An analysis is made of the interaction between the legislature and the judiciary in the Dutch parliamentary setting, focusing in particular on the issue of euthanasia. Using the methodology of positive political theory, two alternative hypotheses are derived about the extent to which the courts may affect public policies. Two main conclusions can be drawn from the analysis of the decision-making process on euthanasia. First, the statutory interpretation the courts gave on euthanasia in the 1980s supports the hypothesis of the court as a policy advocate, not a policy conserver. Secondly, the fact that the courts were able to introduce and maintain a more liberal interpretation of euthanasia during the last decade can be explained as a consequence of the heterogenous preferences on this issue held by the political parties that formed the successive governing coalitions.

Many students of the United States Congress have contended that the institution is too closely tied to the interests of members' local constituencies. While the responsiveness this charge implies may seem laudable, the localism said to exist, especially in the House, weakens national agents of representation such as the political parties. Institutional features like seniority and the norm of reciprocity are often criticized for the premium they place upon members' success in their local constituencies, and the narrow, particularistic policy which results. Those who prefer a legislature responsive to national interests lament the disproportionate influence of constituencies with well-placed representatives on the committees and subcommittees in the House, and the fragmented, ‘distributive’ character of the legislative process.

Political leaders across Africa frequently accuse the media of promoting homosexuality, while activists often use the media to promote pro-LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer) narratives. Despite extensive research on how the media affects public opinion, including studies that show how exposure to certain information can increase support of LGBTQs, there is virtually no research on how the media influences attitudes towards LGBTQs across Africa. This study develops a theory that accounts for actors' mixed approach to the media and shows how different types of media create distinct effects on public opinion of LGBTQs. Specifically, the study finds that radio and television have no, or a negative, significant effect on pro-gay attitudes, whereas individuals who consume more newspapers, internet or social media are significantly more likely to support LGBTQs (by approximately 2 to 4 per cent). The author argues that these differential effects are conditional on censorship of queer representation from certain mediums. The analysis confirms that the results are not driven by selection effects, and that the relationship is unique to LGBTQ support but not other social attitudes. The results have important implications, especially given the growing politicization of same-sex relations and changing media consumption habits across Africa.

Most of the variables in survey-based studies of electoral behaviour are measured only at second hand. Although sex or race can be coded from direct observation, and whether an individual voted can often be ascertained from documentary evidence, researchers must usually rely on respondents' accuracy and truthfulness in reporting attitudes and in recalling past behaviour. Both of these may involve significant biases. Research has shown that many events are underreported by survey respondents, although clearly desirable activities like voting may be overreported. Other work has suggested the likelihood that ‘non-attitudes’ will be reported by many respondents. When these two are compounded, so that respondents are asked to recall previous attitudes or dispositions, the danger of misrepresentation is multiplied.

How do international institutions affect political liberalization in member states? Motivated by an examination of the World Bank loans program, this article shows that institutions can incentivize liberalization by offering opportunities for countries to become associated with advanced, wealthy members. In the World Bank, when a loan recipient reaches a specified level of economic development, it becomes eligible to graduate from borrower status to lender status. Using a regression discontinuity design, the study demonstrates that this incentive motivates states to improve their domestic behavior with respect to human rights and democracy. Combining qualitative and quantitative evidence, the results suggest that the desire to become a member of this elite group is responsible for motivating member states to reform due to the belief that such membership brings diffuse international and domestic benefits.

How does wartime violence shape post-war women's representation? Does past violence make women more or less likely to run for office? And if they do run, are they getting elected? This article argues that violence influences women's representation in contrasting ways at these two stages. In wartime, women have more opportunities to gain leadership skills, which likely increases the number of women running for office after the war. However, past violence also increases threat perceptions among voters. This, combined with gender stereotypes about male and female politicians, likely reduces voter support for female candidates. Using pre- and post-war electoral and wartime violence data at the municipal level from Bosnia, the authors present evidence that is consistent with their argument. The results hold across a number of robustness tests, including accounting for post-war demographic gender balance and women's party list placement.

Government action presupposes extraction. Historically, four different sources of public revenue may be distinguished. Tributes, which are common in peimitive and belligerent states, are variable levies exacted at irregular intervals. Tariffs raised on the basis of the physical control of strategic passageways are important sources of income for mercantile states in the early stage of their development. Taxes play some role in semi modern economies but evolve more fully as the financial mainstay of government in advanced industrial societies. In addition, many states draw large receipts from the profits of trade. The planned economies in the socialist bloc are trading states rather than tax states. The different logistic properties of these revenue sources affect the prospects for government growth at various stages of economic development. The expansion of the tax state is strongly linked to the proliferation of monetary flows in modern society. At the same time, some non tax receipts such as user charges and other incomes from trade retain their importance, and the present ‘crisis of the tax state’ might possibly lead to a more composite structure of government revenue.

Of all the freedoms cherished by liberals, perhaps none is more cherished than freedom of expression. Most would accept that some limits should be placed upon that freedom, but what sort of limits those should be and how far they should extend are matters of controversy. That controversy is all the greater when the purpose for which free expression is limited is itself one which is as potentially compromising to liberalism as the prevention of offence to people's feelings. In this paper I shall examine the relative claims of free expression and offended feelings by focusing on a subject which juxtaposes the two particularly clearly: blasphemy.

This article explores an agency model in which voters learn about both an incumbent and an opponent. They observe the incumbent’s policy record and update their beliefs about his opponent via a campaign. Although the former is relatively more informative, it can be costly for the voter to learn about the incumbent from her policy record. This is because policy reforms, which allow a voter to learn an incumbent’s ability, are risky and can leave the voter worse off. Then the voter may prefer the incumbent to take safer actions. The efficient level of reform – the one preferred by the voter – balances the value of learning with the expected policy costs/benefits. In a world where the opponent’s campaign is uninformative, reform can be too low due to the incumbent’s fear of failure. Or it can be too high: the incumbent may gamble on success. This article shows that the presence of an opponent who can reveal information via a campaign exacerbates these inefficiencies. An incumbent who anticipates the effect of an opponent’s campaign on voter beliefs is more likely to make inefficient policy choices. Further, such campaigns can lead to an overall welfare loss when they reveal little about the opponent’s ability and yet have an impact on the incumbent’s policy choice.

Traditionally, and for some good reasons, elections in Communist one-party states have been treated as relatively unimportant phenomena, essentially ‘massive demonstrations of ritualized affirmation’, or simply a test of the Communist party's mobilization powers. The absence of competing political parties and consequently opposing goals and programmes does clearly mean that such elections are very different from those in liberal democratic states. They do not and cannot, for example, resolve the often crucial question of political succession.

In recent years centrist-liberal parties, such as the German Free Democratic Party (FDP) in 2013 and the British Liberal Democrats in 2015 and 2017, suffered enormous electoral defeats. These defeats highlight a prominent puzzle in the study of party competition and voting behavior; the empty center phenomenon. That is, empirical evidence suggests that most parties do not converge to the median voter's position, despite the centripetal force of the voters’ preference distribution. Using survey data from Canada, Finland, Germany and the United Kingdom, this article shows that deterioration of centrist parties’ valence image is followed by a collapse of their vote shares. Using mathematical simulations, this article shows that centrist parties have limited strategic opportunities to regain their support. Differently from other parties, centrist parties cannot alter their policy platforms to compensate for their deteriorated valence image. These results have important implications for political representation and voters–elite linkages.

There are three paths to constitutionalism in the modern world. Under the first, revolutionary outsiders use the constitution to commit their new regime to the principles proclaimed during their previous struggle. India, South Africa, Italy and France have followed this path. Under the second, establishment insiders use the constitution to make strategic concessions to disrupt revolutionary movements before they can gain power. Britain provides paradigmatic examples. Under the third, ordinary citizens remain passive while political and social elites construct a new constitution. Spain, Japan and Germany provide variations on this theme. Different paths generate different legitimation problems, but the EU confronts a special difficulty. Since its members emerge out of three divergent pathways, they disagree about the nature of the union’s constitutional problem, not merely its solution. Thus the EU confronts a cultural, not merely an economic, crisis.

Voters in US elections receive markedly different representation depending on which candidate they elect, and because of incumbent advantages, the effects of this choice persist for many years. What are the long-term consequences of these two phenomena? Combining electoral and legislative roll-call data in a dynamic regression discontinuity design, this study assesses the long-term consequences of election results for representation. Across the US House, the US Senate and state legislatures, the effects of ‘coin-flip’ elections persist for at least a decade in all settings, and for as long as three decades in some. Further results suggest that elected officials do not adapt their roll-call voting to their districts’ preferences over time, and that voters do not systematically respond by replacing incumbents.

Rivalry is characterized by mutual mistrust, anger and fear, and becomes increasingly intractable as confrontations between rivals militarize. The empirical record confirms that rivalries account for the vast number of militarized interstate disputes and wars in the international system. Although considerable attention has been spent on the initiation, duration or termination of rivalries, to date no comprehensive theoretical framework for their persistence or failure exists. Following Fearon, a rationalist explanation of rivalry termination is developed. It is argued here that the adoption of liberal institutions helps alleviate the commitment problems arising in rivalry. Free-market reform, democratic institutions and membership in international organizations all build trust and increase defection costs among rival states, and therefore help to shorten the duration of rivalry. Using a Cox proportional hazard model and Thompson's data on rivalries, it is shown that change towards democracy, as well as the joint effect of democracy and economic development increase the likelihood of rivalry termination. Also, joint membership in international organizations with mechanisms for dispute settlement reduces the duration of rivalry.Arobustness check using Diehl and Goertz's list of rivalries produces similar results.

Central both to formal theories of coalition formation and many, actual, collective decision-making processes is the distribution of some reward, or payoff as it is commonly called, among those participants able to control a decision. The payoff constitutes an object of value for the players, or the stakes of the game, the disposition of which becomes a primary focus of bargaining among them. It is usual to assume that participants in coalition-forming contexts are rational actors, and this is often interpreted to mean that they pursue strategies intended to maximize their individual shares of the available payoff. Theories based upon this general structure have furnished a variety of important propositions, focusing mostly upon the composition of winning coalitions.

Existing research shows that the election of members of previously underrepresented groups can have significant consequences for policymaking. Yet, quotas, reserved seats, communal rolls, and race-conscious districting make it difficult to distinguish whether it is group membership, electoral incentives, or a combination of the two that matters. It is argued here that lawmakers who are members of underrepresented groups will stand out as defenders of their group’s interests only when electoral rules incentivize them to do so. This is demonstrated empirically using data from New Zealand, showing that Māori Members of Parliament systematically vary in the extent to which they represent their ethnic group as a function of the three different sets of rules under which they were elected.

This study investigates how antidiscrimination policy and related policy knowledge influence citizens’ support for the democratic system and its institutions. The article argues that antidiscrimination measures and knowledge about rights to equal treatment foster perceptions of government responsiveness, which increase political support among target groups and citizens who advocate egalitarianism. Utilizing a longitudinal design and more valid measures to resolve causality issues, the results of the empirical models show that increases in policy knowledge over time systematically predict higher political support, especially among individuals who hold egalitarian values. Individuals who are discriminated against express particularly high political support in contexts where antidiscrimination laws are expanded. Overall, the results amplify the role of policy knowledge as a key factor in studying policy feedback effects.

The increasing importance of women in politics is a common feature of almost all advanced industrial societies. Women have become increasingly active in most aspects of political life during the 1970s: as voters, as lobbyists and, perhaps most significantly of all, as candidates for election to public office. The traditional prejudice against women in public life, which assumes women to be less suited to politics by temperament and training, suggests that they could be expected to receive fewer votes than men in an election. But it is unclear to what extent this prejudice has been mitigated by the broad changes which have taken place in women's roles in recent years. Can we still expect women candidates to fare less well than their male counterparts?

Such eviddce as there is in Australia suggests that the parties are less likely to nominate women but that, once nominated, women candidates fare neither better nor worse than men. Sawer concludes that ‘the differential electoral fortunes of male and female candidates has always reflected the failure to pre-select women for safe and winnable seats, not any failure to win votes.’ In a similar vein Mackerras argues that ‘the average performance of women is neither better nor worse than that of men. Women will be elected when parties select them for winnable seats.’ Research in the United States and Britain also suggests that a candidate's sex does not matter: Darcy and Schramm found that sex did not matter in the United States, controlling for incumbency and party, and in an analysis of three British general elections, Hills concluded that ‘the gender of a candidate makes only a very small difference to the voters.’

Coalition phenomena are at the heart of politics everywhere, but they acquire a special significance in fragmented multiparty systems. In these systems, the distribution of political forces is such that parties are compelled to seek out at least one and often two or more partners, depending on the level of the system's fragmentation. The existence of a structural constraint that forces co-operative interaction is a major distinguishing feature of these systems and, accordingly, coalition-related phenomena occupy a central position in the political process. Coalition-maintenance activities are prominent, debates over coalition alternatives are frequent, procedures for the resolution of cabinet crises become institutionalized, and appropriate general orientations develop both at the level of the specialized actors in the political system and of the citizenry.