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The EU harmonisation has created changes in the military's formal and informal influence in the directions of decreased formal and informal military influence in civilian politics. The EU reforms have created changes in the mindset of the citizens, by creating changes in the security culture of the citizens and in the civil-military related political culture. The desired level of alignment has not been reached. Therefore, the study examines the areas where further alignment is required. Moving from Rebecca L. Schiff's concordance theory, the article examines the relationship between the Turkish military, the civilian politics and the society before and after the EU harmonisation process. It examines the effects of the EU harmonisation process on the changes in the civil-military balance of power, and on the related security culture and political values. The analysis focuses on: (i) increased civilian control and consequent changes in the policy of accountability; (ii) transparency building in the defence sector; (iii) parliamentary oversight; and (iv) the change in the political culture related to the civil-military issues. It also investigates the extent the EU harmonisation has achieved in building democratic civil-military relations in order to align with the EU standards.

Theoretically, the quality of representation is likely to be enhanced when more societal segments are included in formal political structures. An interesting question, however, is whether a similar correlation holds empirically outside established Western democracies. In the 2015 Egyptian parliament, women representation achieved an all-time high of 14.9% of total seats – nearly four times the historical Egyptian average. It is asked whether female legislators riding this unprecedent tide were different from their male colleagues in terms of their socio-economic backgrounds. But more importantly, the authors examine whether this increased representation led to any change in inclusion of more women’s issues in the legislative agenda, and how traditional topics are debated.

The authors conducted a content analysis of selected parliamentary scripts – generating on an original data set – to trace the topics and interventions raised by female MPs. The authors draw on the extensive literature on women’s representation, giving special attention to the structure versus agency dichotomy in this quest.

The authors conclude that female MPs were as active in parliamentary debates as to their male colleagues. Moreover, women did stress women issues more than men. The results indicate that the inclusion of traditionally under-represented groups does affect parliamentary agendas.

The authors conducted a content analysis of selected parliamentary scripts – generating on an original data set – to trace the topics and interventions raised by female MPs based on a case study of the 2015 Egyptian parliament.

This chapter focuses on the Swedish agriculture policy from the 1940s to 1960s. Which gender visions were explicitly and implicitly expressed in Swedish agricultural policy discourse during the formative period of the welfare state? In what way were farming women, men and families represented in debates in the Swedish Riksdag (the Parliament) in the parliamentary processes, in bills, proposals and protocols? The point of departure is the concept of family farm, its introduction and the different understandings and discussions it was met with.

One significant feature of both old and new democracies is that their Parliaments all have parliamentary library and research services in one form or another. In a totalitarian State, parliamentary libraries appear to be an unnecessary luxury. In the developed and many developing countries the parliamentary library and research service is a vital element. Describes the workings of the library and research service of The Parliament of New South Wales and how the Members’ needs for information are met and measured.

The purpose of this paper is to assess the information needs and information-seeking behaviour of Members of Parliament (MPs) in Bangladesh. It aimed at determining the information sources, preferred information format, frequency of seeking information and access to information and communication technology and online information services by the MPs. The study also intended to assess the role of parliament library for satisfying the information needs of the MPs.

A survey method was adopted for data collection; the respondents were interviewed by the researchers with the guidance of a structured questionnaire. The questionnaire was read out for the respondents and filled up by the interviewers based on the answers they received. Fifty MPs were selected for the study using simple random sampling. The data were analysed with the help of weighted mean.

The study found that the MPs mainly seek information to make a parliamentary request/inquiry, to make a speech and to make a decision. The most important sources of information were minutes of sessions, mass media, personal letters and information networks; and they preferred printed formats rather than online documents. The result also showed that only a few MPs were aware of the information services provided by the parliament library and were satisfied with the services they received.

There has been no study carried out on the information needs and information-seeking behaviour of MPs in Bangladesh prior to this research. The study will help the policymakers to improve the library services for MPs in Bangladesh.

Some employers contend that the college graduates they hire should have stronger communication and critical thinking skills upon arrival from their various college/university programs in which they majored. As higher education continues its efforts to meet the demands for employers, the authors contend that the benefits of participation in debate exercises can be incorporated into various courses as a teaching tool to increase facility with these soft skills. A practical application of debate in a specific organizational leadership course is presented, along with highlights of the student participants’ reflections upon the experience, and the initial signs of positive impact on these skills. Suggestions of future application of debate into curricula are also shared.

This study aims to deal with the evaluation of institutional development and effectiveness of regional parliaments; it provides a scientific contribution to the development of the field of parliamentary studies by developing a set of indicators to present a parameter for evaluating regional parliaments with application to the Arab Parliament. The study concluded with the development of a parameter of 35 indicators to measure institutionally, efficiency and effectiveness of the institution, with application to the Arab Parliament, as well as developing an integrated assessment of the strengths and weaknesses in the institutional aspects and organizational efficiency.

The study is predicated on the principle of institutional approach and the systems analysis. The curriculum is applied to the Arab Parliament as an institution to quantify efficiency and efficacy according to the implementation of a set of proposed practical indicators. The study additionally applies both Huntington’s institutional standards such as Adaptability, Involution, Autonomy and Coherence, as well as the indicators of institutions efficiency according to PrePanti such as Openness, Reception (R), Autonomy (A), Balance (B), Congruence (C), Internal Efficacy (I), Reformulation (R) and Roles (R), which refer to the first seven Latin letters “First RABCIRR”.

The researcher endeavored to answer the main questions; How to quantify the degree of institutionalization, its impact on the efficiency and efficacy of regional parliaments. The researcher’s approaches and the standards of efficiency and efficacy figured a comprehensive set of indicators that composed an integrated parliamentary standard to assess the degree of institutionalization, efficacy and efficiency of regional parliaments as a scientific contribution based on the Arab Parliament that can be applied to all regional parliaments.

This research is an attempt to create a Parliamentary Index to complement the previous scientific initiatives and efforts in developing such an index, which consists of 35 indicators and its application to the Arab Parliament. This research uses the principles of institutional approach, system analysis methodology and efficiency. The approach is applied to the Arab Parliament as a regional parliament to measure efficiency and effectiveness by applying a set of the proposed indicators.

The present article deals with the topic of migrants’ exclusion from welfare benefits in European host countries from the angle of the research on the so-called “welfare chauvinism” (Andersen and Bjørklund 1990, p. 212). More specifically, it explores the political justifications behind welfare chauvinism in the policy debate surrounding some recent chauvinist-oriented social policies. Drawing on that, the article develops a theoretical argument to generate expectations about how politicians use different types of justifications. The fundamental proposition is that the chauvinistic arguments used are shaped by the different types of social programs, i.e. either universal or means-tested programs.

Qualitative content analysis of several selected parliamentary debates in the period 2017–2019 in Austria is carried out. In order to improve the efficiency of the research, the author relies on MAXQDA, an advanced piece of software for qualitative data analysis, to code the qualitative data and analyze them. The author prefers this to other similar programs as it is considered a valid and reliable tool within the academic research world.

The article points out that programs design works as an explanatory factor to highlight variations of welfare chauvinist arguments.

It develops for the first time a theoretical argument explaining the presence and variation of welfare chauvinist arguments based on social programs design.

This paper examines actors and discourses shaping new Canadian legislation designed to advance diversity in corporate governance.

This paper performs a stakeholder and discourse analysis drawing on texts of parliamentary debates.

The paper illuminates tensions regarding definitions of diversity, its importance for boards of directors and the mechanisms favoured for implementation. Official discourses examined show that, unlike for other political issues, opposition was largely muted, and most stakeholders engaged in the process supported legislation advancing diversity. Nonetheless areas of debate and positioning by actors and suggest important differences, with outcomes linked to non-traditional power bases.

This study provides insights into the discursive environments of organizations and processes relating to promoting diversity and equality in the political decision-making domain, a critical venue for understanding advancement of equity, often neglected in organizational studies.

By understanding the complex and competing discourses surrounding diversity and inclusion at the macro level this paper provides a context for understanding organizational (meso) and individual (micro) beliefs and behaviours.

This study shows how advocacy shapes how policy and legislation are framed and the ways mainstream organizations, including women's groups, may advance gender equality without regard to other dimensions of diversity or intersectionality.

This study maps the political discourse around recent Canadian legislation designed to improve diversity on boards that must, in the Canadian context, address more than gender.