Suchergebnisse

International audience ; In June 2013, Istanbul and many cities across Turkey became stages of massive demonstrations and occupations, which were sparked by a conflict over Gezi Park in central Istanbul. For many, the 'park issue' was simply the last straw, and it led to unprecedented revolt, reflecting a huge number of grievances against the government for some, while for others it emphasized the impoverishing consequences of the Justice and Development Party's (AKP's) urban policies. Instead of disentangling causes and effects, we think that a productive way of approaching the oppositional surge that erupted in Gezi Park is through the political work that space does in the context of the increasing prominence of speculation-driven and authoritarian interventions in urban spaces. Gezi, as an event, not only disrupted the routinized scripts of an increasingly autocratic government and defied the presumed consensus over real-estate and infrastructure-led economic growth policies, but also helped to articulate a series of political agendas across the urban–rural continuum that came before it. Even after the occupation, the Gezi spirit continued to politicize space through various de-localizations. By elaborating on a particular phrase popularized during Gezi, namely yaşam alanı (life space), the article discusses how the riot's political impact deepened and expanded not only through defending a space but also by creating new ones, both materially and conceptually.

A recent democratic experience in Tunisia in which a religious political party, Ennahdha, took over government for 3 years, provides an opportunity to learn from the interactions between the support to religious parties and improvements in infrastructure access rates. The correlation is not simple. Ennahdha did get, initially, political credit for improvements in regions with low initial networked water connections and it did deliver to the regions where they enjoyed political support. But the support faded as access improved, reducing the political attractiveness of the sector or at least reducing it importance as compared to other concerns voters may have. For sanitation, a correlation is also noted but it is much less robust. Tunisia's experience suggests that the reputation of religious parties to care for the unmet needs of population is, at least, partially justified. However, water seems to be a much more effective and reliable voters' grabber than sanitation and this may penalize investment in sanitation, a matter of concern since it has significant health and environmental effects. Moreover, once voters enjoy enough access and once they have seen the overall performance of the party, they treat the party like any other ; info:eu-repo/semantics/published

The main argument of this paper is that there is considerable heterogeneity in the way aid can shape tax performance in developing countries: through behavioural effects, donor conditionality, recipient policy reform and technical assistance; and these effects are country-specific. We investigate these effects by applying the dynamic Common Correlated Effects Mean Group estimator to a dataset comprising 84 developing countries from 1980 to 2013. The following results ensued: aid and taxes comprise an equilibrium relation, with a positive long-run association between aid and taxes; causality runs from aid to taxes, suggesting that on average, changes in aid induce permanent changes in taxes.

This thesis conducts a controversy study focusing on the intermingling of political considerations and emerging science in a controversy over whether or not the Zipingpu dam in China's Sichuan Province caused the magnitude 7.9 Wenchuan earthquake on May 12th 2008. The 2008 Wenchuan earthquake was one of the deadliest, costliest and biggest earthquakes in China in three decades. Over 90,000 people died, went missing or were presumed dead, and economic damage was estimated at over 100 billion US dollars in 2013. For scientists to suggest that such an unfathomable disaster could have been man-made was controversial to say the least. Not only because the root cause of the earthquake pointed to was a dam, and dam projects are inherently rife with conflict, but also because the Zipingpu dam was itself a high priority project for the Chinese central government and the Sichuan Province.

International audience ; In June 2013, Istanbul and many cities across Turkey became stages of massive demonstrations and occupations, which were sparked by a conflict over Gezi Park in central Istanbul. For many, the 'park issue' was simply the last straw, and it led to unprecedented revolt, reflecting a huge number of grievances against the government for some, while for others it emphasized the impoverishing consequences of the Justice and Development Party's (AKP's) urban policies. Instead of disentangling causes and effects, we think that a productive way of approaching the oppositional surge that erupted in Gezi Park is through the political work that space does in the context of the increasing prominence of speculation-driven and authoritarian interventions in urban spaces. Gezi, as an event, not only disrupted the routinized scripts of an increasingly autocratic government and defied the presumed consensus over real-estate and infrastructure-led economic growth policies, but also helped to articulate a series of political agendas across the urban–rural continuum that came before it. Even after the occupation, the Gezi spirit continued to politicize space through various de-localizations. By elaborating on a particular phrase popularized during Gezi, namely yaşam alanı (life space), the article discusses how the riot's political impact deepened and expanded not only through defending a space but also by creating new ones, both materially and conceptually.

El fragmento de Bruce Bueno de Mesquita, expone los principios y líneas generales que fundamentan la Teoría de la Elección Racional y su aplicación a las Relaciones Internacionales. Partiendo de la idea de que la atención debe ponerse, no sobre los estados, sino sobre los líderes políticos ?motivados por intereses personales y no nacionales, como es el deseo de mantenerse en el poder? y los procesos de toma de decisiones; Bueno de Mesquita cuestiona las asunciones de paradigmas previos en torno a la separación del ámbito nacional e internacional. Asimismo, expone como los líderes políticos, influidos por tres conceptos clave como son el poder, las preferencias y las percepciones, toman decisiones y se coordinan entre ellos, utilizando interacciones estratégicas ; This Bruce Bueno de Mesquita's fragment sets out the principles and general lines that support the Rational Choice Theory and its application to International Relations. Starting with the idea that we must pay attention, not to Nation States, but to Political Leaders ?motivated by personal interests, not national ones, such as their wish to stay in office?, and Decision Making Processes; Bueno de Mesquita challenges the assumptions of previous paradigms related to the separation among the National and International scene. He also states how the Political Leaders, influenced by three key concepts, such as power, preferences and perceptions, take decisions and coordinate their foreign policy actions, using strategic interactions

We investigate whether lending by the dominant Russian state bank, Sberbank, contributed to Vladimir Putin's ascent to power during the presidential elections of March 2000. Our hypothesis is that Sberbank corporate loans could have been used as incentives for managers at private firms to mobilize employees to vote for the incumbent regime. In line with our proposed voter mobilization mechanism, we find that the regional growth of Sberbank corporate loans in the months before the presidential election is related to the regional increase in votes for Putin and to the regional increase in voter turnout between the Duma election of December 1999 and the presidential election of March 2000. The effect of Sberbank firm lending on Putin votes was most pronounced in regions where the governor was affiliated with the regime and in regions with extensive private employment. The effect was less apparent in regions with many single-company towns, where voter intimidation is sufficient to get the required result. Additional robustness checks and placebo regressions confirm the main findings. Our results support the view that additional Sberbank corporate loans granted prior to the March 2000 presidential election facilitated Putin's early electoral success.

Bhana (2001) and Landy, Maharaj and Mainet-Valleix (2004) argue that people of Indian origin have lost much of their ancestral legacy as they became South Africans over the last 140 years. Using a largely qualitative lens this paper explores whether Indian cultural identifiers influence South African Indian identity and concludes with the voices of respondents showing a hybrid cultural model instead of an exclusively Indian identity model. The hybrid model is informed by especially second and third generation respondents' exposure to Western and African influences. Data for this paper were produced from 21 face to face interviews with three generations of South African Indians in the Metropolitan Area of Durban.

International audience ; In June 2013, Istanbul and many cities across Turkey became stages of massive demonstrations and occupations, which were sparked by a conflict over Gezi Park in central Istanbul. For many, the 'park issue' was simply the last straw, and it led to unprecedented revolt, reflecting a huge number of grievances against the government for some, while for others it emphasized the impoverishing consequences of the Justice and Development Party's (AKP's) urban policies. Instead of disentangling causes and effects, we think that a productive way of approaching the oppositional surge that erupted in Gezi Park is through the political work that space does in the context of the increasing prominence of speculation-driven and authoritarian interventions in urban spaces. Gezi, as an event, not only disrupted the routinized scripts of an increasingly autocratic government and defied the presumed consensus over real-estate and infrastructure-led economic growth policies, but also helped to articulate a series of political agendas across the urban–rural continuum that came before it. Even after the occupation, the Gezi spirit continued to politicize space through various de-localizations. By elaborating on a particular phrase popularized during Gezi, namely yaşam alanı (life space), the article discusses how the riot's political impact deepened and expanded not only through defending a space but also by creating new ones, both materially and conceptually.