Afera Grimma-Hoffmanna. Szwajcarski przypadek samowolnej misji parlamentarzysty w polityce zagranicznej

2021 ◽  
Vol 2(163) ◽  
pp. 9-26
Author(s):  
Piotr Bednarz

The years of the First World War were also a difficult period for Swiss society. Its political polarization came out particularly sharply in the face of the political crises that occurred at the time. One of the most serious was the so-called Grimm-Hoffmann affair of June 1917. The leader of the Swiss socialist milieu, one of the better-known parliamentarians, Robert Grimm, who went to Stockholm to attend the socialist congress and then to Petrograd, turned out to be a secret agent of the head of the Political Department of the Swiss government, Arthur Hoffmann. Robert Grimm’s mission was to probe the new Russian government about the possibility of a separate peace between Russia and Germany. This exposed unlawful action, undertaken without the agreement of the government, led to an international scandal, as the actions of R. Grimm and A. Hoffmann were contrary to Switzerland’s policy of neutrality. At the same time, there was an intensified press campaign in the country against A. Hoffmann, ending with his resignation. The arguments used by the public in their attacks on A. Hoffmann, clearly show that the Swiss society did not tolerate the actions of parliamentarians that went against the customs of a democratic state.

2019 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 255-281
Author(s):  
Sylvia Dümmer Scheel

El artículo analiza la diplomacia pública del gobierno de Lázaro Cárdenas centrándose en su opción por publicitar la pobreza nacional en el extranjero, especialmente en Estados Unidos. Se plantea que se trató de una estrategia inédita, que accedió a poner en riesgo el “prestigio nacional” con el fin de justificar ante la opinión pública estadounidense la necesidad de implementar las reformas contenidas en el Plan Sexenal. Aprovechando la inusual empatía hacia los pobres en tiempos del New Deal, se construyó una imagen específica de pobreza que fuera higiénica y redimible. Ésta, sin embargo, no generó consenso entre los mexicanos. This article analyzes the public diplomacy of the government of Lázaro Cárdenas, focusing on the administration’s decision to publicize the nation’s poverty internationally, especially in the United States. This study suggests that this was an unprecedented strategy, putting “national prestige” at risk in order to explain the importance of implementing the reforms contained in the Six Year Plan, in the face of public opinion in the United States. Taking advantage of the increased empathy felt towards the poor during the New Deal, a specific image of hygienic and redeemable poverty was constructed. However, this strategy did not generate agreement among Mexicans.


Politics ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 026339572110090
Author(s):  
David T Smith ◽  
Katie Attwell ◽  
Uwana Evers

COVID-19 vaccine development has been widely awaited, but concerns around acceptance and political polarisation prevail. We sought to determine the willingness of Australians to take a (then prospective) COVID-19 vaccine, compared with their previously recorded opinions about other vaccines. We also sought to determine reasons for hesitancy, levels of support for possible government mandates, and the political basis of support. We surveyed 1200 Australians, including 898 participants in a panel previously asked in 2017 about vaccines and mandates. In all, 66% of respondents indicated they would take a coronavirus vaccine, less than the 88% who in 2017 agreed that vaccines are safe, effective, and necessary. Also, 70% of the respondents who indicated hesitancy were concerned about the safety of the vaccine if it was developed too quickly, and 73% of all respondents agreed that the government should require a coronavirus vaccine for work, travel, and study. This is lower than the 85% who agreed with the childhood vaccine mandate in 2017, but slightly higher than the number of respondents who indicated that they would definitely be willing to take the coronavirus vaccine themselves. Older respondents, higher income respondents, and respondents who vote for major parties were all significantly more likely to take a coronavirus vaccine and to support government requirements.


2014 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 23
Author(s):  
Tawanda Zinyama ◽  
Joseph Tinarwo

Public administration is carried out through the public service. Public administration is an instrument of the State which is expected to implement the policy decisions made from the political and legislative processes. The rationale of this article is to assess the working relationships between ministers and permanent secretaries in the Government of National Unity in Zimbabwe. The success of the Minister depends to a large degree on the ability and goodwill of a permanent secretary who often has a very different personal or professional background and whom the minster did not appoint. Here lies the vitality of the permanent secretary institution. If a Minister decides to ignore the advice of the permanent secretary, he/she may risk of making serious errors. The permanent secretary is the key link between the democratic process and the public service. This article observed that the mere fact that the permanent secretary carries out the political, economic and social interests and functions of the state from which he/she derives his/her authority and power; and to which he/she is accountable,  no permanent secretary is apolitical and neutral to the ideological predisposition of the elected Ministers. The interaction between the two is a political process. Contemporary administrator requires complex team-work and the synthesis of diverse contributions and view-points.


2001 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kirsten Kozolanka

Abstract: When faced with privatization by the Ontario government, the public educational broadcaster TVOntario took a pro-active stance in the face of the neo-liberal ideology of reduced public expenditure and institutional restructuring. TVO won short-term salvation by embracing market model methods, but in so doing it may have lost its niche as a public educational broadcaster. It now faces two major policy challenges. It must balance its general-audience broadcast arm with its newly refocused educational arm and it must negotiate possible political interference from the imperative to connect the government's newly revised school curricula to its new technology-in-education arm. This paper also situates the TVO example as a rejection of the privatization agenda of the Government of Ontario. Finally, this paper uses the TVO example to raise questions about hybrid models of broadcasting. Résumé: Pour éviter que le gouvernement de l'Ontario ne la privatise, la station éducative publique TVOntario a adopté une position qui prend les devants face à la volonté néolibérale de réduire les dépenses publiques et restructurer les institutions. À court terme, TVO s'est protégé en adoptant des méthodes axées sur le marché, mais celles-ci lui ont peut-être coûté son créneau particulier à titre de diffuseur éducatif public. En effet, TVO doit maintenant relever deux défis politiques imposants. La station doit équilibrer le besoin de s'adresser à un auditoire général avec celui remis au point d'offrir des émissions éducatives. En outre, elle doit parer à des interventions politiques possibles émanant de son obligation de relier le nouveau curriculum scolaire à sa nouvelle branche consacrée à la technologie dans l'éducation. Cet article discute de TVO comme manifestant un rejet des projets de privatisation du gouvernement ontarien. Finalement, l'article utilise l'exemple de TVO pour soulever des questions sur des modèles de radiodiffusion hybrides.


Author(s):  
Michael Eamon

In October 2011, the Government of Canada began a two-year, nation-wide celebration of the bicentenary of the War of 1812. The widely-criticized initiative returned the public eye to a traditional ‘interpretive tableau’ of war heroes, namely Isaac Brock, Tecumseh, Charles de Salaberry and Laura Secord. While the scope and expense of the federal government’s efforts have been unprecedented, the political battle to maintain certain memories of the War is one that is not new. A struggle against the forgetfulness of Canadians, and particularly young Canadians, has animated commemorations of the War for almost two centuries. Looking at a selection of past commemorative efforts this essay explores how the inertia of a traditional tableau of heroes has tended to overshadow other narratives and newer interpretations. Yet all is not lost. Using the example of the author’s exhibition, Faces of 1812, it is suggested that publicly-constructed histories can be employed as a useful departure point for the public historian and provide a foundation from which the public can obtain a broader, more critical perspective on both the commemorated events and history writ large.


2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
David Broadstock ◽  
Xiaoqi Chen ◽  
C. S. Agnes Cheng ◽  
Wenli Huang

ABSTRACT We investigate whether the aggregated political relations of a firm's top management team (TMT) add value to the firm's performance. We distinguish between the political relations that arise from TMT's own work experience, which are termed direct political connections (DPC), and the relations that TMT develops from working for the same institution with the government officials, which are termed implicit political connections (IPC). We find that IPC are positively associated with firm performance and that they often have a stronger effect than DPC do. We also find that the effect of IPC on firm value is stronger in SOEs and in firms located in under-developed provinces. Moreover, we find that after the anti-corruption campaign, the effect of DPC decreases but the effect of IPC does not significantly change. Overall, our results suggest the importance of investigating a firm's aggregated political connections, especially its IPC. JEL Classifications: G32; D72; J33; L33. Data Availability: Data are available from the public sources cited in the text.


2019 ◽  
pp. 48-68
Author(s):  
Dannagal Goldthwaite Young

This chapter illustrates how conservative outrage programming and liberal satire were articulated as reactions to perceived problematic aspects of the political information environment in the 1990s. Both genres were fueled by the political polarization and media distrust that had exploded in the last third of the twentieth century. And both genres were made possible by new media technologies of the late 1990s. In the face of political polarization and a reduction of trust in journalism, conservative talk radio’s Rush Limbaugh and Fox News’s Roger Ailes created programming to deconstruct the ideological bias they perceived in mainstream news. Meanwhile, comedians worked to deconstruct the bias that they saw in the profit-driven news of that era; not an ideological bias but a bias in favor of strategy, spin, and partisan jargon.


2013 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-24
Author(s):  
Guy Davidov ◽  
Maayan Davidov

Research on compliance has shown that people can be induced to comply with various requests by using techniques that capitalise on the human tendencies to act consistently and to reciprocate. Thus far this line of research has been applied to interactions between individuals, not to relations between institutions. We argue, however, that similar techniques are applied by courts vis-à-vis the government, the legislature and the public at large, when courts try to secure legitimacy and acceptance of their decisions. We discuss a number of known influence techniques – including ‘foot in the door’, ‘low-balling’, ‘giving a reputation to uphold’ and ‘door in the face’ – and provide examples from Israeli case law of the use of such techniques by courts. This analysis offers new insights that can further the understanding of judicial decision-making processes.


2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 84-146 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nikki Usher

The U.S. journalism industry is facing unprecedented challenges from questions of economic stability, rising antimedia sentiment among the government and the public, new technologies that have democratizing effects on news production, and the lowest levels of trust in journalism in decades. At the same time, the United States is facing structural inequality and political polarization that has taken on a distinctly place-based dimension. Taken together, the places of news have changed, both because of forces inside and outside journalism: The places where journalists do their work have changed, not only in an immediate sense of their own work routines but also because of the larger place-based realignment in the United States. This monograph argues that place must be at the center of scholarly and industry analysis to better understand the challenges to professional journalism today.


2018 ◽  
Vol 19 (7) ◽  
pp. 1871-1900
Author(s):  
Patrick O'Brien

AbstractAlthough Ireland is often cited as part of the vanguard of countries adopting forms of judicial self-governance in the 1990s, this appearance can be misleading: the Irish judiciary are self-governing only in limited respects. The judge-led Court Service is in charge of court estate, non-judicial personnel and provision of information on the court system to the public. Many key matters – discipline, promotions and deployment – remain largely out of the control of the corporate judiciary. Judicial appointments are significantly at the discretion of the government. In the last decade, there have been significant moves towards a more corporate judiciary and these are reflected in the creation of a judges’ representative body, the Association of Judges of Ireland, and a shadow Judges Council. There are currently proposals to create a new independent mechanism for appointing judges and to create a Judicial Council with a significant role in disciplining the judiciary.The Irish experience highlights the importance of political and cultural factors in establishing and maintaining judicial independence and self-governance. Despite the significant role for the government in judicial appointments, and the presence of a culture of political patronage in these appointments, there is nonetheless a robust culture ofindividualjudicial independence once judges have been appointed. The creation of the Courts Service in 1999 was a significant transfer of administrative power to the judiciary but it was approved without demur by the political branches, who welcomed the depoliticization of controversial decisions about court estate. Conversely, reforms to judicial appointments have been weak because politicians saw value in maintaining a relatively harmless form of political patronage, and proposals for a Judicial Council that have agreed in outline for two decades have yet to be enacted, apparently because they lack sufficient political salience. The defence of judicial independence, and the creation of robust institutional mechanisms for defending it, ultimately requires the goodwill of politicians.


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