When Is A Pledge A Pledge?

Despite the central role of election pledges in modern representative democracy, it remains uncertain how voters define pledges. We examine this by focusing on four rhetorical dimensions of political statements: the pledge giver, the formulation of commitment, the policy content and quantification. In three conjoint experiments on representative samples totalling around 6,000 respondents in the United States, Britain and Denmark, we find remarkably consistent results. On the one hand, voters consistently differentiate between statements in a highly focused manner: a promise is a promise if it is sincere and realistic – no matter who made it and whether it can be checked. On the other hand, voters are not willing to hold their party accountable for a given statement – even if they consider it an election pledge. We demonstrate that this is the perceptual logic of election pledges in Western democracies.

On a Chomskyan postulation in conceptual metaphor theory

This paper is an attempt to make a comparison between Lakoff and Johnson’s conceptual metaphor theory and Chomsky’s transformational generative grammar, and to demonstrate a Chomskyan postulation in the former. Although Lakoff and Johnson regard Chomsky’s linguistics as a modern representative of traditional Western philosophies of language that tend to highlight the a priori assumptions rather than empirical findings, the cognitive theory of metaphor contains a Chomskyan metaphysical assumption as its most important notion, i.e. the assumption of conceptual metaphors. Thus, what the present paper wants to argue with ample evidence is that Lakoff and Johnson’s conceptual metaphor theory resembles Chomsky’s logic and that their notion of conceptual metaphors is very much a Chomskyan postulation. What the present study tries to further demonstrate is that the abovementioned two theories actually have many points in common, which also implies that Lakoff and Johnson have failed to avoid the paradigm that they believe is conflicting with their own.

The Principles of Open Democracy

This chapter builds on the previous chapters to sketch the alternative paradigm of “open democracy.” It first draws on a stylized contrast between Classical Athens and modern representative democracy. The chapter then theorizes a new model of democracy — open democracy — which layers new principles on top of the most normatively appealing ones found in the previous models, expanding the scope of some principles and occasionally replacing or reformulating others entirely. It goes on to offer a list of five core institutional principles. These include participation rights, deliberation, the majoritarian principle, democratic representation, and transparency. These principles are supposed to inform institutional design without over-determining it.

Election Result Prediction using Spatial Statistical Method

Since 17th Century, Modern representative democracy in all forms is being made possible by having a formal way of collecting people's overall opinion on who is to be chosen as their representative. Election is a most important event in any democratic country. Confronting on predicting the winning person/party in the election is the biggest challenge here. In this paper, a study of spatial statistics method to predict the election result using the exploratory data analysis is carried out by applying spatial statistical methods. The paper presents, prediction of the election result with respect to the income level of the citizen and also a comparison of results obtained from the different statistical methods

Candlelight demonstrations and the presidential impeachment in South Korea

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to introduce and analyze the short-term and long-term causes of the candlelight demonstrations and the ensuing presidential impeachment in South Korea, as well as the characteristics of the organization that planned the candlelight demonstrations and the participants of them. Design/methodology/approach The research is based on the previous literature, news articles, as well as various surveys on the randomly selected participants of the demonstrations and on a representative sample of Korean electorate, including non-participants as well. Findings The candlelight demonstrations, although “triggered” by a news report, would not have occurred, without angers and discontents accumulated over the president’s whole term by the irregularities and wrongdoings of the administration. The system of checks and balances in democratic system did not work properly. In that regard, the candlelight demonstrations and the ensuing presidential impeachment were just an unanticipated expression of the problems and defects built in the Korean democratic system of 1987, which would have found a way out in any form eventually. Originality/value Based on the analysis of the candlelight demonstrations and the ensuing presidential impeachment, the paper suggests instructive implications on a new democracy as well as on modern representative democracies that are in jeopardy now.

Machiavelli against the Venice myth: a sixteenth-century dialogue on the nature of political representation

Florence may be a birthplace of modern representative democracies but its legacy encumbers these democracies with a component of elitism and oligarchy that depreciates all attempts to revive contemporary democratic political culture through reference to classical republicanism. This chapter reconstructs the discussion between two main ideological opponents in the early 16th century Florence – between populist republicanism defending governo largo represented by Machiavelli and elitist republicanism defending governo stretto whose main proponent was Francesco Guicciardini. The chapter argues that Guicciardini’s proposed constitutional reform of Florence, the introduction of the institution of the senate, originates the “Venice Myth” that is present in democratic elitism today. That reform would eliminate the people’s ability to effectively influence the government’s decision by reducing representation only to collective authorization of the elite’s proposals without any possibility for the popolo to discuss or influence them. By contrast, Machiavelli’s proposals display an agonistic understanding of representation whose purpose does not consist - as proponents of the Venice myth still seem to believe - in reducing or bypassing social conflicts, but in institutionalizing executing them in and through representative institutions. The permanence of this agonistic conflict in and through representative institutions makes modern democracy possible.

Small and medium business: sociological trends

The article justifies the conclusion that small and medium business is the most important component of the development of a modern state, a mean for achieving its social and economic goals. The overall objectives of the country’s development are simultaneously the goals of state support for small and medium-sized businesses. Thus, in recent years, attempts have been made to move the national economy and Belarusian society to a new model of economic development, to increase economic activity of small and medium-sized businesses as the most important catalysts for the state’s advancement. The phenomenon of a modern representative of the Belarusian small and medium business is studied in the work. His essence, development tendencies and their refraction in the Belarusian social and economic reality are determined, a sociological model of motivation and characteristic personal traits, qualities and characteristics is proposed.

Summary and Conclusions

The concluding chapter presents a summary of the main findings concerning party change, personalization, and the relationship between them. It then proposes directions for future research on these phenomena and their interaction. It also suggests that it makes sense to see the combination of party decline and personalization as a potential threat to the quality of modern representative democracy, and maybe even to democracy per se. Finally, it makes preliminary suggestions as to how personalized energies could be rechanneled into the party. The chapter ends by claiming that there is no reason why parties should not revitalize their abilities to reorient personal energies toward collective action. After all, that is what parties were—and still are—about.