Suchergebnisse

Political competitions and access to power, in plural societies like Nigeria, takes different forms and dimensions. Ethnic pluralism in Nigeria has more often than not been characterized by contestations and struggles for access to power and the resources of the Nation-State. Nigeria has therefore become a "cake. to be shared among the various nationalities, while nobody cares about the baking of the cake. The ethnic factor which initially ignited the demands for States creation has continued to torment the country. Thus, ethno-regional interests are usually mobilized to campaign for States creation and development and these agitations have been persistent and seemingly endless. This aim of this paper is to argue that the logic of continued States creation in Nigeria, purportedly to bring government closer to the people and achieve national development is a failed strategy. Again,the history and nature of States creation in Nigeria has failed to assuage the very forces that instigate the demands for new States. The prospects for national development and integration as well as local autonomy depend on the emergence of a purposeful, courageous, visionary and national leadership. Besides the leadership question, Nigeria needs a repositioned and strengthened local government system, an orientation to enable Nigerians on the need for peaceful co-existence and constitutional amendments to ensuring a true Federal system where the other levels of government will control a substantial amount of their resources.

Behind the Scenes examines planning in the City of Adelaide from 1972 until 1993 within the historical framework of City/State relations from 1836 when the Province of South Australia was founded. During this 21-year period, the City had its own planning and development control legislation separate from the rest of the State. Dr Llewellyn-Smith examines why this situation came about, why it continued for this particular period and why it ceased in 1993 when the separate legislation was repealed and the City became part of the State system under the new Development Act 1993. Behind the Scenes includes original interviews with many of the key individuals in the City and State who played influential roles during this period. Dr Llewellyn-Smith himself was the City Planner from 1974 until 1981 and then the Town Clerk/Chief Executive Officer of the Adelaide City Council from 1982 until 1993: this book, then, is both a work of scholarship and an insider's account.

This article applies a concept of "presidential leverage" to the inner workings of the White House, specifically decisions regarding the location of policy formulation. The guiding question addresses how a president's leverage in the political system influences decisions regarding policy making. Findings support the propositions that (1) leverage has a systematic impact on presidential policy formation, (2) divided government has little or no impact on policy making location, and (3) presidents who are ideologically compatible with Congress are less likely to centralize. I conclude with some general thoughts on the current state of presidential leverage.

ObjectiveIn this article, I apply the concept of partisan biases to personal financial evaluations. I ask whether there are systematic differences in partisans' evaluations of their personal finances that depend on whether their preferred party occupies the White House. I argue that when there is a Democratic president in office, Democrats will view their personal financial situations more favorably than Republicans. Conversely, when there is a Republican president in office, Republicans will view their personal finances more favorably than Democrats.MethodsI use ordered probit and ordinary least squares (OLS) regression models.ResultsI find that partisan biases do exist when it comes to personal financial evaluations. However, the weight assigned to partisanship when it comes to personal evaluations is contingent on the level of party polarization at the time of the survey.ConclusionPartisan biases are more pervasive than previously thought, even trickling down to evaluations that are personal in nature.