NEPAD and good governance

This paper is an analysis of South Africa's public service improvement strategies since 1994. It first describes the historical factors that underpinned South Africa's service delivery initiatives before 1994. It is argued that the pre-1994 public service sector was racialised and highly politicised, as opposed to being people-centred and service delivery oriented. The transition to democracy in 1994 necessitated a complete revision of South Africa's public administrative system in order to meet the developmental challenges of service delivery needs. However, this transition also coincided with global reform initiatives that were taking place in the public sector, as informed by the new public management (NPM) paradigm with its emphasis on cost effectiveness, accountability and transparency. The primary argument of the paper is that commendable legislative reforms have been enacted in South Africa's public administration system in the post-1994 period, based on the NPM, but the fragility of the state bureaucracy as manifested in the silo approach characterising the South African government operations, as well as capacity limitations, encumbers the success of these reforms. The Community Development Worker (CDW) programme, operating in South Africa's Eastern and Western Cape Provinces, is used as a case study to illustrate this argument. A brief look at India's experience of the NPM also informs the discussion. The significance of the case study lies in the fact that it was conceived in the interest of increased responsiveness and accessibility to government services, a vital pillar of the NPM framework.     

Introduction: Regional powers in contest and engagement: making sense of international relations in a globalised world

Over the last couple of years, ‘African ownership’ has become a buzzword in many fields. Economic development initiatives like the New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) are based on it, partnership agreements like the Joint AU–EU Africa Strategy are built around it and its central concept of Africanisation guides virtually all external relations of the continent. African leaders (rightly) insist on it, international organisations (rightly) preach it and many non-African actors are (unsurprisingly) hiding behind it. The concept of African ownership is so omnipresent today that it is more than surprising that the simple question of who actually owns it has not yet been asked. It is the declared purpose of this paper to disentangle rhetoric from reality and identify the owner as well as the limits of African ownership in the sphere of peace and security.     

Regionalism,personalism, ethnicity,and violence: parties and voter preference in the 2010 parliamentary election in Kyrgyzstan

On the basis of interviews, census data, and precinct-level electoral results from the October 2010 parliamentary election in Kyrgyzstan, this paper examines the influences on the party vote in Kyrgyzstan. Instead of traditional socioeconomic variables, this study finds that regionalism (North vs. South), ethnicity, personalism, and violence offered the most compelling explanations of party preference in Central Asia's most competitive election. The paper also examines the contextual factors that constructed and filtered voter demand, from Kyrgyzstan's political and economic conjuncture in 2010 to its unusual party system and electoral rules.     

Governance and Hyper-corruption in Resource-rich African Countries

Official corruption is frequently associated with the abundance of valuable extractive resources. This article reviews the worst cases of ‘resource curse’ in Africa—Angola, Republic of Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and Nigeria—in light of the most recent developments. Despite its systematic association with public corruption, however, mineral wealth is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition. Corruption is widespread in resource-poor countries as well—in Africa and elsewhere—and some resource-rich African countries such as Botswana have a record of good economic performance and high public integrity, suggesting specific ways in which transparency and accountability for the use of mineral resources can be encouraged and corruption correspondingly reduced. Because corruption in resource-rich African countries is heavily influenced by external interests, particularly the multinational extractive industries, recent initiatives by the United States and the international community to foster transparency carry a significant potential for reducing corruption and improving governance.     

Meteoric trajectory: The Res Publica Party in Estonia

Formed in 2001, Res Publica won the Estonian parliamentary elections in 2003, and its leader became prime minister. It failed to win a single seat in the European Parliament in 2004 and was down to 5 per cent in opinion polls in 2005 when it dropped out of the cabinet. The founding chairperson of the party analyses here the causes for Res Publica's rapid rise and fall, reviewing the socio-political background and drawing comparisons with other new parties in Europe. Res Publica was a genuinely new party that involved no previous major players. It might be characterized as a ‘purifying bridge party’ that filled an empty niche at centre right. Its rise was among the fastest in Europe. For success of a new party, each of three factors must be present to an appreciable degree: Prospect of success?=?Members?×?Money?×?Visibility. Res Publica had all three, but rapid success spoiled the party leadership. Their governing style became arrogant and they veered to the right, alienating their centrist core constituency. It no longer mattered for the quality of Estonian politics whether Res Publica faded or survived.     

Terrorism,war and the economy of scale: an interview with Ted Goodnight

Apart from the great debates on the definition of terrorism or its causes, the discussion about whether ‘new terrorism’ can really be considered new or not has become one of the central disagreements in terrorism research. This article will respond to the criticism voiced by some of the proponents of the ‘new terrorism’ idea and reflect on the merits of their arguments. It will emphasis the importance of words and the implication of small predicates such as ‘new’ for the construction of terrorism and our reaction to it.     

从代际更替的角度看潜在的新生代浙商培育

浙商转型与浙商的代际更替紧密联系,老一代浙商创业者将在今后的一二十年时间内完全退出历史舞台,文章提出接替他们的新浙商群体的主体部分不是“富二代”,而是崛起中的草根创业者。潜在的新生代浙商群体具有明显的“代特征”,即生活条件优越化,人力资本知识化,自我定位主流化。与老一代浙商相比,潜在的新生代浙商成长环境发生了巨大的变迁,在物质环境方面发生了从“山多地少”、“条件恶劣”到“衣食无忧”、“分层明显”的变化;知识环境方面发生了从“农民出身”、“艺工起家”到“读书学习”、“知识经济”的变化;群体意识环境方面发生了从“边缘生存”、“模仿创新”到“融入主流”、“网络时代”的变化。潜在的新生代浙商培育需要在变化的环境中因势利导。     

Regionalizing Multilateralism: Estimating the Power of Potential Regional Voting Blocs in the IMF

This paper explores the voting power of hypothetical regional voting blocs in the Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund. We first discuss the prospect of regionally defined groups becoming more significant in the Fund’s decision-making process. After briefly outlining the IMF’s formal decision procedures, including its weighted voting system, use of special majorities, and the function of voting groups in the Fund’s Executive Board we define three indices of a priori voting power — the Banzhaf, Johnston, and Shapley-Shubik indices — which are then applied to existing voting groups. Following this we simulate several regionally defined a priori coalitions and their potential to influence outcomes in passing resolutions in the Fund using a simple majority. The coalitions we specify are based on the assumption that members of the IMF will form into voting blocs based on regionally-defined preferences. The procedures employed use existing voting weights to project the relative strengths of alternative regional blocs that could emerge within the IMF. Our results indicate that the United States would have the greatest voting power in almost all scenarios. A voting bloc comprised of European countries, however, would be able to dominate the United States unless the U.S. formed an Asia-Pacific bloc. Japan, the PRC, and other Asian countries appear to be unable to form voting blocs that would provide them with more voting power than the United States.     

新时期青年农民工“文化反哺”现象初探

"文化反哺"即"逆向社会化",是一种自下而上的文化传承模式.当代青年农民工已初步具备"文化反哺"的能力,并有责任通过"文化反哺" 提高农村成人社会的现代社会适应能力.青年农民工"文化反哺" 在社会主义新农村建设中具有重要的社会价值.在肯定青年农民工"文化反哺"对农村社会进步的积极推动作用的同时,也要注意对其加以正确的引导.     

台湾南部的社会政治环境与民进党的政治版图——兼对“南方政治”定义的探讨

台湾的政治版图已出现所渭"北蓝南绿"的格局,台湾学界有人将南部稳定支持绿营政党的情形命名为"南方政治"。实际上民进党在南部的政治版图从1990年代中期就已经显形,台湾南部由于本省人占多数的"省籍-族群"分布、具有更厚重本土味的性格与社会经济状况等的耦合,再加上绿营耕耘多年,引导和激发了较浓厚的"本土"价值,目前民进党在南部的政治版图虽收缩,但这种社会政治环境使其仍有一定的根基。不过,研究者多数从民进党或泛绿在南部的得票率和政治版图等来分析"南方政治",这种定义是狭义性的,就"南方政治"与南部的社会政治环境相关性,从广义上其更应定义为地域意识或地方性在政治上的表现,它虽与民进党的关联颇深,但在蓝营方面也会有所体现。