Presidential Succession and Democratic Transitions

2007 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander Baturo
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Transitions ◽  
Presidential Succession

Dictators and Democrats

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephan Haggard ◽  
Robert R. Kaufman
Keyword(s):  
First Century ◽  
Organizational Capabilities ◽  
Mass Mobilization ◽  
Democratic Transitions ◽  
Authoritarian Rule ◽  
Emerging Democracies ◽  
Regime Changes ◽  
Political Landscape ◽  
Transitions To Democracy ◽  
Multiple Routes

From the 1980s through the first decade of the twenty-first century, the spread of democracy across the developing and postcommunist worlds transformed the global political landscape. What drove these changes and what determined whether the emerging democracies would stabilize or revert to authoritarian rule? This book takes a comprehensive look at the transitions to and from democracy in recent decades. Deploying both statistical and qualitative analysis, the book engages with theories of democratic change and advocates approaches that emphasize political and institutional factors. While inequality has been a prominent explanation for democratic transitions, the book argues that its role has been limited, and elites as well as masses can drive regime change. Examining seventy-eight cases of democratic transition and twenty-five cases of reversion to autocracy since 1980, the book shows how differences in authoritarian regimes and organizational capabilities shape popular protest and elite initiatives in transitions to democracy, and how institutional weaknesses cause some democracies to fail. The determinants of democracy lie in the strength of existing institutions and the public's capacity to engage in collective action. There are multiple routes to democracy, but those growing out of mass mobilization may provide more checks on incumbents than those emerging from intra-elite bargains. Moving beyond well-known beliefs regarding regime changes, this book explores the conditions under which transitions to democracy are likely to arise.

Democratic Transitions and Institutional Change: What's Behind the Association?

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Bjjrnskov ◽  
Martin Rode
Keyword(s):  
Institutional Change ◽  
Democratic Transitions

Police in Africa

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Sierra Leone ◽  
Police Officers ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Democratic Transitions ◽  
State Institutions ◽  
Security Issues ◽  
Self Perceptions ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
Everyday Practices ◽  
Police Forces

State police forces in Africa are a curiously neglected subject of study, even within the framework of security issues and African states. This book brings together criminologists, anthropologists, sociologists, historians, political scientists and others who have engaged with police forces across the continent and the publics with whom they interact to provide street-level perspectives from below and inside Africa’s police forces. The contributors consider historical trajectories and particular configurations of police power within wider political systems, then examine the ‘inside view’ of police forces as state institutions – the challenges, preoccupations, professional ethics and self-perceptions of police officers – and finally look at how African police officers go about their work in terms of everyday practices and engagements with the public.The studies span the continent, from South Africa to Sierra Leone, and illustrate similarities and differences in Anglophone, Francophone and Lusophone states, post-socialist, post-military and post-conflict contexts, and amid both centralizsation and devolution of policing powers, democratic transitions and new illiberal regimes, all the while keeping a strong ethnographic focus on police officers and their work.

Reevaluating the Middle-Class Protest Paradigm: A Case-Control Study of Democratic Protest Coalitions in Russia

2017 ◽  
Vol 111 (4) ◽  
pp. 637-652 ◽  
Author(s):  
BRYN ROSENFELD
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
Population Data ◽  
Case Control ◽  
Democratic Transitions ◽  
Electoral Fraud ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Middle Classes ◽  
State Sector ◽  
State Dependent ◽  
Selective Incentives

A large literature expects rising middle classes to promote democracy. However, few studies provide direct evidence on this group in nondemocratic settings. This article focuses on politically important differentiation within the middle classes, arguing that middle-class growth in state-dependent sectors weakens potential coalitions in support of democratization. I test this argument using surveys conducted at mass demonstrations in Russia and detailed population data. I also present a new approach to studying protest based on case-control methods from epidemiology. The results reveal that state-sector professionals were significantly less likely to mobilize against electoral fraud, even after controlling for ideology. If this group had participated at the same rate as middle-class professionals from the private sector, I estimate that another 90,000 protesters would have taken to the streets. I trace these patterns of participation to the interaction of individual resources and selective incentives. These findings have implications for authoritarian stability and democratic transitions.

Stability and Governability the Benign Effects of Party Dominance in South Africa

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 56-75
Author(s):  
Ainara Mancebo
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
African National Congress ◽  
The Other ◽  
Democratic Transitions ◽  
African Countries ◽  
National Congress ◽  
Independence Era ◽  
Party Dominance

A tripartite alliance formed by the African National Congress, the South African Communist Party and the Congress of South African Trade Unions has been ruling the country with wide parliamentarian majorities. The country remains more consensual and politically inclusive than any of the other African countries in the post-independence era. This article examines three performance’s aspects of the party dominance systems: legitimacy, stability and violence. As we are living in a period in which an unprecedented number of countries have completed democratic transitions, it is politically and conceptually important that we understand the specific tasks of crafting democratic consolidation.

scholarly journals Russia and the CIS in 2008: Axis of Authoritarianism??

Asian Survey ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
pp. 135-145 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles E. Ziegler
Keyword(s):  
Financial Crisis ◽  
Economic Performance ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
Global Financial Crisis ◽  
Great Power ◽  
The Caucasus ◽  
Central Asian ◽  
Presidential Succession ◽  
The Global Financial Crisis ◽  
The Impact

Russia's seamless presidential succession produced no major changes in domestic politics or foreign policy. Ties with Asia remained strong, though several key relationships——with China, Japan, and the Central Asian states——frayed under the impact of Russia's military action in Georgia. Impressive economic performance in the first half of the year boosted Russian confidence as a great power, but its vulnerability to the global financial crisis together with the heavy-handed operation in the Caucasus undermined Moscow's standing with both Asia and Europe by the end of the year.

scholarly journals The Dictatorship Game: Simulating a Transition to Democracy

2015 ◽  
Vol 48 (02) ◽  
pp. 353-357
Author(s):  
Luis F. Jiménez
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Politics ◽  
Role Playing ◽  
Transition To Democracy ◽  
Sufficient Condition ◽  
Democratic Transitions ◽  
Theoretical Concepts ◽  
Teaching Evaluations ◽  
Central Topic

ABSTRACTA central topic in the comparative-politics subdiscipline is the study of democratic transitions. Despite a growing role-playing literature, there are currently no simulations that illustrate the dynamics of democratic transitions. This article proposes a role-playing simulation that demonstrates to students why it is difficult for countries to transition to democracy and why protests are a necessary but not sufficient condition to topple a dictatorship. As surveys and teaching evaluations subsequently showed, this exercise succeeded in clarifying the more difficult theoretical concepts as well as in making a potentially dry subject more accessible.

Justice in democratic transitions

1997 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
pp. 175-184
Author(s):  
Alexandra Barahona de Brito
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Transitions
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