Download or read book Stalled Democracy written by Eva Bellin and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2018-07-05 with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this ambitious book, Eva Bellin examines the dynamics of democratization in late-developing countries where the process has stalled. Bellin focuses on the pivotal role of social forces and particularly the reluctance of capital and labor to champion democratic transition, contrary to the expectations of political economists versed in earlier transitions. Bellin argues that the special conditions of late development, most notably the political paradoxes created by state sponsorship, fatally limit class commitment to democracy. In many developing countries, she contends, those who are empowered by capitalist industrialization become the allies of authoritarianism rather than the agents of democratic reform.Bellin generates her propositions from close study of a singular case of stalled democracy: Tunisia. Capital and labor's complicity in authoritarian relapse in that country poses a puzzle. The author's explanation of that case is made more general through comparison with the cases of other countries, including Mexico, Indonesia, South Korea, Turkey, and Egypt. Stalled Democracy also explores the transformative capacity of state-sponsored industrialization. By drawing on a range of real-world examples, Bellin illustrates the ability of developing countries to reconfigure state-society relations, redistribute power more evenly in society, and erode the peremptory power of the authoritarian state, even where democracy is stalled.

Download or read book Africa s Stalled Development written by David K. Leonard and published by Lynne Rienner Publishers. This book was released on 2003 with total page 180 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This thoughtful discussion probes the international roots of Africa's civil conflicts and lackluster economies. Analyzing an unwitting system that creates a set of incentives inimical to development, the authors offer a new way of thinking about Africa's development dilemmas and the policy options for addressing them. Weak states, aid dependence, crushing debt, and enclave economies, argue the authors, create disincentives for long-term economic growth and even peace. The nature of Africa's interaction with the international system often supports these negative features; thus, the remedy must come from a radical restructuring of that relationship. Africa's Stalled Development heeds that call by presenting specific and innovative prescriptions for change that are sure to stimulate a much-needed debate. -- Publisher description.

Download or read book Red State Blues written by Matt Grossmann and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2019-10-31 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Despite winning control of twenty-four new state governments since 1992, Republicans have failed to enact policies that substantially advance conservative goals. This book offers the first systematic assessment of the geography and consequences of Republican ascendance in the states and yields important lessons for both liberals and conservatives.

Download or read book Stalled written by Linda Trimble and published by UBC Press. This book was released on 2013-05-31 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Following significant increases in women’s electoral representation in the 1980s and '90s, progress has stalled. Despite some high-profile successes at the provincial level, there are now only a few more women in Canada’s parliament and legislatures than a decade ago. What has happened to the representational gains for women and why does gender parity remain so elusive? To answer these questions, Stalled provides a provides a detailed roadmap of women’s political representation as candidates, office-holders, cabinet ministers, party leaders, and as representatives of the Crown at all levels of government across Canada. Prospects for gender parity in political office are assessed in each jurisdiction and institution. Explanations are re-examined and analyzed using data from across the country. The representation of women in elected and appointed offices is an important indicator of both gender equality and the overall health of democratic governance. By this measure Canada continues to fall short.

Download or read book Democracy in China written by Jiwei Ci and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2019-11-19 with total page 433 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A respected Chinese political philosopher calls for the Communist Party to take the lead in moving China along the path to democracy before it is too late. With Xi Jinping potentially set as president for life, China’s move toward political democracy may appear stalled. But Jiwei Ci argues that four decades of reform have created a mentality in the Chinese people that is just waiting for the political system to catch up, resulting in a disjunction between popular expectations and political realities. The inherent tensions in a largely democratic society without a democratic political system will trigger an unprecedented crisis of legitimacy, forcing the Communist Party to act or die. Two crises loom for the government. First is the waning of the Communist Party’s revolutionary legacy, which the party itself sees as a grave threat. Second is the fragility of the next leadership transition. No amount of economic success will compensate for the party’s legitimacy deficit when the time comes. The only effective response, Ci argues, will be an orderly transition to democracy. To that end, the Chinese government needs to start priming its citizens for democracy, preparing them for new civil rights and civic responsibilities. Embracing this pragmatic role offers the Communist Party a chance to survive. Its leaders therefore have good reason to initiate democratic change. Sure to challenge the Communist Party and stir debate, Democracy in China brings an original and important voice to an issue with far-reaching consequences for China and the world.

Download or read book Constitutional Democracy in Crisis written by Mark A. Graber and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2018-08-23 with total page 737 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Is the world facing a serious threat to the protection of constitutional democracy? There is a genuine debate about the meaning of the various political events that have, for many scholars and observers, generated a feeling of deep foreboding about our collective futures all over the world. Do these events represent simply the normal ebb and flow of political possibilities, or do they instead portend a more permanent move away from constitutional democracy that had been thought triumphant after the demise of the Soviet Union in 1989? Constitutional Democracy in Crisis? addresses these questions head-on: Are the forces weakening constitutional democracy around the world general or nation-specific? Why have some major democracies seemingly not experienced these problems? How can we as scholars and citizens think clearly about the ideas of "constitutional crisis" or "constitutional degeneration"? What are the impacts of forces such as globalization, immigration, income inequality, populism, nationalism, religious sectarianism? Bringing together leading scholars to engage critically with the crises facing constitutional democracies in the 21st century, these essays diagnose the causes of the present afflictions in regimes, regions, and across the globe, believing at this stage that diagnosis is of central importance - as Abraham Lincoln said in his "House Divided" speech, "If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it."

Download or read book Conservative Parties and the Birth of Democracy written by Daniel Ziblatt and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2017-04-18 with total page 448 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How do democracies form and what makes them die? Daniel Ziblatt revisits this timely and classic question in a wide-ranging historical narrative that traces the evolution of modern political democracy in Europe from its modest beginnings in 1830s Britain to Adolf Hitler's 1933 seizure of power in Weimar Germany. Based on rich historical and quantitative evidence, the book offers a major reinterpretation of European history and the question of how stable political democracy is achieved. The barriers to inclusive political rule, Ziblatt finds, were not inevitably overcome by unstoppable tides of socioeconomic change, a simple triumph of a growing middle class, or even by working class collective action. Instead, political democracy's fate surprisingly hinged on how conservative political parties - the historical defenders of power, wealth, and privilege - recast themselves and coped with the rise of their own radical right. With striking modern parallels, the book has vital implications for today's new and old democracies under siege.

Download or read book Democracy in Crisis written by Roland Rich and published by Lynne Rienner Publishers. This book was released on 2017 with total page 231 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Présentation de l'éditeur : "Democracy is in crisis. After the hope engendered by the Third Wave, democracies around the world are beleaguered with threats from multiple sources. What are these threats? Where did they come from? And how can the challenges to democratic governance best be overcome? Grappling with these questions, Roland Rich interprets the danger signs that abound in the United States and Europe, in Asia and the Arab World, in Africa and Latin America, and offers innovative strategies for turning the tide."

Download or read book Doing Democracy Differently written by Henrike Knappe and published by Verlag Barbara Budrich. This book was released on 2017-01-16 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Transnational civil society networks have become increasingly important democratizing actors in global politics. Still, the exploration of democracy in such networks remains conceptually and methodologically challenging. Practice theory provides a framework to study democracy as routinized performances even in contexts of fluid boundaries, temporal relations and a diffuse constituency. The author attempts to understand how new forms of democratic practice emerge in the interaction between political actors and their structural environments.

Download or read book Inequality and American Democracy written by Lawrence R. Jacobs and published by Russell Sage Foundation. This book was released on 2005-08-25 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the twentieth century, the United States ended some of its most flagrant inequalities. The "rights revolution" ended statutory prohibitions against women's suffrage and opened the doors of voting booths to African Americans. Yet a more insidious form of inequality has emerged since the 1970s—economic inequality—which appears to have stalled and, in some arenas, reversed progress toward realizing American ideals of democracy. In Inequality and American Democracy, editors Lawrence Jacobs and Theda Skocpol headline a distinguished group of political scientists in assessing whether rising economic inequality now threatens hard-won victories in the long struggle to achieve political equality in the United States. Inequality and American Democracy addresses disparities at all levels of the political and policy-making process. Kay Lehman Scholzman, Benjamin Page, Sidney Verba, and Morris Fiorina demonstrate that political participation is highly unequal and strongly related to social class. They show that while economic inequality and the decreasing reliance on volunteers in political campaigns serve to diminish their voice, middle class and working Americans lag behind the rich even in protest activity, long considered the political weapon of the disadvantaged. Larry Bartels, Hugh Heclo, Rodney Hero, and Lawrence Jacobs marshal evidence that the U.S. political system may be disproportionately responsive to the opinions of wealthy constituents and business. They argue that the rapid growth of interest groups and the increasingly strict party-line voting in Congress imperils efforts at enacting policies that are responsive to the preferences of broad publics and to their interests in legislation that extends economic and social opportunity. Jacob Hacker, Suzanne Mettler, and Dianne Pinderhughes demonstrate the feedbacks of government policy on political participation and inequality. In short supply today are inclusive public policies like the G.I. Bill, Social Security legislation, the War on Poverty, and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that changed the American political climate, mobilized interest groups, and altered the prospect for initiatives to stem inequality in the last fifty years. Inequality and American Democracy tackles the complex relationships between economic, social, and political inequality with authoritative insight, showcases a new generation of critical studies of American democracy, and highlights an issue of growing concern for the future of our democratic society.

Download or read book Transitions to Democracy written by Lisa Anderson and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 1999-09-22 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Are the factors that initiate democratization the same as those that maintain a democracy already established? The scholarly and policy debates over this question have never been more urgent. In 1970, Dankwart A. Rustow's clairvoyant article "Transitions to Democracy: Toward a Dynamic Model" questioned the conflation of the primary causes and sustaining conditions of democracy and democratization. Now this collection of essays by distinguished scholars responds to and extends Rustow's classic work, Transitions to Democracy--which originated as a special issue of the journal Comparative Politics and contains three new articles written especially for this volume--represents much of the current state of the large and growing literature on democratization in American political science. The essays simultaneously illustrate the remarkable reach of Rustow's prescient article across the decades and reveal what the intervening years have taught us. In light of the enormous opportunities of the post-Cold War world for the promotion of democratic government in parts of the world once thought hopelessly lost of authoritarian and totalitarian regimes, this timely collection constitutes and important contribution to the debates and efforts to promote the more open, responsive, and accountable government we associate with democracy.

Download or read book Capitalism Democracy and Ecology written by Timothy W. Luke and published by University of Illinois Press. This book was released on 1999 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The world that was revolutionized by industrialization is being remade by the information revolution. But this is mostly a revolution from above, increasingly shaped by a new class of technocrats, experts, and professionals in the service of corporate capitalism. Using Marx as a touchstone, Timothy W. Luke warns that if communities are not to be overwhelmed by new class economic and political agendas, then the practice of democracy must be reconstituted on a more populist basis. However, the galvanizing force for this new, more community-centered populism will not be the proletariat, as Marx predicted, nor contemporary militant patriotic groups. Rather, Luke argues that many groups unified by a concern for ecological justice present the strongest potential opposition to capitalism. Wide-ranging and lucid, Capitalism, Democracy, and Ecology is essential reading in the age of information. "Challenging and provocative." -- Robert Holsworth, coauthor of Affirmative Action and the Stalled Quest for Black Progress

Download or read book Rethinking Arab Democratization written by Larbi Sadiki and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2009-02-12 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rethinking Arab Democratization 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 into the 21st century. 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. Oxford Studies in Democratization is 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. The series editor is Laurence Whitehead, Official Fellow, Nuffield College, University of Oxford.

Download or read book The Inclusionary Turn in Latin American Democracies written by Diana Kapiszewski and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2021-02-04 with total page 587 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Latin American states took dramatic steps toward greater inclusion during the late twentieth and early twenty-first Centuries. Bringing together an accomplished group of scholars, this volume examines this shift by introducing three dimensions of inclusion: official recognition of historically excluded groups, access to policymaking, and resource redistribution. Tracing the movement along these dimensions since the 1990s, the editors argue that the endurance of democratic politics, combined with longstanding social inequalities, create the impetus for inclusionary reforms. Diverse chapters explore how factors such as the role of partisanship and electoral clientelism, constitutional design, state capacity, social protest, populism, commodity rents, international diffusion, and historical legacies encouraged or inhibited inclusionary reform during the late 1990s and early 2000s. Featuring original empirical evidence and a strong theoretical framework, the book considers cross-national variation, delves into the surprising paradoxes of inclusion, and identifies the obstacles hindering further fundamental change.

Download or read book Democracy in Chains written by Nancy MacLean and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2018-06-05 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the Lillian Smith Book Award Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize Finalist for the National Book Award The Nation's "Most Valuable Book" “[A] vibrant intellectual history of the radical right.”—The Atlantic “This sixty-year campaign to make libertarianism mainstream and eventually take the government itself is at the heart of Democracy in Chains. . . . If you're worried about what all this means for America's future, you should be.”—NPR An explosive exposé of the right’s relentless campaign to eliminate unions, suppress voting, privatize public education, stop action on climate change, and alter the Constitution. Behind today’s headlines of billionaires taking over our government is a secretive political establishment with long, deep, and troubling roots. The capitalist radical right has been working not simply to change who rules, but to fundamentally alter the rules of democratic governance. But billionaires did not launch this movement; a white intellectual in the embattled Jim Crow South did. Democracy in Chains names its true architect—the Nobel Prize-winning political economist James McGill Buchanan—and dissects the operation he and his colleagues designed over six decades to alter every branch of government to disempower the majority. In a brilliant and engrossing narrative, Nancy MacLean shows how Buchanan forged his ideas about government in a last gasp attempt to preserve the white elite’s power in the wake of Brown v. Board of Education. In response to the widening of American democracy, he developed a brilliant, if diabolical, plan to undermine the ability of the majority to use its numbers to level the playing field between the rich and powerful and the rest of us. Corporate donors and their right-wing foundations were only too eager to support Buchanan’s work in teaching others how to divide America into “makers” and “takers.” And when a multibillionaire on a messianic mission to rewrite the social contract of the modern world, Charles Koch, discovered Buchanan, he created a vast, relentless, and multi-armed machine to carry out Buchanan’s strategy. Without Buchanan's ideas and Koch's money, the libertarian right would not have succeeded in its stealth takeover of the Republican Party as a delivery mechanism. Now, with Mike Pence as Vice President, the cause has a longtime loyalist in the White House, not to mention a phalanx of Republicans in the House, the Senate, a majority of state governments, and the courts, all carrying out the plan. That plan includes harsher laws to undermine unions, privatizing everything from schools to health care and Social Security, and keeping as many of us as possible from voting. Based on ten years of unique research, Democracy in Chains tells a chilling story of right-wing academics and big money run amok. This revelatory work of scholarship is also a call to arms to protect the achievements of twentieth-century American self-government.

Download or read book The Narrow Corridor written by Daron Acemoglu and published by Penguin Books. This book was released on 2019 with total page 594 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How does history end? -- The Red Queen -- Will to power -- Economics outside the corridor -- Allegory of good government -- The European scissors -- Mandate of Heaven -- Broken Red Queen -- Devil in the details -- What's the matter with Ferguson? -- The paper leviathan -- Wahhab's children -- Red Queen out of control -- Into the corridor -- Living with the leviathan.

Download or read book Kill Switch The Rise of the Modern Senate and the Crippling of American Democracy written by Adam Jentleson and published by Liveright Publishing. This book was released on 2021-01-12 with total page 301 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With a new epilogue on filibuster battles under the Biden administration THE CASE FOR ENDING THE FILIBUSTER "A truly excellent book… blistering and persuasive.” —Ezra Klein, New York Times An insider’s account of how politicians representing a radical white minority of Americans have used “the world’s greatest deliberative body” to hijack our democracy. Our democracy is under assault from homegrown authoritarians, with most observers blaming Donald Trump and the Republican Party that submitted to him. Yet as Adam Jentleson shows, the problem not only goes back to the nineteenth century, but is less about the presidency than it is about our nation’s most venerated institution: the United States Senate. A revelatory history of minority rule in America as expressed through the Senate filibuster, Kill Switch shows that white conservatives have long relied on the filibuster—which is not featured in the Constitution, and which, as Jentleson demonstrates, the Framers would have opposed—to shut down attempts to create a multiracial democracy. Featuring a new epilogue on filibuster battles under the Biden administration, Kill Switch will remain an essential warning about the costs of empowering this nation’s right-wing minority. • “Jentleson understands the inner workings of the institution, down to the most granular details, showing precisely how arcane procedural rules can be leveraged to dramatic effect.” —Jennifer Szalai, New York Times • “Careful and thorough and exacting.” —Michael Tomasky, New York Review of Books • “[An] excellent, surprising new book.” —Benjamin Wallace-Wells, The New Yorker