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Democracy
Kinds of Democracy Terms modified by Democracy Selected AbstractsON THE ROAD TO DEMOCRACY: THE CZECH REPUBLIC FROM COMMUNISM TO FREE SOCIETYECONOMIC AFFAIRS, Issue 1 2006Jackie Newbury [source] POLICY COMPROMISES: CORRUPTION AND REGULATION IN A DEMOCRACYECONOMICS & POLITICS, Issue 3 2008TOKE S. AIDT This paper evaluates the extent of regulation in a democracy with corruption. Elected politicians can restrict entry of firms in exchange for bribes from entrepreneurs. Full liberalization implies free entry and allocative efficiency. Voters re-elect politicians based on observed performance. We demonstrate that voters agree to tolerate corruption and inefficient regulation; that efficient policies can be promoted by productivity growth; that productivity growth reduces the cost of providing wage incentives; and that corruption is procyclical and economic policy is countercyclical in a corrupt democracy. [source] DEWEYAN DEMOCRACY IN A GLOBALIZED WORLDEDUCATIONAL THEORY, Issue 4 2009Kathy Hytten Drawing primarily on the work of John Dewey, Kathy Hytten argues that rethinking democracy can help us to respond more productively to the challenges of globalization. Dewey maintained that democracy is much more than a political system; instead it is a personal way of life, a mode of associated living, and a moral ideal. Yet this is not the vision of democracy prevalent today, especially within the rhetoric of globalization. Hytten begins by describing some of the challenges of globalization. She then shows how Dewey faced similar challenges, discussing why Dewey's ideas are still relevant. Hytten goes on to trace how Dewey's conception of democracy can help us to think differently about these challenges. She concludes by arguing that Dewey offers us some valuable democratic habits, dispositions, and visions that remain important resources in building a pluralistic, socially just, inclusive, and enriching community within our globalized world. [source] PHILOSOPHY AS TRANSLATION: DEMOCRACY AND EDUCATION FROM DEWEY TO CAVELLEDUCATIONAL THEORY, Issue 3 2007Naoko Saito In this essay Naoko Saito aims to find an alternative idea and language for "mutual national understanding," one that is more attuned to the sensibility of our times. She argues for Stanley Cavell's idea of philosophy as translation as such an alternative. Based upon Cavell's rereading of Thoreau's Walden, Saito represents Thoreau as a cross-cultural figure who transcends cultural and national boundaries. On the strength of this, she proposes a Cavellian education for global citizenship, that is, a perfectionist education for imperfect understanding in acknowledgment of alterity. Our founding of democracy must depend upon a readiness to "deconfound" the culture we have come from, the better to find new foundations together. The "native" is always in transition, by and through language, in processes of translation. [source] FOUR MODELS OF THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CONFUCIANISM AND DEMOCRACYJOURNAL OF CHINESE PHILOSOPHY, Issue 1 2010BAOGANG HE First page of article [source] DEMOCRACY AND MERITOCRACY: TOWARD A CONFUCIAN PERSPECTIVEJOURNAL OF CHINESE PHILOSOPHY, Issue 2 2007JOSEPH CHAN [source] THE SPIRIT OF DEMOCRACY AND THE RHETORIC OF EXCESSJOURNAL OF RELIGIOUS ETHICS, Issue 1 2007Jeffrey Stout ABSTRACT If militarism violates the ideals of liberty and justice in one way, and rapidly increasing social stratification violates them in another, then American democracy is in crisis. A culture of democratic accountability will survive only if citizens revive the concerns that animated the great reform movements of the past, from abolitionism to civil rights. It is crucial, when reasoning about practical matters, not only to admit how grave one's situation is, but also to resist despair. Therefore, the fate of democracy depends, to some significant degree, on how we choose to describe the crisis. Saying that we have already entered the new dark ages or a post-democratic era may prove to be a self-fulfilling prophecy, because anyone who accepts this message is apt to give up on the hard work of organizing and contestation that is needed to hold political representatives accountable to the people. This paper asks how one might strike the right balance between accuracy and hope in describing the democracy's current troubles. After saying what I mean by democracy and what I think the current threats to it are, I respond to Romand Coles's criticisms of reservations I have expressed before about rhetorical excess in the works of Stanley Hauerwas, Alasdair MacIntyre, and Richard Rorty. This leads to a discussion of several points raised against me by Hauerwas. A digression offers some of my reasons for doubting that John Howard Yoder's biblical scholarship vindicates Hauerwas's version of pacifism. The paper concludes by arguing that Sheldon Wolin's work on the evisceration of democracy, though admirably accurate in its treatment of the dangers posed by empire and capital, abandons the project of democratic accountability too quickly in favor of the romance of the fugitive. [source] STRUCTURING GLOBAL DEMOCRACY: POLITICAL COMMUNITIES, UNIVERSAL HUMAN RIGHTS, AND TRANSNATIONAL REPRESENTATIONMETAPHILOSOPHY, Issue 1 2009CAROL C. GOULD Abstract: The emergence of cross-border communities and transnational associations requires new ways of thinking about the norms involved in democracy in a globalized world. Given the significance of human rights fulfillment, including social and economic rights, I argue here for giving weight to the claims of political communities while also recognizing the need for input by distant others into the decisions of global governance institutions that affect them. I develop two criteria for addressing the scope of democratization in transnational contexts,common activities and impact on basic human rights,and argue for their compatibility. I then consider some practical implications for institutional transformation and design, including new forms of transnational representation. [source] MODERN SOVEREIGNTY IN QUESTION: THEOLOGY, DEMOCRACY AND CAPITALISMMODERN THEOLOGY, Issue 4 2010ADRIAN PABST This essay argues that modern sovereignty is not simply a legal or political concept that is coterminous with the modern nation-state. Rather, at the theoretical level modern sovereign power is inscribed into a wider theological dialectic between "the one" and "the many". Modernity fuses juridical-constitutional models of supreme state authority with a new, "biopolitical" account of power whereby natural life and the living body of the individual are the object of politics and are subject to state control (section 1). The origins of this dialectic go back to changes within Christian theology in the late Middle Ages and the early modern period. In particular, these changes can be traced to Ockham's denial of the universal Good in things, Suárez's priority of the political community over the ecclesial body and Hobbes's "biopolitical" definition of power as state dominion over life (section 2). At the practical level, modern sovereignty has involved both the national state and the transnational market. The "revolutions in sovereignty" that gave rise to the modern state and the modern market were to some considerable extent shaped by theological concepts and changes in religious institutions and practices: first, the supremacy of the modern national state over the transnational papacy and national churches; second, the increasing priority of individuality over collectivity; third, a growing focus on contractual proprietary relations at the expense of covenantal ties and communal bonds (section 3). By subjecting both people and property to uniform standards of formal natural rights and abstract monetary value, financial capitalism and liberal secular democracy are part of the "biopolitical" logic that subordinates the sanctity of life and land to the secular sacrality of the state and the market. In Pope Benedict's theology, we can find the contours of a post-secular political economy that challenges the monopoly of modern sovereignty (sections 4,5). [source] DEMOCRACY AND GOVERNANCE NETWORKS: COMPATIBLE OR NOT?PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION, Issue 3 2007ERIK-HANS KLIJN This paper investigates the relationship between representative democracy and governance networks at a theoretical level. It does so by offering four conjectures and their implications for theory and practice. The incompatibility conjectures rests on the primacy of politics and sees governance networks as a threat. The complementarity conjecture presents governance networks as a means of enabling greater participation in the policy process and sensitivity in programme implementation. The transitional conjecture posits a wider evolution of governance forms towards network relationships. The instrumental conjecture views governance networks as a powerful means through which dominant interests can achieve their goals. Illustrative implications for theory and practice are identified, in relation to power in the policy process, the public interest, and the role of public managers. The heuristic potential of the conjectures is demonstrated through the identification of an outline research agenda. [source] HABERMAS, DEMOCRACY AND RELIGIOUS REASONSTHE HEYTHROP JOURNAL, Issue 4 2010PHIL ENNS First page of article [source] Laïcité in Reverse: Mono-Religious Democracies and the Issue of Religion in the Public SphereCONSTELLATIONS: AN INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF CRITICAL AND DEMOCRATIC THEORY, Issue 1 2010Nadia Urbinati First page of article [source] Party Mergers and Splits in New Democracies: The Case of South Korea (1987,2007)GOVERNMENT AND OPPOSITION, Issue 4 2010Kyungmee Park This study explores how a party's organizational mode affects its stability in new democracies. A party organization was stable under these three conditions: when the relationship from lower to upper organizations has institutionalized a strong vertical organization mode; when the central party power is concentrated on the leadership; and when the leadership has been safely shifted after elections. In the case of two ruling parties in South Korea, each mode produced differences in party stability. The dissimilar organization modes of two parties resulted in different organizational stability. [source] Semi-presidentialism, Cohabitation and the Collapse of Electoral Democracies, 1990,2008GOVERNMENT AND OPPOSITION, Issue 1 2010Robert Elgie Semi-presidentialism is the situation where a constitution makes provision for both a directly elected fixed-term president and a prime minister and cabinet who are responsible to the legislature. A common argument against the adoption of a semi-presidential constitution by a new democracy is the problem of cohabitation , where a president from one party holds power at the same time as a prime minister from an opposing party and where the president's party is not represented in the cabinet. The concern is that cohabitation creates competing power centres within the executive that are dangerous for young democracies. This article shows that cohabitation has been directly associated with the collapse of a young democracy in only one case. Moreover, by specifying the conditions under which cohabitation can occur, we also show that the threat of cohabitation has been associated with collapse in only one further case. We suggest that this is so because cohabitation refers to a very specific situation that can only occur under a certain combination of circumstances that can often be avoided. Overall, we show that there is little evidence to support one of the most well-known and long-standing arguments against semi-presidentialism. Thus, while semi-presidentialism may indeed be perilous for new democracies, we conclude that it is perilous for reasons other than the problem of cohabitation. [source] Five Ways of Institutionalizing Political Opposition: Lessons from the Advanced DemocraciesGOVERNMENT AND OPPOSITION, Issue 1 2004Ludger Helms ABSTRACT Legitimate political opposition constitutes a key component of any form of liberal democracy, which has, however, received surprisingly scant attention in the more recent political science literature. In an attempt to revitalize the debate about the various forms of political opposition, this paper starts with distinguishing five different ways or models of institutionalizing political opposition in liberal democratic systems. It goes on to look at how these different models have worked in the constitutional practice of selected western democracies. In the second part of this article, the focus is on the possible lessons that constitution-makers in democratizing countries could draw from this experience. Whereas there is no best model of opposition in general, some models would seem to be better suited to meet the particular needs of new democracies than others. [source] Crisis Management in Transitional Democracies: The Baltic ExperienceGOVERNMENT AND OPPOSITION, Issue 4 2002Eric Stern First page of article [source] Local Governance as Government,Business Cooperation in Western Democracies: Analysing Local and Intergovernmental Effects by Multi-Level ComparisonINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF URBAN AND REGIONAL RESEARCH, Issue 3 2008CLEMENTE J. NAVARRO YÁÑEZ Abstract The internationalization of economics and politics has forced local governments to develop new context-appropriate strategies; these strategies, characterized by a greater degree of interaction with non-governmental key actors and with the business world in particular, have been termed local or urban governance. This article is intended to illustrate the impact of three factors , local leadership, local political arenas and intergovernmental relationships , on the formation of cooperative networks between local governments and business organizations as one of the basic types of urban governance model. To achieve this, a comparative multi-level analysis presenting the CEO's perpective on such issues was conducted. The results show how local and intergovernmental opportunity costs and leadership are the factors that largely determine the degree of collaboration between local government and business. Résumé L'internationalisation de l'économie et de la politique a forcé les gouvernements locaux àélaborer de nouvelles stratégies en fonction des contextes ; caractérisées par une interaction plus forte avec des acteurs-clés non gouvernementaux et avec le monde de l'entreprise en particulier, ces stratégies ont reçu l'appellation de gouvernance locale ou urbaine. L'impact de trois facteurs , autorité locale, arènes politiques locales et relations intergouvernementales , sur la formation des réseaux de coopération entre gouvernements locaux et entreprises est présenté comme l'un des types essentiels de modèle de gouvernance urbaine. Pour ce faire, une analyse comparative multi-niveaux a été menée sur la vision des directions générales d'entreprises concernant ces questions. Les résultats montrent la manière dont les autorités et les coûts d'opportunité locaux et intergouvernementaux déterminent en grande partie le degré de collaboration entre les gouvernements locaux et le monde des affaires. [source] Openness, Uncertainty, and Social Spending: Implications for the Globalization, Welfare State DebateINTERNATIONAL STUDIES QUARTERLY, Issue 3 2009Irfan Nooruddin We extend the literature on openness and spending in developing countries arguing that the effect of increasing openness depends on both regime type and the level of openness. Democracies respond to increases in openness by increasing spending while dictatorships respond by decreasing spending. However, the degree to which countries pursue the strategy of choice depends on the level of openness. In autarkic countries, an increase in import competition has more severe consequences for perceptions of job insecurity and dislocation. In response, government management of openness will be more vigorous under these conditions regardless of whether the leader increases or decreases spending. Economic selection mechanisms at work will produce an outcome wherein, at higher levels of openness, further import liberalization has smaller effects on perceptions of job insecurity and dislocation. Hence, both the demand and the supply of government management of openness will be lower. [source] Two-Level Security Management and the Prospects for New Democracies: A Simulation AnalysisINTERNATIONAL STUDIES QUARTERLY, Issue 3 2000Marc V. Simon Most new democracies face serious internal, ethnic/separatist conflicts; in addition, some face international threats. The literature on the growth of democracy in the global system and its impact on world politics does not fully account for the dual threats all states must address in managing their security. Based on theoretical work by Starr (1994) which describes the "common logic" of conflict processes in war and revolution, we outline a model of how states respond to security threats from both external and internal sources. Using computer simulation, we analyze the model and evaluate the relative importance for state security of factors such as system size, numbers of democracies in the system, extraction/allocation strategy pursued by new democracies, and government legitimacy level. Our results show that new democracies thrive in systems that are predominantly democratic. Also, ally support can provide crucial resources for new democracies facing internal threats. Finally, "endangered" democracies can recover security by attempting to buy off domestic threats rather than deter them, and by improving legitimacy. [source] Horizontal Accountability in Transitional Democracies: The Human Rights Ombudsman in El Salvador and GuatemalaLATIN AMERICAN POLITICS AND SOCIETY, Issue 4 2004Michael Dodson ABSTRACT Postwar El Salvador and Guatemala have undertaken to reform and democratize the state and to support the rule of law. Each country entered the 1990s hobbled by a legacy of authoritarian rule, while a corrupt and politicized judiciary offered virtually no check on the abuse of power. Because the judiciary has performed poorly as an institution of horizontal accountability, this article examines the performance of a new "accountability agency," the Human Rights Ombudsman. The article discusses the context in which the office was established and developed in each country, perceptions of its performance, and political responses as the office began to perform its function of holding public officials accountable in their exercise of power. Unfortunately, this new office may fall prey to the same weaknesses that have plagued older institutions in both countries. [source] The Uneven Performance of Third Wave Democracies: Electoral Politics and the Imperfect Rule of Law in Latin AmericaLATIN AMERICAN POLITICS AND SOCIETY, Issue 3 2002Joe Foweraker ABSTRACT This article investigates the performance of the new democracies of the third wave by developing a conceptual model of the core elements of liberal democratic government and by constructing a new Database of Liberal Democratic Performance. The performance is shown to be uneven in two main ways. First, the institutional attributes of democratic government advance while individual and minority rights languish. Second, particular institutional attributes coexist uncomfortably, as do particular rights. A comparison of Brazil, Colombia, and Guatemala complements the big picture drawn from the database and focuses on the specific contextual conditions that can create the general political contours of the wave. The uneven democratic performance of these cases is mainly explained by the combination of persistent oligarchic power and a largely unaccountable military. Yet uneven performance, and the imperfect rule of law in particular, does not necessarily prevent democratic survival. [source] Wirtschaftliche Entwicklung und Demokratie , Ist Demokratie ein Wohlstandsmotor oder ein Wohlstandsprodukt?PERSPEKTIVEN DER WIRTSCHAFTSPOLITIK, Issue 4 2006Uwe Sunde But does this association constitute a causal relationship according to which democracy is a determinant of economic development? Or is it, conversely, economic development that paves the way for democratization? This paper gives an overview of the recent empirical literature that has dealt with this question. The empirical evidence raises doubts about the existence of any direct causation. However, there seem to be indirect causal mechanisms. Democracies seem to implement better conditions for the accumulation of human capital, in particular in terms of a rule of law. On the other hand, democracies do not simply arise as consequence of economic development, but because of an adequate social environment with little inequality, which may be associated with economic well-being. [source] Institutionalizing Neutrally Competent Policy Analysis: Resources for Promoting Objectivity and Balance in Consolidating DemocraciesPOLICY STUDIES JOURNAL, Issue 2 2005David L. Weimer Creating institutions that foster the production of objective and balanced policy analysis is a challenging task for all types of regimes. The value of neutral competence often suffers in tradeoffs with the value of responsiveness, especially in the exercise of executive authority. Institutional designers, however, are not without resources for structuring arrangements to promote the production of objective and balanced policy analysis: organizations can be created with an incentive to achieve "reputations" for neutral competence; organizations can be isolated from being too politically responsive through forms of "independence"; for promoting interaction based on "professional norms" can be created to resolve conflicts about prediction; "participation in international organizations" can be leveraged to counteract domestic biases; and "transparency" can be employed to facilitate balancing of views or to shame severe abuses. This essay sets out the logic underlying design with these sorts of institutional resources, illustrates their use primarily in the U.S. context, and speculates on their application in consolidating democracies. [source] Constraint Respecters, Constraint Challengers, and Crisis Decision Making in Democracies: A Case Study Analysis of Kennedy versus ReaganPOLITICAL PSYCHOLOGY, Issue 6 2005Jonathan W. Keller Models linking domestic political constraints (audience costs, pressures for the diversionary use of force, democratic norms and institutions) to foreign policy behavior generally assume that leaders simply recognize and submit to constraints in their domestic environments,a strong structural argument. In contrast, research on political leadership and decision making suggests that leaders vary systematically in their orientations toward constraints: "constraint respecters" tend to internalize potential constraints, while "constraint challengers" are more likely to view them as obstacles to be overcome. This article develops an integrative theoretical framework that explicitly incorporates these insights and applies them to the domain of crisis decision making. After identifying leaders' expected orientations toward constraints via at-a-distance methods, the plausibility of hypotheses derived from this framework is examined through case studies that explore the decision-making processes employed by President Kennedy (a "constraint respecter") and President Reagan (a "constraint challenger") during international crises. The results suggest that there is important variation in how leaders perceive and respond to domestic constraints, and that leadership style is one,though not the only,important source of this variation. [source] Democratic Deepening in Third Wave Democracies: Experiments with Participation in Mexico CityPOLITICAL STUDIES, Issue 1 2007Imke Harbers After the initial transition to democratic rule the question of how to improve the quality of democracy has become the key challenge facing Third Wave democracies. In the debate about the promotion of more responsive government, institutional reforms to increase direct participation of citizens in policy-making have been put on the agenda. The Federal District of Mexico City constitutes a particularly intriguing case in this debate. This article explores how political participation developed in Mexico City between 1997 and 2003 and what effects this has had on democratic deepening. It develops an ideal-type conceptual framework of citizen participation that outlines the conditions under which participation contributes to democratic deepening. Overall, the case of Mexico City highlights how the promotion of participation can fail to make the aspired contribution to democratic deepening and might even have negative effects on the quality of democracy. [source] Party Size, Ideology, and Executive-Level Representation in Advanced Parliamentary DemocraciesPOLITICS & POLICY, Issue 3 2009CAROLYN FORESTIERE How do party size and ideology matter for executive-level representation in parliamentary systems? This paper attempts to answer this question by providing and analyzing comparative data on 105 parties across 16 advanced parliamentary democracies. The electoral performance of each party is assessed, alongside the extent of each party's legislative and executive representation over time, from roughly 1945 to 1995. Two main conclusions are derived from the analysis. First, concerning party size, larger parties tend to be overrepresented in government-level institutions while for smaller parties the evidence is mixed, since almost half of the smaller parties in the data set have never achieved executive-level representation. Second, concerning party ideology, center parties have been largely overrepresented in executive institutions while left-wing parties have been the most systematically underrepresented in the 16 countries. ¿Qué tanto importan el tamaño del partido y su ideología para la representación a nivel ejecutivo en los sistemas parlamentarios? Este articulo trata de responder esta pregunta al proveer y analizar información comparativa de 105 partidos a través de 16 democracias parlamentarias avanzadas. La actuación de cada partido es evaluada junto al grado de la representación legislativa y ejecutiva a través del tiempo, aproximadamente desde 1945 hasta 1995. Dos conclusiones principales se derivan del análisis. Primero, en relación al tamaño del partido, los partidos grandes tienden a ser sobre-representados en las instituciones al nivel del gobierno mientras que para partidos más pequeños la evidencia es mixta, ya que casi la mitad de los pequeños partidos en el conjunto de datos nunca han logrado representación a nivel ejecutivo. Segundo, en relación a la ideología, los partidos de centro han sido mayormente sobre-representados en las instituciones del ejecutivo mientras que los partidos de izquierda han sido los más sistemáticamente sub-representados en los 16 países. [source] "Global NATO", "League of Democracies", "Union of the West": Complementary or Contradictory?POLITICS & POLICY, Issue 1 2009Article first published online: 23 JAN 200 No abstract is available for this article. [source] Judicial Hegemony: Dworkin's Freedom's Law and the Spectrum of Constitutional DemocraciesRATIO JURIS, Issue 3 2002Brian Donohue Ronald Dworkin's Freedom's Law offers a solution to a thorny problem in American constitutional law. He argues that the authority of the American Supreme Court to make the final determination on constitutional questions is consistent with democratic principles. In this paper, I try to show that his solution is unsatisfactory because it permits the possibility of a judicial usurpation of authority that is inconsistent with his characterization of democratic principles. Freedom's Law is also a bold attempt to offer prescriptions for constitutional democracies generally. By drawing a distinction between two concepts of authority, I object to this effort. I argue that Dworkin's analysis assumes the operation of a conception of authority that I label the pyramid model. I also introduce a bipolar model of authority and try to show its application to the Canadian constitutional scheme. On this basis, I conclude that his prescriptions are relevant only for a portion of the spectrum of constitutional democracies. [source] Economic Inequality and Intolerance: Attitudes toward Homosexuality in 35 DemocraciesAMERICAN JOURNAL OF POLITICAL SCIENCE, Issue 4 2008Robert Andersen Using hierarchical linear models fitted to data from the World Values Survey and national statistics for 35 countries, this article builds on the postmaterialist thesis by assessing the impact of economic inequality across and within nations on attitudes toward homosexuality. It provides evidence that tolerance tends to decline as national income inequality rises. For professionals and managers, the results also support the postmaterialist argument that economic development leads to more tolerant attitudes. On the other hand, attitudes of the working class are generally less tolerant, and contrary to expectations of the postmaterialist thesis, are seemingly unaffected by economic development. In other words, economic development influences attitudes only for those who benefit most. These findings have political implications, suggesting that state policies that have the goal of economic growth but fail to consider economic inequality may contribute to intolerant social and political values, an attribute widely considered detrimental for the health of democracy. [source] Is Democracy Good for the Poor?AMERICAN JOURNAL OF POLITICAL SCIENCE, Issue 4 2006Michael Ross Many scholars claim that democracy improves the welfare of the poor. This article uses data on infant and child mortality to challenge this claim. Cross-national studies tend to exclude from their samples nondemocratic states that have performed well; this leads to the mistaken inference that nondemocracies have worse records than democracies. Once these and other flaws are corrected, democracy has little or no effect on infant and child mortality rates. Democracies spend more money on education and health than nondemocracies, but these benefits seem to accrue to middle- and upper-income groups. [source] | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||