Research Articles
Permanent URI for this collection
Browse
Browsing Research Articles by Department "International Relations"
Now showing 1 - 9 of 9
Results Per Page
Sort Options
Publication Daring to Fail: Input-Oriented Voting under Supranational Policy Constraints(European Consortium for Political Research, 2023-08) Konstantinidis, Nikitas; Jurado, Ignacio; Dinas, Elias; Ministry of Economy, Industry andCompetitiveness of Spain; https://ror.org/02jjdwm75Recent literature argues that with ever-increasing levels of supranational constraints governments haveless ‘room to manoeuvre’; therefore, voters will place less weight on policy outcomes in their voting decisions. Thequestion that remains less explored is how voters fill this accountability gap. We argue that, in this context, votersmay move away from outcome- to input-oriented voting. Fulfilling their promises becomes less vital for incumbentsas long as they exhibit effort to overturn an unpopular policy framework. We test this argument against a surveyexperiment conducted in the run-up to the September 2015 election in Greece, where we find a positive impact ofthe incumbent’s exerted effort to challenge the status quo of austerity on vote intention for SYRIZA – the seniorcoalition government partner at the time – despite the failed outcome of the government’s bailout negotiationsPublication Enlarging the immunities of European parliament's members: The Junqueras judgment(Cambridge University Press, 2021) Torre de Silva, Víctor; Torre de Silva, Victor; https://ror.org/02jjdwm75Members of Parliament have traditionally enjoyed different kinds of immunities; nowadays,these are openly criticized on several grounds. The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has recently given a judgment on the inviolability of European Parliament's members,which might be regarded as a milestone in its scarce case law on the matter: Oriol Junqueras Vies,Judgment of the Grand Chamber of December 19,2019. This Article intends to summarize and comment on this decision,a preliminary reference requested by the Spanish Supreme Court in a notorious criminal procedure,connected with the suspended referendum on Catalonia's independence. The CJEU reinforces the inviolability of Members of European Parliament (MEPs),thus strengthening the powers of this institution. However,the judgment perhaps fails to fully capture European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) case law and was rendered at a time when the controversy on Mr. Junqueras had arguably become outdated. © The Author(s) 2021.Publication Is There a War Party? Party Change, the Left–Right Divide, and International Conflict(Sage, 2018-05-09) Bertoli, Andrew; Dafoe, Allan; Trager, Robert ; https://ror.org/02jjdwm75Are leaders from certain parties particularly likely to engage in military conflict? This question is difficult to answer because of selection bias. For example, countries may be more likely to elect right-wing leaders if their publics are more hawkish or if the international system is particularly dangerous. Put simply, who comes to power is not random, which makes causal inference difficult. We overcome this problem by using a regression discontinuity design. Specifically, we look at close presidential elections that were essentially “tossups” between two candidates. We find that electing right-wing candidates increases state aggression. We also find that electing candidates from challenger parties makes countries much more likely to initiate military disputes, particularly in the first year of the new leader’s term. This result is consistent with other studies that find that the likelihood of state aggression increases following major leadership transitions.Publication Leader age and international conflict: A regression discontinuity analysis(Sage, 2023-12-07) Bertoli, Andrew; Dafoe, Allan; Trager, Robert ; University of California; Charles Koch Foundation; https://ror.org/02jjdwm75Does leader age matter for the likelihood of interstate conflict? Many studies in biology, psychology, and physiology have found that aggression tends to decline with age throughout the adult lifespan, particularly in males. Moreover, a number of major international conflicts have been attributed to young leaders, including the conquests of Alexander the Great and the ambitious military campaigns of Napoleon. However, the exact nature of the relationship between leader age and international conflict has been difficult to study because of the endogeneity problem. Leaders do not come to power randomly. Rather, many domestic and international factors influence who becomes the leader of a country, and some of these factors could correlate with the chances of interstate conflict. For instance, wary democratic publics might favor older leaders when future international conflict seems likely, inducing a relationship between older leaders and interstate conflict. This article overcomes such confounding by using a regression discontinuity design. Specifically, it looks at close elections of national leaders who had large differences in age. It finds that when older candidates barely defeated younger ones, countries were much less likely to engage in military conflict. Its sample is also fairly representative of democracies more broadly, meaning that the findings likely hold true for cases outside the sample. The results demonstrate the important role that individuals play in shaping world politics. They also illustrate the value of design-based inference for learning about important questions in the study of international relations and peace science.Publication New chimeras and old victimism: Italy’s foreign policy (2008-2018)(Centro Estudios Politicos Constitucionales, 2020) Testoni, Michele; https://ror.org/02jjdwm75The article aims to analyze Italy’s foreign policy in the 2008-2018 decade,stressing both its elements of change and its factors of persistence. In this period,Italian politics has undergone a profound,and still unfinished,transformation: from a second republic —a majoritarian democracy dominated by the controversial figure of Silvio Berlusconi— to a third republic,distinguished by the rise of populist,anti-systemic and anti-globalist forces such as the Five Stars Movement and the Northern League. Therefore,one of the most important,and interesting,questions is what kind of relationship exists between the new mechanics of Italy’s political system and the country’s international action. Since any process of change is characterized by the complex and simultaneous interaction of aspects of novelty and continuity,what are the main innovations of Italy’s foreign policy? Above all,what results,in material and symbolic terms,has it achieved? This paper seeks to demonstrate that Italy’s recent foreign relations can be defined by two general phenomena. Firstly,the reap-pearance of two recurring patterns of its diplomatic history: a feeling of frustration in relation to its major allies and the ambition to go back to a policy of «decisive weight» (peso determinante) in the European and the Mediterranean chessboards. Secondly,the permanence of a condition of institutional weakness and unresolved incoherence between the rank and the role of the country in the international arena,a fact that unites both the elites and the public opinion. The conclusion that can be drawn is that,as a consequence of the current process of social fragmentation and polarization,Italy’s foreign policy between 2008 and 2018 has expanded —and not reduced— its characteristics of inadequacy and volatility,thus amplifying its structural ineffective-ness. © 2020,Centro Estudios Politicos Constitucionales. All rights reserved.Publication Rebel Strategies and the Prospects for Peace(Wiley, 2022-01-19) Qiu, Xiaoyan (Christy); https://ror.org/02jjdwm75Prominent formal theories of conflict provide considerable insight into how civil wars begin and end, but offer little understanding of how they proceed during wartime. One prevalent pattern is that rebel strategies vary significantly within conflicts over time, from guerrilla to conventional tactics. Why do rebels switch between different fighting strategies? How does the transition affect civil war negotiations? I develop a model of rebel–government negotiation in which rebels choose fighting strategies throughout a multiperiod war. The analysis shows that rebels switch from guerrilla to conventional tactics after gaining strength, and the expectation of growth delays rebels' transition to conventional fighting. The potential switch between different fighting strategies hurts the prospects for peace and prolongs civil wars. I identify the generic conditions under which peace is infeasible, no matter how belligerents negotiate. These conditions characterize the incipient stages of many rebellions, thereby explaining the lack of serious negotiations early on.Publication State Support for Rebels and Interstate Bargaining(Wiley, 2022-10-20) Qiu, Xiaoyan (Christy); https://ror.org/02jjdwm75Since the end of World War II, leaders have frequently supported rebel groups in other countries as a coercive strategy in international disputes. However, the strategic rationale by which rebel groups gain international support is non-obvious. Many recipient groups are too weak to viably win and are hostile to the sponsoring state's goals. Using a formal model, I explain that the fundamental objective of transnational rebel support is to gain bargaining leverage against a rival state by depleting its resources to counter internal and external challenges. This subversive effect provides a sufficient incentive for sponsoring the rebels even when favourable conditions suggested by previous studies are absent. Sponsoring rebels is attractive even if conventional warfare is not comparatively costly and even if rebel and sponsor preferences diverge. Moreover, given the goal of destabilizing rival regimes, potential sponsors prefer to support weaker rebel groups and provide more support to them.Publication Sustainable Tourism Social and Institutional Innovation—The Paradox of Dark Sky in Astrotourism(MDPI, 2022) Escario Sierra, Francisco; Álvarez Alonso, César; Moseñe Fierro, José Antonio; Sanagustín Fons, María Victoria; Agencia Estatal de Investigación; https://ror.org/02jjdwm75Astrotourism is an emerging type of sustainable tourism based on the observation of the dark sky,free of light pollution,and of all the experiences that have developed around it. The views and perceptions of the main social actors and their constellations and interactions are considered. Both the public decision-makers concerning astrotourism and the civil society involved were analysed in this research through a case study in Aragon,an inland Spanish region. New institutionalism in sociology based on the actors provides a coherent structural framework and explanation of the most relevant aspects in astrotourism in Aragon as well as help to understand the social and institutional innovation,in the sense that civil society has organised itself for many years to show and bring astronomy closer to the social majority; in light of this social reality,institutions have had to respond appropriately,taking and allowing for the participation of astronomical associations,in order to develop tourist experiences in relation to the appropriate dissemination of this science. Even more so,we studied the socioeconomic dynamics and territorial impacts. Thanks to the application of a qualitative method,specifically,semi-structured interviews with relevant informants in the territory,we discovered a hidden relevant social situation around astrotourism. Is the so called “paradox of dark sky” that emerges in communities where social welfare gains such as widespread access to artificial light are jeopardised by a new collective approach to artificial light control and light pollution that prevents high-impact emotional experiences around the dark sky,but takes into account that astrotourism is an opportunity for the endogenous and sustainable socioeconomic development of these forgotten areas. © 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI,Basel,Switzerland.Publication "Take back control"? The effects of supranational integration on party-system polarization(Springer, 2019-05-10) Matakos, Konstantinos; Mutlu Eren, Hande; Konstantinidis, Nikitas; https://ror.org/02jjdwm75In this paper, we examine the relationship between supranational integration and domestic party-system polarization (extremism). We first construct a theoretical argument that uncovers the key trade-off between the “output legitimacy” of a supranationally integrated party system and the inevitable loss of “input legitimacy” caused by externally imposed policy constraints. This translates into a strategic tradeoff between responsibility and responsiveness at the party level of electoral competition. We hypothesize that while moderate supranational policy constraints can initially speed-up platform convergence, ever-closer political integration may reverse the trend towards higher levels of party-system polarization and party extremism.We apply our framework to the case of EU integration and test our key non-monotonic prediction both at the party-system level of polarization and at the party level of ideological extremism. Finally, we apply to synthetic control method (SCM) for causal inference in comparative case studies to study how political integration and supranational policy constraints have affected their overall level of party-system polarization over time. Our overall empirical analysis strongly corroborates our theoretical argument.