scholarly journals Patterned pogroms: Patronage networks as infrastructure for electoral violence in India and Indonesia

2019 ◽  
Vol 57 (1) ◽  
pp. 171-184 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ward Berenschot
Keyword(s):  
Political Competition ◽  
Religious Communities ◽  
Dark Side ◽  
Informal Networks ◽  
Everyday Functioning ◽  
Economic Changes ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Electoral Violence ◽  
Communal Violence ◽  
Social Divisions

The regular occurrence of election-related violence between ethnic or religious communities has generated a burgeoning literature on ‘the dark side’ of democracy. This literature provides convincing accounts of how political competition incentivizes politicians to foment violence. Yet such elite-oriented approaches are less convincing in explaining why and how political elites succeed in mobilizing people who do not share their concern for electoral benefits. This article addresses this challenge by relating the capacity of politicians to foment violence to the everyday functioning of patronage networks. Using ethnographic fieldwork to compare violent and nonviolent areas during Hindu–Muslim violence in Gujarat (2002) and Christian–Muslim violence in North Maluku (1999–2000), I find that the informal networks through which citizens gain access to state benefits (‘patronage networks’) shape patterns of election-related violence between religious communities. Politicians succeeded in fomenting violence in areas where citizens depended strongly on ethnicized patronage networks, while violence was averted in areas where state–citizen interaction was organized through networks that bridge religious divides. Interpreting this finding, I argue that patronage networks generate both infrastructure and incentives to organize violence. They provide the infrastructure for violence because their everyday functioning generates interdependencies between politicians and local followers that facilitate the instigation and organization of violence. Patronage networks also generate incentives for violence because when prevailing patronage networks bridge social divides, politicians relying on these networks have an interest in preventing communal violence. When socio-economic changes cause patronage networks to become organized along religious divides, as occurred in the violent areas in Gujarat and North Maluku, divisive political discourse is more likely to resonate and political actors are more likely to benefit electorally from communal violence. In this manner this article provides a novel explanation for both subnational variation in patterns of violence and the hardening of social divisions.

Labor and Development in Twenty-first-Century Latin America: Two Political Options

2018 ◽  
Vol 46 (6) ◽  
pp. 25-41
Author(s):  
Laura Carla Moisá Elicabide ◽  
Jana K. Silverman ◽  
María Piñón Pereira Dias
Keyword(s):  
State Intervention ◽  
Southern Cone ◽  
Labor Policy ◽  
First Century ◽  
Market Regulation ◽  
Wage Policy ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Social Divisions ◽  
Regulation And Supervision ◽  
The Pacific

An analysis of the results of social and labor policy in two Southern Cone countries (Uruguay and Brazil) and two members of the Pacific Alliance (Mexico and Colombia) between 2000 and 2012 focused on minimum wage policy, state intervention in labor market regulation and supervision, and relations between governments and social and political actors, especially unions, indicates that, in contrast to the situation in the progressive countries, the neoliberal policies adopted by Mexico and Colombia maintained social divisions instead of reducing them in this period. Un análisis de los resultados de la política social y laboral en dos países del Cono Sur (Uruguay y Brasil) y dos miembros de la Alianza del Pacífico (México y Colombia) entre 2000 y 2012 enfocado en la política de salario mínimo, intervención estatal en regulación y supervisión del mercado laboral, y las relaciones entre los gobiernos y los actores sociales y políticos, especialmente los sindicatos, indica que, a diferencia de la situación en los países progresistas, las políticas neoliberales adoptadas por México y Colombia mantuvieron las divisiones sociales en lugar de reducirlas en este período.

scholarly journals Public Opinion in Africa

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey Conroy-Krutz
Keyword(s):  
Public Opinion ◽  
Political Development ◽  
New Technologies ◽  
Political Competition ◽  
Political Campaigns ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
For Profit ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Health And Economic Development

Projects to measure public opinion in Africa have increased considerably in the last two decades. Earlier data-collection efforts focused on health and economic development, with limited attempts to gauge public opinion before the late 1990s. Possibilities expanded as a wave of political liberalizations swept the continent after the Cold War, and as government limitations on speech freedoms and survey research loosened. Knowledge about public opinion remains uneven, however; more surveys are conducted in wealthier, more stable, and more democratic countries. Various actors are leading these efforts. Academic and research organizations have been at the forefront, with Afrobarometer, which has conducted surveys in about two-thirds of African countries since 1999, the most prominent. The majority of studies are conducted by for-profit companies, media houses, and political campaigns, and many results are never publicly released. The growth in surveys of public opinion in Africa has had important ramifications across a number of realms. Academics have developed and tested new theories on how Africans respond to and shape their political and economic systems, and some long-standing theories have been challenged with newly available empirical evidence. Candidates and parties attempt to measure public opinion as they develop mobilizational and persuasive campaign strategies. Election observers have used survey data collected before and after voting to assess whether official results comport with citizens’ preferences. And international and domestic policymakers have increasingly used public opinion data from Africa to determine economic and political development priorities, and to assess the effectiveness of various programs. However, there is evidence that the survey enterprise in Africa is becoming increasingly politicized, with some officials attempting to block the release of potentially embarrassing results, or preventing surveys from being conducted altogether, and other political actors attacking survey organizations when they do not like what the data show. As organizations conducting public opinion surveys in Africa modify their strategies in the face of new technologies and changing political contexts, the ever-increasing availability of data on what Africans think about how their countries are and should be governed continues to fundamentally change academic understanding, policymaking, and actual political competition.

Questione morale e crisi di regime. La prima Repubblica italiana alla prova degli scandali (1992-1994)

2009 ◽  
pp. 27-42
Author(s):  
Jean Lpuis Briquet
Keyword(s):  
Political System ◽  
Political Change ◽  
Political Competition ◽  
Political Elite ◽  
Political Crisis ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Leading Role ◽  
Political Impact ◽  
Before And After

- According to the standard thesis, the political crisis in Italy between 1992 and 1994 and the collapse of the Christian Democrat regime are related to the revelation of corruption of the political elite by the judiciary. However, judicial revelations and corruption scandals have regularly occurred in Italy, before and after this crisis, without provoking a drastic political change and the reject of the political system by the electorate. Considering this paradox, the article suggests an alternate account of the 1992-1994 events that underline the way in which the political competition had been affected by the scandals: the moral crusades against corruption had in this period a political impact because they had been relayed and supported by emerging political actors in order to challenge the established elites and to claim a leading role in reshaping the political system.

scholarly journals Electoral violence and the legacy of authoritarian rule in Kenya and Zambia

2019 ◽  
Vol 57 (1) ◽  
pp. 111-125 ◽  
Author(s):  
Johan Brosché ◽  
Hanne Fjelde ◽  
Kristine Höglund
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Political Competition ◽  
Political Mobilization ◽  
Authoritarian Rule ◽  
Interethnic Relations ◽  
Ethnic Mobilization ◽  
Electoral Violence ◽  
The Core ◽  
Multiparty Politics

Why do the first multiparty elections after authoritarian rule turn violent in some countries but not in others? This article places legacies from the authoritarian past at the core of an explanation of when democratic openings become associated with electoral violence in multi-ethnic states, and complement existing research focused on the immediate conditions surrounding the elections. We argue that authoritarian rule characterized by more exclusionary multi-ethnic coalitions creates legacies that amplify the risk of violent elections during the shift to multiparty politics. Through competitive and fragmented interethnic relations, exclusionary systems foreclose the forging of cross-ethnic elite coalitions and make hostile narratives a powerful tool for political mobilization. By contrast, regimes with a broad-based ethnic support base cultivate inclusive inter-elite bargaining, enable cross-ethnic coalitions, and reduce incentives for hostile ethnic mobilization, which lower the risk of violent elections. We explore this argument by comparing founding elections in Zambia (1991), which were largely peaceful, and Kenya (1992), with large-scale state-instigated electoral violence along ethnic lines. The analysis suggests that the type of authoritarian rule created political legacies that underpinned political competition and mobilization during the first multiparty elections, and made violence a more viable electoral strategy in Kenya than in Zambia.

The ‘elected’ and the ‘excluded’: sociological perspectives on the experience of place and community in old age

2007 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 321-342 ◽  
Author(s):  
CHRIS PHILLIPSON
Keyword(s):  
Old Age ◽  
Life Histories ◽  
Local Level ◽  
Later Life ◽  
Community Change ◽  
Economic Changes ◽  
Social Divisions ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Community Attachments

This article explores various issues concerned with belonging and identity in the context of community change and residential location. It examines the changing nature of community attachments in later life, and their impacts on the quality of old age lives. It also notes the increased importance of environmental perspectives within gerontology, not least because environments are being transformed through the diverse social, cultural and economic changes associated with globalisation. The argument is developed that globalisation offers a new approach to thinking about community and environmental relationships in later life, and that the impact of global change at a local level has become an important dimension of sociological aspects of community change. It is argued that it is especially important to apply these perspectives to older people, given that many have resided in the same locality for long periods. At the same time, globalisation also gives rise to new types of movement in old age, and is constructing an expanding mix of spaces, communities and lifestyle settings. A key argument of the article, however, is that global processes are generating new social divisions, as between those able to choose residential locations consistent with their biographies and life histories, and those who experience rejection or marginalisation from their locality.

scholarly journals Issue dimensionality and party competition in turbulent times

2019 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 4-11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan Rovny ◽  
Stephen Whitefield
Keyword(s):  
Political Competition ◽  
State Of The Art ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
The Social ◽  
Turbulent Times ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Broad Framework ◽  
Ideological Structure

We start from the premise that the content of political competition is regularly remade by shifting contexts and by the strategic activity of political actors including parties. But while there are naturally thousands of potential issues on which politics can be contested, there are in practice and for good reasons ways in which structure and limits come to reduce the competition to more cognitively manageable and regularized divisions—in short, to issue dimensions. It is highly timely to return to these questions since, we argue, the social, political, and economic turbulence of recent years raises the possibility that the ideological structure of how parties present themselves to voters may be radically shifting. The papers in this special issue, therefore, each tackle an important aspect of the shifting character of the issues that underlie party competition in various European settings. In this article, we provide an overview of the relevant “state of the art” on issue dimensionality and how the subject is situated within the broad framework of understanding party competition.

scholarly journals SOCIAL MEDIA AND KOSOVO’S POLITICAL ACTORS

2021 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 193-196
Author(s):  
Ilire Zajmi
Keyword(s):  
Social Networks ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Mass Communication ◽  
Information Dissemination ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Political Competition ◽  
Modern Society ◽  
Traditional Media ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
The Social

Social media are changing the nature of mass communication, demediating traditional media. They are being used as powerful platforms for the distribution and dissemination of information, activities, promotion of institutions, certain groups of interest of individuals, but also political actors for different purposes.Placing and disseminating information through the opportunities offered by social media enables the mobilization of a wider audience in new ways and ways. Politicians are exploiting these opportunities provided by social networks, without having to put information through journalists or traditional media. There are two theories in the literature regarding the use of social networks, optimistic and pessimistic theory. According to optimistic theory, social networks provide opportunities to compete for power. Theorists of this theory of using social media think that in the digital age, we are witnessing the transformation of information and the audience that uses them. According to them, the global success of social media has made it possible for everyone to connect directly to his audience through the platforms offered. With the use of these platforms, politicians gain attention and at the same time build a symmetrical or asymmetric relationship with their followers.Pessimistic theory, however, blames the social media for the use of false promise, and a pseudo-modernization of modern society. Studies believe that involvement in social networks and political actors at the same time implies a greater engagement of the audience that absorbs the information disclosed and affects the democratization of political competition. This paper aims to analyze the use of social networks as a means of information dissemination by Kosovar political actors and the content of the information being disclosed.The paper analyzes the posts of three key Kosovar politicians, Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj, President Hashim Thaçi and Kosovo Assembly Speaker Kadri Veseli in their profiles on Facebook and Twitter social networks during a one-month monitoring period during May 2019

scholarly journals RELIGIOUS IDENTIFICATION AND SOCIAL DISTANCE BETWEEN RELIGIOUS GROUPS IN YOGYAKARTA

2016 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 141 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cahyo Pamungkas
Keyword(s):  
Religious Identity ◽  
Social Distance ◽  
Rural Areas ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Religious Groups ◽  
Economic Changes ◽  
Communal Violence ◽  
Religious Identification ◽  
Religious Fundamentalist ◽  
Urban And Rural Areas

This paper explains how political, religious, and economic changes in Yogyakarta affect the formation of religious identity and social distance between different religious groups. The strengthening of religious identity in this area took place in the period of the Diponegoro War (1825-1830) when religious issues were used in the mobilization against the Dutch colonialist. Then, the spread of Christianity in Java at the end of 19th led to several tensions between missionaries and several Islamic organizations, but never developed into communal violence. In 1930s, the relation between religious groups remain harmonious due to the development of tolerant culture and pluralism. During the 1980s, the use of religious identity grew both in urban and rural areas in line with social processes of modernization. Da’wat activities on Campus (Lembaga Dakwah Kampus) plays important roles in promoting religious life in urban areas. The 1998 political reform marked the rise of religious fundamentalist movements that to a certain degree contributes to social distance between religious groups.

Democratization Theories and Turkey

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ekrem Karakoç
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Religious Communities ◽  
Independent Effect ◽  
Modernization Theory ◽  
Future Studies ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
State Dependent ◽  
Fertile Ground ◽  
Support For Democracy ◽  
Dependent State

This chapter investigates whether the major approaches in democratization literature offer satisfactory explanations for Turkey’s recent transition to unstable authoritarianism. It argues that modernization theory has a limited explanation for the rise of authoritarianism in recent years. The causation between democratization and development flows from the former to the latter in the Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi era. Business and major unions have been, mostly if not all the time, state-dependent/state-led actors, and their impact on democratization does not have a strong independent effect. While (medium) leverage and (high) linkage with Europe and the West were crucial in the startling pro-democratic reforms (2000–2005), later on they did not save Turkey from being an authoritarian country. Studies on Turkish political culture suggest that support for democracy among elite and public opinion is highly contextual. Among subfields of democratization literature, Turkish studies have notably contributed to the debate on secularism. Future studies could focus on a kind of political Islam enmeshed within nationalism, especially in the form of Turkish-Islam ideology, as well as differences in religious communities and their alliance with political actors. Overall, Turkish studies offers a fertile ground to contribute to the democratization literature that investigates the uneasy relationship between nationalism, national identity, and democracy.

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