Radical Right Parties in the Political System of States： Theoretical and Practical Aspects

The article deals with the question of whether far-right parties are able to influence the political and party system in the contemporary state. Far-right parties have acquired special political features that are grounded on a broad variety of far-right ideological norms and political instruments. Far-right parties challenge the state government and policy offering the key （anti-immigration politics） to solve a variety of complicated issues. The main idea of the article is that far-right parties are flexible enough in their political rhetoric and instruments to gain electoral support. Based on different concepts and theories we should underline that far-right parties have a prominent electoral future but their place in the political arena greatly depends on existing conflicts of social and cultural nature in the nation-state.

Populism and Political Party Institutionalisation in the Three Baltic States of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania

The three Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania make for interesting comparative case studies in the rise of contemporary populism in Europe. All three countries share a similar modem history, democratic political system, level of economic development and are in the same western-oriented regional clubs （NATO, European Union, OSCE, European Council and, in the case of Estonia and Latvia, OECD, etc.）. However, they do differ in the extent to which populism has played a role in their national politics. Populism has played a marginal role in Estonian politics, but has long been central to the Latvian party system and influential in Lithuanian politics. This article tackles two key issues in the study of populism. First, it focuses on political party institutionalisation as the key variable in explaining the differing impact of populist political parties across the Baltic states. It examines and explains the higher turnover of political party creation and destruction in Latvia and, to a lesser extent, Lithuania and argues that institutions--and par- ticularly the laws that frame party organisations and participation in elections-- create political opportunities for populist parties. The second part of the paper considers the different types of populist parties to have emerged in the Baltic states in recent decades. While previous studies of populism in the Baltic states （such as Auers and Kasekamp in J Contemp Eur Stud 17（2）：241-254, 2009; Auers and Kasekamp, in： Wodak et al （eds） Right wing populism across/beyond Europe, Bloomsbury Academic Press, London 2013） have explicitly focused on Radical Right Populist parties, this article additionally identifies a number of parties in the region that are not explicitly radical right, but are certainly populist.

National Security Letters:C.L.R.James,Melville,and the State

In the early 1950s,at the height of America’s McCarthyite witch hunts and anti-communist hysteria,Trinidad-born C.L.R.James,who had been living in the United States illegally since 1938,was arrested and held for deportation on the basis of his Marxist philosophy and activism.While imprisoned on Ellis Island,he drafted the text of Mariners,Renegades and Castaways:The Story of Herman Melville and the World We Live In,a book that is equal parts literary criticism and argument for the very Americanness of James’s revolutionary thought.This essay examines the discussions within James’s revolutionary organization surrounding the composition of that work,and the centrality of Melville to their visions of a revolutionary America.