An important contribution to the debate on forms of civil society in Africa and elsewhere, and to the global literature on dissent. In Humor, Silence, and Civil Society in Nigeria, Ebenezer Obadare offers an innovative perspective on the idea and reality of civil society. Mobilizing a wide range of concepts and insights from political science, African studies, sociology, cultural studies, media studies, anthropology, communications theory, and international development, Obadare develops a notion of civil society that radically departs from the literature's axiomatic focus on voluntary civic associations and focuses instead on more informal strategies of resistance, such as humor and silence. Compellingly argued, Humor, Silence, and Civil Society in Nigeria raises provocative questions on a topic of keen importance for students, scholars, and policymakers. Ebenezer Obadare is professor of sociology at the University of Kansas. He is coeditor of Civic Agency in Africa: Arts of Resistance in the 21st Century(James Currey, 2014).

This book provides the first in-depth study of healthcare reforms in post-communist Eastern Europe. Combining insights from comparative politics and public policy analysis, it examines health reforms in Slovenia, the Czech Republic, and Poland between 1989 and 2019. The book argues that the post-communist transformation of healthcare policy has entailed a process of policy learning, and that the countries' reform pathways were shaped by a series of initiatives aimed at applying market-oriented policy ideas in healthcare. The success of these initiatives has been influenced by three factors: policy legacies, political competition, and institutional configurations. The book offers a novel comparison of health reform in the region and policy changes more generally. It will appeal to scholars and students of public policy, health policy, and European politics.

"Research in Micropolitics: Political Decision Making, Deliberation and Participation" is the sixth in a series dating back to 1989 and third under the editorship of Delli Carpini, Huddy and Shapiro. The purpose of this series is to publish original essays on a variety of substantive, conceptual and methodological issues of relevance to political psychology, with particular emphasis on promising new areas of theory and research. The essays contained in this latest volume address three important and interrelated themes in the theory and practice of democratic politics: the use of information short cuts in political decision making; the role of deliberation in citizens' attitude and opinion formation; and, the pathways to civic and political participation.Drawing on well-established theory and findings from both political science and psychology (as well, on occasion, on the author's own original research) each essay provides an interpretative review of recent and important research. Taken together, the essays offer a valuable contribution to our understanding of the complex and context-dependent dynamics of mass politics today, pointing out questions that remain unanswered and promising ways to answer these questions in future research.

First Published in 2000. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

This timely study analyzes the inner workings of the political and military control system used by the USSR and former communist regimes in Eastern Europe to rule the region until recent times. It then shows how these controls collapsed and were swept away by the revolutions in 1989. This up-to-date work describes current problems in East European security and points to future needs. This appraisal of the use of military and political power in the area is written for political scientists, military historians and analysts, for students and experts in East European studies and in international organization. Certain coercive and socializing mechanisms define the Soviet/Communist control system which was the key to the effectiveness of the Warsaw Treaty Organization and to the reliability of East European armed forces. The history covers the period from the end of World War II to the present. The work describes the disintegration of the system of controls during the 1980s and its collapse and the end of the WTO and previous military arrangements in 1989. The study analyzes the 1989 revolutions and points to new problems and uncertainties facing East European states as they depoliticize their armed forces and renationalize their foreign security policies.

The book is devoted to the subject of Venezuela's politics and the different dimensions of its longstanding crisis, with various researchers exchanging ideas on the current problems affecting the country. It is the first comprehensive overview on the dimensions of Venezuela's current crisis written in English, thus filling an important research gap. Especially the participation of international, well-known scholars make it a global enterprise. The book covers historical and theoretical facts surrounding the case of Venezuela and also focuses on the parties and actors that play decisive roles in the conflict. Subjects include the military, public administration, ideology, the opposition, the party landscape along with its crisis and Venezuela's oil policy. Furthermore the book touches upon international and regional aspects: Venezuela's diplomatic relations with the EU, the USA, Cuba and Colombia, respectively. The volume addresses a wider audience, such as scholars on Latin American and especially Venezuelan Politics, International Relations, as well as an interested public, including journalists and politicians.

This work provides an introduction to the major issues that face Ukraine today and explains how they were shaped. Contrasting the generally bleak picture that international media reports present, it suggests that Ukraine has actually accomplished a great deal in a short time. In seven years, from 1991 to 1998, Ukraine went from being a little-known nation within a non-democratic state to an internationally recognized independent country. It established a political identity for itself separate from Russia and made steps towards creating a democratic political system including adopting a new Constitution. All this was done without the shedding of blood. The book looks at these and other issues. The first chapter provides a broad historical background and explains why history is important in the region today. Chapter 2 describes Ukraine's starting point in 1991. It explains the legacies left behind by the Soviet Union: what Ukraine had and what it lacked when it declared independence. The remaining chapters provide an overview of the main political, economic, social, cultural and foreign policy issues in Ukraine. A separate chapter is devoted to Ukrainian-Russian relations.

The debate on governance originates in the OECD world. At the latest since the postcolonial debate, we know that we need to "test" our assumptions under radically different conditions. This book offers an extended perspective of local self-governance by examining cases from South Asia, Africa, and Latin America, together with a study of militias in the USA. The chapters present a wide variety of local actors who pursue different notions of order legitimized by local traditions based on hierarchy or deeply rooted communalism, Islamic theology, or grassroots democracy. Some local actors claim a state-like authority and challenge the territorial state. In such cases, there is no longer "a shadow hierarchy" but opposition to the state. Different violent actors fight for supremacy, and the state is just one actor among others. The empirical studies presented in this book show how different kinds of local self-governance are combined with varieties of statehood, and thus contribute to an understanding of the notion of governance in a fundamental sense that goes beyond the special case of the OECD world.

Traditional forms of top-down government are being challenged by the growing complexity and fragmentation of social and political life and the need to mobilize and activate the knowledge, ideas, and resources of private stakeholders. In response to this important challenge there has been a persistent proliferation of interactive forms of public governance that bring together a plethora of public and private actors in collaborative policy arenas. This book explores how these new forms of interactive governance are working in practice and analyses their role and impact on public policy making in different policy areas and in different countries. The need for facilitating, managing and giving direction to interactive policy arenas is also addressed through empirical analyses of different forms of metagovernance that aim to govern interactive forms of governance without reverting to traditional forms of hierarchical command and control. Finally, the normative implications of interactive policy making are assessed through studies of the democratic problems and merits associated with interactive policy making.

This volume examines the process through which climate change is transforming global governance, as both an increasingly central issue on the international stage and an increasingly structured policy domain with its specific modes of governing, networks of actors, discourses, and knowledge practices. Collectively, the contributions aim to assess how and why climate change is becoming a dominant frame in international politics. In doing so, they also contribute to understanding the dynamics and drivers of climatization.As global warming progresses and efforts to mitigate and adapt intensify, living under a changing climate-or in a 'new climate regime' (Latour 2015)-increasingly appears as a central feature of 'our' new, and highly unequal, human condition in the Anthropocene. In other words, we firmly believe that climatization is here to stay. It is thus crucial to better understand this process, recognizing its problems and ambiguities, but also examining its transformative potential and identifying the conditions under which such potentials can be harnessed with a view to building a more effective and equitable climate politics. We think that the chapters in this book contribute to this endeavour.

Combining international and internal perspectives, Professor Karpat analyses the transformation of the Ottoman Empire over the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He views privatization of state lands and the increase of domestic and foreign trade as key factors in the rise of a Muslim middle class, which, increasingly aware of its economic interests and communal roots, then attempted to reshape the government to reflect its ideals. Based on a wealth of original archival documents, records, memoirs, and published sources, this is likely to become an indispensable reference for students of Islam, modern Turkey, and the Middle East, as well as for students of modernism and of encounters between civilizations.

This book covers critical issues in Nigeria's external relations since 1960. As an independent nation, Nigeria has stood out as the most populous black country in the world and contributed immensely to the search for solutions to pressing international issues, notably in Africa affairs. Nigeria has also participated actively in global affairs and used the platform of international organisation to advance her national interests, cognisant also of its regional and global obligations and responsibilities. Contributors to this thought-provoking book make a strong case for Nigeria to press for a foreign policy that puts Nigerian people at the centre. One of the strong points also emanating from the contributors of this book is the imperative for Nigeria to address domestic challenges that continue to impinge on the country's external image.

This volume, largely the work of Spanish scholars, looks at the functioning of Spain since the introduction of democracy and more particularly since the Constitution of 1978.
Contents: The Franco Legacy in Perspective: Juan Carlos and the Emergence of Democracy Paul Preston. Collective memory and the transition to democracy: on the peculiarity of the Basque Country in Spanish context Paloma Aguilar Fernandez. Reflections on the Struggle Against Franco Elias Diaz. Decentralisation in Spain: weakly institutionalized pluralism Joseph M. Colomer. Elections, parties and democratic consolidation in Spain Jose Ramon Montero. Political Scandals in Democratic Spain Fernando Jimenez Sanchez. Power Diffusion or concentration: in search of the Policy Process Paul Heywood. Pressure Groups and the Articulation of Interests Joaquim M Molins and Alex Casademunt. Judicial Review and Political Empowerment: Abortion in Spain Belen Barreiro Perez-Pardo.

Violence and Social Injustice Against Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual People helps you look past the stereotypical picture of violence against sexual minorities--the public physical assaults on gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered youth by hypermasculine male thugs--and directs you toward the many daily acts of quiet violence that go on, unhindered, in the workaday settings of our legal, social, educational, and law-enforcement institutions. You ll learn about the frightening prevelance of complacency, homophobic ignorance, and apathy that pervades our police departments, courts, high schools, and churches. Also, armed with this critical insight and statistical research, you ll be better equipped to wage a non-violent war of fairness and mutual respect against the daily, senseless violence of policy and practice that threatens to render gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered people unwelcome and battered citizens in their own communities.You ll find that Violence and Social Injustice Against Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual People is ideal for aiding social workers, counselors, teachers, and criminal justice officials in removing the unseen acts of violence from the policies and practices of the public sector. These and other specific areas will give you the information and the fortitude necessary to evoke positive change in your community: legal issues relating to same-sex marriage the connection between social injustice and violence violence against sexual minority youth sexual identity and ethnic minorities practice and policy recommendationsAs this book shows, violence against sexual minorities can be subtly woven into the very fabric of some of our most long-standing, respected social institutions. For too long, the sexual minorities of color, for example, and the lesbian who suffers physical assault at the hands of a partner, have had little or no help from social workers, law enforcement, or education for fear of receiving either complete negligence or increased antagonism. But now, in Violence and Social Injustice Against Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual People, you ll find the facts and tools necessary for turning the ugliness of communal violence into social justice for people of all sexual orientations.

"Sustainable development" quickly became the universal goal for environmentalists in the 1990s, motivated by the 1988 Brundtland Report and the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio. When the time came to bring theory into reality, sustainable development revealed far more complexity than first anticipated. To attain sustainable development in the full sense of the phrase"meeting present needs without compromising the resources needed for future societies"environmental and social concerns would need a constant presence in all major economic decisions. The Cornerstone of Development: Balancing Environmental, Social, and Economic Imperatives profiles many of the first attempts to implement sustainable development initiatives worldwide. The model: Canada's experience with "multistakeholder" decision-making. Under the guidance of Canada's National Task Force on Environment and Economy, nationwide and provincial round tables brought government officials together with corporate officers to formulate sustainable development guidelines. Authorized by the Canadian government to serve as an "Agenda 21 organization," the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) subsequently researched the feasibility of adapting the multistakeholder approach to the needs and practices of developing countries. The results are in these pages: valuable case histories from Africa, Latin America, Asia and Canada, each recounting the risks and benefits from integrating environmental, social and economic policies. When IDRC members were asked for ways to address environmental sustainability, they had few examples to follow"and little evidence that such endeavors could be fulfilled. The research and problem-solving effortsthey produced are now collected here, for the guidance of other environment/development balance programs worldwide.

This book explores Bangladesh's shift from a 'bottomless pit' into a 'middle-income' category. Six chapters in the book cover topics on microfinance growth, ready-made garment production, and social safety net programs playing pivotal roles particularly for women empowerment. In doing so, the book shows that the net effect was not just a change to the country's limited number of representative brands, but also a realization of many more brands to have built up over time.

This book provides an in-depth investigation of Russian online anti-establishment resistances in 2016-2019. Grounded in qualitative content analysis of the YouTube videos and social media data of opposition activist Alexey Navalny and his associates, the research covers the history of these communications, their tactics, and the impact on the Russian public sphere and peripheral electorates. Drawing from populism, journalism and digital media studies, Glazunova skilfully shows Russia's digital public sphere to be a multi-faceted site with its own struggles, challenges, and unique communication strategies for political survival. An important and original work, Digital Activism in Russia reflects on the past, present, and future of such resistances in Russia, the central role played by digital media, and its relevance for the political activists struggling for democracy around the world.

This book explores the leading role that cities can play in shaping progressive policies in collaboration with various stakeholders. It examines the timing of such shifts to progressivity in cities, the interactions that enable progressive actions to be developed and sustained, and the challenges and constraints facing progressive cities. The book approaches the themes using an array of methods to investigate how progressive city governments emerge, what constitutes a "progressive city" in terms of governance institutions, processes and outcomes and whether progressive cities are destined to be ephemeral or if they can be sustained over time. With its focus on the emerging role of local governments in shaping city futures, this book is useful for students, academics, government official and policy makers interested in geography, sociology, urban planning, public policy, political economy, social movements, participatory democracy and Asian and European studies.

What is the form of government of the European Union (EU)? And how is the institutional governance of the Eurozone evolving? These questions have become pressing during the last few years. On the one hand, the Euro-crisis and the legal and institutional responses to it have had major implications on the constitutional architecture of the EU and the Eurozone. On the other hand, the May 2014 elections for the European Parliament and the ensuing struggle to form the European Commission have brought to the fore new tensions in the EU political system. The purpose of this book, which brings together the contributions of EU lawyers, comparative constitutional lawyers and political scientists, from all over Europe and the United States, is to offer a new look at the form of government of the EU and the Eurozone and consider its potential for future development. While offering a plurality of perspectives on the form of government of the EU and the Eurozone, this book emphasises how the Euro-crisis represents a watershed in the process of European integration, makes the case for a more legitimate and effective form of government for the EU and the Eurozone, and identifies possible windows of opportunity for future treaty reforms. The volume will provide food for thought for scholars, policy-makers and the public at large as they continue debating the most apt form of government for the EU and the Eurozone.

This new paperback comprehensively reviews the research evidence on the links between guns, violence, and gun control, and reports results of the author's own research as well. In Targeting Guns, Kleck follows the line of argument and careful statistical inference of his earlier prizewinning volume, Point Blank, while updating the literature reviews and statistical information, and adding two chapters.

What is the Privy Council? What does it do? How did it come into being? We have no written constitution and, therefore, no easy answers to these questions. There are people who would argue that it has no power at all. Others might disagree. Particularly if you had been sentenced to death in a former British overseas territory that still used the Privy Council as its court of appeal, for example, or if you were a student having a row with your college examiners where the University Chancellor, or the Official Visitor, was a member of the royal family. Perhaps a priest who had been defrocked by the Church of England's Court of Arches, or, for that matter, a Prime Minister trying to establish a Royal Charter to control the press.The Privy Council meets several times a year when five or six members of the Cabinet - who are all Privy Counsellors - are summoned to attend on the Queen and, among other business, Acts of Parliament receive the royal assent. Much of the work of the Council is done by standing or ad-hoc committees and sometimes politicians are made Privy Counsellors so that they can serve on such committees.For centuries, Privy Counsellors were sworn to secrecy by the Privy Council Oath and until 1999 to break that oath was regarded as an act of treason. Traditionally, the Council has always existed to advise the Sovereign on the exercise of the Royal Prerogative, to make laws, to condemn to death and to go to war. Nowadays, most of its power has been devolved, yet it cannot simply be dismissed as having a purely ceremonial role. Its tentacles spread to every area of parliamentary and public life. Brides, battleships and burial plots are all affected by the current workings of the Privy Council, as is the governance of both the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man. By Royal Appointment takes us on an anecdote-filled odyssey through the history of one of England's oldest and most secretive institutions, its history spanning our history from King Cnut, through the Middle Ages, up to its modern embodiment and functions.

The concept of decentralization embraces several distinct processes, including the deconcentration of governmental and administrative functions, involving both their physical relocation and the devolution of powers, whether political or economic. This book presents a theoretical framework for observations of such phenomena in Latin America, relating them to the modern, or post-modern, tendencies of fragmentation of monolithic structures in many countries and in many fields of human activity. As such it is the first book to systematically examine the process in a particular region and to relate theoretical concepts to Latin American realities.

Part I includes chapters illustrating the process in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Ecuador, and Peru. The focus shifts according to the particular context, some chapters emphasize the contradictions posed by state development and political, and administrative structures, while others examine the impact of neo-liberal economic measures in relation to spontaneous decentralization of people and activities. Part II provides a detailed case study of Mexico, with analyses of both political and economic aspects as practiced by the state and the private sector of the economy. The volume concludes with a consideration of the extent to which these circumstances are common to other parts of the Third World. A significant volume for Latin American Studies collections and those involved with regional planning and economic geography and development.