Although episodic volunteering is a popular form of volunteering and has received increasing attention from researchers, the motives and characteristics of episodic volunteers in different industries or types of events remain underresearched, especially in the context of cultural events. This study is based on a sample of more than 2000 episodic volunteers and analyzes demographic characteristics, motives, and volunteer experience of cultural event volunteers by applying between and within analysis. The between analysis compares cultural and social event volunteers and finds that cultural event volunteers show higher time engagement but are more self-serving in their motives. The within analysis emphasizes intrinsic motives over extrinsic motives, leading to the conclusion that saturation of extrinsic motives reduces willingness for future engagements.

This article argues that the duties to protest and to listen to protest are central democratic obligations required for active citizenship. Section 1 sketches protest as communicative resistance. Section 2 argues that we always have a duty to listen to felicitous protests against injustice and that, under conditions of social uprising, we also have a duty to protest. Section 3 defends a view of protest participation that takes into account subjects’ positionality with respect to the injustice being protested, arguing for the special prerogatives of victims and the duties to defer and yield of non-victims within protest movements. Finally, Section 4 elucidates the notion of giving proper uptake to protest and what I call echoing a protest, that is, expressing communicative solidarity with that protest.

In some countries, direct democracy is used successfully to increase legitimacy of decisions or mitigate conflict, and in other countries, authoritarian leaders seem to instrumentalize and manipulate referendums. How can referendum integrity be analyzed? This article presents an empirical instrument to evaluate the variety and integrity of referendums. This encompasses criteria for the analysis of direct democracy. First, we develop a referendum cycle model based on the electoral cycle framework, assessing referendum quality in a number of dimensions from electoral laws and electoral procedures, thematic limitations of referendums, to voter registration, the initiation of referendums, campaign and media coverage as well as campaign financing. The empirical instrument is designed to be used in expert surveys, and piloted in the Turkish constitutional referendum of 2017. The article presents the results of the pilot study, draws out opportunities and limitations of this approach and suggests avenues for its future development.

Dynamic capability research increasingly seeks to identify mechanisms founding dynamic capabilities because this microfoundation provides options for influencing the application of dynamic capabilities. Dynamic capabilities in turn support organizations to achieve continuous organizational change. We pursue deeper insight into the microfounding mechanisms of dynamic capabilities with regard to management-related variables. Survey data from hot spots of refugee crisis 2016 all across Austria allow us to examine how managerial mechanisms on microlevel and dynamic capabilities on macro-level are linked and particularly how managers can influence the application of dynamic capabilities. Data evaluation is based on mediation analysis. Study reveals that participative leadership fosters dynamic capabilities of NPOs active in refugee aid. Further, we provide evidence that the manager´s perception, how self-determined he/she is and how impactful his/her actions are, enhances the application of dynamic capabilities.

Stress in Gujarati (Indo-Aryan, India and Pakistan) has been alternately claimed to be strictly positional or sensitive to vowel sonority. The latter analyses figure prominently in arguments for scalar markedness constraints (de Lacy 2002, 2006). This study presents acoustic measures and speaker intuitions to evaluate both the positional and sonority-driven stress hypotheses. The acoustic results support weakly cued positional stress, though speaker intuitions for primary stress placement were inconsistent. This replicates Shih's (2018) negative findings, and indicates that Gujarati stress should not figure in discussions of sonority-driven stress or associated theoretical proposals.

Recent scholarship on diaspora engagement and transnational repression has investigated how authoritarian regimes seek to engage, govern and control their diasporas. Recognizing that diasporas are diverse and that homeland states thus devise different strategies in relation to different groups, this research has—to a large extent—focused on the varied positions held by regime supporters and dissidents. Inter-generational differences, however, have not been studied in this context. Drawing on established frameworks theorizing extraterritorial authoritarian practices, this article explores the ways in which second-generation diaspora—or diaspora youth—is either included as subjects, patriots and clients, or excluded as outlaws and traitors by authoritarian regimes. Drawing on the literature on transnationalism and second-generation migrants, and using examples from empirical cases, we argue that the skills, resources and multi-sited embeddedness of the second-generation diaspora can make them particularly interesting targets for transnational engagement—or repression. We draw attention to specific strategies for mobilizing the support of diaspora youth, but also note that some techniques to control or repress extraterritorial subjects are less efficacious in relation to this generation.

Jacques Rancière's discussion of disidentification provides an important account of how existing inegalitarian structures and hierarchically ordered identities may be challenged. However, Rancière treats disidentification as a discursive phenomenon, centered on naming. As an explanation of how the invisible might become visible, it is problematic to overlook the body, since appearance requires our bodies to be seen, to become visible. Drawing on discussions of the subject-in-process and the idea of identity as both enfleshed and performatively constituted, this article seeks to enrich Rancière's discussion of disidentification by focusing attention on its embodied dimensions. It does so by exploring, through an analysis of the Miss America protest of 1968, the role of corporeality both in constituting spaces of appearance and in articulating democratic demands for visibility.

Sue Donaldson, Janneke Vink, and Jean-Paul Gagnon discuss the problem of anthropocentric democratic theory and the preconditions needed to realize a (corrective) interspecies democracy. Donaldson proposes the formal involvement of nonhuman animals in political institutions—a revolutionary task; Vink argues for changes to the law that would cover nonhuman animals with inviolable political rights; and Gagnon advises a personal change to dietary choices (veganism) and ethical orientations (do no harm). Together, the three proposals point to a future position where humans can participate in a multispecies world in which nonhuman others are freed from our tyrannical grasp.

This article investigates the impact of electoral reforms on entry barriers in political markets. The discussion starts by delineating the theoretical boundaries of various political markets, such as those for participation, parties and government. By taking a cue from industrial organisation theory, the article offers an analysis of entry barriers, both hard and soft, along with their operationalisation for empirical research. Based on this theoretical framework, a single hypothesis is investigated. It posits that the modification of the entry barriers in the market for parties leads to changes in the concentration of the popular vote for party lists. An observable implication of this relationship would be if an electoral reform that raises entry barriers led to subsequent increases in the Herfindahl index (a measure of market concentration), and vice versa. This proposition is empirically tested by a comparative analysis of a new database covering Czechia, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia. The analysis offers support for the following proposition: in most cases the changes in the entry barriers led to a corresponding change of concentration in the market for parties.

In the light of the climate crisis, ‘green transitions’ are inevitable to address the environmental harm caused by fossil capitalism. The article argues that the pathway of such green transitions is closely interrelated with welfare setups, as the answer to the questions ‘who wins, who loses; who supports, who opposes the green transition—and why?’ is strongly dependent on the welfare setup of a given economy. The welfare state not only stabilises the economy, prevents deprivation and balances class interests, it also structures interest constellations, material living conditions, and cultural lifestyles. Hence, which ‘green social risks’ need to be addressed, which social groups will seek to have a voice in a green transition, which transition routes are seen as legitimate, and which societal cleavages emerge around the transition—all these factors are shaped by the welfare setup of a country. Drawing on comparative welfare state theory, the article provides an analytical starting point for considering country-specific factors of green transitions and thus, outlines the potential of this political science research strand for debates on eco-social policy, politics, and polity.

This paper deals with the question: To what extent do individual religious characteristics, in addition to collective religious characteristics, contribute to the explanation of formal and informal volunteering in the Netherlands at the beginning of the 21st century? To answer this research question, we used the SOCON 2005–2006 dataset. Our main finding concerns informal volunteering: we found that spirituality increases the likelihood of informal volunteering, implying that openness to other people’s needs increases the likelihood of the actual provision of help. There are no other aspects of religiosity that are related to informal volunteering. With regard to formal volunteering we found that, in line with previous research, religious attendance is related positively to formal volunteering, religious as well as secular volunteering, which can be regarded as support for the proposition that religious involvement is important for norm conformity. Further, having a more religious worldview decreases the likelihood of formal volunteering which might show that those with a strong religious worldview are more concerned with the ‘otherworldly’ and less so with what they do in this world. We found no influence of individual religious characteristics on formal volunteering. These results confirm the idea that integration into a religious community plays quite a large role in explaining formal volunteering. Informal volunteering, however, seems to be independent of social networks: it rather depends on individual motivation.

This article outlines a theoretical framework for interpreting the meaning and function of political protest in modern democracies and develops normative criteria for assessing its democratic quality. To allow for a better understanding of how social structures, legal institutions, and political engagement interact in protest, I combine analytical perspectives from social theory and democratic theory. A useful first distinction, I argue, is between reformist and transformative forms of protest. While reformist protest does not challenge the given framework of the modern democratic order, transformative protest politicizes the basic principles of that order. Finally, I develop four criteria to identify emancipatory traits within protest movements: 1) expanding the circle of those who benefit from the fulfillment of democracy's promises; 2) the establishment of discursive democratic spaces; 3) a balance between dramatization and exchange; and 4) a willingness to become someone else.

This study investigates a discourse about billionaire philanthropy established in letters submitted by 187 of 209 signatories of the Giving Pledge. The philanthropy of the wealthy is gaining increasing public attention and is subject to growing criticism, which demands additional study of how the wealthy collectively explain their generosity. The mixed-method analysis finds a strong emphasis on education and health causes and identifies two distinct and coherent rationales for being generous. The majority of letters express a social–normative rationale, consisting of two prevailing explanations: an expressed gratitude and desire to “give back” (1) and references to family upbringing as a socializing force (2). A minority of letters articulate a personal–consequentialist rationale, highlighting three separate explanations: a large inheritance may harm offspring (1), giving as personal gratification (2), and an acknowledgment of excess wealth with no better use (3). An expressed desire to have impact and make a difference appears in both rationales. The overall dominance of a social–normative rationale projects a discourse emphasizing benevolence as well as a narrative in which billionaires are an exceptionally productive and grateful subset of society. While previous studies have primarily focused on identifying individual psychological motives, this study shows how the Giving Pledge letters reflect a philanthropic discourse among the wealthy going back to Andrew Carnegie’s Gospel of Wealth.

Volunteer rates vary greatly across Europe despite the voluntary sector’s common history and tradition. This contribution advances a theoretical explanation for the variation in volunteering across Europe—the capability approach—and tests this approach by adopting a two-step strategy for modeling contextual effects. This approach, referring to the concept of capability introduced by Sen (Choice, welfare and measurement, Oxford University Press, 1980/1982), is based on the claim that the demand and supply sides of the voluntary sector can be expected to vary according to collective and individual capabilities to engage in volunteering. To empirically test the approach, the study relied on two data sources—the 2015 European Union (EU) Survey on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC), including an ad hoc module on volunteering at the individual level, and the Quality of Government Institute and PEW Research Center macro-level data sets—to operationalize economic, human, political, social, and religious contextual factors and assess their effects on individuals’ capability to volunteer. The results support the capability hypothesis at both levels. At the individual level, indicators of human, economic, and social resources have a positive effect on the likelihood of volunteering. At the contextual level, macro-structural indicators of economic, political, social, and religious contexts affect individuals’ ability to transform resources into functioning—that is, volunteering.

Echoing the call for ‘no taxation without representation’, the development of modern taxation went hand‐in‐hand with Western democratisation. However, taxation appears to have lost its role in the third wave of democratisation. Unlike early democratisers, contemporary autocracies tend to introduce a ready‐made modern taxation system before democratisation. With advice from international organisations, the value added tax (VAT), which mature democracies innovated, has been adopted for economic adjustment and development in globalised markets. Despite these divergences, it is argued in this article that a fundamental relationship between taxation and representation remains. Taxation inherently involves a social contract between revenue‐seeking rulers and citizens, and thus involves their bargaining over representation. Therefore, the production of state revenue intervenes in contemporary democratisation as well. By factoring in the effect of the VAT in 143 developing countries between 1960 and 2007, an entropy‐balancing analysis has confirmed its important role in contemporary democratisation. The taxation‐democratisation linkage has travelled from early to contemporary democratisation.

This article reframes the traditional view of Persian rhetoric as merely a derivative of Arabic tradition by examining its development through four key manuals: Muhammad ibn ʿUmar Rādūyānī’s Tarjumān al-Balāgha, Rashīd al-Dīn Vatvāt’s Hadāʾiq al-Sihr, Shams-i Qays-i Rāzī’s al-Muʿjam, and Sayf-i Jām-i Hiravī’s Jāmiʿ al-Sanāyiʿ. It is an exploration of the historical and cultural contexts in which these works were composed, highlighting how Persian rhetoricians adapted and reshaped Arabic models as part of a broader movement toward literary autonomy. By foregrounding these dynamics, the article offers a fresh perspective on the reciprocal relationship between Arabic and Persian rhetorical traditions. Particular attention is given to Tarjumān al-Balāgha as a seminal effort to Persianize rhetorical tradition, in which Rādūyānī adapts and reconfigures Arabic concepts to lay the groundwork for a distinct Persian literary identity, and to Jāmiʿ al-Sanāyiʿ, which subsequently consolidates this project into a coherent and comprehensive Persian framework. Together, these works mark pivotal moments in the trajectory of Persian rhetorical thought and reflect broader cultural and intellectual currents in the medieval Islamicate world.

Previous research has shown that experiential knowledge plays an important role for service user movements and has also discussed ambiguities in the definition of this type of knowledge. This study contributes to clarifying how experiential knowledge is understood within the service user movement. Through semi-structured interviews, it explores how Swedish mental health service user organisations (MHSUOs) and service user entrepreneurs (SUEs) regard the role of experiential knowledge for their endeavours. The study shows that SUEs and MHSUOs view experiential knowledge as complementary to established medical and expert knowledge. Both groups further reflect on the functions of individual and collective dimensions of experiential knowledge. Emotions are important in conveying experiential knowledge, although emotional commitment can be short-lived. The study discusses challenges for SUEs and MHSUOs in developing strategies to manage risks tied to strategic essentialism, and also in maintaining a critical standpoint towards established service providers.

The same linguistic data can often be analyzed in multiple ways, using different theoretical assumptions. Systematic comparison of the competing analyses requires understanding how the theories give rise to them, and the consequences and predictions implied by each set of assumptions. In this paper, we compare two theories of segmental harmony: Agreement-by-Correspondence (ABC) (Rose & Walker 2004; Hansson 2010; Bennett 2015), and Agreement-by-Projection (ABP) (Hansson 2014). We analyze typologies in each through Property Theory (Alber, DelBusso & Prince 2016; Alber & Prince 2016, in prep.). Typological analysis shows the strong parallelism between the different proposals at both the extensional and intensional levels. Not only do both theories predict the same set of surface distinct languages, but these follow from a similar internal structure. We show how the ABP proposal formally combines two ABC constraints, collapsing the ABC typology along the correspondence/non- correspondence dimension.

Most citizens of representative democracies do not take political decisions in their everyday lives. Although participation in periodic elections, political parties, or social movements varies, above all, according to socio-economic status, taking a political decision is, in general, a relatively extraordinary event for the vast majority of citizens. The everyday political experience of these citizens is rather structured by watching and listening to political elites. Unlike the tenor of democratic theory, this quotidian mode of passively following politics is ocular democracy's starting point. So far, the debate on ocular democracy has emphasized its shortcomings as a normative theory. Notwithstanding these shortcomings, this article illustrates the potential of ocular democracy as an analytical tool in the context of intra-party democracy. Podemos’ intra-party procedures are analyzed by complementing an institutional perspective with ocular democracy, thus showing how a party leader inclined to appear particularly venturesome undermines ambitious forms of intra-party democracy.