Democratization : upso

Understanding Social Action, Promoting Human Rights

Ryan Goodman, Derek Jinks, and Andrew K. Woods — 2013-01-24

Author:: RyanGoodmanDerekJinksAndrew K.Woods
ISBN:: 9780195371895
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195371895.001.0001
Published in print:: 2012
Published Online:: 2013-01-24

Over the last 20 years, the social scientific understanding of human behavior has taken a significant leap forward. Important advances in several fields have increased the complexity and accuracy of prevailing models of individual actors, group dynamics, and communication. Yet too few of the key insights of that scholarship have been incorporated into the theory or practice of human rights promotion. With this book, legal scholars Ryan Goodman, Derek Jinks, and Andrew K. Woods begin the process of incorporation, by collecting research from a broad set of disciplines and underscoring its implications for human rights scholarship and practice. By focusing on nonlegal, empirical scholarship that touches on norm creation, diffusion, and institutionalization, the book presents a broad range of interdisciplinary insights relevant to human rights scholars and practitioners. The volume introduces work from multiple disciplines including economics (Herb Gintis), communications (Robert C. Hornik), social psychology (Jonathan Baron; Deborah Prentice; Paul Slovic and David Zionts), moral biology (John Mikhail), political science (Margaret Levi, Tom R. Tyler, and Audrey Sacks), social network analysis (David Lazer), and negotiation theory (Lee Ross, Byron Bland, and Brenna Powell).

The Lessons of Rancière

Samuel A. Chambers — 2013-01-24

Author:: Samuel A. Chambers
ISBN:: 9780199927210
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Political Theory, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199927210.001.0001
Published in print:: 2012
Published Online:: 2013-01-24

“Liberal democracy” is the name given to a regime that much of the world lives in or aspires to, and both liberal and deliberative theorists focus much of their intellectual energy on working to reshape and perfect this regime. But what if “liberal democracy” were a contradiction in terms? Taking up Jacques Rancière’s polemical claim that democracy is not a regime, Samuel Chambers argues that liberalism and democracy are not complements, but competing forces. By way of the most in-depth and rigorous treatment of Rancière’s writings to date, this book seeks to disentangle democracy from liberalism. Liberalism is a logic of order and hierarchy, of the proper distribution of responsibilities and rights, whereas democratic politics follows a logic of disordering that challenges and disrupts any claims that the allocation of roles could be complete. This book resists the tendency to collapse democracy into the broader terms of liberalism, by defending a vision of “impure” politics. chambers shows that there is no sphere proper to politics, no protected political domain. The job of political theory is therefore not to say what is required in order for politics to occur, not to develop ideal “normative” models of politics, and not even to create new political ontologies. Instead, political theory is itself an enactment of politics in Rancière’s sense of dissensus: politics thwarts any social order of domination. The book explores the possibility of a critical theory beyond unmasking and a democratic politics beyond liberalism.

Digital Cities

Karen Mossberger, Caroline J. Tolbert, and William Franko — 2013-01-24

Author:: Karen Mossberger, Caroline J. Tolbert, William Franko
ISBN:: 9780199812936
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, American Politics, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199812936.001.0001
Published in print:: 2012
Published Online:: 2013-01-24

In an age when the United Nations has declared access to the Internet a human right, and universal access to high-speed broadband is a national goal, urban areas have been largely ignored by federal policy. Federal policies have focused on rural infrastructure. Yet, the U.S. is a metropolitan nation, and urban applications offer unparalleled advantages for addressing both innovation and inequalities in broadband access. This neglect may result in the failure to realize the social benefits of broadband and a broadly-connected digital society. Connecting various levels of analysis, from the nation to the neighborhood, the authors break new ground and challenge assumptions in several areas. Offering evidence that mobile-only Internet users have dramatically lower levels of online activity and skill, they argue that this has become a second-class form of access, affecting many minorities and urban poor. Digital citizenship and full participation in economic, social, and political life requires home access. Using multilevel statistical models, the authors present new data ranking broadband access and use in the nation's 50 largest cities and metropolitan areas, showing considerable variation across places. Unique, neighborhood data from Chicago examines the impact of poverty and segregation on access in a large and diverse city, and parallels analysis of national patterns in urban, suburban and rural areas. Together, the chapters demonstrate the significance of place for shaping our digital future, and the need for policies that recognize cities as critical for addressing both social inequality and opportunity.

Democracy in Motion

Tina Nabatchi, John Gastil, Matt Leighninger, and G. Michael Weiksner — 2013-01-24

Author:: TinaNabatchiThe Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Syracuse UniversityJohnGastilThe University of WashingtonMattLeighningerThe Deliberative Democracy ConsortiumG. MichaelWeiksnerSocialFeet.com
ISBN:: 9780199899265
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Political Theory, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199899265.001.0001
Published in print:: 2012
Published Online:: 2013-01-24

The field of deliberative civic engagement is rapidly growing around the world—but it remains highly fragmented. Motivated by the widely recognized need to pool the collective experience and knowledge of scholars, practitioners, and advocates, this book represents the first comprehensive assessment of deliberative civic engagement. Each chapter in the book addresses a broad, yet specific “big question” about deliberative civic engagement, and reviews both published and unpublished writings across disciplines, settings, locations, and processes to assess what we know, how we know it, and what we do not yet know. Part I provides a broad overview of deliberative civic engagement, defining terms and examining the many organizations doing work related to deliberative civic engagement. Part II introduces the reader to process and design issues central to deliberative civic engagement, including questions about recruitment and participation, communication, inclusion and diversity, and the use of online tools. Part III examines issues integral to deliberative civic engagement, including questions about the impacts and outcomes of such processes for individuals, communities, and policy, and well as questions about the evaluation of such processes. Part IV concludes the book with two chapters. This book examines and responds to critics' concerns about deliberative civic engagement. The other draws together the work in the previous sections, examining uncertainties and unresolved questions, and looks to the future, developing an agenda for the advancement of the practice and study of deliberative civic engagement.

Deliberative Democracy and Divided Societies

Ian O'Flynn — 2012-09-20

Author:: Ian O'Flynn
ISBN:: 9780748621446
Publisher:: Edinburgh University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748621446.001.0001
Published in print:: 2006
Published Online:: 2012-09-20

In a world where the impact of internal conflicts is spreading ever wider, there is a real need to rethink how democratic ideals and institutions can best be implemented. This book responds to this challenge by showing that deliberative democracy has crucial, but largely untapped, normative implications for societies deeply divided along ethnic lines. Its central claim is that deliberative norms and procedures can enable the citizens of such societies to build and sustain a stronger sense of common national identity. More specifically, the book argues that the deliberative requirements of reciprocity and publicity can enable citizens and representatives to strike an appropriate balance between the need to recognise competing ethnic identities and the need to develop a common civic identity centred on the institutions of the state. Although the book is primarily normative, it supports its claims with a broad range of empirical examples, drawn from cases such as Bosnia and Herzegovina, Lebanon, Macedonia, Northern Ireland and South Africa. The book also considers the normative implications of deliberative democracy for questions of institutional design. It argues that power-sharing institutions should be conceived in a way that allows citizens as much freedom as possible to shape their own relation to the polity. Crucially, this freedom can enable them to reconstruct their relationship to each other and to the state in ways that ultimately strengthen and sustain the transition from ethnic conflict to democracy.

The United Nations Democracy Agenda

Kirsten Haack — 2012-07-19

Author:: Kirsten Haack
ISBN:: 9780719079818
Publisher:: Manchester University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.7228/manchester/9780719079818.001.0001
Published in print:: 2011
Published Online:: 2012-07-19

This book provides a critical, conceptual-historical analysis of democracy at the United Nations, detailed in four ‘visions’ of democracy: civilization, elections, governance and developmental democracy. ‘I know it when I see it’ were the famous words of US Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart on defining obscenity. It is with the same conviction and (un)certainty that liberal peacebuilders and democracy promoters have used democracy to achieve both the immediate goals of peacekeeping and the broader, global mission of the UN. Today, democracy may have gained an international dimension, yet its success as an organizational practice depends on how it has been defined. Drawing on political theory and democratization scholarship, the book questions the meaning of this well-‘known’ idea. It analyses the way in which the UN, through its Secretary-General, relevant agencies and organizational practices, have thought about, conceptualized and used democracy. The book shows that while the idea of democracy's ‘civilizing’ nature has played a prominent part in its use by the UN, an early focus on sovereignty and self-determination delayed the emergence of the democracy agenda until the 1990s. Today, a comprehensive democracy agenda incorporates not only elections but a broad range of liberal-democratic institutions. Despite this, the agenda is at an impasse, both practically and philosophically. The book questions whether an extension of the UN democracy agenda to include ‘developmental democracy’ is feasible.

Towards a Regional Political Class?

Klaus Stolz — 2012-07-19

Author:: Klaus Stolz
ISBN:: 9780719079795
Publisher:: Manchester University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.7228/manchester/9780719079795.001.0001
Published in print:: 2010
Published Online:: 2012-07-19

Focusing on professional politicians, this book investigates the interrelationship between political career patterns and political institutions in two of the most widely discussed cases of regionalism: Catalonia and Scotland. It deals with two different yet closely related sets of questions. Firstly, how do professional politicians pursue their careers in the regional context? And secondly, how do they shape and reshape the political institutions in which they pursue these careers? The book is based on extensive empirical research including a comprehensive data set on the careers of Catalan and Scottish parliamentarians, systematic surveys of regional representatives as well as in-depth interviews with a wide range of politicians and experts in both regions. Exploring the effects of political professionalisation on regional democracy, it goes beyond traditional studies of regionalism and decentralization, while its focus on the regional career arena introduces a territorial dimension to the study of political careers.

Groups, Representation and Democracy

Darren R. Halpin — 2012-07-19

Author:: Darren R. Halpin
ISBN:: 9780719076527
Publisher:: Manchester University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.7228/manchester/9780719076527.001.0001
Published in print:: 2010
Published Online:: 2012-07-19

Whether called pressure groups, NGOs, social movement organisations or organised civil society, the value of ‘groups’ to the policy process, to economic growth, to governance, to political representation and to democracy has always been contested. However, there seems to be a contemporary resurgence in this debate, largely centred on their democratising potential: can groups effectively link citizens to political institutions and policy processes? Are groups an antidote to emerging democratic deficits? Or do they themselves face challenges in demonstrating their legitimacy and representativeness? This book debates the democratic potential and practice of groups, focusing on the vibrancy of internal democracies, and modes of accountability with those who join such groups and to the constituencies they advocate for. It draws on literatures covering national, European and global levels, and presents empirical material from the UK and Australia.

Globalizing Democracy

Katherine Fierlbeck — 2012-07-19

Author:: Katherine Fierlbeck
ISBN:: 9780719049958
Publisher:: Manchester University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.7228/manchester/9780719049958.001.0001
Published in print:: 2008
Published Online:: 2012-07-19

Democracy has become a victim of its own success: the more that global societies wish to be seen as ‘democratic’, the more inflated the term becomes and the less meaning it has. We must avoid looking to democracy as a way of achieving personal autonomy and meaningful lives, and return to an understanding of democracy as a means of diffusing power between political agents. This updated, new edition examines some of the philosophical and theoretical issues underlying the ‘democratic project’ that increasingly dominates the fields of comparative development and international relations. The first concern presented here is normative (and, to a certain degree, epistemological): as democracy becomes more widely accepted as the political currency of legitimacy, the more broadly it is defined. But as agreement decreases regarding the definition of democracy, the less we are able to evaluate how it is working, or indeed whether it is working at all. What are the philosophical justifications presented for such an expansion of interpretation, and what are the political reasons underlying it? The second issue is causal: what are the claims being made regarding how best to secure a democratic system in developing states? To what extent do our beliefs and expectations of how political relations ought to be governed distort our understanding of how democratic societies do in fact emerge; and, conversely, to what extent does our understanding of how democracy manifests itself temper our conception of what ought to be?

Global Justice Networks

Paul Routledge and Andrew Cumbers — 2012-07-19

Author:: Paul Routledge, Andrew Cumbers
ISBN:: 9780719076855
Publisher:: Manchester University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.7228/manchester/9780719076855.001.0001
Published in print:: 2009
Published Online:: 2012-07-19

This book provides a critical investigation of what has been termed the ‘global justice movement’. Through a detailed study of a grassroots peasants' network in Asia (People's Global Action); an international trade union network (the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mining and General Workers); and the Social Forum process, it analyses some of the global justice movement's component parts, operational networks and their respective dynamics, strategies and practices. The authors argue that the emergence of new globally connected forms of collective action against neoliberal globalisation are indicative of a range of variously place-specific forms of political agency that coalesce across geographic space at particular times, in specific places and in a variety of ways. They also argue that, rather than being indicative of a coherent ‘movement’, such forms of political agency contain many political and geographical fissures and fault-lines, and are best conceived of as ‘global justice networks’: overlapping, interacting, competing and differentially placed and resourced networks that articulate demands for social, economic and environmental justice. Such networks, and the social movements that comprise them, characterise emergent forms of trans-national political agency. The authors argue that the role of key geographical concepts of space, place and scale are crucial to an understanding of the operational dynamics of such networks. Such an analysis challenges key current assumptions in the literature about the emergence of a global civil society.

Democracy in Crisis

Stella Gaon — 2012-07-19

Author:: Stella Gaon
ISBN:: 9780719079238
Publisher:: Manchester University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.7228/manchester/9780719079238.001.0001
Published in print:: 2010
Published Online:: 2012-07-19

This book explores the political implications of violence and alterity (radical difference) for the practice of democracy, and reformulates the possibility of community that democracy is said to entail. Most significantly, contributors intervene in traditional democratic theory by contesting the widely held assumption that increased inclusion, tolerance and cultural recognition are democracy's sufficient conditions. Rather than simply inquiring how best to expand the ‘demos’, they investigate how claims to self-determination, identity and sovereignty are a problem for democracy, and how, paradoxically, alterity may be its greatest strength. Contributions include an appeal to the tension between fear and love in the face of anti-Semitism in Poland, injunctions to rethink the identity-difference binary and the ideal of ‘mutual recognition’ that dominate liberal-democratic thought, critiques of the canonical ‘we’ which constitutes the democratic community, and a call for an ethics and a politics of ‘dissensus’ in democratic struggles against racist and sexist oppression. The contributors mobilise some of the most powerful critical insights emerging across the social sciences and humanities—from anthropology, sociology, critical legal studies, Marxism, psychoanalysis, critical race theory and post-colonial studies—to reconsider the meaning and the possibility of ‘democracy’ in the face of its contemporary crisis.

Christianity and Democratisation

John Anderson — 2012-07-19

Author:: John Anderson
ISBN:: 9780719077388
Publisher:: Manchester University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.7228/manchester/9780719077388.001.0001
Published in print:: 2009
Published Online:: 2012-07-19

This book examines the contribution of different Christian traditions to the waves of democratisation that have swept various parts of the world in recent decades, offering an historical overview of Christianity's engagement with the development of democracy, before focusing in detail on the period since the 1970s. Successive chapters deal with: the Roman Catholic conversion to democracy and the contribution of that church to democratisation; the Eastern Orthodox ‘hesitation’ about democracy; the alleged threat to American democracy posed by the politicisation of conservative Protestantism; and the likely impact on democratic development of the global expansion of Pentecostalism. The author draws out several common themes from the analysis of these case studies, the most important of which is the ‘liberal-democracy paradox’. This ensures that there will always be tensions between faiths which proclaim some notion of absolute truth and political order, and which are also rooted in the ideas of compromise, negotiation and bargaining.

Towards a Deliberative and Associational Democracy

Stephen Elstub — 2012-03-22

Author:: Stephen Elstub
ISBN:: 9780748627394
Publisher:: Edinburgh University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748627394.001.0001
Published in print:: 2008
Published Online:: 2012-03-22

In an era where citizens of liberal democracies are becoming increasingly disillusioned, dissatisfied and disenfranchised by the dominant political institutions and decision-making processes in these polities, new ideas of how to deepen democracy, re-engage citizens and enhance decision-making legitimacy are required. This book suggests that a combination of deliberative democracy and associational democracy is both a normatively desirable and an empirically plausible solution to the complex problems present in contemporary societies – as well as being compatible with many recent trends in governance. The author argues that by combining deliberative with associational democracy, the weaknesses of each model alone are compensated by the other, allowing the key strengths of each to manifest themselves. The book goes further by offering a detailed set of original, institutional requirements for liberal democracies that, if adopted, will enable a deliberative and associational democracy to be realised in practice. It achieves this by starting off with first principles, considering arguments about why democracy is valuable and elaborating on why both deliberative and associational democracy – especially when combined – can enhance these normative principles, which make democracy and its required revitalisation so important.

The Politics of Radical Democracy

Adrian Little and Moya Lloyd — 2012-03-22

Author:: Adrian Little, Moya Lloyd
ISBN:: 9780748633999
Publisher:: Edinburgh University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748633999.001.0001
Published in print:: 2008
Published Online:: 2012-03-22

This book addresses the idea of radical democracy and, in particular, its poststructuralist articulation. It analyses the approach to radical democracy taken by a number of contemporary theorists and political commentators, including Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe, Judith Butler, William Connolly, Jacques Ranciére, Claude Lefort, Sheldon Wolin, Michael Hardt, Antonio Negri and Giorgio Agamben. By examining critically the accounts of democracy advanced by these theorists, the book explores how a more radically conceived theory of democracy might be extended in a more egalitarian and inclusive direction. It draws on the insights of radical democratic theory to explore a range of concrete political cases (e.g. the struggles of indigenous people, same-sex marriage, societies emerging from prolonged social and political strife, and the role of social movements in opposing processes of globalistion) in order to illustrate its practical nature.

Democratic Piety

Adrian Little — 2012-03-22

Author:: Adrian Little
ISBN:: 9780748633654
Publisher:: Edinburgh University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748633654.001.0001
Published in print:: 2008
Published Online:: 2012-03-22

This book presents an analysis of the nature of democratic theory, focusing on the prevalence of pious discourses of democracy in contemporary politics. Democracy is now promoted in religious terms to such an extent that it has become sacrosanct in Western political theory. The book argues that such piety relies on unsophisticated political analysis, paying scant attention to the complex conditions of contemporary politics. The contention is that it is more useful to think of democracy in terms of the centrality of political disagreement and its propensity to generate political violence. This argument is exemplified by the ways in which democracy and violence have been conceptualised in the war on terrorism. The book challenges democratic piety through the application of key contemporary approaches in political theory, including complexity theory, post-structuralism, and the idea of radical democracy. It uses the work of theorists such as Jacques Ranciére, William Connolly, Chantal Mouffe, Judith Butler, Giorgio Agamben, Walter Benjamin, and Alain Badiou to interrogate the discourses of democracy that characterise contemporary political debate. Finally, the book grounds the theoretical analysis of democratic discourse with examples from contemporary politics such as the struggles for recognition of refugees and asylum seekers.

Making Rights Claims

Karen Zivi — 2012-01-19

Author:: Karen Zivi
ISBN:: 9780199826414
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Political Theory, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199826414.001.0001
Published in print:: 2012
Published Online:: 2012-01-19

Despite the global popularity of rights language, nagging suspicions remain about the compatibility between the practice of rights claiming and democracy. Does rights claiming advances democratic freedom and equality or does it undermine participatory practices while reinforcing dominant forms of power? Should marginalized individuals and groups make rights claims to challenge oppression and injustice or should they seek an alternative language and form of political contestation? Making Rights Claims provides a unique entrée into these important and timely questions. Rather than simply taking a side in the debates for or against rights claiming, Zivi argues that we first need to understand the relationship between rights and democracy anew. Combining insights from speech act theory with recent developments in democratic and feminist thought, she develops a theory of the performativity of rights claiming and argues that if we understand and study rights claims as speech acts that create the world they seem to represent, we will see that it is through rights claiming, that we constitute and reconstitute ourselves as democratic citizens, shape our communities, and transform constraining categories of identity in ways that may simultaneously advance and challenge aspects of democracy.

Changes for Democracy

Leonardo Morlino — 2012-01-19

Author:: Leonardo Morlino
ISBN:: 9780199572533
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization, Comparative Politics
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199572533.001.0001
Published in print:: 2011
Published Online:: 2012-01-19

A review of the main theoretical findings in the literature on democratic changes prompts the author to propose an empirical definition of democracy, to discuss the main existing normative definitions and to suggest a new type of regime, the hybrid regime, which is also empirically analysed. The second and third parts of the book cover three geopolitical areas (Southern and Eastern Europe and Latin America) and present the main theoretical results of the empirical analysis on transition towards democracy and installation, consolidation and crisis, deepening and worsening of qualities with all related connections and hypotheses. The analysis reveals two new and relevant results. First, how the different macro-processes should be explored in different ways and with different theoretical ends: only a framework when transition and installations are considered; more precise hypotheses when consolidation and crisis are under scrutiny; connections and theoretical hypotheses when qualities and deepening are studied. Second, the empirical research makes it possible to single out three core sub-processes and a key mechanism. When dealing with transition and democratic installation the core sub-process is the unfolding of a learning process at elite and mass levels towards democratic legitimation. When consolidation and crisis are considered, domestic anchoring and external anchoring are the two core sub-process that should be mentioned. In the macro-processes of deepening or weakening of qualities, the core mechanism is mutual convergence of qualities. This mechanism emerges from the empirical analysis of existing connections between the procedures, contents, and results of democracy.

From Protest to Parties

Adrienne LeBas — 2011-09-22

Author:: Adrienne LeBas
ISBN:: 9780199546862
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199546862.001.0001
Published in print:: 2011
Published Online:: 2011-09-22

Why do strong opposition party organizations emerge in some democratizing countries, while those in others remain weak or quickly fragment on ethnic lines? From Protest to Parties offers an explanation for why opposition parties vary in organizational form, cohesion, and mobilizational reach. The book draws upon an in-depth analysis of three countries in Anglophone Africa: Zimbabwe, Zambia, and Kenya. Though these countries share similar institutional frameworks, including electoral rules, party development has taken a different route in each. The explanation emphasizes the ways in which historical legacies interact with strategic choices to produce different trajectories of party development. In terms of the role of history, the book argues that strong opposition parties are more likely where authoritarian states relied on alliances with corporate actors like labor. In these contexts, ruling parties armed their allies, providing them with mobilizing structures and political resources that could later be used to challenge the state. Secondly, opposition parties are more likely to maintain their organizational cohesion and the commitment of activists when they use strategies and appeals that escalate conflict and reorient social boundaries around the lines of partisan affiliation. Polarization forges stronger parties, but it also increases the likelihood of violence and authoritarian retrenchment. The book provides an explanation of why democratization in the hybrid regimes of the late Third Wave may prove more conflictual and more protracted than earlier transitions to democracy.

The Metamorphosis of Leadership in a Democratic Mexico

Roderic Ai Camp — 2011-01-01

Author:: Roderic Ai Camp
ISBN:: 9780199742851
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199742851.001.0001
Published in print:: 2010
Published Online:: 2011-01-01

The overall purpose of this book is to use an original, detailed set of collective biographies of influential national political leaders in Mexico—numbering 3,000 individuals from all braches of the federal government, as well as all state governors, from 1935 to 2008—to test numerous questions about how that leadership has changed, what influences brought about that change, and what extent the shift from a semi-authoritarian to a democratic electoral model alters the composition of national politicians. Using this unique data set, based on four decades of research, and on extensive interviews and correspondence with politicians, many significant alterations are discovered. Among the most important findings, the book concludes that democratic change produces alterations in leadership that are as dramatic or more so than those produced by violent change; that women have played an especially influential role in the democratic transition, especially through the legislative branch; that informal variables, such as kinship ties to important political families, are unaffected by significant changes in a political model; that certain institutional patterns are difficult to restore or hard to change; that specific reforms in the 1960s produced long-term unexpected patterns which continue to influence the composition of leadership to this day; that democracy has revived the importance of local political experience; that partisanship has increased with democratic politics; that the Miguel Alemán generation from the 1900s produced long-term institutional characteristics of Mexican politics; and that governors have emerged as potentially the most important national politicians of the future.

The Digital Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy

Philip N. Howard — 2010-09-01

Author:: Philip N. Howard
ISBN:: 9780199736416
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Comparative Politics, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199736416.001.0001
Published in print:: 2010
Published Online:: 2010-09-01

Around the developing world, political leaders face a dilemma: the very information and communication technologies that boost economic fortunes also undermine power structures. Globally, one in ten internet users is a Muslim living in a populous Muslim community. In these countries, young people are developing their political identities—including a transnational Muslim identity—online. In countries where political parties are illegal, the internet is the only infrastructure for democratic discourse. In others, digital technologies such as mobile phones and the internet have given key actors an information infrastructure that is independent of the state. And in countries with large Muslim communities, mobile phones and the internet are helping civil society build systems of political communication independent of the state and beyond easy manipulation by cultural or religious elites. This book looks at the role that communications technologies play in advancing democratic transitions in Muslim countries. As such, its central question is whether technology holds the potential to substantially enhance democracy. Certainly, no democratic transition has occurred solely because of the internet. But, as the book argues, no democratic transition can occur today without the internet. According to this book, the major (and perhaps only meaningful) forum for civic debate in most Muslim countries today is online. Activists both within diasporic communities and within authoritarian states—including Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan—are the drivers of this debate, which centers around issues such as the interpretation of Islamic texts, gender roles, and security issues. Drawing upon material from interviews with telecommunications policy makers and activists in Azerbaijan, Egypt, Tajikistan, and Tanzania and a comparative study of seventy-four countries with large Muslim populations, this book demonstrates that these forums have been the means to organize activist movements that have lead to successful democratic insurgencies.

Democracy, Agency, and the State

Guillermo O'Donnell — 2010-09-01

Author:: Guillermo O'Donnell
ISBN:: 9780199587612
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Comparative Politics, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199587612.001.0001
Published in print:: 2010
Published Online:: 2010-09-01

This book aims to contribute to a comparatively informed theory of democracy. The book begins by arguing that conceptions of ‘the state’ and ‘democracy’, and their respective defining features, significantly influence each other. Using an approach that is both historical and analytical, it traces this relationship through the idea of legally sanctioned and backed agency which grounds democratic citizenship. From this standpoint the book explores several aspects of the democratic regime and of the state, distinguishing four constitutive dimensions (bureaucracy, legality, focus of collective identity, and filter). The book goes on to examine the role played by the idea of ‘the nation’ or ‘the people’, and the ways in which the state represents itself to different sections of society, especially in countries marred by deep inequality and pervasive poverty. Drawing on the examples of democratic and non-democratic regime, the book discusses the dialogical spaces congenial to democracy, as well as examining the options that may or may not enable agency, and the complex comparative and ethical issues raised by the intersection of agency with globalization and legal pluralism. Throughout these discussions several comparative vistas are opened, especially but not exclusively toward Latin America. The book concludes by offering a justification of democracy, even of the flawed democracies that nowadays abound.

The Unfinished Democratization of Europe

Erik O. Eriksen — 2010-02-01

Author:: Erik O. Eriksen
ISBN:: 9780199572519
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, European Union, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199572519.001.0001
Published in print:: 2009
Published Online:: 2010-02-01

The widening and deepening of the European Union have brought to the fore the question of democracy at the European level. The system of domination already in place at the European level requires and aspires to direct legitimation—from the citizens themselves and not merely indirectly, from the member nation-states. Such can only be achieved by making the EU into a democratic polity. But can democracy be disassociated from its putative nation-state foundation? This book develops a revised concept of democratic legitimacy based on discourse theory. It is argued that post-national democracy requires a constitution but not necessarily a state. The Union amounts to less than a state but more than an international organization and a system of transnational governance. In the political theory of the multi-level constellation that makes up the EU, it is conceived of as a regional subset of an emerging cosmopolitan order. The EU is a state-less government. As it is not premised on group identity, it is able to accommodate a high measure of variance with regard to territory and function. The book analyses the reforms undertaken to bring the EU ‘closer to the citizens’. It documents elements of democratization and the reduction of arbitrary power. However, democracy requires that the citizens can approve or reject the laws they are subjected to. Since the institutional and civic conditions under which a public justification process would be deemed legitimate are not in place, European post-national democracy remains an unaccomplished mission.

Rethinking Arab Democratization

Larbi Sadiki — 2009-05-01

Author:: Larbi Sadiki
ISBN:: 9780199562985
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Comparative Politics, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199562985.001.0001
Published in print:: 2009
Published Online:: 2009-05-01

This book unpacks and historicizes the rise of Arab electoralism, narrating the story of stalled democratic transition in the Arab Middle East. It provides a balance sheet of the state of Arab democratization from the mid-1970s up to 2008. In seeking to answer the question of how Arab countries democratize and whether they are democratizing at all, the book pays attention to specificity, highlighting the peculiarities of democratic transitions in the Arab Middle East. To this end, it situates the discussion of such transitions firmly within their local contexts, but without losing sight of the global picture, namely, the US drive to control and ‘democratize’ the Arab World. The book rejects ‘exceptionalism’, ‘foundationalism’, and ‘Orientalism’, by showing that the Arab World is not immured from the global trend towards political liberalization. But by identifying new trends in Arab democratic transitions, highlighting their peculiarities, and drawing on Arab neglected discourses and voices, the book pinpoints the contingency of some of the arguments underlying Western theories of democratic transition when applied to the Arab setting.

Regime-Building

Oisín Tansey — 2009-05-01

Author:: Oisín Tansey
ISBN:: 9780199561032
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Comparative Politics, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199561032.001.0001
Published in print:: 2009
Published Online:: 2009-05-01

This book is a study of regime change in the context of international administration, where the United Nations and other multilateral organizations hold temporary executive authority at the domestic level. Work on the politics of state-building has highlighted how these administration operations can influence nearly every aspect of politics in the country or territory in which they are deployed. This book concentrates in particular on the ‘regime-building’ practices of these missions, and examines the aims and influences of international administrations in the area of democratic development, as well as their ultimate impact on the process of regime change. Through a comparative analysis of events in Bosnia, Kosovo, and East Timor, the book demonstrates how external actors assume positions of power conventionally held by domestic elites, and in so doing gain the ability to affect democratic development in ways unavailable to international actors in more conventional settings. In particular, the case studies highlight the ways in which the democracy promotion objectives of international administrators can have both positive and negative effects on democratization processes, with the presence of international authorities helping to rule out non-democratic options in some areas, while at times undermining democratic development in others. The book identifies the key international actors involved, highlights the mechanisms of influence available to them in these contexts, and explores the crucial mediating role of domestic actors and structures.

Democracy and the State in the New Southern Europe

Richard Gunther, P. Nikiforos Diamandouros, and Dimitri A. Sotiropoulos — 2009-05-01

Author:: RichardGuntherProfessor of Political Science, Ohio State Universityhttp://psweb.sbs.ohio-state.edu/faculty/rgunther/rgunther.htmP. NikiforosDiamandourosProfessor of Comparative Politics, University of AthensDimitri A.SotiropoulosAssistant Professor of Political Science, University of Athenshttp://www.pspa.uoa.gr/node.php?n=0_1_10_sotiropoulos&lang=en
ISBN:: 9780199202812
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, European Union, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199202812.001.0001
Published in print:: 2006
Published Online:: 2009-05-01

This book is the fourth in a five-volume series examining the cultural, economic, political, and social changes that have transformed Southern Europe (Greece, Italy, Portugal, and Spain) in the final three decades of the 20th century. Like the preceding three volumes, it examines the impact of three powerful transformative forces that, in general, have eroded away the “exceptional” status of these countries and moved them toward the mainstream of Western industrialized societies: democratization, socioeconomic modernization, and Europeanization. Four public policy sectors (taxation, environmental protection, social welfare programs, and aggregate levels of social spending) and three institutional arenas of the state itself (the judiciary, public administration, and relationships among the national, subnational, and supranational levels of government) serve as the analytical foci of these studies. In contrast with the rapid, “leapfrogging” processes of political change identified in the first two volumes (especially with regard to democratic consolidation and the emergence of “modern” political parties and patterns of electoral behavior), transformations of the state and public policies in these four countries have entailed considerable time-lags, persisting rigidities in some sectors, and striking divergences in the evolution of state structures. At the same time, there have been substantial cross-national differences and divergences among policy sectors (with taxation, aggregate levels of social spending, and, in Spain, political decentralization evolving rapidly, while other policy domains and state institutions have resisted change). The book concludes that these three broad social forces alone cannot account for these patterns. It concludes that they can only be accounted for by political processes, involving the extent to which institutions or policy subsectors had been closely linked to or autonomous from the former, pre-democratic regime, as well as the resources available to defenders of the status quo.

Bourgeoisie, State and Democracy

Graeme Gill — 2008-09-01

Author:: Graeme Gill
ISBN:: 9780199544684
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Political Theory, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199544684.001.0001
Published in print:: 2008
Published Online:: 2008-09-01

This book is concerned with two major issues: the role of the economic bourgeoisie in the emergence of democracy, and the nature and role of the new class of businessmen that has emerged in post-Soviet Russia. Through extensive analysis of the emergence and role of a new business class in Britain, France, Germany, and the USA at the time of their respective ‘industrial revolutions’ (with a brief comparative look at the pre-Soviet tsarist bourgeoisie), it explores the assumptions and conclusions of the major theories linking class and democratisation. The historical experiences of these classes is compared with that of the post-Soviet business class, and the implications for Russian politics explored. Thus, the book comprises a comprehensive analysis of the origins and development of a business class in these five countries, with Russia treated in the greatest depth. The patterns of bourgeois integration into the political structure are explored, showing that the new class of businessmen is not a clear proponent of democracy, but is content to fit in to the sort of arrangements that best enables it to exploit the state.

Accountability Politics

Jonathan A. Fox — 2008-05-01

Author:: Jonathan A. Fox
ISBN:: 9780199208852
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199208852.001.0001
Published in print:: 2007
Published Online:: 2008-05-01

How can the seeds of accountability ever grow in authoritarian environments? Embedding accountability into the state is an inherently uneven, partial, and contested process. Campaigns for public accountability often win limited concessions at best, but they can leave cracks in the system that serve as handholds for subsequent efforts to open up the state to public scrutiny. This book explores how civil society ‘thickens’ by comparing two decades of rural citizens' struggles to hold the Mexican state accountable, exploring both change and continuity before, during, and after national electoral turning points. The book addresses how much power-sharing really happens in policy innovations that include participatory social and environmental councils, citizen oversight of elections and the secret ballot, decentralized social investment funds, participation reforms in World Bank projects, community-managed food programs, as well as new social oversight and public information access reforms. Meanwhile, efforts to exercise voice unfold at the same time as rural citizens consider their exit options, as millions migrate to the US, where many have since come together in a new migrant civil society. This book concludes that new analytical frameworks are needed to understand ‘transitions to accountability’. This involves unpacking the interaction between participation, transparency, and accountability.

Predicting Party Sizes

Rein Taagepera — 2007-09-01

Author:: Rein Taagepera
ISBN:: 9780199287741
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199287741.001.0001
Published in print:: 2007
Published Online:: 2007-09-01

For a given electoral system, what average number and size distribution of parties can we expect? This book makes specific predictions that agree with world averages. The basic factors are assembly size and district magnitude (the number of seats allocated in the district). While previous models tell us only the direction in which to change the electoral system, the present ones also tell us by how much they must be changed so as to obtain the desired change in party system and cabinet duration. These are quantitatively predictive logical models. Combined with known particularities of a country, these models can be used for informed institutional design. Allocation of seats among countries in the European Parliament is also put on a logical basis.

Levelling the Playing Field

Andrew Mason — 2007-05-01

Author:: Andrew Mason
ISBN:: 9780199264414
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199264414.001.0001
Published in print:: 2006
Published Online:: 2007-05-01

‘Equality of opportunity for all’ is a fine piece of political rhetoric but the ideal that lies behind it is slippery. Some see it as an alternative to a more robust form of egalitarianism, whilst others think that when it is properly understood it provides us with a real radical vision of what it is to level the playing field. This book combines a meritocratic conception of equality of opportunity that governs access to advantaged social positions, with redistributive principles that seek to mitigate the effects of differences in people's circumstances. Taken together, these spell out what it is to level the playing field in the way that justice requires.

Gender and Justice in Multicultural Liberal States

Monique Deveaux — 2007-01-01

Author:: Monique Deveaux
ISBN:: 9780199289790
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199289790.001.0001
Published in print:: 2006
Published Online:: 2007-01-01

This book explores the challenges that culturally plural liberal states face when they hold competing political commitments to cultural rights and sexual equality, and advances an argument for resolving such dilemmas through democratic dialogue and negotiation. Exploring recent examples of gendered cultural conflicts in South Africa, Canada, and Britain, this study shows that there is an urgent need for workable strategies to mediate the antagonisms between the cultural practices and arrangements of certain ethno-cultural and religious groups, and the norms and constitutional rights endorsed by liberal states. Yet such strategies will be successful only insofar as they can resolve conflicts without either reinforcing women’s subordination within cultural communities or unjustly dismissing calls for cultural recognition and forms of self-governance. To this end, the book develops an approach to mediating cultural tensions that takes seriously the demands for justice by cultural and religious minorities in liberal democratic states. Grounded in an argument for democratic legitimacy, this approach invokes norms of political inclusion and democratic dialogue, and highlights negotiation and compromise as the best vehicles for arriving at resolutions to conflicts of cultural value. However, the book also reconceives the basis of democratic legitimacy so as to include not merely formal expressions of political consent, but also a range of informal democratic activities that occur in the private and social spheres, from acts of cultural reinvention and subversion to outright expressions of dissent and cultural refusal.

Democracy and Diversity

Benjamin Reilly — 2007-01-01

Author:: Benjamin Reilly
ISBN:: 9780199286874
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199286874.001.0001
Published in print:: 2006
Published Online:: 2007-01-01

This book shows how political reformers across the Asia-Pacific region have responded to the reality of their internal diversity by deliberate, innovative, and often highly ambitious forms of political engineering. Harking back to the success of the East Asian ‘Tigers’ and their unorthodox but successful interventions in the economic arena, many democratizing Northeast Asian, Southeast Asian, and Pacific Island states are now seeking to manage political change by far-reaching reforms to their electoral, parliamentary, and party systems. This book is part of the Oxford Studies in Democratization, a series for scholars and students of comparative politics and related disciplines. Volumes concentrate on the comparative study of the democratization process that accompanied the decline and termination of the cold war. The geographical focus of the series is primarily Latin America, the Caribbean, Southern and Eastern Europe, and relevant experiences in Africa and Asia.

Democracy in Iran

Ali Gheissari and Vali Nasr — 2006-05-01

Author:: Ali Gheissari, Vali Nasr
ISBN:: 9780195189674
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0195189671.001.0001
Published in print:: 2006
Published Online:: 2006-05-01

Recently Iran has once again been in the headlines. Reputed to be developing nuclear weapons, the future of Iraq's next-door neighbor is a matter of grave concern both for the stability of the region and for the safety of the global community. President George W. Bush labeled it part of the “Axis of Evil,” and has railed against the country's authoritarian leadership. Yet as Bush trumpets the spread of democracy throughout the Middle East, few note that Iran has one of the longest-running experiences with democracy in the region. This book looks at the political history of Iran in the modern era, and offers an in-depth analysis of the prospects for democracy to flourish there. After having produced the only successful Islamist challenge to the state, a revolution, and an Islamic Republic, Iran is now poised to produce a genuine and indigenous democratic movement in the Muslim world. Democracy in Iran is neither a sudden development nor a western import. The concept of democracy in Iran today may appear to be a reaction to authoritarianism, but it is an old idea with a complex history, one that is tightly interwoven with the main forces that have shaped Iranian society and politics, institutions, identities, and interests. This book seeks to understand why democracy failed to grow roots and lost ground to an autocratic Iranian state. Why was democracy absent from the ideological debates of the 1960s and 1970s? Most important, why has it now become a powerful social, political, and intellectual force? How have modernization, social change, economic growth, and the experience of the revolution converged to make this possible?

Democratic Accountability in Latin America

Scott Mainwaring and Christoper Welna — 2005-04-20

Author:: ScottMainwaringConley Professor of Political Science, University of Notre Damehttp://kellogg.nd.edu/scottmainwaring/index.shtmlChristoperWelnaAssociate Director of The Kellogg Institute for International Studies, University of Notre Damehttp://www.acm.edu/about_us/staff_directory/5
ISBN:: 9780199256372
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0199256373.001.0001
Published in print:: 2003
Published Online:: 2005-04-20

This book brings together studies on democratic accountability in Latin America by authors from different theoretical perspectives. It seeks to further understanding on the web of institutions that form the mechanisms of accountability, the interaction between these institutions, and interaction between electoral accountability, intrastate accountability, and societal oversight. The book is divided into four parts. Part I discusses conceptual and theoretical issues on accountability. Part II presents three chapters on legislatures, executives, and oversight agencies. Part III has three chapters on the judiciary and related mechanisms of accountability. Part IV deals with innovations in oversight of public officials.

International Democracy and the West

Richard Youngs — 2005-01-20

Author:: Richard Youngs
ISBN:: 9780199274468
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0199274460.001.0001
Published in print:: 2004
Published Online:: 2005-01-20

This book adds to debates on the international dimensions of democratisation by exploring the politics and actions of Western governments, multinational companies, and non-profit organisations (NGOs). It finds that governments, businesses and NGOs all show increased concern for democratic trends, but their strategies are beset by uncertainty and ambivalence.

Gender Justice, Development, and Rights

Maxine Molyneux and Shahra Razavi — 2005-01-20

Author:: MaxineMolyneuxProfessor of Sociology at the Institute of Latin American Studies, University of Londonhttp://americas.sas.ac.uk/about/maxine.htmlShahraRazaviResearch Co-ordinator, United Nations Research Institute for Social Developmenthttp://www.unrisd.org/80256B3C005BC203/(httpPeople)/D978A8DEC0EA8D5680256B5D00391902?OpenDocument
ISBN:: 9780199256457
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0199256454.001.0001
Published in print:: 2002
Published Online:: 2005-01-20

This book features a collection of empirical and theoretical studies on developments in women’s rights in the 1990s. It is divided into four parts. Part I focuses on the different aspects of liberalism and the challenges to its neo-liberal or contractarian form. Part II examines the gender implications of the tensions between orthodox macroeconomic agendas, social rights, and welfare delivery. Part III centres on the place of women’s movements in states and social movements that claim democracy as a legitimising principle. Part IV studies the conflicts between universalism and multiculturalism.

Democracy and Public Management Reform

Luiz Carlos Bresser-Pereira — 2004-11-16

Author:: Luiz Carlos Bresser-Pereira
ISBN:: 9780199261185
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0199261180.001.0001
Published in print:: 2004
Published Online:: 2004-11-16

The two major political institutions acting in modern democracies–civil society and the state–assume new ways of relating among themselves, thereby producing new democratic governance. Discusses two aspects of this global change: the republican democracy that is emerging in the twenty-first century and public management reform. The objective of this reform is to increase state capacity, to create a ‘strong state’: able to produce representative and accountable democratic governments; able to protect civil rights and assure markets, and so liberal; able to promote social justice, and so social; able to resist corruption and rent seeking, and thus republican. Starts from the assumption that, just as only a strong civil society may guarantee democracy, only a strong state may assure competitive markets. Defines the words ‘nation-state’ (or ‘country’), state, and civil society.

The Politics of Memory and Democratization

Alexandra Barahona De Brito, Carmen Gonzalez Enriquez, and Paloma Aguilar — 2003-11-01

Author:: Alexandra Barahona DeBritoPrinceton UniversityCarmenGonzalez EnriquezUniversidad Nacional de Educacion a Distancia (UNED)PalomaAguilarUniversidad Nacional de Educacion a Distancia (Madrid, Spain)http://www.uned.es/dcpa/Profesores/Aguilar.html
ISBN:: 9780199240906
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0199240906.001.0001
Published in print:: 2001
Published Online:: 2003-11-01

The book explores how new democracies face an authoritarian past and past human rights violations, and the way in which policies of truth and justice shape the process of democratization. Eighteen countries in Central and South America, Central, Eastern and South Europe and South Africa are analysed in detail. The main variables affecting the implementation of truth and justice policies (purges, truth commissions and trials, among other policies) are: the balance between old and new regime forces; the availability of institutional, human and financial resources, the nature of the ideological preferences and commitments of the elites in question; the mobilization of social groups pressing in favour of these policies; and the importance of human rights in the international arena. The duration and degree of institutionalization of dictatorship is also important. A prolonged dictatorship makes it harder for a new democracy to implement truth and justice policies, particularly when repression occurred in the distant past and if repression gained social complicity. The magnitude and methods of repression used against opposition forces in the dictatorship also shape transitional truth and justice: torture, assassination, and disappearances and clandestine repression in general (as in Central and South America, South Africa) require a different response to official institutionalized ‘softer’ repression (as in Portugal, Spain and Eastern Europe). The findings indicate that, with hindsight, there appears to be no direct relation between the implementation of policies of backward-looking truth and justice and the quality of new democracies. Democracy is just as strong and deep in Spain, Hungary and Uruguay, where there was no punishment or truth telling, as it is in Portugal, the Czech Republic or Argentina, which experienced purges and trials. However, such policies are justified not merely on instrumental grounds, but also for ethical reasons, and they symbolize a break with a violent, undemocratic past.

Partners for Democracy

Ray A. Moore and Donald L. Robinson — 2003-11-01

Author:: Ray A. Moore, Donald L. Robinson
ISBN:: 9780195151169
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/019515116X.001.0001
Published in print:: 2002
Published Online:: 2003-11-01

This book demonstrates that Japan's postwar Constitution has provided a solid foundation for democracy because, contrary to the conventional view that the American Occupation simply “imposed” it, there was considerable Japanese input in its making. The first two chapters analyze a sharp clash, during the American planning of the Occupation, over the fate and role of Emperor Hirohito. Papered over in the Potsdam Declaration and never resolved in official Washington, the dispute gave General Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP), an opportunity to protect the emperor and use his authority to support MacArthur's own objectives. In the fall of 1945, both American and Japanese officials determined that democratization required constitutional revision and that Japan should take the lead in revising its Constitution. Accordingly, Japanese scholars and officials began advancing their ideas. Meanwhile, both the emperor and the cabinet named commissions (headed by Konoe Fumimaro and Matsumoto Jōji, respectively) to study the need for amendments. However, poor communication from the American side and political chaos among the Japanese doomed these fledgling efforts. In early February 1946, MacArthur, alarmed by the Moscow Agreement that created the Far Eastern Commission (FEC) and fearing that he might lose control over the political reform of Japan, ordered his Government Section (GS) to draft a model constitution for Japan, then pressured Prime Minister Shidehara's cabinet to present it as a Japanese government draft. Japanese attempts to modify SCAP's draft, an effort that achieved some success in the face of determined American resistance, have been largely ignored by those who slight Japan's contribution to its own postwar democratization. Chapters 12 through 20 trace the deliberations of the Japanese parliament (called the Diet) during the summer of 1946. It is a mistake to pass over this stage quickly, as most accounts of Japan's postwar democratization do. This was a critical juncture in postwar Japan's commitment to constitutional democracy, affording politicians in the recently elected House of Representatives and in the House of Peers a major opportunity to put their imprint on the document. Intense struggles took place over the role of the emperor, Article 9 (renouncing war and armed forces), the bill of rights and provisions for parliamentary governance. The Conclusion emphasizes that, as Japan currently deliberates whether to amend its postwar Constitution, it is important to understand that the transformation of Japan into a stable constitutional democracy was a joint achievement, to which both American and Japanese contributions were substantial and crucial.

The New Politics of Inequality in Latin America

2003-11-01

Author:: Douglas A.ChalmersColumbia Universityhttp://www.columbia.edu/cu/polisci/fac-bios/chalmers/faculty.htmlCarlos M.VilasUniversidad Nacional Autonoma de MexicoKatherineHiteColumbia Universityhttp://politicalscience.vassar.edu/bios/kahite.htmlScott B.MartinColumbia Universityhttp://www.gpia.info/node/374KeriannePiesterColumbia UniversityMoniqueSegarraColumbia University
ISBN:: 9780198781837
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0198781830.001.0001
Published in print:: 1997
Published Online:: 2003-11-01

Almost all agree that political systems in Latin America underwent a transformation in the 1980s. The usual quick description of this change was ‘democratization’. But whether one takes an optimistic or a pessimistic view of the level of democracy that was achieved, one thing was sure—the traditional forms of participation by, and representation of, the poor, the working population, and others structurally disadvantaged had changed. The chapters examine the labour organizations, political parties, indigenous and environmental groups that have emerged, sometimes amidst new forms of violence. Others recount efforts to rebuild social–democratic projects and to create new models of participatory politics in municipalities and around social programmes. There is no consensus on whether these new forms will produce more democracy. Rather, the chapters present a variety of conceptual tools to identify trends and assess their impact.

The International Dimensions of Democratization

Laurence Whitehead — 2003-11-01

Author:: LaurenceWhiteheadNuffield College, Oxfordhttp://www.lac.ox.ac.uk/staff_a-z_directory/staff/lwhitehead
ISBN:: 9780199243754
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0199243751.001.0001
Published in print:: 2001
Published Online:: 2003-11-01

The ending of the Cold War has brought about a flurry of regional initiatives to promote and consolidate democratization, especially in east Central Europe and in Central and South America. This volume provides a historically grounded analysis of the significance and limitations of such attempts at ‘democracy by convergence’, and reconsiders some established ideas about the relationship between domestic and international factors in recent democratization processes. Combining theoretical approaches with empirical case studies, the book examines the development of democratic regimes in countries and regions as diverse as Brazil, Spain, Greece, the Caribbean, and east Central Europe. At the international level, the book considers the influence of US foreign policy, international finance, the UN, and the European Union, as well as a wide range of international political influences on democratization.

Institutions and Democratic Citizenship

Axel Hadenius — 2003-11-01

Author:: Axel Hadenius
ISBN:: 9780199246663
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0199246661.001.0001
Published in print:: 2001
Published Online:: 2003-11-01

The book contains two parts that have a broad theme in common. The aim in Part I is to contribute to the debate on democracy's preconditions. Drawing on a broad range of theories, the author specifies certain societal and institutional traits that can serve to further democracy. Democratic development in Africa, Latin America, and India is then compared. The conclusion is that democracy is not the product of social and economic forces first of all. To a greater extent, it is the consequence of prevailing institutional conditions, i.e. the nature of the state The historical development of state structures is the object of analysis in Part II. The focus is mainly on Europe. The prospects for democracy in modern times have been greatly affected, the author maintains, by varying paths of institutional development. Moreover, the differing modes of state have displayed a variable capacity for governance and economic development. The evolution of state structures thus has consequences across broad areas of political and social life.

Human Rights and Democratization in Latin America

Alexandra Barahona de Brito — 2003-11-01

Author:: Alexandra Barahona de Brito
ISBN:: 9780198280385
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0198280386.001.0001
Published in print:: 1997
Published Online:: 2003-11-01

This book analyses the Uruguayan and Chilean experiences with the transitional politics of truth and justice regarding past human rights violations. These policies are shaped by the legacy of repressive rule, and the dynamics of the politics of transition and of the balance of power under the new democratic governments peculiar to each country. The issue is central to the politics of transition for ethical, symbolic, practical and political reasons: politically it is the most explosive transitional issue; on a practical level, only official acknowledgement can resolve pending legal questions for survivors and families of victims; ethically, it is hard to generate democratic consensus or social endorsement for social reform without involving principles and ideals that appeal to the underlying values and aspirations of the citizenry. Dealing with legacies of state repression permits the beginning of the process of ‘deconstruction of cultures of fear’ without which democratization cannot occur. This is not only desirable and necessary; some kind of truth telling policy has proved to be both required and feasible in a wide range of contemporary regime transitions. However, justice is not always possible: limitations on prosecutions are more self-imposed than 'structural', more political than institutional, and clearly there is a tension between the conditions necessary to ensure accountability and those that govern periods of transition. Unconsolidated democracies are not able to practise the politics of a consolidated democracy; the politics of consolidated democracies includes the capacity to call the powerful to account. This is perhaps the yardstick with which to measure consolidation. Instead of practising the politics of consolidated democracy, what these countries have to engage in is the politics of democratic consolidation. Although truth and justice policies may remain relevant after the transition and 'leak into' the politics of democratization, (where they can continue to be a source of conflict in the judicial system and of latent or overt painful and deep-seated social animosities), the resolution of the issue in the formal political arena can and does make it marginal in terms of day-to-day politics. Consolidation depends more crucially on the reform of key institutions that permitted abuse and impunity: the thorough reform of the judiciary and of the forces of repression. If a government does not undertake a proper reform of the institutions that made abuse and impunity possible, the democracy it presides over will be lame and incomplete.

The European Union and the Promotion of Democracy

Richard Youngs — 2003-11-01

Author:: Richard Youngs
ISBN:: 9780199249794
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0199249792.001.0001
Published in print:: 2002
Published Online:: 2003-11-01

This book assesses European Union (EU) policies aimed at encouraging democratization in East Asia and the North African and Middle Eastern states within the Euro–Mediterranean partnership—these two regions being the source of some of the strongest conceptual challenges to ‘Western’ liberal democracy since the end of the cold war. The book addresses theoretical debates over the international dimensions of democratization and the EU's characteristics as an international actor, including in relation to the development of a Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP). The factors both driving and inhibiting European democracy promotion policies are explored. The book outlines the EU's distinctive bottom‐up philosophy, aimed at constructing the socio–economic and ideational foundations for political liberalization, but argues that the EU has, in practice, failed to develop a fully comprehensive and coherent democracy promotion strategy.

Electoral Systems and Democratization in Southern Africa

Andrew Reynolds — 2003-11-01

Author:: Andrew Reynolds
ISBN:: 9780198295105
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0198295103.001.0001
Published in print:: 1999
Published Online:: 2003-11-01

This book is one of the series Oxford Studies in Democratization, and examines electoral systems and democratization in southern Africa. The design of electoral systems and executive types is increasingly being recognized as the key lever of constitutional engineering to be applied in the interests of political accommodation and stability in ethnically divided societies. In this comparative study of democratic design in southern Africa, Andrew Reynolds finds that the decisions about how to constitute representative parliaments have wide-ranging effects on the type of parties and the party system that develops, the nature of executive–legislative relations, and the inclusiveness of both majority and minority interests in the process of governance. While electoral system design is the primary focus of the book, the related constitutional issues of whether to choose a presidential or parliamentary system, and whether to entrench consensual, consociational, or majoritarian government are also discussed. In analysing the experiences of Malawi, Namibia, South Africa, Zambia, and Zimbabwe, the author presents conclusions that help shed light on the success or failure of democratic design in other fledgling democracies, in both Africa and beyond.

Democratization

Laurence Whitehead — 2003-11-01

Author:: Laurence Whitehead
ISBN:: 9780199253289
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0199253285.001.0001
Published in print:: 2002
Published Online:: 2003-11-01

Argues that democratization is best understood as a long‐term, dynamic, and open‐ended process extending over generations. Standard models of causal explanation, therefore, need to be supplemented by more interpretative approaches. Basic questions of citizen security, the nature of public accountability, and the role of money as a source of political power need reconsideration. The book proposes a range of new perspectives on the complex linkages between democratization and state formation, on the logic of paired comparisons and comparisons between large regions of the world, and on the relationship between democratic ideals and ‘really existing’ democratic outcomes.

Democratic Consolidation in Eastern Europe Volume 2: International and Transnational Factors

Jan Zielonka and Alex Pravda — 2003-11-01

Author:: JanZielonkaEuropean University Institutehttp://www.sant.ox.ac.uk/people/zielonka/index.htmlAlexPravdaSt Antony's College, Oxfordhttp://www.rees.ox.ac.uk/staff_a-z_directory/staff-russia/apravda
ISBN:: 9780199244096
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/019924409X.001.0001
Published in print:: 2001
Published Online:: 2003-11-01

This is the second volume in a two‐volume series on democratic consolidation in Eastern Europe. The series focuses on three major aspects of democratic consolidation in Eastern Europe: institutional engineering, transnational pressures, and civil society. This volume analyses the external parameters of democratic consolidation in 13 European countries: how different international actors and various economic, cultural, and security types of transnational pressures have shaped democratic politics in the region. The aim is to contrast a set of democracy theories with empirical evidence accumulated in Eastern Europe over the past 10 years. The volume tries to avoid complex debates about definitions, methods, and the uses and misuses of comparative research. Instead, it establishes what has really happened in the region, and which of the existing theories have proved helpful in explaining these developments. The Introduction sets out the distinctive features of the post‐communist wave of democratization, examines the aims and methods of major international actors, and considers the determinants of their impact on the political development of Eastern Europe. The volume is divided into two parts. The first part presents a conceptual and comparative analysis. The second consists of detailed studies of individual countries undergoing democratic consolidation. Case study chapters deal with the following countries: Estonia and Latvia, Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, Bulgaria, and Macedonia, the states of former Yugoslavia, Belarus, and Ukraine, and finally Russia. The concluding chapter identifies a set of variables responsible for the enormous impact of external factors on democratic consolidation in Eastern Europe. It conceptualizes the interplay of internal and external factors impinging upon democracy, and shows the interplay of different positive and negative types of external pressures, such as conditionality.

Democratic Consolidation in Eastern Europe Volume 1: Institutional Engineering

Jan Zielonka — 2003-11-01

Author:: JanZielonkaEuropean University Institutehttp://www.sant.ox.ac.uk/people/zielonka/index.html
ISBN:: 9780199244089
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0199244081.001.0001
Published in print:: 2001
Published Online:: 2003-11-01

This is the first volume in a two‐volume series focusing on two major influences on democratic consolidation in Eastern Europe—institutional engineering and transnational pressures. Volume 1 analyses constraints on and opportunities for institutional engineering in Eastern Europe: to what extent elites in Eastern Europe have been able to shape, if not manipulate, the politics of democratic consolidation through institutional means and how. The aim is to juxtapose a set of democracy theories with empirical evidence accumulated in Eastern Europe over the course of the last 10 years. The volume tries to avoid complex debates about definitions, methods, and the uses and misuses of comparative research. Instead, it tries to establish what has really happened in the region and which theories have proved helpful in explaining those developments. The volume begins with a presentation of conceptual and comparative frameworks, followed by in‐depth empirical analyses of the 13 individual countries undergoing democratic consolidation. The empirical case studies deal with the following countries: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, Russia, Belarus, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Hungary, and Poland. The conclusions evaluate the enormous impact of institutions on development of democracy in Eastern Europe and show that constitutional design is central to the process of democratic consolidation.

Democracy Between Consolidation and Crisis

Leonardo Morlino — 2003-11-01

Author:: Leonardo Morlino
ISBN:: 9780198280828
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0198280823.001.0001
Published in print:: 1998
Published Online:: 2003-11-01

What are the key factors to describe and explain the consolidation of a democracy or its possible internal crisis? After providing a few conceptual guidelines and the empirical indicators of consolidation and crisis, a systematic comparative analysis of the following aspects in the four Southern European countries (Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Greece) is unfolded: consensus and legitimation, party systems and party organizations, and relationships of organized and non‐organized interests with parties and state institutions. The consequent models of consolidation, and the related explanations, are given. What happens later in those countries is analysed with special reference to dissatisfaction, discontent, and perceived inefficacy. The concluding remarks pay attention to the ‘quality’ of democracy.

The Architecture of Democracy

Andrew Reynolds — 2003-11-01

Author:: AndrewReynoldsAssistant Professor, Department of Political Science, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hillhttp://www.unc.edu/depts/polisci/faculty_pages/reynolds.html
ISBN:: 9780199246465
Publisher:: Oxford University Press
Subjects:: Political Science, Democratization
DOI:: 10.1093/0199246467.001.0001
Published in print:: 2002
Published Online:: 2003-11-01

This book, comprising papers contributed to a conference entitled Constitutional Design 2000 and held at the University of Notre Dame in December 1999, brings together the views of the leading academic specialists on the theory of effective democratization, and of the institutional design tasks involved.