Building a Regime-Type Framework

2021 ◽  
pp. 5-24
Author(s):  
Christopher M. Davidson
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Saudi Arabia ◽  
Social Contract ◽  
The Other ◽  
Regime Type ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Arbitrary Decision

As a first step in trying to understand the nature and impact of the changes taking place in Saudi Arabia and the UAE, this chapter considers what ‘type’ of regimes their rulers (or rather de facto rulers) now represent. Firstly, it establishes the scholarly consensus on the political systems underpinning the Gulf monarchies, namely their ‘sheikhly authority’ (based on some form of elite consultation and Islamic legitimacy), and their hydrocarbon-financed and social contract-based ‘rentier’ structures (in which citizens generally accept wealth distributions in exchange for their political acquiescence). Secondly, it makes the argument that MBS and MBZ’s regimes have taken a more autocratic-authoritarian turn--moving away from their predecessors’ sheikhly-rentierism--and hypothesizes that their highly personalistic and seemingly more arbitrary decision-making processes might represent some form of contemporary sultanism. In this context, it also makes clear that the other four Gulf monarchies do not appear to have taken the same path, and have mostly retained their historic consultative elements.

The Politics of Education: Development and Literature, Problems, Possibilities

1973 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 251-264
Author(s):  
G. S. Harman
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Other ◽  
Politics Of Education ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Education Development ◽  
Educational Management ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Research Specialization

The politics of education is a very new field of research specialization, both in education and political science. The main developments to date have been in the United States, but there is a growing interest in the field in a number of countries including Australia, the United Kingdom, Canada and New Zealand. As with any new field, the politics of education faces a variety of problems. But on the other hand it promises not only to increase our understanding of educational and political systems but to provide substantial help in tackling current pressing problems in education, particularly in the areas of educational management and decision-making processes.

scholarly journals Responses to Modified Monty Hall Dilemmas in Capuchin Monkeys, Rhesus Macaques, and Humans

2018 ◽  
Vol 31 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julia Watzek ◽  
Will Whitham ◽  
David A. Washburn ◽  
Sarah F. Brosnan
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Rhesus Macaques ◽  
The Other ◽  
Comparative Approach ◽  
Capuchin Monkeys ◽  
Monty Hall Dilemma ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Monty Hall ◽  
Text Version ◽  
Switch Strategy

The Monty Hall Dilemma (MHD) is a simple probability puzzle famous for its counterintuitive solution. Participants initially choose among three doors, one of which conceals a prize. A different door is opened and shown not to contain the prize. Participants are then asked whether they would like to stay with their original choice or switch to the other remaining door. Although switching doubles the chances of winning, people overwhelmingly choose to stay with their original choice. To assess how experience and the chance of winning affect decisions in the MHD, we used a comparative approach to test 264 college students, 24 capuchin monkeys, and 7 rhesus macaques on a nonverbal, computerized version of the game. Participants repeatedly experienced the outcome of their choices and we varied the chance of winning by changing the number of doors (three or eight). All species quickly and consistently switched doors, especially in the eight-door condition. After the computer task, we presented humans with the classic text version of the MHD to test whether they would generalize the successful switch strategy from the computer task. Instead, participants showed their characteristic tendency to stick with their pick, regardless of the number of doors. This disconnect between strategies in the classic version and a repeated nonverbal task with the same underlying probabilities may arise because they evoke different decision-making processes, such as explicit reasoning versus implicit learning.

scholarly journals Pasteloza – refurbishing of the PPR heritage

2019 ◽  
Vol 63 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-64
Author(s):  
Sara Nikolić
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Thermal Insulation ◽  
Citizen Participation ◽  
Civic Participation ◽  
The Other ◽  
Geometric Figures ◽  
State Administration ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
The City ◽  
Housing Estates

Abstract Colourful zigzags, arcade game motifs, geometric figures, pseudo-frames of windows and even infantile drawings of flora and fauna – those are just some of the visible symptoms of the aesthetical and urbanistic chaotic condition also known as Polish pasteloza. One of the most common readings is that the excuse of thermal insulation is being (ab)used in order to radically erase the urbanistic, cultural and political heritage of Polish People’s Republic (PPR) from the city landscape. On the other hand, inhabitants of ‘pastelized’ housing estates claim to be satisfied not only with the insulation but also with their role in decision-making processes. A sense of alienation from one’s home seems to have gone away, together with the centralized state administration, and it is being replaced by citizen participation. The possibility of vindication of pasteloza’s ‘crimes against aesthetics’ will be deliberated in this paper – in order to pave a path for more complex understanding of this phenomenon that could offer a solution for achieving a compromise between aesthetics and civic participation in post-transition processes.

Getting to the Future

2021 ◽  
pp. 109-128
Author(s):  
Michael K. MacKenzie
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
The Political ◽  
Collective Decision Making ◽  
Political Dynamics ◽  
The Future ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Electoral Cycles ◽  
Shared Futures ◽  
Deliberative Processes

This chapter makes three arguments in support of the claim that we need inclusive deliberative processes to shape the future in collectively intentional, mutually accommodating ways. First, inclusive collective decision-making processes are needed to avoid futures that favour the interests of some groups of people over others. Second, deliberative processes are needed to shape our shared futures in collectively intentional ways: we need to be able to talk to ourselves about what we are doing and where we want to get to in the future. Third, deliberative exchanges are needed to help collectivities avoid the policy oscillations that are (or may be) associated with the political dynamics of short electoral cycles. Effective processes of reciprocal reason giving can help collectivities maintain policy continuity over the long term—when continuity is justified—even as governments and generations change.

Us and Them : Scientists' and Animal Rights Campaigners' Views of the Animal Experimentation Debate

1995 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth S. Paul
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Animal Rights ◽  
Animal Experiments ◽  
Animal Experimentation ◽  
The Other ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Opposing Group ◽  
Relative Capacity ◽  
Extreme View

AbstractAnimal rights campaigners and scientists working with animals completed anonymous questionnaires in which they were asked to report, not only on their own beliefs and ideas about the animal experimentation debate, but also on those they perceived the opposing group to hold. Both groups of participants tended to have a negative and somewhat extreme view of the other. But they did have an accurate grasp of the arguments and defenses commonly offered on both sides of the debate, and showed some agreement concerning the relative capacity of different animals to suffer. Differences appeared in the level of the phylogenetic hierarchy at which participants thought animals might be capable of suffering, and in their decision-making processes regarding the admissibility of animal experiments.

Expert knowledge and decision-making in controversy contexts

1993 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 417-426 ◽  
Author(s):  
Camille Limoges
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Boundary Conditions ◽  
Learning Process ◽  
Expert Knowledge ◽  
Collective Learning ◽  
The Other ◽  
Current View ◽  
Public Controversy ◽  
Decision Making Processes

There was a time when the mobilization of experts was a taken-for-granted, unproblematic aspect of decision-making processes. That confidence has vanished. Ascertaining the significance of expertise now requires a reconsideration of the dynamics of controversies. The current view still assimilates controversy to the medieval exercise of the disputatio in which two parties argue one against the other. A non-reductionist view is needed to take fully into account the diversity of worlds of relevance involved in the dynamics of any public controversy. Only then is it possible to understand how decision making is predicated upon associations of worlds of relevance, and how expertise is actually a collective learning process which sets the boundary conditions for the efficacy of individual experts.

scholarly journals Age-dependency in binocular rivalry is reflected by exclusive percepts, not mixed percepts

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Elahe Arani ◽  
Raymond van Ee ◽  
Richard van Wezel
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Binocular Rivalry ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
The Other ◽  
Perceptual Decision Making ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Determining Factors ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Neural Factors ◽  
Inhibitory Interactions

AbstractSome aspects of decision-making are known to decline with normal aging. One of the known perceptual decision-making processes which is vastly studied is binocular rivalry. It is well-established that the older the person, the slower the perceptual dynamics. However, the underlying neurobiological cause is unknown. So, to understand how age affects visual decision-making, we investigated age-related changes in perception during binocular rivalry. In binocular rivalry, the image presented to one eye competes for perceptual dominance with the image presented to the other eye. Perception during binocular rivalry consists of alternations between exclusive percepts. However, frequently, mixed percepts with combinations of the two monocular images occur. The mixed percepts reflect a transition from the percept of one eye to the other but frequently the transitions do not complete the full cycle and the previous exclusive percept becomes dominant again. The transitional idiosyncrasy of mixed percepts has not been studied systematically in different age groups. Previously, we have found evidence for adaptation and noise, and not inhibition, as underlying neural factors that are related to age-dependent perceptual decisions. Based on those conclusions, we predict that mixed percepts/inhibitory interactions should not change with aging. Therefore, in an old and a young age group, we studied binocular rivalry dynamics considering both exclusive and mixed percepts by using two paradigms: percept-choice and percept-switch. We found a decrease in perceptual alternation Probability for older adults, although the rate of mixed percepts did not differ significantly compared to younger adults. Interestingly, the mixed percepts play a very similar transitional idiosyncrasy in our different age groups. Further analyses suggest that differences in synaptic depression, gain modulation at the input level, and/or slower execution of motor commands are not the determining factors to explain these findings. We then argue that changes in perceptual decisions at an older age are the result of changes in neural adaptation and noise.

Moving against Disappearance

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jens Richard Giersdorf
Keyword(s):  
East Germany ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Berlin Wall ◽  
The West ◽  
Pedestrian Movement ◽  
Political Situation ◽  
The Social ◽  
East German

Nearly a year after the fall of the Berlin Wall, East Germany was subsumed into the West German national structure. As a result, the distinct political systems, institutions, and cultures that characterized East Germany have nearly completely vanished. In some instances, this history was actively—and physically—eradicated by the unified Germany. This chapter works against the disappearance of East German culture by reconstructing the physicality of the walk across the border on the day of the opening of the Berlin Wall and two choreographic works depicting East German identities on stage. The initial re-creation of the choreography of a pedestrian movement provides a social, political, and methodological context that relates the two dance productions to the social movement of East German citizens. Both works take stances on the political situation in East Germany during and after the opening of the Berlin Wall in 1989, although one is by a West German artist, Sasha Waltz, and the other by East German choreographer Jo Fabian.

scholarly journals Technology, Public Participation, and the American Bureaucracy

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher George Torres
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Public Participation ◽  
Federal Government ◽  
Science And Technology Studies ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
Qualitative Interviews ◽  
Environmental Literacy ◽  
The Political ◽  
Policy Entrepreneurs ◽  
Decision Making Processes

This dissertation analyzes three participatory technology assessment (pTA) projects conducted within United States federal agencies between 2014 and 2018. The field of Science and Technology Studies (STS) argues that a lack of public participation in addressing issues of science and technology in society has produced undemocratic processes of decision-making with outcomes insensitive to the daily lives of the public. There has been little work in STS, however, examining what the political pressures and administrative challenges are to improving public participation in U.S. agency decision-making processes. Following a three-essay format, this dissertation aims to fill this gap. Drawing on qualitative interviews with key personnel, and bringing STS, policy studies, and public administration scholarship into conversation, this dissertation argues for the significance of “policy entrepreneurs” who from within U.S. agencies advocate for pTA and navigate the political controls on innovative forms of participation. The first essay explores how the political culture and administrative structures of the American federal bureaucracy shape the bureaucratic contexts of public participation in science and technology decision-making. The second essay is an in-depth case study of the role political controls and policy entrepreneurs played in adopting, designing, and implementing pTA in NASA’s Asteroid Initiative. The third essay is a comparative analysis of how eight political and administrative conditions informed pTA design and implementation for NASA’s Asteroid Initiative, DOE’s consent-based nuclear waste siting program, and NOAA’s Environmental Literacy Program. The results of this dissertation highlight how important the political and administrative contexts of federal government programs are to understanding how pTA is designed and implemented in agency science and technology decision-making processes, and the key role agency policy entrepreneurs play in facilitating pTA through these political and administrative contexts. This research can aid STS scholars and practitioners better anticipate and mitigate the barriers to embedding innovative forms of public participation in U.S. federal government science and technology program design and decision-making processes.

scholarly journals Leiten oder leiten lassen? Gesprächsanalytische Beobachtungen zur interaktiven Aushandlung der Leitungsfunktion im Klassenrat

2019 ◽  
Vol 70 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-104
Author(s):  
Nadine Nell-Tuor ◽  
Nina Haldimann
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Interaction Analysis ◽  
The Other ◽  
School Life ◽  
Leadership Responsibility ◽  
Teaching Format ◽  
Specific Focus ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
The One ◽  
Do So

Abstract The class council is a teaching format which takes place regularly, aiming at the teacher stepping back from his/her conventional role as the organizing authority in order to allow the students to participate directly in decision-making processes concerning their everyday school life. This format results in a unique interactional constellation among the participants. In this article, we explore this interactional constellation from the perspective of conversation and interaction analysis. On the basis of videographies of class council sessions in which students and teachers occupy different participation roles, we ask how those roles are negotiated interactively. With a specific focus on the teacher and the moderator (student), we ask to what extent the teacher is able to delegate leadership responsibility among the group. It is shown that teachers are only partly able to do so. Often, teachers influence the interaction on a multimodal level. The challenge of organizing the class council lies in the need for the participants to accomplish different (and in part incompatible) interactional orders: on the one hand, teachers as well as students have to consider their specific participation roles; on the other hand, their participation roles are framed institutionally and cannot easily be changed.

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