How Elites Can Maintain their Power in the Middle East: The Junblat Family as a Case Study

Elites are more than the producers of wealth and power; elites reproduce themselves and control the masses by means of norms and values. For many years, the Junblat family of Lebanon has based its leading role on the idea of protecting the Druze community's interests and rejuvenating Druze glory. Despite the enormous political, economic and social transformations the area has witnessed, the Junblat family has succeeded in maintaining a continuous tradition of leadership and power from the early seventeenth century to the present. This article will argue that the explanation behind the durability of this political power lies in what might be called the ‘ideology of adjustment’ on one hand and preserving organic communication with the masses on the other. Many conclusions can be drawn from the case of the Lebanese Junblat family regarding behavioural patterns and structures of traditional elites in the Arab Middle East. The most important is that traditional elites have no commitment to ideology other than to the degree that it allows them to adjust, serves their self-preservation and helps them to gain as much power as they can.     

All by Myself: Personal Qualifications versus Party Affiliation in Colombian Mayoral Elections

Political decentralization has been promoted as a way to devolve responsibility, bring government closer to citizens, and improve accountability. The shift prompted new local elections, but were the elected officials responsive to citizens or to national party elites? This study examines unique survey data from 125 Colombian mayors to identify the factors they believe were critical in their victories and thereby to identify the people to whom they believe they owe loyalty: citizens or party leaders. Examining the relative value mayors assign to their own actions versus those of the party, combined with information on how they financed campaigns, sheds important light on subnational electoral dynamics in Colombia.     

Local Politics and Political Power in Russia: The Case of Yaroslavl'

An American political scientist surveys local political reforms in Russia as they were proposed in 1988-1989 and implemented in 1990-1991. Using the city and provincial governments of Yaroslavl' as a case study, the author examines whether old political elites have shown themselves capable of adapting to the new political rules and retaining influence over local decision making. The paper then assesses differences in the strength of this influence in rural and urban areas and consequences of the power struggle between old and new political elites for Russian President Yel'tsin's reform program. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: P20, H1.     

China and Africa: economic growth and a non-transformative political elite

Prevailing narratives in the discourse on China-Africa engagement are that China is developing Africa. This paper departs from those narratives because they disregard the agency of Africa's political elite. Basing its argument on the nature of the African political elite, the paper analyses their role in determining the impact of China's economic and trade engagement on economic development in their respective countries. To do that, it first discusses the nature and identity of African political elites, and examines how they control their states and scarce resources. Having done that, the paper then analyses their role in determining the nature and extent of development emanating from their countries’ economic engagement with China. It then concludes that it is not how much foreign states invest in African countries that determines Africa's rise, but rather political elites who influence the direction of their states’ development.     

The Changing Role of NGOs in Rural Chile After Democracy

Abstract — The article examines how NGOs in rural Chile operated during the dictatorship and how their role changed after the return of democracy. An NGO (OPDECH) in Southern Chile is used as a case study. During the Pinochet regime, NGOs maintained a critical distance from the government by creating a niche for opposition researchers and activists. They provided a possibility of economic survival for professionals whilst working on alternative proposals to address the socio-economic needs of the poor majority. External funding from international agencies provided much needed resources but created as well a culture of reliance and a clientelistic middle class of professionals. The NGO in Southern Chile became a nucleus of resistance and expertise on regional development by safekeeping democratic tradition and providing a range of solutions to local development problems. After the restoration of democratic government many professionals joined the government. NGOs exchanged their altruism for a more pragmatic, opportunistic and, in some cases, more efficient role as executors of government programmes. The case study in Southern Chile illustrates this trajectory well. After municipal elections a collaborative role with local government was sought by OPDECH that aimed to implement local initiatives as well as advise local and regional governments on environmental and developmental issues. Given the NGOs historical commitment to grassroots development, it remains to be seen what role they can play in supporting local government while forging a new role for themselves in a democratic context.     

下诺夫哥罗德州政治状况与地区发展前景

下诺夫哥罗德州一度是俄罗斯改革的前沿阵地和代名词,在俄罗斯的政治经济版图中有着特殊的地位。目前,该州是伏尔加河沿岸联邦区的行政中心,其政治经济进程值得关注。从联邦中央与地方的关系来看,莫斯科成功地规范着下诺夫哥罗德州的政治进程,地方政府依赖中央的政治和财政支持。从下诺夫哥罗德州内部的政治发展来看,历任州长面临的都是大致类似的复杂局面:联邦中央、总统派驻伏尔加河沿岸联邦区全权代表、地方政治经济精英、联邦层面的大型企业、地方层面的商业利益,等等诸多方面的相互影响与竞争。由此,州长在联邦层面的工作经历和影响力,在地区层面的协调手段和整合力,即,同时得到中央和地方的支持和认可,并在中央与地方同时具有关键影响力,是地方政治经济良性发展的重要保障。下诺夫哥罗德新任州长格列布·尼基京,年富力强,是俄罗斯新生代州长的代表,也大致具有上述品质,其在下诺夫哥罗德州的执政状况,值得关注。     

Elite Relations in Germany

Traditionally, Germany has had a segmented elite with little interchange between economic, cultural, political and military elites. Although borderlines have become somewhat more permeable (except for military elites), the professionalisation of politics as a career has led to a political class in a static sense, that is, when it comes to securing common privileges. Political decisions, however, are not controlled by a unified political class but are the result of a complex decision making process involving a wide range of elites extending beyond the political class.     

Moving towards EU membership and away from liberal democracy

ABSTRACT

The article concludes the Special Issue, Illiberal Politics in Southeast Europe, on the retreat of liberal democracy in the region. It focuses on the central themes that link all the papers together: free and fair elections, media freedom, judicial independence, privileged access to public resources and the role of civil society. It seeks to disentangle the causes and consequences of illiberal politics in the region and explores the similarities in the illiberal practices and strategies incumbents use with the aim of staying in power indefinitely. The main argument is that democratic backsliding in Southeast Europe is deeply rooted in the unfinished transitions of the 1990s, which gave rise to new political and economic elites and that blending those two into one resulted in the dominance of the executive over the judiciary and legislature. These new elites became entrenched during the wars and conflicts that affected the region. The enabling factors were of societal origin – clientelist practices, corruption, nepotism and mistrust in politics accompanied by external factors – as well as international pull and push factors (from the EU and Russia) along with a domino effect of democratic backsliding in the region.     

Cultural Politics, Communal Resistance and Identity in Andean Irrigation Development

This article uses two case studies to illustrate how Andean irrigation development and management emerges from a hybrid mix of local community rules and the changing political forms and ideological forces of hegemonic states. Some indigenous water-control institutions are with us today because they were consonant with the extractive purposes of local elites and Inca, Spanish and post‐independence Republican states. These states often appropriated and standardised local water-management rules, rights and rituals in order to gain control over the surplus produced by these irrigation systems. However, as we show in the case of two communities in Ecuador and Peru, many of these same institutions are reappropriated and redirected by local communities to counteract both classic 'exclusion-oriented' and modern 'inclusion-oriented' water and identity politics. In this way, they resist subordination, discrimination and the control of local water management by rural elites or state actors.     

Militarizing Japan’s Southwest Islands: Subnational Involvement and Insecurities in the Maritime Frontier Zone

Abstract

This paper sheds light on a relatively underexplored aspect of Japan’s recent security changes by examining the subnational level where the impact has been far-reaching. It focuses on Japan’s maritime frontier zone: the Yaeyama Islands located at the southwestern end of the Japanese archipelago and administered as part of Okinawa Prefecture. It argues that while Yaeyama militarization has been primarily a national response to China’s portrayed assertiveness in the East China Sea, it has also been facilitated by the strategic actions of local political elites, in cooperation with sympathetic extra-local forces. Political elites from two islands, Yonaguni and Ishigaki, have been motivated primarily by diverging material and ideational factors. Yonaguni elites have viewed militarization largely through the prism of “compensation politics.” Their counterparts in Ishigaki have been driven by more ideological objectives, seeking militarization for deterrence purposes and otherwise transforming the island into a rightist breeding ground in defence of Japanese territory. Yaeyama militarization has not only diminished enthusiasm for seeking autonomy and enhancing economic security through microregional cooperation, but has also enhanced local-level insecurities while creating and exacerbating divisions.     

Élites gubernamentales en tres entidades federales de México (2000-2012) Un análisis estructural

This article aims at analyzing the profile and the social structure resulting from the career itineraries of governmental elites in the states of Guanajuato, the State of Mexico, and Mexico City during the 2000-2012 period. The author applies a mixed method combining the conventional sociological analysis with a network approach. The study observes in the first place the relevance of the local space for the creation and development of elites. Secondly, it identifies the regularities and divergences in the elite recruitment and development processes in the three states under study. Finally, the analysis reveals that instability in employment may be simultaneously construed as uncertainty and an asset since it allows the local elites to gather a considerable political and social capital.     

Indonesian West Timor: The political-economy of emerging ethno-nationalism

Encouraged by the post-Soeharto atmosphere of reform and regional autonomy legislation proposed under Habibie, the aspirations of Indonesia's regional elites have been stirred. Yet prosperity has remained elusive for many amidst continuing economic decline and as an unreformed military continues to threaten the business ambitions of regional elites. In West Timor, one of the poorest parts of Indonesia, local elites have had to contend with the added burden of the fallout from the 1999 pro-integrationist military operation in East Tindonesian military-trained tormentors, the West Timorese have paid highly for independence in the East and sufmor. Beginning with the need to host the quarter-million East Timorese refugees who fled West accompanied by their Ifered enduring economic malaise. This is reflected in the devastation of tourism and foreign investment, the suspension of major aid projects, the severing of the air-link to Northern Australia and a United Nations high-security alert in force since 2000. This crisis in which the aspirations of regional elites have been thwarted by the neglect and incapacity of central government and by the nature and political agenda of the Indonesian military elites, has provoked several reactions. As some West Timorese elites have lobbied for a share of the East Timorese petroleum revenues, the discovery of an essential Timorese-ness by others has been manifested in the ethno-nationalist Negara Timor Raya (Nation of the Land of Timor) movement.     

去工业化与再工业化——对美国中镇的个案研究

位于“铁锈带”地区的美国印第安纳州中镇在20世纪下半叶经历了其他美国“铁锈带”城市的相似遭遇。2009年博格华纳中镇工厂关闭,成为中镇去工业化的最后一个重要事件,其关闭原因主要来自地方工会和全球政治经济两个方面。在去工业化给个人与社区带来消极影响的同时,中镇各方曾经尝试各种新产业,部分中镇精英在新形势下积极寻求再工业化。它的再工业化基本由私人部门主导,政府配合,采取多元、整体的经济发展策略,大学也在其中发挥着重要作用。     

How oil autocracies learn to stop worrying: Central Eurasia in 2008 global financial crisis

Autocracies in developing countries are more likely to collapse during economic crises. Some influential works and popular media extend this argument to oil-rich autocracies, but cross-national empirical studies find little evidence to support this view. Yet, while the causes of their stability during boom periods are well understood, how oil-rich autocratic regimes remain stable during busts is underexplored. This article advances an explanation that refines and complements existing accounts. I argue that we need to take into account three interrelated factors that currently are likely to stabilize oil-rich autocracies: considerable savings, policy learning, and sustenance of coercive capacity. Leveraging evidence drawn from 40 original interviews, documents, news media, and academic literature, I investigate the role of these factors through a comparative case study of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan during the 2008 global economic turmoil. The findings highlight the ruling elites’ ability to amass sizeable savings that later provide safety cushions, to update their know-how through drawing lessons within and beyond fiscal policy, and to sustain coercive capacity without resorting to overt repression. Through economic crises, they may learn to not escape the “resource curse,” but to escape despite the “resource curse.”     

The inverted cycle: Kabul and the strongmen's competition for control over Kandahar, 2001–2006

Afghan tribes and local communities have been exposed to foreign patronage since at least the 19th century, but the scale of patronage relative to Afghanistan's internal economy increased dramatically after the late 1970s. Inevitably, this had a major impact on Afghanistan's own internal dynamics and on the mechanisms of political legitimisation. This article focuses on the province of Kandahar, which occupies a privileged space in Afghan politics and history, having given origin to almost all of the country's ruling elites. It deals with three groups of tribal strongmen, who tried to use tribally based patronage systems to stake a claim to local power.     

Regime security,base politics and rent-seeking: the local and global political economies of the American air base in Kyrgyzstan, 2001–2010

Unlike the eponymous hero of the Kyrgyz epic, Manas, who united the Kyrgyz people, the American air base situated at Kyrgyzstan's Manas International Airport became a source of fracture in Kyrgyz politics after its establishment in late 2001 to support the US-led war in Afghanistan. Whilst international attention focuses on the geopolitics of a so-called New Great Game over basing rights in Central Asia, a more significant political and economic struggle concerning the Manas Air Base is related to its fuel supplies. The air base became a source of rent for the ruling elites and an object of controversy between the government and opposition in two successful uprisings, which removed presidents Askar Akayev and Kurmanbek Bakiyev from power (in 2005 and 2010, respectively). The air base's secret fuel contractors, with their unknown beneficiaries, offshore registration and low visibility, built close links to the regimes of the two ousted presidents. The lucrative and illicit contracts and subcontracts were purportedly used by both presidents and their entourages for personal enrichment and to strengthen their regimes but were ultimately a factor in their downfall. Drawing on the results of recent congressional and non-governmental investigations and interviews with representatives of the fuel-supply companies and members of the former regime, this work assesses the role of the US Manas Air Base in regime security and rent-seeking schemes during the Akayev and Bakiyev tenures. Thus, this article will contribute to the growing literature on rent-seeking in Eurasia's hybrid regimes and the external dimensions of regime security.     

Her Majesty's Protected Subjects: The Mishaqa Family in Ottoman Damascus

The protégé system that the Ottoman Empire encountered as the result of diplomatic relations with European powers later became a clear threat to the very existence of the empire. Among these powers, Britain, until the nineteenth century, executed its consular affairs via the Levant Company in the Middle East, but later employed local people, mostly non-Muslim Ottomans, as dragomans, consular agents and vice-consuls to execute its services in the region. The dragomans not only translated treaties and official documents, but also commented on the messages to and from the authorities and this gave them much more important roles. In this regard, members of the Mishaqa family served the British and later American interests under different posts ranging from dragoman, to consular agent and vice-consul. As they gained confidence, they were accorded British consular protection which provided them considerable privileges, and passed their duties to their sons. Unlike similar Levantine families who assumed dragomanship in the imperial centre as a household tradition, members of the Mishaqa family were deeply embedded in the local society and therefore could give insights on social and political changes in the Ottoman province of Damascus. After attaining British protection in 1840, members of the family served in British and American consulates until the beginning of the First World War. However, the protégé status of the family members paved the way for continued debates over their nationality and citizenship. This article attempts to present the basic codes of consular protection and Ottoman responses within the context of the story of Mishaqa family.     

Las élites neoliberales en México: ¿cómo se construye un campo de poder que transforma las prácticas sociales de las élites políticas?

The recomposition of Mexican political elites during the 1980s overlaps with the transformation of a development model that shifted from a basically protectionist and nationalistic model to a neo-liberal and open-oriented one. Such a switch has implied far-reaching changes in the social practices of political elites. Based on a record that contains each high-rank official during the 1988–2014 period, the mechanisms having established a transnational power network crossing from one presidential term to the next are reviewed, as well as those factors that favored the organization of a power field increasingly focused on the border between the national, regional and global spaces. Some of those mechanisms include the international historical context; the creation of working teams with a basically neo-liberal worldview; the trajectories of the high-rank officers; the reforms that have been driven; the fluent transit among public and private positions, and the highly varied relationships established between this group of officials and transnational actors and organizations. It is concluded that the elites’ new social practices do not only hamper and challenge the creation of public goods and autonomous structures with the capacity of planning according to the general interest, but they also encourage institutional depredation.     

South Africa and Japan: maintaining a difficult friendship

Japan's economic and political relationship with South Africa has been characterised historically by ambiguity. Throughout the twentieth century, economic ties were underpinned by mercantilist and strategic considerations. During apartheid, this placed Japan in an uneasy position as it sought to balance a relationship of expediency with wider foreign policy objectives in the rest of Africa and beyond. The demise of apartheid created the space for new forms of engagement centred on the pursuit of cognate goals. This has seen the intensification and deepening of economic ties in particular. Yet relations, especially at the political and diplomatic levels, have also been more complex than anticipated, and in recent years, the rise in Africa of other players from Asia and the Global South has had a bearing on South Africa–Japan ties. In this paper, it is argued that two related dynamics pivoting on policy elites’ changing conceptions (or self-view) of the nature of the state they are running and its place in the wider world order help explain the post-apartheid evolution of the South Africa–Japan relationship. First, there has been an apparent shift in South African foreign policy elites’ self-view, mediated by a changing systemic context. The development and manifestation over time of a stronger Global South self-conception in South African foreign policy, fashioned in juxtaposition to what have been considered in the past key Global North relationships, had direct consequences for South Africa–Japan ties. Second, meso- and micro-level dynamics – the role of the general operations in the diplomatic (i.e. bureaucratic) arena, and the personalities and shifting political preferences of individual executive leaders – had major impacts on how South Africa engaged with Japan in the past two decades.