Political Belonging in a Neoliberal Era: The Struggle of the Sans-Papiers

This article argues that political belonging should be understood in the context of diverse spatial imaginaries which encompass but are not confined to the state. Engin Isin's approach to citizenship provides a theoretical grounding for this claim. By way of demonstration, the article focuses on the spatially reconfigured practices of the neoliberal state in relation to irregular migration. It shows how the policing of irregular migration sustains a logic of political belonging based on connections between state, citizen and territory. This logic is simultaneously compromised by transnational state practices including the exploitation of irregular migrant labour. Irregular migrants are contesting their positioning within these multidimensional statist frameworks that posit them as outsiders even while they are integrated into local sites of a global political economy. The struggle of the Sans-Papiers, a collective of irregular migrants in France, provides an example in this context. Their claims to entitlement also mobilize multiple dimensions of political belonging and provide insight into transitions in political community, identity and practice.     

Political Science Research Internships and Political Science Education

This article reports on the evaluation of political science research internships and considers their costs and benefits for a political science education. Students indicated high levels of appreciation of the inaugural Political Science Research Internship Unit at the University of Western Australia in terms of its contribution to their personal development and work experience. A substantial number of interns gained insights into the policy process through this form of experiential learning. Many came to appreciate the contingency and the normative dimensions of knowledge in the policy process. Whereas about half of the students found the transition from the seminar room to the policy world difficult, the other half were more successful in applying their theoretical knowledge to practical experiences. The article also indicates how this evaluation informs future course design.     

Concepts in Political Science

A concept is the name of any general element in one's experience, and, consequently, in social science all conclusions are based on concepts. The main object of this article is to indicate the existence of a logical gulf between the concept as an object of analysis made by social science and the concept as a means to accomplish the analysis     

Why Political Science Needs Political Theory

Normative political theory and empirical social science have a reciprocal relationship. This thesis is illustrated by taking up two topics: one is social exclusion; the other is ethnicity and discrimination.     

Experimental Methodology in Political Science

Experiments offer a useful methodological tool to examine issuesof importance to political scientists. The historical and culturaldifferences between experiments in behavioral economics andsocial psychology are discussed. Issues of central concern toexperimentalists are covered, including impact versus control,mundane versus experimental realism, internal versus externalvalidity, deception, and laboratory versus field experiments.Advantages and disadvantages of experimentation are summarized.     

政治学中的民族议题

突破中国民族话语中以“民族”概念专指少数民族的思维的限制就会发现,人类历史上的“民族”概念最早形成于欧洲,指的是具有国家形式的人群共同体。这样一种与国家结合在一起的民族,具体表现为国民的共同体,是在一个长期的历史过程中形成的。民族形成后便将形成过程中经历的人口国民化、国民整体化等蕴涵于自身,使其成为蕴涵一系列社会政治机制的人口组织形式,并为欧洲现代社会、现代国家和现代政治的形成奠定基础。在“民族”概念的使用范围拓展以后,不具国家形式的各种历史文化共同体也被以“民族”概念来指称和描述,从而使民族的种类迅速增加。这样的民族共同体又对民族国家的统一、稳定和治理产生着深刻的影响,在国内和国际政治关系中发挥着重要的作用。对如此形态多样和影响深远的民族现象,政治学者不能漠然视之,而必须积极主动地关注和研究。由此形成的民族议题,既是政治学理论和知识体系构建不可或缺的重要方面,也是解释中国现代国家的构建和发展及政治学知识体系完备和创新的重要渠道。     

Political Science as a Broad Church: The Search for a Pluralist Discipline

In 1996 Robert Goodin and Hans-Dieter Klingemann published an edited collection of essays, A New Handbook of Political Science , that provides probably the best overview of the discipline of political science, at least as seen through the eyes of the mainstream of the profession. Goodin is an American working at the Australian National University, while Klingemann is a German working in Berlin. Nevertheless, their overview represents an American view of political science, which is hardly surprising as more than 75 per cent of living political scientists are American. Overall, they present a picture of the discipline as professional, pluralistic and improving rapidly. Here, we take issue with that view, not as an ambition, but as a reality. In contrast, we argue that political science, particularly US political science, is still dominated by a positivist epistemology and, particularly, by behaviouralist and rational choice approaches that are underpinned by that positivism. We begin by outlining Goodin and Klingemann's argument and critiquing it. Subsequently, we take issue with them empirically, using evidence drawn both from their own edited collection and an analysis of the contents of the two foremost US and UK journals; in the US the American Political Science Review , the American Political Science Association's main journal, and the American Journal of Political Science , and in the UK the British Journal of Political Science and Political Studies , the Political Studies Association's main journal. The methodology adopted is discussed below. In the last section, we consider the consequence of our findings for the future of political science in Britain.     

The Emergence of Science as a Political Brand

This article seeks to explain how science has emerged as political brand. While science and politics have intersected for centuries, more recent social, cultural, and political events led to increased attention to the role of science in everyday life and how science is used in policy decision-making. This led to a tipping point in 2017 when the March for Science was formed, following what many in the U.S. and countries around the world viewed as anti-science stances by political leaders. The political spectacle of the March for Science not only brought increased attention to the scientific community, but also emerged to define the brand of science in society. Drawing on research from the role of brands in consumer culture – including political marketing, brand resonance, and brand community – I describe the implications of the science brand for the scientific enterprise, and the ways in which the scientific community consider the strategic communication of their brand within the political marketplace.