Going transnational? Candidates' transnational linkages on Twitter during the 2019 European Parliament elections

How transnational are European Parliament (EP) campaigns? Building on research on the Euro-pean public sphere and the politicisation of the EU, this study investigates to what extent the 2019 EP campaign was transnational and which factors were associated with ‘going transna-tional’. It conceptualises Twitter linkages of EP candidates as constitutive elements of a transna-tional campaign arena distinguishing interactions with EP candidates from other countries (hori-zontal transnationalisation) and interactions with the supranational European party families and lead candidates (vertical transnationalisation). The analysis of tweets sent by EP candidates from all 28 member states reveals that most linkages remain national. Despite this evidence for the second-order logic, there are still relevant variations contingent on EU positions of parties, the adoption of the Spitzenkandidaten system and socialisation in the EP. The findings have impli-cations for debates on the European public sphere and institutional reform proposals such as transnational party lists that might mitigate the EU’s democratic deficit.

The architecture of school governance: Rebuilding democratic legitimacy within an academized system

Successive governments, in embracing a neoliberalist ideology of decentralization and privatization, have radically reformed the nature of community-based, comprehensive state education. The transition from ‘government to governance’ (Rhodes, 1997) combined with the ideology of academization (DfE, 2010a) has created a democratic deficit 1 (Corbett, 1977). Academies are placed outside of local elected scrutiny or community-based accountability systems and governance legitimacy is in crisis (Glatter, 2013). This article explores the problematization of academized governance (Allen and Gann, 2017) with respect to the democratic deficit and the consequential lack of stakeholder engagement – argued as unethical within a democratic society and a system that frequently leads to failings of accountability (Wilkins, 2016). Utilizing the conceptual lens of Empowered Participatory Governance (EPG) (Fung and Wright, 2003), the authors seek to present a new architecture of governance that seeks to restore democratic legitimacy. Democratic governance innovations, the micro-governance network (Allen, 2017) and a refreshed local education board (Gann, 2021) provide a new architecture for a post new governance environment and, in so doing, a counter-narrative to the rhetoric of academization.

Yorùbá Philosophy and Contemporary Nigerian Realities

Beginning from Marx’s understanding of the relationship between philosophy and reality, this Introduction to the special edition of the Yoruba Studies Review explores the inevitable but complex relationship that exists between philosophy and its place. Specifically, it is grounded on the urgency of interrogating Nigeria’s postcolonial realities in the light of Yorùbá philosophical insights that, among other things, enable a rethinking of postcolonial social practices especially as sites of identity, agency, knowledge, objectivity, and even of resistance and power. Premised on the fundamental assumption that Yorùbá philosophy constitutes a fundamental site of scholarship within which the task of understanding and reinventing the Nigerian state and societies can be achieved, the Introduction weaves this assumption into the analysis of the fourteen essays that explores Nigeria’s postcolonial realities ranging from overpopulation, public (im)morality, ethnic conflict, injustice, and democratic deficit to environmental degradation, disability, depersonalization, youth culture, and a glaring disconnection between educational theory and practice.

Why Europe Does not Need a Constitution: On the Limits of Constituent Power as a Tool for Democratization

In this article, I question the use of the notion of ‘constituent power’ as a tool for the democratization of the European Union (EU). Rather than seeing the absence of a transnational constituent power as a cause of the EU’s ‘democratic deficit’, I identify it as an opportunity for unfettered democratic participation. Against the reification of power-in-action into a power-constituted-in-law, I argue that the democratization of the EU can only be achieved through the multiplication of ‘constituent moments’. I begin by deconstructing the normative justifications surrounding the concept of constituent power. Here I analyze the structural aporia of constituent power and question the autonomous and emancipatory dimension of this notion. I then test the theoretical hypothesis of this structural aporia of the popular constituent power by comparing it with the historical experiments of a European popular constituent power. Finally, based on these theoretical and empirical observations, I propose to replace the ambivalence of the concept of popular constituent power with a more cautious approach to the bottom-up democratization of European integration: that of a multiplication of transnational constituent moments.

Paradoxes of Visibility and Preservation: Cultural Heritage Law and the Making of the City as an International Legal Category

The push for cities to be a part of international legal governance processes is tied to the promise of bridging international law’s democratic deficit. However, the exercise of cities’ personality in international law can end up replicating many of the same democratic deficits with which international law is usually charged. Therefore, cities as agents may be an unsatisfactory way of addressing international law’s democratic deficits. Instead, cities as objects can raise the visibility of cities and the local communities that live therein, but without giving agency to a State actor. This visibility can then pave the way for communities themselves to be directly involved in international legal governance processes. This article uses the example of international heritage law, where cities are very significantly represented in international heritage lists and even a specific instrument (the 2011 Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape) to showcase the limitations and possibilities of the project of cities in international law. I argue that there is a paradox of visibility and agency that permeates international legal possibilities for cities, and placing the city simultaneously in the registers of object and subject ultimately defers the central question of community involvement in international law on global public goods.

O poder de polícia e a administração da Justiça: Estado e partido na Alemanha nazista e na Itália fascista

The aim of this article is to discuss the differences and similarities between the police and legal systems shaped during the Fascist dictatorships of Italy and Germany and their implications on the collapse of Fascism in 1943 and the survival of Naziism until 1945. The article also discusses the police and legal culture created under these regimes and its survival in the later period, with the consequent democratic deficit. The backdrop to this is a discussion on the relationship between police officers, judges, and militiamen within the regimes of Italian Fascism and Nazi Germany and the broader subject of the relationship between State and party in these regimes. As “case-control studies”, the examples of Spain, Brazil, and Japan will also be discussed.

The democratic deficit of the EU: Breaking the spell of a false analogy

The article contains a critique of the concept of the democratic deficit of the EU. Its logical unsustainability is revealed by demonstrating that it is based on the ‘fallacy of false analogy’. Several of the numerous implications of this assertion are elaborated, with a special emphasis on the ‘no-demos thesis’. The article does not treat the idea of the democratic deficit of the EU merely as an analytical concept that is based on a false analogy and thus logically incorrect. For the concept has been persistently used in political debates as one of the most destructive tools against the EU. The concluding section contains a radical proposal for a counter-offensive in favour of European integration.