147 resultados para Political elections
Resumo:
This article establishes whether there is a case for revising traditional accounts of politics and the public sphere given the ways in which digital technology is now being used in Western and non-Western settings to engage people politically. The article presents a case for framing this inquiry in terms of imaginaries. It then argues for a new political imaginary which helps to specify what is required for deliberative democratic practice in a way that shifts us away from the dominant liberal-utilitarian political imaginary that currently informs the political value systems of most Western nations. Drawing on the work of key political theorists such as Habermas and Dahlgren, five propositions or conditions for deliberative practice are identified that can be used in empirical investigation to help determine the democratic capacity and potential of new political communication and civic spaces being opened by means of digital media.
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Immigration to Australia has long been the focus of negative political interest. In recent times, the proposal of exclusionary policies such as the Malaysia Deal in 2011 has fuelled further debate. In these debates, Federal politicians often describe asylum seekers and refugees as ‘illegal’, ‘queue jumpers’, and ‘boat people’. This article examines the political construction of asylum seekers and refugees during debates surrounding the Malaysia Deal in the Federal Parliament of Australia. Hansard parliamentary debates were analysed to identify the underlying themes and constructions that permeate political discourse about asylum seekers and refugees. We argue that asylum seekers arriving in Australia by boat were constructed as threatening to Australia’s national identity and border security, and were labelled as ‘illegitimate’. A dichotomous characterisation of legitimacy pervades the discourse about asylum seekers, with this group constructed either as legitimate humanitarian refugees or as illegitimate ‘boat arrivals’. Parliamentarians apply the label of legitimacy based on implicit criteria concerning the mode of arrival of asylum seekers, their respect for the so-called ‘queue’, and their ability to pay to travel to Australia. These constructions result in the misrepresentation of asylum seekers as illegitimate, undermining their right to protection under Australia’s laws and international obligations.
Resumo:
Using data from 28 countries in four continents, the present research addresses the question of how basic values may account for political activism. Study 1 (N = 35,116) analyses data from representative samples in 20 countries that responded to the 21-item version of the Portrait Values Questionnaire (PVQ-21) in the European Social Survey. Study 2 (N = 7,773) analyses data from adult samples in six of the same countries (Finland, Germany, Greece, Israel, Poland, and United Kingdom) and eight other countries (Australia, Brazil, Chile, Italy, Slovakia, Turkey, Ukraine, and United States) that completed the full 40-item PVQ. Across both studies, political activism relates positively to self-transcendence and openness to change values, especially to universalism and autonomy of thought, a subtype of self-direction. Political activism relates negatively to conservation values, especially to conformity and personal security. National differences in the strength of the associations between individual values and political activism are linked to level of democratization.
Resumo:
Do the political values of the general public form a coherent system? What might be the source of coherence? We view political values as expressions, in the political domain, of more basic personal values. Basic personal values (e.g., security, achievement, benevolence, hedonism) are organized on a circular continuum that reflects their conflicting and compatible motivations. We theorize that this circular motivational structure also gives coherence to political values. We assess this theorizing with data from 15 countries, using eight core political values (e.g., free enterprise, law and order) and ten basic personal values. We specify the underlying basic values expected to promote or oppose each political value. We offer different hypotheses for the 12 non-communist and three post-communist countries studied, where the political context suggests different meanings of a basic or political value. Correlation and regression analyses support almost all hypotheses. Moreover, basic values account for substantially more variance in political values than age, gender, education, and income. Multidimensional scaling analyses demonstrate graphically how the circular motivational continuum of basic personal values structures relations among core political values. This study strengthens the assumption that individual differences in basic personal values play a critical role in political thought.
Resumo:
This study uses the concept of ‘place-making’ to consider political engagement on Sina Weibo, one of the most popular microblogging services in China. Besides articulating statepublic confrontation during major social controversies, Weibo has been used to recollect and renarrate the memories of a city, such as Guangzhou, where dramatic social and cultural changes took place during the economic reform era. The Chinese government’s ongoing project to create a culturally indifferent ‘national identity’ triggers a defensive response from local places. Through consuming news and information about leisure and entertainment in Guangzhou, the digital narration of the city becomes an important source for Guangzhou people to learn about their geo-identity, and the kind of rights and responsibility attaching to it.
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This chapter provides a history of the media as political actors and identifies key principles that have shaped their role in both democratic and authoritarian polities (i.e., information, interpretation, participation, critical scrutiny). In addition, the chapter explores recent trends impacting on the performance of that role, such as the emergence of the Internet and, as a consequence of that process, a globalized public sphere of transnational news media outlets. It is argued that to make the Internet truly valuable as a political resource, democratic societies continue to require the work of skilled, professional journalists and their sense making, interpretative functions. Because of that journalists and their organizations remain crucial to the translation of content into meaningful messages.
Resumo:
Since the early 1980s, when confidence in institutions was first measured in an Australian academic social survey, Australia - And the world - has faced many political, social and economic changes. From corporate scandals and company collapses, to unprecedented terrorist attacks, to major ongoing international conflicts, to changes in government and all manner of political machinations, to the global financial crisis and its aftermath. One consequence of such developments has been that many major political, social and economic institutions have come under intense pressure. Using survey research data, this paper investigates how public confidence in various Australian institutions and organisations has changed over time. The results are variable and in some instances surprising. Confidence in some institutions has remained high, and in some low, over an extended period of time. In other cases, confidence has varied quite markedly at different time points. As well as looking at trends in the level of public confidence in institutions, the paper examines different dimensions of confidence together with underpinning socio-political factors. It also discusses theoretical and practical implications of the data.
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Debates over the legitimacy and legality of prostitution have characterised human trafficking discourse for the last two decades. This article identifies the extent to which competing perspectives concerning the legitimacy of prostitution have influenced anti-trafficking policy in Australia and the United States, and argues that each nation-state’s approach to domestic sex work has influenced trafficking legislation. The legal status of prostitution in each country, and feminist influences on prostitution law reform, have had a significant impact on the nature of the legislation adopted.
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Between the national and household factors, community or “meso-level” changes in political economy and livelihoods in southwestern Bangladesh illustrate that in order to understand the impacts on people and nations of climate change-related environmental changes – changes that are expected to include rising sea level, saline inundation, and increased likelihood and intensity of cyclones in Bangladesh – we need to understand the dynamics of the built and natural environment and the political economies these sustain. Meso-level political economies affect the sources of income and livelihood available in distressed environmental conditions, and therefore influence how well the people in them can adapt to changing environmental conditions. In this study we have seen the underlying political economies whose dynamics, and not slow onset environmental changes or disastrous environmental events, are pushing Bangladeshis to incorporate migration strategies into their livelihood strategies.
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Although tactical voting attracts a great deal of attention, it is very hard to measure as it requires knowledge of both individuals’ voting choices as well as their unobserved preferences. In this article, we present a simple empirical strategy to nonparametrically identify tactical voting patterns directly from balloting results. This approach allows us to study the magnitude and direction of strategic voting as well as to verify which information voters and parties take into account to determine marginal constituencies. We show that tactical voting played a significant role in the 2010 election, mainly for Liberal–Democratic voters supporting Labour. Moreover, our results suggest that voters seem to form their expectations based on a national swing in vote shares rather than newspaper guides published in the main media outlets or previous election outcomes. We also present some evidence that suggests that campaign spending is not driving tactical voting.
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Health policy interventions provide powerful tools for addressing health disparities. The Latino community is one of the fastest growing communities in the United States yet is largely underrepresented in government and advocacy efforts. This study includes 42 Latino adults (M age 5 45 years) who participated in focus group discussions and completed a brief questionnaire assessing their experiences with political health advocacy. Qualitative analyses revealed participants considered cancer a concern for the Latino community, but there was a lack of familiarity with political advocacy and its role in cancer control. Participants identified structural, practical, cultural, and contextual barriers to engaging in political health advocacy. This article presents a summary of the findings that suggest alternative ways to engage Latinos in cancer control advocacy.
Resumo:
Objective Poor dietary intake is the most important behavioural risk factor affecting health globally. Despite this, there has been little investment in public health nutrition policy actions. Policy process theories from the field of political science can aid understanding why policy decisions have occurred and identify how to influence ongoing or future initiatives. This review aims to examine public health nutrition policy literature and identify whether a policy process theory has been used to analyse the process. Design Electronic databases were searched systematically for studies examining policymaking in public health nutrition in high-income, democratic countries. Setting International, national, state and local government jurisdictions within high-income, democratic countries. Subjects Individuals and organisations involved in the nutrition policymaking process. Results Sixty-three studies met the eligibility criteria, most were conducted in the USA and a majority focused on obesity. The analysis demonstrates an accelerating trend in the number of nutrition policy papers published annually and an increase in the diversity of nutrition topics examined. The use of policy process theory was observed from 2003, however, it was utilised by only 14% of the reviewed papers. Conclusions There is limited research into the nutrition policy process in high-income countries. While there has been a small increase in the use of policy process theory from 2003, an opportunity to expand their use is evident. We suggest that nutrition policymaking would benefit from a pragmatic approach that ensures those trying to influence or understand the policymaking process are equipped with basic knowledge around these theories.
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The thesis provides an understanding of the ignored need for a modern air defence system for the Australian air force to meet the growing threat from Japan in the 1930s and early 1940s. The quality of advice provided to, and accepted by, Australian politicians was misleading and eliminated the need for fighters and interceptors despite glaring evidence to the contrary. Based on primary source material, including official documents, Allied and Axis pilot memoirs, popular aviation literature and newspaper and magazine articles and interviews, the thesis highlights the inability of Australian politicians to face the reality of the international situation.
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As the use of Twitter has become more commonplace throughout many nations, its role in political discussion has also increased. This has been evident in contexts ranging from general political discussion through local, state, and national elections (such as in the 2010 Australian elections) to protests and other activist mobilisation (for example in the current uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen, as well as in the controversy around Wikileaks). Research into the use of Twitter in such political contexts has also developed rapidly, aided by substantial advancements in quantitative and qualitative methodologies for capturing, processing, analysing, and visualising Twitter updates by large groups of users. Recent work has especially highlighted the role of the Twitter hashtag – a short keyword, prefixed with the hash symbol ‘#’ – as a means of coordinating a distributed discussion between more or less large groups of users, who do not need to be connected through existing ‘follower’ networks. Twitter hashtags – such as ‘#ausvotes’ for the 2010 Australian elections, ‘#londonriots’ for the coordination of information and political debates around the recent unrest in London, or ‘#wikileaks’ for the controversy around Wikileaks thus aid the formation of ad hoc publics around specific themes and topics. They emerge from within the Twitter community – sometimes as a result of pre-planning or quickly reached consensus, sometimes through protracted debate about what the appropriate hashtag for an event or topic should be (which may also lead to the formation of competing publics using different hashtags). Drawing on innovative methodologies for the study of Twitter content, this paper examines the use of hashtags in political debate in the context of a number of major case studies.
Resumo:
Campaigning in Australian election campaigns at local, state, and federal levels is fundamentally affected by the fact that voting is compulsory in Australia, with citizens who are found to have failed to cast their vote subject to fines. This means that - contrary to the situation in most other nations – elections are decided not by which candidate or party has managed to encourage the largest number of nominal supporters to make the effort to cast their vote, but by some 10-20% of genuine ‘swinging voters’ who change their party preferences from one election to the next. Political campaigning is thus aimed less at existing party supporters (so-called ‘rusted on’ voters whose continued support for the party is essentially taken for granted) than at this genuinely undecided middle of the electorate. Over the past decades, this has resulted in a comparatively timid, vague campaigning style from both major party blocs (the progressive Australian Labor Party [ALP] and the conservative Coalition of the Liberal and National Parties [L/NP]). Election commitments that run the risk of being seen as too partisan and ideological are avoided as they could scare away swinging voters, and recent elections have been fought as much (or more) on the basis of party leaders’ perceived personas as they have on stated policies, even though Australia uses a parliamentary system in which the Prime Minister and state Premiers are elected by their party room rather than directly by voters. At the same time, this perceived lack of distinctiveness in policies between the major parties has also enabled the emergence of new, smaller parties which (under Australia’s Westminster-derived political system) have no hope of gaining a parliamentary majority but could, in a close election, come to hold the balance of power and thus exert disproportionate influence on a government which relies on their support.