Suchergebnisse

Bezug nehmend auf Befunde empirischer Analysen im Rahmen der DFG-Studie "Politische Einstellungen, politische Partizipation und Wählerverhalten im vereinigten Deutschland" argumentiert der Verfasser, dass es überzogen erscheint, die Panelmethode aufgrund ihres bedeutsamsten Makels - nämlich der Panelmortalität - als Ganzes infrage zu stellen. Auf der anderen Seite verbietet sich aber eine unreflektierte Betrachtung von Ergebnissen auf der Grundlage von Paneldaten ebenso. Panelmortalität stellt für Längsschnitterhebungen eine wichtige Restriktion dar, denn sie vollzieht sich in aller Regel eben nicht zufällig. Sozialstrukturelle Merkmale spielen bei der Frage, ob sich eine Person auch ein weiteres Mal befragen lässt, ebenso eine Rolle wie das Interesse und die subjektive Kompetenz in Bezug auf den Untersuchungsgegenstand. Gerade vor dem Hintergrund der Komplexität des Themenbereichs Politik ist die Panelmortalität für politikwissenschaftliche Umfragen besonders ernst zu nehmen. Die Untersuchung hat ergeben, dass subjektives politisches Interesse einen bedeutsamen Prädiktor der Teilnahme an den Folgewellen darstellt. Das Panel erweist sich im Vergleich zu den parallelen Querschnitterhebungen als wesentlich stärker politisiert. Für die Verteilung von zahlreichen Merkmalen hat dies Konsequenzen. Am Beispiel der Wahlbeteiligung bzw. Wahlabsicht wird gezeigt, dass diese im Panel im Zeitraum von 1994 bis 2002 kontinuierlich ansteigt. Offenbar verbirgt sich dahinter jedoch kein realer Trend, da ein solcher in den Querschnitterhebungen nicht zu erkennen ist. Daraus ließe sich ableiten, dass es in den Paneldaten zu systematischen Verzerrungen der univariaten Verteilungen kommt, wenn die interessierenden Merkmale mit dem politischen Interesse in Zusammenhang stehen. Für die weitaus meisten Einstellungsdimensionen des Syndroms Politikverdrossenheit waren solche Verzerrungen nicht zu erkennen, wohl aber bei der Dimension der internal efficacy. Da diese subjektive politische Kompetenz abbildet, ist ihre Nähe zur Selbsteinschätzung des politischen Interesses offenkundig. (ICF2)

"Am 21. April werden in Nigeria Präsident, Senat und Repräsentantenhaus sowie am 14. April die Gouverneure und die Parlamente von 36 Bundesstaaten gewählt. Das komplizierte Wahlsystem wird - sehr wahrscheinlich - eine rasche Ermittlung des Wahlsiegers verzögern. Dennoch sind schon jetzt einige Aussagen möglich: Die Wahlvorbereitung, obgleich besser als 2003, war erneut von zahlreichen Unzulänglichkeiten geprägt. Den Parteien fehlen sowohl ideologisch-programmatische Differenzen wie auch dauerhafte organisatorische Strukturen im Land; sie sind reine Wahlkampforganisationen im Interesse einzelner reicher Politiker oder kleiner Cliquen. Einen starken Nachfolger für den international angesehenen Präsidenten Olusegun Obasanjo wird es nicht geben. Seine Partei, die regierende People's Democratic Party, wird erneut als stärkste Kraft erwartet. Gelingt die Wahl, wäre es der erste legitime Machtwechsel Nigerias - zumindest auf der personellen Ebene." (Autorenreferat)

"Overreporting wird in der deutschsprachigen Methodenliteratur kaum behandelt – zu Unrecht, wie ein Blick auf die empirischen Daten zeigt. Der vorliegende Artikel hat sich daher zum Ziel gesetzt, dieses in Vergessenheit geratene Problem in Erinnerung zu rufen, und geht auf drei Ebenen vor: Im ersten Teil präsentieren wir einen Überblick über den beachtlichen Literaturkorpus im englischsprachigen Raum und nehmen eine Systematisierung entlang methodischer Problemstellungen und theoretischer Begründungen des Phänomens vor – der sozialen Erwünschtheit einerseits und dem Misremembering andererseits, das als Erinnerungsproblem oder als 'source confusing' verstanden werden kann. Im zweiten Teil widmen wir uns den zwei theoretischen Erklärungssets anhand empirischer Daten aus der Schweiz. Mit der Hilfe von Aggregatdatenanalysen sowie dreier Feldexperimente nehmen wir erste explorative Hypothesentests vor und analysieren den
Effekt theoretisch hergeleiteter Maßnahmen auf der Ebene des Fragebogens (Wording). Es zeigt sich, dass Gegenmaßnahmen zur sozialen Erwünschtheit mit kleinen Modifikationen im Wording schwierig zu erreichen sind und sogar kontraproduktiv sein können. Ein Effekt des Treatments zum Misremembering ist bei großen Zeitabständen zwar vorhanden, jedoch bleibt die kausale Begründung offen und schwierig. Daher schlagen wir im letzten Teil weitere Maßnahmen für künftige Untersuchungen vor: Ein Bogus-pipeline-Experiment, Kontrollen über Erwünschtheits- bzw. Erinnerungsskalen, eine Meta-Analyse und Validitätsstudien für jene Länder, die noch keine haben." (Autorenreferat)

With all but one contest at the state and local
levels resolved, elections this cycle in Bossier Parish demonstrated that to come
close to beating its political establishment, you had to have a pretty organized
effort behind you.

At stake were all the seats on the Police Jury as
well as two state Senate and two state House of Representative slots, with a
couple of House posts already decided when House District 10 incumbent
Republican Wayne
McMahen and House District 5 newcomer Republican Dennis Bamburg didn't draw
opponents, as well as a few juror positions with just incumbents filing. Among
the others, in all but one Jury and one House seat establishment forces had a
rooting interest in, if not intense involvement supporting, a particular candidate.

The House race it didn't particularly care about
was the District 2 matchup between Caddo Parish Democrats Terence Vinson from
the School Board and Steven Jackson from the Parish Commission. It offered a contrast
in styles both in terms of candidates and campaigns: Vinson utilizing
traditional canvassing methods and with a steady record in office, while
Jackson spent more overall and more on media to go with his more controversial
personality, most recently being convicted
for impersonation of a police officer. That apparently didn't faze enough
voters, who gave him a narrow win.

Bossier political powers-that-be did care about
the House District 9 race between Republicans state Rep. Dodie Horton and
businessman Chris Turner, with them backing the challenger. Horton decisively
turned him back, in part because of the assistance she received from the Louisiana Freedom Caucus through its
political action committee, a group of consistent conservative House
members of which she is a member and is led by another area House member,
Republican Alan
Seabaugh.

Seabaugh himself was on the ballot and in the
crosshairs of the establishment – not just Bossier's but of other big government,
get-along-go-along politicians and special interests across the state – for
Senate District 31. Those forces aggravated at his reform and smaller
government agenda propped up to oppose him retired basketball coach Mike
McConathy running under the GOP label. Seabaugh prevailed in a contest that,
when all is said and done, likely in terms both of dollars spent by the campaigns
and by others on their behalf, will end up as the most expensive in state
history.

Thus, strong candidate organizations and allied
interests could maintain their foothold against the establishment. That lesson
also was the case in the other Senate contest, District 36, that turned into a
big establishment win, but not so much because of its efforts. There, GOP
incumbent Robert Mills lost
handily to Republican Bossier Parish School Board member Adam Bass.

Mills had angered conservatives by voting in the
Senate this year not to hold back surplus money to pare down pension
obligations and deposit more into the state's Budget Stabilization Fund savings
account, against the preferences of Horton, Seabaugh, and the Freedom Caucus.
The politically ambitious Bass, who had been testing the waters for Bossier
City mayor in 2025 with establishment backing, stepped into an ideal situation where
he could have that support and benefitted from some conservatives deserting
Mills (for example, Seabaugh, busy with his own campaign, didn't aid Mills as
he had in 2019). Despite the Mills campaign gaining an advantage monetarily in
the closing weeks of the campaign, conservative acceptance of Bass and local
powerbroker backing (in a district that had changed to his favor through
reapportionment) was more than enough to make Mills the only incumbent senator
to lose this cycle.

That establishment success, minus reformist or small
government conservative backing with one possible exception, was more pronounced
in Jury races. All but one incumbent ran again, and in the District 10 exception
former School Board member Democrat Julius Darby, the incumbent's brother, qualified,
with most finding success without great difficulty

Given their level of campaigning, resources
committed, and district demographics, three Republican challengers – all reformers
and conservatives – had the best shot to win of all challengers. In District 1,
small businessman Mike Farris took on GOP incumbent Bob
Brotherton; in District 5, former juror Barry Butler faced off against GOP
incumbent Julianna
Parks; and in District 12, small businessman Keith Sutton squared off against
GOP incumbent Mac
Plummer.

Brotherton looked vulnerable given his health that
made him difficult for him to attend Jury meetings, much less campaign. He and
Parks both served, likely
illegally, on the parish-appointed Library Board of
Control and certainly illegally had appointed Parish Administrator Butch
Ford as interim director of libraries for several months. They and Plummer had
made Ford administrator in full knowledge legally he didn't qualify, a matter still
in doubt nearly two years later.

Yet Brotherton supporters are dug in like ticks in
a district that swings north to south along the eastern edge of the parish –
his wife represents a very similar district on the School Board – and his
surrogates campaigned well enough for him to win without a runoff. And Parks
was able to draw upon her connections – her husband Santi is Bossier City's
elected judge – to seal a comfortable win.

 However, Sutton knocked off Plummer and did so because
of superior organization. South Bossier has gained a reputation as the most
rebellious part of the parish to the existing power elite, with reformist political
activism from a handful of elected (past and present) officials that are allies
of Sutton's, including former School Board member Shane Cheatham (his podcast
partner), Bossier City Councilor Brian Hammons,
and Bamburg (Republicans all), as well as from others not in office. Sutton
also aggressively canvassed the district on foot and by mail.

 As things turned out, he might be the only
reformer on the new Jury. One other incumbent lost, but that came from District
9's tilt between two establishmentarians, Democrat incumbent Charles
Gray and Republican former Bossier City chief administrative officer Pam
Glorioso. Demographics favored Gray with a Democrat voter registration advantage
of 2:1 and a near-majority black registration (Gray is black).

Perhaps
overconfidently given those demographics, Gray concentrated on outdoor
advertising while Glorioso ran a more retail-oriented campaign. Also hurting
Gray was dispirited turnout by black Democrat voters, who weren't excited by
their party's offerings at the state level, and possibly reputationally in being
a Library Board of Control member likely serving illegally who also approved of
Ford's illegal service in two different capacities. So, Glorioso won a
low-turnout contest, but she won't join any reformist efforts Sutton might
back.

Sutton
might get help from an unlikely source. In District 10, despite the Darby's
family hold over that area of town (brother Jeff is on the Bossier City Council
and sister Samm is on the School Board), Julius got pushed into a runoff by Democrat
military retiree Mary Giles, who herself courted controversy with careless
placement of campaign signs. It's the only legislative or local race left
to be decided on Nov. 18.

Even if
Sutton remains the only juror not tied into the Bossier good-old-boy-and-girl
network, at least citizens will have one voice on the Jury to question
orthodoxy and bad decisions such as those surrounding the library and Ford's
employment. And that this
cycle attracted more competition than any since 1987, even if most challengers
lost, foists more pressure for accountability onto the nine returning
incumbents, knowing that questionable actions will provoke a need to campaign
ending possibly in losing.

The article attempts to view the type of social man from the perspective of his psychological state. A usual state of man should be differentiated from agitation (stressed, extraordinary one). A person usually perceives social distance in terms of "close" and "distant". A person's withdrawing into his own "small" world is an important prerequisite both for his coping with social reality and for immersing himself in his own affairs and interests. During recent months, especially in convulsive political rhetoric after the events in Beslan (September 2004), variations of enemy image have acquired allegedly new meanings: as if after rather long, more than fifty years long intermission the issues of "a world plot" against our country, inner enemies, "traitors of Russia" have come to the surface of official life. This theme of "a world plot" is close for the most part to the elder age people of the "Soviet" training. Appeals for holding out against "a world plot" are evidently aimed not at the victory over enemy but at domestic consumption, at social mobilization for the sake of achieving some intra-political or even intra-clan objectives. The processes of transition from an agitated state of society to a usual one may be characterized as rutinization. The structure of these processes suggests re-evaluation of both pragmatic expectations and symbolic vestments of social action. Rutinization of the Soviet order led finally not to its stabilization but to weakening its foundations and further collapse. Both M.Gorbachyov's rule and B.Yeltsin's Presidency have brought about not rutinization but crises which were followed by changes in regimes types and in composition of ruling elites. Under the present conditions rutinization trends are combined with crisis turns in domestic, foreign, economical policies and with corresponding shifts in slogans and attitudes. The simplest and the most obvious behavior of ordinary man is adjusting. But neither its obviousness nor wide spreading makes this type of behavior the only possible one. Latent factors such as crisis or unjustified actions from "above" together with accumulating hidden irritation in "the bottom" may contribute to destroying the standard patterns of mass behavior. Mass rallies in various regions of Russia starting in January 2005 show that "unlikely" types of behavior turnout to be actual and meaningful. Recent Russian events attach special importance to the analysis of similar and differing features of mass actions in Georgia and Ukraine. In both cases the atmosphere of wide national and political mobilization provided psychological background and resource for mass action. "Common denominator" of situations in these countries may be considered a situation of "postSoviet impasse" characteristic of many countries of the Soviet legacy. Actions of mass protest all over Russia turned out to be a shock for the authorities and have significantly changed the situation in the country during a few weeks. Having accustomed to endure and adjust "an ordinary man" showed himself indignant and actively protesting for the first time during many decades. The point is that "privileges" inherited from the Soviet times or gained later are a key link in that silent "social contract" which provided relative stability and peace in a poor society of deficit, is that very "bone" which was thrown to the people by the regime that was not capable of providing the economy efficiency and a normal welfare level and got cheap and obedient labor force. Hasty and unprepared cancellation of the privileges combined with absence of modern economy, with the living standard lower than late Soviet one (1991) actually blows up this "social contract". The outcome is a wretched and socially dangerous travesty of liberal reforms compromising the power and liberalism. One of the most important consequences will be further ruin of first of all in the consciousness of ordinary man "indestructible unity of the party (power, President) and the people" in Russia. ; The article attempts to view the type of social man from the perspective of his psychological state. A usual state of man should be differentiated from agitation (stressed, extraordinary one). A person usually perceives social distance in terms of "close" and "distant". A person's withdrawing into his own "small" world is an important prerequisite both for his coping with social reality and for immersing himself in his own affairs and interests. During recent months, especially in convulsive political rhetoric after the events in Beslan (September 2004), variations of enemy image have acquired allegedly new meanings: as if after rather long, more than fifty years long intermission the issues of "a world plot" against our country, inner enemies, "traitors of Russia" have come to the surface of official life. This theme of "a world plot" is close for the most part to the elder age people of the "Soviet" training. Appeals for holding out against "a world plot" are evidently aimed not at the victory over enemy but at domestic consumption, at social mobilization for the sake of achieving some intra-political or even intra-clan objectives. The processes of transition from an agitated state of society to a usual one may be characterized as rutinization. The structure of these processes suggests re-evaluation of both pragmatic expectations and symbolic vestments of social action. Rutinization of the Soviet order led finally not to its stabilization but to weakening its foundations and further collapse. Both M.Gorbachyov's rule and B.Yeltsin's Presidency have brought about not rutinization but crises which were followed by changes in regimes types and in composition of ruling elites. Under the present conditions rutinization trends are combined with crisis turns in domestic, foreign, economical policies and with corresponding shifts in slogans and attitudes. The simplest and the most obvious behavior of ordinary man is adjusting. But neither its obviousness nor wide spreading makes this type of behavior the only possible one. Latent factors such as crisis or unjustified actions from "above" together with accumulating hidden irritation in "the bottom" may contribute to destroying the standard patterns of mass behavior. Mass rallies in various regions of Russia starting in January 2005 show that "unlikely" types of behavior turnout to be actual and meaningful. Recent Russian events attach special importance to the analysis of similar and differing features of mass actions in Georgia and Ukraine. In both cases the atmosphere of wide national and political mobilization provided psychological background and resource for mass action. "Common denominator" of situations in these countries may be considered a situation of "postSoviet impasse" characteristic of many countries of the Soviet legacy. Actions of mass protest all over Russia turned out to be a shock for the authorities and have significantly changed the situation in the country during a few weeks. Having accustomed to endure and adjust "an ordinary man" showed himself indignant and actively protesting for the first time during many decades. The point is that "privileges" inherited from the Soviet times or gained later are a key link in that silent "social contract" which provided relative stability and peace in a poor society of deficit, is that very "bone" which was thrown to the people by the regime that was not capable of providing the economy efficiency and a normal welfare level and got cheap and obedient labor force. Hasty and unprepared cancellation of the privileges combined with absence of modern economy, with the living standard lower than late Soviet one (1991) actually blows up this "social contract". The outcome is a wretched and socially dangerous travesty of liberal reforms compromising the power and liberalism. One of the most important consequences will be further ruin of first of all in the consciousness of ordinary man "indestructible unity of the party (power, President) and the people" in Russia.

The election in Tajikistan took place peacefully, but restrictive candidate registration requirements resulted in a lack of genuine choice and meaningful pluralism. The campaign was formalistic and limited voters' opportunity to make an informed decision. Extensive positive state-media coverage of the official activities of the incumbent President provided him with a significant advantage. In a positive step, the Central Commission for Elections and Referenda (CCER) took measures to enhance the transparency and efficiency of the administration of elections. Significant shortcomings were noted on election day, including widespread proxy voting, group voting, and indications of ballot box stuffing. (ODIHR/Pll)