Segnalazione bibliografica. Autore: Jason Ross Arnold Acta Politica 47, 67-90 (January 2012) Abstract Social scientists have demonstrated how transparency and democratic accountability can help control political corruption. Whereas this research has had much to say about how an open media environment produces constraints on politicians, the problem of how a politically ignorant public can enforce accountability has received much less attention. In this article, I argue that effective citizen monitoring of government officials depends on accurate corruption perceptions, which depends on the degree to which citizens are politically informed. An analysis of 10 Latin American countries with varied levels of corruption shows that...

Segnalazione bibliografica. Acta Politca (April 2011), n.46: pp. 158-179 Autori: Carlo Ruzza, Stefano Fella Abstract This paper documents and analyses how populist discourse was used in very different ways by political entrepreneurs of the Italian right, leading to three specific manifestations. The empirical range of populist ideologies is identified through a frame analysis of party materials and connected to the varying political and cultural opportunities of different kinds of parties. However, it is argued that at the same time a common reliance on some common populist tenets constituted an innovative strategy of the Italian right, and that as an ideology one of...

This paper explores the role played by job precariousness in political orientations, and examines the extent to which job precariousness could represent a new political division in Italian society. We have investigated the explanatory role of job precariousness for political orientations and analysed its interaction with the declining traditional cleavages (territory, class, religion). Based on a national sample of 15,000 workers, our results provide some evidence that job precariousness is a social variable exerting a significant impact on political orientations. Furthermore, we found that different conditions of job precariousness, such as temporary work and unemployment, affect political attitudes in different ways. Finally, our evidence suggests that the relationship between job precariousness and political orientations is significantly influenced by territory and class.

Birch, S. (2012). Daniel Bochsler, Territory and electoral rules in post-communist democracies, reviewed by Sarah Birch. Party Politics, 19(1), 167–167. http://doi.org/10.1177/1354068812465706 Vai al sito web

Come vedono i toscani la politica? Che rapporto hanno con essa? C'è qualcosa di diverso rispetto alla «subcultura rossa» della Prima Repubblica? Da questa ricerca, commissionata dalla Regione Toscana e condotta dal Centro Italiano Studi Elettorali con un approccio misto, quantitativo e qualitativo, emergono risposte articolate. Da un lato, è viva e in salute la partecipazione associativa, espressione di una tradizione che viene da lontano. Dall'altro, emerge invece un declino della partecipazione politica, assieme a elementi di tensione nel rapporto tra cittadini, partiti e istituzioni. Segni inevitabili del grande cambiamento simbolico e organizzativo che ha investito i partiti...