International Journal of Politics Culture and Society最新文献

This paper introduces a theoretical model for distinguishing between mere popularity and personality cults as there currently is an inflated use of the personality cult concept, especially in news media, attaching it to significantly different phenomena. The model is based on Weber's concept of charismatic authority and consists of three parameters, widespread symbolic elevation, resilience and religious parallels, covering a representational and social practice dimension. Both dimensions are needed to constitute a personality cult. Trump, Putin and Ardern are used as examples of the model's ability to distinguish between cult and non-cult phenomena. The comparison shows that only Trump and Putin have a cult on both dimensions. Mere popular politicians like Ardern are more comparable to celebrities as these do not have the same authority and power over the followers as leaders with a personality cult - despite potentially showing some cultlike tendencies on the representational dimension. Popular politicians are thus especially characterised by lacking the key social practice aspect of personality cults. As they might still exhibit some cultlike characteristics, the different phenomena are best perceived as being on a continuum ranging from mere admiration or popularity to a personality cult.

In this article, we present a conceptual model for the study of intellectual trajectories. The notion of trajectory combines the figure of the intellectuals, as actors, and the stages on which they act. With the help of this model, we seek particularly to study the figure of the global digital public intellectual and the global digital stage on which this figure operates. By studying the case of Project Syndicate (the most important global platform or stage for the circulation of ideas through opinion columns), we show empirically that this stage has particularities that make it a circuit for such circulation. The notion of circuit seems to us more appropriate than field to describe this type of global stage at a transnational scale, still characterized by a lower level of institutionalization.

This paper assesses the impact of age and ideological identification on the left-right scale on the use of online social networks to acquire political information. Socio-demographic indicators and ideological identification have been found to impact democratic engagement and the access and use of social networks. In countries where the digital divide (access to the internet) and digital inequality (use of the internet) coexist, the impact of socio-demographic indicators is stronger, as those with fewer tools and resources have less access and make less use of social networks for democratic engagement. We postulate three hypotheses on the effect of socio-demographic determinants and ideological identification and test them using 6 national polls conducted between 2017 and 2019 in Chile, a middle-income country with high levels of inequality. Though socio-demographic variables and ideological identification impact the use of social networks to acquire political information, young people who do not identify on the ideological scale are as likely to use social networks to obtain political information as older people who identify on the left-right scale. As generational replacement kicks in, online democratic engagement will become more intense. Even the non-ideological youth is more politically engaged than the ideologically identified older age cohorts.