In this paper we argue for a surprising similarity between the kinds of roles notation plays in music and in mathematics. We argue that in both cases the notation is doing more than merely documenting something that we have an independent grip on – either a musical performance/composition or a mathematical structure. In both instances, the notation can lead to new innovations, it can help in abstracting away from distracting details and it can facilitate explanations. In light of these functions, we argue that both musical and mathematical notations serve as models of the intended targets: musical and mathematical structures. Seen in this light, developing, and reflecting upon, notation is central to both musical and mathematical practice and is deserving of greater philosophical attention.

Much has been written over the past decade about the rise and success of far-right parties as key actors of dissensus over liberal democracy. Less attention, however, has been devoted to similar transformations taking place within civil society. This article examines the role played by think tanks in Poland and Hungary in building a new illiberal field. Drawing on Gramsci’s concept of cultural hegemony and Bourdieu’s notion of cultural capital, we theorize four core functions performed by illiberal think tanks: mediating, building, disseminating, and legitimizing this emerging field. Using Twitter data, we analyze how these illiberal think tanks operate as crucial nodes in connecting national, European, and American intellectuals and actors. Through their work and accumulation of cultural and academic capital, they contribute to fostering dissensus over liberal democracy in Central and Eastern Europe and beyond.

Institutions—defined as strategies, norms and rules (Ostrom Understanding institutional diversity, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 2005)—are omnipresent in third sector contexts. In this paper, we present the Institutional Grammar (IG) as a theoretically informed approach to support institutional analysis in third sector research. More specifically, the IG coding syntax allows the researcher to systematically wade through rich text and (transcribed) spoken language to identify and dissect institutional statements into finer syntactical segments of interest to the researcher. It is a versatile method that can generate data for small- or large-N research projects and can be integrated with mixed-method research designs. After first introducing and describing the IG, we present a case study to illustrate how a IG-based syntactic analysis can be leveraged to inform third sector research. In the case, we ask: Do the rules embedded in regulatory text addressing the involuntary dissolution of charity organizations differ between bifurcated and unitary jurisdictions in the United States? Using IG’s ABDICO 2.0 syntax, we identify eleven “Activation Condition” (AC) categories that trigger action and assess variation among the 46 jurisdictions. We ultimately conclude that the rules do not differ between bifurcated and unitary jurisdictions, but that finding is not the primary concern. The case demonstrates IG as an important methodological advance that yields granular, structured analyses of rules, norms and strategies in third sector settings that may be difficult to identify with other methods. We then emphasize four areas of third sector research that could benefit from the addition of IG-based methods: analysis of (1) rule compliance, (2) inter-organizational collaboration, (3) comparative study of institutional design, and (4) the study of institutional change. We close the paper with some reflections on where IG-based analysis is headed.

Time is not the first concept that comes to mind when we think about democracy. Yet, every notion of the “political” is based on a specific perception of time. While institutionalized democracies are legitimized by a time that appears as objective and linear, more radical approaches to democracy rely on specific “political” times. Drawing on Claude Lefort, Gilles Deleuze, and Félix Guattari, I argue that there are two logics of time that lead to very different political potentials: With Lefort, constant struggles leading to the production of a linear time appear as the political; Deleuze and Guattari emphasize the political potential of queer times that escape any pregiven identity, subjectivity, and linearity. If we conceive of democracy as the structure that realizes the political, the question of time becomes crucial to understand its meanings.

Older adults have long been considered critical actors in developing and implementing age-friendly community (AFC) initiatives. However, there has been limited empirical research on the ways they advance AFC implementation, especially in terms of their participation through AFC leadership roles (e.g. committee chairs, work group members). This study addresses this critical gap by exploring the functions that older adults exhibit in AFC implementation in the United States – namely, the underlying purposes and processes operating through their implementation actions. As one of the few studies exploring AFC implementation processes from the direct perspectives of older adults, this study conducted qualitative interviews with 23 older adult leaders of AFC initiatives across four states. Through reflexive thematic analysis, we identified two overarching thematic categories regarding the functions of their efforts towards AFC change. First, older adults advance AFC programme processes by guiding (e.g. determining priority areas) and carrying out (e.g. handling day-to-day programme logistics) the work. Second, older adults strengthen network capacity through connecting people and organizations to advance AFC implementation and spreading ageing-inclusive mindsets and practices among community actors. The findings support the view of older adults’ participation in AFC implementation as a multidimensional phenomenon wherein they employ multiple co-occurring functions that fluctuate dynamically across organizational roles, activities and tenure with the initiative. This study highlights the importance of continued research on the people enacting age-friendly efforts in their communities to better understand the ways that AFC efforts can catalyze local leaders – including older adults themselves – towards impact on ageing.

Despite fierce politicization in arms‐exporting democracies, we lack systematic research on mass public preferences on arms transfers. We propose that citizens either apply a deontologist (rejecting transfers categorically) or consequentialist (trading‐off economic, strategic and normative aspects) calculus of preference formation. Conducting population‐representative survey experiments ($N=6617$) in Germany and France, two global top‐five major arms exporters, we find that 10–15 per cent of respondents follow deontologist considerations, a preference structure potentially relevant for all foreign policies involving the use of military force. Still, a majority shows differentiated preferences, giving largest weight to normative considerations, with assessments affected by moderating features (e.g., scenarios of just war). Principled rejection of arms trade and a large consequentialist weight for normative factors are more pronounced in Germany compared to France, indicating that public opinion might pose a stronger constraint for government policy in this country. Respondents' preferences match opinion polls on post‐Russian invasion Ukraine armament, indicating high external validity of our experiments.

This paper presents the first cross-linguistic investigation into the phonological behavior of implosive sounds. In many feature theories, implosives share features with obstruent sounds, plus some implosive-specific laryngeal feature. These feature theories predict, then, that implosives should pattern phonologically as a natural class with obstruents, to the exclusion of sonorants. We take a detailed look at the phonological patterning of implosives in six languages, and present results of a typological survey of implosives in 88 languages where implosives contrast with sonorants and obstruents at the same place of articulation. We find that, despite previous feature-based proposals which assume that implosives are obstruents, implosives pattern with sonorants to the exclusion of obstruents in 38% of languages in our sample. Another 32% of languages show mixed behavior, where implosives pattern with both obstruents and sonorants, depending on the specific phonological process involved. We discuss the implications of our results for the phonological featural representation of implosives, and propose future historical and phonetic studies to further illuminate the cross-linguistic behavior of implosive sounds.

By comparing and analysing four cross-national measures of democracy, this article provides novel information regarding the statistical properties, convergence, and interchangeability of some of the most frequently used measures of democracy. The author points out limitations related to the statistical properties of these measures and finds that even if measures of democracy are highly convergent, their interchangeability is weak. This means that the choice of the measure of democracy has considerable consequences for the conclusions of a given study. Especially so in studies covering the last few decades, because the author finds that in general the interchangeability of democracy measures has decreased since the 1980s. In choosing one measure over another, scholars should be aware of the limitations identified in this article. To overcome problems related to weak interchangeability, if a single measure cannot be credibly chosen on theoretical grounds, the author recommends users of the measures to validate their findings with multiple measures of democracy.

We report qualitative findings from a study in a multi-ethnic, multi-faith city with high levels of deprivation. Primary research over 2 years consisted of three focus groups and 18 semi-structured interviews with food insecurity service providers followed by focus groups with 16 White British and Pakistani women in or at risk of food insecurity. We consider food insecurity using Habermas’s distinction between the system and lifeworld. We examine system definitions of the nature of need, approved food choices, the reification of selected skills associated with household management and the imposition of a construct of virtue. While lifeworld truths about food insecurity include understandings of structural causes and recognition that the potential of social solidarity to respond to them exist, they are not engaged with by the system. The gap between system rationalities and the experiential nature of lay knowledge generates individual and collective disempowerment and a corrosive sense of shame.

In political research, scholars have increasingly paid attention to the political challenges of integrating new public policies into existing policy subsystems, which bears important implications for the study of eco-social policy and politics. By drawing on policy integration research, we identify and discuss insights and lessons deriving from policy integration scholarship, which appear to be relevant for understanding policy linkages between the social and environmental domains especially regarding the European Green Deal (EGD). More specifically, we focus on the following two aspects: (1) the elements of policy design and implementation practices that are deemed to be helpful for ensuring equilibrium between social and environmental goals and (2) political factors that are likely to affect policy integration dynamics along the social and environmental aspects (eco-social nexus). This article contributes to the literature by tracing novel research trajectories for the eco-social debate to explore in the policy integration perspective.

This paper explores volunteering and inequality in the global South through an analysis of volunteering remuneration. We argue that the growing remuneration of volunteers reflects an increasing financialisation of volunteering by aid and development donors to match labour to project and sectoral objectives. We examine how these remuneration strategies shape volunteering economies and (re)produce hierarchies and inequalities in contexts in the global South where volunteers are often from marginalised communities. We analyse data collected in Africa and the Middle East as part of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) Global Review on Volunteering to explore these interweaving volunteering hierarchies and how they articulate with existing social stratifications. In these contexts, we argue that a livelihoods and capabilities approach across macro-, national and local levels provides an alternative and more nuanced way of accounting for volunteer remuneration within the range of assets that communities have to build their lives and future. When oriented towards catalysing these community assets, and away from rewarding particular kinds of individual labour, remuneration has the potential to enable rather than undermine sustained volunteering activity by and within marginalised communities.

Why did some individuals react to the Covid-19 crisis in a prosocial manner, whereas others withdrew from society? To shed light onto this question, we investigate changing patterns of charitable giving during the pandemic. The study analyzes survey data of 2000 individuals, representative of the populations of Germany and Austria. Logistic regressions reveal that personal affectedness by Covid-19 seems to play a crucial role: those who were personally affected either mentally, financially, or health-wise during the first 12 months of Covid-19 were most likely to have changed their giving behavior. The observed patterns fit psychological explanations of how human beings process existential threats. Our findings indicate that a profound societal crisis in itself mainly leads to changes in charitable giving if individuals are severely affected on a personal level. Thereby, we contribute to a better understanding of the mechanisms underlying individuals’ charitable giving behavior in times of crisis.

Minority governments often rely on the legislative support of parties, which play an ambiguous role in politics: while they are formally part of the opposition, they are simultaneously committed to keeping the government in office and passing its bills. Are these support parties protected from the electoral cost of governing or do voters recognize their responsibility for policy outcomes and hold them accountable? I hypothesize that voters who are dissatisfied with government performance will have less sympathy towards and will be less likely to vote for support parties. Using Comparative Study of Electoral Systems data, I find consistent support for both hypotheses. Voters seem to recognize the connection between support parties and the government and have both an affective and an electoral response to it. While voters dislike support parties more than junior members when they are dissatisfied with government performance, they punish the two types of parties similarly at elections. Support parties are thus in no way exempt from the accountability mechanisms.

Despite growing interest in African civil society and the enduring legacy of colonialism, studies on this theme with a historical perspective are still few. This article analyses the evolution of associational life in Luanda from its origins in the mid-nineteenth century until the decolonisation in 1974. It is based on a complete census of the officially recognised bylaws, which confirmed that formal associationism was exclusive to settlers and a minority of ‘assimilated’ natives. Modern associations among the ‘detribalised’ urban populations, never recognised by the colonial authorities, were considered by analysing ethnographic research. Historical empirical evidence sustains the idea that the colonial encounter determinately shaped civil society and the public sphere, determining the inequality in access and exercise of citizenship while illustrating the strategies used by native people to overcome legal and political constraints to associationism.

While direct state funding of political parties has been a prominent theme in cross‐national research over the last decade, we still know little about party strategies to access state resources that are not explicitly earmarked for partisan usage. This article looks at one widespread but often overlooked informal party practice: the ‘taxing’ of MP salaries – that is, the regular transfer of fixed salary shares to party coffers. Building on notions of informal institutions developed in work on new democracies, the theoretical approach specifies factors that shape the acceptability of this legally non‐enforceable intra‐organisational practice. It is tested through a selection model applied to a unique dataset covering 124 parties across 19 advanced democracies. Controlling for a range of party‐ and institutional‐level variables, it is found that the presence of a taxing rule and the collection of demanding tax shares are more common in leftist parties (high internal acceptability) and in systems in which the penetration of state institutions by political parties is intense (high external acceptability).

Civil society strengthening programs aim to foster democratic governance by supporting civil society organization (CSO) engagement in advocacy. However, critics claim that these programs foster apolitical and professional organizations that have weak political effects because they do not mobilize citizen participation. This literature focuses on how donor programs lead to low legitimacy of CSOs with citizens, limiting the means to develop agency toward the state. Here I investigate the influence of CSO legitimacy with donors and citizens on civic agency. Empirical research was conducted in Bosnia–Herzegovina on CSOs considered legitimate by donors, citizens, and both. I found that different forms of legitimacy were associated with different strategies and agency. CSOs with both forms of legitimacy, which have not received much attention until now, turned out to be of particular interest. These CSOs demonstrated agency as intermediaries between donors, government, and citizens, which enabled greater agency and broader outcomes.

A 3D/4D ultrasound study of Russian stressed vowels in the context of ‘soft’ (phonetically palatalized or palatal) versus ‘hard’ consonants reveals that vowels in these two contexts differ systematically in terms of the position of the tongue root while the tongue dorsum is less consistently modified depending on the speaker, vowel or consonant context. This paper proposes that the observed vowel allophony, as well as the softness contrast in Russian consonants, and the contrast between /i/ and /ɨ/, are all defined in tenns of the feature [ATR].

The conceptual malleability of the notion of social innovation has resulted in the appropriation of the concept in various sectors. The goal of the paper is to provide a critical view of such appropriation. We contend that this appropriation often includes the usage of the concept to advance agendas away from or opposed to that of the common good. This paper evaluates such problematic usage by identifying the distinguishing and core aspects of social innovation. These include the social need-meeting dimension geared towards marginalised or disadvantaged communities which is enacted via processes of social and/or power relations shifts of these groups. The paper locates the current trajectory of social innovation discourse to identify that it is in the actions of grassroots third sector initiatives, where the democratic side of social innovation is conserved, and calls for its advancement to prevent exploitation of disadvantaged communities and hogging of resources away from initiatives that are committed to it.

Grandparenthood is widely understood as a valued identity in later life, associated with treasured grandparent–grandchild relationships. Although scholars highlight the importance of mutuality and bidirectional flows in these relationships, there is a need for qualitative research exploring grandparents’ experiences of receiving care from their grandchildren. Material goods and services are often bound up with practices of intergenerational care, although this has rarely been the focus of research on grandparent–grandchild relationships. Informed by theories of care and consumption practices, and in-depth interviews, this article addresses two questions: how did grandparents experience receiving care from grandchildren during the pandemic, and how were consumption practices bound up with those experiences? Participants described experiencing various kinds of care from grandchildren (toddlers to young adults), suggesting that they experienced grandchildren’s care – and caring consumption practices – as autonomous or embedded within parental caring practices. Both types of care appeared to foster grandparental wellbeing, by highlighting that grandparents matter to younger generations: even small acts of care were experienced in this way. This was a particularly powerful message during the pandemic, when many older people felt physically and emotionally vulnerable and othered by media discourse about their expendability. Beyond offering further insights into the experiences of older people during the pandemic, these findings contribute to understanding of intergenerational care between grandparents and grandchildren. They demonstrate how the complex and multi-directional circulation of care within families is bound up with material practices, and how experiencing even small acts of care from grandchildren can foster grandparents’ wellbeing.