyenneté et de participation sociale sur la base des autonomies locales que les activistes revendiquent de manière stratégique comme leur horizon principal. Dans l’articulation entre local et global, toujours présente dans le discours des activistes, j’ai montré comment le « global » constituait une dimension surtout narrative, émergente par rapport au tissu des interconnexions hétérogènes entre les différentes dimensions locales. Cette dimension narrative se concrétise surtout dans un complexe de productions éditoriales qui véhiculent des imaginaires cosmopolites. A l’intérieur de ces imaginaires partagés, les autochtonies sont un élément discursif de résistance aux logiques impersonnelles et immatérielles tels que « la globalisation », le « néolibéralisme » ou « l’Empire ». Dans le second chapitre, j’ai exploré le monde proprement « antagoniste » des Centre Sociaux Occupés, les fameux CSO italiens, en décrivant l’histoire des occupations et de l’antagonisme du conflit ouvert contre l’Etat et les partis politiques historiques (en particulier le Parti Communiste Italien), pour se différencier de ces mouvements des années soixante-dix qui s’étaient alors définis comme « marxistes hérétiques ». La généalogie des idéologies des occupants des CSO trouve ses racines dans le mouvement ouvrier et étudiant des années soixante-dix, dans les autogestions et dans les pratiques d’autonomie de classe. J’ai montré comment cette période historique, sur laquelle les interprétations de la société italienne connaissent, aujourd’hui encore, de profondes divisions, a généré des fractures sociales et émotives à l’intérieur des mouvements de cette époque, qu’une partie des gauches radicales ont recousues uniquement dans les années quatre-vingt-dix, lorsque de nombreux anciens militants se sont rencontrés sur la route du Chiapas insurgé. J’ai décrit, en particulier, le cas de l’association Ya Basta, formée au sein des CSO au milieu des années quatre-vingt-dix pour soutenir les Zapatistes. Je me suis surtout arrêtée sur la composante vénitienne des CSO et de Ya Basta, liée de manière particulière aux expressions plus théoriques du mouvement ouvrier des années soixante-dix. Ceci m’a permis de confronter, à travers une ethnographie rapproché de pratiques et de discours, la figure du militant organique de cette époque avec l’activiste d’aujourd’hui, dont la socialisation personnelle est moins totalisée dans la sphère de la participation politique et qui, à la différence du « vieux » militant, se mobilise en faveur de causes plus circonscrites et est doté d’une perspective historique plus faible et plus malléable pour situer le sens de ses actions. Dans le troisième chapitre, j’ai examiné la question de l’insurrection du mouvement zapatiste mexicain. J’ai montré comment la construction intellectuelle internationale du zapatisme constituait un cas d’« orientalisme ». J’ai décrit les secteurs de la société chiapanèque que le zapatisme a mobilisés, en montrant qu’il ne s’agissait pas de la partie la plus traditionaliste de cette société, mais plutôt de couches de la population détachées des communautés traditionnelles afin de rechercher des nouvelles voies d’accès aux ressources. Elles ont sélectionné, dans le rapport dialogique qu’elles entretiennent avec les activistes internationaux solidaires, certains aspects « ethniques » de leur culture, en renforçant d’un côté les projections essentialisantes des européens solidaires, mais en activant en même temps une stratégie efficace de résistance culturelle dans laquelle l’essentialisme a un statut pleinement stratégique. J’ai montré, donc, la manière dont se démêlent les politiques culturelles des Zapatistes qui, en essayant de parler au nom de toute la population paysanne et subalterne chiapanèque, ont développé des discours et des pratiques où les catégories de la marginalisation de l’« indigène » aspirent à devenir les catégories d’un rachat. La construction de l’« indigène », au Mexique, est un fondement politique du colonialisme interne propre au nationalisme mexicain, profondément raciste, qui fonde son statut de « culture » sur l’opposition narrative avec un état de « nature » ou la population autochtone est, de fait, reléguée, bien qu’elle soit encensée, dans les structures du discours muséologique d’Etat comme le fondement mythologique de la nation. La question du nationalisme mexicain touche de près les chiapanèques eux-mêmes, qui adhèrent au mouvement zapatiste. Ceux-ci, quoique pratiquant l’autonomie administrative vis-à-vis de l’Etat, se réapproprient cependant une partie de son apparat symbolique, en commençant par les drapeaux, en utilisant leurs revendications indigénistes comme moyen de revendiquer la citoyenneté mexicaine. Dans ce contexte de conflit latent se délient les profondes transformations du territoire et de la société chiapanèque dans sa complexité, impliquée dans un champ de forces qui génèrent des effets paradoxaux, portés par le tourisme et par le modèle de développement qu’il véhicule d’un côté, et par la guérilla et la solidarité politique internationale de l’autre. Dans le quatrième chapitre, j’ai suivi le zapatisme comme une trame, afin de mener mon ethnographie sur le terrain des CSO de Rome. A travers le récit de leur rapport avec le zapatisme, et de leurs différentes expériences, individuelles, et collectives, vécues en relation avec lui, les personnes qui peuplent le monde « antagoniste » de la ville ont montré les profondes transformations qu’ont subi les modes d’engagement politique au fil des années. Il en est ressorti une approche essentiellement réformiste, dans laquelle les antagonistes se mesurent au contexte local en collaborant activement avec les institutions municipales et en suivant parfois un parcours d’entrée en leur sein. Les antagonistes dialoguent, donc, avec l’Etat, à travers ses ramifications territoriales, avec lesquelles ils collaborent. Ils reconnaissent le potentiel démocratique des communautés de quartiers et, au maximum, citadines, en tant qu’institutions légitimes et utiles dans lesquelles il est possible « se constituer en société ». Parallèlement à ces pratiques, les antagonistes ont mûri, au cours des années, une idéologie dont le rapport avec l’Etat n’est plus révolutionnaire et subversif, mais est plutôt inséré dans un parcours progressif et ouvert de changement de regard sur la sphère politique dans son ensemble. Cette maturation est exprimée, par les activistes romains, avec un langage emprunté aux Zapatistes, auxquels ils attribuent également des changements dans les pratiques internes au CSO de gestion du pouvoir et du leadership. Ces mutations ont commencé avec la crise des mouvements italiens à la fin des années soixante-dix et avec son hybridation avec le mouvement féministe. La donnée essentielle qui émerge est le détachement des activistes par rapport à des idéologies structurées et à des formes organiques et classifiables d’appartenance politique. Les continuelles revendications d’indéfinition interrogent quant à la capacité de conceptualisation des instruments de l’anthropologie, me conduisant à envisager que l’apparat théorique le plus adapté pour comprendre les sujets émergents de la crise de la représentation des narrations politiques traditionnelles est celui proposé par la queer theory, qui fait de la résistance aux définitions organiques un rempart pour la déconstruction des systèmes de pouvoir et de vérité hégémoniques. Dans le cinquième chapitre, j’ai émis l’hypothèse de l’utilité d’une perspective mettant en relation non seulement les mondes « antagonistes » italiens entre eux, mais pouvant aussi mettre en évidence les contacts de ceux-ci avec la réalité d’un autre pays. J’ai donc présenté une ethnographie des processus mimétiques du zapatisme à Barcelone, en me concentrant sur un groupe, le plus important, qui coordonne la solidarité catalane avec le Chiapas. Des différences avec le contexte « antagoniste » italien sont apparues, dues surtout à la différente base historique des deux pays. Le mouvement « antagoniste » catalan se présente comme davantage inclusif et avec une base théorico-réflexive plus faible par rapport à son homologue italien, qui est au contraire plus différencié et au sein duquel coexistent des groupes qui présentent des éléments de compétitivité entre eux. Deux notables homologies entre les deux contextes ont aussi fait surface. La principale est la propension des activistes à choisir une perspective communautaires, qui est incarnée pour tous de manière exemplaire par les communautés zapatistes chiapanèques. Comme il était déjà apparu au cours de la recherche parmi les mouvements italiens, les Catalans aussi expriment une idée de citoyenneté qu’ils entendent comme pleinement démocratique, à la différence de celle proposée par les modèles politiques hégémoniques de participation aux institutions de l’Etat. Les « antagonistes » italiens et catalans ont en commun l’idée d’appartenir à une société civile qui est supérieure à la société politique, dont elle serait structurellement séparée. Cette société civile, pour eux, est une entité idéalement parallèle à l’Etat, opposée à celui-ci sur le plan rhétorique, mais non basée sur des pratiques d’affrontement ouvert, mis à part les éléments de « sortie » des lois, comme les occupations de maisons, en Italie comme à Barcelone. D’autre part, une des idées zapatistes qui connaît le plus de succès parmi la communauté solidaire internationale est celle de s’autogérer en se séparant de l’Etat central, sans néanmoins vouloir le combattre ouvertement. L’aspiration qui rassemble les Zapatistes et les philo-zapatistes des mouvements européens est donc celle de fonder une société civile parallèle à l’Etat. Les activistes barcelonais et italiens ont en commun la volonté de donner vie à des communautés, volonté qui consiste surtout en une tentative constante d’identifier des éléments, des thématiques, des intérêts, des dangers et des ennemis en mesure de fusionner ceux qu’ils perçoivent comme des individus faiblement interconnectés, des monades qui, à leurs yeux, sont aliénés par la société de consommation et, en dernière analyse, par les conséquences de l’ordre capitaliste. En harmonie avec l’ensemble des discours transversaux que l’on peut globalement indiquer comme constituant la pensée critique exprimée par les mouvements altermondialistes, les activistes retiennent que c’est la « société civile » qui se trouve être le « nouveau sujet politique », apparu avec les mouvements qui ont vu le jour à partir de Seattle. Dans le sixième chapitre, j’ai suivi les activistes italiens qui se rendent au Chiapas, de différentes façons, et avec différentes aspirations. J’ai montré comment ces voyages, individuels ou collectifs, constituaient une initiation politique et étaient en mesure de marquer profondément le parcours existentiel des personnes qui y participent. Suivre les activistes au Chiapas a permis de comprendre les différentes modalités de se rapporter à l’« autre » et à l’« ailleurs » chiapanèque. Il s’agit d’un ailleurs souvent idéalisé et objet d’exotisme de la part des activistes. Les différentes procédures de solidarité et d’apprentissage de styles de vie « communautaires, écologiques et démocratiques » auprès des Zapatistes présentent des traits d’ethnocentrisme inconscient de la part des activistes. Dans certains cas, est apparue la manière dont l’ordre « universaliste » du système de valeur européen se révèle, quoi qu’il en soit, être dominant par rapport à celui, local, des communautés zapatistes, et cela même dans des rapports qui se voudraient être de coopération paritaire. J’ai examiné les idéologies sous-tendues aux rhétoriques de coopération, et comment l’emploi de ces rhétoriques s’avère fondamental, en Italie, pour enraciner, sur son territoire spécifique, le discours politique « antagoniste », qui tend à construire des communautés locales à partir de narrations universalistes qui se réfèrent à un zapatisme idéal. Dans le rapport dialogique entre activistes italiens et chiapanèque, la manière dont les Zapatistes « mettent en scène » le zapatisme a émergé, ainsi que la manière dont cette image est, par la suite, véhiculée par les activistes une fois rentrés en Italie, selon des schémas qui construisent, entres autres choses, une différence impossible à combler entre « nous » et les « autres », même dans un partage idéal de la perspective politique et éthique de l’action des mouvements. Cette supposée distance ontologique est aussi fixée par un texte d’une certaine manière officiel, qui « explique » le Chiapas aux activistes. Les constructions opérées dans ce texte par les deux auteurs ont été examinées, tout comme les modalités de gestion du texte lui-même. Dans le septième chapitre, j’ai montré comment le zapatisme, au moins dans son utilisation internationale, était un discours unificateur et souple, qui permet aux activistes d’exprimer une mutation, existentielle et politique. Face à la perte de puissance des grandes narrations politiques, incarnées par les partis et les syndicats, ceux qui, aujourd’hui, se sentent impliqués en première ligne dans la promotion d’un changement social en direction d’un éco-socialisme ont recours au zapatisme pour affirmer la légitimité d’un expérimentalisme idéologique qui cherche des solutions et des adaptations progressives en réponses aux évolutions permanentes du monde contemporain. A Rome, au sein du « mouvement pour le droit au logement » (« movimento per il diritto alla casa »), qui dialogue avec les institutions municipales, comme à Bologne, où des écrivains militants tentent de véhiculer, à travers le monde de l’édition, l’idée d’un mouvement altermondialiste hétéroclite, les personnes utilisent un discours zapatiste pour évoquer des valeurs liées à la justice sociale comme un bien propre des communautés citoyennes, sujet principale du discours du mouvement. Il apparaît ainsi que le pouvoir évocateur du zapatisme, avec différentes déclinaisons, donne vie au discours « antagoniste » italien, de manière différente selon les lieux où il est produit. La modalité de construction de l’objet ethnographique a donc été celle « de suivre l’histoire » (Marcus, 2009). J’ai donc considéré le zapatisme comme une trame structurée et diffuse sur la résistance mondiale des indigènes du monde contre l’ordre néo-libéral, au nom de la défense de la Terre et de la justice sociale, confrontant cette trame à la réalité de l’analyse ethnographique de différents sites de construction et de diffusion de la narration elle-même. De cette manière, il est apparu que le zapatisme constituait un registre discursif qui permet à différents contextes locaux d’imaginer un « global » et de se mettre en relation avec lui, en fournissant un support narratif à la construction d’un écoumène global altermondialiste.

El desacuerdo es un componente central de la política en cuanto se extiende y persiste a través de todas las posturas ideológicas y los asuntos de política pública. Desafiar puntos de vista opuestos y defender posturas personales, tanto en contextos electorales como en la política contenciosa, determina en gran medida la forma en que experimentamos la política diariamente. En consecuencia, la aceptación del desacuerdo es un requisito fundamental para un aspecto normativo de cómo se concibe la democracia: la toma de decisiones que considera posiciones contrapuestas. Esta tesis se centra en una dimensión actitudinal del desacuerdo político que involucra procesos cognitivos que pueden ayudar a entender mejor a los demás y a reconocer activamente las diferencias: la toma de perspectiva. Esta tesis aborda la investigación previa sobre el desacuerdo político considerando la toma de perspectiva como un tema relevante de estudio, y de esta manera contrapone actitudes generales tales como la tolerancia y la empatía, con objetos de actitud específicos, tales como posiciones contrarias y adversarios políticos. Esta tesis propone principalmente estudiar las consecuencias potenciales del desacuerdo en circunstancias particulares y explorar las percepciones de atribución culpa en asuntos que dividen la opinión pública. El diseño de investigación se basa en el contexto de la protesta política con el fin de aprovechar los casos en los que la opinión pública está claramente dividida y donde el desacuerdo entre las posiciones es evidente. Esta tesis se compone de tres artículos. El primer artículo se centra en issue publics y sus interacciones con las organizaciones mediante el análisis del entorno informacional de asuntos específicos. Más concretamente, se evalúa la exposición de las personas al desacuerdo político en la movilización a la protesta investigando el rol de las organizaciones en la vinculación de posiciones opuestas. Se encuentra una relación positiva entre la exposición al desacuerdo y la toma de perspectiva en el contexto de la movilización en los casos de las manifestaciones por la independencia catalana y el aborto en España. El segundo artículo proporciona una medición única de la toma de perspectiva basada en una mención directa de los adversarios políticos con el fin de estudiar en qué grado se relacionan la disposición a tomar la perspectiva de los adversarios con las motivaciones para protestar y para participar en un referéndum sobre la independencia catalana. El estudio se basa en datos de una encuesta transversal en Cataluña con el fin de confirmar el potencial efecto desmovilizador de la exposición al desacuerdo político. En contraste con estudios anteriores de comportamiento electoral, el efecto potencial en este estudio depende del estatus del grupo. En particular, aunque los defensores del status quo están menos dispuestos a manifestarse o a participar en el referendo, los retadores no tienen una menor disposición cuando consideran puntos de vista opuestos al suyo. Este efecto es mediado por la identidad de grupo, lo cual confirma la importancia del contexto particular en la hipótesis de presiones cruzadas. El tercer artículo investiga el desacuerdo político mediante la identificación de los factores individuales, organizacionales y contextuales que explican las diferencias entre las atribuciones de culpa en asuntos de posición. Los datos de encuestas a manifestantes que participaron en eventos de protesta a gran escala en ocho ciudades europeas entre 2009 y 2011 revelan diferencias entre las percepciones con respecto a los adversarios políticos, en la percepción de los manifestantes sobre el desacuerdo, y sobre la manera en que estas percepciones varían de acuerdo con el asunto, con los diferentes niveles de vinculación con las organizaciones, y de acuerdo con cada contexto. La tesis avanza la investigación sobre los componentes actitudinales de la exposición, las posibles consecuencias sobre el comportamiento y las percepciones del desacuerdo político. Centrarse en las actitudes hacia el desacuerdo y hacia los adversarios políticos en el contexto de la protesta en asuntos altamente divisivos ofrece una nueva perspectiva para las preguntas centrales de la literatura sobre el desacuerdo político. Las conclusiones de la tesis también pueden ampliar nuestra comprensión de la política contenciosa y del desacuerdo cotidiano, la cual no es evidente al estudiar las dinámicas electorales. Las conclusiones sobre el rol de las organizaciones políticas también plantean implicaciones prácticas a la luz de su papel de significación del conflicto político y de mediación entre adversarios políticos. Establecer el potencial de influencia estos roles sobre las actitudes individuales es relevante no sólo para la investigación académica, sino que también puede guiar políticas que busquen promover el civismo.
Disagreement is a central component of politics, for it extends and persists across all ideological stances and all issues of policy. Challenging opposing views and defending personal perspectives, both in electoral contexts and in contentious politics, greatly determine how we experience politics daily. Consequently, negotiating disagreement is an underlying requisite for a normative aspect of how we tend to conceive democracy: considerate decision-making. This dissertation focuses on an attitudinal dimension of disagreement that involves cognitive processes that, in turn, can help people to better understand others and actively acknowledge differences: perspective taking. This dissertation addresses previous research on political disagreement by considering perspective taking as a relevant subject of study and, in doing so, shifting from general attitudes, such as tolerance and empathy, to particular attitude objects, such as opposing stances and political adversaries. This dissertation chiefly proposes to address potential attitudinal and behavioral consequences of disagreement in particular circumstances and to explore perceptions of blame attribution in highly divisive issues. Its design is grounded in the context of protest politics in order to leverage cases in which both public opinion is clearly divided and disagreement between positions is highly evident. This dissertation is composed of three papers. Paper 1 focuses on issue publics in their actual interactions with organizations by analyzing the informational environment of their specific issues. More specifically, it assesses individuals’ exposure to political disagreement in protest mobilization by questioning the role of organizations in linking opposing stances in such mobilization. As a result, it finds positive relationships between exposure to disagreement and perspective taking in the context of such mobilization, particularly in cases of demonstrations for Catalan independence and abortion in Spain. Paper 2 provides a unique measure of perspective taking built on direct mentions to political adversaries in order to gauge the extent to which mentioning adversaries relates to individuals’ motivations to demonstrate and turnout for a referendum on Catalan independence. The study draws upon data from a cross-sectional survey in Catalonia in order to confirm a demobilizing effect of exposure to political disagreement. In contrast to previous studies of voting behavior, the potential effect in this study depends upon group status. In particular, though defenders of the status quo become less resolved to demonstrate or to turn out, challengers do not when considering opposing viewpoints. This effect is mediated by group identity, which confirms the importance of the issue context in the cross-pressures hypothesis. Paper 3 investigates political disagreement by identifying individual, organizational, and contextual factors that explain differences between blame attributions in position issues. Data from protest surveys of demonstrators who participated in large-scale events in eight European cities between 2009 and 2011 reveal differences among perceptions regarding political adversaries, how demonstrators perceive disagreement, and how these perceptions vary among issues, organizational involvement, and contexts. As a result, the dissertation as a whole advances the research of attitudinal components of exposure, potential behavioral consequences, and perceptions of disagreement. Focusing on attitudes toward disagreement or political adversaries in the context of protest politics and highly divisive issues provides new insight into core questions of the literature addressing political disagreement. The dissertation’s findings can also broaden our understanding of contentious politics and everyday disagreement that might not be captured by electoral dynamics. The findings regarding the role of politically motivated organizations also pose practical implications in light of their roles in providing meaning to political conflict and mediating political adversaries. Establishing the potential influence of these roles on individual attitudes is relevant not only for academic research; it can also guide policy in order to promote civility.

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This thesis examines if increased Department of Defense (DOD) involvement in political warfare (PW) is justified through a qualitative, comparative analysis of U.S. PW actions conducted by the Department of State, Central Intelligence Agency, and DOD in two Cold War cases: Italy from 1943–1948 and Chile from 1961–1973. Concepts of strategy and social movement models of Doug McAdam, Charles Tilly, and Sidney Tarrow are applied to historical PW actions, both overt and covert. The case-study analysis clarifies each agency’s conduct of PW and develops analytical tools to classify PW actions by approach and impact within the political setting. Data was collected from archives, declassified government documents, and expert analyses. Results indicate that, compared to other U.S. agencies, the DOD had a limited direct role in PW in the cases studied, but was an important enabler. In applying models of social movement theory to historical analysis, this thesis identifies and develops the contentious politics mobilization model’s potential use in planning and evaluating PW strategies.

La dimensione delle politiche pubbliche locali e con esse le politiche sociali sono state sempre oggetto di particolare attenzione per la qualità dei servizi erogati a favore dei cittadini. Certamente in un clima di "austerità permanente " coniugare risorse erogate e qualità dei servizi non è certo facile per i decisori politici locali che si trovano ad affrontare problemi connessi con la gestione delle scuole, sostegno alle famiglie, accesso ai servizi socio-sanitari, politiche abitative di sostegno ai cittadini in difficoltà economiche. In quest'ottica il ruolo strategico delle politiche locali sono fondamentali per delineare come le ideologie e l'appartenenza partitica dei decisori politici locali incidono nella effettiva pratica delle costruzione del welfare locale. Questo lavoro cercherà di mostrare come le politiche pubbliche locali possono essere influenzate dall'appartenenza politica dei decisori politici. Le complessità delle congiunture economiche attuali non permettono politiche pubbliche espansive e di conseguenza le politiche sociali pongono seri problemi ai politici sul territorio. Partendo da questi assunti, in questo lavoro, cercherò di far emergere le dinamiche che sottintendono il rapporto tra il livello politico e la comunità locale e se il colore politico e l'ideologia di appartenenza hanno influenzato nel corso degli anni le politiche pubbliche locali nel loro complesso e in particolare le politiche sociali sul territorio.

The objective of this thesis is to examine the political modernization experience of the Uzbeks. In order to do that, first, this dissertation critically analyze the modernization theory, and second, the identity- and socio-political transformation of Uzbeks in the pre-modern and modern eras. The political modernization of Uzbeks and its relation with the peculiar social-political structures, as well as the impact of Tsarist and the Soviet rule on those structures are examined. Moreover, the dissertation analyzes the emergence of an Uzbek political identity and its influence on the post-Soviet independent Uzbekistan. The main argument of this dissertation is that the Uzbek experience under the Tsarist and Soviet rule has inevitably transformed the Uzbek society and achieved relative success in changing the traditional forms into ostensibly modern ones. However, despite the successful political modernization during the Soviet era, the specific socio-political organization, clans and kinship structures inherent in the Uzbek society succeeded adapting and even transforming modern institutions and structures externally imposed by the Soviet. These informal traditional structures emerged as strong institutions in the post-independence era. Moreover, the dissertation claims that the transition and modernization approaches to Post-Soviet Uzbekistan failed in understanding the peculiar socio-political structures and their impact on informal politics in independent Uzbekistan.

The 1997 British general election saw the return of 120 women Members of Parliament. The central question of this thesis is whether this unprecedented number of women MPs makes a difference to the political representation of women. The research is applied political theory, in which conceptual analysis is informed by and informs the empirical research. Pitkin's seminal contribution The Concept of Representation and Phillips' The Politics of Presence are both considered. In particular, Phillips' 'shot in the dark thesis', which makes a link between women's numerical representation and the substantive representation of women by women representatives, is subjected to empirical analysis. The data are drawn from interviews with half of the Labour women MPs elected for the first time in the 1997 election. The introduction in Chapter 1 includes discussions of the research objectives and the research design and methods. Chapter 2 explores women's legislative recruitment within the Labour Party, focusing upon its policy of all-women shortlists. Chapters 3 and 4 examine Pitkin's and Phillips' ideas respectively. The next three chapters (Chapters 5, 6 and 7) utilise the empirical data to analyse in tum symbolic, microcosmic and substantive conceptions of representation. The last of these chapters centres upon the question of whether women representatives seek and are able to act for women at constituency, parliamentary and governmental levels. The analysis broadly supports Phillips' thesis. However, the intersection of party and gender identities is emphasised to a greater extent. It is also argued that women MPs may not have, at least as yet, secured the 'safe spaces' from which to act for women. These conclusions suggest both that the complexity of the concept of representation must be recognised and that combining conceptual and empirical analysis engenders a more sophisticated understanding of women's political representation.

If we are interested in questions about how we ought to organize our political lives, what kind of weight, if any, should we give to evidence about what people actually think? The thesis explores this question about the role of public opinion in normative political theory. First, I disentangle a number of distinct justifications for taking account of public opinion. Specifically, the thesis evaluates four views of the status of public opinion: as an epistemic resource; a feasibility constraint; a means of democratizing political theory; or constitutive of moral and political ideals. I defend the epistemic argument, outlining two forms in which popular attitudes represent a valuable epistemic resource. The thesis criticizes the feasibility and democratic accounts of the role of public opinion as these are presented in the existing literature, but suggests more convincing ways of reconstructing these arguments. Finally, I reject the view that public opinion constitutes the ideal of justice, arguing that such an account is subject to a fundamental tension. As well as clarifying the status of popular attitudes, the thesis addresses the methodological difficulties that arise when we seek to bring public opinion to bear on ideas from political theory, whose meaning and status in everyday political thought and discourse is often limited or uncertain. I outline two approaches to integrating normative theory with the investigation of popular attitudes that mitigate the methodological problems that often confront such projects. The second major aim is to situate the question of the role of public opinion in the context of wider debates about the aims and methods of contemporary political theory. In particular, I address recent demands for greater ‘realism’ in political theory, distinguishing two main strands of realist critique and drawing out their contrasting implications for the role of public opinion.

Thesis (M.A. in Security Studies (Middle East, South Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa))--Naval Postgraduate School, June 2009.
Thesis Advisor(s): Hafez, Mohammed ; Boylouny, Anne Marie. "June 2009." Description based on title screen as viewed on July 13, 2009. DTIC Identifiers: Hezbollah, Hizbullah, political integration, social movement theory, Lebanese Shia, Shiite Muslims, Imam Sayyid Musa Al-Sadr, PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization), radicalization, Arab-Israeli War, Al Nakba, Six Day War, IDF (Israeli Defense Forces), Cairo Agreement, Islamic fundamentalism, social movement theory. Author(s) subject terms: Hezbollah, Hizbullah, Lebanon, Political Integration, Social Movement Theory. Includes bibliographical references (p. 55-61). Also available in print.

Darbe nagrinėjama problema - ar Tarptautinio Valiutos Fondo (toliau TVF) keliamos sąlygos bei reikalaujamos reformos krizės metu gali padėti sparčiai pagerinti šalies politinius-ekonominius rodiklius? Ar TVF reformos, vykdomos krizės metu gali būti taikomos bet kokioms šalims, bet kokioje aplinkoje? Tyrimo objektas – politiniai bei ekonominiai Japonijos ir P.Korėjos rodikliai. Darbo tikslas – ištirti, ar TVF savo įgyvendintų reformų dėka Azijos krizės metu, paskatinio spartesnį ekonomikos atsigavimą P.Korėjoje, ženkliai pagerino politinių-ekonominių rodiklių gerėjimą šalyje, paskatino TUI į P.Korėją srautus. Visą šią situaciją palyginti su Japonijos atveju, kur atitinkamos, anksčiau minėtos TVF reformos nebuvo įgyvendintos. Iš tyrimui atlikti darbe keliamo tikslo suformuota hipotezė, kurią siekiama patvirtinti arba paneigti tyrimo metu gautais rezultatais: Hipotezė - TVF pagerino P.Korėjos politinius-ekonominius rodiklius sparčiau nei tai padarė Japonija savo šalyje, nevykdydama TVF reformų. Kadangi TVF reformos buvo nukreiptos į Vakarų politinės ekonomijos modelio įvedimą P.Korėjoje, pasitvirtinus iškeltai hipotezei bus įrodyta, jog Vakarų modelis gali būti sėkmingai pritaikytas kaip alternatyva Azijos modeliui tiek Azijos, tiek kitose, Vakarų modeliui nebūdingose aplinkose. Darbo uždaviniai: • Pasirinkti konkrečius politinės ekonomijos teorinius aspektus, kurie padėtų susiaurinti ir sukonkretinti tyrimą; • Išskirti konkretų atvejį tyrimui atlikti; • Išanalizuoti TVF... [toliau žr. visą tekstą]
This Final Master thesis is designeded to investigate the Western political economy model applicability to change Asian model in its region. During the Asia Financial Crisis in 1997 Korea republic (further South Korea) asked the IMF financial aid and accepted all the conditions and made many reforms in the country. Those reforms were directed into liberalizing the market, open up to foreign investors and to create more attractive foreign direct investment (further FDI) climate in S.Korea. This was about to change theretofore exited Asian political economy model into more liberal Western model. The problem – could IMF reforms help to recover countries‘ economies more effective and sharply after the crisis? Could those IMF reforms be successfully adjusted into any environment? The object – political-economical indicators of Japan and S.Korea. Objective of investigation – to find out if IMF reforms in S.Korea helped to recover its economy more rapidly and successfully than in Japan, where IMF reforms were not implemented. From objective the hypothesis that after investigation will be confirmed or rejected appear: Hypothesis – IMF improved political-economical indicators in S.Korea more sharply than Japan, where the government did not implemented any IMF reforms. Regarding to the fact that IMF reforms were designeded to implement Western political economy model into Asia country – S.Korea, confirmation of the hypothesis would also prove that Western model could be... [to full text]

Historians have long been familiar with the link between astrology and politics, especially during the Civil War and Interregnum. By contrast, the link between them during the later seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries has been neglected by historians. This thesis sets out to bridge an historical gap. It provides a detailed study of astrology and politics between 1678, with the Popish Plot, and 1715. It examines the extent to which astrology was used as political propaganda during these years through a close study of the works published by the leading astrological polemicists, focusing particularly on their annual almanacs. It also examines the role religion played in politics, and the way in which the astrologers' religious outlooks and beliefs shaped their political views. The vitriolic feuds between leading astrologers on opposite sides of the divide are also examined in detail. This thesis is divided into four chapters. The first elucidates the outlook of the astrologers writing in the last years of Charles H's reign, covering the Popish Plot and Exclusion Crisis, and the period of Tory ascendancy between 1681 and 1685. The second chapter assesses how astrologers reacted to the succession of the Catholic James 111, and his attempts to give Catholic subjects equality with their Protestant counterparts. Chapter three examines reactions to the Glorious Revolution and the reign of William 111, and chronicles astrologers' attitudes toward the succession, war and the Church. The final chapter deals with the reign of Anne, focusing on the ferocious party battles for which it is notorious. It assesses the extent to which these were reflected in the works of the astrologers and examines their arguments as the battle lines were drawn. The thesis argues that the stormy nature of politics between 1678 and 1715 ensured that the link between astrology and politics, which had become much weaker following the Restoration, was reforged and rendered as strong as it had ever been. Indeed the period witnessed a final renaissance in political astrology.

The application of marke ting to the political process has been advanced in a number of writings . A marketing perspective in e xamining the political process and electoral behaviour offers n ew insights into electoral behaviour and understanding the c ampaign p r ocesses of polit i cal parties . Research on the actual marketing orientation of political parti es is not signif i cant at this stage and as such this r e search addr esses the market i ng orientation and structur al and process charact eristics of political marketing with the research problem being: To determine what extent marketing has been inc orporated i n to the ope rations of the QLD Liberal Party and identify the struc tural and process characteristics of par ty's market ing environment. The research questions were : RQ 1. To what extent has the QLD Liberal Party adopted the marketing concept and is there support within t he party for the researcher's redefini tion of the Ma rke ting Concept i nto poli tical terminology to suit political marketing? RQ 2. To what extent are the QLD Liberal Party market ing oriented? RQ 3 . What are the struct ural and process characteristics o f the QLD Liberal Party's marketing environment? These research questions provided a focus for the investigations and the r esearcher' s endeavor to address the research problem. Chapter 1 of this thesis set the scene and identif i ed the broad d ire ctions and boundaries for t he study. It i ntroduced the topic and set out the purpose of the s tudy and its background. Chapte r a lso justif i ed the study on a number of theoretical and pra ctical 1 grounds and h ighlights the signif icance of the study because of its focus on polit i cal marketing which is postulated to b e part of marketing's e xtended doma in . Chapter 2 provided a review of the relevant literat u re , addressing the broader parent discipline f ocusing on the market ing concept, e xchange, market orientation and other key concepts and parent di s cipline issues . Importantly the r eview identified t he arguments for proposing that mar keti ng or more pre cisely a marketing orientation has been incorporated into politics by political parties rests upon the generic concept of marketing and that it (the generic concept) has been accepted as a central paradigm in marketing. Chapte r 2 then focused on the immediate discipline of political marketing and reviews the similari ties between commercia l marketi ng and pol itical marketing and other issues and concepts that the political marketing literature has addressed. From the two areas gaps in the literature are identified and the research questions developed. Chapter 3 aqdressed the methodological issues related to the research area and discussed the selected methodology. I t descri bed the data gathering techniques to be employed and types of analysis to be performed in the two stage primary research desi gn of this case study. Chapter 3 also established that the study was rigorous, methodologically sound and repl icable. Chapter 4 presented t he patt erns of results of the two s t age data gathering of the primary research for the three research question. The anal ysis of results i ndicated that the key dimensions and concepts addressed in the survey were significantly associated and the scale was quite rel i able and as such the measure of internal consistency was satisfactory . The results were judged not to be an artifact of the individual or separate stages . The pattern of results indicated that the interviewees had mini mal to none existent understanding of the marketing concept and a somewhat negative attitude toward ic. However survey results indicated a positive acceptance and attitude toward the marke ting concept generally and also its application in politics. The researcher's redef inition of t he marketing concept i nto political terms also received a high level of acceptance from respondents . The results indicated t he marketing concept has not been adopt~d by the party and their voter focus is minimal and they do not have a market orientation . The results indicated that the organisation is highly ' organisa tion centered ' which i ndicates the l a ck of a true marketing orientation; it has a strong sales orientation, where it believed electora l success is obtained if it can persuade the voters to accept its policy and issues stands rather than its competitors. The QLD Liberal Party does not possess a marketing 'mind set', structure or follow processes that yield a marketing orientation. The structural and process characterist i cs of the QLD Liberal party's marketing environment indicated that the product is a complex blend of various elements and that ser vice is a component . The results also indicate that loya lty was very important for the par ty and that mutability created pr oblems because of the party's minor status and alignment with the National Party. Furthe r the r esults indicated amateurism and volunteers creat ed p r oblems of control and motivation for the party and that a negative percept i on of marketing exists in some sections of t he party. The results also indicated that campaigns are based on style over substance and there is a high use of negative advertising and with the media being both a market and communications channel . The r esearch orientation of the party is toward polling and tactical voting was a critical strategy in campaigns. Chapter 5 discussed the findings and detailed the conclusions drawn f r om the data pre sented in c hapter 4 t o a nswer the r esearch prob lem , and discussed the implications of the study's findings. The r esearch problem as such went beyond e xami ning singular concepts that are appropriate in marketing and looked for the i n tegrated and synergistic appli cati on of marketing concept s and tools by- the party. It also focused on the political marketing environment to e xamine the structural and process characteristics that affect the party's operations . The conclusion about the research problem was that the party has not incorporated marketing into it operations. Specifically marketing whi ch is i ntegrated and s ynergistic . Further the study identified those structural and process characteristics that wer e identified in the literature and discovered t hat the produ~L was more comp lex than the literature indicated. Further the ~arketplace was identified as being competitive and volatile . Al so the process element of party tactical voting in a preferential voting system was ide n tified as being a critical s trategy to ensure t he opposing candidates were allocated last on the ballot by loyal voters. Further the mar keting concept with its custome r centered orientation creates a major concern from the perspective of interviewees, as they indicate the role and significance of the voter{customer) in deve l oping the political product is negligible. In conclusion the results of this study indicated that marketing has not been successfully extended into the QLD Liberal Party 's political operations, even though the party argues it successfully uses advertising and political polling. Contrary t o the party's belief marketing is characterised by an integrated and synergistic mix of product development and design , dis tribution, pricing or economic cost and promotion . This set of marketing activities is the twin edge. sword of marketing, the first edge is the mix of these elements that are developed to meet the needs and wants of target customers (voters) and the second edge is to meet the objectives of the organisation.

Die Frage nach der politischen Ordnung steht im Mittelpunkt des Lehrtextes zur Einführung in die Wissenschaft von der Res Publica. Dieses als Skript konzipierte Lehrbuch dient als Grundlage der Einführungsvorlesung an der Universität Potsdam. Mit einem nüchternen Blick in die Geschichte, von der Antike über die frühe Neuzeit bis in die Gegenwart – und dies global – wird das Politische aus verschiedenen Perspektiven diskutiert. Es ist vor allem ein Text für jene, die sich mit dem Politischen zu beschäftigen beginnen, jedoch auch für jene lohnenswert, die sich erneut der Grundlagen versichern möchten.

The political actions of the Druze of Israel have formed the focus of a large body of research. Despite this, academic studies to date have failed to explain why so many Druze resorted to a politics of loyalty when Israel was first established but have, in more recent years, resorted to a politics of violence. The research herein proposes that a model of the politics of accommodation is able to explain the political actions of the Druze during the first three decades of the Israeli state. Data from The Israel State Archives and the archives of leading Druze families show that many Israeli-Druze resorted to a politics of loyalty. This loyalty was inextricably linked to the perception of the new state and its government's policy as creating a new structure of opportunity for the economic, social and political progress of the Druze community whilst also safeguarding the Israeli-Druze community as a distinctive cultural and religious group on its own land. Similarly, it is proposed that the ethnic state supremacy model is able to explain the recent rise in the politics of violence within the Israeli-Druze community. Data from personal interviews with state officials and Druze activists confirmed that many Israeli-Druze resorted to a politics of violence because they perceived the Israeli government's policy as a threat to their preservation as a cultural and religious group on its own land. This study of Druze political action is intended as a contribution to the debate surrounding the Israeli state's politics in relation to Israel's Arab minority. This research also seeks to address wider issues in that it proposes a model that is applicable to the general question of ethnic conflict resolution in divided societies and polarised states.

In den theoretischen Grundlagen moderner Verfassungsstaaten wird Angst als zentrale politische Größe ausgewiesen. In der Hobbesschen Ursprungsmythologie moderner Staatlichkeit spielt sie eine entscheidende Rolle für die Staatskonstituierung. Aufgrund ihrer Staatszentriertheit bietet die Vertragstheorie allerdings kein hinreichendes Erklärungspotential für die transnationale terroristische Strategie der Angst. Der Angstpolitik des Terrorismus steht aber auch eine Nutzbarmachung der Angst durch Regierungen bedrohter Staaten gegenüber.
In modern state theory, fear turns out to be of great political significance. In the Hobbesian foundational myth of the modern constitutional state, fear is an important force because it motivates the establishment of states. But because of its theoretical concentration on states, contractualist thought does not provide an adequate explanation for the transnational terrorist strategy of fear. The primacy of fear used by terrorists can be juxtaposed to the utilisation of fear by governments threatened by terrorist attacks.

The purpose of this thesis is to demonstrate the aesthetic strategy of the political philosophy of Edmund Burke, by considering the relation between the "artificial infinite" of the Enquiry Into our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful, and the "immemorial custom" of the Reflections on the Revolution in France. The argument addresses misreadings of Burke found in recent critical theories on the "aestheticism" of "bourgeois ideology."
The thesis shows that the demotion of the sublime in favour of the beautiful which is considered by these critics to be characteristic of bourgeois aestheticism, does not happen in Burke's aesthetics. It also shows that the "naturalism" of bourgeois ideology is contradicted by the strategic artificiality of Burke's politico-aesthetic. Insofar as the ideologue seeks to resolve the contingent aspects of language and history, Burke cannot be considered an ideological thinker. Rather, Burke's political philosophy consistently fails to provide the coalescence of subjective and universal which is required for ideology. Finally, the irreconcilable contingency of Burke's view of political experience shows that his conservatism is not, as his critics would have it, static and unchanging.

This dissertation is a critical study of technopolitical issues in the history of African American people. Langdon Winner's theory of technopolitics was used to facilitate the analysis of large scale technologies and their compatibility with various political ends. I contextualized the central technopolitical issues within the major epochs of African American political history: the Atlantic slave trade, the African artisans of antebellum America, and the American Industrial Age. Throughout this study I have sought to correct negative stereotypes and to show how "technological gauges" were employed to belittle people of African descent. This research also has shown that the mainstream notion that Africans had no part in the history of technology is false. This study identifies and analyses specific technologies that played a major role in the political affairs of Africans and African Americans. Those technologies included nautical devices, fort construction, and automatic guns in Africa, and hoes, plows, tractors, cotton gins, and the mechanical cotton pickers in America. The findings of this study suggested that African Americans have been disengaged and victimized by western technologies. This dissertation proposes how to overcome the oppressive uses of technology.

Thesis advisor: Robert C. Bartlett
This dissertation investigates Aristotle’s famous claim that “the human being is by nature a political animal.” This claim seems to express a basic disagreement between Aristotelian political philosophy and the contractarian political philosophy that informs modern liberalism. Aristotle asserts, contrary to Hobbes, for instance, that the political community is not a convention between naturally individual human beings but a natural entity in its own right prior to and authoritative over the individual. Yet not only are Aristotle’s reasons for supposing that we are naturally political obscure and questionable, but the meaning of Aristotle’s claim that we are naturally political is not altogether clear. For not only does Aristotle suggest that we are naturally political because the city is naturally prior to and authoritative over us, but he suggests we are political animals above all due to our distinctive faculty of reason, or speech, which, because it is the medium of the perception of advantage and justice that informs our actions, is what constitutes the city. Speech, in other words, is what brings the city to sight as the natural whole Aristotle asserts it to be. This suggests, however, that the naturalness of politics must be evaluated on the basis of such speech, which admits of clarification, and not on the basis Aristotle originally offers, which is speculation about the origins of the city. We argue that Aristotle’s dialectical examinations of despotic, political, and kingly forms of rule provide an outline of this task of clarification, which alone can permit us to evaluate the naturalness of politics. A close reading of these examinations, however, indicates that Aristotle ultimately rejects the view that the city is the natural whole it presents itself as being
Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2018
Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
Discipline: Political Science

This thesis brings the concept of humanitarianism sharply into focus within the discourse of international political theory. Existing literature examines humanitarianism obliquely, via debates on military humanitarian intervention or human rights, resulting in an impoverished account of a vital idea. Meanwhile, a vibrant discussion among professional humanitarians has recently questioned the nature of their endeavour, along lines that clearly fit the remit of international political theory. Bringing together these two discussions in the course of its critical analysis, the thesis argues that humanitarianism should be conceptualised as a political context in which we articulate, negotiate and defend our understandings of common humanity. Central to this politics are the ways in which we react to and conceptualise human suffering, through humanitarian crises that are often "crises of humanity". In sparking concern and mobilising responses to suffering, the affective underpinnings of the humanitarian impulse create a complex and shifting backdrop to extensions of solidarity and humanitarian action. At the heart of this action is the idea of rescue, a crucial "presumptive occasion" of our moral life. But an important part of humanitarian action consists in the efforts to institutionalise the humanitarian impulse. In this sense human rights and projects of global justice represent important crystallisations of humanitarian concern, yet neither can fully capture the more contingent workings of the humanitarian impulse. What emerges is an understanding of humanitarianism as a broad discussion, central to the identity of contemporary liberal international political theory, but with a scope best gleaned not from cosmopolitan accounts, but from a more fluid internationalist tradition of thought. The thesis concludes that the importance of this theoretical approach will be borne out by the complex and far-reaching practical challenges that humanitarianism is set to confront over coming decades, not least the "crisis of humanity" threatened by climate change.

Territory is an important part of contemporary political debates but there is an odd silence about the concept of territory in contemporary political theory. The unraveling of colonization and concerns over global justice should make territory a central aspect of political theory, yet it is not. This silence has the curious feature of recalling the original justifications for territorial acquisition. Because territory is neglected by contemporary thinkers, it is important to return to theorists such as Grotius, Hobbes, Locke, Pufendof and Kant for a critical engagement with the concept of territory. Understanding the arguments of these thinkers illuminate the presuppositions of present day theorists and contributes to the understanding of contemporary theoretical problems. The thesis is organized into eight chapters. The first two chapters consider the neglect of territory in political theory the role of territory in international law. This sets up the three middle chapters which are critical engagements with historical thinkers organized around three conceptions of territory: territory as possession, as property and as jurisdiction. Contemporary cosmopolitanism is inspired, in part, by unraveling of colonization and a concern for global justice. Chapter 6 considers the relationship between contemporary cosmopolitanism and the legacy of the historical conceptions of territory. The next chapter investigates the communitarian critique of cosmopolitanism and the role of identity in territorial claims. At first glance there seems to be good reasons for contemporary theory to presuppose or ignore territory. However, the answer, though skeptical, is more subtle. Following Rawls and others, contemporary theory is right to remain silent about territory and about property in territory. The main skepticism is about arguments for colonial restitution or global redistribution of resources. This is because many take a crude territory as property view - which when abandoned seems to leave the world un-owned and therefore subject to equal distribution or claims. Yet skepticism is not the only alternative. Jurisdiction entails some elements of the territory as property view. This is a more sophisticated claim than the straight territory as property argument. Here ownership is a secondary but important claim states make in the absence of a binding universal norm. As a result there is a prima facie but not indefeasible right to particular territory. Identity plays a role in linking peoples to places. It also raises the bar to colonial restitution and global resource redistribution. This legitimates the current view of territory in political theory and international law where territory is pre-supposed but not theorized.

The purpose of this thesis is to evaluate the processes of consolidation and decomposition of the Venezuelan party system and their relation to democratic stability. Both processes are analyzed through a theoretical framework based on four conditions for institutionalization and three conditions for decomposition of a party system. Preliminary findings reveal that the Venezuelan party system became institutionalized as of 1969 but began to unravel during the 1980s. This particular order, whose legitimacy rested on the distribution of rents, solidified an arrangement that collapsed when confronted with a deteriorating economic environment combined with growing popular disenchantment stemming from its institutional inability to represent and respond to shifting demands. The thesis also concludes that current political developments do not respond to a process of institutionalization of a new party system but to the development of an inchoate system.

In the past decades, political theory and philosophy have seen the canonization of a new conceptual difference, whose roots have been traced back to a number of thinkers, but whose main theoretical elaboration can be said to have begun with the Centre de recherches philosophiques sur le politique founded by Jean-Luc Nancy and Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe in 1980 and closed in 1984: the difference between la politique and le politique, or between ‘politics’ and ‘the political’. As Chantal Mouffe (2005a: 8f), borrowing Heidegger’s vocabulary, has pointed out, the two terms operate on different levels: whereas ‘politics’ refers to the ‘ontic’ level and designates the empirical ‘facts’ of political organization – practices, institutions, discourses, etc. – ‘the political’ implies a philosophical inquiry at the ‘ontological’ level, asking, as Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy (1981: 12) put it, about the ‘essence of the political’. While, in theorists as diverse as Alain Badiou, Jacques Rancière, Slavoj Žižek, Claude Lefort, Roberto Esposito, Ernesto Laclau, and many others – most of them located on the political left – this inquiry has yielded very different results, they all agree on the basic necessity to make this distinction between conventional politics, on the one hand, and a more profound dimension concerning the institution of the social itself, on the other. Similarly, virtually all the thinkers mentioned are in agreement as to the state of the political in the contemporary world: they all see it as in danger of being ignored, repressed or neutralized in the context of what they criticize as increasingly ‘post-political’ and ‘post-democratic’ social arrangements. This critique of today’s post-politics is a powerful and important one. In the following, I want to argue that the work of Stuart Hall to some extent shares in – in fact, anticipates, since most of the relevant theories were developed after 1989 – this critical discourse. More specifically, I will 1) bring out and discuss Hall’s critique of post-politics; 2) elaborate upon his own understanding of the political, which is implicit in this critique and elsewhere in his writings – I will argue that Hall’s thought can be considered as belonging to what the sociologist Oliver Marchart (2010) has termed ‘the moment of the political’, insofar as it is a product of and response to our ‘post-foundational condition’, emphasizing as it does conflictuality, contingency and the groundlessness of society; 3) and finally, building on this, I will briefly talk about the conclusions concerning (ontic) politics that the post-foundationalism Hall shares with most of the other theorists I have mentioned leads him to, which are very different from those arrived at by philosophers such as Badiou, Rancière or Žižek and closer – partly via the shared engagement with Gramsci – to those of Mouffe and Laclau or Lefort.

This thesis explores the injunctions and disjunctures effected through relations between politics, philosophy, and ethics by working through various issues and problems confronting discourses of identity politics. These confrontations concern such matters as speaking positions and their relations to the legitimation of knowledge claims; relations between history, power, and the appropriation of political identities; relations between philosophy and politics; and the renegotiation of these relations with regard to a certain space of ethics and justice. Among the cases studied are those concerning the 'authenticity' of Australian Aboriginal identities; the politics of appropriation and subversion in 'queer' commentaries; the epistemological and political status of the category of 'woman' in feminist criticism; and the ethical status of a freedom fighter (Chris Hani) who belonged to the South African Communist Party. According to a certain structure of identity, the realms of politics, philosophy and ethics are separable from one another, while according to a certain logics of identity politics these realms are inseparable from one another. This thesis argues, however, that these realms are neither separable nor inseparable: they are always being brought into crisis in the formation of emancipatory struggles. While many commentators concerned with the disjunctures of such a crisis have sought to reconcile the irreducibility between the three domains by asserting the primacy of the political, this thesis is concerned with ways in which the privileging of 'the political' can have detrimental effects for the promise of the emancipatory ideal. This is not to undermine the importance accorded to the category of the political, but to pursue what might ironically be the political and ethical costs of refusing to question (via a necessary and difficult detour through the philosophical language of ontology) the privileged status of the political in such movements. Beginning with Foucault's analytics of discourse, the thesis moves to a consideration of Derrida's critique of the metaphysics of presence. This critique (as argued by way of Derrida's negotiations with Foucault, Nietzsche, Levinas and Marx) raises problems for any notion of identity insofar as the metaphysics of presence infuse all relations between politics, philosophy and ethics, requiring such relations to be continually re-applied and re-worked. While this is to unsettle the structure of identity, it is not to refuse the necessity of politics or the urgency of decisions. On the contrary, the critique of politics opens onto a certain space of justice which pledges the emancipatory promise of identity politics to the promise of a democracy-yet-to-come.

In this dissertation I discuss the tension between social choice and political philosophy. The aim is to explore the possibility of a ‘tolerable Platonism’, a form of political Platonism that can be consistent with a liberal defence of democracy. My starting point is the social choice theory view, namely the liberal justification of democracy elaborated by Riker in Liberalism against Populism. Riker’s analysis is shaped by Arrow’s theorem and around the dichotomy between liberalism and populism. Riker maintains that these are the two main traditions of interpreting democracy and the two contrasting accounts of democratic voting. But Arrow’s theorem is not just the basis for the social choice research program; it is also a fundamental background out of which the more general concerns of contemporary political philosophy about the just institutions grow. The following question drives my discussion: can political philosophy and its account of democracy be contained in Riker’s dichotomy between liberalism and populism? To put the matter more provocatively, and to emphasize the main interest that drives this work: should political philosophy give up to populism? The question aims to engage social choice theory on shared terrain (the passage from individual preferences to collective decision; the connection between method and ideal; the confrontation between market and democracy). The mathematic language in which social choice theory formulates its assessments should not prevent political philosophy from recognising the importance of this account of politics and democracy, and from confronting the controversies that the social choice analysis reveals. Rawls’s program itself might be regarded as an outcome of this confront. This dissertation will not refute Riker’s work or the social choice theory framework that underlies it. The aim is to use Riker’s distinction between liberalism and populism to reflect on the normative commitments of political philosophy; to re-describe the aggregative problem formalised in Arrow’s theorem by using the “idealistic” point of view of political philosophy. If political philosophy does not accept Riker’s distinction and invitation - Riker’s solution seems to call for a ‘positive’ political philosophy, that is, one solely based on criteria of feasibility and weighted toward the method side of the tension between ideals and methods - the challenge is to point out the problems that redound from a rigid discontinuity between the two views. And a first, good argument for this exploration is that some of the most interesting cases of normative political theory propose solutions that mix liberalism and populism (e. g. Mill and Rawls). I do not wish not to minimize the importance of the liberal, anti-tyrannical option but rather to show that a more objectivistic version of liberalism is possible within the anti-tyrannical framework. Following the path drawn by epistemic democracy, I aim to take some steps toward a version of liberalism that is more compatible with populism.

This work is an inquiry into the nature of politics. I will argue that the idea of a "political sphere" emerged primarily in reference to the subject matter of political science, and therefore its nature is that of a scientific object (chapter 1). Building on recent and less recent debates among social science methodologists and philosophers of science, I will defend a realist approach to the explanation of political phenomena (chapter 2). I will then proceed to work out the implications of this realist approach concerning the nature of its object(s) of study (chapter 3). My conclusion is that political phenomena consist solely of the effects of the causal properties of individual entities, and that, strictly speaking, there is no such thing as a "political sphere" at the ontological level. Such a scientific object must instead be seen as the product of the classification of political phenomena into kinds with increasing degree of generality, at the top of which lies the class of all political phenomena – i.e. the political domain. In line with the realist approach I defend, I contend that such classifications are based on stipulations about the similarities between individual phenomena rather than on general features that such phenomena actually share (chapter 4). Finally, I will conclude that despite their relative arbitrariness, such classifications constitute representational models whose validity can be tested on the basis of their explanatory power (chapter 5).

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This research aims to examine the organization and functioning of representative politics in São Carlos between the years 2001-2008, including the way that political representation is exercised at the local level. We seek to identify and analyze the profile of local political elites, the strategies adopted by councilors in the performance of representation as well as the relationship established with the executive. To this end, we look back on the local scene from the resumption of the political divide, the rules of the legislative process, in addition to the agenda approved by the mayor and the City Council. The study seeks to demonstrate that the choice made by political actors would be related, as far as possible, to the unique dynamics of county policy. Although individuals are the basic unit of analysis, they operate according to the parameters set by the institutional environment in which they operate. Are the preferences of the actors as well as its position in the political game that make these opt for a strategy or other possibilities in the field of institutional rules.
Esta pesquisa tem por objetivo analisar a organização e o funcionamento da política representativa no município de São Carlos entre os anos de 2001 a 2008, compreendendo o modo que a representação política é exercida em nível local. Buscamos identificar e analisar o perfil das elites políticas locais, as estratégias adotadas pelos vereadores no exercício da representação, bem como a relação estabelecida com o poder Executivo. Para tanto, nos debruçamos sobre o cenário local a partir da retomada da disputa política, das regras do processo legislativo, além da agenda aprovada pelo prefeito e pela Câmara Municipal. O estudo busca demonstrar que a escolha feita pelos atores políticos estaria relacionada, na medida do possível, às singularidades da dinâmica política do município. Embora os indivíduos sejam a unidade básica de análise, estes operam de acordo com os parâmetros estabelecidos pelo ambiente institucional em que atuam. São as preferências dos atores, bem como o seu posicionamento no jogo político que fazem com que estes optem por uma estratégia ou outra no campo das possibilidades das regras institucionais.

Divided government has been studied at length in the political science literature, much of which has focused on the effect of this phenomenon on various legislative outcomes. Despite this high level of attention, the literature has employed a narrow definition of divided government that equates the phenomenon with divided party control. This dissertation demonstrates that divided government is comprised of several distinct components, of which party control is only part. To determine whether government is truly divided, one must include measures of both party (party control and the strength of party majorities) and ideology (in terms of the ideological distance between the president and Congress). When previous studies of divided government are re-examined using these more appropriate measures of the components of divided government, it is clear that both party and ideology drive legislative outcomes. This dissertation demonstrates that divided government is a much more complex political phenomenon. Furthermore, this research suggests that the presidential-congressional relationship may be less adverse during periods of divided party control than periods of unified party control. This underscores the need to include measures that capture the components of divided government in future studies on related topics.

Wissenschaft hat einen großen Anteil daran, internationale Umweltprobleme auf die politische Tagesordnung zu bringen und Maßnahmen zu ihrer technischen Lösung zu entwerfen. Dies gilt sowohl für den Abbau der Ozonschicht als auch für den Klimawandel. So relevant die Generierung von wissenschaftlichen Erkenntnissen in diesen Feldern ist, so komplex ist die Interaktion zwischen Wissenschaft und Politik und so schwierig ist es, Verlässliches darüber zu sagen. Thomas Hickmann analysiert das Verhältnis von Wissenschaft und Politik in internationalen Umweltregimen aus einer neuen Perspektive. Er untersucht nicht den Einfluss wissenschaftlicher Erkenntnisse auf die Politik, sondern rückt die Frage in den Fokus, inwieweit Regierungen Einfluss auf die Wissenschaft nehmen, um nationale Interessen durchzusetzen. Diese Perspektive wurde in der Forschung bislang weitgehend vernachlässigt, weshalb eine systematische Analyse dieser Frage in der Literatur fehlt.

Does democracy lead to less income inequality? The intuition behind this question is simple and appealing: how well does political equality translate into economic equality? Although there are philosophical and theoretical foundations for the expectation that democracy should lead to less income inequality, empirical evidence, especially those from recent studies, has not been very robust. To contribute to the discussion, instead of repeating the analysis with an updated dataset or slightly different coverage, this project introduces several new perspectives to enhance our understanding towards the relationship between democracy and income inequality. Each question below corresponds to one of the chapters included in this research. First, is democracy still a relevant concept in determining income inequality if no direct associations can be found? Secondly, should the effect of democracy be considered from a long-term perspective? Thirdly, can the theoretical foundations of democratic redistribution be strengthened? And finally, should we regard concepts like government spending as a homogenous category and expect uniform effects from them? The answers to these questions can hopefully shine light on the true relationship between democracy and income inequality.

In 1994, in response to repeated scandals of political corruption, or of money politics as it was also called, the Japanese Diet passed a comprehensive package of political reform laws. By placing the focus on a change in the election system, this package suggested that money politics was primarily a problem of the incentive structures that the political system provided. This dissertation is based on the premise that political reforms and the debate that produces them are a good indicator of how the Japanese themselves evaluated money politics and what they hoped to change about it. The dissertation shows that both money politics and the political reforms designed to address it have not been a recent phenomenon but have existed more or less continuously for at least 70 years. It analyses the history of three case studies of political reforms that were aimed partly or exclusively at changing money politics: first a political education initiative, second the establishment and amendment of the law controlling political finance and fund-raising, and finally the attempted creation of a law on defining and regulating political parties. These three case studies suggest that reformers saw money politics predominantly as a function of political culture, not of the electoral system. Specifically, they placed this political culture in an evolutionary process of modernisation which sometimes did, sometimes did not resemble Westernisation. They were concerned especially about the role of organisations such as labour unions, companies and political parties as mediators in the relationship between the Japanese voters and the state. Finally, the fact that a changing coalitions of politicians, bureaucrats and independent activists supported the modernisation of the political culture suggests that this interpretation of money politics was widely shared.

In a nation-state, ethnonationalism and political nationalism equate with each other in both theory and practice. In a multinational state, the mutual antagonisms between the two forms of nationalism demonstrate. In multinational states such as Ghana where "politics of the belly" prevails, ethnonationalism is the political nationalism, and more the substance rather than style of politics. This is the paradox within the rationality of Ghanaian politics. Owing to the modernising and integrative factors associated with urbanisation, urbanites are notioned to be detribalised and more prone towards political nationalism than ethnonationalism. A survey on the political attitudes of supposedly detribalised Ghanaian urbanites would reveal that urbanites, although geographically detribalised, are not so attitudinally, and for most, association with their ethnonational roots grew stronger with length of urban experience, even if there is no proof of a direct relationship between the two, or between association with roots and ethnonationalism. Ethnonationalism results from "politics of the belly", and subsequently, the postcolonial nation-state project, which seeks to integrate a heterogeneity of ethnonational identities submerged under single statehood, becomes a chore as a result. The thesis argues that identity perceptions among Ghanaians, vis-a-vis fellow multinational citizens, are influenced by the immediate political history as well as distant myths of origin, and that, an accentuation of current enmities between various ethnonational groups enhances the invocation of myths of origin to explain the present. The anthropological proof that majority of Modern Ghana are traceable to Ancient Ghana, except Ewes and CTMs', offers an explanation to: (a) modem heightened animosities between Akans and Ewes, even though there is no evidence of enmity between the two groups in the distant history, and; (b) the perception by some, that Ewes are not "native" Ghanaians. The thesis highlights the overall effects of citizens' identity perceptions on political actions and trends in Ghana. The thesis contributes that, there is a wider, more inclusive Guan ancestry and perception for the majority of Ghanaians than any current, exclusive, "latter-day" Guan identity, and that, the adoption of the name "Ghana" for the postcolonial state has more to do with anthropology than political fantasy. Both the Ghana hypothesis and Guan controversy are thereby explained. The thesis also discusses past agitation by non-Ewe groups in the Volta Region of Ghana for a separate Region, as well as the case for pan-Eweist irredentism in the West African sub-region. The scope of the thesis is broad, encapsulating theorising on the doctrine of nationalism, and assessing the extent of its global applicability. The essential Eurocentricity of the doctrine is exposed, as well as its subsequent inapplicability to several pre-l 8th century nations in Africa, for example the Fanti and Ashanti. The thesis further contributes that Ghanaian spouses tended to conceal their political views from each other, the ratio weighing against the female gender. The research involved methodological innovation, utilising a computerised technique to circumvent the `culture of silence 'Z and potential negative response to postal questionnaire method. The innovative strategy ensured anonymity, confidentiality and express delivery, and has positive application for societies with limited freedom of political expression.