Focusing on Focusing Events: Event Selection,Media Coverage,and the Dynamics of Contentious Meaning‐Making

Despite the prevalent assumption among scholars of social movements and contentious politics that transformative contentious events are also the focus of public attention and discussion, there has been little attempt to substantiate this. After making a case for why to focus on focusing events and suggesting that these events should be thought of as products of a dialogical contentious meaning‐making process, we develop a coverage attribute‐based method for identifying focusing events. For illustrative purposes, we apply our method to the coverage of contentious events during the “first” intifada by Israeli‐Jewish, Jewish settler, and Palestinian newspapers. Findings from analyses of 11,868 news items reveal that newspapers are likely to strategically quiet contentious events that are strategically amplified by newspapers affiliated with opposing or targeted parties, and vice versa, depending on their interpretation of these events as political opportunities or threats. Analyses of variations across and within contending parties reveal the role of structure and agency in the dialogical seesaw‐like dynamics of contentious meaning‐making.     

‘There it will be better … ’: Southern Sudanese in Khartoum imagining a new ‘home’ away from ‘home’

At the time of the research, Khartoum was a multi-ethnic and multinational metropolis of 8 million people. A considerable part of the population consists of Southern Sudanese migrants and displaced persons that came during the 20 years plus of civil war in South Sudan to the capital. These people were categorised after the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), as displaced people regardless as to whether they come to the capital as labour migrants, students or because of the war to the capital. The notion of displacement assumes that they are people who are ‘out of place’: thereby assuming a former situation of being in place, a place that can be called ‘home’. After the CPA from 2005, this frequently only imagined home became a real place for the IDP’s to which they are supposed to go back. Yet, many migrants and displaced people are reluctant to move to Southern Sudan. Their decision about going to the South or staying in Khartoum depends not only on the opportunities and perspectives in their respective ‘home’ areas but also on the perceptions of belonging and identity. The imaginations and aspirations about the future life in South Sudan, which I analyse in this article, reflect this ambivalent positioning.     

Who are the active and central actors in the ‘rising civil society’ in Mexico?

The debate about the rise of civil society in Mexico suggests that the processes of political and economic liberalization are multiple and uneven and, thus, have different and contradictory effects on different social groups. This study takes such arguments into account and examines the nature of collective identities and social networks that are more likely to be mobilized in the rising civil society. Who, with what types of social networks and identities, are the active actors in this rising civil society in Mexico? This study also attempts to identify the central actors who take an active part in multi-sector coalitions. As such a broad coalition often leaves profound effects on politics and society, it is vital to ask which actors are likely to take an important step toward multi-sector coalition making. Using a catalog of 1797 protest campaigns collected from three Mexican newspapers between 1964 and 2000, event frequency analysis is employed to find active actors and social network analysis – blockmodel method and degree centrality measure – is applied to uncover central actors. The analyses reveal that while workers, peasants, or students continue to be very active, the centrality of these actors in contentious networks and coalitions has not increased. New central actors in the rising civil society turn out to be civic associations and NGOs formed around single issues, such as environment, retirement, and human rights. When a multi-sector coalition occurs in contemporary Mexico, NGOs and civic associations are likely to play a crucial role in it.     

Twitter publics: how online political communities signaled electoral outcomes in the 2010 US house election

Online social networks are an important setting for understanding the intersection of online communities and offline political processes. This paper analyzes the different ways that people discuss elections on Twitter. Using data from a random sample totaling 113,985 tweets and 30,995 users, we examine the differences between users who employ various strategies to talk about US 2010 Congressional candidates. We show that users who simply include the text of a candidate's name in a message exhibit different behaviors than those who use platform-specific mechanisms. Users who employ free-text tend to have younger accounts, are less likely to be ‘verified’, and generate fewer messages about candidates. Furthermore, candidates’ share of the free-text Twitter public has a larger correlation with their vote tallies than @mentions or hashtags. This research has methodological implications for studying the dynamics between online discourse and offline behavior. Overall, our findings support the view that forms of communication that are more accessible are more indicative of broader social trends.     

Supporting the democratic political organisation of Muslim immigrants: the perspective of Muslims in the Netherlands and Germany

Using data from three survey studies, this paper examines the support for the democratic political organisation of Muslims among Muslim immigrants in the Netherlands (Studies 1, 2, and 3) and Germany (Study 3). Using a social psychological perspective, support is examined in relation to religious group identification, Muslim linked fate, perceived discrimination, fundamentalist religious belief, and host national identification. The findings in all three studies show support for the political organisation of Muslims. Furthermore, higher religious group identification and higher linked fate were associated with stronger support. More discrimination and more fundamentalist beliefs were also associated with stronger support, and part of these associations was mediated by linked fate. National identification was not associated with support for the political organisation of Muslims.     

The Nature of the Political Reconsidered

I present an immanent, and explanatory, critique of reflections on the nature of politics and of power within political science. I argue that these reflections are problematic, to the extent that they presuppose an actualist conception of the political, and that this is generated by an empiricist way of thinking on the one hand and a constructivist way of thinking on the other. I show how re‐defining politics, power, and the political on the basis of a dialectical critical realist ontology resolves these problems and, thereby, allows us to understand the conditions for social change and the relationship between the political and the economic. My argument has two, important implications: first, that the proposal that those who study politics professionally should celebrate philosophical diversity is dangerous–at least if it makes it difficult to sustain a distinct, emancipatory form of political inquiry; and, second, that the nature of social reality justifies the need both for specialized forms of inquiry, such as politics and economics, and integrative forms of inquiry, such as political economy.     

历史地缘政治背景下广西政治中心的选择与分省设想

唐后期,为了控驭广西西南部的非汉民族,在广西境内首次设立高层政区岭南西道,道治位于邕州,但历时短暂。从北宋到明代,在以民族因素为主导的地缘政治背景下,广西的政治中心长期位于桂林。清代中前期,民族因素对广西地缘政治的影响削弱,桂林作为省会只是历史惯性的作用。清后期爆发的边疆危机,成为广西地缘政治变动的新因素,广西省会由桂林迁往南宁成为历史发展的妊然趋势。     

留美幼童与近代中国政治

留美幼童是近代中国第一批留学的群体。他们在近代中国的历史舞台上扮演着重要的角色．特别是在归国以后的岁月里,他们对近代中国政治的贡献比较明显,其表现为：第一,引进近代风气,冲击官僚旧习;第二,维护铁路主权,引爆革命高潮;第三,投身革命实践,促进民主进程。     

论新时期网络参政与中国民主政治发展

新时期网络参政对中国民主政治发展促进作用将更加明显,是有中国特色民主政治发展的重要内容之一。网络参政的作用已经引起了党和国家领导人的重视,地方党和政府的负责人也逐渐注意到网络参政的实际意义,其作用主要体现在：促进参与式民主的发展;促进传统集权等级制权力结构的转换;促进社会平等;促进政治、政府公开的发展;促进选民与人大代表的沟通;促进公民政治社会化的加强。网络参政还是把双刃剑,应该加强规范和管理。     

《红岩》:知识分子的凤凰涅槃

在新中国十七年"红色经典"当中,<红岩>是社会影响最大的一部小说,作品成功塑造了一批中国共产党人的光辉形象,并以生动而感人的故事情节,书写了知识分子革命者的钢铁意志和精神炼狱,进而成为了广大知识分子思想改造的政治"教科书",由此深深影响了几代中国人的成长历程.