... it is the time of time that has passed: this strange idea of a vast army moving forward, preceded by the most daring innovators and thinkers, followed by a mass of slower and heavier crowds, ...while the rearguard of the most archaic, the most primitive, the most reactionary people trails behind-just like the Navis, trying hopelessly to slow down the inevitable charge forward. Why do I wish to reuse the oversized genre of the manifesto to explore this shift from future to prospect? Because in spite of the abyss of time, there is a tenuous relation between the Communist and the Compositionist Manifesto.
South Africa recorded the highest number of COVID-19 cases and deaths in Africa despite having what seemed to be one of the best government response mechanisms on the continent. This paper explores ...the responses of both the government and the citizens of South Africa to the COVID-19 pandemic. Through a literature review, the study established that the government's response to the pandemic was influenced by various factors, including the responsibility to protect citizens' lives, the need to defend the state's sovereignty, and compliance with global health imperatives. This was achieved through strict and coercive government measures, which left little room for public participation in decision-making. The findings also indicate public dissent towards government directives, which may be attributed to a lack of public awareness and preparedness in public health emergencies. The social contract theory provides a useful framework for analysing and understanding the actions of the government and citizens in response to COVID-19 in South Africa. Understanding these aspects is crucial for drawing informative lessons for effective public health and socio-economic interventions in future pandemics and health-related emergencies.
•The term “social contract” is increasingly used in social science literature but is rarely well operationalized.•We define social contracts as agreements between societal groups and the state on ...rights and obligations toward each other.•The notion of social contracts helps to compare state-society relations in different countries and at different times.•After independence, MENA countries had similar social contracts, which were then challenged by the Arab uprisings in 2011.•Since then, social contracts in MENA countries have developed in different directions.
The term “social contract” is increasingly used in social science literature to describe sets of state-society relations – in particular with reference to the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Nevertheless, the term has thus far remained insufficiently conceptualized and its potential to inform a systematic analysis of contemporary states has been underutilized. This article contributes to the filling of this gap. It defines social contracts as sets of formal and informal agreements between societal groups and their sovereign (government or other actor in power) on rights and obligations toward each other. We argue that social contracts are partly informal institutions, which are meant to make state-society interactions more predictable and thereby politics more stable. Their effectiveness depends on their substance (deliverables exchanged between government and society), scope (the actors involved and the geographic range of influence) and temporal dimension (beginning, evolution, and duration). Social contracts can differ substantially in all three dimensions.
This approach complements established theories of comparative politics and sharpens the perspective on state-society relations. It helps to (i) compare state-society relations in different countries, (ii) track changes within one country, (iii) find out when and why social contracts are broken or even revoked, (iv) uncover how external players affect state-society relations, and (v) analyze how state-society relations can be Pareto improved.
Against this background, this article shows that after independence, MENA countries had quite similar social contracts, which were based on the provision of social benefits rather than political participation. We argue that they degenerated steadily after 1985 due to increasing populations and budgetary problems. The Arab uprisings in 2010–11 were an expression of discontent with a situation in which governments provided neither political participation nor social benefits, like employment. Since then, social contracts in MENA countries have developed in different directions, and their long-term stability is questionable. We address the question of how they can be transformed to become more inclusive and therefore more stable.
Do citizens view state and traditional authorities as substitutes or complements? Past work has been divided on this question. Some scholars point to competition between attitudes toward these ...entities, suggesting substitution, whereas others highlight positive correlations, suggesting complementarity. Addressing this question, however, is difficult, as it requires assessing the effects of exogenous changes in the latent valuation of one authority on an individual’s support for another. We show that this quantity—a type of elasticity—cannot be inferred from correlations between support for the two forms of authority. We employ a structural model to estimate this elasticity of substitution using data from 816 villages in the Democratic Republic of Congo and plausibly exogenous rainfall and conflict shocks. Despite prima facie evidence for substitution logics, our model’s outcomes are consistent with complementarity; positive changes in citizen valuation of the chief appear to translate into positive changes in support for the government.
Abstract
Although data breaches are common, limited knowledge exists regarding consumer sentiments towards them and the personal actions taken following a breach. First, we explore trends using a ...database chronicling 14 years of breaches. Then, guided by Social Contract Theory, our study analyzes a secondary dataset of survey responses from 890 affected consumers to understand perceptions of breaches, including attitudes towards businesses, expected actions businesses take following a breach, and protective actions. The integration of Social Contract Theory with Privacy Calculus Theory and Protection Motivation Theory in the study of data breaches provides a lens to examine how context‐specific attributes impact consumer actions following a breach. Our findings show that data breaches are frequent, vary across industries, and consumer attitudes and actions vary by data type compromised.
However conceptualised, the institutions and relations associated with the state are clearly crucial to political ecological research. Environmental policies are enacted through state institutions, ...and property rights over land and resources are enforced by the legal framework and monopoly power associated with the state form. Nevertheless, political ecologists have sometimes had an uneasy relationship with conceptualisations of the state, leading to recurring questions over the adequacy of political ecological theorisations. Over the last decade and a half such questions have led to a call for dialogues with political geography and, more recently, with critical geopolitics. In this second progress report, I review recent political ecological theorisations of the state, pointing to a set of shared concerns associated with the processes, relations and struggles through which states are brought into being and acquire certain effects. I will conclude with a note of caution when it comes to an uncritical dialogue with more abstract interpretations of state power.
Crime represents a profound threat to societal well-being, generating misery and disorder. Understanding its nature, causes, patterns, and consequences is vital for its effective prevention and ...control. In Nigeria, the past two decades have witnessed a steady rise in criminal activities, straining resources and impeding national development. Relying on the Social Contract thesis, this study examines how the preponderance of criminality and insecurity has systematically hindered Nigeria's developmental aspirations. In this study, we contend that the states primary duty is to safeguard citizens and their property, as espoused by the social contract theory. However, the relentless wave of criminality in the last two decades in Nigeria has greatly undermined the social agreement between the Nigerian state and its citizens. This is in addition to the diversion of resources from other states responsibilities to the security of the citizenry and the defence of the state. The implication of this situation, as revealed in this study, is the general hampering of the comprehensive national progress and prosperity of the Nigerian state. In this regard, we, therefore, recommend the imperativeness of a communal approach towards tackling the spate of security challenges in Nigeria whilst also recognizing that safeguarding the society remains a collective responsibility of both the Nigerian state and its citizenry. By fostering a culture of security amongst all, the Nigerian state and its citizenry can address the pervasive triggers and impact of crime whilst building a safer and prosperous future for all.
A review of the monograph “Public administration in a digital society: to a new social contract” is presented. The book under review is devoted to the development of a scientifically based concept ...of the social contract of the digital society. According to the authors, the modern period of state development, the period of searching for better and more targeted forms of interaction between the authorities and the population significantly expands the possibilities of mass participation of the population in state governance using information and telecommunication technologies. The authors make the conclusion that humanity is in the widest range of options – from strengthening the tendencies of the state, whose supervisory functions may be too total in relation to the person, to digital consensus democracy, when citizens are able to reach agreements on a wide range of socially significant tasks. The book proposes the use of digital network platforms as communication platforms that ensure the establishment of a certain level of trust between citizens and the population. This is a research publication, that introduces the government and municipal employees, representatives of science, education and of public organisations and political parties, all interested in the range of modern problems of social development in the context of the digital transformation of most public spheres and the public administration transformation.
This brief paper is a general treatment of war – its morality and its political and social effects. Accordingly, we discuss primarily those armed interactions between nations, or, in “civil” wars, ...those aimed at securing the reins of government. These must, we contend, be inherently immoral on one side – the one which “starts” the war in question – and inherently moral on the other, who after all are defending their lives against the first. To say this requires a moral theory, which we briefly develop. It proceeds on Hobbesian-contractarian lines: if mankind occupies a “state of nature,” then we will all be worse off than if we join with each other in adopting the restrictions of morality – fundamentally, and primarily, of nonviolence, of living at peace with each other. This raises a question about the very rationality of war, to be sure. And yet, war we have, in considerable and unfortunate abundance. How can this be? Some tentative answers are suggested.
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