Partisan Attachment and Democracy in Mexico: Some Cautionary Observations

Party identification is a central concept in studies of parties and elections. Drawing from an extensive literature linking the concept of party identification to the understanding of Mexico's electoral politics, this article explores how the Mexican experience informs the understanding of party identification in general, especially in emerging democracies. There, voters' attachments to political parties are usually seen both as essential to and a positive sign of democratic development. This study finds evidence consistent with these arguments in the Mexican case but also identifies aspects of Mexican party identification that are not so clearly supportive of democratic politics; that indeed may delay or even undermine democratization. These findings illustrate the relevance of the Mexican experience to the wider literature on parties and elections, particularly the well-documented relationship between party identifications and democratization.     

Democracy Beyond Secrecy: Assessing the Promises and Pitfalls of Collective Voting

This paper assesses collective voting as a specific mode of democratic decision‐making and compares it to secret voting. Under collective voting, voters gather in one place and decide by the show of hands. We theorise two potential advantages and two disadvantages of collective voting so defined. We then draw on original survey data from one of the largest polities practising collective voting, the citizen assembly of the Swiss canton of Glarus. We find that both the promises and pitfalls of non‐secret voting are exaggerated. Non‐secret voting’s suspected pitfalls – social pressure and abstention – do not generally materialise in our sample, although for women they do appear to be relevant to some extent. However, the promises of collective voting – enabling cue‐taking and discursive bridging and bonding – are equally realised to a limited extent only.     

The Poverty of Democracy: Neoliberal Reforms and Political Participation of the Poor in Mexico

Twenty years after governments across Latin America began implementing neoliberal reforms in earnest, concern is growing about their impact on the quality of democracy in the region. This article examines this issue in the case of Mexico by exploring how patterns of political participation, especially among the rural and urban poor, have changed since the implementation of free market reforms. It asks whether the institutional innovations associated with free market reforms make it easier or more difficult for the poor to participate in Mexico's political process. The answer is not encouraging. Despite democratic openings, the new linkages between the state and citizens established as a result of the transition to a free market development model stifle the voice of the poor not through the threat of force or coercion, but by creating obstacles and disincentives for political mobilization that affect the poor more severely than other groups.     

Moving Beyond the Policy of No Policy: Emigration from Mexico and Central America

Do Caribbean Basin states influence U.S. immigration policy? Although the terrorist attacks of September 2001 eventually derailed migration talks, before that time Mexico and the United States appeared poised to negotiate a major bilateral agreement, largely on Mexico's terms. Drawing on 88 detailed interviews conducted with Mexican and other Caribbean Basin elites, this article examines sending‐state preferences for emigration and their capacity to influence policy outcomes. The informants considered migration to be the most problematic issue on the bilateral agenda, but also saw migration policy as relatively open to source‐state influence. A case study of Mexican emigration policymaking details the national and transnational changes that make migration increasingly an inter‐mestic policy issue.     

Imperialism and Democracy: Convergence and Divergence

This article explores two models of non-state education provision in Myanmar (Burma), in order to draw conclusions regarding templates for ethnic education regimes in this fast-changing country. Ethnic Armed Groups in Myanmar have developed education systems in the context of long-running armed conflicts. This paper examines two such regimes. Karen communities struggle with few resources to educate their children. Despite great difficulties, the Karen National Union has developed a curriculum based upon one Karen dialect, which is employed in about 1,000 schools. Graduates of this education regime are mostly unable to speak fluent Burmese, or to integrate with the Myanmar tertiary education system; they are orientated towards a Karen national identity, rather than Myanmar citizenship. However, with the beginnings of a substantial peace process, Karen educators will need to re-think their implicitly separatist agenda. A comparative case study is offered by the Mon ethnic minority. The New Mon State Party has had a fragile ceasefire since 1995. Some 270 Mon National Schools provide Mon language instruction at elementary levels, shifting to Burmese at middle school. As the Mon Schools follow the government curriculum, with extra classes in Mon language and history-culture, graduates are able to matriculate and enter the nationwide tertiary education system. We argue that the Mon experience can be a useful model for education reform in a transitional Myanmar, as political and civil society leaders negotiate a more decentralised state.     

"亚洲式民主":功能及其限度

"亚洲式民主"是90年代以来引起广泛争议的重大国际学术问题.本文认为,"亚洲式民主"在东亚国家实现经济现代化的过程中发挥了双重功能,即既维持了政治稳定,又促进了经济发展.但另一方面,随着环境和条件的改变,"亚洲式民主"也日益暴露出局限性.文章最后指出,"亚洲式民主"可能是通向自由式民主的一种过渡形态.     

Competitiveness and Democracy

After reviewing progress in Latin America's economic stabilization and international competitiveness in the last two decades, this essay discusses the current post‐Washington Consensus “social democratic convergence” agenda, which aims to sharpen market efficiency, improve the quality of democratic governance, and advance equity goals by attacking the social deficit. Two illustrative examples, at opposite ends of the development spectrum, are Nicaragua's pro‐CAFTA agenda and Chile's Chile Compete program. More generally, pluralistic democracy can hamper progress by giving veto powers to recalcitrant vested interests; but enlightened political leadership can make gains by combining carefully crafted coalitions, international support, popular pressures, and an attractive ideological message.     

从“自由民主”到“可控民主”:俄罗斯政治体制改革的经济学解析与启示

从"自由民主"到"可控民主"俄罗斯的民主政治改革引起了广泛关注.本文在梳理俄罗斯政治体制改革曲折历程的基础上,力图运用放宽了假定条件的"新比较经济学"分析框架,解读俄罗斯政治体制改革与经济绩效之间的因果关系.文章认为,关于俄罗斯实行"可控民主"制度原因的诸多分析中,历史传统回归论是正确的,所以"可控民主"在俄罗斯将具有持久的生命力.     

Democracy and market economy

In the following article, Professor Seizaburo Sato, former Research Director of the Institute for International Policy Studies, addresses the relation between democracy and market economy and the problems that might develop as economic globalization continues to deepen. Liberal democracy and market economy face a number of problems, he says, but they are at this stage the best political and economic systems to follow, and we should take steps to improve them where we can. Although recognizing the positive value of diversity, he emphasizes the importance of international cooperation and a minimum set of common rules. At the same time, he urges constant technological innovation and the fostering of capable political leaders who have a comprehensive vision for the future and a strong sense of public responsibility.     

Competition and Coalescence in European Party Systems: Social Democracy and Christian Democracy Moving into the 21st Century

Party systems in Europe have been in transition since the 1990s. New parties have emerged and appear more successful in gaining representation in parliament and government than before. Conversely the established party families in many postwar West European party systems ‐ Social Democracy and Christian Democracy in particular ‐ seem to have lost ground. We argue that an ideological convergence is developing between these two party families towards the ‘centre of gravity’ of their respective party systems. This may help to explain why ‘new’ parties of the Left and the Right have competed more successfully since the 1990s: they have bypassed Social and Christian Democratic parties in terms of both Left/Right and Progressive/Conservative dimensions and differences. These developments are explored by analysing party programmes. It appears that many Social and Christian Democratic parties are indeed often moving closer to each other. In fact, we conclude that being in the centre of a party system or in government is hardly an electoral asset any more in most West European polities.     

Undemocratic Democracy: Venezuela and the Distorting of History

President Hugo Chávez has been the subject of much frenzied comment, as much at academic conferences as in the press. Criticism has been to a great degree personalised against his very visible public profile. The crisis of democracy in Venezuela has been widely ascribed to faults committed by the traditional parties since the early 1980s and reflected in the coterminous rise in crime and violence. Support for Chávez, or even objective comment, has been at a premium. This article looks at the crisis of democracy across a wider timescale and sees the ‘most stable democracy in Latin America’ to have been deeply flawed from the outset. It reflects an earlier propaganda campaign, similarly short on meaningful analysis, aimed at undermining the popularity of a previous unconventional leader of Venezuela, Marcos Pérez Jiménez. It is claimed that Venezuelans want to preserve democracy but are also ready to support military coups to oust corrupt or inefficient politicians. Is Chávez merely representative of transient anti‐party feeling or could the history of Venezuelan democracy have caused a more fundamental change in relationships between the mass of the people and their leader?     

Democracy and development: With Special attention to Korea

Academic discussions on the relationship between regime type and economic growth of developing countries have been drawn to three linkages, the contribution of a certain type of political authoritarianism to rapid industrial transformation, the trend towards democracy after a long period of sustained economic development, and possible negative economic consequences of democratization itself. There are theoretical reasons to support the first two assertions, but the third proposition is less tenable. The case of Korea shows that democratic changes have resulted in higher consumption, have induced inflationary policy, and have led to wage increases in excess of productivity gains. However, these might well be transitional rather than steady-state phenomena. Political learning can prevent young democracies from becoming captives to distributional coalitions.