scholarly journals The role of national symbols in the political protests: case of Mexico

Author(s):  
Liudmila Leonidovna Kleshchenko

This article explores the specificity of using national symbols in the political protests. The construction of the new meanings of national symbols by protest movements is viewed in the frame of collective memory. The goal of this research is to determine the peculiarities of involving unofficial national symbols in the protest discourse by the opposition political forces on the example of modern Mexico. It is demonstrated how the radical protest Neozapatismo movement uses the image of the country's national hero Emiliano Zapata for legitimizing the own agrarian program and rule in the state of Chiapas, as well as a resource for mobilizing the supporters of drastic agrarian reforms. The conclusion is made that due to such characteristics of national symbols as sacred nature, wide occurrence, recognition, they possess high mobilization potential, carrying out mobilization function in the political protests. It pertains to both, state symbols (flag, coat of arms, anthem) and unofficial symbols. National symbols can also be used by protest movements as a means of legitimation / deligitimation of authority. The author underlines that the use by political actors of national symbols, which may cause strong emotional response of the audience, should be considered as manipulative political technology.

1970 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 307-326 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenneth R. Libbey

POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS IN DEMOCRATIC STATES HAVE USUALLY COME into existence as the manifestation of a principle of political philosophy or as the result of a compromise among forces with different aspirations for the polity. Often both factors have been involved. Certainly the consequences for political behaviour of introducing any particular structure have been of concern to its architects, but many of these consequences are unforeseeable and the actual impact of an institutional change or the character of a formal role may in time become quite different from that intended.For a political actor, such as an individual, an interest group or a party, formal structures are given attributes of the political environment. Along with the more diffuse qualities of the political culture, they constitute the framework within which political actors must compete for influence over public policy. This framework, both formal and informal, is uneven in its effects on the fortunes of the various political forces. It favours some approaches and some groups more and in different ways than it favours others. The British Labour Party, with its concentrated voting strength, is disadvantaged by the single-member district/plurality electoral system, while its counterpart in Germany is able to maximize its strength in a system of proportional representation.


2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (5) ◽  
pp. 69-80
Author(s):  
D.G. SELTSER ◽  

The purpose of the article is to clarify the place and role of the decree in the general course of the political process and highlight its direct consequences for the fate of the CPSU and the USSR. The scientific literature on the topic is analyzed. It is concluded that scientists draw a direct connection between the final events of the history of the USSR – Yeltsin's decree about departisation, degradation of the CPSU, resistance to the Emergency Committee and the liquidation of the CPSU / USSR. The author describes the stages of the personnel actions of Gorbachev and Yeltsin. In his opinion, the nomenclature system was expected: «construction» of the elite (1985–1987), elections in the party (1988–1990), elections in the state (1989–1990), decree about departisation (1991). The decree is seen as the final stage in the denationalization of the party. The CPSU, having lost power and property, ceased to be a state. The content of the decree, the behavior of political actors in connection with its adoption and the political consequences of the decree are considered. In conclusion, it is concluded that the decree was a domino effect, a provocation to the instant collapse of the USSR.


Author(s):  
Christopher F. Karpowitz

A powerful tool for content analysis, DICTION allows scholars to illuminate the ideas, perspectives, and linguistic tendencies of a wide variety of political actors. At its best, a tool like DICTION allows scholars not just to describe the features of political language, but also to analyze the causes and the consequences those features in ways that advance our understanding political communication more broadly. Effective analysis involves helping academic audiences understand what the measures being used mean, how the results relate to broader theoretical constructs, and the extent to which findings reveal something important about the political world. This involves exploring both the causes and the consequences of linguistic choices, including by attending closely to how those texts are received by their intended audiences. In this chapter, the authors review ways in which DICTION has been used and might be used to better understand the role of political leadership, the meaning of democracy, and the effects of political language on the political behavior of ordinary citizens.


Journalism ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 146488492095950
Author(s):  
Jefferson Lyndon D Ragragio

Editorials are a political force used by news media to fulfil its watchdog function in fragile democracies like the Philippines. However, they also serve as a platform to invite a more positive reading of strongman administration. Against the backdrop of media populism, the article will problematize how the Fourth Estate articulates its political stance by examining the tensions and complexities in editorials. It will highlight the ways the media deals with subjects and stories surrounding Rodrigo Duterte. Through an analysis of editorials of four leading dominant news outlets (Bulletin, Inquirer, Rappler, and Star), three meta-thematic categories of media frames are uncovered. First, character degradation frames delineate how the media denounces the ties of Duterte with other political actors, particularly the Marcoses and China’s Xi. Second, pro-establishment frames echo the optimistic mantra of the government amid crisis. And third, non-editorial frames exhibit the failure of media to publish watchdog-inspired editorials. Each of these categories has underlying frames that are indicative of the democratic potential, or lack thereof, of news media.


2013 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 590-612
Author(s):  
Luca Ozzano

AbstractThis article is part of a special issue on the five Muslim democracies. It aims at understanding the role played by religion, and particularly by religiously oriented actors, in Turkey's democratization processes. The first section analyzes the different theoretical approaches to the role of religion in democratization. The second section analyzes the different phases of Turkey's political history since the 1980 coup, taking into account both democratization processes and the role played by religious actors in the political system, and trying to understand the possible relations between the two phenomena.


2020 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 406-426
Author(s):  
Ming-sho Ho

This article examines two major protests related to working-hour reforms in Taiwan in 2000 and 2016–18, paying particular attention to the shift in the composition of protesters from union members to youth activists. The decline in mass membership and the failure to consolidate a national federation have diminished the political presence of labour unions. The emergence of youth protest movements, both before and after the 2014 Sunflower Movement, made possible the advent of Taiwan’s youth as political actors. The reconfiguration of Taiwan’s working hour politics has paralleled the global transition from the classical organization-based collective action to the digitally enabled ‘connective action’. The concluding section provides reflections on the impacts as well as the limitations of this newer form of labour politics.


Author(s):  
Orlando Coutinho ◽  
◽  

The way in which an unknown virus has moved from a local to a global case, taking on a pandemic outline, has caused significant changes in the lives of all human beings. Firstly, for that reason, it is unknown, then because behind the ignorance comes mistrust and fear. Nowadays, these ingredients are - in the political-social space - substance for the biggest factors of action and decision of the actors of the power. Have we been in a war context, as some have said? Was confinement, global and so prolonged, really necessary? Was decreeing a state of emergency essential? Were the exception measures proportional? And are they reversible? This article aims, in the way of the ideas of several authors that thinking about the political philosophical role of health contexts, of exception state, and of political control of the State, in face of public health issues and not only, understand the “state of the art” in the way of governing western democracies, in the firstly, but flying over other geographies and systems as the virus has assumed global contours. And, by means of the concrete measures, politically adopted, by the different political actors, what real impacts they had on the life and the institutions working, and on the psychology of the persons individually or socially considered.


2019 ◽  
Vol 26 ◽  
pp. 111-124
Author(s):  
Rafał Klepka

The struggle for good change: Media narratives in the parliamentary election campaign in 2015 The role of media narratives in politics is particularly important in the time of narrative media, which interpret reality more than they report on the course of events. The article presents the results of research on the content of TV news programs Wiadomości of TVP, Fakty of TVN, and weeklies Polityka, Newsweek and W Sieci from the period preceding the parliamentary campaign in 2015. The aim of the analysis was to determine to what extent the election materials illustrate the activities of the political actors and how many prepared narratives were intended to clearly suggest to the voters who to vote for. The conclusion drawn from the research is that positive and coherent narratives can significantly increase the chance of achieving electoral success.


2018 ◽  
Vol 224 (3) ◽  
pp. 253-272
Author(s):  
Teacher. Osama AbdAli Khalaf

    The consensual democracy Considered a form of a ruling , in the Unconsensus in heterogeneous national or sectarian or ideological, which is limited to the core political issues that require political consensus, does not extend to all levels of political action because this democracy may be crippling political stability and lead the leaders of the political forces role pivotal in this aspect, the more these leaders have taken in the national interest supreme value at the expense of ethnic or narrow sectarian interests, whenever consensus and political stability, and the more hardened leaders in their own interests, were introduced in a closed circle of conflict and instability.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charlotte Dolez

This article investigates how citizens speak about representative democracy and questions their perceptions of representation and of the democratic regime they live in, by mobilizing the distinction between diffuse and specific support, in a context of personalized politics. It shows that political actors and their performances are at the core of citizens' perceptions. I investigate citizens' representations of the political field through an original qualitative fieldwork, composed of couple interviews with French citizens, under the Sarkozy presidency. Studies about the political support of citizens often mobilize quantitative surveys to measure the degree of support and satisfaction. I rather choose the qualitative approach to grasp perceptions of political field through discussions about political and societal issues. Couple interviews offer an adequate framework to observe political opinions that are built in daily life. Representations of the political field are mainly dominated by the role of political actors. Political parties and institutions are rarely mentioned. Politicians are systematically held accountable, and are often criticized in citizens' discussions. The existing literature has often distinguished specific and diffuse support. My analysis tends to show that the weakness of the former through personalization can undermine the support for the regime. However, alternatives to representative democracy remain underexplored and even not considered. Overall, these representations depend on sociopolitical factors, such as political convictions or social backgrounds.


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