Crossing the Line: Local Ethnic Geography and Voting in Ghana

2013 ◽  
Vol 107 (2) ◽  
pp. 344-361 ◽  
Author(s):  
NAHOMI ICHINO ◽  
NOAH L. NATHAN

Theories of instrumental ethnic voting in new democracies propose that voters support co-ethnic politicians because they expect politicians to favor their co-ethnics once in office. But many goods that politicians deliver to voters are locally nonexcludable in rural areas, so the local presence of an ethnic group associated with a politician should affect a rural voter's assessment of how likely she is to benefit from that politician's election. Using geocoded polling-station–level election results alongside survey data from Ghana, we show that otherwise similar voters are less likely to vote for the party of their own ethnic group, and more likely to support a party associated with another group, when the local ethnic geography favors the other group. This result helps account for the imperfect correlation between ethnicity and vote choice in African democracies. More generally, this demonstrates how local community and geographic contexts can modify the information conveyed by ethnicity and influence voter behavior.

2016 ◽  
Vol 49 (14) ◽  
pp. 1896-1929 ◽  
Author(s):  
Noah L. Nathan

African democracies are increasingly urban. While ethnicity is generally correlated with vote choice, recent research suggests there may be less ethnic voting in cities. But I show that voting for ethnically affiliated parties is as common in some neighborhoods in urban Ghana as in rural areas, while virtually non-existent in other neighborhoods elsewhere within the same city. This intra-urban variation is not explained by differences in the salience of ethnic identities or other individual-level characteristics of voters themselves. Instead, it is influenced by the diversity and wealth of the local neighborhoods in which parties and voters interact. These neighborhood characteristics change otherwise similar voters’ expectations of the benefits they will receive from an ethnically affiliated party when living in different places, producing intra-urban differences in the importance of ethnicity for vote choice.


2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 95-107
Author(s):  
Dian Trianita Lestari ◽  
Iriyani Astuti Arief ◽  
Shinta Arjunita Saputri

The research aims to determine and analyze the voter behavior of the Ambaipua Village community in regional head elections of South Konawe in 2020. This research uses political participation and voter behavior concept to see what underlying the community in determining the choice of their regional head, whether influenced by sociological, psychological or rational aspects. The data collection techniques used were interviews, literature studies and documentation. The results showed that the voting pattern of the Ambaipua Village community could be understood from three approaches, namely sociology, psychology and rational. A sociological approach in which the majority of informants stated that the religious aspect greatly affects who the candidate will be elected, that they will choose a candidate who has the same belief/religion. Meanwhile, from the psychological approach, it was found that the informants were not influenced by the political parties carrying the regional head candidates, but the majority would choose the incumbent with the assumption that they had succeeded in developing the region in the previous period. On the other hand, the rational approach was seen from the tendency of informants to choose candidate who have good political experience. Based on the results by the writers, it can be concluded that the sociological approach especially religion is more prominent than the other two approaches. This is because religious knowledge will have a great influence on aspects of people's lives, including their political choices.


2021 ◽  
pp. 135406882110187
Author(s):  
Antonio Benasaglio Berlucchi

The Five Star Movement (M5S) emerged as Italy’s largest party in the 2018 election. After one year in government with the far-right League, the party formed a new coalition with the center-left Democratic Party (PD). These unconventional alliances and the M5S’s ambiguity on substantive issues such as immigration and minority rights raise questions on the value positioning of its voters. Does the M5S represent a socially liberal electorate, or has the party become a new home for voters expressing sentiments of hostility toward immigrants and minorities? I hypothesize that the M5S’s ambivalence on social issues enabled the party to attract a significant share of voters with exclusionary attitudes toward foreigners and minorities. I use survey data to measure individuals’ dispositions toward outgroups and run binary and multinomial logistic regressions to predict vote choice for the M5S and the other main parties in the 2018 election. The empirical findings suggest that the M5S has become a valid option for voters adhering to exclusionary attitudes, and show that there is no particular elective affinity between the voters of the M5S and the PD.


JMS SKIMS ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 90-95
Author(s):  
Noorul Amin

Background: The present age is the age of stress. Everybody is disturbed due to one or the other reason irrespective of their age. However, adolescents are more prone to psychological and sociological disturbances.Objectives:To assess the psychosocial problems in adolescents.Methods: The study was conducted in selected schools of urban and rural areas taking 100 participants each for boys and girls using convenient sampling method. The tool used was youth self report. The data collected was analyzed using appropriate statistical methods.Results: The study revealed that 48.5% adolescents were well adjusted; 47% were having mild psychosocial problems; 4% had moderate psychosocial problems and 0.5% had severe psychosocial problems.Conclusion: Adolescents irrespective of their living places had varying degrees of psychosocial problems. JMS 2017; 20 (2):90-95


2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mesfin Wudu Kassaw ◽  
Ayele Mamo Abebe ◽  
Biruk Beletew Abate ◽  
Seteamlak Adane Masresha ◽  
Ayelign Mengesha Kassie ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Globally, 4 million infants die in their first 4weeks of life every year; above 8 million infants died before their first year of birthday, and nearly 10 million children died before their 5th birthday. Majority of the deaths were occurred at home because of not receiving health care. In Ethiopia, 120,000 infants died during their first 4 weeks of life. The aim of this study was to assess maternal knowledge about neonatal danger signs and its associations after they had been thought by health professionals in Ethiopia. Methods This study used the 2016 Ethiopian Demographic and Health Survey data (EDHS) as a data source. The 2016 EDHS data were collected using a two stage sampling method. All the regions were stratified into urban and rural areas. The study sample taken from the 2016 EDHS data and used in this further analysis was 325. A logistic regression model was used to assess the associations with post health education maternal knowledge on neonatal danger signs. Results In this study, mothers who had poor knowledge about neonatal danger signs (NDS) were 69.8 % (227) (95 %CI (64.8, 74.8 %). In the final logistic model, wanted no more child ((AOR = 4.15), (95 %CI = 1.12, 15.41)), female child ((AOR = 0.58), (95 %CI = 0.34, 0.98)), primary level maternal education ((AOR = 0.42), (95 %CI = 0.19, 0.92)), secondary level maternal education ((AOR = 0.37), (95 %CI = 0.16, 0.91)), and average size of child ((AOR = 2.64), (95 %CI = 1.26, 5.53)), and small size child ((AOR = 4.53), (95 %CI = 1.52, 13.51)) associated with post health education maternal knowledge about NDS. Conclusion The mothers’ knowledge about NDS is poor even they were gave a birth in health facilities. Wanting of additional child, child sex, maternal education and size of child were associated with NDS knowledge. This indicates that the mode of health education provided for mother might not be appropriate and needs protocol changes.


Author(s):  
Tuuli-Marja Kleiner

Does civic participation lead to a large social network? This study claims that high levels of civic participation may obstruct individual social embeddedness. Using survey data from the German Survey on Volunteering (Deutscher Freiwilligensurvey; 1999–2009), this study conducts macro- as well as multi-level regressions to examine the link between civic participation and social embeddedness. Findings reveal that civic participation on the sub-national regional level is not generally associated with social embeddedness, but it affects the participants’ and non-participants’ possibilities for friendships differently. This holds especially true in urban areas, but the effect cannot be found in rural areas. The analysis has implications for further research to enhance the social embeddedness of the excluded.


2021 ◽  
Vol 29 (3) ◽  
pp. 150-157
Author(s):  
Fiona MacVane Phipps ◽  
Alan D Price ◽  
James Ackers-Johnson ◽  
Penny A Cook ◽  
Alexandra M. Clarke-Cornwell ◽  
...  

Background Several industry funded studies between 2001–2018 have compared the use of a single brand of baby wipes to cleansing with water and either cloth or cotton wool during nappy changes. All of these studies found that wipes were safe and effective from birth. Recommendations from these studies have included the need for brand or formula comparison but to date, no previous study has done this. Aims The ‘Baby skin integrity comparison survey’ (BaSICS) study was designed to compare three brands of baby wipes to determine if there was any difference in the incidence of irritant diaper dermatitis (IDD or nappy rash) during the first eight weeks of life. Methods Mothers who were allocated to a single brand of nappy but divided into three baby wipe allocation groups, collected and reported survey data on infant skin integrity during one nappy change daily with the use of a user-friendly smartphone application. Findings All brands of wipes were acceptable to mothers and safe and effective when cleaning during nappy changes. The brand containing the fewest ingredients showed a clinically significant advantage of fewer incidents of rash than the other two brands. Conclusion This study demonstrated that wipe formulation is a significant factor in prevention or reduction of IDD during the first eight weeks of life.


2020 ◽  
pp. 135406882090802
Author(s):  
Sejin Koo

Studies of party activism highlight that party activists are driven by various motivations and that these affect their level of activism. However, it remains unclear whether policy-motivated activists are more engaged in party activities than those motivated by other incentives and whether the motivation–activism link varies with party characteristics. This article investigates these questions by focusing on political actors linking parties and voters in the local community. I use a party activist survey data set collected during recent national election campaigns in three Asian young democracies: Taiwan, Korea, and Mongolia. The results demonstrated the prominence of policy motivation as an impetus for activists’ intraparty commitment. I also found that the positive effect of policy motivation is especially robust in small parties, while it is muted in large parties and that party membership increases the probability of intraparty commitment, challenging the widely held belief that formal membership is pointless in Asian parties.


2005 ◽  
Vol 38 (2) ◽  
pp. 171-188 ◽  
Author(s):  
Terry D. Clark ◽  
Jill N. Wittrock

Efforts to test Duverger’s law in the new democracies of postcommunist Europe have had mixed results. Research argues that mixed systems have an effect on the number of effective parties that is distinct from that of single-mandate district and proportional representation systems. Less attention has been given to the effect of other institutions on the party system, particularly strong presidents. Analyzing election results in postcommunist Europe, the authors find support for Duverger’s law after controlling for the strength of the executive. They argue that strong presidents substantially reduce the incentive for parties to seize control of the legislative agenda. Hence, the restraint that electoral systems exercise on the proliferation of parties and independent candidates is weakened. The authors find that a further consequence of strong presidents is that the incentive for majority control of committees and the legislative agenda is weakened.


2018 ◽  
Vol 54 (1) ◽  
pp. 115-146 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eleonora Kovacs Rac ◽  
Sabina Halupka-Rešetar

Abstract A large body of academic literature (e.g. Fishman 1977, 1999; Giles and Johnson 1981; Romaine 2000, among others) claims that language is one of the most significant markers of ethnic identification and that it plays a crucial role not only in the external perception of an ethnic group by outsiders but also in the selfidentification of an ethnic group. In a minority environment, sense of ethnic identity and language retention are connected very tightly, which is why it is of extreme importance to study attitudes towards the dialects of a language and value judgments about them. The paper presents the results of a research into attitudes toward dialects, conducted with approximately three hundred 5th and 8th grade pupils (age 12 and 15, respectively) attending school in Hungarian in two regions of Vojvodina, Serbia. It explores the subjects’ local features of identity, given that the research was conducted in eight different localities. The results of the research serve as a sound basis for developing use-centered, functional-situational mother tongue education of Hungarian minority pupils living in Serbia, since the current curriculum completely disregards the language varieties of many Hungarian minority pupils brought up and living in rural areas, who acquire and use the dialect spoken in the family.


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