Rethinking electoral reform in New Zealand: the benefits of citizens' assemblies

In 2011, New Zealanders decided by referendum to retain the mixed member proportional representation voting system. This article investigates the benefits of including a deliberative, participatory process in electoral reform to encourage collective debate and an informed choice by voters. In the last decade, Canada and the Netherlands have used citizens' assemblies, a form of participatory democracy, for electoral reform. This paper argues that a similar process would have been appropriate and valuable for New Zealand. Moreover, the discussion highlights the value of citizens' assemblies for minorities who can be outvoted in a referendum. This is considered with specific reference to voters in the Māori seats who had much at stake in the electoral reform. In addition to the general benefit of citizens' assemblies for electoral reform, a New Zealand assembly would have allowed for collective deliberation that ensured the inclusion of the perspectives of voters in the Māori seats.     

The green vote in presidential elections: Past performance and future promise

The electoral impact of the environment issue has been debated for years. Thus far, evidence regarding the issue's electoral impact has concentrated on the 1996 presidential election. Two of the three inquiries into that contest found that the environment had a significant impact on voters’ candidate choices. In an effort to clarify the environment's electoral impact, this research expands the inquiry to include five presidential elections, 1984 through 2000. Findings indicate that the environment had a significant impact in four of these five elections—all but in 2000. The research goes on to examine reasons for variability in the environment's impact, concluding that candidates who play the role of environmental villain/adversary have a surprisingly important role in the issue's electoral strength.     

俄罗斯的10年轮回

从叶利钦当选俄罗斯总统到现在，10年间俄罗斯经历了一个轮回由高度集中到极端民主，再由极端民主走回权威体制。俄罗斯的10年轮回说明，数年的民主化改革并没能从根本上改变俄罗斯，俄罗斯的经济土壤上结不出西方议会民主的政治果实。虽然看起来俄罗斯似乎回到了它原来的出发点，实际上却上升到一个高的层次。     

Public Opinion in the System of Management

Negative assessments of the results of Russian reforms have recently become commonplace in the statements of Western economists. It is becoming just as fashionable to curse them as to be on a fat-free diet or to be fighting cholesterol. And on the contrary, to justify or at least explain the logic of development of the events in Russia and direct attention toward the country's achievements is becoming just as indecent and "socially hazardous" in the United States as offering a coat to a lady, or, even worse, paying a compliment. Unfortunately, all attempts at a considered analysis of Russian post-Communist history immediately run into a wall of perplexity (or indignation), which is then inevitably followed by rhetorical questions such as "Haven't the oligarchs plundered the whole country?" or "Yeltsin is an inveterate drinker, isn't he?" (This was the same in the Stalinist Soviet Union, when, in response to any story of a rise in the well-being of the Americans, the vigilant Soviet worker was supposed to utter something proudly along the lines of "But on the other hand, you lynch blacks there!")     

How Does Separability Affect The Desirability Of Referendum Election Outcomes?

Recent research has shown that in referendum elections, the presence of interdependence within voter preferences can lead to election outcomes that are undesirable and even paradoxical. However, most of the examples leading to these undesirable outcomes involve contrived voting situations that would be unlikely to occur in actual elections. In this paper, we use computer simulations to investigate the desirability of referendum election outcomes. We show that highly undesirable election outcomes occur not only in contrived examples, but also in randomly generated elections. Our data suggest that the presence of interdependent preferences significantly increases the likelihood of such undesirable outcomes, and that certain alternative voting methods, such as sequential voting and setwise aggregation, hold the potential to produce outcomes that more accurately reflect the will of the electorate.     

Are Ballot Order Effects Heterogeneous?*

Objective. Past research on ballot order effects has typically focused on the average benefit a candidate receives if placed at the top of the ballot. This study addresses a gap in the literature by examining the possibility that a simple average may mask systematic differences in how the ballot order effect varies across candidates and voters. Methods. Using data from all Australian federal elections between 1984 and 2004, a sample that covers 1,187 separate electoral contests and 7,113 candidate × election observations, this study estimates the effect of ballot order on a candidate's share of the primary vote. To determine whether ballot order effects differ across voters as well as candidates, the study also makes use of electorate‐level demographic data from the 1996 and 2001 Australian censuses. Results. The results of these estimations indicate that being placed first on the ballot increases a candidate's vote share by about 1 percentage point. As a proportion of their total vote, this effect is much larger for independents and minor parties than for major parties. The ballot order effect appears to be similar for male and female candidates, and does not show strong trends upward or downward over the 20‐year period covered by our study. Across electorates, the ballot order effect is higher in places where voters are younger and fluency in English is lower. Conclusions. A statistically significant ballot order effect was a consistent feature of Australian federal elections between 1984 and 2004. Moreover, this study challenges the assumption that ballot order effects are homogenous, and finds that the effect of being placed atop the ballot varies across both candidates and voters.     

After New Labour: political and policy consequences of welfare state reforms in the United Kingdom and Australia

ABSTRACT

Growing global integration, combined with the collapse of Soviet Communism, created major challenges for centre-left politics in the democratic world. This article considers two transformative Labour Party-led experiments that refurbished the welfare states of Australia and the United Kingdom, respectively. In Australia, this includes the Hawke–Keating (1983–1996) and Rudd–Gillard (2007–2013) Governments, and in the United Kingdom, the ‘New Labour’ Blair–Brown Governments (1997–2010). We present a comparative political economy of these welfare reforms, one that draws on both the policy transfer and policy diffusion literatures. By the 1980s, both parties faced three problems related to national economic decline, the ideological challenge to Keynesianism, and the decline of the traditional working-class electorate. We argue both parties developed common electoral and governing strategies aimed at winning support for a market-driven social-democratic program. Policy simultaneously compensated voters for market inequalities and deepened market relations. Focusing on how labour governments managed post-industrial change, responded to inequalities, advanced quasi-markets, and negotiated with union partners, we argue these experiments produced increasingly contradictory results that left both parties electorally and ideologically depleted. Despite important similarities, we note differences – starting points, discrete events and institutional variations have mattered to reform paths and their consequences.     

Sex, Age, and the Implementation of the Motor Voter Act: The 1996 Presidential Election

Objective . Among the existing studies of political participation, few discuss differences between men and women. Of those published, most have focused upon substantive policy preferences, perhaps noting women's newly dominant electoral presence but not probing its characteristics or limits. In this analysis we build on the work of Schlozman, Burns, and Verba (1994) by examining the compound effects of closing dates, state National Voter Registration Act implementation delay, and age upon women and men. Methods . Using the 1996 Current Population Survey Voter Supplement we compare the impact of legal obstacles among different age groups of men and women in the 1996 presidential election. Results . We find that legal restrictions do have a different impact on men and women, especially the youngest and oldest members of the latter group. Conclusions . The most significant implication of our work is that policy efforts aimed at further reducing legal barriers to political participation may facilitate women's growing electoral dominance.     

Trends in Pension Reform in the Russian Federation: A Bbrief Overview

The purpose of this paper is to briefly summarize the main trends in the pension reform process which has been carried out in the Russian Federation since the collapse of the USSR in 1991. The Russian Federation and the other former Soviet Republics, currently CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States) countries, having undergone a transition from centrally planned to open-market economies, face a common challenge: the need to adapt their social security programmes to new political, economic and social realities.     

The "Antidemocratic Personality" Revisited: A Cross-National Investigation of Working-Class Authoritarianism

More than 60 years ago, psychologists identified a potential threat to democracy from within, namely the "antidemocratic personality" arising from the "authoritarian syndrome." It was soon discovered that the problem of authoritarianism was especially acute among those who were low in education and income, and that it was associated with intolerance toward others. However, several important questions were left unresolved. We revisit fundamental theoretical and empirical questions concerning the existence and nature of "working-class authoritarianism," focusing especially on four psychological aspects of authoritarianism, namely, conventionalism, moral absolutism, obedience to authority, and cynicism. In a cross-national investigation involving respondents from 19 democratic countries, we find that all four aspects of authoritarianism are indeed related to moral and ethnic intolerance. However, only obedience to authority and cynicism are especially prevalent among those who are low in socioeconomic status. Conventionalism and moral absolutism were significant predictors of economic conservatism, whereas obedience to authority and cynicism were not. We find no support for Lipset's (1960) claim that working-class authoritarianism would be associated with economic liberalism. Instead, we find that authoritarianism is linked to right-wing orientation in general and that intolerance mediates this relationship. Implications for electoral politics and political psychology are discussed.     

Ideology over strategy: Extending voting rights to felons and ex-felons, 1966-1992

The disenfranchisement of felons and ex-felons has long served to restrict the practice of democracy in the United States. In the late 20th century, a number of states allowed increasing numbers of felons and ex-felons to vote. Previous work has noted that Democrats are often associated with extensions of voting rights to felons and ex-felons. If this is the case, what accounts for their support for re-enfranchisement? In this paper I conduct a series of event history analyses of voting rights policy changes at the state level. I argue that Democratic support was not based on expected electoral benefits that might derive from changes in the composition of the electorate. Instead, analyses suggest that would-be reformers—often Democratic, but also Republican—were importantly constrained by the ideological climate among a state's population. Thus, policy liberalism appears to have trumped crass partisan strategizing in encouraging restoration of voting rights to felons and ex-felons. Results also confirm claims that local patterns of racial domination were relevant in decisions to re-enfranchise or not.     

Political Opposition in Russia: Is it Becoming Extinct

This article uses Russian experience to examine several issues concerning the relationship of electoral procedures, democratization, and liberalization. The author's interpretation of certain aspects of the political process in contemporary Russia does not coincide with the opinions of other researchers, including some published in our journal. L. Diamond raised a similar set of predominantly theoretical issues in "Is the 'Third Wave' of Democratization Over?" [Polis, 1999, no. 1].     

Russian Society Before and After 2012

The Russian elections of 2012 mark a turning point by showing that electoral corruption was an open demonstration of indifference to public opinion, a demonstration of power, and a refusal to “play by the rules.” The new political system that is developing is becoming institutionalized.     

“I Pay Enough Taxes Already!” Applying Economic Voting Models to Environmental Referendums*

Objectives. Models of economic voting have rarely been applied to referendum votes. We fill this gap by testing citizens' voting behavior on environmental policy in relation to their perception of the business cycle and general orientation toward politics. Thus, the study examines the personal, institutional, and economic determinants of vote choice on 36 environmental bills from 1983 to 2004 in Switzerland. Methods. We apply a logistic hierarchical model, where individual characteristics on Level 1 are nested within contextual determinants situated on Level 2. Results. We confirm the crucial importance of the individual‐level variables education, political affinity, car ownership, and urbanity. Classifying the electorate into five groups, using open‐ended survey questions about respondents' reasons for approval or dismissal of the bills, allows for finer hypotheses testing. We show that the individuals' positive perception of their personal current economic condition has a positive effect on the likelihood of supporting the proposals. In turn, we prove the negative, constraining effect of deteriorating macroeconomic conditions on approval rates. Conclusions. By applying economic voting models to referendum analyses we advance the understanding of citizens' vote choice on environmental ballots, we show the role of context, and we propose an original typology of voters' general orientation toward politics.     

Immigrant Success in the Knowledge Economy: Institutional Change and the Immigrant Experience in Canada, 1970–1995

This research examines how institutional changes associated with the emergence of a "knowledge economy"—specifically the expansion of education and the changing labor market structure —shaped employment experiences of newly arriving immigrants to Canada over the period 1970–1995. Census data on successive cohorts of immigrant men and women (from microdata files for 1981, 1986, 1991, and 1996) show a progressive trend toward lower rates of labor force participation and lower levels of earnings relative to the native-born population, both overall and for most specific origins groups. These trends are only partly attributable to business cycle fluctuations in labor demand. The present article examines the impact of selected educational and labor market changes on successive cohorts of immigrants, using intertemporal substitution methodology. The analysis finds that (1) increased native-born education levels infringe upon the traditional immigrant education advantage, outpacing effects of increased immigrant skill selectivity; (2) increased returns to education among native-born workers do not apply to immigrants; and (3) other institutional obstacles to immigrant success also exist. The declining relative value of immigrant education may be due to the location-specific nature of credential validation processes. Directions for further research and policy analysis are suggested.     

Organizing Across the Divide: Local Feminist Activism, Everyday Life, and the Election of Women to Public Office

Objectives . A disciplinary division of labor has discouraged research into the intersections between social movements and electoral participation. To address this gap, this study investigates the efforts of local women activists who organize around electing feminists to public office. Methods . Data was collected through participant observation and in–depth, unstructured interviews with 22 women active with a local chapter of the National Women's Political Caucus (NWPC). Results . The study found that local Caucus women (1) experience everyday life politics in connection with electoral activity, (2) organize through both their own formal structure and a vast informal community–based organizational network, and (3) influence electoral activity in a seemingly candidate–centered environment. Conclusions . Local Caucus activists play a critical albeit less visible role in organizing feminist electoral influence. These findings suggest the importance of research that transcends disciplinary boundaries to investigate the interactions between nonparty grassroots activism and electoral activity.     

Ethnic Phobias in the Structure of National Identification

The most recent (July 1996) monitoring studies conducted by VTsIOM [the Russian Center for Public Opinion Research], which included measures of the ethnic attitudes and national orientations of the Russian population, indicate that mass ethnic phobias or frustrations, as well as traumatic experiences associated with the loss of the country's former great-power status, the disintegration of the USSR, and the Soviet way of life in general have already peaked' (Table 1). Indices of ethnic hostility have dropped in comparison with the preceding year (1995), in some respects reaching the level of 1993, or even the still earlier and lower threshold values determined in 1989-90.     

Location of Public Goods and the Calculus of Voting: The Seattle Monorail Referendum*

Objectives. In this article we explore how the geographic location of a proposed public good on the ballot in a local referendum influences voting turnout. We argue that voters who live farther away from the good, and are thus likely to bear the cost of the good but have no access to it, would be more motivated to turn out in the election. Drawing on the cost‐orientation hypothesis, or negativity effect, “that people are more strongly motivated to avoid losses than to approach gains,” we expect these voters to derive higher expressive benefits from the act of voting relative to those of voters located closer to the good. Methods. We examine voting turnout in the 2002 referendum in the City of Seattle on the proposed construction of a monorail. We conduct our study at the precinct level using spatial tools of analysis. We evaluate the effect of accessibility on turnout by means of a curvilinear model that incorporates demographic and political variables. Results. We find that voting turnout is determined partly by accessibility. Turnout is higher in precincts located farther away from the monorail line than in precincts located relatively closer to the line. Partisanship conditions this effect. Conclusions. This study provides tentative support for linking voter turnout to the negativity effect via expressive benefits. Voters' location in relation to a public good may affect directly their political behavior by means of their perceived net gains or losses from the good.     

Regional Welfare System Developments in Russia:Community Social Services

Micro-level studies of welfare service developments are largely absent from the literature on Russian social policy issues, which tends to concentrate on macro-level social security arrangements. This paper highlights the emergence of community-based social services in the post-1991 era, examining their development in two provincial Russian cities, based on an empirical study carried out in 1998. The paper adds to a growing literature which seeks to understand "welfare systems" from the perspective of welfare services as opposed to a social security or policy-based approach. It takes a user-group perspective on the services by looking at their use by, and relevance for, disabled children regarded as having learning difficulties, and their families. The empirical data indicate the shape of "new" services in the field sites, the means by which such institutions were maintained and their integration into the welfare sphere as a whole. Their development and maintenance at the local level is explained in part by socio-economic, political and administrative factors in these regions. By highlighting the various factors that help to maintain welfare provision and drive change at the local level, the case studies indicate the possible shape of future welfare developments in Russia as a whole.