scholarly journals State Bastardisation And Terrorism In Nigeria: A Discourse

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 37-46
Author(s):  
Enoch Ndem Okon ◽  
Dodeye Uduak Williams ◽  
Godwin. S Mmaduabuchi Okeke
Keyword(s):  
Citizenship Education ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
Integration Policy ◽  
The Public ◽  
Analysis Techniques ◽  
Secondary Sources ◽  
Private Lives ◽  
Terrorist Groups ◽  
Political Advantage

Abstract This paper seeks to unearth and analyse the variables which promote and sustain primordial groups’ identities and their linkages to the emergence and sustenance of terrorist groups in Nigeria. Grounded in the pluralist theory of sovereignty, the study adopts historical research design. It relies solely on data from secondary sources, which are presented qualitatively, and the finding is analysed using content analysis techniques. The study reveals that the promotion of primordial identities above national identity for political advantage by the political elites leads to state bastardisation in Nigeria. Besides, it identifies the apostolical promotion of some neoliberal values without corresponding citizenship education, as responsible for the emergence of Boko Haram and other such groups that challenge the sovereignty and legitimacy of the Nigerian state. It also questions the continuous promotion of religion in the public domain in a secular state and concludes that genuine integration policy is an urgent imperative. The study recommends that ethno-religious politics be buried; religion should be returned to the private lives of the citizenry. Besides, citizenship education and societal development should be prioritised in order to strengthen the state, and weaken the capacity of primordial groups to challenge the Nigerian State with violent outbursts.

The Oxford Handbook of Political Representation in Liberal Democracies

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Public Interest ◽  
Political Representation ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
International Level ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Liberal Democracies ◽  
The Public ◽  
Nation States ◽  
Mass Publics

How can democracies effectively represent citizens? The goal of this Handbook is to evaluate comprehensively how well the interests and preferences of mass publics become represented by institutions in liberal democracies. It first explores how the idea and institutions of liberal democracies were formed over centuries and became enshrined in Western political systems. The contributors to this Handbook, made up of the world’s leading scholars on the various aspects of political representation, examine how well the political elites and parties who are charged with the representation of the public interest meet their duties. Clearly, institutions often fail to live up to their own representation goals. With this in mind, the contributors explore several challenges to the way that the system of representation is organized in modern democracies. For example, actors such as parties and established elites face rising distrust among electorates. Also, the rise of international problems such as migration and environmentalism suggests that the focus of democracies on nation states may have to shift to a more international level. All told, this Handbook illuminates the normative and functional challenges faced by representative institutions in liberal democracies.

scholarly journals Whistleblowing in a Depraved Nigerian Economy: Challenges and Prospects

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 1 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ayamba, Itojong Anthony
Keyword(s):  
Study Data ◽  
Financial Resources ◽  
The Political ◽  
National Assembly ◽  
The Public ◽  
Secondary Sources ◽  
Religious Conflicts ◽  
Private And Public ◽  
Almost All ◽  
Political Economic

Corruption in Nigeria, as in several other countries across the globe, is a serious scourge that continues to expose the country to developmental setbacks in the political, economic and social facets. Apart from the unquantifiable financial resources lost annually to corruption in the private and public sectors, almost all of Nigeria’s security, social, ethnic, political and religious conflicts can be traced to corruption directly or indirectly. Whistleblowing, as an anti-corruption mechanism, has proven to be effective in many parts of the world. This paper, from a background of rentierism, attempts to examine the epistemology of Nigeria’s whistleblowing policy as well as the effectiveness, limitations, and justifications for the enhancement of the policy. The descriptive design was employed as the methodology of the study. Data were obtained mainly from secondary sources. The Theory of Two Publics was employed as theoretical framework for the study. The paper identifies insufficient legal knowledge, fear of reprisals, lack of meaningful litigation, prebendalism/loyalty provisions, and cultural and historical barriers as some of the challenges of whistleblowing in Nigeria. The paper submits that the policy, though a viable one, but yet to get the backing of an enabling law as at the time of this study, should be delicately formulated, assertively promoted to the public, and speedily sent to the National Assembly for consideration and passage.

scholarly journals On the Concepts of the “Family” and the “Household” in the Political Theory of Jean Bodin

2019 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 130-148
Author(s):  
Gulnara Bayazitova
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
The Political ◽  
Ancient Rome ◽  
The Public ◽  
Secondary Sources ◽  
Jean Bodin ◽  
The Family ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Difference ◽  
The Republic

The article examines the tradition of formation of the concepts “family” (famille) and “household” (ménage) in the political theory of the French lawyer, Jean Bodin. The article looks into different editions of Six Books of the Commonwealthto explore the connotations of the key concepts and the meaning that Bodin ascribed to them. As secondary sources, Bodin uses the works by Xenophon, Aristotle, Apuleus, and Marcus Junianus Justin, as well as the Corpus Juris Civilis. Bodin examines three different traditions, those of Ancient Greece, Ancient Hebrew, and Ancient Rome. Each of these traditions has its own history of the concepts of the “family” and of the “household”. Bodin refers to ancient traditions for polemics, but eventually offers his own understanding, not only of the concepts of “famille” and “ménage”, but also of the term «République», defined as the Republic, a term that (with some reservations) refers to the modern notion of state. The very fact that these concepts are being used signifies the division of the political space into the spheres of the private and the public. Furthermore, the concepts of the “family” and of the “household” are key to understand the essence of sovereignty as the supreme authority in the Republic. The author concludes that the difference between Bodin’s concepts of the “family” and the “household” lies not only in the possession of property and its legal manifestation, but also in the fact that the “household” is seen by Bodin as the basis of the Republic, the first step in the system of subordination to the authority.

Challenging the frivolities of power: the ubiquitous camera and Nigerian political elites

Africa ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 89 (2) ◽  
pp. 286-302 ◽  
Author(s):  
George Emeka Agbo
Keyword(s):  
Public Access ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
The Public ◽  
The World ◽  
The Status ◽  
African Context ◽  
Visual Materials ◽  
Social Networking Website ◽  
Ubiquitous Presence

AbstractThe last decade has witnessed the ubiquitous presence of camera devices, from conventional cameras to communication gadgets (such as mobile phones, iPads and tablets), built with the capacity to produce, edit, disseminate and interact through photographs. In this article, I analyse visual materials circulated on Facebook, YouTube and Nairaland (a locally popular social-networking website used by Nigerians) to demonstrate how the ubiquity of the camera, its overt and surreptitious use, and the transformation and circulation of the resulting photographs constitute political acts in a postcolonial African context. The camera's ubiquity encompasses the increasing availability of photographic devices, but also the growing, and politically charged, inclination to put them to use, framing the world through which their users move. The production and dissemination of the resulting photograph gives it the status of an eyewitness account, amidst contestations that heighten its force as political articulation. Lastly, the ubiquitous camera is a means through which the public observes, polices and exposes the duplicity of state functionaries. The article contributes to an understanding of the ways in which digital infrastructure allows public access to the political undertaking of photography.

The vulgarity of democracy. Political, pornography, masculinity and politics in Ecuador

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xavier Andrade
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Social Process ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
Public Office ◽  
The Public ◽  
Image Objects ◽  
Audience Responses ◽  
Neoliberal Policies ◽  
Deviant Sexuality

The Vulgarity of Democracy explores key aesthetics and affective aspects of democracy via a visual ethnographic exploration of political pornography and the public uses of machismo to construct agendas for popular redemption in Guayaquil, Ecuador, during the 1980s. This period was the beginning of a highly conflictive social process as a result of the imposition of neoliberal policies. Its focus is on the life and work of Pancho Jaime (1946-1989), the most controversial and widely known rock promoter and independent journalist. Between 1984 and his assassination in 1989, Jaime’s underground publications used in-depth investigation as well as gossip, pornographic cartoons, and obscene language to comment on democracy and the corruption of political elites. Jaime’s strategy was to denounce the conduct of powerful figures in public office, and caricaturize their deformed bodies as indexes of their supposedly “deviant” sexuality. Following contemporary and comparative discussions on the political economy of images, and the materiality of image-objects, X. Andrade analyzes the production, circulation, and consumption of Pancho Jaime’s political magazines, audience responses to grotesque visual and aggressive textual discourses, and the effects of revealing public secrets about popular understandings of politics.

Rivalries of proximity beyond the household in Niger: political elites and thebaab-izeypattern

Africa ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 87 (1) ◽  
pp. 120-136 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jean-Pierre Olivier de Sardan
Keyword(s):  
Party Politics ◽  
The Political ◽  
Social Perceptions ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
Structural Components ◽  
The Public ◽  
Political World ◽  
Political Conflicts ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Family

AbstractIn Niger, there is an increasing rejection ofpolitik(a term with highly pejorative connotations): that is, party politics and the politics of democracy, characterized by personal rivalries and power struggles between clans and factions. But there is a direct link (albeit not a causal one) between the social perceptions of intra-familial rivalries and the social perceptions of political rivalries. The archetypical relationship among thebaab-izey(children of one father but different mothers) is characterized by competition and jealousy. This is a product of the latent rivalry that pits co-wives against each other. Polygamy is clearly at odds with a number of received ideas and clichés about ‘the African family’ as primarily a locus of support and solidarity. Such formal social norms may reign in public situations, but in private de facto practical norms give rise to subtle discriminations and the omnipresence of more or less hidden conflicts within the family. The same is true for the political microcosm of Niger. While the public norm of the concern for the public good is supposed to regulate political behaviours, rivalry and jealousy are structural components of the political world. Thebaab-izeypattern is frequently used in reference to politicians. Political conflicts are above all personal/factional conflicts in which friends and supporters are implicated, and are rivalries of proximity. In the familial space as in the political space, ‘magico-religious entrepreneurs’ (i.e. experts in the occult) are merely an ‘accelerator’ of these conflicts: they reinforce suspicions about the familial or political entourage, which, in turn, intensify rivalries.

scholarly journals MENGGUGAT PUTUSAN MAHKAMAH KONSTITUSI TENTANG PENCALONAN MANTAN NARAPIDANA DALAM PEMILU

2020 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jamaludin Ghafur
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Code ◽  
Primary Sources ◽  
The Political ◽  
Constitutional Court ◽  
Political Rights ◽  
Election Law ◽  
Law System ◽  
The Public ◽  
Secondary Sources ◽  
Civil Law System

The constitutional court through its decision No. 42 / PUU-XIII / 2015 states that all ex-convicts may run in elections as long as their political rights are not revoked by the court. They are only required to honestly and openly announce to the public about their convict status. according to the Court, the limitation and even revocation of the political rights of ex-convicts must not be carried out by lawmakers through legislation instruments but must be with a court decision as regulated in Article 35 paragraph (1) number 3 of the Criminal Code. This decision is not entirely correct for two reasons. First, Indonesia as a country that adheres to a continental European legal system (civil law system), the law has a higher position as a source of law (primary sources of law). Whereas the court's decision only as one of the secondary sources of law. Second, the conflict between the Election Law and the Criminal Code should be resolved according to the lex specialis derogat legi generalist principle. Thus, the prohibition for ex-convicts to run for the election as regulated in the Election Law should be interpreted as a specialist regulation so that it can override the provisions contained in the Criminal Code.

Breaking Authoritarian Bonds: The Political Origins of the Taiwan Administrative Procedure Act

2005 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 365-399 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeeyang Rhee Baum
Keyword(s):  
Status Quo ◽  
Administrative Reform ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Survival ◽  
The Public ◽  
Secondary Sources ◽  
Administrative Procedure ◽  
Regulatory Policies ◽  
The Status ◽  
Administrative Procedures

Taiwan recently adopted a series of administrative reform laws designed to make the bureaucracy more transparent and allow public participation in regulatory policies. Because administrative reform limits the executive's power, it is clear why legislatures would favor strict administrative procedures. But it is less clear why presidents would support them. The passage of these laws begs the question why presidents support administrative procedural reforms designed to restrict their abilities to act freely. I argue that in Taiwan, President Lee Teng-hui's control of his party deteriorated as factional disputes within his own party increased over time. Lee ultimately concluded that the Kuomintang's political survival depended on major reforms. Consequently, the status quo-oriented bureaucracy—hitherto an important source of support for Lee and his key constituencies—became an impediment. Lee supported Taiwan's Administrative Procedure Act in order to reduce the bureaucracy's capacity to impede reform. More generally, I argue that administrative procedures designed to open up the bureaucracy to the public, including previously excluded groups, can serve politicians' goal of redirecting the bureaucracy. Archival data, secondary sources, and interviews with key presidential advisers, senior career bureaucrats, and politicians support my argument.

Environmentalism in Australia: elites and the public

1999 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 331-350 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruce Tranter
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Environmental Issues ◽  
Political Elite ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
Environmental Groups ◽  
Political Issue ◽  
The Public ◽  
Environmental Group ◽  
Tentative Evidence

Political elites (federal candidates) from all parties in Australia exhibit more favourable attitudes toward the environment than voters. Nevertheless, the magnitude of these elite-public differences are declining over time as 'the environment' has become a mainstream political issue. The level of environmental activism among the political elite is on the rise, both within and across party boundaries, indicating an increasing acceptability of 'the environment' among politicians. On the other hand, there is some evidence of a decline in environmental group membership and a shift in the issue priorities of environmental groups, with members now increasingly supportive of 'green green' environmental issues. There is also tentative evidence to suggest that as a mobilising agent for activism 'the environment' is in decline, as environmental issues become 'routinised' and ensconced in mainstream political culture.1

Belgium's Adaptation to the EU : Does Federalism Constrain Europeanisation ?

Res Publica ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 44 (4) ◽  
pp. 575-597
Author(s):  
Peter Bursens
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
General Public ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
Federal System ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Dominant Focus ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Eu

This article starts from the observation that the Belgian level of adaptation to the requirements posed by its membership of the European Union is surprisingly low. Following an institutionalist line of thinking, it is argued that the impact of the European Union is seriously constrained by the characteristics of the Belgian federal system. This results into defining both cultural (1) and structural (2) indicators for the degree of Europeanisation: (1) European opinions and awareness of political elites and the general public and (2) the Belgian domestic organisation of European co-ordination mechanisms. The article more concretely argues that the European opinions and European awareness of the political elites and the public opinion are coloured by an inwards-looking mentality that stems from the dominant focus on the ongoing federalisation process. In addition, it is also found that the limited Europeanised installation and outcomes ofthe European co-ordination mechanisms are at least partly shaped by hard and soft federal elements

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