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The Yellow Vests movement in France was the most widespread and violent protest movement France has seen since 1968. This research highlights the resemblances and dissimilarities between the Yellow Vests and other Occupy movements. We find similarities in movement origins around suddenly revealed economic issues and relative deprivation. We also find that the Yellow Vests resemble other Occupy movements in terms of a combined strategy of a diffused and countrywide occupation of public spaces alongside weekly mass protest, and a lack of central organization and rejection of leadership. The Yellow Vests, however, differ from other Occupy movements in the extreme violence of the weekly demonstrations. Despite its rejection by the media, violence did not affect widespread public approval. In addition, the Yellow Vests achieved most movement objectives in spite of the lack of effective leadership with whom politicians could negotiate.

This article offers a new explanation for the results of twin studies in political science that supposedly disclose a genetic basis for political traits. I argue that identical twins tend to be more alike than nonidentical twins because the former are more similarly affected by the same environmental conditions, but the content of those greater trait similarities is nevertheless completely malleable and determined by particular environments. The twin studies method thus can neither prove nor refute the argument for a genetic basis of political traits such as liberal and conservative preferences or voting turnout. The meaning of heritability estimates results in twin studies are discussed, as well as the definition and function of the environment in the political science twin studies. The premature attempts to associate political traits with specific genes despite countertrends in genetics are also examined. I conclude by proposing that the alternative explanation of this article may explain certain puzzles in behavioral genetics, particularly why social and political traits have higher heritability estimates than common physical and medical traits. I map the main point of disagreements with the methodology and the interpretation of its results, and delineate the main operative implications for future research.

The concept of Human Dignity has become more and more prevalent in legal, moral and philosophical discourses. However, as much as linguistic functions of the concept have become widespread, its meanings have become ambiguous and blurred. This paper seeks to map and depict the main functions and meanings that the concept of human dignity encompass, and, hence, to enable both those concerned with law and its interpretation, and moral-philosophers to discern the different linguistic-spheres and the different meanings this concept encircle. The analysis will show that the meanings of human dignity are socially constructed in accordance with particular cultural and historical contexts. There is no one "true" meaning of human dignity, but rather different levels of "thickness" and "thinness" that are culturally determined in each society. The paper advances insights regarding the use of human dignity in both the legal parlance -as a justification for human rights in legal documents; and in the moral-philosophical parlance -as compared to a worldview on the one hand, and as related to humiliation on the other.

The Social Justice Protest movement in 2011 was the largest social movement in Israel’s history. The movement received media coverage for almost two months and in all news outlets, despite the protest’s broad demands and its overall radical indictment against the economic system and the status quo. This study explores the causes for this extraordinary media coverage. We find that movement characteristics of the leadership’s professional background, the media strategies they employed, and the effects of mainstream channels on media tactics were important. We also find that journalists’ personal identification with the movement is a key factor leading to the wide and favorable media coverage. Personal identification led many journalists to report favorably on the movement and write supportive opinion columns, to ignore stories that could damage it, to participate and volunteer in movement activities, and to offer their professional skills to help the movement leadership. We propose a tentative model consisting of factors and mechanisms that may explain when personal identification and journalistic activism are more likely to occur.