Voters probably do not take a series of relevant issues into consideration but rather vote on the basis of the few issues that happen to be on their minds at the moment of the decision. Issue salience, i.e. the availability of issue-schema's, is to a certain extent determined by the political communication during the election campaign. A content analysis of the debates during the 1991 campaign shows that the socio-economic issues, the ethnic issue and the immigrant issue were on top (...) of the agenda. A similar analysis of the party political broadcasts and the ads in the national newspapers indicates that the parties tried to focus the campaign on the socio-economie issues, the functioning of the political system and to a much lesser extent on the environmental issue and the communal issue. Only the latter nationalist party attempted to prime the immigrant issue. Survey data show that this issue was exceptionally salient in the electorate, as were the ethnic issue and the political system issue. (shrink)

A sample survey of 3000 Belgians shows that a large majority in both Flanders, Wallonia and Brussels is in favour of the monarchy. This support is based mainly on an attachment to tradition and a belief that the monarchy is the only institution capable of holding the nation together. Comparison with earlier research indicates that the influence of the king, as perceived by the population, has increased during the last 15 years. Older generations and catholics tend to be more royalistic. (...) Opposition against the monarchy is strongest amongst non-religious groups, younger generations, ecologists and - in Flanders - socialists and Flemish nationalists. (shrink)

In various parliamentary democracies, institutional reformers have proposed to directly elect the prime minister, but it is only in Israel that this reform has been implemented. In this article, the Israeli model is compared to the proposals involving the direct election of the prime minister in France, Italy, the Netherlands and Belgium. The analysis focuses on three crucial characteristics: the object of the election, the electoral system and the relationship between the assembly and the executive. It is shown that there (...) is substantial variation among the models. Some of proposed models are close to the presidential idealtype. Other models combine a direct election of the executive with the possibility of censure by the assembly, and thus constitute a new regime type which can be labelled as 'neo-parliamentary'. The Israeli model belongs to this group, although it is atypical because of the investiture requirement. Finally, some models approach the parliamentary idealtype as they allow the assembly to replace the elected prime minister. White most models involve a concurrent but separate election of the prime minister and the assembly, it is argued that a linked election offers better possibilities to bring about an executive majority in the assembly. (shrink)

The political socialization of a sense of national belonging is problematic in a socio-political environment where children are confronted with multiple national identities. A survey was administered to a diversified sample of 1000 Flemish secondary school pupils, aged 17-18. The data show that most Flemish preadults,when asked, hesitate between the Flemish and the Belgian identity, which they moreover hardly consider as contradictory. This lack of a single evident fatherland somehow results in an absence of genuine patriotism. Significant in this respect (...) is the fact that identification with the local community takes preference over allegiance to the nation. In addition, Flemish youth adopt a low-profile attitude towards both Flanders and Belgium. The political socialization process apparently does not effect an emotional attachment to either the Flemish or the Belgian political system. Obviously, respondents who vote fora Flemish-nationalistic party,or whose parents do so, tend to prefer the Flemish identity. (shrink)

The 1995 simultaneous election of three legislative assemblies offered the Belgian voters an opportunity to split their ballot between three different parties. An analysis of Flemish individual level survey data shows that 76.1% cast a straight ticket vote, white 20.9 % split their tickets between two and 3 % between three different parties. Ticketsplitting occurs most frequently amongst voters who mention the personality of individual politicians or the issues as a reason to support a party. In addition, the likehood of (...) ticket-splitting increases amongst the higher educated and the non-partisans. No support was found for the hypothesis that ticket-splitters in a multi-party system tend to lean towards one party on some issues and towards the other party on others. Instead, ticket-splitters generally take a position in between two parties. No evidence was found of a differential issue impact across elections, in this sense that regional issues are more critical to regional elections and federal issues to federal elections. (shrink)

Since 1989 candidates in Belgian elections have to declare their campaign expenses, but there is a widespread doubt as to the validity of the declared expenses as an indicator of the real cost of the campaign. After the 2000 local elections, data were collected concerning the campaign expenses of 2762 candidates spread over 134 municipalities in the Flemish region of Belgium. An analysis relating the declared expenses to a number of predictor variables reveals a sensible and systematic pattern, which can (...) be interpreted as an indirect indication of their validity. There is a limit on spending, but the research shows that, on average, the candidates only spend 25% of what they are allowed to. Controlling for a number of relevant background variables, the campaign expenditures were found to have a substantial effect on the preference votes for the candidates. (shrink)

A survey amongst 602 Flemish secondary school pupils, aged 17-18, shows that a distinction can be made between two different, albeit closely related, dimensions of royalism : the emotional attachment to the king as a person and to the royal family on the one hand, and the political support for the monarchy on the other. Respondents are predominantly indifferent or negative about the monarchy, particularly on the emotional dimension. A multivariate analysis shows that male and non-churchgoing pupils are more negative (...) on both dimensions. Pupils from migrant families are more positive on the emotional dimension. The scores on both dimensions are higher amongst pupils who identify with Belgium rather than with Flanders, who have strong patriotic feelings and who tend towards an authoritarian attitude. The scores are lower amongst pupils with apreference for a regionalist party. The hypothesis that intense royalist feelings coincide with a general attitude of trust in the political authorities was only confirmed with regard to the emotional dimension, while the political support for the monarchy appears to be detached from the trust in the political authorities. (shrink)

Rankings of politicalparties are often used to map the multiple party preference of the electorate. This article shows how the obtained rankings may be analysed by means of the exploded logit-technique, which allows for testing both the difference between the rankings and the effect of either categorical or quantitative independent variables on the rankings. An analysis of the effect of age on the party preference rankings of the christian democratie electorate in the 1991 Belgian parliamentary election shows that the older (...) CVP-voters tend to rank the liberal and the socialist party equally, white the younger voters hesitate between the liberal and the green party. The younger CVP-voters are also significantly less averse of the far-right Vlaams Blok. (shrink)

Unbelievable Errors defends an error theory about all normative judgements: not just moral judgements, but also judgements about reasons for action, judgements about reasons for belief, and instrumental normative judgements. This theory states that normative judgements are beliefs that ascribe normative properties, but that normative properties do not exist. It therefore entails that all normative judgements are false. -/- Bart Streumer also argues, however, that we cannot believe this error theory. This may seem to be a problem for the (...) theory. But he argues that it makes this error theory more likely to be true, since it undermines objections to the theory and it makes it harder to reject the arguments for the theory. -/- He then sketches how certain other philosophical theories can be defended in a similar way. He concludes that to make philosophical progress, we need to make a sharp distinction between a theory's truth and our ability to believe it. (shrink)

Gricean pragmatics. Saying vs. implicating ; Discourse and cooperation ; Conversational implicatures ; Generalised vs. particularised ; Cancellability ; Gricean reasoning and the pragmatics of what is said -- The standard recipe for Q-implicatures. The standard recipe ; Inference to the best explanation ; Weak implicatures and competence ; Relevance ; Conclusion -- Scalar implicatures. Horn scales and the generative view ; Implicatures and downward entailing environments ; Disjunction : exclusivity and ignorance ; Conclusion -- Psychological plausibility. Charges of psychological (...) inadequacy ; Logical complexity ; Abduction ; Incremental processing ; The intentional stance ; Alternatives ; Conclusion -- Nonce inference or defaults?. True defaults ; Strong defaultism ; Weak defaultism ; Contextualism ; Conclusion -- Intentions, alternatives, and free choice. Free choice ; Problems with the standard recipe ; Intentions first ; Free choice explained ; Comparing alternatives ; Two flavours of Q-implicature ; Conclusion -- Embedded implicatures : the problems. The problems ; Varieties of conventionalism ; Against conventionalism ; Conclusion -- Embedded implicatures : a Gricean approach. Disjunction ; Belief reports ; Factives and other presupposition inducers ; Indefinites ; Contrastive construals and lexical pragmatics ; Conclusion. (shrink)

In this volume, Geurts takes discourse representation theory (DRT), and turns it into a unified account of anaphora and presupposition, which he applies not only to the standard problem cases but also to the interpretation of modal expressions, attitude reports, and proper names. The resulting theory, for all its simplicity, is without doubt the most comprehensive of its kind to date. The central idea underlying Geurts' 'binding theory' of presupposition is that anaphora is just a special case of presupposition projection. (...) But this is only one of the ways in which the concept of presupposition is taken beyond its traditional limits. Geurts shows, furthermore, that presupposition projection is crucially involved in several phenomena that are not usually viewed in presuppositional terms, such as modal subordination, de re readings of attitude reports, and rigid designation. While making his case for DRT and the binding theory, Geurts also presents an incisive analysis of what is probably still the most influential account of presupposition, viz. the satisfaction theory, demonstrating that there are fundamental problems not only with this theory but with the very framework in which it is couched. (shrink)

The concept of resistance has always been central to the reception of Hegel's philosophy. The prevalent image of Hegel's system, which continues to influence the scholarship to this day, is that of an absolutist, monist metaphysics which overcomes all resistance, sublating or assimilating all differences into a single organic 'Whole'. For that reason, the reception of Hegel has always been marked by the question of how to resist Hegel: how to think that which remains outside of or other to the (...) totalizing system of dialectics. In recent years the work of scholars such as Catherine Malabou, Slavoj Žižek, Rebecca Comay and Frank Ruda has brought considerable nuance to this debate. A new reading of Hegel has emerged which challenges the idea that there is no place for difference, otherness or resistance in Hegel, both by refusing to reduce Hegel's complex philosophy to a straightforward systematic narrative and by highlighting particular moments within Hegel's philosophy which seem to counteract the traditional understanding of dialectics. This book brings together established and new voices in this field in order to show that the notion of resistance is central to this revaluation of Hegel. (shrink)

Health-promoting nudges have been put into practice by different agents, in different contexts and with different aims. This article formulates a set of criteria that enables a thorough ethical evaluation of such nudges. As such, it bridges the gap between the abstract, theoretical debates among academics and the actual behavioral interventions being implemented in practice. The criteria are derived from arguments against nudges, which allegedly disrespect nudgees, as these would impose values on nudgees and/or violate their rationality and autonomy. Instead (...) of interpreting these objections as knock-down arguments, I take them as expressing legitimate worries that can often be addressed. I analyze six prototypical nudge cases, such as Google’s rearrangement of fridges and the use of defaults in organ donation registration. I show how the ethical criteria listed are satisfied by most—but not all—nudges in most—but not all—circumstances. (shrink)

According to the error theory, normative judgements are beliefs that ascribe normative properties, even though such properties do not exist. In this paper, I argue that we cannot believe the error theory, and that this means that there is no reason for us to believe this theory. It may be thought that this is a problem for the error theory, but I argue that it is not. Instead, I argue, our inability to believe the error theory undermines many objections that (...) have been made to this theory. (shrink)

One of the most pervasive criticisms of nudges has been the claim that they violate, undermine or decrease people’s autonomy. This claim, however, is seldom backed up by an explicit and detailed conception of autonomy. In this paper, we aim to do three things. First, we want to clear up some conceptual confusion by distinguishing the different conceptions used by Cass Sunstein and his critics in order to get clear on how they conceive of autonomy. Second, we want to add (...) to the existing discussion by distinguishing between ‘autonomy’ as the ability to set your own ends and ‘autocracy’ as the ability to actually realize those ends. This will allow for a more careful ethical evaluation of specific nudge interventions. Third, we will introduce the idea of ‘perimeters of autonomy’ in an attempt to provide a realistic account of personal autonomy and we will argue that it can alleviate most of the worries about nudging being autonomy-undermining. (shrink)

Many philosophers claim that it cannot be the case that a person ought to perform an action if this person cannot perform this action. However, most of these philosophers do not give arguments for the truth of this claim. In this paper, I argue that it is plausible to interpret this claim in such a way that it is entailed by the claim that there cannot be a reason for a person to perform an action if it is impossible that (...) this person will perform this action. I then give three arguments for the truth of the latter claim, which are also arguments for the truth of the former claim as I interpret it. (shrink)

What is property, and why does our species happen to have it? In The Property Species, the economist Bart Wilson explores how we acquire, perceive, and know the custom of property, and why this might be relevant to social scientists, philosophers, and legal scholars for understanding how property works in the twenty-first century.

People talk not only to others but also to themselves. The self talk we engage in may be overt or covert, and is associated with a variety of higher mental functions, including reasoning, problem solving, planning and plan execution, attention, and motivation. When talking to herself, a speaker takes devices from her mother tongue, originally designed for interpersonal communication, and employs them to communicate with herself. But what could it even mean to communicate with oneself? To answer that question, we (...) need a theory of communication that explains how the same linguistic devices may be used to communicate with others and oneself. On the received view, which defines communication as information exchange, self talk appears to be an anomaly, for it is hard to see the point of exchanging information with oneself. However, if communication is analysed as a way of negotiating commitments between speaker and hearer, then communication may be useful even when speaker and hearer coincide. Thus a commitment-based approach allows us to make sense of self talk as well as social talk. (shrink)

We can understand and act upon the beliefs of other people, even when these conflict with our own beliefs. Children’s development of this ability, known as Theory of Mind, typically happens around age 4. Research using a looking-time paradigm, however, established that toddlers at the age of 15 months old pass a non-verbal false-belief task (Onishi and Baillargeon in Science 308:255–258, 2005). This is well before the age at which children pass any of the verbal false-belief tasks. In this study (...) we present a more complex case of false-belief reasoning with older children. We tested second-order reasoning, probing children’s ability to handle the belief of one person about the belief of another person. We find just the opposite: 7-year-olds pass a verbal false-belief reasoning task, but fail on an equally complex low-verbal task. This finding suggests that language supports explicit reasoning about beliefs, perhaps by facilitating the cognitive system to keep track of beliefs attributed by people to other people. (shrink)

We argued that formal objections to the error theory overgeneralize and therefore fail. Christine Tiefensee and Gregory Wheeler deny this. We argue that they are wrong, for two reasons. The first concerns how we should adjudicate conflicts between formal and substantive commitments. The second concerns an overlooked tension between formal objections and non-error-theoretic views. Our discussion shows that the commitments behind formal objections to the error theory, such as the dual schema, should be regarded as much more contentious than is (...) often assumed. (shrink)

Gricean pragmatics has often been criticised for being implausible from a psychological point of view. This line of criticism is never backed up by empirical evidence, but more importantly, it ignores the fact that Grice never meant to advance a processing theory, in the first place. Taking our lead from Marr, we distinguish between two levels of explanation: at the W-level, we are concerned with what agents do and why; at the H-level, we ask how agents do whatever it is (...) they do. Whereas pragmatics is pitched at the W-level, processing theories are at the H-level. This is not to say that pragmatics has no implications for psychology at all, but it is to say that its implications are less direct than is often supposed. (shrink)