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The article demonstrates how references to Nazi and Soviet past are perceived and evaluated by the European Court of Human Rights. Individual cases concerning Holocaust and Nazism, which the Court has examined so far, are compared here to judgments rendered with regard to Communist regime. The article proves that the Court treats more leniently state interference with freedom of expression when memory about Nazism and Holocaust is protected than when a post–Communist state wants to preserve a critical memory about the regime. The authors of the article agree with the attitude of the Court which offers a wide margin of appreciation to states restrictively treating references to Nazism and Holocaust, including comparisons to the Holocaust, Nazism or fascism used as rhetorical devices. At the same time they postulate that other totalitarian systems should be treated by the Court equally

We study the political opinions of Swedish social scientists in seven disciplines and find indications of a left‑right divide, with sociology and gender studies being the most disciplines, with business administration, economics, and law being the most right‑leaning ones, and with political science and economic history being located somewhere in between. This pattern is found when looking at party preferences, left‑right self‑identification, and positions on economic policy issues. Overall, there is a slight dominance in sympathies for the right, although there are more academics to the left among those most involved in activities with a potential to influence decision‑makers.

Croatia represents in many respects a unique case in the world in the way it standardized the right to vote, the electoral model, and the pattern of political representation of the diaspora in the national parliament. Besides standard theoretical arguments that explain the right of diaspora members to vote in parliamentary and presidential elections in the country, the authorities made use of a number of contextually specific political, economic, military, and moral reasons for that. It was shown that principled reasons which were used to justify legalizing diaspora voting rights and institutionalization of special electoral models as well as the patterns of political representation in the Croatian parliament were subordinated to the interests to symbolically integrate the Croats from Bosnia and Herzegovina in the political system of Croatia, who would then, as a sort of generic voters, secure safe votes and bonus seats for the Croatian Democratic Union.

Argues that there is a link between the neoliberal model in the global economy & the deterioration of political & economic rights in Latin America, especially in Venezuela. There, the decline of political legitimacy & the growing impoverishment of the population are explained in part by the globalization process, but more so by its conjunction with state capital accumulation. Accumulation was at work prior to 1989 at the expense of increasing citizen participation in political decision making & redistributing economic resources. With globalization in the 1990s, the earlier state capital accumulation model was threatened, & the state unable to deal with internal violence. Living conditions deteriorated because of a predatory state & global predators, as evidenced by income & budget statistics. 4 Tables, 67 References. M. Pflum

SIMILARITIES BETWEEN POSTWAR FRANCE & ITALY ARE STRIKING. BOTH ARE TRADITIONALLY CATHOLIC, BOTH HAVE COMMUNIST PARTIES THAT COMMAND CLOSE TO ONE FOURTH OF THE VOTE, BOTH HAVE STRONG CHRISTIAN DEMOCRATIC MOVEMENTS, BOTH HAVE LABOR MOVEMENTS DOMINATED BY MARXIST-LENINISTS, AND BOTH COUNTRIES ARE NOTED FOR GOVERNMENTAL INSTABILITY.

Argues that, strange as it may seem, the US may be moving left. The 2006 midterm elections are examined. The meaning of the voter shift is discussed in terms of policy preferences, highlighting the economy as a unifying theme, the war on terror, & health care. What these developments mean for US liberalism in light of the 2008 presidential elections is considered. While the US is seen to be moving to the left, a Great Society-style liberalism is not likely to emerge; many obstacles stand in the way of a full-blown liberal political agenda. D. Edelman

Recent scholarship has demonstrated that the language of subjective natural rights can be found in a wide variety of medieval juristic and scholastic texts. This is part of a general trend in the study of political ideas that stresses the continuity between medieval and modern political values. However, many leading scholars of medieval political ideas maintain that no language of subjective natural rights can be found in Aquinas's political writings, based as they are on a famous objective definition of right (jus) as the object of justice (justitia). Other scholars argue that Aquinas's notion of subjective rights is peripheral to his political philosophy. The essay argues that Aquinas, while commenting on canon law texts, explicitly posits a subjective natural right to marry, based on the natural equality and natural liberty of all human beings. This can be seen by his claim that a slave may contract marriage, even without the consent of the master. This is one example of an instance in which Aquinas refers to specific legal issues in order to explicate his understanding of liberty and right. For Aquinas there are certain areas of liberty or mastery (dominium) that are exempt from all human authority, and wherein a person has rights to decide how to pursue natural human goods.