Zelenskyy’s populist learning curve

Author(s): Anna Korbut / Language(s): English Issue: 04 (42)/2020

Upon being elected to the presidential office, Volodymyr Zelenskyy dissolved the parliament during his inauguration speech on May 20th 2019, paving the way for a snap election. That blitzkrieg helped him remove the unfriendly legislature and expand his grip on power by having his party ride the wave of popularity it was receiving. At that point, the Servant of the People party was ahead of any of its established competitors in the polls. The problem was that the party did not yet exist.

Salient Factor of Voting Behaviour and its Relationship with Ethnic and Political Tolerance in Malaysia

Author(s): Mohd Azmir Mohd Nizah,Afi Roshezry Abu Bakar / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2020

The study of tolerance become extremely important 60 years ago when Allport discusses the nature of prejudice due to the increasing multi-diversity society. Tolerance then has been observed as a critical key element in the multi-diversity society politically, ethnically, religiously and culturally ever since. The previous study demonstrated that tolerance has a constructive effect on social solidity and coherence. Nonetheless, it is found an insufficient amount of information on rational voting behavior when ethnic and political tolerance factors are involved. This study has been conducted to explore factors of rational voting behavior in Malaysia in regards to ethnic and political tolerance. A quantitative study uses a survey method with a questionnaire as a data collection technique involving three parliamentary areas is observed. Data then analyzed using Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) with 600 respondents were engaged in the study using multistage cluster and random sampling techniques. The result revealed that while political tolerance is not statistically significant with voting behaviour, but ethnic tolerance evidenced a substantial negative relationship. Ethnic tolerance and political tolerance both had a significant positive relationship. It also revealed that voting behaviour positively influenced by the level of education, a party supported and ethnic identity. Hence, it is clear that ethnic political tolerance has a considerable consequence on the rationale of voting behavior. However, the effects are diverse, in which identical and dissimilar ethnicities act as mediation elements. This study gratifies the aperture to the current body of knowledge and allows great connotation at a situation where ethnic politics are observed as the most important material and tolerance becomes a salient factor in managing Malaysia’s society.

A poszt-multikulturalizmus felé? A diverzitás változó közösségei, feltételei és kontextusai

Author(s): Steven Vertovec / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 4/2018

Retoryka populistyczna w parlamentarnej kampanii wyborczej w Republice Czeskiej z 2017 r.

Author(s): Tomasz Kasprzak / Language(s): Polish Issue: 1/2017

The paper presents the history of the populist dimension. Populism is depicted in this article as a phenomenon with many planes of conceptualization. In order to combine the considerations of populism and the party system, Czech groups have been investigated, which can be included in the current commonly called modern populism in modern politics. The subject of the study was not marginal groups, including detached parties, and those which have been present on the Czech political scene since 1993: ČSSD, ODS, TOP09, KDU-ČSL, ANO 2011, KSČM.

Pedofilia w Kościele katolickim za pontyfikatów Benedykta XVI i papieża Franciszka

Author(s): Agata Płachecka / Language(s): Polish Issue: 1/2017

One of the main internal social problems with which the institution of the Catholic Church struggles over the last two pontificates is the occurrence of pedophilia in its ranks. The article analyzes the difference in the approach to the problem over the last two pontificates, and the studied scale of the phenomenon and the territorial scope allow undoubtedly giving this practice a global character. Based on the analyzes of pontificates, the picture of the problem of pedophilia in the Church clearly emerges as a legacy after many years of policy of covering this type of sexual abuse by church leaders. The disclosure of cases of sexual abuse committed by ministers in individual countries was the direct cause of the crisis of the local universal Churches during the pontificate of Benedict XVI and Pope Francis.

Sport i polityka. Wpływ konfliktu w byłej Jugosławii na życie i karierę Drażena Petrovica

Author(s): Marek Szczutkowski / Language(s): Polish Issue: 1/2016

Drazen Petrovic was a unique personality. The outstanding Croatian sportsman opened the door to basketball careers for European players in the United States. The player, thanks to his extraoridinary skills and hard work, became a star in the American NBA league. He was often compared to Mozart. Finding many other similarities (beginning of the career at the young age, remarkable talent, unique approach to responsibilities etc.) he also died prematurely. The goal of the paper is to present the influence of the conflict in the former Yugoslavia on the figure’s personal life as well as his sports carrer with reference to the political situation in the former Yugoslavia. The goal was achieved through an analysis of references (Polish and English). The paper presents also statistical data illustrating the player’s achievements.

Rocznice urodzin weteranów Komunistycznej Partii Chin w polityce wewnętrznej Chińskiej Republiki Ludowej

Author(s): Adrian Brona / Language(s): Polish Issue: 1/2016

This article analyses functions of birthday commemoration of veterans of Communist Party of China. Content analyses of official ceremonial speeches and case study was applied to research ceremonies of 120th anniversary of Mao Zedong birthday and 100th anniversary of Xi Zhongxun, Hu Yaobang and Liu Huaqing birthdays. The study is based on Maurice Halbwachs’s concept of collective memory. The results shows legitimizing function of those events – both of party rule over China and Xi Jinping leadership in the party.

The change of the attitude of Ukrainians to Russia in the conditions of the anti-terrorism operation and humanitarian aid needs of population of Donbass region: the results of sociological researches

Author(s): Maxim Enin / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2016

The article describes the specific features of the new terrorism in the Donbass which has the support of Russia in the struggle for influence on the policy of Ukraine. The terrorist organizations on Donbass are specific territorial units. Using the concept ‘state’, focusing on the Orthodox faith and idea of ‘Russian world’ this terrorism has purpose to capture a new territory, intimidation and demoralization of Ukraine and the world community. In the context of anti-terrorist operation in the Donbass region we studied also the dynamic of changing the attitude of Ukrainians to Russia. From December 6 to December 15, 2014 the Kiev International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) conducted All–Ukrainian poll of public opinion. Deterioration of attitudes towards Russia is observed in all regions. At the same time for studying attitude of Russians to Ukraine the Levada-center in Russia from 23 to 26 January, 2015 conducted a survey on a representative selection for Russian. The purpose of the second research is monitoring humanitarian aid needs of the residents of Donbass (Donetsk and Lugansk region). The research was conducted by the Kiev International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) in December 2014 (the author of article is one of the organizers of this research). The humanitarian situation in Donbas has deteriorated during period from December 2014 to September 2015: increased number of respondents who estimate the situation of living conditions as unbearable in their localities. A significant share surveyed population (15%) would like to leave the localities of Lugansk and Donetsk region but they are not able. Despite a distress half of the residents of Donbass are optimistic and unite to help each other.

Even before the pandemic, we have been living in isolation

Author(s): Marina Shupac / Language(s): English Issue: 05 (43)/2020

COVID-19 harshly hit the population on the banks of the Dniester River – those from Moldova, on the right bank, and those from the breakaway region of Transdniestria, on the left bank. While the people of Transdniestria have been living in a symbolic isolation for the past number of decades, the measures imposed by the de-facto authorities there during the outbreak made the region even more isolated. However this has not stopped the people of the para-state from exploring alternative ways of connecting with the outside world and with each other.

Forms of Inter-party Cooperation. Electoral Coalitions and Party Mergers

Author(s): Raimondas Ibenskas,Nicole Bolleyer / Language(s): English Issue: 03/2018

Various forms of inter-party cooperation have important effects on party system fragmentation and stability in young democracies. However, the conceptualisation and measurement of these forms of inter-party cooperation and the examination of their consequences on party system development remain limited in the literature on parties and party systems. This research addresses this gap in the scholarship in three ways. First, we present the analytical scheme of different types of party cooperation. We argue that the forms of inter-party cooperation vary on two dimensions. The first dimension refers to their structural basis: the stability of the cooperation as captured by whether it is rule-based or, in other words, underpinned by shared rules that are mutually accepted. The second dimension refers to their scope: the number of functional areas of party life subject to cooperation. The two dimensions lead us to four basic forms of inter-party cooperation: (1) non-rule-based, functionally restricted coalitions; (2) rule-based, functionally restricted coalitions; (3) non-rule-based organization-wide mergers; and (4) rule-based organization-wide mergers. Second, we develop theoretical expectations on the frequency of these forms of inter-party cooperation in Central and Eastern Europe. Third, to test these expectations, we present empirical evidence on the number of electoral coalitions and mergers in the first six electoral periods in 10 countries in the region. The results of the analyses support our expectations: non-rule-based organization-wide mergers are rare. The other three forms of party cooperation (nonrule- based coalitions; rule-based coalitions; rule-based mergers) are fairly common in most countries in the region, although less so in the more recent electoral periods.

“I’m Paying, So I Decide”: Czech ANO as an Extreme Form of a Business-Firm Party

Author(s): Lubomír Kopeček / Language(s): English Issue: 04/2016

Business-firm parties founded on the initiative of a political entrepreneur are a phenomenon of growing importance in contemporary party politics. In practice, these are either commercial companies, whose structure is used for a political project, or new and separate organisations constructed on business principles. This article examines the case of Czech party ANO (“YES”), established by the owner of the Agrofert holding company Andrej Babiš. The party achieved remarkable success in the 2013 Czech general election. The opportunity for ANO’s success was provided by strong voter dissatisfaction, reinforced by the scandalous circumstances of the centre-right government’s fall. This context created a fertile ground for the introduction of a new entity espousing anti-party, anti-corruption, and anti-political sentiments. In ANO’s organisation and functioning, a strengthening of certain traits characteristic of this type of parties is apparent. A robust system for screening party members and representatives has been gradually put into place, and human resources–style techniques of psychological testing were employed at the party’s inception. Furthermore, the power in the party has been wholly centralised around the leader, and the party’s territorial structures assigned merely service tasks. ANO has also maximised its electoral-professional orientation. The strengthening of the typical traits of a business-firm party can be explained by reference to the party’s origin in the business environment and the notions entertained by its leader. In many respects, Babiš’s party has brought the organisational model of a business-firm party to its limits.

The Effects of Electoral Rules on Parliamentary Behavior: A Comparative Analysis of Poland and the Czech Republic

Author(s): Mary Stegmaier,Kamil Marcinkiewicz,Michael Jankowski / Language(s): English Issue: 04/2016

Do different types of preferential-list PR systems create different incentives for how Members of Parliament vote? To examine this, we compare the quasi-list system of Poland, where only preference votes determine which candidates win seats, to the flexible-list system in the Czech Republic, where the 5 percent preference vote threshold required to override the party ranking of candidates gives the party greater power in influencing which candidates become MPs. We analyze roll call votes in the 2007–2011 Sejm and the 2010–2013 Czech Chamber of Deputies and, after controlling for party and MP characteristics, we find that in both countries, MPs with lower preference vote shares are more likely to vote along with their party. But, when we compare the strength of this relationship, we observe substantial differences. The magnitude of this relationship in the Czech Republic is ten times stronger than in Poland, which can be attributed to the more prominent role Czech electoral rules give to the party.

Corporate State Capture in Open Societies. The Emergence of Corporate Brokerage Party Systems

Author(s): Abby Innes / Language(s): English Issue: 03/2016

Investigations into Central Europe’s emerging party–state relationships—in contrast to those of the former Soviet Union—have focused less on the abuse of public office for private gain and more on patronage and clientelism as political resources. That debate in turn has been bounded by the conventional political science preoccupation with civil society, party, and state relations. This article contends that these conventions have tended to deflect our attention from the contemporary dynamics of political corruption in Central Europe, in which the commercial sector is a major player and the gains of political players primarily private. Building on the assumption that party systemic adaptations are contingent on changing power relations within the political economy, this article offers an ideal typical party model to characterise the behaviour of political parties that preside over the continuous marketization of the state. A “corporate brokerage party” directs its strategic focus to the private sector and acts primarily as a broker of the state’s power in the marketplace, whether expressed through privatisation, regulation, or public procurement. Using the Czech Republic as a critical case study for Central Europe, the evidence suggests that politicians able to direct allocation to the private sector with low regulatory constraints act less evidently as technocratic brokers of the public interest, partisan constituency, or organisation builders and more as private agents.

Multiple Candidacies and the Role of the Lowest Electoral Tier for Individualized Campaigning

Author(s): Mihail Chiru / Language(s): English Issue: 04/2015

The effects of mixed electoral systems on politicians’ incentives and work in the legislature are most often studied in isolation from the possibly mediating role of campaign behavior. The tier in which a candidate runs might determine a particular style and content of campaigning, more or less party centered and more or less constituency oriented, which in turn could shape how the elected politician will perceive her mandate and act upon it. But what type of campaigning prevails when candidacy in multiple tiers is the rule and the majoritarian element is the dominant component of the mixed electoral system? The present study draws on a survey of 431 candidates in the 2010 Hungarian parliamentary elections and uses linear, logistic regressions and marginal effects to estimate the effect of the above-mentioned electoral system characteristics as well as of organizational and career attributes on campaign norm, constituency-related agenda, and independent campaigning. What appears to matter the most for the degree of campaign individualization is the lowest electoral tier in which the candidate runs, irrespective of her electoral security. The study also reveals the significant effects of two dimensions previously ignored by the literature: the level of nomination and the local politics profile (years of experience and the prospect of holding a dual mandate).

Assessing the Role of European Attitudes in Cross-National Research: Does the Post-Communist Context Matter?

Author(s): Magda Giurcanu / Language(s): English Issue: 02/2015

How does Eastern Europe contribute to the debate over EU’s democratic deficit from an electoral perspective? Does Eastern Europe challenge our theoretical understanding of what motivates European citizens to participate and express their opinions in European Parliamentary elections? While there is no overarching consensus in the academic community regarding these questions, this essay aims to illustrate how a deeper understanding of one post-communist case and a bottom-up perspective on attitudes and political behavior in one locale, Romania, allowed the researcher to delve deeper into the taken-for-granted dynamics that European citizens from the South, East, and West engage in when voting in European Parliamentary elections. The approach of “ethnographic sensibility” mentioned in the workshop’s discussions and illustrated in several contributions to this volume (see e.g. Kubik 2013; Knott 2015) constitutes then a useful starting point in deconstructing conventional knowledge. Moreover, during the process of moving up the ladder of generality and building inferences from one case study to a region, Eastern Europe still shares enough characteristics to deserve its own dummy variable, so to speak, in large-N continentwide analyses covering the 2004 and 2009 European Parliamentary (EP) elections. Yet, as Joshua Tucker (2015) mentions in his contribution, it is unclear whether the historical legacies discussed at the workshop and further elaborated on by Grigore Pop-Eleches (2015) will continue to play a role in a priori distinguishing Eastern Europeans’ political attitudes and behaviors from other EU citizens in the South or West in future EP elections.

For Rule of Law, Political Plurality, and a Just Society: Use of the Legislative Veto by President Václav Havel

Author(s): Vlastimil Havlík,Milan Hrubeš,Marek Pecina / Language(s): English Issue: 02/2014

The President of the Czech Republic has few opportunities to actively intervene in the legislative process and express his opinion on the current situation, except for one: the power to veto laws. It is one of the most important powers belonging to the Czech Republic’s head of state, through which the president is able to influence the results of the legislative process. According to the Czech constitution, the veto must be accompanied by a written explanation, which gives the president an extraordinary opportunity to express his own view of not only the particular law being vetoed but the general political situation and direction of the country. The importance of the reasoning is greater if the state is headed by a strong figure with a clear vision of how society should function. The first Czech president, Václav Havel, was undoubtedly such a figure. This study will bring a qualitative analysis of Václav Havel’s veto reasonings, and point out how he systematically based his argumentation on three principles: rule of law, political plurality, and a just (humane) society.

Struggle over Dimensionality. Party Competition in Western and Eastern Europe

Author(s): Jan Rovný,Erica E. Edwards / Language(s): English Issue: 01/2012

This article analyzes the impact of party strategies on the issue structure, and consequently the dimensional structure, of party systems across Europe. Conceptualizing political competition in two dimensions (economic left-right and social traditionalism versus liberalism), the authors demonstrate that political parties in both Eastern and Western Europe contest the issue composition of political space. The authors argue that large, mainstream parties are invested in the dimensional status quo, preferring to compete on the primary dimension by emphasizing economic issues. Systematically disadvantaged niche parties, conversely, prefer to compete along a secondary dimension by stressing social issues. Adopting such a strategy enables niche parties to divert voter attention and challenge the structure of conflict between the major partisan competitors. The authors test these propositions using the 2006 iteration of the Chapel Hill Expert Surveys on Party Positions. Findings indicate that while the structure of political conflict in Eastern versus Western Europe could not be more different, the logic with which parties compete in their respective systems is the same. The authors conclude that political competition is primarily a struggle over dimensionality; it does not merely occur along issue dimensions but also over their content.

Encouraging Effective Democratic Competition

Author(s): Anna Grzymała-Busse / Language(s): English Issue: 01/2007

Political party competition is critical to fostering good governance and preventing corruption. However, several aspects of competition—the number of parties, their vote share, or their specific ideology—have no demonstrable impact on corruption. In contrast, the robustness of competition is critical in constraining governments and monitoring policy. Parties have to clearly profile themselves, be credible coalition partners, and prioritize parliamentary monitoring above building organizations. Above all, political party competition must be inclusive: no party should be excluded a priori from governance or coalitions because of their ideology or the identity of the constituency they represent. This is especially the case in new democracies, where capable and stable competitors are in short supply. Consequently, former authoritarian parties need to be included: they have the greatest incentives to monitor the behavior of the new governing parties, and they often have the greatest capacity to do so.

Generația Z și liderii politici. Preferințele celor care au votat pentru prima dată în 2019

Author(s): Sergiu Gherghina,Paul Emanuel Tap / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 201-202/2019

The presidential elections reflect the electoral support provided to various political leaders. One driver for voting is the citizens’ preference for specific features that leaders possess. This article aims to investigate the features that first-time voters appreciate about a political leader. In doing so, it analyzes the preferences of those who voted for the first time in the 2019 presidential elections. These voters belong to the Generation Z and there is little information available about their political preferences. Our exploratory analysis uses individual level data from an original survey conducted between 25 November and 15 December 2019 on a nation-wide sample of 664 first-time voters who cast a vote. The results indicate a combination of preferences that is somewhat unexpected and forms an important basis for further research.

Kleine Anmerkungen zweier prominenter Siebenbürger über Kaiser Joseph II.

Author(s): Udo W. Acker / Language(s): German Issue: 2/2012

Der langjährige Bürgermeister, Senator und Abgeordnete von Mediasch zur Nationsuniversität, Michael Conrad von Heydendorff d. Ä. (1730-1821), der über seinen Großvater mit dem siebenbürgischen Gouverneur Baron Samuel von Brukenthal verwandt war (Cousins 2. Grades), berichtet in seiner viele hundert Seiten umfassenden, ab 1803 verfassten Selbstbiographie auch Einzelheiten über die im Jahre 1787 erfolgte Entlassung des Gouverneurs von Siebenbürgen. Heydendorff, der knapp zehn Jahre jünger als Brukenthal (1721-1803) war, pflegte mit diesem doch einen recht freundschaftlichen, beinahe intimen Umgang.