Suchergebnisse

One aspect of deliberation is giving reasons to support a position. In this article, I explore how citizens engage in this activity by developing a framework that breaks down reason-giving into component parts, applying it to a set of eight National Issues Forums. Deliberators typically provided evidence (usually in the form of factual statements) to support their conclusions, but frequently did not tie them together with an infrastructure of logical and causal connections. Deliberators engaged in reason-giving by presenting evidence but did not explicate the underlying logic of their positions. This suggests that deliberative research should focus greater attention on understanding the conditions that encourage and facilitate the effective use of evidence to support conclusions, as well as how patterns of reason-giving influence deliberative quality.

The state‐level ballot initiative process has been criticized for failing to live up to the progressive ideals of a citizen‐driven, grassroots endeavor. Much less attention, however, has been paid to the initiative process on the local level. This article assesses the democratic credentials of the local initiative process by analyzing which groups sponsor initiatives and what types of issues they attempt to influence. Using a dataset of California initiatives between 2001 and 2008, I find that the local initiative process is a mix of interest group politics and citizen‐driven efforts. There are many examples of "grassroots" campaigns that resemble twentieth‐century progressives' hopes for direct democracy. By contrast, established interest groups frequently use ballot measures to accomplish their political goals, similar to dynamics observed at the statewide level. This is a result of the relatively small size of jurisdictions, which creates conditions favorable to both types of politics.El proceso de las propuestas de ley a nivel estatal ha sido criticado por los altos ideales progresistas impulsados por los ciudadanos. Sin embargo, el proceso de iniciativas a nivel local ha recibido mucho menos atención. Este articulo evalúa las cualidades democráticas de los procesos de iniciativas ciudadanas locales analizando qué grupos patrocinan iniciativas y qué tipos de problemas tratan de influir. Usando una base de datos de las iniciativas California entre 2001 y 2008, encuentro que el proceso de las iniciativas locales es una mezcla de intereses de grupos políticos y esfuerzo impulsado por los ciudadanos. Existen muchos ejemplos de campañas "con raíces locales" que se asemejan a las expectativas progresistas del siglo veinte por una democracia directa. Por otra parte, grupos de interés establecidos usan las urnas frecuentemente para lograr sus objetivos políticos, de manera similar a la dinámica observada a nivel estatal. Este es el resultado de áreas jurídicas relativamente pequeñas, lo cual crea condiciones favorables para ambos tipos de políticas.Related Articles:"Conditions for Efficacious Petitions," (2011): http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1747‐1346.2011.00314.x/abstract"Elite Frame Selection and Development in Ballot Initiative Campaigns," (2009): http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1747‐1346.2009.00175.x/abstract"Raiders of the Lost Vote," (2005): http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1747‐1346.2005.tb00643.x/abstract

Moose (Alces alces) hunting and other means of forest food production employed by members of First Nations communities are undertaken as part of their treaty rights in Ontario, articulated in specific nation-to-nation agreements with the Government of Canada on behalf of the British Crown. Aroland First Nation in Northwestern Ontario is party to Treaty 9 (1905), which overtly protects the community's rights to hunt throughout the unoccupied tracts of Crown land claimed as "traditional territory." Traditional use supersedes provincial authority and, as such, is not managed by provincial policy or regulation. This jurisdictional divide has presented an interesting history and many challenges for both provincial managers and First Nations land users. Strained relationships between provincial authorities and First Nations, emergent from decades of misunderstandings of jurisdictional authority, have presented difficulty in all aspects of natural resource management. In this paper, we engaged community-based researchers in an exploration of the community's perspective of the current and historical management regime. We also quantified the annual moose harvest by the First Nation, an assessment that is never undertaken by provincial managers; our results show a 40% error in provincial calculations. This error could have significant implications for future moose populations, as well as wildlife managers and both provincial and First Nations hunters. In collaboration with community members, we interpret the results, discuss implications, and provide recommendations for future consideration.

That theWehrmachtparticipated fully in a racial war of extermination on behalf of the National Socialist regime is indisputable. Officers and enlisted men alike accepted the logic that the elimination of the Soviet Union was necessary for Germany's survival. The Wehrmacht's atrocities on the Eastern Front are a testament to the success of National Socialist propaganda and ideological training, but the construct of "Judeo-bolshevism" originated during World War I and its immediate aftermath. Between 1918 and 1923, central Europe witnessed a surge in right-wing paramilitary violence and anti-Semitic activity resulting from fears of bolshevism and a widely held belief that Jews were largely responsible for spreading revolution. Jews suffered the consequences of revolution and resurgent nationalism in the borderlands between Germany and Russia after World War I, but it was inside Germany that the construct of Judeo-bolshevism evolved into a powerful rhetorical tool for the growingvölkischmovement and eventually a justification for genocide.

AbstractAs US broadband access becomes increasingly common and more individuals routinely go online, the implications for the local retail sector are unclear. Lower online prices and the lack of an effective sales tax suggests that growing e‐commerce purchases would negatively impact local retail sales, which would in turn decrease revenue for public services. This can be particularly problematic in rural areas, with fewer retail stores and an increased dependency on sales tax. However, e‐commerce comprises only a surprisingly small portion of the total retail market (3.6% in 2008), and surveys have suggested that a significant portion of consumers use the Internet to research a product before ultimately buying offline. This paper uses county‐level data from Oklahoma in 2008 to examine the effects of broadband adoption rates on local sales tax collections. The results show that, while a naïve cross‐section model suggests that higher levels of broadband access increase the amount of local sales tax collected, a more appropriate difference‐in‐differences approach finds no statistical impact on collections. This implies that although many community developers in rural areas worry about the implications of e‐commerce, current levels of Internet activity neither detract from nor contribute to the amount of tax collected from local retail sales. Resumen. A medida que el acceso a servicios de banda ancha en los EE.UU. es cada vez más común y cada vez más individuos se conectan a Internet de modo cotidiano, no está claro lo que esto implica para el sector del comercio local. Los precios en línea cada vez más bajos y la falta de un impuesto de ventas efectivo sugieren que el aumento de las compras por comercio electrónico tendría un impacto negativo en las ventas del comercio local al por menor, que a su vez generaría menos ingresos para los servicios públicos. Esto puede ser particularmente problemático en áreas rurales, al tener menos comercios al por menor y una mayor dependencia de los impuestos de ventas. Sin embargo, el comercio electrónico solo constituye una porción sorprendentemente pequeña del total del sector al por menor (3,6% en 2008), y varios muestreos sugieren que una parte significativa de consumidores usa Internet para informarse sobre el producto antes de hacer finalmente su compra en un establecimiento comercial. Este artículo utiliza datos a escala de condado del estado de Oklahoma en 2008 para examinar los efectos de la tasa de adopción de banda ancha sobre la recaudación de impuestos de ventas locales. Los resultados muestran que, aunque un modelo transversal simplista sugiere que cuanto mayor es el acceso a servicios de banda ancha mayor es la recaudación por impuestos de ventas locales, bajo un enfoque más adecuado de diferencias en diferencias no se encontró un impacto negativo en la recaudación. Esto implica que aunque muchos de quienes se dedican al desarrollo de comunidades de áreas rurales están preocupados por las implicaciones del comercio electrónico, los niveles actuales de actividad en Internet no suman, pero tampoco restan, a la cifra de impuestos recaudados localmente por ventas al por menor.