Suchergebnisse

Organic production targets the development of a sustainable cultivation system and a variety of high-quality products with an emphasis on environmental protection and high standards of animal protection. In South Africa the organic sector pioneered private practices and systems in small informal groups to guide the public and private sectors on environmental and sustainability issues. A private certification system for organic products is applicable in the country, consisting of network certification and third-party certification in collaboration with foreign and locally-based certification organisations. Local producers also use self-declaratory vendor claims associated with organic labels. A State auditor mechanism is nonetheless applicable with respect to the use of the term "free range" on labels for meat products. South African National Standards (SANS 1369) on Organic Agricultural Production and Processing (OAPP) have been drafted by the South African Bureau of Standards (SABS) but the final version has not yet been made public. There is currently no specific legislation on organic products in the country, while draft regulations on the control and sale of organic products are yet to be promulgated. This paper looks into organic food regulation in South Africa and examines how far this private sector mechanism for organic food certification is in need of State regulation.

Discusses Serbia's struggle for democratic values after the fall of the Milošević regime provoked by the NATO war, and after the trauma caused by the secession of Kosovo. Are the value systems of the post-Milošević era true stumbling blocks of a delayed transition of this country? Seventeen contributors from Norway, Serbia, Italy, Germany, Poland and some other European countries covered a broad range of topics in order to provide answers to this question. The subjects of their investigations were national myths and symbols, history textbooks, media, film, religion, inter-ethnic dialogue, transitional justice, political party agendas and other related themes. The authors of the essays represent different scholarly disciplines whose theoretical conceptions and frameworks are employed in order to analyze two alternative value systems in Serbia: liberal, cosmopolitan and civic on the one hand, and traditional, provincial, nationalist on the other

The essays in this book focus attention on the role of political groups in the new functioning and development of the new African societies and the political systems of which they are a part. The authors, all recognized authorities, have sought to identify and compare the manifestations of the general tendency among the new states of Tropical Africa toward the establishment and consolidation of one-party political systems, and to examine, in the light of this general trend, the different dimensions of the problem of integration. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press's mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1964.

By examining the system of authoritarianism in eight Arab republics, Joseph Sassoon portrays life under these regimes and explores the mechanisms underpinning their resilience. How did the leadership in these countries create such enduring systems? What was the economic system that prolonged the regimes' longevity, but simultaneously led to their collapse? Why did these seemingly stable regimes begin to falter? This book seeks to answer these questions by utilizing the Iraqi archives and memoirs of those who were embedded in these republics: political leaders, ministers, generals, security agency chiefs, party members, and business people. Taking a thematic approach, the book begins in 1952 with the Egyptian Revolution and ends with the Arab uprisings of 2011. It seeks to deepen our understanding of the authoritarianism and coercive systems that prevailed in these countries and the difficult process of transition from authoritarianism that began after 2011

Discusses Serbia's struggle for democratic values after the fall of the Milošević regime provoked by the NATO war, and after the trauma caused by the secession of Kosovo. Are the value systems of the post-Milošević era true stumbling blocks of a delayed transition of this country? Seventeen contributors from Norway, Serbia, Italy, Germany, Poland and some other European countries covered a broad range of topics in order to provide answers to this question. The subjects of their investigations were national myths and symbols, history textbooks, media, film, religion, inter-ethnic dialogue, transitional justice, political party agendas and other related themes. The authors of the essays represent different scholarly disciplines whose theoretical conceptions and frameworks are employed in order to analyze two alternative value systems in Serbia: liberal, cosmopolitan and civic on the one hand, and traditional, provincial, nationalist on the other.

"The economic and political conditions that have led to the rise of radical right parties exist in similar form and intensity all over Europe. Yet, radical right parties have only been successful in a few countries. In Germany, the Republikaner's less than 2% of the vote is much lower than the National Front's high of 15% and the Freedom Party's 27% of the vote in national legislative elections. Why do such a small percentage of voters choose the radical right in Germany? Why is the radical right winning more seats in Austria than in France and Germany? The main argument in this book is that radical right parties will have difficulty attracting voters and winning seats in electoral systems that encourage strategic voting and/or strategic coordination by the mainstream parties. The analysis demonstrates that electoral systems and party strategy play a key role in the success of the radical right."--Jacket

The paper relates to the literature on contemporary non-democratic systems with multi-party elections. It aims to prove that electoral competitiveness is a key concept for understanding these systems, but this concept is currently underdeveloped. It first reviews the main approaches of competition and competitiveness, then, using the widely accepted type of competitive authoritarian hybrid regime, argues that the concept developed by its inventors does not provide sufficient support to detect competitiveness, because the factor of uncertainty used by the concept creators to justify its existence is not accompanied by any real indicators. The conclusion of the article is that competitiveness should therefore be derived not from the unidentifiable uncertainty factor, but from the concept of electoral integrity, which indicates the existence or the absence of genuine (competitive) elections, and from the concept and characteristics of electoral manipulations.

Members of parliament (MPs) are elected via two different tiers in mixed‐member electoral systems—as winners of a seat in a constituency or as party candidates under proportional rules. While previous research has identified important consequences of this "mandate divide" in parliaments, questions remain how this institutional setup affects MPs' political behavior in other arenas. Analyzing more than one million social media posts, this article investigates regional representation in the online communication of German MPs. The results show that MPs elected under a direct mandate refer approximately twice as often to their constituencies by using regionalized wording and geographic references than MPs elected under the proportional tier. The substantive findings provide new evidence for the benefits of mixed‐member electoral systems for political representation while the methodological approach demonstrates the added value of social media data for analyzing the political behavior of elites.

When Members of Parliament (MPs) disagree publicly with their party, this provides a signal to voters regarding both their political views and their character valence. We argue that the strength of this signal to voters depends on the personal career costs an MP incurs by dissenting. The greater the perceived costs of dissent to the MP, the more positively voters should react to dissent. In line with this theory, we use a series of conjoint analysis experiments in Britain, Germany, and Austria to show that: (1) dissent has a more positive effect on voter evaluations in systems where the costs of dissent are higher, and (2) more costly types of dissent have a greater impact on voter evaluations. These findings have important implications for understanding how voter evaluations of MPs depend on beliefs about parliamentary systems and how parliamentary institutions condition the link between voters and MPs.

The International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) in Laxenburg, Austria, was founded during the period of détente in 1972 to bring together scientists from East and West to research shared problems, and thus to build a "bridge" between the two opposed systems. The underlying image of knowledge was in stark contrast to the intellectual culture established in East Germany. This article reconstructs East Germany's role at IIASA. Even if participation was considered important for displaying East German science, I argue that its contribution was caught up in the precepts of the western scholar as a class enemy. Using the records of the party and the Stasi, I show this along the best documented case, the economist Harry Maier, who was one of the few social scientists who visited IIASA for two years between 1978 and 1980, and then, in 1986, used a conference visit to escape from East Germany.

When Members of Parliament (MPs) disagree publicly with their party, this provides a signal to voters regarding both their political views and their character valence. We argue that the strength of this signal to voters depends on the personal career costs an MP incurs by dissenting. The greater the perceived costs of dissent to the MP, the more positively voters should react to dissent. In line with this theory, we use a series of conjoint analysis experiments in Britain, Germany, and Austria to show that: (1) dissent has a more positive effect on voter evaluations in systems where the costs of dissent are higher, and (2) more costly types of dissent have a greater impact on voter evaluations. These findings have important implications for understanding how voter evaluations of MPs depend on beliefs about parliamentary systems and how parliamentary institutions condition the link between voters and MPs.

Voters in elections under plurality rule face relatively straightforward incentives. In proportional representation systems, voters face more complex incentives as electoral outcomes don't translate as directly into policy outcomes as in plurality rule elections. A common approach is to assume electoral outcomes translate into policy as a vote‐weighted average of all party platforms. However, most of the world's legislatures are majoritarian institutions, and elections in PR systems are generally followed by a process of coalition formation. Results obtained using this assumption are not robust to the introduction of even minimal forms of majoritarianism. Incentives to engage in strategic voting depend on considerations about the coalitions that may form after the election, and the voters' equilibrium strategies are shaped by policy balancing and the postelectoral coalition bargaining situation, including considerations about who will be appointed the formateur.

Scandinavia and Australia share an early emphasis on tax-financed minimum pension schemes rather than Bismarckian style contribution-based earnings related schemes. I argue that Scandinavia and Australia also share a similar sequence of later pension-political developments, despite differences in the timing of various initiatives, as well as in the institutional designs of these initiatives. First, means-testing was softened and ultimately abolished in the minimum protection systems of both Scandinavia and Australia. Second, compulsory earnings-related pensions were introduced. The introduction of compulsory earnings-related pension schemes coincides with a period of increased income-testing in the minimum schemes, resulting in the emergence of a dual pension structure in both Scandinavia and Australia. The impact of federalism, party structure and the use of regulatory policies (e.g. compulsory arbitration) as an alternative to tax-and-spend policies in bringing about the observed convergence towards dual systems are discussed

Abstract.  Applying the demand‐side claims of Kitschelt's theory, and the expectation that electoral systems affect voter choice, this article provides an explanation of cross‐national variation in support for new radical right (NRR) parties between 1982 and 1995. After discussing concepts and measures, two versions of qualitative comparative analysis (Boolean analysis and fuzzy‐set analysis) are applied to data for ten West European countries. The results suggest that, in combination with electoral systems that had larger district magnitudes, NRR strength resulted from a restructuring of the space of party competition due to post‐industrialism and growth in the welfare state. Convergence between major parties of the left and right was not among the combination of conditions that led to NRR success. Apart from demonstrating that fuzzy‐set analysis can yield a simpler explanation than Boolean analysis, this study reveals anomalous NRR outcomes for Austria, Belgium and France.