scholarly journals Political corruption in Italy

2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (3) ◽  
pp. 324-334
Author(s):  
Carlo Guarnieri ◽  
Cristina Dallara ◽  
Michele Sapignoli

At least since the 1990s, corruption has continued to be listed as one of the major shortcomings affecting old and new European democracies. In spite of that, measuring political corruption is still a tricky task. In this scenario, some recent studies proposed to turn the attention to the judicial actions to curb corruption, through criminal prosecution, shedding light specifically on the investigations involving high-level politicians (Popova and Post 2018; Dallara 2019).  In this paper we aim to present data about judicial prosecution of political corruption in Italy, emphasizing how the number of investigations involving political actors seems rather high, although relatively few cases end with a conviction. Moreover, we aim to suggest some explanatory factors that could account for this situation. Among them: the salience of the issue in the political and public debate; the governance structure of the Italian judicial system and some characters of the Italian criminal law and procedure.

2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 210
Author(s):  
Didi Febriyandi

This paper looks at how the political dynamics that occurred in the Sebatik City expansion process in 2006-2012. The process of regional expansion can be understood as a political phenomenon by involving long administrative and political processes. This paper focuses on looking at political aspects so that it discusses in detail the interests of actors and how these actors articulate their interests. The research method used is descriptive qualitative. Primary data collection techniques are done through observation, structured interviews. For secondary data collection is done by documentation and library techniques.The results showed that the political process is complicated because it involves many interests of political actors making the Sebatik City expansion not realized until now. Although academic studies declared eligible and supported by the majority of Sebatik Island, high-level negotiations-negotiations have failed to realize Sebatik as Daera h Autonomy New (DOB). The political process that occurred did not create a consensus so that there was a conflict of interests that ultimately made the Sebatik City Expansion process hampered. Key Words: decentralization, regional autonomy, outer islands, division


2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 53-80
Author(s):  
Stanislav Sheverdyaev ◽  
Alina Shenfeldt

As a result of intensive international debate and the adoption of a number of renowned international anticorruption conventions and initiatives in the 1990s and 2000s, the issue of corruption has become a convenient theme for different kinds of generalizations in social sciences. However, national legislation does not reflect these developments in its legal regulation due to conservatism inherent in jurisprudence. One of the most evident gaps in this respect is the sphere of political corruption. While political science and political economy for decades have been successful in explaining political processes in different countries as corrupt conspiracies of political elites, business structures, and other actors in the political process, legal science has kept itself separate from such problems and prefers to deal with individual acts of corruption. But if for criminal law such an approach seems logical due to the methodology of the criminal law, for other branches of law which set forth a systemic view on social processes – primarily administrative and constitutional – there seems to be an omission.Nowadays, there is a quite favourable environment for the development of a consistent legal understanding of anticorruption in Russia. This has become possible thanks to current Russian administrative reforms, when the need for a highly professional bureaucracy led to a greater demand for various anticorruption mechanisms. The next possible step in Russia may be an attempt to ensure the effectiveness of well-proven anti-corruption methods of the political system as a whole.In this article we propose a brief background to the evolution of the concept of political corruption in Western and Russian political and legal science, which entails the necessity of complex scientific legal synthesis on this issue, allows to discuss the existing methodological potential and creates new opportunities to build up appropriate systemic legislative models.


2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 155-170
Author(s):  
Darya I. Judina ◽  
◽  
Sergei A. Ivanov ◽  

The Internet as a special space for political activity and political communication is becoming more and more attractive to political actors. The intensification of political activity on the Internet leads to the increase of researchers’ interest. One of the prominent areas of this research is the analysis of the efficiency of communication strategies used by politically oriented communities on the Internet. The results of such assessment contribute to, in particular, characterizing the level and features of the political engagement of Internet users into political processes. To study these processes, a telephone survey of residents of St. Petersburg was conducted. St. Petersburg was chosen because it is one of the largest cities in Russia with high Internet coverage and a high level of political activity compared to other regions. The results showed that politically oriented communities effectively implement primary communication strategies — information and presentation. More than two-thirds of politically active Internet users in St. Petersburg noted that visiting the relevant resources helped them to understand the political situation, to define their attitude toward parties, politicians, social movements and organizations. At the same time, the strategy of supporting political identification has not yet worked for the majority of users. Perhaps this is a consequence of the fact that the majority of St. Petersburg citizens have not yet found appropriate political leaders and organizations. The authors found that the majority of Internet users display an interest in politics permanently, and not only during the pre-election period. The hypothesis that one of the factors of an efficient strategy of politically oriented communities is emphasizing anti-power positions was confirmed. The survey results also confirmed the high level of opposition views among Internet users.


Author(s):  
Francesc-Andreu MARTÍNEZ GALLEGO

LABURPENA: Lan hau komunikabideen eta ustelkeria politikoaren arteko harremanei buruzkoa da. Lanaren estrategia komunikabideek gobernatzaileen eta gobernatuen arteko harremanak hedatzeko bitarteko aktiboak bezala duten jarrera agertzea da, hau da, komunikabideek ustelkeriari buruz emandako informazioa izan ez dadin prentsaren jatorrietatik datorren ataza soila, hots, askatasun publikoen eta gobernu onaren watchdog or atari-txakur lana. Gauzak horrela, komunikabideak aktore politikoak dira, interes partikularrak dituzte eta egitateekiko elkarrekintza dute, eta egitate horiei garrantzia ematen diete (edo ez), interesen arabera. Ustelkeria politikoko eskandaluak kazetaritzako argitan, komunikabideen enpresen interesen arabera eta sistema politikoaren eta komunikabide sistemaren arteko harremanak kontuan izanda aztertu behar dira. Horrela soilik ahal izango diogu lana honen funtsari ekin, alegia: zer egin dezakete komunikabideek demokraziaren kalitatea handitzeko, hau da, ustelkeria politikoa bertatik erauzi edo, gutxienez, mugatzeko? RESUMEN: El presente trabajo es un estudio crítico sobre la relación existente entre medios de comunicación y corrupción política. La estrategia del mismo consiste en desvelar la posición de los medios de comunicación como mediatizadores activos de la relación entre gobernantes y gobernados, de manera que la información sobre corrupción producida por los medios no se vea como el mero cumplimiento de una tarea asignada desde sus orígenes ilustrados a la prensa, a saber, su labor de watchdog o perro guardián de las libertades públicas y del buen gobierno. Vistas así las cosas, los medios se configuran como actores políticos con intereses particulares que interaccionan con los hechos y a los que confieren (o no) la entidad de noticiables en grados diversos. Los escándalos de corrupción política deben estudiarse a la luz de las narrativas periodísticas, a la luz de los condicionamientos empresariales de los medios y a la luz de la configuración de las relaciones entre el sistema político y el sistema mediático. Sólo así podremos encarar la cuestión de fondo que se plantea al final de este trabajo y que pregunta qué pueden hacer los medios de comunicación para acrecentar la calidad de la democracia extirpando o al menos limitando en ella la corrupción política. ABSTRACT: This work is a critical analysis about the relationship between mass media and political corruption. Its strategy is to unveil the mass media position as an activ mediator in the relationship between governers and governeds so that information about corruption by the media cannot be seen as the simple fullfilment of an assigned task to the press since its Enlightment origins, i.e. their job of watchdog or guard dog for public liberties and good governance. As things stand, mass media are configured as political actors with particular interests that interact with facts to which the give (or not) a gradual entity of political newsworthiness. The scandals of political corruption should be studied in the light of journalistic narratives, corporate constraints of the mass media and the setting of relationships among the political and the media system. Only this way we will be able to face the underlying issue that arises at the end of this work and that questions what mass media can do in order to improve the quality of democracy by removing or at least constraining within the political corruption.


2018 ◽  
Vol 51 (3) ◽  
pp. 231-244 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Popova ◽  
Vincent Post

Do Eastern European courts effectively constrain politicians and uphold the rule of law? Criminal prosecution of grand (high-level) corruption can further the central principle of equal responsibility under the law by demonstrating that even powerful political actors have to submit to the laws of the land. This article introduces the Eastern European Corruption Prosecution Database, which contains entries for all cabinet ministers (927 in total) who served in a government that held office in one of seven post-Communist Eastern European countries since the late 1990s. The systematic data collection reveals that Bulgaria, Romania and Macedonia consistently indict more ministers than Croatia, the Czech Republic, and Poland; Slovakia has barely indicted anyone. We aim to start a research agenda by formulating hypotheses about which countries will see more corruption prosecutions and which ministers’ characteristics would make them more likely to face the court. We use the database to begin testing these hypotheses and find some evidence for several associations. We find no strong evidence that EU conditionality or membership raises the profile of the grand corruption issue or leads to more indictments. Party politics seems to affect the frequency of corruption indictments more than the structure and behavior of legal institutions. Indictment rates are lower when a former Communist party controls the government and individual ministers from junior coalition partners are more vulnerable to indictment than other ministers. The existence of a specialized anti-corruption prosecution or a more independent judiciary do not seem to lead to the indictment of more ministers on corruption charges. Finally, we discuss avenues of future research that our database opens, both for the analysis of country-level and individual-level variation.


2008 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 139-155 ◽  
Author(s):  
YAEL DARR

This article describes a crucial and fundamental stage in the transformation of Hebrew children's literature, during the late 1930s and 1940s, from a single channel of expression to a multi-layered polyphony of models and voices. It claims that for the first time in the history of Hebrew children's literature there took place a doctrinal confrontation between two groups of taste-makers. The article outlines the pedagogical and ideological designs of traditionalist Zionist educators, and suggests how these were challenged by a group of prominent writers of adult poetry, members of the Modernist movement. These writers, it is argued, advocated autonomous literary creation, and insisted on a high level of literary quality. Their intervention not only dramatically changed the repertoire of Hebrew children's literature, but also the rules of literary discourse. The article suggests that, through the Modernists’ polemical efforts, Hebrew children's literature was able to free itself from its position as an apparatus controlled by the political-educational system and to become a dynamic and multi-layered field.


Moreana ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 50 (Number 193- (3-4) ◽  
pp. 54-73
Author(s):  
Nicolas Tenaillon

As a renowned jurist first and then as a top politician, Thomas More has never given up researching about a judicial system where all the fields of justice would be harmonized around a comprehensive logic. From criminal law to divine providence, Utopia, despite its eccentricities, proposes a coherent model of Christian-inspired collective living, based on a concern for social justice, something that was terribly neglected during the early 16th century English monarchy. Not only did History prove many of More’s intuitions right, but above all, it gave legitimacy to the utopian genre in its task of imagining the future progress of human justice and of contributing to its coming.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 149-154
Author(s):  
YURI FRANCIFOROV ◽  
◽  
MARINA BARANOVA

The purpose of the article is to consider the peculiarities of investigative and judicial actions that are caused by their postponement, the inability to attract a lawyer, as well as the suspension of the preliminary investigation during the period of emergency measures taken by the government of the Russian Federation in response to the outbreak of the coronavirus infection pandemic (COVID-19). The authorsanalyze the features of the courts activity in connection with the coronavirus pandemic, which is associated with minimizing the personal reception of citizens and submitting documents via electronic Internet reception offices of courts or by Russian Post, as well as the possibility of conducting online court sessions. The authors come to the conclusion that the judicial system was not sufficiently prepared for the pandemic, and therefore it is urgently necessary to adopt a special normative act that would regulate the implementation of judicial proceedings in emergency situations, allowing to continue to consider urgent cases, including materials on the election, extension, cancellation or change of a preventive measure.


Author(s):  
Yaroslav Skoromnyy ◽  

The article examines the features of the formation (genesis) of legal responsibility of judges in Ukraine (from Kievan Rus to the present day). It has been proven that at present there are many problems regarding the criminal (legal) responsibility of judges. It was found that judges are insufficiently protected from manifestations of criminal prosecution, which, in turn, affects the increase in loyalty to the prosecution, in contrast to the defense in the criminal process. It has been established that today there are no perfect mechanisms for appealing the inaction of judges in court. It was determined that bringing judges to disciplinary responsibility in the High Council of Justice does not fully comply with the requirements of the European Charter on the Status of Judges. Based on the results of the legal analysis of the activities of the institutions of judicial responsibility, it was found that modern methods of bringing judges to justice in Ukraine are imperfect, often contradictory, and in some cases allow judges to avoid responsibility. It has been established that the issue of civil liability of judges for carrying out wrong actions against citizens today requires an urgent solution, since the legal literature does not fully disclose the provisions that govern the conditions, grounds and procedure for holding judges accountable for resolving unfair sentences and implementing illegal actions that entail material and/or moral damage to citizens. It has been determined that for harm caused as a result of an unjust court decision made by a judge, as well as due to the judge's inaction, property liability is imposed on the state, since the judge conducting the proceedings acts on behalf of the state, that is, Ukraine. It was found that today a judge can be brought to disciplinary responsibility in cases determined in accordance with the Law of Ukraine «On the Judicial System and the Status of Judges».


2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 135-143
Author(s):  
Irina V. Rudneva

The article examines the issue of how, under the conditions of growing nationalism in the Socialist Republic of Croatia in the late 1960s, Miloš Žanko, one of the Croatian leaders, bravely opposed the political trends, which threatened both the region and his country. In the newspapers and magazines, at the Party congresses, he entered into harsh polemics with Croatian nationalists, who were exposing their insidious schemes and defending the idea of brotherhood and unity. However, Žanko did not anticipate how deeply nationalist ideology was rooted and how strong it was in Croatia, at what a high level of the establishment this ideology was supported, and what price the person who was daring to oppose it would have to pay.


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