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Women’s Political Representation in Post-Soviet Republics: Parliamentary Elections in Georgia and Abkhazia
No full textThe post-Soviet republics, outside the EU, have a comparatively poor record on women’s parliamentary representation. This has been blamed on the negative legacy of the Soviet system on contemporary gender relations, the complex relationship between the electoral and party systems and on-going political instability. An aspect of this instability is the emergence of de facto states within the internationally recognised boundaries of the former Soviet republics. Research on this region has also underlined the importance of in-depth studies of women representation in the form of single country case studies that have the capacity to tease out these sets of relationships. In this context examining both the ‘parent’ and the ‘de facto’ state allows the trajectory of the gender dimension of the political system to be examined comparatively in two political entities that share a recent political, economic and social history. As a contribution to this debate this paper examines the gender dimensions of two parliamentary contests in 2012, one in the de facto state of Abkhazia and the other in its parent state of Georgia, as a means of analysing the factors that explain the level of women’s formal political representation in these states
Social Trust and Value Similarity: the Relationship between Social Trust and Human Values in Europe
No full textThe purpose of the current paper is to test whether value similarity may foster social trust in society and whether people have higher levels of social trust when they emphasise the same values that prevail in their country. The relationship between social trust and human values was examined in a sample of 51,308 people across 29 European countries using data from the European Social Survey round 6. Results suggest that value similarity is more important in generating individual level social trust in countries where the overall levels of social trust are higher. There is a stronger positive relationship between value similarity and social trust in Scandinavian countries, which have high social trust levels, while in countries with a low level of social trust, congruity of the personal value structure with the country level value structure tends to decrease the individuals trustfulness
Constitutional Reforms in Europe in the 20thCentury as a Repository of Legal Ideas
No full textThere is no doubt that the final decades of the 20th century have changed the world significantly. For instance, for Eastern European researchers have new possibilities opened to move freely throughout the world in order to improve their studies. Also the increasingly globalizing world has given us new technical possibilities to communicate faster which, for instance, has given encouragement to cooperate in the fields of sciences, where previously there was no cooperation at all or it was rare.
Compliance of the right to issue regulationsof the Bank of Estonia with the constitution and EU law
No full textThis article is concentrated on the question of whether the Bank of Estonia may issue regulations according to the constitution and on the interpretation of the constitution related to this question.
The assessment of the compliance of the right to issue regulations of the Bank of Estonia with the constitution requires theoretically and practically justified answers to the three following questions:
Which role does the Bank of Estonia play arising from the constitution and law?
Based on the principles and standards of the constitution, what kinds of remedies and legal acts need to be issued for its role (tasks)?
Can Riigikogu issue the right to also issue regulations to those bodies/persons that have no respective right according to the constitution (unless explicitly provided for by the constitution)?
Mis on relatsiooniline võimukäsitlus?
No full textThere are at least two major understandings of relational approach to power that seldom if ever enter dialogue with each other. The aim of this paper is to bring out the differences and potentials for a dialogue of these perspectives by untangling the ontological underpinnings and methodological consequences of each. First, a perspective I call “Anglo-American relationalism”. Compared to traditional approaches that overwhelmingly focus on the powerful (the As) this perspective highlights the importance of considering also the contribution of the powerless (the Bs) to creating and upholding power relations. Second, an approach to power I call “Continental relationalism” presumes the primacy of relations over entities. The identities of the elements of power relations are viewed not as being “given” prior to those relations, but as being constituted within them
Development of the mechanism of constitutionalcontrol in the Russian Federation
No full textThe mechanism of constitutional control has not been developing in Russia for very long, meeting difficulties and obstacles, and nowadays it still faces some challenges. It’s obvious that future difficulties and problems will be successfully overcome, as has happened in the past, but the question is what is the cost?
Legal support obligations of theRussian Federation to create the conditions for a decent life rights
No full textCreating the conditions for a decent human life is one of the fundamental provisions of the Constitution of the Russian Federation contained in Article No. 7. The mentioned position is based on the principles of The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) which was adopted in 1948 and The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) adopted in 1966.
Kodakondsuse identiteedi tahkude tüpoloogia Eesti-Portugali perede näitel
No full textTavaliselt mõistetakse kodakondsuse all indiviidi õiguslikku sidet riigiga. Kui struktuuri tasandil on see kindlaks määratud reeglitekogum, siis tegutseja tasandil on sel rohkem keeruline ja mitmetahuline sotsiaalne iseloom. Artikkel asetab kodakondsuse perekonna konteksti ning näeb lojaalsust riigile ja suhteid peresfääris ühendatuna. Artikkel keskendub nendele segaperedele, mille on moodustanud erinevate Euroopa Liidu riikide kodanikud ning keda ühendab Euroopa kodakondsus sünnilt. Intervjuud Eesti emade ja Portugali isadega näitasid, et pereloome teisest rahvusest ja kodakondsusest partneriga võib avada erinevaid kodakondsuse identiteedi dimensioone. Artikkel tutvustab emotsionaalset, praktilist, egalitaarset, sümboolset ja osalevat kodakondsuse identiteeti avavat kategooriat. Uuringudisain võimaldab vaatluse alla võtta ka topeltkodakondsuse ja Euroopa kodakondsuse nendes kategooriates
Esimese maailmasõja algus Eestis. Võim ja ühiskond [Beginning of the First World War in Estonia. Government and Society]
No full textIn 2014, many countries in the world commemorated the centennial of World War I. This inspired widespread discussion on how the past is assessed and how historical memory is generated. Until recently, the focus of research was on the military and political aspects of World War I, whereas newer publications indicate that the social and economic history of the war is also now being tackled. While the circumstances causing the great powers who fought in World War I to join the war, as well as subsequent events, are by now rather clear, the wartime situation in the European countries that were born after the war in the territories of former empires is still largely unknown.
One such country is Estonia, which formed part of the Russian Empire in 1914 and was divided between the Province (Governorate) of Estonia and northern part of the Livonian province. How did Estonia receive the news of World War I, how did the nation’s mood differ from that of the Empire’s capital, a couple of hundred kilometres to the east,and how did the war affect life in the governorates – all these questions are explored in this article.
(Longer version of the English abstract is included in the article, starting from p 42.
Vabastamine propaganda abil. Juozas Gabrys ja Leedu iseseisvusliikumine 1911–1918 [Liberation through propaganda. Juozas Gabrys and the Lithuanian independence movement 1911–1918]
No full textDuring the Russian Revolution of 1905, Juozas Gabrys alias Paršaitis already played an active political role as leader of the “Farmer’s Union”and one of the three secretaries of the “Great Diet of Vilnius”. Because of Russian repression he had to emigrate to Western Europe and in 1907 settled down in Paris, where he soon established an important political network. In 1911, he founded the “Lithuanian Information Bureau” and, together with the French journalist Jean Pélissier, the “Union des Nationalités” and its journal, the “Annales des Nationalités”. His aim was to achieve independence through propaganda, not only for the Lithuanians, but also for the other oppressed nationalities in Europe. World War I offered him a great chance to realize his aim.
However, as France was allied with Russia he was obliged in July 1915 to move to Lausanne in neutral Switzerland. Here he was free to organize, with only seven employees, a vast propaganda campaign to liberate Lithuania from the Russian yoke. He published three specialist periodicals but also succeeded in flooding more than 50 European newspapers with Lithuanian propaganda. He also organized several conferences the most important being the 3rd “Conference of Nationalities” on June 1916 in Lausanne, where more than 400 delegates from various nationalities denounced their oppression by Russia and Britain. He was financed by Lithuanian emigrants in America and by the German Embassy in Berne, but his greatest exploit was the world-wide collect in support of Lithuanian war victims during “Lithuanian Day” on 20 May 1917 organized by the Catholic Church, which made this “Ethnic Entrepreneur” a millionaire.
His influence on political events – the creation of the “Taryba” (Lithuanian Council) and the proclamation of the independence of Lithuania as German satellite state in March 1918 – was negligible. He supported the Taryba against the oppressive German military occupation regime but neglected to create a personal power base in Lithuania, and when after the German defeat, Lithuania became genuinely independent in November 1918, he was completely excluded from the government. Last efforts in 1919 to seize power in Lithuania either with the help of a French military mission or a coups d’état failed, and thereafter the political role of Gabrys was finished