Democratic Constitutions, Electoral Commissions and Legitimacy – The Example of Australia

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Paul Kildea ◽  
Sarah Murray
Keyword(s):  
Institutional Design ◽  
Institutional Trust ◽  
Electoral Institutions ◽  
Political Landscape ◽  
Australian Context

Abstract This article explores the structure, management and institutional design of commissions in Australia and unpacks how these institutions operate within the Australian political landscape. Part 1 looks at the structure of Australian electoral commissions and how they maintain structural independence. Part 2 seeks to better understand Australian electoral institutions, through an examination of how they have manoeuvred administrative and political challenges and emergencies when they have arisen. Finally, Part 3 employs a neo-institutionalist lens to focus on the internal and external dynamics that assist or hinder the operation of commissions in Australia and how legitimacy and institutional trust can be created, maintained and harmed by electoral agencies in the Australian context.

From Representation to Integration

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Francesca R. Jensenius
Keyword(s):  
Institutional Design ◽  
Group Representation ◽  
Caste System ◽  
Primary Sources ◽  
Social Injustice ◽  
Electoral Institutions ◽  
Policy Tool ◽  
Group Integration ◽  
Electoral Quotas ◽  
Caste Groups

Chapter 2 provides an introduction to SCs as a group. It presents a historical overview of how quotas became an important policy tool for addressing social injustice in India, and notes primary sources on the initial debates about the design of electoral institutions in the early twentieth century. Tracing the debate on electoral quotas between 1905 and 1950, the chapter shows the gradual shift in focus from group representation to group integration. This was reflected in disagreements about the optimal institutional design for combating the caste system: should SC politicians be elected by SC voters only, or by voters from all caste groups? The latter view prevailed, with quotas explicitly designed to integrate SC politicians into mainstream politics by making it necessary for them to appeal to voters from all caste groups.

scholarly journals Trusting the People and the System. The Interrelation Between Interpersonal and Institutional Trust in Collective Action for Agri-Environmental Management

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (24) ◽  
pp. 7022 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jasper R. de Vries ◽  
Eva van der Zee ◽  
Raoul Beunen ◽  
Rianne Kat ◽  
Peter H. Feindt
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Management ◽  
Collective Action ◽  
Institutional Design ◽  
Biodiversity Loss ◽  
Institutional Trust ◽  
Institutional Performance ◽  
Successful Operation ◽  
Policy Model ◽  
Trust Development ◽  
The People

Agri-environmental schemes have been introduced in numerous countries to combat biodiversity loss in agrarian landscapes that are important for both food production and biodiversity. The successful operation of such schemes depends strongly upon trust between actors involved, as well as trust in institutions that govern these schemes. However, the interplay between interpersonal and institutional trust in the context of collective action for agri-environmental management is not well understood. To address this question, we explore the case of agri-environmental management in the province of Drenthe (in The Netherlands), where a new policy model was implemented. This case shows how both institutional design and institutional performance critically influence trust dynamics. Under the old policy model, farmers struggled with auditing and control, which fostered mistrust and hampered collective action. Under the new model, a landscape approach, more responsibilities were delegated to farmers, and more room was created for interaction, which fostered trust both between actors and in institutions. Based on our findings, we conclude that institutional designs that reflect trust in the actors can foster interpersonal and institutional trust that, in turn, facilitates collective action. However, old arrangements can also create path dependencies that limit trust development and impede collective action for agri-environmental management.

Thinking outside the (Ballot) Box: Informal Electoral Institutions and Mexico's Political Opening

2003 ◽  
Vol 45 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-54 ◽  
Author(s):  
Todd A. Eisenstadt
Keyword(s):  
Institutional Design ◽  
Local Elections ◽  
Focal Points ◽  
Electoral Institutions ◽  
Subnational Elections

AbstractThis article studies the development of informal bargaining tables to mitigate postelectoral conflicts in some 15 percent of Mexico's local elections between 1989 and 2000, even as formally autonomous electoral commissions and courts were being constituted. By documenting the dual institutions that resulted, the study qualifies theories of institutional design that take actor consent for granted. It argues that in the Mexican case and perhaps others, elections, particularly subnational elections, are focal points for informal bargaining over rules that are the true motors of protracted transitions. It finds electoral institutions to be critical to democratization, but for reasons beyond those given by most institutionalists.

From meditation to action – a research agenda for studying informal global rule-making: remarks on ‘Cosmopolitanism, publicity, and the emergence of a “global administrative law”’

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-7
Author(s):  
Oliver Westerwinter
Keyword(s):  
Global Governance ◽  
Comparative Research ◽  
Research Agenda ◽  
Institutional Design ◽  
Administrative Law ◽  
Democratic Legitimacy ◽  
Institutional Architecture ◽  
Global Law ◽  
Rule Making ◽  
Law Making

Abstract Friedrich Kratochwil engages critically with the emergence of a global administrative law and its consequences for the democratic legitimacy of global governance. While he makes important contributions to our understanding of global governance, he does not sufficiently discuss the differences in the institutional design of new forms of global law-making and their consequences for the effectiveness and legitimacy of global governance. I elaborate on these limitations and outline a comparative research agenda on the emergence, design, and effectiveness of the diverse arrangements that constitute the complex institutional architecture of contemporary global governance.

Institutional Trust of Electronic Health Care Records System Measure

2011 ◽  
Author(s):  
José Manuel Ortega Egea ◽  
María Victoria Román González
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Institutional Trust ◽  
Electronic Health ◽  
Health Care Records

From Market Studies to Society Analysis

2005 ◽  
pp. 63-81
Author(s):  
Ya. Kouzminov ◽  
K. Bendoukidze ◽  
M. Yudkevich
Keyword(s):  
Institutional Theory ◽  
Policy Making ◽  
Institutional Design ◽  
The Real ◽  
Economic Agents

The article examines the main concepts of modern institutional theory and the ways its tools and concepts could be applied in the real policy-making. In particular, the authors focus on behavioral assumptions of the theory that allow them to explain the imperfection of economic agents’ behavior as a reason for rules and institutions to emerge. Problems of institutional design are also discussed.

Trust in Modern Russia (Comparative Approach to "Social Virtues")

2010 ◽  
pp. 83-102 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Sasaki ◽  
Yu. Latov ◽  
G. Romashkina ◽  
V. Davidenko
Keyword(s):  
Social Capital ◽  
Empirical Data ◽  
Comparative Studies ◽  
Sociological Theory ◽  
Comparative Approach ◽  
Institutional Trust ◽  
Opinion Poll ◽  
World Values Survey ◽  
Medium Level ◽  
International Projects

This article offers economic and sociological theory of trust, embodying the idea of "social capital" by James Coleman. It also analyzes empirical data on personal and institutional trust obtained on the basis of nationwide opinion poll in the project "Comparative studies of trust in different countries during the period of globalization". The problem of trust is considered in the context of the international projects "World Values Survey" and "Trust Barometer" which made it possible to construct a mental world map of personal and institutional trust for various countries. It is shown that Russia has not a low, but a medium level of trust. In the mental world map some patterns were presented that reflect the basic trust as a form of social capital.

Party preferences and political participation: the emergence of the Turkish-origin German voter

2008 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-40
Author(s):  
Vera Eccarius-Kelly
Keyword(s):  
Political Participation ◽  
Voting Behavior ◽  
Green Party ◽  
Missed Opportunities ◽  
Social Democrats ◽  
Political Landscape ◽  
Turkish Origin ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Future ◽  
Specific Interests

The article examines trends in voting preferences and voting behavior of Turkish-origin German voters. Despite only representing a small percentage of the total German electorate, Turkish-origin voters are gaining an opportunity to shape the future political landscape. While the Social Democrats have benefited most directly from the minority constituency so far, this author suggests that the Green Party is poised to attract the younger, better educated, and German-born segment of the Turkish-origin voters. All other dominant national parties have ignored this emerging voting bloc, and missed opportunities to appeal to Turkish-origin voters by disregarding community-specific interests. 

Bacurau as Science-Fiction Revenge Fantasy

2020 ◽  
Vol 74 (2) ◽  
pp. 84-86
Author(s):  
Jocimar Dias
Keyword(s):  
Science Fiction ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Far Right ◽  
Political Landscape ◽  
Colonial Violence

When Bacurau (dir. Kleber Mendonça Filho and Juliano Dornelles, 2019) was released in Brazil, it was mainly received as a left-wing critique of the rise of the far right in the country’s political landscape. But some critics argued that the feature’s insistence on graphic violence was actually a celebration of barbarism, equating the oppressed villagers to their genocidal oppressors. This article refutes this view, borrowing from the analysis of science-fiction revenge fantasies and also following Foucault’s genealogical perspective. It argues that Bacurau actually reenacts Brazil’s foundational colonial violence through its complex temporality, in order to rediscover the forgotten past of real struggles that remain surreptitiously inserted in all levels of society, perhaps in the hope that new ways of resistance may flourish from its spectatorial experience.

Finding one's own linguistic space: views on English, Afrikaans and identity in a semi-urban Australian context

2012 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Aniko Hatoss ◽  
Henriette Van Rensburg ◽  
Donna Starks
Keyword(s):  
Australian Context
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