Search

Copyright of Politische Vierteljahresschrift is the property of Springer Nature and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper adds to a revitalization of alienation as a political problem in the field of housing studies, pointing us to property relations that fragment tenants from acting together with other residents in similar positions. Analyzing ethnographic observations and interviews conducted in Basel with tenants facing mass cancellations of rental contracts, it operationalizes the problem of alienation to more closely examine the interplay of property relations and the subjective or collective experience of tenants: The consolidation of landlords' interests through complicit legal frameworks fragments tenants not only by producing insecurities within affected blocks. This consolidation also drives processes of individualization and conflict between fellow tenants and between tenants and their union, as well as harms tenants' belief in (local) political institutions. On the other hand, experiencing these fragmentations and the widespread inhibition of people to act together with others is, in some cases, the most sorrowful aspect for tenants facing rental contract cancellations in Basel. With the proposed understanding of alienation, the paper adds to two debates in housing studies: Outlining alienating property relations, it first foregrounds institutional constraints regarding the question of why many residents do not confront landlords' plans. Secondly, political alienation highlights the sorrow that can stem from the inhibition of collective action. Here the paper contributes to the debate around displacement and un-homing, showing them to be much more than the loss of original habitat. Lastly, the paper responds to the query of how to empirically apply the theoretically driven concept of alienation by moving questions of collective agency to the fore in housing and alienation theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Investigación Bibliotecológica is the property of UNAM, Centro Universitario de Investigaciones Bibliotecologicas and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Larq Journal for Philosophy, Linguistics & Social Sciences is the property of Republic of Iraq Ministry of Higher Education & Scientific Research (MOHESR) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article identifies the shortage of affordable, secure housing as a key driver of political alienation, particularly among young people. The social consequences of this trend for this group include, but are not limited to, delayed independent living and family formation, declining mental health and diminishing belief in their ability to match the living standards of their parents. Increasingly vulnerable and insecure, many young people now link the issue of housing with inward migration. Left unresolved, this issue will further polarise (and radicalise) the political choices of younger generations in the years ahead. In response, this article proposes three immediate actions. First, a dramatic expansion of construction for all types of housing where excess demand exists. Second, the use of public money to ensure that housing options exist for people of all ages, social classes and income levels. Public money should not be utilised for schemes which ultimately inflate house prices further. Third, to tackle widening intergenerational inequalities, existing housing wealth must be taxed fairly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spanish language media is linked to multiple forms of Latino political mobilization, including protest, naturalization, and voting. However, recent research associates geographic access to Spanish language broadcasts with significantly lower rates of Latino voter participation. We engage this controversy by exploring whether relative consumption of Spanish and English language media shapes rates of civic and voter participation among Latinos using data from the 2016 Cooperative Multiracial Postelection Survey and our own 2021 survey. 1 Next, we test the hypothesis that Spanish language media acts through politicized identities to shape Latino civic engagement, as some theorize. We find strong association between Spanish language media consumption and politicized identities among Latinos but no evidence that these identities constitute a conduit through which Spanish language media mobilizes. Instead, our results show that the mobilizing effect of Spanish language media consumption on civic engagement is direct and independent of politicized identity. These findings indicate a need to explore whether Spanish language media consumption influences Latino participation through differences with English language media in terms of content and/or fragmentation that better educate Latinos to participate, reduce political alienation, or accomplish both. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following Donald Trump's surprising victory in the 2016 US presidential election, some popular and scholarly sources suggested that Trump's candidacy may have been bolstered, in part, by the mobilization of "politically alienated" voters. This argument is puzzling, however, as certain forms of political alienation are often negatively related to political participation, making it unclear whether or how alienation may have been related to turnout and to support for Trump at the ballot box. I shed light on this puzzle using data from the American National Election Studies, which contain measures of two dimensions of political alienation: inefficacy and cynicism. With these data I examine how either dimension relates to turnout and to vote choice in 2016 and in 2020. Cynicism emerges as a positive predictor of both turnout and the Trump vote in 2016, but not in 2020. Inefficacy, however, does not positively predict turnout or the Trump vote in either election. I offer a potential explanation for the diminished relationship between cynicism and mobilization in the 2020 elections by applying a Structural Topic Model to open-ended survey responses about Trump, which reveals a substantial decrease in the salience of Trump's "political outsider" qualities during his reelection bid. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the main causes of and meanings attributed to the mass demonstrations of June 2013 in Brazil, arguing that the defeat of the movement's momentum contributed to the later appropriation and regressive manipulation of the political dissatisfaction by the far right. Franz Neumann's theoretical categories of political alienation and social anxiety help to support the reflection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Less educated citizens are both descriptively and substantively outnumbered by higher educated citizens in political and societal institutions. While social science has devoted much time to explain why such education effects exist, it has largely neglected the role of feelings of misrecognition in inducing political alienation among less educated citizens. We argue that education has become so central in processes of economic and social stratification that it is likely that less educated citizens feel misrecognized due to their marginal presence in societal and political institutions, which would then lead to their political alienation. This would in particular be the case in societies that are more 'schooled', that is, societies where schooling is a more dominant and steering institution. We analysed data from 49,261 individuals in 34 European countries and found that feelings of misrecognition were strongly related to political distrust, dissatisfaction with democracy, and vote abstention. These relations explained a significant part of the difference between higher and less educated citizens in political alienation. We also found that this mediation effect was larger in countries that are more schooled. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study examines the interpersonal circumstances that facilitate the spread of political alienation between parents and adolescent children. A total of 571 German adolescents (314 girls, 257 boys) and their mothers and fathers each completed questionnaires describing their own political alienation at two time points, approximately 1 year apart. In addition, adolescents completed questionnaires describing their perceptions of warmth in relationships with parents. Adolescents were in the sixth (M = 12.24 years old), eighth (M = 13.48 years old), and 10th (M = 15.51 years old) grades at the outset. Dyadic analyses revealed that initial parent political alienation predicted subsequent increases in adolescent political alienation for youth who described relationships with parents as high in warmth but not for those describing relationships as low in warmth. Mothers and fathers did not differ in terms of the magnitude of their influence. Adolescents did not influence the political alienation of their parents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Nigerian political system has experienced a high level of election-related violence at various epochs of its development. The incidences of violence during elections in Nigeria have resulted in the loss of lives and posed a threat to electoral participation and political stability. The study surveyed the perceptions of Nigerians on the effect of violence on the participation of eligible voters in the Nigerian electoral process. It attempts to ascertain the cause of the low turnout of voters in the 2019 general elections. The study adopted the survey research design and used data from 1,200 respondents selected from six local government areas representing the six geo-political zones. Simple percentages and Chi-Square statistical techniques were employed to test and determine the degree of association intrinsic to the stated hypotheses. The findings from the study show a positive relationship between violence and alienation. Thus, political violence perpetrated by political opponents and parties (among others) during elections results in the alienation of voters from the electoral process. Consequently, it is opined that the federal and state governments should put on modalities to mitigate the incidence of violence during elections. Also, perpetrators of electoral violence should be prosecuted and sanctioned accordingly.

The current thesis aims to investigate the political alienation among Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora. The study approached on both the literature of theoretical and empirical work. The importance of the study is that it is the first topic, which proposes political alienation among Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora, to the author's knowledge using a large sample that covered all Palestinian refugees worldwide. The study is considered one of the pioneering studies that examined this subject due to the scarcity of studies that dealt with the issue of political alienation among Palestinian refugees. The study constituted an important reference for researchers who are interested in the issue of political alienation in general, in addition to researchers interested in the issue of Palestinian question in particular. To achieve the study aims, the study adopted the descriptive method used a triangulation approach of quantitative and qualitative designs, and a questionnaire, which is appropriate to the exploratory nature of the research, which will provide more meaningful in-depth data. The target population consists of Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora during 2021 that includes 15,378,205 Palestinians. The overall sample composed of nine thousands five hundred and ninety-eight Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora (5822 males and 3776 females) 15 years of age or above stratifiedly selected, due to region. The participants were from, Palestine, neighbor countries, Arab countries, South America, Europe, North America, Asia, and Australia. Political alienation among Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora was evaluated using an index of a 40-item scale. A 5-point Likert scale (Strongly agree, agree, neither, disagree and strongly disagree) was used to assess the political alienation among the sampled population through an online survey that was launched on May 19, 2021, and the data were collected for a period of twelve months. Data were analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS-23). In total, nine thousands five hundred and ninety-eight were conducted. Respondents were above 15 and 87 years of age (M 33.38, SD 13.64); and the vast majority (82.9%) were married. Males represented 60.7% of the participants, while the remaining 39.3% were females. Half (49.4%) of the respondents had a secondary degree, and almost 48.3% had highly religious committed. The majority (57.4%) were working, and had on average of 5.56 family members, with a range of 1 to 15 (SD 2.45). Party affiliation represented 55.8% of the participants, while the remaining 44.2% do not have any party affiliation; and the majority (58.4%) were independent, (22.6%) were from Fateh, (13.6%) from Islamic trends (Hamas, Islamic Jihad), (3.7%) from left Trends (People's, Democracy, FDA, People's Party), and (1.8%) from other political fractions. The findings showed that, the political alienation as experienced by the sample of nine thousands five hundred and eighty-nine Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora was moderate (M 3.20 SD 0.54). Of the Palestinian refugees surveyed in the Diaspora, 64% preserved a moderate level of political alienation. Furthermore, the study explored the demographic breakdown over the political alienation among Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora with the aim of identifying any differences. Findings showed that all of the study independent variables were significant predictors for the political alienation among Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora that are, gender, age, marital status, number of family members, educational level, religion commitment, relation to work force, Political party affiliation, fraction affiliation, and the religion commitment. In light of the study findings and the discussion, the study recommends, given the concept of political socialization the utmost importance in the teaching curriculum and the different media outlet, it is necessary to activate the political participation of the Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora, by taking charge of the refugees themselves or choosing their representative in any future solutions to their just cause, activating all official and popular institutions to support the Palestinian refugee cause, which is the basis of the Palestinian cause, and since there is large proportion of politically independents, the study recommends the emergence of a new party linked to the Palestinian refugee issues, which will have a prominent role in the conflict solution, especially the political participation, the right of return, and the right to self-determination. Holding the Palestinian elections as soon as possible with the participation of all Palestinian factions and all Palestinians in the Diaspora. Empowerment the role of women in the Palestinian political life through awareness programs and amending the mechanisms of the Palestinian political system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent pluralist accounts of the People and popular sovereignty, defining it as either a performance or a process, are divorced from the realities of mass disempowerment. By shifting emphasis from who to what, these notions of the People, though seemingly unconcerned with the problem of positing this entity as a collective agent, have actually posited the politically active as the concrete subject of the People. Consequently, I argue that these recent theories exclude the reality of mass disempowerment within contemporary democracies by marginalizing agency, presupposing empowerment, and assuming the resonance of the various representations of the People. Simply put, they suffer from an activist-centric bias that renders the politically alienated, disempowered, and inactive as irrelevant entities, a nameless shadow lurking behind analyses of popular power. Hence, my task is to clear the ground for a more comprehensive theory of the People and Popular Sovereignty by exposing the roots, limits, and costs of this activist-centric bias. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current thesis aims to investigate the political alienation among Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora. The study approached on both the literature of theoretical and empirical work. The importance of the study is that it is the first topic, which proposes political alienation among Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora, to the author's knowledge using a large sample that covered all Palestinian refugees worldwide. The study is considered one of the pioneering studies that examined this subject due to the scarcity of studies that dealt with the issue of political alienation among Palestinian refugees. The study constituted an important reference for researchers who are interested in the issue of political alienation in general, in addition to researchers interested in the issue of Palestinian question in particular. To achieve the study aims, the study adopted the descriptive method used a triangulation approach of quantitative and qualitative designs, and a questionnaire, which is appropriate to the exploratory nature of the research, which will provide more meaningful in-depth data. The target population consists of Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora during 2021 that includes 15,378,205 Palestinians. The overall sample composed of nine thousands five hundred and ninety-eight Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora (5822 males and 3776 females) 15 years of age or above stratifiedly selected, due to region. The participants were from, Palestine, neighbor countries, Arab countries, South America, Europe, North America, Asia, and Australia. Political alienation among Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora was evaluated using an index of a 40-item scale. A 5-point Likert scale (Strongly agree, agree, neither, disagree and strongly disagree) was used to assess the political alienation among the sampled population through an online survey that was launched on May 19, 2021, and the data were collected for a period of twelve months. Data were analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS-23). In total, nine thousands five hundred and ninety-eight were conducted. Respondents were above 15 and 87 years of age (M 33.38, SD 13.64); and the vast majority (82.9%) were married. Males represented 60.7% of the participants, while the remaining 39.3% were females. Half (49.4%) of the respondents had a secondary degree, and almost 48.3% had highly religious committed. The majority (57.4%) were working, and had on average of 5.56 family members, with a range of 1 to 15 (SD 2.45). Party affiliation represented 55.8% of the participants, while the remaining 44.2% do not have any party affiliation; and the majority (58.4%) were independent, (22.6%) were from Fateh, (13.6%) from Islamic trends (Hamas, Islamic Jihad), (3.7%) from left Trends (People's, Democracy, FDA, People's Party), and (1.8%) from other political fractions. The findings showed that, the political alienation as experienced by the sample of nine thousands five hundred and eighty-nine Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora was moderate (M 3.20 SD 0.54). Of the Palestinian refugees surveyed in the Diaspora, 64% preserved a moderate level of political alienation. Furthermore, the study explored the demographic breakdown over the political alienation among Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora with the aim of identifying any differences. Findings showed that all of the study independent variables were significant predictors for the political alienation among Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora that are, gender, age, marital status, number of family members, educational level, religion commitment, relation to work force, Political party affiliation, fraction affiliation, and the religion commitment. In light of the study findings and the discussion, the study recommends, given the concept of political socialization the utmost importance in the teaching curriculum and the different media outlet, it is necessary to activate the political participation of the Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora, by taking charge of the refugees themselves or choosing their representative in any future solutions to their just cause, activating all official and popular institutions to support the Palestinian refugee cause, which is the basis of the Palestinian cause, and since there is large proportion of politically independents, the study recommends the emergence of a new party linked to the Palestinian refugee issues, which will have a prominent role in the conflict solution, especially the political participation, the right of return, and the right to self-determination. Holding the Palestinian elections as soon as possible with the participation of all Palestinian factions and all Palestinians in the Diaspora. Empowerment the role of women in the Palestinian political life through awareness programs and amending the mechanisms of the Palestinian political system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study uses quantitative methods to determine the relationship between political alienation and non-voting intentions in Student's Executive Boards Member. This study used a correlational descriptive design with the subjects of 92 people who were members of the Student's Executive Boards of all faculties at the State University of Malang. Political alienation data were collected through the political alienation scale with a reliability rate of 0.888, calculated using the Alfa Cronbach formula. The data analysis technique in this study used multinomial logistic regression analysis with the help of SPSS. The results of this study are that most students have a moderate to a high level of political alienation, with 48.91% having a moderate level of political alienation and 45.65% having a high level of political alienation. Regarding voting intention, 42.39% of the research participants intended to vote, 32.61% intended not to vote, and the rest were undecided. A significant positive relationship between political alienation and non-voting intentions is shown by a coefficient result of 0.852. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article raises the issue of using Russia's transformations over the last three hundred years as material for creating a theory of bureaucracy that differs from Max Weber's understanding of it. This issue is addressed using the understandings developed at the Rostov School of Political Sciences of the Southern Federal University (Russia), which is working out a conceptual apparatus for studying the Russian, Soviet, and post-Soviet bureaucracy in relation to the process of forming an opposition free from stereotypes of bureaucratic action, behavior, and thought. This kind of opposition could not have arisen in monarchical, Soviet, or post-Soviet Russia. The reasons for this are explained by a theory of bureaucracy that contains a reconstruction of Marx's definition of bureaucracy as a social parasitic organism, a reflection of numerous social contradictions and the embodiment of political alienation. The article discusses the cognitive situation in contemporary Russia, ways for researchers to avoid the choice imposed by post-Soviet authorities, and the specific features of the genesis and structure of the assertion of police society in Russia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Direct voting and public deliberation are often considered as a means to increase legitimacy of political decision-making. This study investigates whether the legitimizing effects of these procedural arrangements are affected by the level of threat stemming from topic associated with a decision-making situation. Further, we explore potential individual-level moderators. A vignette experiment with a mixed design was conducted (N = 220). Results showed that the presence of a direct vote as well as public deliberation increased perceived legitimacy of the decision-making process, the effect of the latter being considerably stronger. Contrary to our expectations, all legitimizing effects remained unaffected by the presence of threat. Nevertheless, the legitimizing effect of a direct vote was stronger for people who were more alienated from and less interested in politics, while it was negligible if alienation was low and interest high. The legitimizing effect of public deliberation was less strong (but still present) for people with higher right-wing authoritarianism and lower political interest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While existing research has considered how individual-level social mobility experiences affect a person’s political outlook, less attention has been paid to how historic levels of social mobility in local areas influence political attitudes and political behaviour. We link individual-level data from the UK Household Longitudinal Study to small area estimates of social class mobility derived from the decennial census. We find that living in a low absolute social mobility area was associated with a higher probability of voting ‘Leave’ in the 2016 UK European Union membership referendum. However, we find no evidence that historical social mobility rates in the local area predict abstention in general elections or attitudinal indicators of political alienation. Given declining rates of upwards mobility, and increasing levels of downwards mobility, our results have important implications for understanding geographies of political discontent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explains the functioning of the dominant discourse and its system of references in Macario (El llano en llamas, 1953) by Juan Rulfo (1917-1986). It proposes a reading of the story as an allegory of the domination of a dictatorship and the state of alienation suffered by the Mexican people during the period immediately preceding the Mexican Revolution (1910). To achieve this purpose, the socio-semiotic status of the speaking subject and the convergence network of the signs that define it are widely analyzed. Thus, it is possible to highlight a precise codification of social elaborations in the discursive structure, which permeates the perception displayed by the figure of the subject of the enunciation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Nigerian political system has experienced a high level of election-related violence at various epochs of its development. The incidences of violence during elections in Nigeria have resulted in the loss of lives and posed a threat to electoral participation and political stability. The study surveyed the perceptions of Nigerians on the effect of violence on the participation of eligible voters in the Nigerian electoral process. It attempts to ascertain the cause of the low turnout of voters in the 2019 general elections. The study adopted the survey research design and used data from 1,200 respondents selected from six local government areas representing the six geo-political zones. Simple percentages and Chi-Square statistical techniques were employed to test and determine the degree of association intrinsic to the stated hypotheses. The findings from the study show a positive relationship between violence and alienation. Thus, political violence perpetrated by political opponents and parties (among others) during elections results in the alienation of voters from the electoral process. Consequently, it is opined that the federal and state governments should put on modalities to mitigate the incidence of violence during elections. Also, perpetrators of electoral violence should be prosecuted and sanctioned accordingly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article highlights the relationship between civil society participation and democratic governance to gain a good understanding of the impact of civil society participation and political alienation on democratic governance. It focuses on the interconnectedness of governance, good governance, democratic governance, and network governance as concepts and phenomena influencing civil society participation. The article also pays attention to criteria derived and extrapolated from a literature review that can be used for the measurement of democratic governance at a local level. These criteria include elements that are refined to present a mechanism for understanding and enhancing civil society participation within a democratic governance framework. The article used a qualitative approach that was underpinned by unobtrusive research methods in order to unify the diverse perspectives into one analytical framework that focuses on the development of an enabling environment for civil society participation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to the social psychological literature, egoistic relative deprivation impairs well-being but has at most little impact on political protest and engagement. We considered this view incomplete and over-simplifying. It was predicted that egoistic relative deprivation itself may impair democracy by increasing support for populism, and that the postulated relationship will be mediated by dysphoric affect, political alienation, and political paranoia. The empirical basis of the article were three studies carried out on nationwide random-quota samples of adult Poles: in 2002 (N = 1500), in 2010 (N = 800), and in 2017 (N = 2000). It was found that support for populism systematically depends directly on dysphoric affect and political paranoia, which are strengthened by egoistic relative deprivation. In 2017, with populist political groupings in power in Poland, the role of political alienation turned out to be ambiguous. Political alienation slightly strengthened political paranoia but directly lowered support for populism. In conclusion it was noted that in Poland's history and in the contemporary Polish mentality there is a great potential for negative affect, pessimism and bitterness. Relative deprivation experienced today successfully maintains this potential. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Al-Frahids Arts is the property of Republic of Iraq Ministry of Higher Education & Scientific Research (MOHESR) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

A common interpretation of the UK's Brexit vote is that it was an expression of anti-establishment sentiment, outrage and dismay from a politically alienated majority. This line of thinking suggests Brexit, like the electoral appeal of Donald Trump and parties such as the Five Star Movement, is but the latest manifestation of a growing disconnect between Western citizens and their democratic institutions. The direct role of political alienation in building support for such anti-establishment causes has, however, barely been examined. This study addresses this gap and uses previous literature on political alienation to build a model to test the claim that Brexit was (at least in part) driven by political alienation in UK citizens. The analyses show that while political alienation did have a substantial effect in making some citizens more likely to support Brexit—specifically those who lacked trust in the integrity of the political elite and felt that the political system was unresponsive—its impact overall was limited. Moreover, claims that Brexit was driven by political alienation understate how alienated from politics most people who were opposed to it also feel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Topic fatigue is a potential reaction to news topics that the media covers intensively. Recipients experiencing topic fatigue are annoyed and state that they do not want to hear or see anything about such topics anymore. As potential outcome, they strive to avoid such topics during their future news exposure. In this essay, we discuss the question of whether topic fatigue is an international problem. Based on initial empirical insights obtained via qualitative interviews, we establish four theses that underline the international meaning of the phenomenon. First, we argue that the level of press freedom can shape the intensity of topic fatigue and that fatigue experiences can be extreme in countries with low press freedom. Second, we discuss topic fatigue as a potential threat to political transitions and democratization processes. Third, we propose that topic fatigue may reinforce resentments against western societies. Regarding this point, the role of the international media in particular for English-speaking, non-western countries is addressed. Finally, we introduce the argument that topic fatigue may erode the deliberative potential of social media, which can be particularly problematic for countries in which the traditional news media is (politically) dependent. Ultimately, the key elements of these theses are used to propose a comparative research design for an international study on topic fatigue.

In this paper we deal with Hobbes's elucidation of the political conflict caused by rebellious groups. First of all, we attempt to prove that groups are important characters in Hobbesian antagonisms. Secondly, it will be argued that the isomorphic structure that underlies all associations is vital to account for these disputes. To wit, the fact that minor corporate bodies are 'similar' vis à vis the State leaves a lengthy flank open to rebellion, since this homology may encourage their leaders to compare themselves with the sovereign and to challenge his or her power. Whereas the inclusion of this trait may seem at face value paradoxical to Hobbes's absolute order project, we shall contend that it is actually a way of ascribing responsibility to the leaders of rebellious groups. Furthermore, as a subsidiary hypothesis, it will be claimed that the centrality of the theory of represented corporations is a result of Hobbes's aim to erase, not rebellion as such, but only its tumultuous setup. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aims to examine the issue of stateless 'bidoon' in Kuwait. The study explores the historical background of the bidoon issue in Kuwait. It finds that the bidoon issue has been influenced by internal and external factors since the emergence of this problem in the 1950s in Kuwait. However, the main object of this study is to trace the relationship between statelessness and political alienation. Thus, it examines the case study of the bidoon in Kuwait to determine whether they feel political alienation. The study relies on a survey to answer this question. A questionnaire, which comprises the three main aspects of political alienation, powerlessness, normlessness, and isolation, was distributed to a sample of 719 bidoon individuals in Kuwaiti society. The study found that most of the research sample of bidoon in Kuwait feel political alienation. Therefore, the study concluded that the feeling of political alienation among bidoon has critical effects on Kuwaiti national security, including crimes and political violence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article critically examines the account of collective self-determination and state legitimacy developed by Stilz in her book. Central to this account is the idea that for a state to be legitimate it must reflect the shared will of the people over which it governs. I argue that the normative taxonomy Stilz employs to develop this criterion of legitimacy ignores the possibility of conditional cooperators: groups who are alienated from society due to the injustices they experience but are willing to affirm their participation in state institutions if these injustices are rectified. I then demonstrate that since there are no grounds for discounting the dissent of conditional cooperators, their presence significantly increases the threshold for state legitimacy that follows from Stilz's theory. As a result, Stilz is forced to abandon her claim that basically just states generally enjoy a qualified 'right to do wrong'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is an old adage that local government is a training ground for democracy. Its human scale means that political amateurs can contribute effectively and meaningfully to the politics of a state. But in a political climate seemingly driven to consolidate local government into ever larger units, can a not so local local government still elicit an efficacious and participatory citizenry? This paper explores the effect of municipality population size on two important aspects of democratic culture: political efficacy and political participation. Via a two-part systematic review, the paper examines how extant empirical literature bears on the relationship between size and both of these aspects, hypothesising that political efficacy plays a mediating role between size and participation. The findings are unequivocal: citizens of smaller municipalities feel a greater sense of political efficacy and participate to a greater degree in local politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we introduce the concept of policy malaise, which refers to citizens' dissatisfaction with the way political institutions and processes handle specific problems such as the refugee issue in Germany. Based on a representative online panel survey with two waves conducted in 2016 and 2017 (N = 836), we explore the occurrence of policy malaise among the German population and its relation to issue-specific media use, trust in news media, and issue fatigue. First, the results indicate that policy malaise toward the refugee issue is widespread in Germany. Second, we found that media use relates differentially to policy malaise: While high exposure to public broadcasting was negatively associated with policy malaise, we found the opposite for private broadcasting. Third, policy malaise is higher for people who experience issue fatigue and lower for people who trust the news media. Finally, trust in media reinforces the negative and positive relations between media use and policy malaise. Implications concerning the associations between policy malaise and political alienation in its broader sense are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

European youth’s civic engagement and political participation in EU-related issues is a timely imperative. Research findings on youth citizenship range from political apathy to alternative forms of participation, although theoretical evidence remains poor. This study is based on empirical data from the Greek contribution to the European program CATCH-EyoU (Horizon 2020), aiming to explore different forms and predictors of youth’s civic engagement and political participation on EU-related issues. Based on social psychological theoretical background, we assumed that the expressed political interest for the EU translates to specific forms of action. Identification with the EU and perceived political efficacy/alienation were expected to mediate the above relationship. The sample consisted of 749 young adults aged 18-27 (M = 22.2, 50.7% women, 89.7% Greek citizens, 72% university students, 75.5% employed). In addition to voting, four components of political participation and civic engagement were studied, namely conventional participation (in support of political parties and goals), activism (acts of protest against the authorities), online participation (social networks), and volunteering (non-profit actions). Mediation analyses showed that the relationship between political interest and participation can be explained by different mechanisms: The sense of belonging in the EU lead to more frequent electoral participation, but to less activism and online participation. On the contrary, EU identity exploration and reconsideration contributed to increased conventional participation. Political efficacy seemed to promote activism and online participation, while political alienation tended to decrease activism. These findings reveal the multiple connotations of youth’s political participation regarding EU issues.