A theory of self-governance: de facto constitutions as filters

2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 127-147
Author(s):  
Alexander William Salter ◽  
Justin Callais
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Property Rights ◽  
Political Power ◽  
The Other ◽  
Institutional Features ◽  
The One ◽  
Predictable Characteristics ◽  
Public Decision ◽  
Public Decision Making

What is self-governance, and under what sets of institutions is it possible? This article explores this question from the perspective of informal (de facto) constitutionalism. The dominant approach, grounded in formal constitutionalism, overlooks crucial institutional features that determine whether governance is something done by individuals to themselves, as opposed to something done by some individuals to others. Understanding self-governance requires not only identifying the durable procedures for public decision-making, but also appreciating how these procedures act as filters that select for the acquisition of political power by individuals with specific and predictable characteristics. The article develops a novel constitutional typology based on the structure of political property rights, on the one hand, and the kinds of individuals that govern, on the other, and use this typology to discover the types of polities most likely to be self-governing.

scholarly journals Die proses van partikuliere en openbare besluitneming

1983 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 80-87
Author(s):  
S. S. Brand
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Public ◽  
Private And Public ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
The One ◽  
Two Sectors ◽  
Public Decision ◽  
Public Decision Making

Private and public decision-making The interaction between the private and public sectors is important in South Africa. Much criticism is expressed by the one sector against the other. This can be partly attributed to an incomplete understanding of the processes of decision-making in the two sectors, and of the differences between them. A comparison is drawn between the most important elements of the decision-making processes in the two sectors. Public decision-making deals mostly with matters concerning the community and the economy as a whole, whereas private decision-making is concerned mostly with parts of the whole. The aims at which decision-making in the two sectors are directed, differ accordingly, as do the perceptions of the respective decision-makers of the environment in which they make decisions. As a consequence, the criteria for the success of a decision also differ substantially between the two sectors. The implications of these differences between private and public decision-making for the approach to inflation and the financing of housing, are dealt with as examples. Finally, differences between the ways in which decisions are implemented in the two sectors, also appear to be an important cause of much of the criticism from the private sector about decision-making in the public sector.

scholarly journals Il governo del consumo di territorio

2012 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
The Other ◽  
Metropolitan Regions ◽  
The World ◽  
Good Government ◽  
Urban Contexts ◽  
Public Decision ◽  
Public Decision Making

(Good) government of the consumption of the territory is now one of the most difficult challenges facing planning and all the other sciences that contribute to the design of effective urban and territorial policies. With a view to contributing to debate on such issues, the authors reflect on the new forms of public decision-making, on the potential of territorial equalisation and on other sizing mechanisms, with reference both to the areas under transformation and the consolidated urban contexts. Based on an in-depth investigation of regeneration, requalification and densification projects for urban areas or metropolitan regions in Italy, Europe or the rest of the world, the text suggests various strategies for intervention with reference to the Tuscan case.

Ways to increase inclusiveness in public decision-making

2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (2 (118)) ◽  
pp. 28-34
Author(s):  
IRINA P. SIDORCHUK ◽  
◽  
ANTON A. PARFENCHIK ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Public Decision ◽  
Public Decision Making

scholarly journals Theology at Thresholds: Learning from a Practice ‘In Transition’

2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-62 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rachel Muers ◽  
Rhiannon Grant
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
The Other ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Theological Ethics ◽  
Reciprocal Influence ◽  
Core Practices ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Collective Process ◽  
The One ◽  
Over Time

Recent developments in contemporary theology and theological ethics have directed academic attention to the interrelationships of theological claims, on the one hand, and core community-forming practices, on the other. This article considers the value for theology of attending to practice at the boundaries, the margins, or, as we prefer to express it, the threshold of a community’s institutional or liturgical life. We argue that marginal or threshold practices can offer insights into processes of theological change – and into the mediation between, and reciprocal influence of, ‘church’ and ‘world’. Our discussion focuses on an example from contemporary British Quakerism. ‘Threshing meetings’ are occasions at which an issue can be ‘threshed out’ as part of a collective process of decision-making. Drawing on a 2015 small-scale study (using a survey and focus group) of British Quaker attitudes to and experiences of threshing meetings, set in the wider context of Quaker tradition, we interpret these meetings as a space for working through – in context and over time – tensions within Quaker theology, practice and self-understandings, particularly those that emerge within, and in relation to, core practices of Quaker decision-making.

Lessing's Treatment of the Story of the Ring, and its Teaching

PMLA ◽  
1901 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 107-116
Author(s):  
W. H. Carruth
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
The Other ◽  
Outward Appearance ◽  
Final Version ◽  
Good Works ◽  
Relative Value ◽  
Healing Power ◽  
Divine Origin ◽  
The One ◽  
Point Of Departure

In Westermann's Monatshefte for January, 1891, and later in his ‘Life of Lessing,‘ Professor Erich Schmidt has outlined the chief features of the history and transformations of the story of the three rings in Europe. On examination it will be found that all the versions of the story belong to one or the other of two types, which are represented by the two earliest forms of the story preserved to us. The oldest version, that of the Spanish Jew Salomo ben Verga, tells of two rings or jewels only, which were in outward appearance exactly alike, and there is no question of one being genuine and the other false, but only of the relative value of the two. In the absence of the father it is found impossible to decide the question, and thus the decision between Christianity and Judaism is simply avoided. In Li Dis dou vrai aniel, a French poem of the end of the twelfth century, three rings appear, and to the original or genuine ring is attributed a marvelous healing power by which it may be recognized, and following which a decision is arrived at among the three religions, in this case in favor of Christianity, although ther were not wanting later narrators so bold as to hint that the true ring was possessed by Judaism. The version of Etienne de Bourbon, the versions of the Cento Novelle, the three versions of the Gesta Romanorum, all belong to one or the other of two types. We may refer to these two types as the Spanish type and the French type. Those of the first type, to which belongs also the version of Boccaccio, the one from which Lessing took his point of departure, avoid a decision, implying that all religions are equally authoritative, but without inherent or inner evidence of their quality. Those of the second type, to which in many of its features Lessing's final version of the story is allied, lead to a decision, making religion of divine origin indeed, but supplying a test, that of good works, whereby the true religion may be recognized.

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