Since the publication of Ekins’s The Nature of Legislative Intent, significant attention has been paid to common attitude models of legislative intention, that is, models that require unanimity among ...its group members. A common interpretation of Ekins is that these common attitudes are to be preferred over aggregated attitudes. I argue that any feasible theory of legislative attitudes will require nontrivial aggregation (i.e., not based on unanimity rules alone). Two arguments are put forward in this regard: first, that nontrivial aggregation better explains uncooperative legislative behaviour and, second, that mathematical problems with aggregation apply to common attitudes as well, since they involve trivial aggregation. These arguments generalise to theories of common attitudes other than Ekins’s.
The Play of International Practice Bueger, Christian; Gadinger, Frank
International studies quarterly,
09/2015, Volume:
59, Issue:
3
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Open access
The core claims of the practice turn in International Relations (IR) remain ambiguous. What promises does international practice theory hold for the field? How does the kind of theorizing it produces ...differ from existing perspectives? What kind of research agenda does it produce? This article addresses these questions. Drawing on the work of Andreas Reckwitz, we show that practice approaches entail a distinctive view on the drivers of social relations. Practice theories argue against individualistic-interest and norm-based actor models. They situate knowledge in practice rather than "mental frames" or "discourse." Practice approaches focus on how groups perform their practical activities in world politics to renew and reproduce social order. They therefore overcome familiar dualisms—agents and structures, subjects and objects, and ideational and material—that plague IR theory. Practice theories are a heterogeneous family, but, as we argue, share a range of core commitments. Realizing the promise of the practice turn requires considering the full spectrum of its approaches. However, the field primarily draws on trajectories in international practice theory that emphasize reproduction and hierarchies. It should pay greater attention to practice approaches rooted in pragmatism and that emphasize contingency and change. We conclude with an outline of core challenges that the future agenda of international practice theory must tackle.
This article explains the nature and constitutional role of norms and explores ways to respond to the challenges they face, which threaten the viability of democracy. Constitutional norms are ...informal unwritten rules embedded in the normative practices of officials and political leaders. The effect of departures from constitutional norms depends on the seriousness with which participants take responsibility for their practice. The article distinguishes norm infringers, who depart from norms but do not intentionally challenge them; norm entrepreneurs, who challenge the norm in hopes of reforming or replacing it; and norm saboteurs, who seek to deal a deathblow to the norm or the constitutional system of which it is a part. Responses appropriate to each kind of deviation are considered.
The theme of this special issue is the necessity of a cosmopolitan turn in social and political theory. The question at the heart of this introductory chapter takes the challenge of ‘methodological ...cosmopolitanism’, already addressed in a Special Issue on Cosmopolitan Sociology in this journal (Beck and Sznaider 2006), an important step further: How can social and political theory be opened up, theoretically as well as methodologically and normatively, to a historically new, entangled Modernity which threatens its own foundations? How can it account for the fundamental fragility, the mutability of societal dynamics (of unintended side‐effects, domination and power), shaped by the globalization of capital and risks at the beginning of the twenty‐first century? What theoretical and methodological problems arise and how can they be addressed in empirical research? In the following, we will develop this ‘cosmopolitan turn’ in four steps: firstly, we present the major conceptual tools for a theory of cosmopolitan modernities; secondly, we de‐construct Western modernity by using examples taken from research on individualization and risk; thirdly, we address the key problem of methodological cosmopolitanism, namely the problem of defining the appropriate unit of analysis; and finally, we discuss normative questions, perspectives, and dilemmas of a theory of cosmopolitan modernities, in particular problems of political agency and prospects of political realization.
As a key feature of the contemporary political landscape, populism stands as one of the most contentious concepts in political science. This article presents a critique of dominant conceptions of ...populism – as ideology, logic, discourse and strategy/organisation – and introduces the category of ‘political style’ as a new compelling way of thinking about the phenomenon. We argue that this new category captures an important dimension of contemporary populism that is missed by rival approaches. In doing so, we put forward an inductive model of populism as a political style and contextualise it within the increasingly stylised and mediatised milieu of contemporary politics by focusing on its performative features. We conclude by considering how this concept allows us to understand how populism appears across the political spectrum, how it translates into the political mainstream and its implications for democratic politics.
Clayton Chin and Geoffrey Brahm Levey's article on "Recognition as acknowledgement" offers a timely reconsideration of the theoretical category of recognition. They propose to understand ...multicultural recognition as acknowledgment. Their proposal offers both an alternative view regarding the object of recognition and the stance the agent of recognition is supposed to take to this object. Whereas classic recognition theory understood recognition as directed at cultures or cultural identities, towards which the state was supposed to take a positive evaluative stance, Chin and Levey follow Tariq Modood in focusing recognition on negative differences experienced by minorities. Chin and Levey furthermore understand acknowledgment as linked to symbolic inclusion of minorities as equal members. I argue that the focus on negative difference sits uneasily with the continued framing of recognition in terms of identities and that recognition as acknowledgment can be understood as a political turn in recognition theory.
In this article I set out to trace some of the implications of recharging the political potency of nature in more-than-human terms. This shifts attention from a biopolitical focus on the ...inventiveness of the life sciences and what this means in terms of the emergence of ‘cyborg’ political subjects to an onto-political focus on the inventiveness of knowledge controversies and what these mean for techno-political practices. Specifically, the article examines the onto-politics of ‘natural’ hazard events and their capacity to force thought in those affected by them, and so to place new demands on research practices in terms of rendering such events affective and amenable to political interrogation. I work these arguments through the demanding experimental ethos of the philosopher Isabelle Stengers, for whom scientific practices produce reliable knowledge claims only in so far as the questions they address are at risk of being redefined by the phenomena mobilized in them, and who extends this ethos to elaborate an understanding of, even a test for, an adequate political theory and practice. I do so with reference to a recent research experiment in which I collaborated with social and natural scientists and people affected by flooding in the UK.
Accession to the European Union means that each Member State must comply, under the community treaties that have been adopted, with several principles and numerous operating standards, among which ...one can distinguish the maintenance of public finance discipline at a sufficiently low level. An instrument supporting the preservation of an adequate balance of public finance is the so-called excessive deficit procedure. Poland was subjected to the excessive deficit procedure in two periods: 20042008 and 20092015.The article employs a unique research methodology to establish long-term trends in law creation, based on the theory of supply and demand. In particular, this text focuses on the question of whether a certain law was intended to increase or decrease the costs of performing state functions. It demonstrates through the use of the tools of mathematical modeling that the excessive deficit procedure applied to Poland not only had an impact on state finances, but also had a long-term effect on the legislature, which consistently created regulations aimed at reducing public expenditure.The paper underlines the significance of sustainable public finances for macroeconomic stability, using Poland as a case study. Despite the beneficial impact of the excessive deficit procedure in reducing Polands public debt, the research uncovers a recurring pattern of increasing public spending after improving financial stability.
The Austro-Hungarian diplomatic services followed the course of the election campaigns for the State Duma in the Kingdom of Poland closely. This is entirely understandable. The Sejm was a novelty in ...the political life of the Habsburg Monarchy’s northern neighbour. Its functioning could have had far-reaching and difficult to predict consequences for the politics of the Romanov Empire. Reports by Austro-Hungarian diplomats accurately reflected the mood of Polish public opinion and the position of individual groups. They drew attention to the deterioration of ethnic relations in the Kingdom of Poland, both between Poles and Jews and between Poles and Russians. They accurately portrayed the dilemmas of Polish society, its powerlessness and frustration, including disappointment with the State Duma. The parliamentarisation of the political system in Russia and the departure from the self-rule did not improve the position of the Polish people in the tsarist state. The results of the elections to the State Duma confirmed the dominance of national democracy in the political life of the Kingdom of Poland. The Austro-Hungarian diplomats regarded this grouping as the true representation of public sentiment and the dominant force on the Polish political scene. They were not entirely impartial in their reports. Their correspondence shows that they were sympathetic to Polish conservative circles and clearly disliked socialist groups.
PDF
