Political Leadership and Public Support In Belarus: Forward to the Past?

Korosteleva-Polglase Elena, White, S., 'Political Leadership and Public Support In Belarus: Forward to the Past?', In: 'The EU and Belarus: Between Moscow and Brussels', (London: Kogan Page), pp.51-71, 2001 RAE2008

Constructing Enemies: 'Islamic Terrorism' in Political and Academic Discourse

Jackson, Richard, (2007) 'Constructing Enemies: 'Islamic Terrorism' in Political and Academic Discourse', Government and Opposition, 42(3) pp.394-426 RAE2008

Peace with Hamas? The transforming potential of political participation

Gunning, J. (2004). Peace with Hamas? The transforming potential of political participation. International Affairs. 80(2) pp.233-255 RAE2008

The French Second Empire: an anatomy of political power

Price, Roger, The French Second Empire: an anatomy of political power (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), pp.x+507 RAE2008

The role of late medieval English monasteries as expressions of patronal authority : Some case studies

St?ber, Karen. 'The role of late medieval English monasteries as expressions of patronal authority: some case studies', in: 'The Use and Abuse of Sacred Places in Late Medieval Towns, Medievalia Lovaniensia, Series I, Studia XXXVIII', (Leuven: Leuven University Press), pp.189-207, 2006 RAE2008

Wykładnia funkcjonalna a zmiana społeczno-polityczna. Studium teoretycznoprawne

Wydział Prawa i Administracji: Katedra Teorii i Filozofii Prawa

Indian Architecture: Social and Political Challenges

The objective of this paper is to reassess the central factors which have shaped the Indian architecture. The author puts forward the concept of plurality introduced by Western art historians and argues that the diversity of the Indian architecture should not be explained in terms of religious differences, but in terms of the socio-economical situation in South Asia. He also elaborates on the Hindu caste system and its impact on the Indian architecture.

Political participation of non-national residents in Portugal

Em Portugal, novas medidas de participação política têm vindo a ser introduzidas tanto por força da transição para uma sociedade multicultural como pela sua participação na integração política europeia que se direcciona para um novo nível de cidadania. O presente artigo pretende mostrar até que ponto os residentes não-nacionais, de países terceiros e da União Europeia, efectivamente usam os seus novos direitos políticos e participam nos actos eleitorais em Portugal, conferindo-lhes a oportunidade de uma maior integração política no seu Estado de residência. In Portugal, new rules of political participation have been imposed by the transition to a multicultural society, in addition to the European political integration that is currently developing towards a new level of citizenship. This paper intends to show to what extent non-national residents, both from EU and non-EU countries, effectively use their new political rights and participate in the Portuguese electoral acts that give them the opportunity for a wider political integration in their state of residence.

Authority Now and in the Old Times

sermon text; MS Word document

The political principles of Mencius / by Francis C.M. Wei.

http://www.archive.org/details/thepoliticalprin00weicuoft

The Impact of AIDS on Government Service Delivery: The Case of the Zambia Wildlife Authority

Background: The loss of working-aged adults to HIV/AIDS has been shown to increase the costs of labor to the private sector in Africa. There is little corresponding evidence for the public sector. This study evaluated the impact of AIDS on the capacity of a government agency, the Zambia Wildlife Authority (ZAWA), to patrol Zambia’s national parks. Methods: Data were collected from ZAWA on workforce characteristics, recent mortality, costs, and the number of days spent on patrol between 2003 and 2005 by a sample of 76 current patrol officers (reference subjects) and 11 patrol officers who died of AIDS or suspected AIDS (index subjects). An estimate was made of the impact of AIDS on service delivery capacity and labor costs and the potential net benefits of providing treatment. Results: Reference subjects spent an average of 197.4 days on patrol per year. After adjusting for age, years of service, and worksite, index subjects spent 62.8 days on patrol in their last year of service (68% decrease, p<0.0001), 96.8 days on patrol in their second to last year of service (51% decrease, p<0.0001), and 123.7 days on patrol in their third to last year of service (37% decrease, p<0.0001). For each employee who died, ZAWA lost an additional 111 person-days for management, funeral attendance, vacancy, and recruitment and training of a replacement, resulting in a total productivity loss per death of 2.0 person-years. Each AIDS-related death also imposed budgetary costs for care, benefits, recruitment, and training equivalent to 3.3 years’ annual compensation. In 2005, AIDS reduced service delivery capacity by 6.2% and increased labor costs by 9.7%. If antiretroviral therapy could be provided for $500/patient/year, net savings to ZAWA would approach $285,000/year. Conclusion: AIDS is constraining ZAWA’s ability to protect Zambia’s wildlife and parks. Impacts on this government agency are substantially larger than have been observed in the private sector. Provision of ART would result in net budgetary savings to ZAWA and greatly increase its service delivery capacity.

Breaking ranks: the emergence of representative associations in the Irish armed forces 1989-1992

This study contexualises the relationship between the armed forces and the civil authority in Ireland using and revising the theoretical framework advanced by Huntington. It tracks the evolution of the idea of a representive body for soldiers in the late 1980s, to the setting up of statutory associations under the Defence Amendment Act 1990. The study considers Irish soldiers political agitation and their use of peaceful democratic activities to achieve their aims. It highlights the fundamental policy arguments that were made against the idea of representation for the army and positions those arguments in the study of civil-military relations. Utilising unique access to secret Department of Defence files, it reveals in-depth ideological arguments advanced by the military authories in Ireland against independent representation. This thesis provides an academic study of the establishment of PDFORRA. It answers key questions regarding the change in the position of Irish government who were categorically opposed to the idea of representation in the army. It illustrates the involvement of other agencies such as the European Organisation of Military Associations (Euromil) reveals reciprocal support by the Irish associations to other emerging groups in Spain. Accessing as yet unpublished Department of Defence files, study analyses tension between the military authorities and the government. It highlights for the first time the role of enlisted personnel in the shaping of new state structures and successfully dismmisses Huntingtons theoretical contention that enlisted personnel are of no consequence in the study of civil-military relations. It fills a gap in our understanding, identified by Finer, as to how politicisation of soldiers takes place. This thesis brings a new dimension to the discipline of civil-military relations and creates new knowledge that will enhance our understanding of an area not covered previously.

An analysis of political efficacy socialisation among threshold voters in the Republic of Ireland

The spread of democracy in the latter part of the twenty first century has been accompanied by an increasing focus on its perceived performance in established western democracies. Recent literature has expressed concern about a critical outlook among younger cohorts which threatens their political support and engagement. Political efficacy, referring to the feeling of political effectiveness, is considered to be a key indicator of the performance of democratic politics; as it refers to the empowerment of citizens, and relates to their willingness to engage in political matters. The aim of this thesis is to analyse the socialisation of political efficacy among those on the threshold of political adulthood; i.e., 'threshold voters'. The long-term significance of attitudes developed by time of entry to adulthood for political engagement during adulthood has been emphasised in recent literature. By capturing the effect of non-political and political learning among threshold voters, the study advances existing research frames which focus on childhood and early adolescent socialisation. The theoretical and methodological framework applied herein recognises the distinction between internal and external political efficacy, which has not been consistently operationalized in existing research on efficacy socialisation. This research involves a case study of 'threshold voters' in the Republic of Ireland, and employs a quantitative methodology. A study on Irish threshold voters is timely as the parliament and government have recently proposed a lowering of the voting age and an expansion of formal political education to this age group. A project-specific survey instrument was developed and administered to a systematic stratified sample of 1,042 post-primary students in the Cork area. Interpretation of the results of statistical analysis leads to findings on the divergent influence of family, school, associational, and political agents/environments on threshold voter internal and external political efficacy.

Police accountability in Ireland: an analysis of the problems posed by the legal, constitutional and political dimensions and how they might be addressed

The concept of police accountability is not susceptible to a universal or concise definition. In the context of this thesis it is treated as embracing two fundamental components. First, it entails an arrangement whereby an individual, a minority and the whole community have the opportunity to participate meaningfully in the formulation of the principles and policies governing police operations. Second, it presupposes that those who have suffered as victims of unacceptable police behaviour should have an effective remedy. These ingredients, however, cannot operate in a vacuum. They must find an accommodation with the equally vital requirement that the burden of accountability should not be so demanding that the delivery of an effective police service is fatally impaired. While much of the current debate on police accountability in Britain and the USA revolves around the issue of where the balance should be struck in this accommodation, Ireland lacks the very foundation for such a debate as it suffers from a serious deficit in research and writing on police generally. This thesis aims to fill that gap by laying the foundations for an informed debate on police accountability and related aspects of police in Ireland. Broadly speaking the thesis contains three major interrelated components. The first is concerned with the concept of police in Ireland and the legal, constitutional and political context in which it operates. This reveals that although the Garda Siochana is established as a national force the legal prescriptions concerning its role and governance are very vague. Although a similar legislative format in Britain, and elsewhere, have been interpreted as conferring operational autonomy on the police it has not stopped successive Irish governments from exercising close control over the police. The second component analyses the structure and operation of the traditional police accountability mechanisms in Ireland; namely the law and the democratic process. It concludes that some basic aspects of the peculiar legal, constitutional and political structures of policing seriously undermine their capacity to deliver effective police accountability. In the case of the law, for example, the status of, and the broad discretion vested in, each individual member of the force ensure that the traditional legal actions cannot always provide redress where individuals or collective groups feel victimised. In the case of the democratic process the integration of the police into the excessively centralised system of executive government, coupled with the refusal of the Minister for Justice to accept responsibility for operational matters, project a barrier between the police and their accountability to the public. The third component details proposals on how the current structures of police accountability in Ireland can be strengthened without interfering with the fundamentals of the law, the democratic process or the legal and constitutional status of the police. The key elements in these proposals are the establishment of an independent administrative procedure for handling citizen complaints against the police and the establishment of a network of local police-community liaison councils throughout the country coupled with a centralised parliamentary committee on the police. While these proposals are analysed from the perspective of maximising the degree of police accountability to the public they also take into account the need to ensure that the police capacity to deliver an effective police service is not unduly impaired as a result.