Search

The argument of this paper is that a liberal defence of school education is not compatible with demands for the exceptional exclusion of children from the exigiencies of compulsory schooling, such as the exception granted to the Amish in Wisconsin v. Yoder. The paper examines liberal political arguments which consider the value of education as purely functional to the citizens' role. It argues that whilst this is important, it remains insufficient and inadequate as well. Rather, the liberal compromise with education should also accept its intrinsic value as part of a valuable life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper has two objectives. First, to advance in the analysis of presidential resignations and their different types, in the frame of the Theory of Presidential Falls. Secondly, the presidential resignations have been considered a mechanism of own flexibilization of the third wave of democratization, taking for granted the affirmation of Linz, on the difficulty and improbability of a president resigning while facing a situation of institutional crisis. This paper argues, however, that it was an institutional resource used, at least, by some historical presidentialisms to overcome, in some occasions, severe political crisis that have similarities to those occurred during the third wave of democratization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the legal structures and the power concentration that developed after the creation of the first revolutionary organs. Therefore, it thoroughly examines the Fundamental Statute of the Republic of Nicaragua, the Council of State, the Statute on the Rights and Guarantees of Nicaraguans, the Statute of the National Assembly and the decrees issued by the Executive and Legislative branches. The paper describes the arduous route that led to the consolidation of the governmental institutions in Nicaragua. This process took place while the Reagan Administration funded armed groups known as «contrarrevolucionarios». On the one hand, the analysis emphasizes the inconsistencies and confusion of the legal instruments involved and, on the other hand, the gestation of a reinforced presidentialism that mutilated the independence of the other governmental branches. Both of them will be noticed in the Constitution of 1987. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work aims to develop a model to explain the behavior of the high courts judges when they take decisions that affect the access to the executive. For this pur-pose, this paper analyzes the cases in which the Supreme Courts in Central America have intervened to decide who can have access to presidential power and under which conditions that can happen. Through the analysis of constitutional interpretations of laws that control presidential re-election or who is the incumbent to the presidency of a country, this paper examines the explanatory factors that have led to the Supreme Courts to decide who is the holder of executive power. In this regard, the article considers the cases of Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Guatemala and Honduras. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the recent years participatory budgeting has become a central issue in the lo- cal governance debates. Nevertheless, little focus has been made on one of its most important dimensions: its sustainability. This paper analyses this issue through a case study of one of those experiences, Logroflo's Presupuesto Ciudadano. Our paper combines both an empirical part—which includes the main data of the experience—plus a theoretical reflection on the way the changes in the municipal government have influenced the development of the experience, based on several indicators. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides a general view about how especially vulnerable people are able to vote nowadays in Spain. It begins with a brief overview of the general regime governing voting in Spain and how votes are emitted. It then examines the normative guidelines affecting the vote for the disabled in more specific detail: access for voters with special mobility needs (direct or by post); special procedures of direct voting for disabled people unable to vote unaided; special procedures enabling the blind to use using braille so they can vote directly; and the special procedure for remote voting by persons whose disablement prevents them from personally filing the corresponding application. Finally, by way of conclusion the paper adds some critical considerations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the main elements of the democratization policy of the European Union and analyses how this policy has been implemented in Cuba since 1996. The paper applies an analytical framework that links the two variables that Levitsky and Way have developed to study the international dimension of regime change: linkage and leverage to the West. The hypothesis put forward is the following: The combination of unanimity and the lack of common will to act before the process of democratization has started, holds back the development of a more active European policy with Cuba. In addition, the democratization policy of the EU is designed more as a policy of democratic consolidation than as a policy of regime change or transition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses how the ratio of women participation within legislatures of autonomous communities has evolved. Its purpose is to verify how effective have been into this the so-called measures for «parity democracy» or «gender balance». Such measures aim at promoting an egalitarian presence of participants of both genders in political representative bodies. Some were voluntarily adopted by political parties while, for others, lawmakers at State and autonomous communities levels were at their origin, such in the case of the recently adopted Law 3/2007 on equal treatment for women and men. Finally, an insight into our neighbouring democracies' experiences in this field completes this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper attempts to show the internal unity of the three elements --ratio, civitas, libertas-- which constitute the political philosophy of Spinoza. Methodologically his thought corresponds to the objective model of the new science, which implies a break with the normative model of practical reason in natural law. Spinoza departs from a physicalist ontological conception of nature, which reduces freedom to rational necessity and natural right to the natural power of man («tantum iuris quantum potentiae»). His illustrated program «from bondage to freedom by knowledge » does not imply a normative moral solution to the problem of living together, but a genetic solution by virtue of the need to find an emergency exit to the impasse of the natural state of war under the fear of death. In this process, reason itself emerges from the womb of affection, through the interaction of the passions of fear and sympathy with the biological principle of interest. Once it has emerged in the form of «common notions», this utilitarian reason enhances the positive feelings of sympathy and cooperation and underpins the agreement to live together under the law. On the basis of this civic contract, the difference between potentia and potestas, ius and lex respectively, people and State, is established in an internal dialectical relationship in which the multitudinis potentia is ultimately decisive. This means that the most natural and rational regime is democracy, which is the only regime that guarantees that the original natural law may become public social right. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the validity of Machiavellian thinking in order to explore the contemporary era in a purposeful way. The current time can be characterized as troubled and unstable, with the alliance between great wealth and fortune and anti-politics adding an extraordinary destabilizing force. In this scenario, the invocation of virtue, as was suggested by Machiavelli, remains valid. Resetting politics based on plural deliberation and engagement with the virtues of excellence, veracity and authenticity, may allow the overcoming of wealth and fortune. At the very least, this is necessary if we want to avoid the sharp edges of anti-politics and to fight populism, the disturbing shadow of democracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the establishment of the first democratic local councils in 1979, ten municipal elections have taken place in Spain. In the few studies devoted to them, voting has habitually been explained by using national variables and following the wellknown model of second-order elections. In this paper we examine the validity of these conclusions by also considering local factors. We have estimated several hierarchical models using an ambitious datasetwhich includes both individual and contextual variables for a representative sample of Spanish municipalities between 1991 and 2011. Our empirical results are particularly interesting, with individual factors such as voters' ideology and contextual indicators such as the unemployment rate at the municipal level having a significant impact on the probability of voting for the incumbent mayor's party. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper's aim is to analyze the role of the Senate in the Canadian federation, paying attention to the disfunctions of the institution and the difficulty of achieving a constitutional reform that is able to resolve these problems. The positions of all the main actors are examined, with special attention to the basis for reform recently laid out by the Supreme Court. Following this, the possibility of achieving a satisfactory reform is studied, including the position of those urging for the abolition of the Upper House. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to provide elements to construct an understanding of the use of the organic metaphor during periods of totalitarianism (Italy and Germany). The Organic State was conceived as a body that needed to be immunized because of the existence of subjects that endangered it. In this way, there was an alliance between the organic metaphor and the immunity paradigm. In what we call immune organicism, the State, as a biological organism, implemented a therapy for diseases that could have infected it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on a survey of international literature, this paper proposes the classification of citizens' preferences for redistribution in three categories that shape those preferences: imperatives of social justice, risk aversion and the institutional framework. With the data provided by the «Spanish Institute for Fiscal Studies Fiscal Barometer » an empirical application for the Spanish case is carried out. We use a probit model when the endogenous variable is dichotomized, and a linear model estimated through ordinary least squares when the dependent variable is an index constructed by principal components. The results, consistent with the theory and international experience, show that the preferences under study, homogeneously distributed throughout the country, are based on the three described determinants. In particular most of the variables are significantly associated with the description of the institutional framework. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent literature dealing with the political effects of the economic shock of 2008-2009 has shown that the economic crisis in capitalist advanced societies has also been a democratic and political crisis. This paper examines the literature of comparative politics which has explored the dynamics of political change activated since the start of the Great Recession, to identify the main sources of political transformation in advanced capitalist democracies. The key findings of this research indicate that the economic crisis of 2008-2009 has woven a complex net of causes and consequences that are transforming politics, as it involves a number of challenges that governments of advanced capitalist democracies find very difficult to deal with. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On 4 july 2014 the Government appointed Antonio Narváez Rodríguez as Judge of the Constitutional Court. The appointment came to fill the vacancy left a month earlier, after having accepted the renounce of Judge Enrique López. The event was characterized by some interesting novelties and other unusual incidents, wich have come to give new developments in the topic. For these reasons in this paper will be presented a chronic and some observations of the selection procedure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to analyze the degree of statehood of Bolivia, assessing the problems that preclude the establishment of an objective State, as well as the constituent challenges of the new Plurinational State. The first part includes an historical review regarding the State in Bolivia, from its founding to the present. The second part is focused on the analysis of, and relation between, the partisan powers and perception of statehood, as an approach for assessing the existence of a public and objective power, the State, in opposition to the particular and subjective powers embedded in political parties. The links between the major ethnic groups and the Plurinational project, within the governmental hegemony exercised by the Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS) led by Evo Morales Ayma, are also assessed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What types of attitudinal surveys are produced by public administrations? Who commissions, uses and analyses them? What are their methodological characteristics and for which policies are they used? Do the contents of surveys commissioned by public administrations at different territorial levels differ? We lack any systematic empirical information to answer these questions in the Spanish case. Three public sources (corresponding to the local, regional and national level) are used to establish a preliminary picture of the attitudinal surveys commissioned by Spanish public administrations. This paper makes a comparative description of these surveys and discusses their differing characteristics. We create a new database of 350 surveys, where characteristics of the survey promoters, its contents and technical details are discussed. The surveys carried out at each of the three levels are quite different. The policy agendas of these administrations, their resources and especially the organisational characteristics of these institutions at their creation are the most likely explanations of many of their differences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper deals with the political philosophy of José Ortega y Gasset (1883-1955). Through discourse analysis it deepens investigations of the origins of Ortega's political key concepts. Based on recent biographical research, the analysis illustrates and explains how the drastic sociopolitical changes experienced in Germany and Italy between 1918 and 1922 came to have major significance for Ortega's political thinking. In fact, the tremendous transformations undergone in both countries had a direct and decisive impact on Ortega's early, and fundamental, essay España invertebrada (1922). The results of the current study allow us to reevaluate Ortega's political philosophy critically and in context, not only with regard to its origin and range, but also its systematic relevance with respect to current political and social problems in Spain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is a work in progress, dealing with property rights regarding the human body. My point of departure is to look for the best way to protect people's right to choose in conflicts concerning the human body or its parts. Medical and biotechnological science is now at a level unimaginable only a few years ago. Furthermore, the influence of corporations is becoming more and more decisive. This paper first examines several conceptions of property, and then goes on to analyze the possibility of considering the human body or its parts as such. If this is indeed the case, as is suggested by some decisions of the jurisprudence of a number of different countries, we have to ask about the rights of individuals whose bodies were the origin of these properties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current crisis of representative democracy and the emphasis on citizens' direct participation in public affairs is taking place at a time when western societies are becoming more diverse, and plural and have a higher percentage of foreign population. This raises the question, to what extent are foreigners guaranteed access to mechanisms of direct participation in public matters. This paper sustains a substantive understanding of citizenship and political participation open to foreign population and defends that, beyond political participation strictly understood (Article 13 of the Spanish Constitution), the Spanish Constitution embraces this understanding. It then analyses to what extent the Spanish legal order conforms to it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowadays, the revival of extreme right-wing populism as well as the increase of protest movements brings the emotions to the forefront. The political conflict seems then to be controlled by passions such as fear and rage. In this context it is worth asking if passions and emotions should play a role in the democratic political legitimacy. This article explores the problems of emotions in the democratic theory. First, we stress the role of emotions in the political scene today, particularly their role in the populist movements. Secondly, this paper advances some suggestion for a solution beyond a strict understanding of the criteria of deliberative democratic theory. The result is a new perspective of the possibilities of the practice of deliberative democracy, one which abandons the search for perfection in only one institution, and looks instead to a more dialogical understanding of deliberative theory itself. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 1/1977 Law of January 4, for Political Reform (LPR), was a key political piece at the beginning of the Spanish Transition to democracy, as well as a legal instrument that allowed the institutional dismantling of the Francoist regime and the transition to a democratic system. This paper analyzes the different phases of the legislative iter and its difficulties, the risky bet on the LPR of Adolfo Suárez and his Government, including the study of the campaign to its ratification by referendum, and giving special attention to the debate between legality and legitimacy and the role played by the memory of the Civil War in the process of elaboration and passing of this Law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The following article analyzes the career of the 110 individuals who served as vice president in the 17 presidential regimes of the American continent in the period spanning from 1985 to 2012. First, the article analyses the variables which influence the selection of succesful vicepresidential candidates, and seeks to elucidate if presidential tickets seeks to increase their political and socio-demographic representation with said candidate. The article also studies the relationship between presidents and their respective vicepresidents, and suggests that the key variables which explain this relationship are the vicepresident's preexisting loyalty towards his running mate, the president's job performance and the vicepresident's own political power. Finally, the paper proposes that the vicepresidency can not be perceived as a stepping stone towards the presidency, as very few sitting or former vice presidents are ever elected to the highest office. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

La legislación española de protección de datos ofrece el régimen sancionador más severo de Europa. Desde 1992, la garantía efectiva de este derecho fundamental se ha sustentado en la tramitación, investigación y, en su caso, sanción de todas las denuncias interpuestas ante la Agencia Española de Protección de Datos. Sin embargo, con las reformas legislativas de 1999 y 2011, se propició que este régimen sancionador extraordinariamente gravoso se viera acompañado de una estrategia preventiva que estimulara el cumplimiento efectivo de dicha legislación. Este trabajo analiza tanto la evolución normativa de este régimen sancionador como la práctica sancionadora de la AEPD que ilustra la justificación y efectos de las sucesivas reformas de la legislación de protección de datos. Spanish data protection law provides the most severe sanctioning regime in Europe. Since 1992, this effective protection of this fundamental right has been sustained in inspections, investigations and, where appropriate, sanctions of all complaints lodge into the Data Protection Spanish Agency. However, with the 1999 and 2011 legislative reforms, this strict sanctioning system would be balanced by a preventive strategy which stimulates effective enforcement of such legislation. This paper analyzes both the legal evolution of this system and the AEPD enforcement activity illustrating the justification and effects of successive reforms of the data protection law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some ten years ago, and within the framework of a collective reflection on the politics of national minority participation in post Communist Europe, I proposed a classification of the diverse ways in which the electoral laws of these countries were addressing the problem of the parliamentary representation of ethnic minorities. In that essay, I argued that formulas contained in these electoral laws had swung from the extreme hostility of those prohibiting the creation of ethnically based parties, to the inclusiveness of those where ethnicity had been converted into the very basis of political representation, going through a wide range of intermediate strategies like hindering that representation, being indifferent towards it, facilitating it in practice, and providing legal guarantees for it. Now in a context in which democracy is already consolidated, the legacy of the Balkan wars is gradually disappearing, and ten of these countries are already part of the EU, it is easy to anticipate that the perception of what should be an adequate treatment for national minorities in electoral laws should have substantially changed. On the basis of the above mentioned paradigms, this paper examines the manners in which these laws have changed their treatment of national minorities, seeks to give an explanation as to why these changes have taken place, and tries to assess their implications in the parliamentary representation of minorities --and, even more, in its social and political integration-- throughout the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Intense financial turbulences within the Eurozone have unleashed what has been referred to as the deepest existentialist crisis in the European Union. In order to face it, the institutional balance that sustains the European Union since Maastricht has been altered by recent reforms in European law, i.e. the reform of the Stability and Growth, the reform of the very TFEU to allow for exceptions to the no bail-out clause (art. 136.3), and the conclusion of two new Treaties, the Treaty establishing the European Financial Stabilisation Mechanism and, above all, the Treaty on Stability, Coordination and Governance in the Economic and Monetary Union, that directs member States to incorporate in their constitutions the «balanced budget rule». Therefore these instruments not only entail centralization of powers in the EU, but also the transformation of the member States' economic constitutions. This paper aims to examine the impact of the constitutional amendment in the Spain's federal estructure, and the analysis focus mostly on the Organic Law passed by the central government to implement the new art. 135 CE. This Organic Law has substantially altered the previous legal framework so that the system of intergovernmental relations between the center and the autonomous communities has been deeply reshaped. In order to ensure the fiscal discipline, the communities are now subject to new monitoring and sanctioning mechanisms. Furthermore, communities' control over their own budgets has decreased because two bail-out mechanisms have been established by the State: the «payments to suppliers fund» and the «regional liquidity fund». These mechanisms are conditioned on the communities' compliance with the budgetary and economic measures undertaken by the central government. Finally an amendment of the Organic Law (2013) has broadened the debt limit rule by including the commercial debt. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to analyze the phenomenon of secession in the context of the European Union. For this, we use the concept of multilevel constitutionalism and study the effects of national self-determination from the perspective of the clause of Art. 50 TEU and the political projects currently driving the independence of regions of Member States. Since international law is often said that secession is an internal matter for the Member States. However, in our opinion the political and legal system of the Union can be characterized also federally, which prevents the national and regional authorities to carry out unilateral acts that go against the principle of Community federal loyalty and European citizenship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes an integrated model that identifies the variables that explain judicial decision-making in Latin American Supreme Courts. As a case study considering the individual votes of the judges of the Fiscal and Tax Chamber of the Ecuadorian Supreme Court, the article finds empirical evidence that the characteristics of the cases, judges' time remaining time on the bench, the government's political strength, and the performance of the economy are good predictors of judicial vote. Unlike research suggesting that judges vote sincerely -according to their own ideological preferences -this article provides evidence that such actors decide cases strategically. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spain is one of the few countries in the European Union where Islam has had a historical role in the social and cultural construction of its identity. However, its modern history is marked by acts of repudiation of non-Christian cultures. Opinion polls indicate that certain groups of migrants from North Africa, Latin America and Eastern Europe, but mainly Muslims, are considered to be incompatible with the popular conception of Spanish identity. The reason for this perception is related to the social construction of the migrant as the «other to govern» by political, academic and media discourses. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate that immigration law also plays a fundamental role in this strategy of «orientalization», i.e. the attribution of certain qualities to migrant groups (illegal, antisocial, criminal, unassimilable, terrorist), the aim of which is to legitimize the selective control of immigration. While meeting the guidelines provided by European authorities, the Spanish immigration and citizenship regime contributes to the construction of otherness, and therefore, to the political and legal (re)definition of what «being Spanish» means. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The final years of the 1950s met in Catalonia and in the Basque Country a new impulse to their respective national movements. The Secretary General of the Movement organized in 1961 a series of written debates on the question. The paper «Cultural and political action to overcome divisive nationalist concepts» studied the Basque question, but its findings were never published. The debate was repeated in very similar terms in 1971 and 1973. The attempts of the speakers for a new regionalism to oppose what they considered separatism, foundered on the Basque society demands and the Franco's authorities refusal to reform the Spanish state centralist model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Decree-Law 16/2012, of April 20, has changed the legislation on immigration and health. One of the measures adopted is the deprivation of the right to health care to irregular migrants, except in certain circumstances. The paper examines the constitutionality of the legislative restriction of the right social respect of undocumented migrants for economic reasons. It also discusses the use of Decree-Law as a rule appropriate for limiting the right to health. In another part of the work is undertaken the study of the different reaction of the Autonomous Communities to reform introduced by Decree-Law 16/2012 and the invasion of the basic state legislation for regional rules you determine that extend health care services and ownership of the right irregular migrants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The legalization of same-sex marriage in Act 13/2005 sparked in our country one of the most important constitutional debates of recent years. Some authors supported the constitutionality of the Act; other authors questioned this constitutionality. The debate has been recently settled by the Spanish Constitutional Court (STC 198/2012). Spain's Constitutional Court upheld the constitutionality of gay marriage. This paper analyzes the decision of the Spanish Constitutional Court in the context of the global debate over same-sex marriage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The use of electronic media in management as well as in the relationship of Public Administration with citizens has experienced an extraordinary development in recent years. In order to clarify the role played by regulation in the intensive use of ICT, especially in the area of e-Health, this paper analyses, both quantitatively and qualitatively, the Spanish regulations produced in this field during the last two decades. Afterwards, these regulations are contrasted with data resulting from the analysis of both the diversity of services offered on line and their depth of transaction. The approach seeks to help clarify the relationship between supply and service functionality and the level of regulation of e-Health within the regional administrations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Debates on the Islamic veil in Europe have become a mirror of national identity. On the one hand, each country manages cultural diversity according to its selfunderstanding as a nation. On the other hand, conflicts around these issues have ended up raising the question about what keep us together as a nation. The context of crisis of multiculturalism that surrounds the debates has derived in campaigns in favor of a strongest feeling of belonging that safeguards social cohesion. This paper analyzes to what extent the understanding and the discourse on national identity are present in the controversies on the veil in Great Britain. The debates start using the British way of understanding liberalism. But they have moved to a broader arena that addresses national identity. The reassessment of «British» has taken place in close connection to the crisis of multiculturalism, blamed as responsible for social division. In this context the veil is considered as a symbol of that lack of integration and separateness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper gives account of the main republican and federal theoretical principles developed by Jefferson from his seminal Notes on the State of Virginia, to some extent shared by Madison. «Great principle» that fuels a new collective action logic, giving birth to the «Republican Party», and later the «Democratic-Republican Party ». This question of principles -true «war of principles» (Hamilton)- about what sort of Nation and State the United States of America was to be, appears notoriously at the origin of the first party system and electoral competition in USA. The disagreement between the «republicans» (Jefferson, Madison) and «federalists» (Hamilton) was very deep and insurmountable, beginning by the idea of Nature as rural rather than urban landscape of the American society, the plural Idea of the American nation, the kind of American Republic defended («ward» based and democratic participative in Jefferson views), and the institutional design of federalism (dualist and defender of the States rights in Jefferson and Madison). The critic of Hamilton not only as «centralist» but as «monarchist» evidenced the substantive ideological and political differences among this three Founding Fathers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The debate and the concerns arising from the current economic crisis raise questions about the future of the EU redistributive policies and the financing of the EU budget. Although it is expected that the cohesion policy follows the reform process of recent decades, currently key elements of this policy are discussed, such as the funding, the characteristics of the new «transition regions», the conditionality linked to macroeconomic indicators added to the formulas to measure and to increase the efficiency. In this paper we analyze the instruments available for the Autonomous Communities to participate in the design of the future cohesion policy and review the functioning of the coordination mechanisms between the different levels of government in a negotiation process, which is crucial for the Autonomous Communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Electoral democracy rests on a straightforward idea: citizens elect their fellow citizens to represent their interests. However, the explanation of voting behaviour is more complex than a probabilistic association between X and Y. A proper understanding demands a close examination of the three links of the causal chain of electoral behavior: parties' entry decisions, campaign strategies and voter predispositions. Without providing the causal mechanisms, regression coefficients are a black box. The goal of this paper is to examine these factors in Spain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies Carl Schmitt considerations on the so-called «third power» of the State. First, with the help of the jurist own it outlines the general doctrine of the separation of powers and its political significance. Then, his book Law and judgment serves as a starting point for analyzing the Schmittean criticism on Kelsen's normativism. In a third stage, it will examine the author's invective against the liberal State of Law and its ideal of achieving a «State of Justice». And finally, it is contemplated how the defender of the Constitution of the German jurist deployed in history its unlimited factual and legal powers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many voices say that the victims of ETA were completely forgotten in the Basque Country until they began to mobilize and gain ground in public opinion in the late 90s. This paper aims to quantify, through content analysis methodology, the presence of the victims in political discourse since the beginning of Basque autonomy, in order to check if it is true that until the turn of the century they were practically invisible to political parties. In addition, the text also compares its presence in discourse with their victimizers, trying to estimate which of the two groups (victims or terrorists) has received more attention from the Basque political forces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper suggests a change in the Spanish penal procedure regarding its actual inquisitorial nature. At present time, as the Judge is in charge of criminal investigation and the Public Ministry controls the Judge, they have exchanged their constitutional missions within the pre-trial phase. The Judge must stop deciding on coercive investigation activities at his own and sole proposal. The Public Ministry must be capable to accomplish its proactive constitutional mission --not reactive as the Judge's- defending legality and public interest since the initial phase; as the faculty to hold charges during the trial belongs to the Public Ministry. Compared to more executive or judiciary public ministry models, the Spanish Public Ministry «impartiality collectively reflected» would unsurpassed endure all the due processes principles within the pre-trial phase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper will attempt to analyze in depth the theory of raison d'etat put for-ward by Juan Blázquez de Mayoralgo. Such an analysis will stem from a review and partial correction of J. A. Maravall's approach to this object of study, and will dis-close what it believes to be the specific originality underlying Blázquez de Mayoralgo's thought by dwelling on the various possible meanings that the term «word» assumes in his work. Such scrutiny will enable us, next, to shed light into Blazquez de Mayoralgo's theory of raison d'etat within the the basic frame of catho-lic theology, its role in the discussion against Machiavelism and --though in a smaller degree-- in the historical context of the Spanish empire. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this article is to analyze the meaning of John Dewey's ideal of «de-mocracy as a way of life», linked to his reformist view of liberalism. This is one of the most interesting cases to watch the distance that separates the ideal from the experience of democracy. Part of his formulations do not easily fit in the history of real polities, not even the American democracy of his time. Yet they are of the highest intellectual and practical interest, among other reasons because of their enduring scholarly influence and the practical inspiration they still provide. The paper discusses firstly the role played by democratic ideals in informing real practices and explores secondly the significance of political expectations generated by those ideals. In doing so, it distinguishes the metaphoric and pedagogic use of democracy as claimed by John Dewey from democracy as a system of government. That way the article highlights the educative value of democratic practices carried out outside the political process, while drawing attention to the institutional conditions for democracy to properly work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes an analytical reconstruction of the main topics that sociological thought has developed and articulated about the concept of community. After a critical outlook on classical thinkers, it analyses communitarian hypotheses which are developed in the contemporary literature, setting a general typology of the proposed approaches and appraising their conceptual novelties. Five ideal-types are distinguished: classical community, territorial community, communicative community, aesthetic community and neo-communitarian community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of the pattern of territorial organization established in the Spanish Constitution of 1978 creates non-statewide institutions with legislative powers, and regional elections are held in order to choose non-national deputies. Turnout in these contests is usually lower than the one registered in the national congressional elections. The paper argues that some special groups of voters are particularly prone to vote in national but not in regional elections. This phenomenon, that is called differential turnout, is studied in the 2005 Basque Country and 2006 Catalonia regional elections. Econometric models show a relationship between voters' judgements on the performance of the regional incumbent and the quality of non-national candidates, on one side, and the propensity of differential turnout, on the other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the inclusion and regulation of social rights in the Statutes of Autonomy of second generation, the main features of the intense academic debate on this issue and the controversial doctrine established by the Constitutional Court Judgments 247/2007, on the Statute of the Comunidad Valenciana, and 31/2010, on the Statute of Catalonia. From a general conceptual framework, the author highlights the arguments that support the legitimacy of their establishment and their relation to fun- damental rights, the respect for constitutional limits, their authentic character of sub- jective rights in terms of structure and regulatory function and, ultimately, the central role given to them by the ⪡estatuyente⪢ legislator in a new statutory model which wants to be supported by the establishment of direct links with citizens. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to attempt to determine Carl Schmitt's position regarding the tradition of «practical philosophy», which is that which develops from the Aristotelian differentiation between two types of knowledge: one that is purely theoretical and another which aims to study and orient human action, politics included. The thesis I wish to prove is that Schmitt, in his The Concept of the Political, has a position that is quite close to that tradition, notwithstanding the important differences that arise. In order to prove this thesis, I will refer to a series of criticisms to this Schmitt text, which would appear to separate the author from that tradition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I discuss Quentin Skinner's denouncement of the «mythology of coherence» through the analysis of Hobbes's doctrine of the rationale for political compliance. The Skinnerian critique involves a descriptive thesis regarding classical philosophical texts' coherence as well as a normative thesis regarding the way these works should be read. The analysis of Hobbes' conception of political obligation seems to corroborate Skinner's descriptive thesis. The validity of Skinner's normative thesis, however, is dubious. Therefore, we should not necessarily interpret that Hobbes' political work involves an incoherent theory in this respect. Hobbes's theory of the rationale for political obligation includes elements of different status and scope, in the sense that not all of them have the same weight or theoretical relevance in the context of Hobbes's argument. Consequently, Hobbes's theory of the rationale for political compliance is not truly incoherent after all. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

These paper aims to enlighten the role displayed by the Tunisian presidential and parliamentary elections in the process of political liberalization on which Ben Ali embarked the country two decades ago. With this aim, the study analyses the electoral politics implemented in the country between 1989 and 2009, by focusing five analytical units. These are the following: I) the political strategies that inspires these electoral politics; II) the normative elements that support and materialize them; III) their impact in the political behaviour of the opposition parties; IV) their effect on the electoral results; and V) their transcendence over the development of the structure of political contestation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Efforts to curtail discrimination against women have traditionally been couched in terms of rights. Although these efforts often lead to improvements in women's equality and living conditions, they do not suffice to deconstruct the structural grounds of gender discrimination in western societies. This paper propounds that we should redefine gender relations through a new model of citizenship. It proposes that we elaborate a model of citizenship that does not rest on the myth of (male) independence, but assumes instead human beings' interdependent and relational nature. It proposes that we move from a model of citizenship towards a model of caringzenship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]