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Do radical right parties present blurry economic stances, or have they clarified their positions while moving towards the economic left? This article questions the strategic behaviour of radical right parties in Western Europe. It shows that although radical right parties have increased their discussion of economic issues, and expert placements of this party family on the economic dimension have become more centrist over time, the uncertainty surrounding these placements continues to be higher for the radical right than any other party family in Europe. The article then moves on to examine to what extent voter‐party congruence on redistribution, immigration and other issues of social lifestyle predict an individual's propensity to vote for the radical right compared to other parties. Although redistribution is the component of economic policy where the radical right seems to be centrist, the findings indicate that it remains party‐voter congruence on immigration that drives support for radical right parties, while the congruence level for redistribution has an insignificant effect. The article concludes that while radical right parties seem to have included some clearly left‐leaning economic proposals, which shifted the general expert views of these parties to the economic centre, their overall economic profiles remain as blurry as ever. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parties with left‐wing positions on economic issues and right‐wing (i.e., authoritarian) positions on cultural issues have been historically largely absent from the supply side of the policy space of Western European democracies. Yet, many citizens hold such left‐authoritarian issue attitudes. This article addresses the hypotheses that left‐authoritarian citizens are less likely to vote, less satisfied with the democratic process and have lower levels of political trust when there is a left‐authoritarian supply gap. Using data for 14 Western European countries from the European Social Survey 2008 in the main analysis, it is shown that left‐authoritarians are less likely to vote and exhibit lower levels of satisfaction with democracy and political trust. A supplementary analysis of national election studies from Finland before and after the electoral breakthrough of the left‐authoritarian True Finns Party in 2011 indicates that whether left‐authoritarians participate less and believe less in the efficacy of voting is contingent on the presence of a strong left‐authoritarian party. This study illuminates how constrained party supply in a two‐dimensional policy space can affect voter turnout as well as political support, and has broader implications for the potential further rise of left‐authoritarian challenger parties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective Work on economic news argues that U.S. coverage focuses primarily on changes rather than levels of future economic conditions; it also both affects and reflects public economic sentiment. Given that economic perceptions are related to policy preferences and government support, this is of consequence for politics. This article explores the generalizability of these findings. Methods Using nearly 100,000 stories over 30 years in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada, we compare media tone, public opinion, and economic conditions. Result Analyses demonstrate that media tone and public opinion follow future economic change in all three countries. Media and opinion are also related, but the effect mostly runs from the public to the media, not the other way around. Conclusion These results confirm the generalizability of prior findings, and the importance of considering more than a simple unidirectional link between media coverage and public economic sentiment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper critically reconsiders debates about the business case for workplace diversity as exemplified in lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) activism. These debates have long suggested that there is an oppositional distinction between justifying diversity on self-interested business grounds and justifying it on the grounds of ethics, equality and social justice. This has led to an impasse between ethically driven diversity theory and activism, and the dominant business case approach commonly deferred to in managerial practice. As a way of mediating this impasse the contribution of this paper is to demonstrate how 'ethical praxis' can be deployed both despite and because of non-ethically motivated approaches to ethics in business. Drawing on Judith Butler's and Emmanuel Levinas's considerations of the relationship between ethics and the practice of justice, it is argued that critiques of the business case for diversity rely on a pure ethics that does not adequately recognize its connection to lived politics. Conversely, support for the business case evinces a politics that has failed to remember its origin in ethics. The paper positions ethical praxis as a political intervention undertaken in the name of ethics and uses this to suggest that the business case, despite its ethical poverty, holds potential to create real opportunities for justice in organizations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Running through Bernard Crick's In Defence of Politics is an implicit faith in the ability of liberal democracy to deliver progress. From the perspective of 1962 such optimism seems well founded. After the years of post war austerity there had been more than a decade of steady growth, the middle class was expanding fast providing unprecedented levels of absolute social mobility (more benign and less complicated than the relative social mobility which today's politicians disingenuously claim to pursue). Matthew Taylor explores the case for 'social politics'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1962, the late Professor Sir Bernard Crick published his seminal work In Defence of Politics. Fifty years on, formal political processes have never been in greater need of defending. In this article, former Home Secretary David Blunkett MP argues that in order to defend politics we need to change the way in which we 'do' our politics. In a 21st century response to Professor Crick's challenge to defend the role of politics in providing a counterweight to the financial markets and economic imperialism, Blunkett considers how it is possible to renew political democracy as a force for progressive change. The last five years of political and financial turmoil have seen politics smeared and even, in the case of Greece and Italy, elected governments removed and replaced by technocrats. With the power of government behind the people, it would be possible to foster a whole new spirit of seeing the political process as a way of organising, advising and yes funding a demand for something better from big institutions both public and private. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective We investigate whether voters in communities with high rates of foreclosure will find it more difficult to participate in elections, given social disruptions associated with home loss in their neighborhoods. Methods We estimate the community-level effects of foreclosure on turnout rates in California ZIP Codes during the 2008 presidential election and an individual-level turnout model using housing data merged with California voter data. Results Foreclosure rates are associated with reduced participation independent of local economic conditions, rates of education, ethnic composition, or individual partisanship, age, and habitual participation. Conclusion Given the relationship between the foreclosure crisis and political participation, this research suggests the need for further investigation. We are especially interested in the potential that housing foreclosure further exacerbates ethnic and economic inequality due to the preponderance of subprime loans, distressed mortgages, and foreclosures in communities of color and lower socioeconomic status. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]