Conclusion

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sona N. Golder ◽  
Ignacio Lago ◽  
André Blais ◽  
Elisabeth Gidengil ◽  
Thomas Gschwend
Keyword(s):  
National Level ◽  
Second Order ◽  
Political Behaviour ◽  
Electoral Democracy ◽  
Multi Level

The goal of this book has been to examine in detail the micro mechanisms underlying the aggregate patterns described by the second-order election model commonly used to study multi-level elections. The book builds on existing work showing that the incentives provided by multiple arenas affect political behaviour and show that these effects are heterogeneous across parties and voters and across regions and countries. Multi-level governance complicates the study of elections but it also creates greater variation, and this variation allows richer theories about party and voter behaviour to be tested. As the importance of electoral arenas beyond the national level increases across ever more countries, it is imperative that those theories help us to understand the implications not just for parties and voters but for the quality of electoral democracy.

Multi-Level Electoral Politics

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sona N. Golder ◽  
Ignacio Lago ◽  
André Blais ◽  
Elisabeth Gidengil ◽  
Thomas Gschwend
Keyword(s):  
Level Structure ◽  
National Level ◽  
Electoral Politics ◽  
Second Order ◽  
National Elections ◽  
Systematic Analysis ◽  
Party Elites ◽  
Subnational Elections ◽  
The Media ◽  
Multi Level

National-level elections receive more attention from scholars and the media than elections at other levels, even though in many European countries the importance of both regional and European levels of government has grown in recent years. The growing importance of multiple electoral arenas suggests that scholars should be cautious about examining single levels in isolation. Taking the multi-level structure of electoral politics seriously requires a re-examination of how the incentives created by electoral institutions affect the behaviour of voters and party elites. The standard approach to analysing multi-level elections is the second-order election model, in which national elections are considered to be first-order elections while other elections are second order. However, this model does not provide micro mechanisms that determine how elections in one arena affect those in another, or explain variations in individual voting behaviour. The objective of this book is to explain how party and voter behaviour in a given election is affected by the existence of multiple electoral arenas. This book uses original qualitative and quantitative data to examine European, national, and subnational elections in France, Germany, and Spain from 2011 to 2015. Party mobilization efforts across multiple electoral arenas are examined, as well as decisions by individual voters with respect to turnout, strategic voting, and accountability. This book provides the first systematic analysis of multi-level electoral politics at three different levels across multiple countries.

Turnout in Multi-Level Systems

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sona N. Golder ◽  
Ignacio Lago ◽  
André Blais ◽  
Elisabeth Gidengil ◽  
Thomas Gschwend
Keyword(s):  
National Level ◽  
The Body ◽  
Political Community ◽  
The Political ◽  
European Level ◽  
National Elections ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
European Elections ◽  
Multi Level ◽  
Different Levels

Voters face different incentives to turn out to vote in one electoral arena versus another. Although turnout is lowest in European elections, it is found that the turnout is only slightly lower in regional than in national elections. Standard accounts suggest that the importance of an election, in terms of the policy-making power of the body to be elected, drives variation in turnout across elections at different levels. This chapter argues that this is only part of the story, and that voter attachment to a particular level also matters. Not all voters feel connected to each electoral arena in the same way. Although for some, their identity and the issues they most care about are linked to politics at the national level, for others, the regional or European level may offer the political community and political issues that most resonate with them.

Constitutional Pluralism and Transnational Justice

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alec Stone Sweet ◽  
Clare Ryan
Keyword(s):  
National Level ◽  
Legal Order ◽  
Rights Protection ◽  
National Courts ◽  
European Court ◽  
Transnational Justice ◽  
Multi Level ◽  
Constitutional Pluralism ◽  
Combined Impact ◽  
Proportionality Principle

In Europe, a cosmopolitan legal order was instantiated through the combined impact of Protocol no. 11 of the ECHR (1998), and the incorporation of the Convention into national legal systems. As a result, two processes—(i) the evolution of constitutional pluralism at the national level; and (ii) the development of rights protection at the transnational level—became causally connected to one another. The first undermined traditional models of domestic orders wherein the notions of constitutional unity and centralized sovereignty reinforced one another. The second process created a multi-level legal system whose effectiveness depends on the extent to which the European Court is able to induce and sustain the cooperation of national courts and officials. The constitutionalization of the proportionality principle, at both the domestic and transnational levels, provided a doctrinal interface for inter-jurisdictional dialogue, and the collective enforcement of the UPR.

scholarly journals More comprehensively measuring quality of life in life-threatening illness: the McGill Quality of Life Questionnaire – Expanded

2019 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Robin Cohen ◽  
Lara B. Russell ◽  
Anne Leis ◽  
Javad Shahidi ◽  
Pat Porterfield ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Quality Of Life ◽  
Second Order ◽  
Model Fit ◽  
Life Questionnaire ◽  
Quality Of Life Questionnaire ◽  
Healthcare Environment ◽  
Life Threatening Illness ◽  
Life Threatening ◽  
Order Factor

Abstract Background Domains other than those commonly measured (physical, psychological, social, and sometimes existential/spiritual) are important to the quality of life of people with life-threatening illness. The McGill Quality of Life Questionnaire (MQOL) – Revised measures the four common domains. The aim of this study was to create a psychometrically sound instrument, MQOL – Expanded, to comprehensively measure quality of life by adding to MQOL-Revised the domains of cognition, healthcare, environment, (feeling like a) burden, and possibly, finance. Methods Confirmatory factor analyses were conducted on three datasets to ascertain whether seven new items belonged with existing MQOL-Revised domains, whether good model fit was obtained with their addition as five separate domains to MQOL-Revised, and whether a second-order factor representing overall quality of life was present. People with life-threatening illnesses (mainly cancer) or aged > 80 were recruited from 15 healthcare sites in seven Canadian provinces. Settings included: palliative home care and inpatient units; acute care units; oncology outpatient clinics. Results Good model fit was obtained when adding each of the five domains separately to MQOL-Revised and for the nine correlated domains. Fit was acceptable for a second-order factor model. The financial domain was removed because of low importance. The resulting MQOL-Expanded is a 21-item instrument with eight domains (fit of eight correlated domains: Comparative Fit Index = .96; Root Mean Square Error of Approximation = .033). Conclusions MQOL-Expanded builds on MQOL-Revised to more comprehensively measure the quality of life of people with life-threatening illness. Our analyses provide validity evidence for the MQOL-Expanded domain and summary scores; the need for further validation research is discussed. Use of MQOL-Expanded will enable a more holistic understanding of the quality of life of people with a life-threatening illness and the impact of treatments and interventions upon it. It will allow for a better understanding of less commonly assessed but important life domains (cognition, healthcare, environment, feeling like a burden) and their relationship to the more commonly assessed domains (physical, psychological, social, existential/spiritual).

scholarly journals Winning, Losing, and the Quality of Democracy

2021 ◽  
pp. 003232172110261
Author(s):  
Richard Nadeau ◽  
Jean-François Daoust ◽  
Ruth Dassonneville
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Study ◽  
Electoral Systems ◽  
Motivated Reasoning ◽  
Quality Of Democracy ◽  
Electoral Democracy ◽  
Democratic Systems ◽  
The Comparative Study

Citizens who voted for a party that won the election are more satisfied with democracy than those who did not. This winner–loser gap has recently been found to vary with the quality of electoral democracy: the higher the quality of democracy, the smaller the gap. However, we do not know what drives this relationship. Is it driven by losers, winners, or both? And Why? Linking our work to the literature on motivated reasoning and macro salience and benefiting from the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems project—covering 163 elections in 51 countries between 1996 and 2018, our results show that the narrower winner–loser gap in well-established electoral democracies is not only a result of losers being more satisfied with democracy, but also of winners being less satisfied with their victory. Our findings carry important implications since a narrow winner–loser gap appears as a key feature of healthy democratic systems.

Content of antenatal care and perception about services provided by primary hospitals in Nepal: a convergent mixed methods study

2021 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yubraj Acharya ◽  
Nigel James ◽  
Rita Thapa ◽  
Saman Naz ◽  
Rishav Shrestha ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Quality Of Care ◽  
Mixed Methods ◽  
Antenatal Care ◽  
Quality Care ◽  
National Level ◽  
Poor Quality ◽  
Public Hospitals ◽  
World Health ◽  
Outcome Variable

Abstract Background Nepal has made significant strides in maternal and neonatal mortality over the last three decades. However, poor quality of care can threaten the gains, as maternal and newborn services are particularly sensitive to quality of care. Our study aimed to understand current gaps in the process and the outcome dimensions of the quality of antenatal care (ANC), particularly at the sub-national level. We assessed these dimensions of the quality of ANC in 17 primary, public hospitals across Nepal. We also assessed the variation in the ANC process across the patients’ socio-economic gradient. Methods We used a convergent mixed methods approach, whereby we triangulated qualitative and quantitative data. In the quantitative component, we observed interactions between providers (17 hospitals from all 7 provinces) and 198 women seeking ANC and recorded the tasks the providers performed, using the Service Provision Assessments protocol available from the Demographic and Health Survey program. The main outcome variable was the number of tasks performed by the provider during an ANC consultation. The tasks ranged from identifying potential signs of danger to providing counseling. We analyzed the resulting data descriptively and assessed the relationship between the number of tasks performed and users’ characteristics. In the qualitative component, we synthesized users’ and providers’ narratives on perceptions of the overall quality of care obtained through focus group discussions and in-depth interviews. Results Out of the 59 tasks recommended by the World Health Organization, providers performed only 22 tasks (37.3%) on average. The number of tasks performed varied significantly across provinces, with users in province 3 receiving significantly higher quality care than those in other provinces. Educated women were treated better than those with no education. Users and providers agreed that the overall quality of care was inadequate, although providers mentioned that the current quality was the best they could provide given the constraints they faced. Conclusion The quality of ANC in Nepal’s primary hospitals is poor and inequitable across education and geographic gradients. While current efforts, such as the provision of 24/7 birthing centers, can mitigate gaps in service availability, additional equipment, infrastructure and human resources will be needed to improve quality. Providers also need additional training focused on treating patients from different backgrounds equally. Our study also points to the need for additional research, both to document the quality of care more objectively and to establish key determinants of quality to inform policy.

Influence of community satisfaction with individual happiness: comparative study in semi-urban and rural areas of Tikapur, Nepal

2017 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 22-32 ◽  
Author(s):  
Myung-Bae Park ◽  
Chun-Bae Kim ◽  
Chhabi Ranabhat ◽  
Chang-Soo Kim ◽  
Sei-Jin Chang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Rural Areas ◽  
Physical Environment ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Positive Relationship ◽  
National Level ◽  
Medical Services ◽  
Community Satisfaction ◽  
Critical Factors ◽  
Urban And Rural Areas

Happiness is a subjective indicator of overall living conditions and quality of life. Recently, community- and national-level investigations connecting happiness and community satisfaction were conducted. This study investigated the effects of community satisfaction on happiness in Nepal. A factor analysis was employed to examine 24 items that are used to measure community satisfaction, and a multiple regression analysis was conducted to investigate the effects of these factors on happiness. In semi-urban areas, sanitation showed a positive relationship with happiness. In rural areas, edu-medical services were negatively related to happiness, while agriculture was positively related. Gender and perceived health were closely associated with happiness in rural areas. Both happiness and satisfaction are subjective concepts, and are perceived differently depending on the socio-physical environment and personal needs. Sanitation, agriculture (food) and edu-medical services were critical factors that affected happiness; however, the results of this study cannot be generalized to high-income countries.

Dynamic endogeneity and corporate governance-performance relationship

2017 ◽  
Vol 44 (5) ◽  
pp. 727-744
Author(s):  
Sujani Thrikawala ◽  
Stuart Locke ◽  
Krishna Reddy
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Governance ◽  
National Level ◽  
Estimation Method ◽  
Estimation Methods ◽  
Governance System ◽  
Past Performance ◽  
Gmm Estimation ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Dynamic Framework

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between corporate governance (CG) and microfinance institution (MFI) performance, using a dynamic panel generalised method of moments (GMM) estimator to mitigate the serious issues with endogeneity. Design/methodology/approach Inconsistent findings and a general lack of empirical results for the microfinance industry leave an unclear message regarding the impacts of CG on MFI performance, especially in emerging economies. The authors use GMM estimation techniques to examine whether CG has an influence on MFI performance. Findings This study confirms that the MFIs’ contemporaneous performance and CG characteristics are statistically significantly positively linked with their past performance. This study finds statistically significant governance effects on MFI performance, including the presence of international directors and/or donor representatives on the board, client representatives on the board, percentage of non-executive directors and the quality of the national governance system. Practical implications These findings provide some insights for policy-makers and practitioners to develop suitable policies and guidelines to streamline MFIs’ operations in emerging countries. Moreover, national and international investors and donors may use these finding as a benchmark for their investment and funding decisions. Originality/value This paper is the first to estimate the CG and performance relationship of MFIs in a dynamic framework by applying the GMM estimation method. This approach improves upon traditional estimation methods by controlling the likely sources of endogeneity. Further, this paper examines whether quality of national-level governance characteristics is related to performance measures of profitability and outreach of MFIs.

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