The institution of traditional authority in Okombahe, Erongo Region of Namibia: can the institution be reconciled with democratic values of justice?

The purpose of the article was to explore the roles and functions of the institution of traditional authority in contributing to access to justice or providing a form of justice through the preservation of customary law to the people of the Okombahe community in the Erongo Region of Namibia. The article's aim was to investigate the factors that have contributed to the institution's resilience and how this resilience may be tied to the type of justice this customary institution provides and represents. The institution of traditional authority has recently caught the attention of both scholars and policymakers due to the increasing return or revival of this "ancient" form of governance in the contemporary era that is constantly changing its procedures and rules of appointment to adapt to contemporary concerns and social problems. The scope of traditional leaders' jurisdiction and power is defined in the roles and functions they fulfil. As a popular legitimate informal institution in Okombahe, traditional leaders were found to manage and resolve conflict, and to preserve communal identity, unity, and continuity. This article highlights the significance of the institution of traditional authority as a legitimate customary institution originating from the bottom-up, and as a system that can be complementary to democracy as opposed to the assumption sometimes held that it is contesting with it. In Okombahe, the institution of traditional authority was found to contribute to providing an accessible justice system option grounded in this community's identity, history and social norms. The data collection employed for this qualitative case study of Okombahe consisted of interviews, supporting documents, and relevant scientific articles.

Trends in Informal Payments by Patients in Europe: A Public Health Policy Approach

Background: A new institutional approach toward informal payments in healthcare views informal payments as arising when there is a misalignment between values/norms (informal institutions) and the formal rules (formal institutions) of patients. However, less knowledge is available on the effectiveness of this approach in tackling informal payments in healthcare. This study aimed to fill this gap by evaluating the trends in the effect of institutional misalignment on informal payments made by patients.Methods: A quantitative study design with data extracted from the last three waves of special Eurobarometer surveys on corruption was used to model the propensity of European patients in 27 European Union countries and the United Kingdom to make informal payments. Multilevel logistic regression analysis was employed in order to test the relationship between the formal–informal institution misalignment and the likelihood to make informal payments. Sensitivity analyses were also performed to test the robustness of the findings.Results: The finding is that there is a strong association between the formal–informal institution misalignment and the likelihood to make informal payments for public healthcare services. Similarly, social norms play a pivotal role. When patients perceive that informal practices are widespread in the public healthcare sector they are more likely to make informal payments themselves.Conclusion: The outcome is a call for complementing deterrence measures toward informal payments in healthcare with measures aiming to reduce the formal–informal institution misalignment and to change the social norms. This can be achieved by improving the structural conditions at country level and by changing values/norms and beliefs of patients.

The Networked Diplomacy of Informal International Institutions

The rise of informal international institutions has been one of the most significant developments in institutional design and choice since the 1990s. While states have increasingly opted for informal governance, little is known about the character of intergovernmental relations in these settings. Scholars, for instance, debate whether great powers dominate such institutions, or whether influence can be exercised by a wider array of players. Drawing from the author’s experience as a government representative within the Proliferation Security Initiative, a leading informal institution, this article provides a theory-driven analysis of intergovernmental interactions within such bodies. It demonstrates that diplomacy within informal institutions tends to assume a decentralized, networked quality that favors actors positioned at the center of intergovernmental networks. In doing so, the article highlights clear means through which central network positions confer influence. The article also sheds new light on the Proliferation Security Initiative and on counterproliferation cooperation more generally.

Islamic Constitutions and Democracy

There is an ongoing debate on the relationship between Islam and (lack of) democracy. Considerable literature shows that Islam, represented as an informal institution by Muslim population share, has a negative effect on democracy. This study examines the effects of formal institutions, specifically constitutions that prescribe Islamic law ( Shari’a) as a source of legislation, on democracy. We use a newly developed coding of the degree to which Islam is incorporated in constitutions. Our empirical results show that the constitutional entrenchment of Islamic law has a negative and significant effect on democracy. Our findings are robust to using different estimators and instrumental variable regressions, employing alternative measures of democracy and controlling for Muslim population, natural resource wealth, and additional control variables. While we show that Islamic constitutionalism is a reason for a democracy deficit in Muslim-majority countries, we find no evidence that Islam is inimical to democracy when not entrenched in the constitution.

Militarised Authoritarian State and Informal Institutions: Zulm and Rasookh in Downtown Srinagar

Kashmir is in a situation of protracted conflict. The paper offers an examination of daily life in the downtown of Srinagar, the region's capital. The conceptual focus is on the role of informal institutions, here defined as ordered patterns of behavior, in this setting. A particular concern with how these informal institutions explains how the different residents make sense of the generalized condition of what they term zulm. Zulm refers to the experience of living with, enduring, and engaging with the administration of the militarized authoritarian Indian state, and can be disaggregated into a series of informal institutions deployed by citizens of downtown Srinagar. Based on the ethnographic fieldwork, the paper looks at how differently situated individuals use these institutions – often in the form of networks, economic relationships, connections – to challenge and sustain relations with state structures. The particular focus is given to the informal institution of rasookh. This thesis makes a contribution to the neo- institutionalist debate within conflict studies by drawing on the social side of the informal institutions. It also contributes to the regional studies literature on South Asia by documenting at close quarters the experience of protracted conflict in Kashmir.

Role of informal institutions in biodiversity conservation: Perspective of the Santhal tribe of India

The study provides insights into the role of an informal institution of the Santhal tribe of India in the conservation of biodiversity. The data has been collected from 124 Santhal key informants from six tribal districts from the states of Jharkhand (Dumka, Pakur and Sahibganj) and West Bengal (Birbhum, Bankura and West Medinipur) through the methods of stratified sampling, chain-referrals, personal interactions, and focussed group discussions. The taboos associated with biodiversity conservation have been categorized into six categories such as segment taboo, specific-species taboo, life-stage taboo, temporal taboo, habitat taboo and method taboo.

Religious Participation: Does It Matter for Sustainable Culture and Entertainment Consumption?

Previous research has studied the correlations between income, education, and sustainable culture and entertainment consumption. The correlation between religion as an informal institution and culture and entertainment consumption is often neglected. Based on this background, this paper attempts to explore the correlation between religious participation (as a proxy for religion) and three kinds of sustainable culture and entertainment consumption. Using the data from the Chinese General Social Survey in 2017 to perform empirical analysis, it is found that religious participation is negatively correlated with the sustainable culture and entertainment consumption. Two-stage least squares and propensity score matching method were employed, verifying the robustness of this result. Additionally, the full sample was divided into sub-samples to discuss the heterogeneous correlation between religious participation and sustainable culture and entertainment consumption. The results suggest that in the low income group and the low marketization degree group, religious participation is most relevant to the sustainable culture and entertainment consumption. This paper contributes to enriching current research.

The Impact of Village Rules and Formal Environmental Regulations on Farmers’ Cleaner Production Behavior: New Evidence from China

Village rules and formal environmental regulations are of great significance for standardizing farmers’ cleaner production behavior, promoting green transformation of agriculture and realizing sustainable development of agriculture. Based on the survey data of 946 farmers in five provinces of China, taking seed coating technology, soil testing and formulated fertilization technology, subsoiling tillage technology, green technology for pest and disease control and straw returning technology as examples, this article empirically analyzes the impact of village rules and formal environmental regulations on farmers’ cleaner production behavior by using the multivariate probit model. When formal environmental regulations are relatively lacking or weak, village rules can be used as a useful supplement to formal environmental regulations to promote farmers’ participation in cleaner production. Based on this, this article argues that the important reason for formal environmental regulations falling into relative system failure is that village rules have not been paid enough attention in promoting farmers’ cleaner production behavior. In the future, we should not only continue to strengthen the role of formal environmental regulations in farmers’ cleaner production, but also cultivate the informal institution represented by the village rules, and build the regulatory system of mutual support between informal institution and formal institution.

History of Jirga Laws in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa - Do Islamic Law and Jirga Laws had the same Historical Jurisprudential Approach?

Jirga, a historical legal antique has been an informal adjudication of Pakhtūns. In the present research endeavor conventional Jirga and its various facets had been critically examined from Sharī’ah perspective i.e. whether such Jirga and its procedure is based on Islamic law or not. Jarga bears a very close resemblance in terms of structure and procedure with Qad̝ā and Taḥkīm. Jirga has been simple with no binding implementation. Since 18th century and on-wards, Jirga has evolved into an informal institution of dispute resolution. The criterion for Jirga-Mārān, and Qād̝ī or Ḥākim, astonishingly, have been identical. Besides the free consent, justice dispenser (Jarga-Mār/Qād̝ī or Ḥākim) was supposed not be relative or party (himself) in the matter at all. The fuqahā, both classical and contemporary, have discussed the intermediation through Jirga. This study focuses on compliance and non-compliance of Jirga to Qad̝ā.