This study attempts to explain reasons that underlie the positive correlation between media use and increased levels of engagement by relying upon the agenda-setting theory. The models set forth suggest the following sequence: News attention as influenced by several antecedent variables affects agenda-setting effects on the readers/viewers; in turn, agenda-setting effects trigger strong attitudes among the public and, finally, strong attitudes lead to various types of civic behaviors. The individual level of statistical analysis employed in this research is based on the 2004 ANES data along with a content analysis of stories from the New York Times and NBC’s Nightly News. Fit statistics of four models -- specifically, first-level newspaper, first-level TV, second-level newspaper and second-level TV -- indicated that all of the structural models were retainable, meaning that the hypothesized sequence reflects well the data. Especially, every direct effect along the chain - ranging from media use to agenda-setting, from agenda-setting to attitudes strength, and from attitudes strength to engagement - was significant. Indirect and total effects of agenda-setting for political and civic participation were all found to be significant. Agenda-setting effects operated as a mediator between media use and civic engagement, as hypothesized. In sum, the effects of agenda-setting may be viewed as related to both the behavioral and the cognitive levels so that: What the public thinks about something can be extended to what the public does about something. / text

The purpose of this study is to investigate the nature, merits and limitations of the citizen participation model used in the process of developing a municipal plan for the impacts of population aging. The research is based on a literature review and participant observation of one case study. It is evident from the literature that citizen participation is integral to the democratic decision making process, since it can strengthen principles central to the practice of democratic government, namely, representation, public interest and accountability. Power and its distribution are fundamental elements in distinguishing one level of participation from another. They are also, therefore, key factors to consider in the design of participation programs. Of the models investigated, partnership is identified as one that requires government and citizens to engage in shared decision making Citizen participation in planning practice over the last twenty-five years has varied widely in terms of the intent, design and techniques used. Among citizen participation theorists there is some consensus on the causes of all too frequent failures in practice. These include differing expectations and objectives among the government actors and citizens involved, failure to match appropriate techniques with objectives, and lack of evaluation. Based on the theory, the partnership model effectively addresses these problems and has considerable advantages over other models such as consultation. The research reveals that in partnership, the objectives of both citizen and government participants guide the process, and that resources, expertise and decision making power are shared during the planning process. Problems associated with the model include dangers of cooptation of citizens involved, and the tendency for the citizen participants to become an elite group unrepresentative of the larger public. These findings are explored and amplified through an evaluation of a case of partnership in practice which generates mixed results in terms of its merits and limitations. This model produced conditions for a substantial degree of shared decision making Techniques used provided direct access to resources and the planning process for citizen and government participants. An open-ended project design and multiple opportunities provided for participation in varying degrees were also successful features used in achieving partner-ship. The research also indicates that citizens engaged in partnership with government were relatively few, and the project lacked political support necessary for changes in resource allocation. These results are attributable to, in part, a trade off between the quality and quantity of citizen participation as sharing of decision making power increases. Conclusions of this study of a model of citizen participation suggest that in defining social issues and developing plans to address them, government and citizen participants need to redefine their roles and expectations of each other. In the past, common roles for citizens in the planning process have been as clients, advocates, complainants, advisors and supplicants. As decision makers and problem solvers engaged in partnership planning with government, their participation may be more effective. The study of the Project on Aging generates some lessons for future practice of the partnership model. This case suggests that planning in partnership requires commitment to the partnership objective as a substantive and not a symbolic goal. This means government takes an active role in creating conditions for partners to act on their interests.

This study deals with the quality of democracy, and its purpose is to examine which factors affect the varying levels of the quality of democracy in the stable democracies in the world. The research question posited in the study is: what explains the varying levels of the quality of democracy in the democratic countries in the world, and do political institutions matter? Theoretically, the quality of democracy is distinguished from other similar concepts employed in comparative politics, and what the quality of democracy stands for is clarified. The quality of democracy is defined in this study as: the level of legitimacy in a democratic system with respect to democratic norms such as political participation, political competition, political equality, and rule of law. In total, four dimensions of the quality of democracy are included that are considered to be very important dimensions of the quality of democracy. These dimensions are political participation, political competition, political equality, and the rule of law. To explain the variation in the quality of democracy, an explanatory model has been developed. The explanatory model consists of five different groups of independent variables: political institutional variables, socioeconomic variables, cultural variables, historical variables, and physical variables. Methodologically, a large-n, outcome-centric research design is employed and statistical analysis is used to examine what effect the five groups of independent variables have on the four dimensions of the quality of democracy. Empirically, the results show that cultural variables and political institutional variables outperform socioeconomic, historical, and physical variables in relation to their effect on the quality of democracy. Consequently, cultural and political institutional variables are the two most important groups of variables when explaining the variation in the quality of democracy in the democratic countries in the world. In relation to the other groups of variables, historical variables are slightly more important than socioeconomic variables when explaining the variation in the quality of democracy. The physical variables constitute the group of variables that has the least importance out of the five groups of variables when explaining the variation in the quality of democracy. In summary, the findings from the study show that the best way of increasing the level of the quality of democracy may be to choose political institutions such as parliamentarism as the executive power system and a proportional system as the electoral system. To put this clearly, to increase the possibility of democratic countries achieving a high level of the quality of democracy they should avoid majority electoral systems and presidential or semipresidential executive systems.

Although more women are successfully breaching the social, economic and political barriers that can prevent them from participating as electoral candidates, few women campaign for elected office. A dearth of female candidates may be understandable, given research demonstrating that women tend to avoid competition and competitive environments. Thus, elections – competitive by design – may attract fewer women than men. This thesis posits that the inherent competitiveness of electoral politics may deter women from campaigning for office. However, this work also forwards that competitive sport socialization during adolescence may prepare women for electoral competition. This paper examines the results of a self-administered survey mailed to 449 female candidates for municipal office. The survey investigated candidates’ adolescent experiences in competitive sports and attitudes relating to internal political efficacy. The results appear to demonstrate a strong correlation between competitive sport socialization and either positive or neutral evaluations of political competition. / x, 163 leaves ; 29 cm

The pedracista electoral coalition that was formed in Mexico during the 1828 presidential elections was deliberately ignored by the traditional historiography of the early national period. Instead it concentrated on the leaders of the liberal struggle, deeming this alliance unworthy of study. There were essentially two key reasons why this happened. On the one hand, General Manuel Gómez Pedraza (1789-1851) was not an archetypal liberal patriot in the mould of those heroes that were exalted and written about by Mexico’s Porfirian and PRIísta historians. His politics were associated with a certain ideological indeterminateness as a result of his moderate stance, proving problematic to historians who were intent on developing a liberal and subsequently post-revolutionary historia patria. On the other hand, the official historiography accepted, unquestioningly, the critical version of his actions that his opponents circulated at the time. As a result of this, the yorkino version of the events is the one that prevailed, casting Pedraza in the role of staunch anti-yorkino in a simplistic bipartisan vision of Mexican politics that depicted the political tensions of the time as a clear-cut confrontation between the pedracista aristocrats and the democratic yorkino followers of mulatto hero of the War of Independence, General Vicente Guerrero (1783-1831). This two-dimensional dichotomy has only recently started to be nuanced by the revisionist historiography of the last thirty years. This has been due, in great measure, to the fact that the traditional interpretation of the pedracista coalition posed a number of significant problems when attempting to understand the political behaviour of the people involved. Above all, it was an interpretation that proved incapable of explaining how such a variety of political tendencies, represented by those individuals who joined the alliance that backed Pedraza’s presidential candidacy, could have come together; i.e., anti-masonic groups, the imparciales, certain yorkinos and former escoceses. This thesis aims to explain what brought these individuals, whose political ideas were ostensibly incompatible, together, in what resulted in a particularly resourceful and successful electoral force. The pedracista coalition represented the first political formation in Mexico that came together specifically to win a presidential election. It was one which set out to bring an end to the political interference of Masonic societies in Mexico, and in particular, that of the Rite of York lodges. It also challenged the yorkinos’ electoral campaign by criticising their leader, Guerrero, and, by highlighting the negative aspects of their Masonic faction. It pointed out, moreover, the dangers inherent in a central administration led by guerrerista yorkinos and, in so doing, made clear the problems that were to be found in the political ideas these individuals stood for, depicting them as partisan, ignorant, and representative of the popular classes. The pedracista coalition argued that the presidency needed to go to someone who did not belong to any particular party, who was virtuous, who was renowned for being hard-working and energetic in government, and who belonged to the exclusive circles frequented by the “hombres de bien”. Given that Pedraza won the elections, it is evident that his coalition benefited from a constitutional structure that favoured his candidacy, gaining, at the same time, the public validation of the governmental authorities in place at the time. However, Pedraza’s candidacy was defeated by the armed mobilizations that ensued in the pronunciamientos pro-yorkino followers launched from October to November 1828, and was consequently eliminated from the political scene until late 1832 given that the leaders of the imparciales as well as Pedraza himself chose not to fight back or support a counter-revolution. During the electoral campaign, the pedracista coalition displayed, with astounding clarity, what it thought were the essential qualities a president needed to possess and, likewise presented a distinctive appreciation of how it thought the Mexican political class should behave. In this sense, the coalition’s views, captured in its votes, networks and press articles, offer a fascinating snapshot of what were the fundamental themes of the Mexican republic during its formative years as a nation-state, and how this ignored political grouping interpreted them. Of particular interest is the manner in which the pedracista coalition explored the ways in which political legitimacy, participation and representation were to be understood, defended, and systematised. By studying the pedracista coalition this thesis offers, for the first time, a detailed analysis of the nature and dynamics of Mexican politics in the mid-late 1820s, as experienced, discussed, and represented by the short-lasting yet effective alliance that was forged around the candidacy of Manuel Gómez Pedraza.

Although the political participation and representation of women has been increasing in South Africa, in other political sectors, this is debatable. In other words, the transformed nature of South African government institutions suggests that in politics, gender transformation has been achieved. While this may be true of the national government, the same is the contested terrain in as far as other levels of political activism are concerned. For example, a look at student politics raises questions on the idea that there is gender equality in South Africa political sphere. Furthermore, there is an assumption that when women are in governance, they use their positions to influence policies to be responsive to issues that affect women. Even this is a highly contested debate, particularly in the context of student politics. In the context of South African institutions of higher learning, Student Representative Council (SRC) is a body through which students are represented in governance of such institutions. In most institutions of higher learning, SRCs have been dominated by male students. However, there has been development which has seen more women getting into SRCs, and this development is credited to policies of individual institutions as well as that of the student political movements which provide for gender transformation. The genesis of gender transformation in student politics has been on the question of presence. In other words, the focus has been on ensuring that women are part of the composition of the SRCs (descriptive representation). And when descriptive representation has been achieved, the focus will extend to the notion of substantive representation. It was therefore important for this study to use a specific institution, University of Kwa Zulu Natal (UKZN) and explore the composition of its SRC with the aim establishing whether the representation of women is descriptive or substantive in nature or even both. The point of entry was to acknowledge the presence of women in the SRC. In exploring the nature of their representation, the researcher focused on how they engage their political movements and the mandates thereof in order to advocate for the feminization of policies. The findings of this study firstly reveal that the SRC of UKZN has not achieved the descriptive representation of women, let alone the substantive one. This needs to be elucidated on. While there are some women in the SRC, their number is too small which is 10 out of 60 and that equals to 16.6%. Politics being the game of numbers, this would naturally make it hard for women to exert a lot of influence. Furthermore, this is a lot less than the target of the vanguard political movements. Secondly, of all the women that are in the SRC, only a small number of women indicated to be contributing a lot of substance in promoting the gender transformation agenda. What separates these women from others is political experience and will power which may translate into capacity. However, the same cannot be said of the other women. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban 2013.

The recent political events in Egypt, Libya, Yemen, and Tunisia (2011) have confirmed the key role of social networks (SNSs), as well as online political news in supporting citizens with their self-determination. Furthermore, “changes in the media landscape present new challenges for scholars interested in the relationship between the media and civil society. Additionally, the explosion of the Internet that started in advanced democracies and has spread through much of the globe provides new and unexplored pathways for communication. Moreover, the inclusion of the Internet in the media environment raises new questions for citizens, politicians, researchers, journalists, and government” (Oates, Owen & Gibson, 2006, p. 1). This study looks at the relationships between young people’s exposure to political news on the Internet and their political awareness. It develops and applies an index for political participation composed of several variables measuring political interest, discussion, knowledge, and participation. The survey among students in both countries was administered in Arabic and German, while the master questionnaire was developed in English. The survey was conducted between April and June 2010 in Egypt at Minia University and in Germany at Technical university of Dresden. The sample size was 1000 (500 in each country) students from several departments representing different academic fields: three departments of Engineering, three departments of Humanities and Social Science, and finally three departments of Natural Science. The study’s main research question was: “What is the impact of students’ exposure to political news on the Internet on their political awareness and civic activities?” The researcher started from the hypothesis that heavy use of political news on the Internet is positively related to political awareness. A further research question aimed at gauging the role of intervening variables such as gender and field of study for the relationship between the use of political news on the Internet and the level of political awareness. Results show that there is a positive relationship between using political online news and political awareness. German students’ political awareness for German students was higher than Egypt student’s political awareness (M=63.02, SD=15.65, comparing to M=45.72, SD= 17.65 for Egyptians).

The aim of the thesis: to define a concept of direct people participation and find out a variety of it's forms, to measure local government's impact of direct citizenry participation level n municipalities of Lithuania, to identify the main problems of direct participation and suggest the solutions of the problems. The principal concepts and forms of direct participation are defined by analyzing gathered scientific literature, experience of foreign countries and the survey's data.

Problem statement and purpose: The purpose of this study was to analyze in what way first-time voters chose to take part of political information. The questions we aimed to answer was how first-time voters use media and other information channels for political purposes, what importance and trust the first-time voters give the different information channels and finally which indicators there is for that structural or individual factors affect the media consumption and political interest. Method and material: We did interviews with twelve 18 years old first-time voters from six different high school programs in Sundsvall, Sweden. Results: The study showed that the premier source of political information were traditional news media, in particular the debates on TV. It’s also in the debates the first-time voter’s trust the most. Even though the social medias are constantly present in their everyday life and even though the first-time voters believe the social medias have potential for engaging young people politically, the possibilities are only taken in advantage by people who are already politically interested. The first-time voters are being affected by both structural and individualized factors. The structural, the social standing in particular, matters for the individual’s political interest and use of traditional media, while the individualized factors primarily matters for the use of social medias.

This research uses the 2010-post election survey by Pew Internet and American Life project and traces the direct and indirect paths of online political information use, Facebook political information use, and mobile phones political information use to political participation to online and offline political participation. Indirect paths are traced through the paths of wider view exposure and the credibility to online and offline political participation. The theoretical framework of the O-S-O-R model is used to guide the path analyses for this research. This research finds that both online political information use and Facebook political information use expose respondents to a wider diversity of views, but that it does not lead to political participation. Furthermore, all three mediums are found to be credible sources of information leading to online political participation with different strengths, while Facebook political information use also leads to offline political participation. Thus, credibility is an important factor and even suggests the possible need for an opinion leader. This is especially so for the use of Facebook, which has the best balanced information dissemination structure its friend network of identifiable people, organisations, and institutions. Facebook also provides the best platform for critical debate and engaging potential voters. Mobile phone political use is also supportive of political participation, but is more questioned in terms of whether the participation it brings is able to lead to critical debate. Keywords: Political participation, Facebook, social media, mobile phones, online political information, wider view exposure, credibility.