Suchergebnisse

Researchers have long viewed ballot cues as key factors in vote choice unrelated to a pure evaluation of a candidate's merits. In this study, I investigate the role of ballot occupation— that is, the title often included with a candidate's name on a ballot. Ballot occupation is more malleable by candidates than other cues, like ethnicity or ballot order, and could be manipulated to produce an electoral benefit. I evaluated a difference in occupation preference between respondents of the two major United States political parties. I conducted an Internet- based survey of 610 individuals, varying the cues presented—occupation, party, or both. The results suggest that listing occupations historically and logically associated with one of the political parties has an effect similar to, but weaker than, the effect of listing the corresponding party. Further, when both a party and an occupation inconsistent with that party are listed (e.g., a "Republican college professor"), the results most clearly reflect those of the party-only group (but are somewhat weaker). This suggests that ballot occupation can act as a proxy for the candidate's political party when no party information is provided, but that occupation has nearly no effect when a party is listed.

Ottoman pirates, Ottoman victims -- The Kadi of Malta -- Piracy and treaty law -- Diplomatic divergence -- Piracy in Ottoman Islamic jurisprudence -- Piracy in the courts

AbstractBeginning with the story of the Muslim youth Mehmed bin Abdülcelil of Tunis, this article examines the plight of Ottoman subjects abducted and sold into slavery within the Ottoman Empire and their efforts to regain freedom through Ottoman courts. Freedom suits (hürriyet davaları) were common in the seventeenth-century Ottoman Empire, so much so that contemporary legal praxis manuals (sukuk) always provided examples of how to document them, but they have never been systematically studied for this period in which slave ownership was extremely widespread and the legality of enslavement depended solely on religion and subjecthood. Drawing on a sample of seventy-nine suits from greater Istanbul and elevensukukmanuscripts, this article considers how the trade in the illegally enslaved was concealed by the immense traffic in licit captives and how the theoretical protections of Ottoman subjecthood clashed with the practical challenges of how to prove it, exposing the gap between slavery as legal institution and slaving in practice. Whereas the vast majority of freedom suits ended in rulings in favor of the victims, most of the illegally enslaved probably never managed to have their cases heard or were turned away for lack of evidence.