I know a professor of comparative politics who thinks that this sub-discipline of political science is too complex for an AP course and too difficult for high school students.
This article probably presents a case study to support his opinions — especially if you're teaching the AP course in one semester.
Carl LeVan and giraffe
Even if you don't teach about "veto players" (it would seem to offer insights into the politics of several of the AP6), there are some good ideas here and some good information.
Kim Yi Dionne, who teaches governemnt at Smith College interviews author Carl LeVan about his new book.
Why are some African governments better at enacting polices that benefit the country as a whole while others engage in pork barrel politics that only benefit specific communities or interests?
That’s the main question driving Carl LeVan in his new book, Dictators and Democracy in African Development: The Political Economy of Good Governance in Nigeria. Most comparative studies of Africa blame poor government performance on ethnic diversity, foreign debt, authoritarianism or resource-dependent economies. Carl’s answer is different…
KYD: Your book closely examines trends in Nigerian policy, arguing that good government performance depends on how political power is distributed… How well does Nigeria represent the rest of the continent?
CL: The challenges to good governance in Nigeria are in many ways characteristic of the complexities in other African countries. It’s a country where colonial rule created regional disparities and artificially enhanced the power of certain ethnic groups (in Nigeria, the Hausa-Fulani). It has a dark history of military rule and coups, and its post-independence economic development has been full of promises betrayed by elites. It is also incredibly diverse…
What makes Nigeria especially challenging to study is that so many of these complexities come together all at once in one place…
KYD: Your book’s argument draws on a theory of “veto players,” a term coined by political scientist George Tsebelis… How can veto players theory transform the study of African governance?
CL: There’s an empirical problem and a conceptual problem… I think that veto players can help us understand some of the structures underlying such regimes…
KYD: You find that an increase in the number of veto players impedes “the delivery of national collective goods…
CL: Ethnicity is obviously still an important part of African politics. But I started my research tracing my dependent variable (outcomes such as court performance, fiscal discipline and classroom size) over time. I then wondered: How can there be so much variation in public policy performance since the 1960s, if the number of ethnic groups is basically the same? That’s the kind of question generated by a single-country study…
One thing that has held Nigeria together… is that any sectional attempt to dominate politics doesn’t last — it just faces too much pressure from other segments of society. Some of this pressure is from ethnic groups and traditional organizations, which are still largely geographically concentrated in their respective “home” regions. But no single group is large enough to dominate the others, leading to coalition building across regions…
KYD: Just a couple of weeks ago, we featured Branch and Mampilly’s book, Africa Uprising: Popular Protest and Political Change. Their book and that post suggest a great deal of political power is also held in the hands of ordinary people, even if popular protests only slowly or incompletely deliver political change. Your focus on veto players — actors who can block or facilitate policy change — almost by definition focuses on political elites. What does that mean for popular protests aimed at initiating political change?
CL: Scholars who use veto players typically focus on formal institutions, in part because most such studies seek to explain patterns across different countries…
I’m trying to push that theoretical discussion by describing conditions when we can juxtapose such broad-based social forces with, say, a particular faction of the military. And that’s precisely what I think happened in the early 1990s, and again right after Nigeria’s transition in 1999. So I take institutionalist tools of political science…
KYD: In Nigeria’s election earlier this year, former head of state Muhammadu Buhari was elected president. Granted, it’s still early. But do you have predictions for the coming years in terms of whether we should expect the Nigerian government to pursue public policies for the benefit of the country as a whole?
CL: Buhari’s presidential campaign capitalized on two frustrations: escalating violence by Islamic insurgents based in the northeast, and widespread corruption that has prevented benefits of recent economic expansion from trickling down. Then within days after being sworn in, his transition team reported that the country is $60 billion dollars in debt, and the governors asked for a huge financial bailout. It immediately reminded me of the way I discuss Buhari’s first weeks in office in 1984 in my book, when he said his predecessors had failed to “cultivate financial discipline” and relied too much on external borrowing. He refused to bail out the states then, and it looks like he’ll do the same now.
Now of course, he faces electoral accountability — perhaps the strongest since independence, given that the 2015 elections went pretty well. But it’s going to be difficult to reduce corruption and deliver the public goods demanded by voters…
Fiscal discipline is a priority for Buhari, and this is difficult under any regime. But Nigeria’s problem isn’t simply spending — it’s spending on budgetary priorities that do not reflect citizen demands and that are not sustainable in the long term…
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In the rich neighborhoods and malls of Iran's largest cities, the frustration of having money but little to buy is showing.
And, what, you ask, does that have to do with government and politics? Think sanctions, cleavages and the political culture. Oh, and corruption. What does this article imply about governance?
From the roadside billboards advertising Rolex and Louis Vuitton, to the glitzy shopping centres that have sprung up across Tehran, it's clear that big brands are becoming big business in Iran.
After decades of austerity following the Islamic Revolution, middle-class Iranians have developed a taste for high-end designer goods, and for Tehran's young rich, shopping has become the new religion.
"Exposure to foreign trends through travelling, the internet and satellite television has created a desire for branded products," says Bahar, a 30-year-old fashion blogger…
One group of super-rich young Tehranis have taken showing off to new levels with their own Instagram site - Rich Kids of Tehran, where without any perceptible sense of irony, they post pictures of their designer clothes and designer lifestyles.
When the site first appeared last year it prompted fury and resentment among poorer Iranians and the conservatives who dominate Iran's political and legal institutions.
But the Rich Kids seem undeterred by the controversy.
Recent postings include pictures of Tehran Fashion Week and a question about where people are going on holiday this year - the responses range from Italy and Istanbul to Japan and Dubai…
In big cities all across Iran, traditional bazaars now face fierce competition from American-style urban shopping centres where big name Western brands are on conspicuous display.
But although these luxury shopping centres look exactly the same as retail outlets anywhere in the world, the designer goods on display have actually been brought in by third-party importers via Turkey and the Gulf States…
The backdoor way in which foreign brands are imported into Iran means they are more expensive than they would be abroad, but so far this doesn't seem to be deterring the shoppers…
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President Muhammadu Buhari has painted a gloomy picture of the Nigeria his new government is battling to reshape, saying he met an almost empty treasury and huge debts left behind by his predecessor.
At a meeting with state house reporters Monday… the president said it was embarrassing that the situation has degenerated to a situation where federal and state government cannot pay their workers.
He decried the huge debts, empty treasury and the declining economy left by the previous administration, saying Nigeria should be in a better position than it is now…
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It seems that the editor(s) at The Economist have had the same alternations of optimism and pessimism about Nigeria that I have had. What does the future appear to be now?
FIVE-and-a-half decades ago, when Nigeria elected its first government at the end of colonial rule, many expected the country to rise quickly to become Africa’s leading power. It had people in abundance, the region’s best universities and vast natural resources. It exported great pyramids of peanuts, was one of the world’s leading sources of cotton and was soon to become Africa’s biggest producer of oil.
Yet within a few years its hopes were dashed… Many expected that the elections which took place at the end of March would be so rigged as to give another term to Goodluck Jonathan, a singularly ineffectual president…
Instead Nigeria confounded not just its critics but itself. The elections were peaceful and, despite some ballot-box stuffing, roughly reflected the will of the majority. The election of the opposition candidate, Muhammadu Buhari, marks the first democratic defeat of a Nigerian president running for re-election as well as the best opportunity to tackle the country’s many problems…
Sceptics will scoff that every new dawn in Nigeria for the past half-century has proved false. Yet there are three reasons for optimism. The first, believe it or not, is Mr Buhari himself…
The election itself gives another reason for hope. Having experienced their first cleanish vote, Nigerians may prove less tolerant of rigging in the future…
Last, Nigeria’s middle class is growing rapidly… Growth has averaged more than 7% a year for the past decade, creating opportunities for bright young Nigerians to make a good living honestly. Instead of jostling to join the government in order to extract rents from their fellow citizens, many are flocking to start businesses. Smartphones and social media have helped fuel this growth, and are also making Nigeria more transparent…
Mr Buhari’s greatest tasks will be to fight corruption and improve security… Mr Buhari needs to clean up and discipline the army. Ordering the generals who are supposed to fight the jihadists out of their air-conditioned offices in the capital and into headquarters closer to the action was a good start…
To clamp down on corruption more broadly, Mr Buhari must both reduce the opportunities for it and also catch and punish the perpetrators…
Another way to reduce the scope for graft would be to reduce the role of the state in the economy…
Nigeria matters because it is the biggest country in the continent that has huge potential for catch-up growth. If it fails, it could bring down half a dozen neighbouring states with it…
Kevin James, who teaches at Albany High School, has links to the articles in The Economist special report on Nigeria in his blog post. I don't know how much access you'll have to the articles if you don't have a subscription. Teaching Comparative blog entries are indexed. Use the search box to look for country names or concept labels attached to each entry.
Here's a pretty clear-cut demonstration of the differences between voting systems. Find out what the voting system is in each of the Nordic countries and compare it the system in the UK, Russia, and Mexico.
After four years of centre-left government, Denmark has swung back to the centre-right.
On the surface, the outcome is not monumental. In 2011, the centre-left won with a majority of 0.5 points.
Meanwhile, on Thursday, the centre-right won by 4.5 points…
[W]hat does make the election… historic is the rise of the rightwing Danish People’s party (DPP). It won the biggest vote share in its 20-year history and, most significantly, emerged as the largest party in the bloc of those to the right of the political spectrum.
The Danish election continues a trend that began in Norway’s 2013 election: the rise of rightwing, anti-immigration parties in Nordic countries.
Although such parties are on the up – with few exceptions – across Europe, what makes the Nordic example somewhat different is that due to more representative voting systems in these countries , the parties’ parliamentary strength is greater in Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Norway than it is elsewhere.
In the UK, Ukip’s 12.5% vote share in May only translated into one seat due to Britain’s first-past-the-post system…
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The plan sounds unrealistic to a Russian expert, but China has already rented land in Africa and South America for food production. Some Chinese are convinced that China is nearing its capacity but not its need to produce. Will it work? Check back in a few years.
A Chinese firm is in talks with Russia about renting up to 115,000 hectares (284,050 acres) of land to grow crops and rear livestock in eastern Siberia.
Trans-Baikal
Trans-Baikal regional officials say the deal with investment firm Huae Sinban could be worth up to $448m (£282m)…
Huae Sinban plans to rent the land for 49 years. China has made similar farming investments in other countries…
Prof Natalya Zubarevich, an economist at Moscow State University, told BBC Russian that it would be "impractical" to lease such a huge area for farming, as the soil would require much work in a harsh climate…
Vegetable oil cultivation was being mentioned, she said, "but sunflowers don't grow in that region". "There's little pasture, because of the harsh continental climate. The Chinese are very capable, but can they cope with that climate? Apparently they'll use greenhouses."…
Russia has been looking east for investment following the imposition of economic sanctions by the West over Moscow's role in the Ukraine conflict.
President Vladimir Putin has met Chinese President Xi Jinping at least five times in the last year and the two have described themselves as "good friends".
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Voice against Nigeria's version of "Big Man" politics
An editorial in Lagos' Daily Independent calls for a more open and transparent way of appointing government officials. What is required to make that happen?
A recent news report indicated that the Governor of Akwa Ibom State, Emmanuel Udom, refused to assist his benefactor and former Governor Godswill Akpabio… build a new house of cards. Udom had refused to appoint Akpabio's elder brother… as Secretary to the State Government. This has once again brought into focus the disturbing issue of godfatherism in Nigerian politics.
Indeed it would be difficult to totally avoid godfatherism or endorsements in Nigeria, because even jobs in the private sector, usually go to the one who knows somebody who knows somebody who knows somebody in the organisation's high places. It gets even more compounded because, Nigeria's 1999 Constitution insists that candidates for elective offices must be presented by political parties.
And as everyone knows, it is always the political party grandees, usually money bags or former holders of high political offices, that get to endorse, suggest or impose candidates that are usually 'elected' or 'selected' by delegates who come out in the open to perform the usual charade of party primaries…
The problem of political godfatherism or endorsements may not necessarily be in the act of endorsement per se. It is that the benefactors then want to impose their minions into strategic political positions in the government of their beneficiaries, often without regard to the competence of the nominees…
The best way out of this bind is that party delegates must not always come out of the ranks of those who survive on crumbs from the table of political party grandees. More importantly, the principle of internal democracy must be upheld within the political parties. Thus candidates that are promoted by any of the interests within political parties must go through due process…
Political godfathers who want to be relevant in the polity must screen, and present, nominees who can be trusted to make astute political judgment in picking their team and making good policy decisions…
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The Nigerian naira is equivalent to about half a cent US. Or it takes nearly 200 naira to equal one US dollar. You do the math and decide if the allowances for Nigerian legislators are reasonable.
The newly sworn in members of the National Assembly will smile home with a whooping N8.64 billion as wardrobe allowance next week, it was learnt last night.
The sum is aside other allowances such as furniture, housing and vehicle, which the lawmakers are entitled to. It was also learnt that the management of the National Assembly is currently allocating offices to the 469 federal lawmakers in both chambers ahead of their resumption on June 23 from the two-week recess that they embarked on June 10.
The N8.64 billion wardrobe allowance translates to N17.5 million for each of the 360 members of the House of Representatives and N21.5 million for each of the 109 senators…
Based on the approval of the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC), the housing allowance for political office holders is usually 200 per cent of their annual salaries, the furniture allowance is 300 per cent of annual salaries, while a motor vehicle loan is pegged at 400 per cent of their annual salaries.
Accordingly, each of the 107 senators besides the Senate President and his deputy, will be paid N4,052,800 as housing allowance. This sum will be paid to them every year, translating to N433,649,600 as housing allowance to be paid to the Senate annually…
On the other hand, each member of the House of Representatives will be paid N3,970,425 as housing allowance upon assumption of office…
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It's eight months before the legislative elections in Iran, but people are planning for them. And journalists are speculating on what a few public statements mean.
Pay attention to the differences between what the politicians say and what the journalists think they mean.
President Hassan Rouhani unofficially kicked off next February’s parliamentary elections before a gathering of provincial governors on 26 May.
“No political or sectarian belief should be discounted, for they are based in religion, science, and personal beliefs, and of course elections without competition are impossible,” Rouhani said. “We have different ideas in our society, and all are free to express their ideas. This is why we have various parties and persuasions.”
Rouhani’s comments suggest he hopes to prepare the way for increased reformist participation in the majles (parliament)…
In an interview with Tehran Bureau, a member of the Islamic Iran Participation Front, a leading party suspended since 2009, expressed cautious optimism.
“He’s certainly come out swinging, but he’ll eventually tone down the intensity as time passes,” she said. “He may be demanding today that these elections be on a par with those of Finland and the UK in terms of openness and freedom, but ultimately he’ll have to temper his expectations to something resembling Turkey’s elections. If his strategy gets results, it’ll be a step forward, since it should translate to more moderates and reformists and fewer fundamentalists in the majles.”
Fundamentalists have held a majority in the 310-seat majles since 2004, when they overturned a reformist majority, and changing this will not be easy. The fundamentalists’ predominance goes back to an election when the Guardian Council, which vets candidates, disqualified around 4,000 reformist hopefuls, including 80 sitting members…
For next February’s election, the reformists’ fears centre on the possibility that they or even candidates close to Rouhani’s government will be disqualified en masse…
Concerns around mass disqualifications can be explained in part by recent statements by Ahmad Jannati, 88, chairman of the Guardian Council since 1992.
“The leadership of the Guardian Council has not forgotten the ‘sedition’ as it relates to those candidates who would participate in the elections,” Jannati told the May gathering of municipal governors…
Jannati’s comments suggest that conservative factions within the governing apparatus are set on continuing revenge against the reformists and the Green Movement, and therefore have no intention of opening up the political arena. But there is clear, and unresolved, tension here with what Rouhani has said…
[A] Tehran-based reformist journalist, who argued next February’s elections were of the “utmost importance” given the wide powers of the majles, including over the selection of ministers.
“In the event that many reformist candidates are not disqualified, there may be considerable room for a competition that decides who controls the majles,” he said. “This would not necessarily translate into a democratic transformation of the legal sphere. The biggest gains will probably be seen over the economic situation and corruption. Although [wider] democracy is undoubtedly an urgent matter, the precarious political conditions simply don’t allow it at present.”
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You should subscribe to CGP Grey's You Tube videos. He is a good explainer. This one ought to start some good conversations/debates. There's a link at the end of this one to his other voting videos.
As is often the case, textbook authors assert things like the existence of a major social class cleavage in the UK, but offer little evidence. Here's some.
Unacknowledged “poshness tests” at elite British companies are thwarting the career prospects of talented working-class applicants and reinforcing social division, according to a government study.
Students at Eton. Posh? Qualified?
The research by the social mobility and child poverty commission found that old-fashioned snobbery about accents and mannerisms was being used by top companies to filter out working-class candidates and favour the privileged.
The commission examined the recruitment processes at 13 elite law, accountancy and financial companies who between them appoint 45,000 of the best jobs in the country. It found that 70% of jobs offered by those firms in 2014 went to applicants from private or selective schools, even though such schools only educate around 11% of the population…
One employer suggested firms were unwilling to sift through applications from those of working-class backgrounds. “Is there a diamond in the rough out there?” the unnamed recruiter told researchers. “Statistically it’s highly probable but the question is … how much mud do I have to sift through in that population to find that diamond?”
Alan Milburn, the former Labour cabinet minister who chairs the commission, said: “Inevitably that ends up excluding youngsters who have the right sort of grades and abilities but whose parents do not have the right sort of bank balances.”…
The report found that there was an increasing awareness of the need for social mobility, but that social class was a “relatively hidden category” of discrimination compared to other forms of diversity.
One recruiter talked about her doubts after appointing someone who lacked “polish”. The unnamed interviewer said: “I recruited somebody … she’s short of polish. We need to talk about the way that she articulates, the way that she, first, chooses words and, second, the way she pronounces them. It will need, you know … it will need some polish because whilst I may look at the substance, you know, I’ve got a lot of clients and a lot of colleagues who are very focused on the personal presentation and appearance side of it.”
The report also said that companies were unwilling to acknowledge the problem. It said: “Social class, however defined, apparently remains a strong determinant of one’s ability to access the elite professions and, once there, to thrive. Yet still, this study would suggest that within elite firms, awareness of the role played by social background in relation to career progression is quite low, especially compared to other diversity axes such as gender…
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I am not aware of a comparative textbook that makes a big deal of the Magna Carta, but I'd wager that all of them mention it. Should they? Or should they just note that its mythology is part of the political culture of the UK? and the USA?
It is relatively unsplashy, as these things go — not very long, not very elegantly written, just 3,500 or so words of Medieval Latin crammed illegibly onto a single page of parchment.
But Magna Carta, presented by 40 indignant English barons to their treacherous king in the 13th century, has endured ever since as perhaps the world’s first and best declaration of the rule of law…
On Monday, Magna Carta’s 800th birthday [was] observed with an extravagant ceremony in Runnymede, the meadow near Windsor where King John of England capitulated to the barons’ demands and affixed his royal seal to the original document all those years ago.
The event... feature[d], among other things, a group of 500 American lawyers… a host of England’s foremost jurists and scholars and… Queen Elizabeth II, attending not on sufferance, but of her own free will…
But there are some legal scholars who believe that the charter is actually not such a big deal. Our adulation of it, they say, comes from what we believe it to have been in hindsight — not what it was at the time…
“The myth of Magna Carta lies at the whole origin of our perception of who we are as an English-speaking people, freedom-loving people who’ve lived with a degree of liberty and under a rule of law for 800 years,” said Nicholas Vincent, a professor at the University of East Anglia and the author of “Magna Carta: A Very Short Introduction.”
“It’s a load of tripe, of course. But it’s a very useful myth.”
For one thing, as Jill Lepore pointed out recently in The New Yorker, the original Magna Carta in fact lived a short life and died an obscure death.
It was not seen at the time as marking a great moment in democratic history. Nobody had a chance to follow any of its provisions. Almost immediately after agreeing to it, King John prevailed on the pope to annul it. (In an instance of, perhaps, poetic justice, John died of dysentery shortly afterward.)
Also, it was a narrowly fashioned agreement between a small group of privileged people and an even-more-privileged monarch; there was no mention of regular people or of democracy as we know it…
“It’s one of the many, many things in the Anglo-American legal tradition that will eventually grow and mutate and be misinterpreted as something that’s important,” Akhil Amar, a professor at Yale Law School…
“There’s no question that it’s had a substantial and enduring impact on the development of law in the United States of America,” said William C. Hubbard, president of the American Bar Association. “The idea that the law comes from the people, and it’s not the law of the king, is fundamental.”…
But as a sign of Magna Carta’s enduring relevance, a provision of the charter holding that, “To no one will we sell, to no one deny or delay right or justice,” was cited last month in a Supreme Court decision on judicial integrity. Upholding a Florida law that forbids judges to solicit campaign contributions, Chief Justice Roberts cited the relevant passage and wrote: “This principle dates back at least eight centuries to Magna Carta.”
“There you have it,” Mr. Hubbard said. “To think that those principles have survived 800 years gives me great hope for the future.”
Of course, there were souvenirs available at Runnymede yesterday:
What Monty Python can teach us about Magna Carta on its 800th birthday
"So on this 800th anniversary of Magna Carta we should remember that good things can happen for accidental reasons."
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The analyst, Ken Saro-Wiwa, is the son of an organizer of protests against the pollution of the petroleum industry in the Niger delta. The elder Saro-Wiwa was executed by the military government in 1995.
The younger Saro-Wiwa grew up in the UK and returned to Nigeria in 2005 as an adviser to former Nigerian President Obasanjo. He was subsequently an adviser to Presidents Yar'Adua and Jonathan.
Ken Saro-Wiwa offers some insightful observations to add to your textbook's description of the Nigerian presidency.
When President Muhammadu Buhari was sworn in as Nigeria’s 15th head of state last month, it was, as the saying goes, the beginning of an end and the end of a beginning. After a decade working as an aide to three presidents, it was time for me to move on just as my country is entering an exciting but critical period in its history.
For the last decade Nigeria has attracted some of the most bizarre and ugly headlines…
Throughout it all I have had front row seats in a drama that feels like a mash-up of Scandal, Game of Thrones and The Da Vinci Code. It was by turns much more exciting, more mundane and more instructive than I bargained for…
In the summer of 2006 I… headed straight to Aso Rock, Nigeria’s state house, revered, reviled and feared in Nigeria’s political lexicon as the Villa…
The Villa is one of the least known but most powerful institutions in the world. Nigeria’s constitution is configured to give the president more powers than any equivalent political office. Despite attempts to strike a balance between the legislature, judiciary and executive, the office of the president is primus inter pares. Part monarchy, part deity, head of state, commander-in-chief of the armed forces, dictator, godfather, Big Man – Nigeria’s chief executive can be anything he cares to be if he exercises the considerable powers vested in his office.
A rambling collection of arabesque and Mediterranean architecture, the Villa is a beehive of offices distributed off long corridors, palatial courtyards fringed by elegant arches with the imposing silence of the place punctuated by a soundtrack of fountains and peacocks. This is the backdrop to a world of high-level business and intense political intrigue, crude and subtle lobbying; it is a secretive place with evident rules of engagement and protocols where the institutional memory resides in the minds of its longest-serving occupants…
[T]he character and content of the presidency was formed and planned by Nigeria’s military rulers who… replicated the military command and control features of the presidency that survived the transition to democratic government in 1999. But this institution is being challenged by the rapidly changing nature of African society, which is, being driven and shaped by a devastating and disruptive combination of demography and technology.
As I watched and learned how to decipher the unspoken codes of a system rooted in secrecy and operated by back-channel activity, I would wonder if such a system could ever reinvent itself for an age that increasingly demands transparency and open government to meet the irreverent expectations and aspirations of a restful and youthful population…
Like much of Africa, Nigeria has a particularly pronounced youth bulge – 70% of the 180 million people are under 30…
Armed with new technologies and connected to communities and networks far beyond their local constituencies, Africa’s youth are finding new, exciting avenues for self-expression through music, fashion, film, television and even gaming culture…
This traffic in and out of Nigeria is creating new pathways, new trade routes. The superhighway will be as important as trains, planes and cars in growing the economy of the continent. In 2012 a study showed that, while only 15% of Nigeria’s internet population shopped online, that traffic was still equivalent to Kenya’s GDP…
These kinds of new businesses are redrawing the economic map. Nigeria’s next billionaires may not own a drop of oil; they will emerge from the marriage of convenience and convergence creating an exciting, complex image of the continent…
For now, though, we still have to reconcile the old with the new. Old Nigeria was founded and sustained by the demands and dictates of the oil industry. Oil remains the lifeblood of Nigeria: distribution, production and extraction of oil and other natural resources have determined and will continue to shape the story of Nigeria and of Africa in the short term…
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Maysam Behravesh is an Iranian doctoral student in Sweden. His insights into the political culture of Iran might be helpful. I wish I could ask him how much of the detail is vital to understanding the motivations of Iranian leaders. In any case, the next time you read about a speech by an Iranian leader, ask yourself how much gender assumptions play in his declarations.
‘Dignity’ has been an indispensible part of discussions in Iran over nuclear talks with world powers. “Iran, with millennia of history, will not be intimidated,” said Mohammad Javad Zarif, the foreign minister in late May, as he dismissed any solution that was “less than respectful, less than dignified”…
Often lurking within discussions about Iran’s prestige and international standing are terms carrying deep associations with gender. Potency, firmness and resistance are all perceived as masculine characteristics, hence embraced and affirmed, while weakness, flexibility and softness are all associated with femininity, therefore to be avoided and disowned.
The masculine thus constructed needs to protect the feminine in order to prove itself, and, at the same time, avoid being contaminated with feminine characteristics…
Framing the Iranian nuclear project in terms of namous helps construct an aura of sanctity and inviolability around it, meaning that any profane, penetrative or possessive treatment of it by outsiders can elicit a radical response.
In a television interview on 18 April, Brigadier General Hossein Salami, deputy head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards (IRGC), stressed that Tehran would respond with vigour to any attempt at visiting its military sites. “I believe that we will not only not allow foreign countries to visit our military centres, but we will not even allow any thought about this issue,” he said, likening such a visit by nuclear inspectors to “occupation of land” and “national humiliation”…
Closely allied with the concept of namous are two other highly gendered keywords, harim (sanctum) and gheirat (manly moral courage). As projected in the Iranian atomic discourse, military sites are nodes of national power and potency and therefore constitute an integral part of the nation’s harim, which should stay free from alien access and, worse still, inspections…
The resonance of this nationalist-paternalist discourse with conservatives and their constituencies has been shown in the formation of a gathering calling itself “We Won’t Allow”… which has organised demonstrations in several Iranian cities…
Such guardianship of the national sanctum, and its protection from insult and alien hands, is usually carried out through demonstrating gheirat: a type of virile moral courage with an occasional religious touch that is intended to guard namous or harim against external adulteration.
When flexibility (narmesh) and compromise (sazesh) – usually perceived as feminine characteristics – are to be exercised, they need to be “heroic” in order to compensate for the dilution of masculinity.
It took the supreme leader’s speech on “heroic flexibility” – with references to Imam Hassan, the 7th-century Shia leader who negotiated a peace treaty with the Sunni caliph Muawiyah – that paved the way for the Rouhani government to persist with the nuclear talks in the face of stiff opposition from ‘principle-ist’ critics of rapprochement with the west…
In a speech to Iranian ambassadors in August 2014, [Rouhani] called opponents of nuclear negotiations “political cowards”, literally the “chicken-hearted...[who]...say we are trembling as soon as the issue of talks comes up.”
It is clear that for many in the Iranian body politic - not least the leadership – the nuclear programme reeks of masculinity, and denuclearization raises fears of emasculation. But what is the relevance of all this, and how can an understanding of it help facilitate the nuclear negotiations in their most critical phase?
In a nutshell, Iran’s dignity is predominantly of a masculine nature. While this holds true of many other nation-states and their foreign policies, western negotiators will be well advised to take these nuances into account. The choice of terminology can be of paramount importance.
Indeed, the international controversy over Iran’s nuclear programme is, in a way, a clash of masculinities, caught up in an array of coercive instruments and escalatory policies like economic sanctions, sabotage and threats of military action. The bottom line is that negotiations and dialogue can rupture this vicious circle of confrontation and prevent it from degenerating into the most rabid exertion of masculinist power - war.
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An AP reporter has an analysis of the election results from Mexico. Keep track of these and see how they hold up. Note: items 3 and 5 on this list both involve Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and should not be surprising.
Here are five things to know about Mexico's midterm elections, seen as a referendum on President Enrique Pena Nieto's government halfway through his six-year mandate.
RULING PARTY TAKES CONGRESS…
THE "BRONCO" TAKES NORTHERN STATE…
LEFTIST OPPOSITION PARTY TAKES A BATH…
FROM THE SOCCER PITCH TO THE MAYOR'S OFFICE…
NEW KID ON THE BLOCK…
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I guess Washington Post London bureau chief Griff Witte was finally cornered by Jeremy Purvis and convinced to persuade his editors to publish this story on a Monday morning.
It raises interesting and long-standing questions about constitutional government and the UK's version of it. But it's not news. The question has been asked since at least the late 18th century.
The words of the Magna Carta have inspired democratic movements the world over and formed a basis for countless constitutions…
Yet somehow, despite birthing the principles of due process and equal rights under law, Britain never got around to codifying a constitution of its own…
Britain is one of just three major democracies that lack formal, written constitutions... [Israel and New Zealand are the others.]
Advocates of a written constitution say none of the big problems are likely to be solved unless Britain does what others accomplished long ago and goes through the difficult process of writing down some basic rules.
“We’ve got a long tradition of helping other countries do it, without recognizing that we need to do it ourselves,” said Jeremy Purvis, a member of the House of Lords who introduced a bill last week that, if passed, would trigger a constitutional convention. “But this is the moment.”…
In truth, Britain does have a constitution… Instead of one document that can be stuffed into a breast pocket or waved about by politicians for dramatic effect, the British constitution lies scattered across centuries’ worth of common law, acts of Parliament, treaty obligations and historical conventions…
The constitution issue has gained more prominence lately… The threat of Scottish independence is felt most acutely. The United Kingdom is not one nation, but four — Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland. For centuries, power has been monopolized in London, but demands are rising for control closer to home…
[Purvis'] bill may clear the House of Lords, but it is unlikely to pass the all-important House of Commons…
Britain’s system is sometimes referred to as an elected dictatorship because it lacks a true separation of powers…
Defenders of Britain’s traditional ways say there is good reason not to change what has worked for this country for ages. Philip Norton, a member of the House of Lords and a constitutional scholar, said that codifying the constitution would amount to fitting the country with “a straitjacket” when it needs to be flexible enough to evolve with changing times…
Anthony King, a University of Essex political scientist, said… “If you look at the people who drew up the American constitution, here was a group with outstanding intellectual capacity — James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, George Washington, George Mason,” he said. “You couldn’t replicate that in Britain in 2015 — probably not in most countries in 2015.”…
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In Mexico's elections for Congress, President Enrique Pena Nieto's Institutional Revolutionary Party and its allies look set to retain control.
On current projections, the PRI will win around 30% of the vote and see its number of seats drop slightly.
An independent candidate has won a state governorship for the first time since legal change allowed that…
The head of the National Electoral Institute, Lorenzo Cordova, said that the president's party and its allies look set to win between 246 and 263 seats in the 500-member lower chamber.
The opposition conservative National Action Party has won around 22% of the vote, he said…
Analysis by Katy Watson, BBC News, Mexico City
Ahead of the elections, there was a great deal of pessimism - the feeling among many that votes do not really matter, politicians here are all the same, and violence will continue no matter what.
But at a polling station on Sunday, in relatively peaceful Mexico City, there was a sense of duty among many - that voting was the only way to make a difference...
Despite President Pena Nieto's promises to restore peace in Mexico, these elections… have been some of the most violent in recent history…
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Political parties in Mexico all give gifts to potential voters. Usually it's things like t-shirts and school notebooks. In 2015, the gifts are televisions.
Isabel Valdez Rodríguez is expecting to pick up two free 24-inch digital televisions — one for herself; the other for her mother — courtesy of President Enrique Peña Nieto’s government.
Her windfall, just two coupons printed with a promise at this point, is part of the government’s effort to switch the country to digital television. To help Mexico’s poorest citizens keep pace with technology, officials are vowing to give away 10 million free televisions.
But here in Mexico’s most populous state, the handout has merged with something else: an election campaign.
While the government describes the television plan as the way to bring all Mexicans into the digital age, opposition parties on the left and the right call it old-fashioned vote buying.
On Sunday, Mexicans will vote in midterm elections that are widely seen as a referendum on Mr. Peña Nieto’s performance…
There are big issues at stake in this election, which will choose all 500 members of Mexico’s lower house of Congress and almost a third of the country’s governors, as well as mayors and legislatures in more than half of the states.
Mr. Peña Nieto needs a working majority in Congress to support a budget overhaul in response to falling oil revenues and to restart his stalled security proposals. A majority would also give his party control over writing the fine print of a new anticorruption system it supported reluctantly.
Polls show that more than half of Mexicans disapprove of the president’s job performance…
But the parties and their campaigns mostly gloss over the country’s pressing issues by competing to hand out gifts while making vague promises of jobs, security, education and social programs…
The campaign gifts are illegal in most cases, but subjected to fines or other sanctions only after complaints are lodged with the Electoral Institute. Because all the parties break the law, such complaints are rare.
Mexico’s elections are publicly financed, and parties receive free television and radio spots. Private donations are allowed, but they are capped, and there are limits on campaign spending…
Even so, private donations flow unchecked and spending often greatly exceeds the limits, with a variety of means used to avoid detection, said Luis Carlos Ugalde, a former president of the Electoral Institute…
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Austerity? Not here. Not in the UK. This is not Greece!
Neither the PM nor his allies nor his opponents nor The Guardian used the word austerity. But look what they're talking about: taxing welfare benefits.
David Cameron has declined to rule out cuts to disability benefits as part of George Osborne’s planned £12bn welfare savings to be outlined this year.
The prime minister, who confirmed to MPs that he stood by his commitment during the election campaign to maintain child benefit in its current form for the next five years, failed to give a similar commitment on disability payments…
The Conservatives were forced during the election campaign to deny they had plans to cut disability benefits after an internal Department for Work and Pensions document, which included proposals for a series of welfare cuts, was leaked to the BBC.
The emails suggested that civil servants, acting on instructions from the Conservatives, had drawn up proposals to tax disability benefits, saving £1.5bn a year. The BBC reported that civil servants were examining the possibility that disability living allowance, personal independence payments and attendance allowance (paid to pensioners over the age of 65 who have personal care needs) would no longer be paid tax free…
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