Politics Go "Viral": A Computational Text Analysis of the Public Attribution and Attitude Regarding the COVID-19 Crisis and Governmental Responses on Twitter

The U.S. confronts an unprecedented public health crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic, in the presidential election year in 2020. In such a compound situation, a real-time dynamic examination of how the general public ascribe the crisis responsibilities taking account to their political ideologies is helpful for developing effective strategies to manage the crisis and diminish hostility toward particular groups caused by polarization. Social media, such as Twitter, provide platforms for the public's COVID-related discourse to form, accumulate, and visibly present. Meanwhile, those features also make social media a window to monitor the public responses in real-time. This research conducted a computational text analysis of 2,918,376 tweets sent by 829,686 different U.S. users regarding COVID-19 from January 24 to May 25, 2020. Results indicate that the public's crisis attribution and attitude toward governmental crisis responses are driven by their political identities. One crisis factor identified by this study (i.e., threat level) also affects the public's attribution and attitude polarization. Additionally, we note that pandemic fatigue was identified in our findings as early as in March 2020. This study has theoretical, practical, and methodological implications informing further health communication in a heated political environment. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of Social Science Computer Review is the property of Sage Publications Inc. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

A Brief Statistical and Geostatistical Survey of the Relationship between COVID-19 and By-Mail Balloting in the 2020 North Carolina General Election

Adding to the already polarizing 2020 general election was the COVID-19 pandemic. One way in which this pandemic greatly affected the election was through an increased participation in by-mail, or mail-in, ballots. The state of North Carolina experienced a 316 percent increase in by-mail votes between 2016 and 2020, when approximately 977,186 votes were cast by mail. It is no surprise that this increase was due to the COVID-19 pandemic;however, these by-mail voting patterns are spatial in nature and vary across the state. This research measures to what degree COVID-19 rates affected by-mail voting rates. Using geographic information systems data developed from robust tabular files provided by the North Carolina State Board of Elections, by-mail votes were calculated and mapped at ZIP code scale and compared to COVID-19 rates measured at different dates. By-mail rates taken from final absentee tallies for the highest and lowest COVID-19 ZIP codes saw no significant differences across multiple dates (30 September 2020 and 31 October 2020) when COVID-19 data were collected. COVID-19 hot spots (high COVID-19 rates surrounded by other high COVID-19 rates) were extracted using geostatistical techniques and compared to COVID-19 cold spots (low COVID-19 rates surrounded by other low COVID-19 rates). It was found the lowest by-mail rates actually occurred in these COVID-19 hot spots across both dates, as well a metric that expressed percentage change in COVID-19 rates in the month before the 2020 election.Alternate :COVID-19使得已经两极分化的2020年美国大选, 变得更加雪上加霜。COVID-19影响选举的一种方式是邮寄选票的增加。2016年至2020年, 北卡罗来纳州的邮寄选票增加了316%, 共约977,186张。毫无疑问, COVID-19导致了邮寄选票的增加。然而, 邮寄选票在本质上是空间性的, 并且在北卡罗来纳州的各个地方具有差异性。本研究计算了COVID-19发病率对邮寄选票比例的影响程度。利用北卡罗来纳州选举委员会提供的准确的表格文件, 本文制作了地理信息系统数据, 在邮政编码尺度上对邮寄选票进行计算和制图, 并将这些邮寄选票与不同时间的COVID-19发病率进行了比较。在拥有最高和最低COVID-19发病率的邮政编码和不同时间（2020年9月30日和2020年10月31日）, 从缺失人数统计中得到的邮寄选票比例没有显著差异。利用地学统计方法提取COVID-19热点（COVID-19高发病率在空间上被其它高发病率所包围）, 并与COVID-19冷点（COVID-19低发病率在空间上被其它低发病率所包围）进行比较。结果发现, 在这两个时间内, 最低邮寄选票比例出现在COVID-19热点地区。本文还制定了一个指标, 可以表示2020年大选前一个月的COVID-19发病率百分比的变化。

Parliamentarism in the Pandemic: Contemporary Challenges

Parliamentary democracy has been stress-tested in the COVID-19 pandemic. The Parliament, as the representation of the people, must be able to work and make unpopular decisions to protect society. Only in a transparent and legitimate decision-making process is it possible to win the support of the people. Parliamentarism in the pandemic must function effectively and safely. Also important is a legally secure election of the parliament in times of crisis to have a legislator legitimised by the people. In times of crisis, a functioning parliamentary system is particularly important for a democracy. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022.

DEMOCRACY AMID CRISES: Polarization, Pandemic, Protests, and Persuasion

Among the more fraught election years in recent history, 2020 transpired amid four interlaced crises: the COVID-19 pandemic, an economic recession and uneven recovery, a racial reckoning, and a crisis of democratic legitimacy that culminated in the riot at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, and widespread belief among Republicans that the election had been stolen from Donald Trump. Democracy amid Crises explains how these forces and the media messaging through which they were filtered shaped the election and post-election dialogue, as well as voter perceptions of both, with worrisome potential consequences for democracy. The book spotlights not one but several electorates, each embedded in a distinctive informational environment. The four crises affected these electorates differently, partly because the unique constellations of media in which they were advertently and inadvertently enmeshed contained dissimilar messages from the campaigns and other sources of influence. Awash in distinctive message streams, the various electorates adopted divergent perspectives on the crises, candidates, and state of the country. As a result, understanding voting behavior and attitudes about the events that followed requires an analysis of both the distinctive electorates and the informational environments that enveloped them. Importantly, our findings raise fundamental questions about the nation's future, occasioned by the contest over whether the 2020 presidential election was fairly and freely decided and by worrisome responses to the reality that the country's citizenry is becoming more multiracial, multiethnic, and, on matters religious, agnostic. © Oxford University Press 2023.

Economic policy uncertainty, governance institutions and economic performance in Africa: are there regional differences?

In recent years, the global economy has witnessed several uncertainty-inducing events. However, empirical evidence in Africa on the effects of economic policy uncertainty (EPU) on economic activities remains scanty. Besides, the moderating effect of governance institutions on the uncertainty-economic performance relationship in Africa and the likelihood of regional differences in the response of economic activities to EPU on the continent are yet to be investigated. To address these gaps, we applied system GMM and quantile regressions on a panel of forty-seven African countries from 2010 to 2019. We find that while global EPU and EPUs from China, USA and Canada exert considerable influence on economic performance in Africa, the effects of domestic EPU and EPUs from Europe, UK, Japan, and Russia were negligible, suggesting that African economies are resilient to these sources of uncertainty shocks. We also find that governance institutions in Africa are not significantly moderating the uncertainty-economic performance relationship. However, our results highlighted regional differences in the response of economic activities to uncertainty, such that when compared to East and West Africa, economic performance in Central, North and Southern Africa is generally more resilient to global EPU and EPUs from China, USA, Europe and UK. We highlighted the policy implications of these findings.

Presidential elections during the pandemic

The presidential election held in 2020 was special due to the ongoing SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, as the electoral process took place in several unusual stages. The first stage was based on the assumption that a standard electoral process would suffice to perform the election. In the second stage, an attempt was made to organise the election by postal voting. The third stage resulted from the failure to hold the vote on the originally scheduled date (10 May 2020). The fourth stage was to hold the electoral process on a new date (28 June 2020). The extraordinary circumstances under which the election took place revealed previously unknown aspects in the application of the law. The paper aims at describing different stages of the process as well as identifying legal problems that were exposed during the elections. The systematics of the article is based on a chronology of events.

Opportunistic oppression: U.S. migration restrictions and public health policy during the COVID-19 pandemic

As the COVID-19 pandemic swept the world in Spring 2020, the Trump administration invoked war against the coronavirus to severely restrict admission of migrants and asylum seekers into the United States. At the same time, it declined to enact national measures to control viral community spread and sharply criticised public health policies. We analyse this notable inconsistency as a case of opportunistic oppression whereby policymakers take advantage of a crisis to pursue pre-existing, and often unrelated, policy preferences. We identify how the securitisation of health and the crisis-enabled politics of enmity allowed the Trump administration to cynically erode migrant human rights protections while simultaneously failing to contain the pandemic. Opportunistic oppression represents an attractive strategy for states facing real and imagined emergencies to pursue political agendas that are not necessarily part of a coherent and effective response to the crisis at hand. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of International Journal of Human Rights is the property of Routledge and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

Living in a Democracy as a Fallen People: A REVIEW ESSAY

Rather, it would be more correct to say that Donald Trump found a ready audience for nationalism and postliberal thinking in the United States and rode a seemingly unlikely wave into the White House by semi-miraculously navigating the twists and turns of the Electoral College. COVID-19, of course, has proved to be a breeding ground of predominantly right-wing conspiracy theories, including regarding vaccines even though they were the result of a Trump-led program. [...]he made an argument that Vice President Mike Pence would be able to refuse to certify the election results. Tocqueville approached democracy as a young aristocrat from a family that had suffered in the French Revolution.

The Impact of COVID-19, Election Policies, and Partisanship on Voter Participation in the 2020 U.S. Election

The COVID-19 pandemic had the potential to wreak havoc on elections. Democracies initiated varied policies to minimize health risks to voters and election workers. This study assesses the impact of voting policies, personal exposure to COVID, and partisanship on voter behavior in the 2020 U.S. general election. Using a comparative state-politics approach and new data, we demonstrate that exposure to COVID substantially influenced voter turnout, and election policies had a major effect on whether a voter cast a ballot by mail, early in-person, or in-person on Election Day. Unique circumstances, including the emergence of voting policies as a polarizing issue, also spawned a new partisan voting gap that is especially prominent among heavy news consumers. Compared to 2018, many more Democrats than Republicans abandoned Election Day voting in favor of mail voting.

Pandemic Populism: Explaining Support for the People's Party of Canada in the 2021 Federal Election

The COVID-19 pandemic has seen opponents of public health mandates deploy a range of populist and anti-elite arguments. The 2021 Canadian federal election was an exceptional "pandemic election" in which the COVID-19 health crisis took centre stage. But the election campaign also saw the populist People's Party of Canada (PPC) rise to prominence by opposing pandemic-related public health restrictions. While the party failed to win a seat, it did manage to triple its vote share (1.6 per cent to 4.9 per cent). It is unclear, however, what factors led to the rise in support for the PPC. To explore this issue, we draw on an original post-election survey (n = 18,950) and focus on populist attitudes and opposition to COVID-19-related public health restrictions. Results from regression models and structural equation models (SEMs) indicate that opposition to public health restrictions was a much stronger factor than populism in shaping support for the PPC.

Pandemic Democracy in Manipur: By Elections and Covid-19

This article provides an initial assessment of the many risks posed by the COVID-19 pandemic on the conduct of genuine and transparent elections in Manipur. It begins with explaining why elections are a vital part of democracy and then using the notion of the electoral cycle, constructs a risk matrix that assesses the relative impact and likelihood of risks to the cycle, as well as proposes a number of potential mitigations to these risks. The root cause of the by-elections in Manipur is to be the election of the Rajya Sabha which held on June 19, 2020 by indulging in cross voting in favour of BJP candidate. There is a clear that the rise of Covid-19 cases be increased during the democratic process of by-elections such as, mass rallies, congregation etc. without maintaining SOPs. The number of elections dimensions of the electoral cycle that can be disrupted and the need for solution raises significant questions about the future of democracy itself.Copyright © 2020 Ubiquity Press. All rights reserved.

Healthy citizens, healthy democracies? A review of the literature

A growing literature over the past 10 years on health and political behavior has established health status as an important source of political inequality. Poor health reduces psychological engagement with politics and discourages political activity. This lowers incentives for governments to respond to the needs of those experiencing ill health and thereby perpetuates health disparities. In this review article, we provide a critical synthesis of the state of knowledge on the links between different aspects of health and political behavior. We also discuss the challenges confronting this research agenda, particularly with respect to measurement, theory, and establishing causality, along with suggestions for advancing the field. With the COVID-19 pandemic casting health disparities into sharp focus, understanding the sources of health biases in the political process, as well as their implications, is an important task that can bring us closer to the ideals of inclusive democracy.

NOTE FROM THE EDITOR: Presidential Tweets, the U.S.–U.K. Free Trade Agreement, Humanitarian Intervention, and China's Bilateral Relations

" Words Matter: Presidents Obama and Trump, Twitter, and U.S. Soft Power. Graph [9] concentrate on the issues that soured the initial optimism for a U.S.-U.K. free trade agreement between President Trump and Prime Minister Johnson which did not come to its planned fruition by 2020. EN Social Media Foreign Policy Twitter Soft Power Obama Trump Boris Johnson Humanitarian Intervention President Clinton Bosnia Kosovo China Sri-Lanka Kazakhstan South Korea ASEAN Sub-Saharan Africa Information Technology. NOTE FROM THE EDITOR: Presidential Tweets, the U.S.-U.K. Free Trade Agreement, Humanitarian Intervention, and China's Bilateral Relations. [Extracted from the article] Copyright of World Affairs is the property of Sage Publications Inc. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

Teaching controversial issues during a presidential election: Exploring how teachers navigated polarized politics in 2020

American politics today is the culmination of historical, political, social, geographic, and economic events that have significantly impacted this country. Over the last year, America and the world have been tested to political, social, and economic extremes not seen in over a century because of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Both the 2020 Presidential election and the storming of the Capitol on January 6th, 2021 are just two of the events that challenged teachers and educators across all levels of schooling to change and adapt teaching practices. It has forced citizens to have difficult conversations about democracy, equality, health, and safety. Educators tasked with teaching government and civics are required to teach political parties and the functions of government. However, in this current socially distant and polarized political climate, doing so was tremendously difficult. For some high school students and teachers, teaching secondary government is only a nine-week crash course into the functions of the government and rights outlined to students. Nine weeks to teach the functions of government, Constitution, rights of citizens, powers of the president, courts, and how federalism and states interact. Furthermore, only a small minority of students who take government courses do so during a presidential election cycle. This reality underscores the importance of understanding how teachers help students navigate such an important function of government. In this polarized political climate post-2016, it is of interest to study how teachers have prepared to teach the election and document their experience navigating campaign issues. This study hopes to shed light on the educational strategies and expectations of secondary government and civics teachers teaching controversial political topics surrounding the 2020 election. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

A Study on Information Disorders on Social Networks during the Chilean Social Outbreak and COVID-19 Pandemic

Information disorders on social media can have a significant impact on citizens' participation in democratic processes. To better understand the spread of false and inaccurate information online, this research analyzed data from Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. The data were collected and verified by professional fact-checkers in Chile between October 2019 and October 2021, a period marked by political and health crises. The study found that false information spreads faster and reaches more users than true information on Twitter and Facebook. Instagram, on the other hand, seemed to be less affected by this phenomenon. False information was also more likely to be shared by users with lower reading comprehension skills. True information, on the other hand, tended to be less verbose and generate less interest among audiences. This research provides valuable insights into the characteristics of misinformation and how it spreads online. By recognizing the patterns of how false information diffuses and how users interact with it, we can identify the circumstances in which false and inaccurate messages are prone to becoming widespread. This knowledge can help us to develop strategies to counter the spread of misinformation and protect the integrity of democratic processes.

Is Democracy Lost?

President Kais Saied's de facto dissolution of parliament in July 2021, abandonment of the constitution, and targeting of the opposition are clear signs that Tunisia is no longer a democracy and has returned to the authoritarian playbook of Arab leaders past and present. I see three main reasons for this abrupt end to Tunisia's decade-old democracy: 1) the failure to accompany political reform with socioeconomic gains for citizens;2) the subsequent rise of populism;and 3) the mistakes of the Islamic party. To move forward in Tunisia and the Arab world more broadly, prodemocratic forces must link freedom, development, and social justice.

State Public Health Communications and Public Compliance during the Pre-election SARS-CoV-2 Pandemic: Interpreting the Effectiveness of Messaging Guidelines Utilizing Moral Foundations Theory

Background: State-level public health messaging during the pre-election coronavirus pandemic was very inconsistent. Moral motivational content of the messages, as characterized by moral foundations theory, may have contributed to the degree of compliance in particular states. More attention to this content might result in greater compliance and a lessening of the pandemic's severity. Method(s): A comprehensive review of official state messaging in six U.S. states (California, Florida, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New York, and Texas) was reviewed for the number and distribution of moral foundations as described by moral foundations theory. A search was done for state-level data concerning compliance with mask-wearing and social distancing, the primary public precautionary measures during the pandemic. Rates of compliance by the state were compared with messaging content and analyzed for associations and correlations with the known partisan leanings of the states. Examples of messages with balanced moral foundations, which might be prospectively employed for greater acceptance, were presented. All data were gathered prior to the introduction of the first available vaccine. Result(s): Message review and compliance data suggested that the quantity and proportion of coronavirus-related official messages and the utilization of a balanced combination of moral foundations were associated with higher levels of compliance with the recommended public health measures and lower infection rates. The political orientations of states did not align with the use of known conservative/liberal preferred moral foundations as previously established by Moral Foundations Theory. Conclusion(s): Adjusting messaging with attention to the balanced employment of moral foundations can lead to wider acceptance of and compliance with preventive public health measures.Copyright © 2023 James F. Hall.

Racial Disparities in Elective Total Knee and Hip Replacement Surgeries during the Covid-19 Pandemic: A Retrospective Study of a Diverse Population in Washington State

Purpose of Study: Total knee (TKA) and hip (THA) arthroplasty procedures are recognized as effective treatments for osteoarthritis of the knee and hip joints which are the leading causes of lower extremity disability among older adults. Previous studies have demonstrated a variance in patients electing to undergo these interventions with non-White patients having significantly lower utilization rates. Our study examined if these disparities continued to exist during the COVID-19 pandemic period. Methods Used: This retrospective cohort study included 580 patients who underwent TKA or THA in 2020 and 2021 in a racially diverse region in Washington State. Demographic data, comorbidities, and post-surgical outcomes were recorded. Patients were stratified as those identifying as White (n=490, 84.5%) or Hispanic/ Latino (n=65, 11.2%). Patients identifying with other races (n=25, 4.3%) were excluded from the study due to small sample sizes. Differences between our two groups were examined using a chi-square test for categorical variables and an independent t-test for continuous variables. The level of significance was set at P < 0.05. Summary of Results: Compared to the White patients, Hispanic/ Latino identifying patients were younger (61.9+/-12.79 years versus 68.58+/-9.00 years;P <0.001), had lower Charlson Comorbidity Index scores (P=0.019), and were more likely to use non-Medicare or Medicaid insurance (P <0.001). No differences were observed in postoperative complication (P=0.632) and COVID-19 infection (P=0.465) rates between the groups. Conclusion(s): Although Hispanic/ Latino identifying patients in this region constitute 45.8% of our study population according to the most recent census tabulation, they accounted for only 11.2% of the patients in our study. These patients were also younger, had fewer comorbidities, and tended to use non-Medicare or Medicaid insurance suggesting an exclusive Hispanic/ Latino patient population electing to undergo TKA or THA procedures during the COVID-19 pandemic. Future studies controlling for osteoarthritis risk factors and patients' election of treatment options may explain these disparities we have observed.

Elections and COVID-19 benefit payments.

This study examines the political factors associated with the implementation of a benefit payment policy in Japan during the COVID-19 crisis. The Japanese government announced a universal cash payment program in April 2020, but the payment date differed across localities. This study estimates the correlation between this timing and local politicians' characteristics, finding that local governments with mayors elected unopposed tended to start making payments comparatively early. As such, mayors elected uncontested may be able to mobilize resources within government offices to execute programs such as the Special Fixed Benefit program in Japan, which attracted public attention.