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From QR codes to stay-at-home orders and mask mandates, the pandemic posed intriguing questions about the nature of political power in a time that is increasingly being classified as marked by democratic erosion, backsliding, or populism, Through a multi-methodological analysis of datasets covering different characteristics of pandemic responses in 54 liberal democratic states, Authoritarian Liberal Surveillance and the COVID-19 Pandemic draws attention to a different set of processes and dynamics. By adopting the theoretical frameworks of authoritarian liberalism and surveillance capitalism, a new explanation of political, economic, and social outcomes that arose over the course of the pandemic is provided in a critical cross-national inquiry. Findings turn attention to a previously neglected set of factors that were behind the emergence of widespread illiberal practices. Many liberal democracies experienced a metamorphosis that arose out of the unfettered implementation of authoritarian liberal economic policy making which merged with previously embedded structures of surveillance capitalism

Introduction, How Mass Shootings Spur Gun Purchases -- Why the Current Era of Gun Culture Differs from the Past -- Case Studies, Processes, and Causal Mechanisms -- Descriptive Trends in Background Checks and Mass Shootings -- Quantitative Analysis of Mass Shootings and Background Checks, 1999-2020 -- A Configurational Analysis of Mass Shootings and Background Checks -- Looking Ahead, Has a Ceiling Been Reached?

Chapter 1. Mass Shootings in Central and Eastern Europe, an Understudied Context -- Chapter 2. Mass Shootings, Offenders and Context -- Chapter 3. Strain Theory and Case Studies -- Chapter 4. Quantitative Analysis of Mass Shootings in central and eastern Europe -- Chapter 5. Comparing Mass Shootings in the CEE Regions with North America -- Chapter 6. Conclusion, Looking Ahead, Will Mass Shootings Remain Rare in the CEE Region?

How did armed forces behave in response to dissent, political instability and territorial disintegration during the collapse of the Soviet Union? To date, substantial attention has been cast on the 1991 August coup attempt, yet our understanding of other potential instances of defection remains incomplete. This study undertakes a comparative analysis of defection throughout 15 Soviet republics. Results reveal that 13 republics experienced subordinates defecting and three experienced commanders defecting. In total, four different pathways led to defection. These findings produce the first comparative observations of defection in this historical time period and lend support to the claim that this phenomenon is equifinal in nature.

Martin Heidegger notably argued that modern technology differs from technology of the past because it constitutes an ontological condition that is shaped by technological structures which determine our views of the world as being scientifically dependent on ordering. This study engages with Heidegger's philosophy on technology to investigate the basis of the COVID pandemic response in liberal democratic contexts. It argues that attempts at controlling the virus represent a newfound technocratic effort to re-optimize human beings as resources and fungible raw materials based on their biological characteristics. In the trajectory of responding to public health crises, governments carried out tech-aided restrictions and policies that produced (and will continue to produce) adverse outcomes for large portions of society that will likely end up surpassing the virus in total hazard ratio.

Scholars emphasize that an influx of resources during the 1980s lowered the costs of collective action and nourished a mass nonviolent anti-apartheid movement that eventually brought down the incumbent regime. Utilising a discourse theoretic approach, this study demonstrates that the 1976 Soweto massacre along with its antecedent organisational campaign waged by the Black Consciousness movement (BCM) were pivotal, yet overlooked historical factors that contributed to the apartheid collapse. While the Soweto massacre led to the detainment of BCM leadership and the death of leader Steve Biko, the event of white police killing black unarmed students in June of 1976 backfired and revealed central antagonisms and contradictions underpinning the apartheid project. Only once political identities were dislocated did the possibility arise for a unified mass opposition movement to form. Alongside weighing economic costs under threat of state repression, this study demonstrates that historical waves of revolutionary mobilisation are also influenced by identity and meanings that get attribute to repressive events by publics.

This study utilizes theory from the Essex School of Ideology and Discourse Analysis (IDA) and investigates speeches and statements made by high-ranking European Union officials from the European Commission as well as policy documents. The inquiry reveals that antagonistic language was used to justify the tracking and tracing of civilians through the articulation of an empty "track and trace" signifier and the articulation of new identities premised on the vaccinated and non-vaccinated. Policy makers articulated new ideas surrounding a regime of truth and a common "people" while simultaneously negating opponents to pandemic policies by articulating floating signifiers, including xenophobia, disinformation, and populism. The exercise of power in health policies during the pandemic functioned according to logics similar to those employed in traditional political domains.

This article reinforces the criticisms I cast on civil resistance literature in my study "Debunking the Myths Behind Nonviolent Civil Resistance" through addressing issues on how scholars code violence, unarmed violence, and nonviolence. It justifies studying unarmed violence as a sole category and explicates the pathways through which unarmed violence can lead oppositional campaigns toward success. In responding to Onken, Shemia-Goeke, and Martin, the article demonstrates that the dichotomization of nonviolence and violence is not premised on analytical equivalency and should be avoided if the study of resistance strategies is to progress onward and step away from the literature's intrinsic ideological bias. There is nothing idealistic about seeking to improve how we operationalize concepts to study resistance strategies, but if scholars in the civil resistance literature fail to move away from universalistic assumptions about nonviolence and social change, they will continue to misinterpret historical processes and produce policy suggestions that are neo-colonial in nature.

Scholars argue that nonviolence is likelier to cause political change in comparison to other strategies, including violence. This study identifies issues throughout this literature ranging from coding procedures, observational sampling, to interpretations of phenomena. If unarmed violence, reactive violence, and omitted cases are analyzed, nonviolent success rates are worse than formerly considered. Inclusion of 19th century (1800–99) cases and previously unanalyzed cases from the 20th century reveals that nonviolent campaigns experienced a 48% rate of success, whereas campaigns that adopted unarmed violence were 61% successful, campaigns utilizing reactive unarmed violence were 60% successful, and 30% of fully violent campaigns were successful. Nonviolence is not a causal determinant of political change, but rather, its implementation falls short of a probabilistic coin toss. There is reason to presume this literature is biased toward elite interests in similar ways to how scientific inquiry on dietary and substance guidelines has historically been skewed by corporatism.