The National Question and Electoral Politics in Quebec and Scotland

by Éric Bélanger
The National Question and Electoral Politics in Quebec and Scotland
Author: Éric Bélanger
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Total Pages:
Release: 2018-04-30
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0773554149
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In Quebec and Scotland, questions of constitutional change, national identity, and national grievance play an important role in the electoral calculations of political parties and voters. Taking a strong stance on the national question can have strategic benefits both for parties pushing for greater autonomy and for those endorsing the status quo. In this in-depth look at issue voting, authors Éric Bélanger, Richard Nadeau, Ailsa Henderson, and Eve Hepburn examine how the national question affects political parties and voter behaviour in both substate nations. Through party manifestos, interviews with legislators, and opinion survey data, this book demonstrates that calls for constitutional change influence political debate, competition, voter choice, and the outcome of elections not only within Quebec and Scotland but also across Canada and the United Kingdom. Minority nationalist parties, the authors show, can gain support by claiming ownership of issues with widespread public agreement, such as self-determination and protecting the identity and interests of the nation. A comprehensive analysis of recent electoral politics, The National Question and Electoral Politics in Quebec and Scotland greatly enhances our understanding of the electoral impact of substate nationalism.

Hierarchies of Belonging

by Ailsa Henderson
Hierarchies of Belonging
Author: Ailsa Henderson
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Total Pages: 391
Release: 2007-11-02
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0773577688
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Ailsa Henderson analyses each nation's linguistic, racial, cultural, economic, and political diversity within a historical and contemporary context. Challenging the assumption that nationalism in Scotland can be characterized as "civic" in contrast to an "ethnic" model in Quebec, Henderson adopts a more complex model of national identity that distinguishes between nationalistic rhetoric, which is invariably civic in form, and public understandings of belonging, which tend to rely on ethnic markers. In Hierarchies of Belonging she demonstrates that nationalist rhetoric and a sense of belonging affect how citizens feel about the state, the nation, and each other.

Constitutional Politics in Multinational Democracies

by André Lecours
Constitutional Politics in Multinational Democracies
Author: André Lecours
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Total Pages: 161
Release: 2021-07-15
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0228007461
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Constitutional politics is exceptionally intense and unpredictable. It involves negotiations over the very nature of the state and the implications of self- determination. Multinational democracies face pressing challenges to the existing order because they are composed of communities with distinct cultures, histories, and aspirations, striving to coexist under mutually agreed-upon terms. Conflict over the recognition of these multiple identities and the distribution of power and resources is inevitable and, indeed, part of what defines democratic life in multinational societies. In Constitutional Politics in Multinational Democracies André Lecours, Nikola Brassard-Dion, and Guy Laforest bring together experts on multinational democracies to analyze the claims of minority nations about their political future and the responses they elicit through constitutional politics. Essays focus on the nature of these states and the actors and political process within them. This framework allows for a multidimensional examination of crucial political periods in these democracies by assessing what constitutional politics is, who is involved in it, and how it happens. Case studies include Catalonia and Spain, Puerto Rico and the United States, Scotland and the United Kingdom, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Quebec and the Métis People in Canada. Theoretically significant and empirically rich, Constitutional Politics in Multinational Democracies is a necessary read for any student of multinationalism.

The Oxford Handbook of Scottish Politics

by Michael Keating
The Oxford Handbook of Scottish Politics
Author: Michael Keating
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 720
Release: 2020-08-21
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0192558706
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The Handbook of Scottish Politics provides a detailed overview of politics in Scotland, looking at areas such as elections and electoral behaviour, public policy, political parties, and Scotland's relationship with the EU and the wider world. The contributors to this volume are some of the leading experts on politics in Scotland.

Englishness

by Ailsa Henderson
Englishness
Author: Ailsa Henderson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 257
Release: 2021-03-04
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0192643789
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Until the Brexit referendum, there was widespread doubt as to whether English nationalism existed at all, at least beyond a small fringe. Since then, it has come to be regarded an obvious explanation for the vote to Leave the European Union. Subsequent opinion polls have raised doubts about the extent of continuing English commitment to the Union of the United Kingdom itself. Yet even as Englishness is apparently reshaping Britain's place in world and perhaps, ultimately, the state itself, it remains poorly understood. In this book Ailsa Henderson and Richard Wyn Jones draw on data from the Future of England Survey, a specially commissioned public attitudes survey programme exploring the political implications of English identity, to make new and original arguments about the nature of English nationalism. They demonstrate that English nationalism is emphatically not a rejection of Britain and Britishness. Rather, English nationalism combines a sense of grievance about England's place within the United Kingdom with a fierce commitment to a particular vision of Britain's past, present, and future. Understanding its Janus-faced nature - both England and Britain - is key not only to understanding English nationalism, but also to understanding the ways in which it is transforming British politics.

The Symbolic State

by Karlo Basta
The Symbolic State
Author: Karlo Basta
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Total Pages: 269
Release: 2021-11-15
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0228009200
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The nation-state is a double sleight of hand, naturalizing both the nation and the state encompassing it. No such naturalization is possible in multinational states. To explain why these countries experience political crises that bring their very existence into question, standard accounts point to conflicts over resources, security, and power. This book turns the spotlight on institutional symbolism. When minority nations in multinational states press for more self-government, they are not only looking to protect their interests. They are asking to be recognized as political communities in their own right. Yet satisfying their demands for recognition threatens to provoke a reaction from members of majority nations who see such changes as a symbolic repudiation of their own vision of politics. Secessionist crises flare up when majority backlash reverses symbolic concessions to minority nations. Through a synoptic historical sweep of Canada, Spain, Yugoslavia, and Czechoslovakia, The Symbolic State shows us that institutions may be more important for what they mean than for what they do. A major contribution to the study of comparative nationalism and secession, comparative politics, and social theory, The Symbolic State is particularly timely in an era when the power of symbols – exemplified by Brexit, the Donald Trump presidency, and the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement – is reshaping politics.

Trust, Distrust, and Mistrust in Multinational Democracies

by Dimitrios Karmis
Trust, Distrust, and Mistrust in Multinational Democracies
Author: Dimitrios Karmis
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Total Pages: 342
Release: 2018-09-15
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0773554343
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The importance of research on the notion of trust has grown considerably in the social sciences over the last three decades. Much has been said about the decline of political trust in democracies and intense debates have occurred about the nature and complexity of the relationship between trust and democracy. Political trust is usually understood as trust in political institutions (including trust in political actors that inhabit the institutions), trust between citizens, and to a lesser extent, trust between groups. However, the literature on trust has given no special attention to the issue of trust between minority and majority nations in multinational democracies – countries that are not only multicultural but also constitutional associations containing two or more nations or peoples whose members claim to be self-governing and have the right of self-determination. This volume, part of the work of the Groupe de recherche sur les sociétés plurinationales (GRSP), is a comparative study of trust, distrust, and mistrust in multinational democracies, centring on Canada, Belgium, Spain, and the United Kingdom. Beliefs, attitudes, practices, and relations of trust, distrust, and mistrust are studied as situated, interacting, and coexisting phenomena that change over time and space. Contributors include Dario Castiglione (Exeter), Jérôme Couture (INRS-UCS), Kris Deschouwer (Vrije Universiteit Brussel), Jean Leclair (Montréal), Patti Tamara Lenard (Ottawa), Niels Morsink (Antwerp), Geneviève Nootens (Chicoutimi), Darren O’Toole (Ottawa), Alexandre Pelletier (Toronto), Réjean Pelletier (Laval), Philip Resnick (UBC), David Robichaud (Ottawa), Peter Russell (Toronto), Richard Simeon (Toronto), Dave Sinardet (Vrije Universiteit Brussel), and Jeremy Webber (Victoria).

Framing Risky Choices

by Ece Özlem Atikcan
Framing Risky Choices
Author: Ece Özlem Atikcan
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Total Pages: 226
Release: 2020-06-03
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0228002257
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The majority of policymakers, academics, and members of the general public expected British citizens to vote to remain in the European Union in the 2016 referendum. This perception was based on the well-established idea that voters don't like change or uncertainty. So why did the British public vote to take such a major economic risk? Framing Risky Choices addresses this question by placing the Brexit vote in the bigger picture of EU and Scottish independence referendums. Drawing from extensive interviews and survey data, it asserts that the framing effect – mobilizing voters by encouraging them to think along particular lines – matters, but not every argument is equally effective. Simple, evocative, and emotionally compelling frames that offer negativity are especially effective in changing people's minds. In the Brexit case, the Leave side neutralized the economic risks of Brexit and proposed other risks relating to remaining in the EU, such as losing control of immigration policy and a lack of funding for the National Health Service. These concrete, impassioned arguments struck an immediate and familiar chord with voters. Most intriguingly, the Remain side was silent on these issues, without an emotional case to present. Framing Risky Choices presents a multi-method, comparative, state-of-the-art analysis of how the Brexit campaign contributed to the outcome. Uncovering the core mechanism behind post-truth politics, it shows that the strength of an argument is not its empirical validity but its public appeal.

The Scottish Political System Since Devolution

by Paul Cairney
The Scottish Political System Since Devolution
Author: Paul Cairney
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2011
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9781845402020
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It outlines the relative effect of each government on Scottish politics and public policy in various contexts, including: high expectations for 'new politics' that were never fully realised; the influence of, and reactions from, the media and public; the role of political parties; the Scottish Government's relations with the UK Government, ELI institutions, local government, quasi-governmental and non-governmental actors; and, the finance available to fund policy initiatives. It then considers how far Scotland has travelled on the road to constitutional change, comparing the original devolved framework with-calls for independence or a new devolution settlement.