Abstract Most public policy frameworks, such as the policy cycle, multiple streams, punctuated equilibrium, policy feedback, and advocacy coalition frameworks, originate from the global north, and their understanding of political elite dynamics remains limited and context-specific. In the global south, particularly in countries like India with distinct constitutional systems and governance structures, this narrow and limited perspective weakens the policy framework’s explanatory power, limiting their ability to address accountability, systemic inequities, and elite manipulation. This study revisits political elites and their will as a socio-political phenomenon, introducing the concept of the ‘policy panopticon’ to describe their pervasive influence on policymaking. The research adopts discourse analysis as its methodological framework to uncover ontological gaps in the public policy frameworks mentioned above. It specifically investigates how these frameworks address the role and influence of political elites and their political will in shaping policy processes. This analysis is based on key indicators derived from a comprehensive literature review of contemporary facets of political class theory, which are then applied within the discourse analysis methodology to examine policy frameworks. The findings highlight that existing policy frameworks fail to account for political willingness, particularly concerning techno-governance artefacts and political class influence. This gap in the literature underscores the need for further theoretical refinement and practical understanding of how political elites shape policy processes within diverse democratic contexts.
History of scholarship and learning. The humanities, Social Sciences
The research examines the concept of “Asabiyya”, its historical and semantic meaning, which goes back to the teachings of the outstanding Arab Muslim thinker Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406). Particular attention is paid to the understanding of Asabiyya as a methodological principle for analyzing the historical process, which is based on the idea of a special form of community of people. Asabiyya is the single basis for the existence of a certain mental reality on which this community is based, ensuring the maintenance and reproduction of social ties, that is, Asabiyya as a term can be considered as the personification of the high consciousness of unity, the unity of the tribal and consanguineous spirit that underlies social solidarity and group consciousness, blind adherence to this unity. Asabiyya as a theory of state formation by Ibn Khaldun's student Ibn al-Azraq (1427-1491) is seen as the main driving cyclical force of the historical process, which Ibn Khaldun first described for understanding the history of the Maghreb and North Africa. It is important to note that Ibn al-Azraq, in his political theory, considered the cyclical nature of Asabiyya as the main reason for the emergence, flourishing and decline of the state. A feature of the concept of the state of Ibn al-Azraq is that the historical cycles in it are not absolutely closed; therefore, there is the possibility of continuity between the dying and the new emerging dynasties. The founder of a new dynasty develops the customs and traditions of the previous one. In addition, the institutions of the state, in his opinion, will have to be updated and improved within the framework of continuity, provided that they still retain the basic forces for development, the most important of which is the power and authority of Asabiyya.
Steve Biko is one of the most important liberation activists of his time. Yet, his theoretical contribution is not well understood or appreciated. This article reconstructs Biko’s political ideas and introduces a new integrated reading and interpretation of his writings, speeches, and recorded interviews. It argues that Biko’s Black consciousness ideal should not only be read as engaging an activist movement or programme but, also, as encompassing an original theoretical framework grounded in a communalist ethos of Biko’s own conceptual development. It argues that Biko’s Black consciousness ideal sought to relate racialised oppression to a historically centred communalist solution framed by two interlocking structural elements—rightful power and free community. The article argues that only by a theoretical and normative consideration of these elements, on Biko’s own conceptual terms, do we get a coherent understanding of Biko’s distinctive view of free postcolonial society.
The purpose of the study is to examine the effect of personality on counterproductive work behaviors and to show how burnout mediates this effect. The study also aims to show the effects of personality dimensions (conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, agreeableness, emotional stability, and openness to experience) on counterproductive work behaviors. In this context, the study sample consists of 270 individuals working in different sectors. The workers included in the study were interviewed with a personal questionnaire. The collected data were analyzed using the SPSS package program. The results showed that personality traits are an important predictor of counterproductive work behaviors and burnout plays a mediating role in this effect. In addition, it was found that there was a significant relationship between the personality dimensions of self-control, extraversion, compatibility, neuroticism and counterproductive work behavior and burnout. It was also found that there is a relationship between openness to experience and burnout. Finally, the study found that burnout mediates the effect of self-control, extraversion, compatibility, and neuroticism on counterproductive work behavior.
The paper proposes and validates the strategic public procurement regulatory compliance model with mediation effect of ethical behavior. It expands the socio-economic theory of regulatory compliance to explore the mediating effect of ethical behavior on the influence of professionalism, familiarity, enforcement, resistance to political pressure and compliance with public procurement regulation. A quantitative research design was deployed using 125 procurement officers as a sample group. The data from the sample was analyzed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM). The results validated the hypotheses for the strategic public procurement regulatory compliance model with mediation effect of ethical behavior. The study not only confirmed the earlier findings on the direct effects of professionalism, familiarity, enforcement, resistance to political pressure and ethical behavior on compliance, but also established the mediating effect of ethical behavior on compliance on all the predictors except resistance to political pressure. The study implied that ethical behavior of public procurement officers should be a strategic point of concern by both policymakers and professional bodies. Theoretically, the studyexpands thesocio-economic theory of regulatory compliance within the context of procurement literature through mediation effects of ethical behavior via structural analysis.
This commentary proposes a methodological approach about policy analysis on autonomous driving. It focuses on the role of discourse, the multiple actors and technologies involved in the processes of urban policy-making. Autonomous driving is considered a crucial case of policy-making in cities, because of the multitude of established and new actors involved as well as the combination of different digitalisation and automation technologies. Current research outlines the uncertainty planners and policymakers find themselves in regarding how to plan and regulate for autonomous driving, and calls for the need of finding the right forms of governance and policy for the implementation of autonomous driving in urban contexts. Therefore, studying the processes of its policy in the making is vital, as it is these processes that determine if and how any kind of policy will come into place. Subsequently, it is urban policy that will define the ways autonomous driving will be implemented and its implications in cities. Since both socio-political and material factors play a role in policy-making, a suitable methodological approach is needed that can address both. Therefore, this commentary discusses methodological developments drawing inspiration from Argumentative Discourse Analysis (ADA) and combining it with elements from Actor-Network-Theory (ANT). The insights provided by the commentary aim at a more comprehensive and thorough understanding of policy-making processes of autonomous driving and how policy change occurs (or not).
This study was made to analyze the exploitation of the workforce in the dependent peripheral economies and also the current global crisis scenario and how they imply in the political crisis and coup underway in Brazil. It was sought through a review of the literature to look at the Marxist theory of dependency in order to identify the conditions that allow explaining the current setbacks that have been taking place in the Latin American scenario in which the coup in Brazil stands out. The exploitation of the working force in our current scenario is linked to the financial capital valuation process and its biggest impacts will occur in the dependent economies in order to pressure them to redefine their economic, political and labor order so they can answer to global capitalism determinations.
Political science, Political institutions and public administration (General)
Hoy en día puede resultar paradójico hablar del triunfo de algún sistema alternativo al neoliberalismo. Sin embargo, David Graeber, teórico y activista anarquista, defiende el éxito de algunos movimientos de protesta de corte anarquista en las últimas dos décadas. Este ensayo trata de entender qué entiende él por “triunfo”, para lo cual es necesario ahondar en su concepción de la sociedad, del ser humano y, en última instancia, de la revolución. La democracia asamblearia y la acción directa serán los puntos de partida de la praxis y de la reflexión en David Graeber y, a partir de ellos, intenta redefinir las fronteras de una sociedad de individuos libres, solidarios y autónomos.
Machiavelli’s political works should be read not only as attempts to shape princely behavior, but as demonstrations of a model of advisory behavior. They are a performance of advice-giving, of the dispassionate, scientistic – but also quietly radical – behavior Machiavelli expects of those tasked with speaking to power. This model’s central feature is concealment of argument and rhetorical intent, a feature inherited from classical rhetoric but put to newly expansive use. This article turns from Machiavelli’s appropriation of the “mirror” literature’s concept of flattery, a kind of counter-ideal of advisory behavior, to his development of the classical rhetoric of self-effacement. It argues that he puts this rhetorical tradition to newly expansive use – not as a proto-scientist of politics but as a dynamic political actor in his own right – inventing ostensibly neutral dilemmas, classifications, and frames to guide the ruler-reader, as if voluntarily, toward some of his most distinctive conclusions.
This research is entitled Political Conceptual Metaphor in Political Discourses: A Cognitive
Semantics Study. The study investigates the type of conceptual metaphor found in the political
discourses. The discourses used as the data are taken from TIME Online Magazine during
February 2015. Moreover, this study also tries to find out the conceptualizations of politics. This
research analyzes the input of political domain and the input of other domains. This research also
investigates the source and the target domain of structural metaphor of politics. In this study the
researcher adapts several theories related to conceptual metaphor from Lakoff and Johnson, and
Evans and Green. Moreover, this research also the theory from Fauconnier The result shows that
orientational metaphor is more common than ontological metaphor in the political discourses
under the issue of 2016 general election. From 105 metaphorical statements, the researcher found
42 orientational metaphors and 63 ontological metaphors. It shows that in the political
discourses, politics commonly being projected as some concrete substances.
Keyword: political conceptual methaphor, political discourse, cognitive semantics
This article deconstructs the theory of modernization and argues that the theory is a political propaganda to mislead the people of Third World countries; the social transformation the theory advocates is not for the development of Third World countries. Instead, modernization is actually gradually destroying the local productive capacity, while cultivating the Western individualism in the South. In Uganda, the policies to bring about modernization under economic reform have made the economy to be dominated by a service sector that neither creates ample employment opportunities nor earns foreign exchange for the country. They have undermined manufacturing and agriculture, and as a result, a large percentage of the population is experiencing food insecurity. The article concludes by arguing that Uganda should have learnt from China's self-determined reforms and China should also learn from Uganda's experience while contemplating to adopt further reforms under foreign pressure.
Economics as a science, Political science (General)
I propose a theory of domination derived from republican political theory that is in contrast to the neo-republican theory of domination as arbitrary interference and domination as dependence. I suggest that, drawing on of the writings of Machiavelli and Rousseau, we can see two faces of domination that come together to inform social relations. One type of domination is extractive dominance where agents are able to derive surplus benefit from another individual, group, or collective resource, natural or human. Another is what I call constitutive domination where the norms, institutions, and values of the community shape the rationality of subjects to accept forms of power and social relations and collective goals as legitimate forms of authority. Each of these make up two faces of a broader theory of social domination that is more concrete and politically compelling than that put forth by contemporary neo-republican theory. I argue that this understanding of domination should be seen as a kind of ‘radical republicanism’ where the centrality of asymmetrical power relations are placed at the centre of all political concerns. I end by considering the relevance of the common interest as a central means by which to judge the existence of these kinds of domination as well as establish a convincing evaluative criteria for critical judgment.
One of the essential functions of the financial system is to provide the long-term funding needed for long-lived and expensive capital assets. However, one of the main difficulties of the current private financial system is its failure to provide such long-term financing. The paper specifically considers the short-termism in Brazil’s financial market as a major obstacle to financing long-term assets. There has been much discussion about how to support private long-term finance in order to meet Brazil’s growing infrastructure and investment needs. In its current form, the National Economic and Social Development Bank (BNDES) is the main source of long-term funding in the country. However, BNDES has been subject to a range of criticisms, such as crowding out private sector bank lending, and it is said to be hampering the development of the local capital market. The paper argues that, rather than following the traditional approach to justify the existence of public banks, based on market failures, finding an effective answer to this question requires a theory of financial instability.
JEL Classifications: E00, E4, E6, G00, G1
A presente pesquisa versa sobre uma das circunstâncias judiciais estabelecidas no artigo 59 do Código Penal Brasileiro para a aplicação da pena-base, qual seja, a personalidade do agente. O estudo destina-se a demonstrar a importância da vetorial da personalidade na hora da aplicação da pena, se é possível considerá-la desfavorável ao agente, bem como se o magistrado é suficientemente capaz de atestá-la. Não obstante, será aqui apresentada a relevância desta circunstância judicial na motivação da condenação e qual a sua relação com grandes linhas de pensamento do Direito Penal, tais como o Direito Penal do Autor e o Direito Penal do Inimigo. Assim, verificar-se-á se pode haver a valoração negativa da vetorial da personalidade, bem como quais são as consequências que resultarão de tal feito.
Jurisprudence. Philosophy and theory of law, Political institutions and public administration (General)
Participatory Budgeting (PB), an institutional innovation to promote democratic change, is a form of collaborative governance in which citizens are involved in decision-making processes about how to spend part or all of available government funds. Like the broader concept of democracy, for PB to be effective, there needs to be an ongoing participatory process that involves the building of civic capacity and infrastructure. This paper focuses on a particular attribute of civic efficacy, that of deliberative public engagement, defined as collaborative problem solving through informed, inclusive, egalitarian processes with the outcomes influencing policy, decisions and/or collaborative action. It is argued that to be a deep democratic reform, PB needs to be more intentionally deliberative than usually practiced, within an environment that nurtures civic collaboration and empowerment. In the current situation of disaffected, often angry and/or cynical citizenry, without resorting to revolution, overcoming the pervasive sense of impotence to effect real change is not easy. It requires ongoing effort to create the civic capacity, policies and the institutions that will enable everyday people to work together with decision-makers to achieve collaborative public wisdom, decisions and action. For PB to avoid being merely a superficial band-aid to the perceived malaise of our democratic systems, we contend that the culture in which it is situated needs to be nurtured and stewarded to be more collaborative, considered and egalitarian. The deliberative democracy process instituted over a number of years in Greater Geraldton, Western Australia, shows how some of the preconditions for an effective participatory budgeting initiative could be achieved. The lessons learned are widely applicable to other western democracies, and potentially, other forms of governance.
<p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; line-height: 120%; page-break-after: auto;" align="JUSTIFY"><span style="font-family: 'DejaVu Serif', serif;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><strong>Resumen.</strong> La investigación que dio origen a este ensayo se interroga sobre el funcionamiento del discurso político argentino contemporáneo, principalmente acerca de sus aspectos genéricos y enunciativos. El objetivo concreto de este trabajo es considerar algunas tentativas de delimitación y clasificación del discurso político, provenientes tanto de los estudios de la discursividad, como de la teoría política. Lejos de ser una cuestión evidente y zanjada, persiste aún como objeto de discusión en las mencionadas disciplinas. El marco teórico lo conforman los estudios del discurso. Dos corrientes de esta disciplina son objeto de observación: la Escuela Francesa de análisis del discurso y la teoría de los discursos sociales.</span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; line-height: 120%;" align="JUSTIFY"><span style="font-family: 'DejaVu Serif', serif;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"> <em>Palabras clave</em>: tipología, discurso político, lo político, la política.</span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; line-height: 120%; page-break-before: auto; page-break-after: auto;" lang="en-US" align="JUSTIFY"><span style="font-family: 'DejaVu Serif', serif;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><strong>Abstract.</strong> This article presents some conclusions of a research project on the operation of contemporary Argentine political discourse, mainly on aspects related to genre and enunciative issues. The specific aim is to present some considerations on the attempts to define and classify political discourse made from the field of discourse studies and the political theory. This matter is not clear and remains unsolved. It persists being a controversial subject in the abovementioned disciplines. Out research is carried out from the theoretical framework of discourse studies. Within this field, we focus our attention on two schools: the French School of discourse analysis, and the theory of social discourses.</span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; line-height: 120%;" lang="en-US" align="JUSTIFY"><span style="font-family: 'DejaVu Serif', serif;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"> <em>Keywords</em>: typology, political discourse, the political, politics.</span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; line-height: 120%; page-break-after: auto;" lang="pt-BR" align="JUSTIFY"><span style="font-family: 'DejaVu Serif', serif;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><strong>Resumo.</strong> A pesquisa que conduziu a este ensaio interroga-se sobre o funcionamento do discurso político contemporâneo argentino, especialmente sobre aspectos genéricos e enunciativos. O objetivo específico deste trabalho é considerar algumas tentativas de definição e classificação do discurso político, provenientes de estudos do discurso e da teoria política. Esta questão, por não ter sido ainda resolvida, persiste como um assunto de controvérsia nestas disciplinas. Os estudos do discurso são o quadro teórico. O objeto de observação são duas escolas desta disciplina: a Escola Francesa da Análise do Discurso e a teoria dos discursos sociais.</span></span></p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; line-height: 120%;" lang="pt-BR" align="JUSTIFY"><span style="font-family: 'DejaVu Serif', serif;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"> <em>Palavras-chave</em>: tipologia, discurso político, o político, a política.</span></span></p>
Best known for inspiring Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, the Galápagos Islands are often referred to as an “evolutionary Eden” and celebrated as one of the world’s few remaining bastions of “pristine” nature. However, recent concerns of a crisis of over-development prompted UNESCO to put the Galápagos on its list of World Heritage Sites “In Danger.” In this paper, we interrogate the conception of pristine nature which undergirds the recent crisis discourse and argue that such understandings of nature are not in fact natural, but are social productions that reflect particular ways of understanding island space. We then explore the material and political effects of understandings of “pristine” nature by showing how they work to structure the tourism industry and investment in public infrastructure in ways that have created social inequalities as well as negative environmental impacts. We then briefly discuss measures taken so far to address the crisis situation, arguing that they would benefit from critical attention to the complexity of social-environmental relations in the Galápagos and a re-thinking of the nature of the islands.