Planning the ‘government of change’: the 2018 Italian coalition agreement in comparative perspective

Coalition agreements in the Italian Second Republic have traditionally been pre-electoral, often long, compre-hensive but vague documents serving also as electoral manifestos for centre-right or centre-left coalitions. In this article, we analyse the 2018 post-electoral coalition agreement between the Movimento Cinque Stelle and Lega in comparative perspective, contrasting this agreement with former coalition programmes enforced since the mid-1990s in Italy and the pre-election manifestos published by these two political parties. The analysis reported here allow us to conclude that the first post-electoral coalition agreement in Italy is shorter than most centre-left documents, as vague as previous agreements and constitutes a compromise committing the Lega to less right-wing positions, the grillini to less progressive stances and both political forces to tone down their Eu-roscepticism. The extent by which these commitments are solid and longstanding is unknown.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

The 2014 European electoral manifestos a preliminary analysis of the main competition dimensions

The European project has enjoyed considerable support from both elite and masses in Portugal. Since the country joined the EEC in 1986, the main political parties have been strong supporters of the Europe project. In recent years, however, this has been undermined by both political and economic crises. In this paper, we produce a preliminary analysis of the competition dimensions in the forthcoming 2014 European elections. We make an empirical analysis of the position held by the five most important Portuguese political parties in relation to European integration, the Euro, debt renegotiation, Eurobonds, and changes in pensions in a context that fosters contestation of European integration and its outputs.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

Does exposure to televised debates change the weight of different criteria for candidate assessment? A quasi-experiment in the context of the 2014 Spitzenkandidaten debate

In this article, we show how exposure to debates primes specific candidate assessments as key factors of candidate appraisal. To fulfil this goal, we rely on quasi-experimental data collected in 24 European Union Member States and focus on a debate starred by largely unknown candidates (the 2014 European Spiztenkandidaten) engaged in a remarkably invisible campaign. Our results show that candidate perceptions become much more important factors of general candidate appraisal after the debate in the case of three out of the five lead candidates, namely those whose image benefitted from their participation in the debate. In several cases, personal likeability became more important in the general assessment of the Spitzenkandidaten, but there was also an increased relevance of the perceptions of leadership strength (Keller) and quality of the ideas to stimulate the European economy (Schulz and Tspiras). Moreover, in the cases of Schulz, Keller, and Tsipras, post-exposure candidate perceptions impacted more their general appraisal by participants without previous knowledge of them than by those who claimed to know them before the debate. Interestingly, leadership strength appraisal was more relevant for the former than for the latter participants. In short, by unveiling these patterns, this article not only provides evidence of the priming effects of debate exposure but also illustrates how such effects may vary according to citizens’ previous knowledge and the candidates’ general performance in the debate.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

In welfare we trust? Political trust in Portugal and Spain, 2008-2014

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Put your action where your mouth is: The relation between populist attitudes and political participation in Portugal

Neste artigo, é explorada a relação entre atitudes populistas e participação política de tipo convencional e não convencional em Portugal. Os dados analisados permitem concluir que estas atitudes estão associadas a uma maior probabilidade de militância num partido político, bem como de envolvimento em várias modalidades de participação expressiva e não partidarizada, tais como a pertença a associações, as manifestações, a assinatura de petições ou abaixo-assinados, e o boicote ou favorecimento de produtos e serviços por motivos políticos, éticos ou ambientais. Por outro lado, as atitudes populistas não estão relacionadas com um maior envolvimento em instâncias de participação não convencional extremas como o bloqueio de vias de comunicação, a ocupação de edifícios ou fábricas e a danificação de espaços públicos.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

O entretenimento e a celebrização como modalidades de comunicação política

Nas últimas décadas, um interessante fenómeno de flagrante diluição de fronteiras entre as esferas da política e do entretenimento tem ganhado expressão em vários países. Estas esferas foram, durante muito tempo, entendidas como sendo – e devendo ser – absolutamente separadas (afinal, a política é uma coisa séria), mas há inegavelmente uma progressiva inversão desta tendência. Os casos da Itália e dos Estados Unidos são, deste ponto de vista, paradigmáticos, embora este fenómeno, com variações e especificidades nacionais, possa ser encontrado em muitos outros países, do Brasil a Portugal, da Inglaterra à Austrália, da Guatemala à Nigéria.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Sailing uncharted waters with old boats? COVID-19 and the digitalization and professionalization of presidential campaigns in Portugal

This article investigates the extent to which the COVID-19 pandemic fostered significant shifts in election campaigning. The argument is that COVID-19 might have had an impact on both digitalization and professionalization, which might have been regarded as necessary strategies to curb the difficulties brought about by the pandemic. We apply a most similar systems design with a threefold comparative scheme in order to capture and isolate such effects in the campaigns preceding the 2021 Portuguese presidential elections, using data from campaign spending, campaign activities, and social media activity and impact. Results show that the pandemic crisis has not, generally speaking, brought about a higher level of digitalization of electoral campaigns, in spite of online events having become more common. On the contrary, while there were signs of feebler patterns of normalization of online competition in 2021 vis-à-vis 2016, namely in terms of engagement, normalization was stronger after the lockdown than before. Lastly, relative investment in professionalization was similar in 2016 and 2021, and the difference between the budgeted and the actual investment in 2021 cannot be attributed to the worsening of the pandemic situation or to the lockdown. In sum, we depict a scenario of remarkable stability of the electoral campaigns put forward by presidential candidates in terms of digitalization and professionalization. Its possible causes and consequences are discussed.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

THEORETICAL AND EXPERIMENTAL ANALYSIS OF A VAPOR-COMPRESSION REFRIGERATION CYCLE WITH A HEAT EXCHANGER BETWEEN THE SUCTION AND LIQUID LINES

Vapor-compression refrigeration systems require a significant amount of electrical energy. Therefore, there is a need for finding efficient ways of operating this equipment, reducing their energy consumption. The use of heat exchangers between the suction line and the liquid line can produce a better performance of the thermodynamic cycle, as well as reduce it. The present work aims at an experimental analysis of the suction/liquid heat exchanger present in a freezer running with refrigerant fluid R-134a. Three different scenarios were used in order to evaluate the thermal performance of the refrigeration cycle. The first scenario was the conventional freezer set up to collect the required data for further comparison. Moreover, the second and third scenarios were introduced with a 20 cm and 40 cm suction/liquid heat exchanger, respectively, into the system. From the experiments, it was observed that the heat exchange does not significantly affect the coefficient of performance (COP) of the freezer. It was concluded from this work that the best scenario analyzed was the 20 cm suction/liquid heat exchanger where most of the thermodynamic properties were improved, one of them being the isentropic efficiency

Democracia direta nos países da Europa do Sul: padrões de diversidade intrarregional

Nos últimos anos, as democracias representativas têm acumulado sinais de algum mal-estar, que se traduzem, por exemplo, em níveis elevados de insatisfação com o desempenho das instituições democráticas e desconfiança em relação aos seus principais atores (cf. Belchior 2015). Em face destes sinais de crise das democracias representativas, alguns autores defendem a necessidade de aumentar as oportunidades de participação dos cidadãos entre eleições, nomeadamente através de instrumentos de democracia direta.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Integração europeia e alinhamentos partidários: o caso português como exemplo para as democracias do Leste Europeu

As eleições europeias de 2004 representaram uma mudança importante na União Europeia (UE): devido ao alargamento, dez novos Estados membros participaram nessas eleições pela primeira vez. Isto significou um considerável alargamento do eleitorado que toma decisões a respeito da composição política do Parlamento Europeu, mas também a diversificação do número e tipo de eleições que tomam lugar nestas democracias. Oito desses países são democracias em processo de consolidação após a dissolução de regimes comunistas autoritários no início dos anos 90 (Eslováquia, Eslovénia, Estónia, Hungria, Letónia, Lituânia, Polónia e República Checa). Nos anos que se seguiram, o alargamento das fronteiras da UE para leste (e sul) continuou: em 2007, aderiram à UE dois outros países pós-comunistas (Bulgária e Roménia), enquanto em 2013 a Croácia se tornou o 28.º Estado membro. Estes países organizaram as suas primeiras eleições para o Parlamento Europeu menos de vinte anos depois das suas primeiras eleições democráticas, sendo que, no caso dos países que integraram a UE em 2004, apenas cerca de catorze anos separam estes dois momentos.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio