Role of Political Mediation within the System of Political Power Relationships in Modern Russia

The authors study the phenomenon of “political mediation” and determine the mediation role of the subjects in the Russian Federation within the system “strong center – strong regions – effective local self-government”. The problems of changing the current model of the federal structure are identified.

The politics within institutions for regulating public spending: conditional compliance within multi-year budgets

Multi-year budget frameworks are often considered as instruments for controlling spending, including in the context of the European Union. This paper shows that the effects of multi-year budgeting depends on several conditions, some of which, may lead to more rather than less spending. The analysis is based on a model of a finance minister’s decision to enforce a previously accepted budget ceiling in subsequent negotiations with a spending minister. The analysis takes account of uncertainty about preferences in these negotiations, positive transaction costs to the finance minister, and the possibility of political mediation through the prime minister. The findings of this paper show that compliance with budget frameworks improves under temporarily stable preferences (e.g. the absence of external shocks), more homogenous preferences within the government (e.g. majoritarian governments in contrast to coalition government), preference similarity between the finance minister and the prime minister (in case of mediation), and increasing transaction costs. In other circumstances, multi-annual frameworks will not be able to block any upward pressure on expenditures.

Nuevas figuras de la Revolución cubana: las mujeres en el Noticiero ICAIC Latinoamericano, 1960-1990.

This article studies women’s representation in the Noticiero ICAIC Latinoamericano, the Cuban Revolution’s newsreel, directed by Santiago Álvarez. It was shown every week between 1960 and 1990, covering aspects of international and national news. It became an important audiovisual tool to spread revolutionary ideas in Cuba. Thus, this article studies the Noticiero ICAIC referring to the concept of “political mediation”: it fulfilled a mediatory function, between Cuban leaders and the people, in the process of building a new society. In the concrete case of women, their representation centers around three protagonists, who also are three possible ways for them to participate in the revolutionary society: the worker, the sportswoman and the militianwoman. With these new feminine representations, the Noticiero ICAIC reflects and gives legitimacy to social and economic changes that can be observed in revolutionary Cuba, especially women’s participation in productive labor. It also contrasts with traditional representations of femininity, associated with the domestic sphere. This article studies these three feminine representations analyzing examples taken from the Noticiero ICAIC’s weekly editions, that can be short reports or editions enterely dedicated to women’s situations

Music education and social development

Art education practices could strategically target those political, social and cultural disparities that negatively affects children and youth. Targeted practices are becoming more concurrent, and such is the case with music education. Historically, music education has directed its efforts mainly to the development of the so-called vocation or talent to play an instrument or to sing. It has been mostly focused to disciplinary training. Consequently, institutionality has governed the music teaching-learning processes since medieval times, prolonging the classical idea of trívium (grammar, dialect, rhetoric) and quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, music) with political mediation of the so-called conservatories or music schools.

“IT HAPPENED BEHIND CLOSED DOORS”: LEGISLATIVE BUFFERING AS AN INFORMAL MECHANISM OF POLITICAL MEDIATION*

The political mediation model explains movement policy outcomes ranging from complete failure to total success. However, the qualitative mechanisms through which political mediation occurs empirically remain understudied, especially as they relate to the content-specifying stages of the legislative process. Furthermore, while we know that political mediation is context dependent, key elements of what political context entails remain underspecified. This article addresses these gaps by tracing the influence of a coalition of social movement organizations (SMOs) seeking to simultaneously shape the content of two major climate bills in a progressive U.S. state where the climate movement enjoys a relatively favorable political context overall. Comparing the divergent trajectories and outcomes of the two bills illuminates the process of legislative buffering, which is conceptualized as an informal mechanism of political mediation. The comparative analysis also reveals situational elements of political context that can present additional hurdles movements must overcome to maximize their success.