Within-study comparisons (WSCs) compare quasi-experimental results to an experimental benchmark and assess the extent to which quasi-experiments (QEs) sacrifice internal validity for external validity. WSCs inform decisions about when to use experiments or QEs, as well as methodological decisions (e.g., covariate selection) about how to implement QEs when they are necessary or preferred. We review the methodological literature on WSCs and present the findings from a WSC of a school voucher program as an example of the use of WSCs to inform policy debates involving the third sector. Prior literature and our results suggest that QE evaluations of third-sector institutions can produce low levels of bias, but only if analytic models include key proxy variables for voluntary self-selection into programs.

Do citizens welcome the involvement of independent experts in politics? Theoretical and empirical work so far provides conflicting answers to this question. On the one hand, citizens may demand expert involvement in political decision‐making processes in order to ensure efficient and effective governance solutions. On the other hand, citizens can be distrustful of experts and reject the unaccountable and non‐transparent nature of expert‐based governance. This note investigates citizen preferences for the involvement of experts in different stages of political processes and across ‘hard’ and ‘easy’ political issues. Results show that, in the absence of explicit output information, respondents prefer independent experts over national elected representatives in the policy design and implementation stages, across political issues. For the crucial stage of decision making, respondents show no difference in their evaluation of processes that delegate decisions to experts or to elected representatives, with the exception of environmental policy, where expert decision making is preferred. These findings are relevant for ongoing discussions on how to incorporate independent experts in political decision making in a way that citizens find legitimate and on how to address increased citizen dissatisfaction with the representative democratic functions performed by political parties, governments and politicians.

Different streams of political research have pointed to two macro‐phenomena that appear as opposite at first glance: On the one hand, the increasing delegation of competencies to jurisdictions beyond the central government, resulting in the denationalization of political authority. On the other, the passing of reforms that reassert the centre of the nation state through policy integration and administrative coordination. In this article, we argue that these two processes can be analysed under a unified framework in terms of multilevel dynamics, whereby delegation ultimately elicits recentring reforms at the national level. To examine this argument and break down the mechanisms at work, we develop two sets of hypotheses: first, we theorise how the delegation of competencies to international organisations, sub‐national entities and independent agencies can eventually trigger recentring reforms; second, we propose that the capacity to act attributed to these actors also shapes such reforms. Our empirical analysis relies on an original dataset across four policy fields and 13 countries. By using multilevel regression models, we show that especially the delegation of competencies to agencies at the national level as well as the double delegation to European agencies increases the probability that governments pass recentring reforms. Furthermore, if these agencies have a stronger capacity to act, recentring becomes more likely. Our findings contribute to the development of multilevel governance as a dynamic theory of policy making.

In his latest opus, The New Despotism, John Keane continues to challenge existing wisdom in the field of democratic theory and comparative political studies. One of the key insights of the book is that there is nothing inherently democratic about democratic innovations and procedures, and thus they can be used to prop up despotisms, rather than usher in democracy. While this insight comports with existing misgivings about elections, the book stands out in the way it explains the sustainability of using the democratic procedures in the new despotisms. For democratic procedures to further the aims of the new despotisms, the condition of “voluntary servitude” needs to be met. “Voluntary servitude” means that people willingly give in to political slavery, and become accomplices in maintaining the illusion that democratic procedures are implemented (215–222). Keane's achievement is that he creates an analytical ecosystem of interlinked assumptions, observations, conditions, and other logical connectors, which make his model of the new despotism so robust.

Functional motivations are closely linked to important volunteer outcomes, yet more socio-political forms of civic participation (CP) besides volunteering are growing. There is little attention on the applicability of functional motivations to such CP, including in disasters. Using a critical realist grounded theory methodology, 39 in-depth interviews were conducted with Singapore residents who had engaged in a diverse range of CP before and during COVID-19. A key mechanism, fulfilling personal functions, was found to relate to functional motivations. Overlapping functions were found, but there are differences in how these functions were fulfilled depending on the form of CP. Perceived accessibility, the subjective mental state about one’s potential to engage, mediated the effectuation of motivations in actual engagement. COVID-19 contributed to emergent CP by increasing perceived accessibility. Participating citizens pre-COVID-19 made adaptations to maintain perceived accessibility to continue CP during the pandemic. These theoretical developments inform policy and research agenda in understanding and leveraging CP.

Research on differences between public, for-profit, and nonprofit providers of welfare services has provided mixed findings, depending on welfare state arrangement, regulation, and service area. This paper’s objective is to study the differences between public, nonprofit (cooperatives and other nonprofits), and for-profit welfare providers from the perspective of the users in the tightly regulated Scandinavian context. We ask how the users perceive the providers from different sectors differently and how this variation can be explained. The study relies on a large-scale survey carried out in 2015 in the city of Oslo, Norway. From the survey, we identify the two main results. First, despite limited differences, users of nonprofit kindergartens are generally more satisfied than users of for-profit and public kindergartens. Second, an important explanation for variations in user satisfaction among kindergartens is identified in a pocket of regulatory leniency: the quality of food service. This is the only expense that varies among kindergartens in Norway. These results indicate that more lenient regulations could potentially increase provider distinctiveness. Based on the existing literature, we discuss why nonprofit providers seem to fare better in the minds of users than public and for-profit providers.

Government formation in multi‐party systems often requires coalition negotiations and finding common ground among coalition partners. Supporters of parties involved in the government formation process face a trade‐off when evaluating such bargaining processes: on the one hand, voters usually prefer seeing their party being in government rather than in opposition; on the other hand, negotiations require coalition compromises that they might dislike. In this paper, we study voters’ willingness to accept policy compromises during government formation processes. We argue that voters’ acceptance of policy compromises depends on both the strength of their party attachment and the importance they assign to the issue at stake during the coalition negotiations. Not giving in on important issues is key, especially for supporters of challenger parties, who hold strong policy preferences on a selected number of issues. To test these expectations, we collected original survey data immediately after the Spanish general election in November 2019. The results show support for the hypothesized effects, shed light on the pressure potential coalition partners face during government formation and help explain the failures of government formation attempts in increasingly polarized societies.

Cataract is the primary cause of treatable blindness in low- and middle-income countries. Due to limited resources, the public sector often fails to provide adequate services, resulting in long waiting times, low quality or significant quantity gaps. Nonprofits are crucial in providing supplementary or complementary funding and resources for affordable eye care and other public goods and services. This study evaluates costs and benefits of cataract surgery at the nonprofit Mexican Institute of Ophthalmology (IMO) using data from interviews conducted in 2022 to estimate its social return. For every peso invested, the average stakeholder receives a 12:1 return in improved autonomy, self-confidence, and reduced stress levels. Sensitivity analysis suggests a SROI ratio of at least 2:1 in the most restrictive scenario, increasing to 33:1 under more lenient assumptions. Measuring and communicating the social value of nonprofit activities is critical for optimizing resource allocation, enhancing accountability, and generating valuable insights into their effectiveness.

Hélène Landemore's Open Democracy (2020) offers both a normative conception of popular rule and an institutional schema intended to advance it. This schema is grounded in a normative conception of popular rule that associates democracy with the values of inclusion and equality. But this association misses a historically important dimension of popular rule—popular sovereignty—which requires the people as a whole to play a critical part in decision making. Landemore's dismissal of popular sovereignty informs her institutional schema, which relies upon both sortition and self-selection. It leaves no significant room for the people as a whole to act, either directly (via referenda) or indirectly (via election). Landemore never explicitly defends this dismissal of popular sovereignty from her conception of popular rule. Given the historical importance of this dimension of popular rule, and its continuing intuitive appeal, any such dismissal requires careful justification.

Approximately 96 per cent of older adults in Australia live at home and one-third of older people aged 65+ are of culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds. Despite recognising that aged care experiences are shaped by sociocultural and institutional systems, there are no scoping reviews of Australia-based research to advance understanding of how family care is provided and received in CALD families. This scoping review fills the research gap by systematically synthesising research on the experiences of family carers of older migrants in Australia to broaden the literature on how sociocultural context shapes care experiences. Using Arksey and O’Malley’s five-stage framework, we searched data on seven electronic databases to solicit journal articles published from 2014 to 2024. After assessing 5,004 studies meeting the eligibility criteria, 15 articles were included and analysed. Thematic analysis identified four themes: (1) cultural expectations of family care; (2) emotional and instrumental burdens of family care; (3) generational gaps in understanding family care; and (4) barriers to accessing services beyond family care. The findings showed strong cultural expectations of filial support among both older migrants and their family carers across cultural groups. However, balancing filial obligations with job commitments proved challenging, and language and system barriers prevented access to needed external care services. This study recommends policies and practices to integrate community and family care. This can improve carers’ experiences and facilitate the delivery of culturally appropriate care to meet care needs.

This paper investigates the effect of volunteering on quality of life (QoL) in 50+ populations across European countries and Israel. We analyzed data from the Survey of Health, Aging and Retirement in Europe (SHARE). Using the Kendall tau-b correlation coefficients, we show that the extent of effect volunteering has on quality of life is nonlinearly related to the prevalence of volunteering in a given country. The relationship follows an inverted-U-shaped curve. In countries where volunteering is the most popular (Denmark, Switzerland, and Belgium) and in countries with the lowest rates (Poland, Greece, the Czech Republic, and Spain), the correlation between volunteering and one’s quality of life is low. The correlation is high in countries with medium levels of volunteering (Austria, Italy, and Israel). Moreover, volunteering affects more internal than external domains of QoL. These new insights extend the discussion started by Haski-Leventhal (Voluntas Int J Volunt Nonprofit Organ 20:388–404, 2009). Our study is correlational, and we do not claim causality.

This contribution about the Netherlands to the special issue [or: section] on volunteering and civic action focuses on changes in public understanding and policy perspectives. Developments since the second half of the nineteenth century show shifting emphases on active membership (based on associational life and typical of the phenomenon of ‘pillarization’), active citizenship (based more on an individual sense of responsibility and more or less political in nature) and unpaid work (volunteering as a gift to society and other people). Government policy over the last two decades has focused heavily on ‘reponsibilization’ of citizens, both as regards providing help to others when they need it (unpaid work/informal care) and in terms of their relationship with the society in which they live (active citizenship). We expand further on the recent notion of the ‘do-democracy’ as a populist and anti-political way of doing things together on a small scale instead of engaging in democratic controversies and trying to get a grip on big issues.

This article investigates how the sex of party heads impacts party positions and uncovers that parties led by a woman modify their stances on sociocultural but not economic debates. I argue that this pattern is a consequence of dissimilar gender gaps in policy preferences across the two ideological dimensions at the elite level. The empirical evidence, based on data for 19 developed democracies around the world between 1995 and 2018, reveals that parties led by a woman tend to emphasise green, alternative and libertarian issues. In particular, anti‐growth, environmental protection and freedom and human rights become more prominent elements of party manifestos under women's leadership. Overall, these findings stress the importance of critical actors and the conditions under which the presence of women in political offices translates into responsiveness towards female citizens.

In this paper, I propose an updated analysis of the tone system of Paicî, one of the rare tonal Oceanic languages. Building on Jean-Claude Rivierre's (1974) work, I show that the tonal system of Paicî is best described with three underlying primitives: a High tone, a Low tone, and a downstep /↓/ analyzed as a register feature independent of tone. Paicî is particularly interesting for the empirical documentation as well as the typological and theoretical understanding of downstep, because it combines many rare properties: (i) only downstepped ↓L is attested; (ii) downstep is incompatible with H tones within the prosodic word (*↓H, *H…↓L); (iii) it is realized utterance-initially; (iv) it has accentual properties, and very likely derives from a former accentual system. The paper also provides an acoustic description of tone and downstep in Paicî, an important step toward filling a serious gap in the documentation of downstepped ↓L tones and their properties.

Political parties maintain connections with various sub-organisations to engage different segments of society. Common among these are party youth wings. These relationships are often described as mutual, where votes are exchanged for policies. However, little research delves into how members of these sub-organisations perceive their roles in relation to the senior party. Based on a web survey of approximately 3000 respondents, this study investigates the views of youth wing members within Swedish political parties. Specifically, it explores whether members believe their youth wing’s primary role should be to influence or support the senior party. Drawing on theories of political engagement incentives, it examines the connection between members’ political and career motivations and their perceptions of these roles. Results suggest that those with career-oriented incentives tend to view the youth wing as supportive, while politically motivated members prioritise influencing the senior party. This research contributes to our understanding of the complex dynamics within political parties and their affiliated organisations, shedding light on how individual motivations shape organisational roles.

The constituted legal status of “Union citizenship” has added another democratic static to the European Union's institutional architecture but it is not yet a status of full political empowerment. What is missing is a citizen-centered opening-up of the (technocratically disguised) European level as a political arena. This article argues that the idea of European citizenship can function as a normative reference point for struggles of political empowerment and institutional reform. Democratic innovations such as sortition-based citizens’ panels organized within the framework of the Conference on the Future of Europe have a socializing function, paving the way for a European-wide public debate on issues of common concern and opening up a chance of (re)appropriating the European Union's institutional structure as a political space. But in order to support lasting democratic transformations they must be backed up by institutional reforms that make European political rights more effective.

This study aimed at developing a scale to measure Social Added Value (SAV) according to the perspective of community members, building on the relational framework and complementing the work of Mannarini et al. (Voluntas: Int J Voluntary Nonprofit Organ 29(6):1315–1329, 2018). The study was conducted on 720 Italian citizens who were not directly involved in Nonprofit and Voluntary Organizations (NPVOs) as active members to examine the statistical validity and psychometric properties of the SAV scale. Confirmatory factor analyses showed that good and satisfactory fit indexes were obtained by a third-order factor model saturated by two second-order variables (contribution to community and quality of external relationships) and eight first-order variables (services and tasks, vision, social responsibility, control mutuality, communality relationship, trust, commitment, capacity to build community connections). Additional analyses revealed that both perceived NPVOs target values and sense of belonging to the community were positively associated with SAV. Theoretical, methodological and practical implications of the findings are discussed.

The presence of an elite group in civil society elicits a discursive friction between the long-standing normative understanding of civil society, acting as a check on government overreach and autocratic tendencies, and elite theories. Robert Michels’s iron law of oligarchy posits that as individuals rise in the ranks to become organizational leaders, they begin to take on elite attributes, and their priorities align with those of other elites and away from those of their constituents. Michels’s argument echoes with today’s populist anti-elitist rhetoric and the way populism rejects any intermediary bodies between the people and the political leaders, including interest organizations in civil society. As an attempt to empirically probe this theoretical tension, this paper explores satisfaction with the way democracy is working among the top-level leaders of the most well-resourced national-level civil society organizations in Sweden and in the UK, drawing on a survey study conducted in 2020–21.