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Local governance has become a subject of particular interest, even in the context of globalization. As a bottom-up strategy, it aims is to increase the opportunities for civil society to engage in affairs of their own. As a top-down strategy, it wants to mobilize all endogenous potential available to improve political steering capacity. This book examines the theoretical approaches towards citizens' participation and provides case studies that indicate a varied menu of contemporary local democracies, urban and regional governance in Europe (Germany, Sweden, and Italy), Asia (Korea and Taiwan) and the US. (Series: Politikwissenschaft - Vol. 172)
With this book we aim at describing and analysing the selection, daily life, networks and values of local top political leaders in seventeen European countries. The empirical nourishment to the investigation into town halls across Europe is a survey conducted in 2003 with mayors and corresponding top local political leaders. The data covering responses from 2700 leaders is a unique and rich material allowing descriptions and analyses pursuing a number of lines of inquiry.
Marion Reiser, Everhard Holtmann Local independent lists as political actors are a common phenomenon on the local level in many European countries – in established Western democracies as well as in the ‘new’ democracies in Central and Eastern Europe. In some West European countries, these non-partisan groups have been an established and stable element in the local political system for decades. Ty- cally, they understand themselves as protectors of a harmonious factual political style. In their opinion, good local politics is not compatible with party politics so they consequently perceive themselves as non-parties. During the last two d- ades, presence and success of local lists have s...
The book analyses how political parties compete and strategise on the issue of territorial reform using case-studies that include countries from both Western (Belgium, Germany, Italy and Spain) and Central-Eastern Europe (Poland, Slovakia and Romania). Each case-study considers different drivers of decentralization, such as territorial identities and the demands of regionalist parties for territorial autonomy or independence, efficiency concerns related to issues of uneven economic development and economic competitiveness, the pressure from supra-national organizations (especially the EU), as well as different combinations of these drivers. They also consider how the ideology and organisation of state-wide parties and the institutional context in which they compete shape their responses to these drivers and their strategy towards the question of territorial reform. This collection investigates the logic of the actions that guide political parties’ strategy to highlight trends that are apparent across the case-studies. This book was originally published as a special issue of West European Politics.
The Oxford Handbook of Urban Politics is an authoritative volume on an established subject in political science and the academy more generally: urban politics and urban studies. The editors are all recognized experts, and are well connected to the leading scholars in urban politics. The handbook covers the major themes that animate the subfield: the politics of space and place; power and governance; urban policy; urban social organization; citizenship and democratic governance; representation and institutions; approaches and methodology; and the future of urban politics. Given the caliber of the editors and proposed contributors, the volume sets the intellectual agenda for years to come.
For many years, the fields of citizenship education and participatory democracy have often operated independently from each other. During the last decade, the Transformative Learning Centre of the University of Toronto has nurtured multiple spaces for an interdisciplinary dialogue among scholars, practitioners and students from these two fields. One of those spaces was the Second International Conference on Citizenship Learning and Participatory Democracy, where close to 300 participants from all over the world shared ideas in more than 150 sessions, including discussions, round-tables, workshops and keynote addresses. This volume brings together a selected collection from the many papers su...
Since the Industrial Revolution, cities and industry have grown together; towns and metropolitan regions have evolved around factories and expanding industries. New Industrial Urbanism explores the evolving and future relationships between cities and places of production, focusing on the spatial implications and physical design of integrating contemporary manufacturing into the city. The book examines recent developments that have led to dramatic shifts in the manufacturing sector – from large-scale mass production methods to small-scale distributed systems; from polluting and consumptive production methods to a cleaner and more sustainable process; from broad demand for unskilled labor to...
Councillors are the essence of local representative democracy, linking ordinary citizens and decision-makers in municipal arenas. In cross-national perspective, and taking in countries from across Europe, this book analyses the recruitment patterns, career, party associations, role perceptions, and attitudes to democracy, representation, and participation of local councillors. Matters such as gender, parties, institutions, municipal reform, functions in governance networks, and councillor influence are considered using data collected in an international survey, covering some 12,000 members of the local political elite. Drawing on diverse and eclectic literature, the contributions in this volume comprise a comprehensive and revealing analysis of modern councillors.
When fellow countrymen win a medal at an international sports event the whole spectrum of positive and negative emotions is expressed, by athletes, spectators, even by the strongest sports-critics and sports-indifferent people. There are winners and losers, fans for and against, sadness and disillusionment, abuse and injustice, grief and pain but there is also fair play, empathy, integrity, joy and optimism. In this essay, I write about abuses, dangers and challenges in sport, what causes them and how we can manage them, but also about how we can better realise the positive potential of sport in the 21e century context. We can do better… Much better! In 2004, Panathlon’s “Declaration o...
The Oxford Handbook of Danish Politics provides the most comprehensive and thorough English language book on Danish politics ever written. It features chapters by 50 leading experts who have contributed extensively to the field they write about. Why is Denmark an interesting topic for a Handbook? In some respects, Danish political institutions and political life are very similar to that of other small, North European countries such as the other Scandinavian countries and Netherland. However, in other respects, Danish politics is interesting in its own right. For instance, Denmark has a world record in minority governments. According to standard scholarly knowledge, this should result in unst...