Herrschaft des Gesetzes, Freiheit, Demokratie

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Capitalist models and social democracy: the case of New Labour

Some of the more critical readings of the adequacy and effectiveness of New Labour in power have been developed by scholars willing to link arguments about the trajectory of Labour politics to wider arguments about the character of the contemporary global economy and the space within it for the construction and development of distinctive capitalist models. Mark Wickham-Jones and Colin Hay in particular have made that linkage in a series of important writings on the contemporary Labour party. Their arguments are here subjected to critical review, and set against a third position on New Labour and global capitalism: one informed by the writings of Ralph Miliband on British Labour and by the arguments of Leo Panitch and Greg Albo on the limits of the 'progressive competitiveness' strategies associated with 'Third Way' social democratic governments.     

Could Japan become the 'Great Britain of the Far East?'

The United States' relationship with the United Kingdom was held up as the model for future US-Japan relations by the bipartisan writers of the so-called Armitage report published in October 2000 before the US election. The two new administrations in both Washington and Tokyo have signaled the potential for a revitalized US-Japan alliance. In this article, David Asher, associate director of Asian Studies at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), argues that it is high time the two countries work together to build a security and economic alliance between the US and Japan that is as committed and durable as that between the US and the UK. He concludes that although it will not be easy, if both countries combine forces there is no reason why this should not be possible.     

Money, Elections, and Democracy in Brazil

Brazis 1993 law requiring candidates to report their campaign contributions has generated a new source of data to explore the supposition that Brazilian elections are extraordinarily expensive. An examination of these data from Brazis 1994 and 1998 general elections reveals that most money for Brazilian electoral campaigns comes from business sources and that leftist candidates have extremely limited access to such financing. The effect on democracy is that Brazis largely unregulated campaign finance system tends to decrease the scope of interest representation.     

Party Strength,the Personal Vote,and Government Spending

“Strong” political parties within legislatures are one possible solution to the problem of inefficient universalism, a norm under which all legislators seek large projects for their districts that are paid for out of a common pool. We demonstrate that even if parties have no role in the legislature, their role in elections can be sufficient to reduce spending. If parties in the electorate are strong, then legislators will demand less distributive spending because of a decreased incentive to secure a “personal vote” via local projects. We estimate that spending in states with strong party organizations is at least 4% smaller than in states where parties are weak. We also find evidence that strong party states receive less federal aid than states with weak organizations, and we theorize that this is because members of Congress from strong party states feel less compelled to secure aid than members from weak party states.     

The dynamic political economy of support for Barack Obama during the 2008 presidential election campaign

In recent years, students of voting behavior have become increasingly interested in valence politics models of electoral choice. These models share the core assumption that key issues in electoral politicds typically are ones upon which there is a widespread public consensus on the goals of public policy. The present paper uses latent curve modeling procedures and data from a six-wave national panel survey of the American electorate to investigate the dynamic effects of voters’ concerns with the worsening economy—a valence issue par excellence—in the skein of causal forces at work in the 2008 presidential election campaign. As the campaign developed, the economy became the dominant issue. Although the massively negative public reaction to increasingly perilous economic conditions was not the only factor at work in 2008, dynamic multivariate analyses show that mounting worries about the economy played an important role in fueling Barack Obama’s successful run for the presidency.