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In discussions of Scandinavian democratization, it is commonplace to argue that long- standing farmer representation in parliament and a lack of feudalism encouraged a democratic-participatory civic culture within the peasant farmer class – or perhaps in the population as a whole. The present essay questions this interpretation in the Swedish case. It centers on a re-interpretation of farmer politics at the national level from a two-chamber system of representation after the 1866-67 reform to the alliance between the farmers' party and Social Democracy in 1933 and offers a new analytical account of the way that one class's attitude to democratic inclusion can change over time, owing to changed political and economic relationships to other classes. I show that Swedish farmers did not organize themselves independently of nobles and land-owners until the 1920s, and that they did not play the role of an independent pro-democratic force. On the contrary, the broad-based organizations of farmers in the 1920s and 1930s, with their democratic, participatory culture, appear to have been heavily influenced by the political culture of liberals and the labor movement, which in democratic society opened the door to a re-shaping of Swedish farmer politics that abandoned the old (subservient) alliance with estate owners. It was notdemocratic farmers who gave rise to Social Democracy – rather, it was Social Democracy that caused farmers to become democratic. Understanding farmer politics correctly also opens up a new understanding of the determinants of Swedish democratization.

Popper and Politics In Africa,- 1. Karl Popper's Social Engineering: Piecemeal Or 'Many-Pieces-At-Once'?- Oseni Taiwo Afisi -- 2. Popper's Critique Of Nationalism And The Quest For Self-Determination In Postcolonial Africa- Adeolu Oluwaseyi Oyekan -- 3. Popper's Piecemeal Social Engineering As The Basis For African Development- Chris Tasie Osegenwune -- 4. Karl Popper's Myth Of The Framework: Exorcising Tribal Mentality In Modern African Society- Olayemi Salami -- 5 Karl Popper's Political Philosophy Through The Eyes Of George Orwell's Animal Farm: A Caution For Marxists In Africa- Babajide Olugbenga Dasaolu -- 6. An Exploration of Karl Popper Within The Context of Freedom in African Politics- Celestine Agoziem, Olayemi Jacob Ogunniyi and Adebakin Oluyinka Osoja -- 7. An exposition of the Liberal concept of Freedom in Popper's Political Philosophy and Africa's Communitarianism- Daniel obasooto -- 8. An overview of Popper's position on liberalism within the confine of Politics in Africa-Adesina abdulfattah Raji, Muse Alade Mumuni and Adesuyi Kolawole Adekola -- 9. Art of government, postcolony and open society in Africa: optimism and aporia of a universal demand- Emmanuel Malolo Dissakè -- 10. Cooperativism as a Socio-economic Development Mechanism in Nigeria: Exploring the Popperian Philosophical Thinking- Ajibola Anthony Akanji -- 11. Karl Popper's Critique Of Collectivism: Between Equalitarian And Totalitarian Justice- Oseni Taiwo Afisi -- 12. Ethno-religious Conflicts In Nigeria: Exploring Karl Popper's Paradox of Tolerance- Temitope Oluwaseun Oluyemi.

Theoretical research on cooperation between public and private partners in infrastructure projects suggests that they can be a tool for preventing white elephants. However, various case studies suggest that actual outcomes are largely dependent on the effective transfer of operational risk to the private partner. This paper explores policy and planning dysfunction, and the idea that private entities that participate in public-private partnerships (PPPs) with no substantial risk transfer, and under heavily subsidized schemes, may engage in lobbying and exert pressure to develop white elephant projects.

Walmart is not only the world's single largest retailer and private employer, it is also a crystallization and an agent of a broader paradigm shift toward "securitization": the convergence of financial and security-oriented logics of risk management. This paper examines the way Walmart mobilizes and manipulates risk to cultivate profit and power and to transform the social and cultural politics within its orbit. Walmart emblematizes and advances capitalist securitization and offers a "risk-free" consumer space as a refuge in an uncertain world, yet it ultimately contributes to a world of systemic insecurity and economic anxiety.

Few issues have proven more contentious in American politics during recent decades than immigration. Although there is wide agreement that the existing immigration system is "broken," major policy reform poses enormous political perils for presidents and congressional leaders. The internal conflicts within the Republican and Democratic Parties are at least as great as those between rival partisans. The obstacles to reform are especially daunting when focused on illegal immigration and the status of unauthorized immigrants. This article explains why immigration policymaking is so politically divisive, and how illegal immigration in particular makes even basic problem definition difficult, focusing on the role of rival ideas and interests, elusive coalition-building, widespread cynicism over past implementation failures, an expanded scope of conflict, and flawed policy alternatives. It also illuminates how the Clinton and Bush administrations formulated strategic responses to pressures for immigration reform. The implications of recent immigration reform politics are striking: Whereas Clinton translated its lethargy and defensive opportunism on immigration policy into consequential electoral gains for the Democrats among Latinos and Asians, Bush's vigorous advocacy produced a rebellious and unmanageable party base and further eroded support for the Republican Party among new immigrant voters and kindred ethnics. Significantly, the Obama administration is almost certain to have far fewer degrees of freedom on immigration than its recent predecessors. Adapted from the source document.

The aim of this paper is to show to what extent and by what mechanisms the United States influenced the political formation of the personality and activities of West German Chancellor Willy Brandt. Special emphasis was placed on American influences during the implementation of Brandt's most famous political concept, 'Eastern Politics', which provides the chronological context of the development of relations in line with pan-European and world political movements and their correlation with Brandt's political path in exile and later in occupied Germany, and, finally, in the newly created independent Federal Republic of Germany. Circumstances, personal (dis)inclinations, and mutual influences gave birth to a rather ambivalent relationship, created mainly due to the interests of both parties, which overlapped in certain periods of time, while later they moved away and became cold, even often hostile.

The 2015 United Nations resolution on Financing for Development stresses the importance of effective resource mobilization and use of domestic resources to pursue sustainable development. The first Sustainable Development Goal is to eradicate extreme poverty for all people everywhere by 2030. This paper proposes an accounting exercise to assess whether it is feasible for countries to eliminate poverty using only domestic resources, in other words, by mere redistribution. Moreover, the paper argues that the concentration of resources in the hands of fewer individuals in the society may hinder the feasibility of implementing effective fiscal policies (from the revenue side and the social spending side) to reduce poverty. The paper provides a new tool to assess the capacity of countries to eliminate poverty through redistribution, and a new tool to approximate the concentration of political influence in a country. The new methodologies are applied to the most recent surveys available for more than 120 developing countries. The findings show that countries with the same fiscal capacity to mobilize resources for poverty eradication differ widely in the political feasibility of such redistribution policies.

An investigation of America's failure to atone for the wrongs of slaveryEver since the unfulfilled promise of "forty acres and a mule" after the Civil War, America has consistently failed to compensate Black Americans for the wrongs of slavery. Exploring why America has struggled to confront the issue of racial injustice, Long Overdue provides a history of the racial reparations movement and shows why it is more relevant now than ever. Through an examination of Americans' unwillingness to address economic injustice, Charles P. Henry crafts a skillful moral, political, economic, and historical argument for African American reparations, focusing on successful political cases. In the wake of successes in South Africa and New Zealand, new models for reparations have found traction in a number of American cities and states, from Dallas to Baltimore and Virginia to California. By looking at other dispossessed groups--Native Americans, Holocaust survivors, and Japanese internment victims in the 1940s--Henry shows how some groups have won the fight for reparations, and explores new ways forward for Black Americans. From Hurricane Katrina to Hurricane Harvey, the events of the 21st century continue to show that the legacy of racial segregation and economic disadvantage is never far below the surface in America. As the issue of reparations is brought to the national stage by figures such as Ta-Nehisi Coates and Kamala Harris, Long Overdue provides a must-read survey of the political and legislative efforts made toward reparations over the course of American history, and offers a new path toward establishing equality for all Black Americans

The European Union of today cannot be studied as it once was. This original new textbook provides a much-needed update on how the EU's policies and institutions have changed in light of the multiple crises and transformations since 2010. An international team of leading scholars offer systematic accounts on the EU's institutional regime, policies, and its community of people and states. Each chapter is structured to explain the relevant historical developments and institutional framework, presenting the key actors, the current controversies and discussing a paradigmatic case study. Each chapter also provides ideas for group discussions and individual research topics. Moving away from the typical, neutral account of the functioning of the EU, this textbook will stimulate readers' critical thinking towards the EU as it is today. It will serve as a core text for undergraduate and graduate students of politics and European studies taking courses on the politics of the EU, and those taking courses in comparative politics and international organizations including the EU.

Serving as the introduction to the special issue on 'Migrant narratives', this article proposes a multi-perspectival and multi-stakeholder analysis of how migration is narrated in the media in the last decade. This research agenda is developed by focussing on groups of actors that are commonly studied in isolation from each other: (1) migrants, (2) media professionals such as journalists and spokespersons from humanitarian organizations, (3) governments and corporations and (4) artists and activists. We take a relational approach to recognize how media power is articulated alongside a spectrum of more top-down and more bottom-up perspectives, through specific formats, genres and styles within and against larger frameworks of governmentality. Taken together, the poetics and politics of migrant narratives demand attention respectively for how stakeholders variously aesthetically present and politically represent migration. The opportunities, challenges, problems and commitments observed among the four groups of actors also provide the means to rethink our practice and responsibilities as media and migration scholars contributing to decentring media technologies and re-humanizing migrants.