Direction Of Political Change Research Articles

Public religions after socialism: redefining norms of difference

ABSTRACTReligion has come to assume quite a public presence in many parts of Eastern Europe. The instrumental use of clergy, religious sentiment and transcendent symbolism reflects the emergence of conditions in which religion is capable of playing an expedient role in processes of forging a new governing and moral order. At this critical juncture, when norms of gender, ethnicity, regionalism and language politics are being redefined, the ambient presence of religiosity makes political initiatives and political protest expressed in a religious idiom particularly effective. Religion has become a resource used to provide the moral justification for proposed norms of behaviour and to legitimate the legal regulations and coercive mechanisms to enforce them. In this way, religion is going public. This article analyses why and how religion assumes a public presence capable of steering the direction of political change and explains how this relates to the practices of everyday religiosity revealed in ethnography.

The main stages in the formation of the theory of the Second Modern in modern political science

The article analyzes the process of formation, empirical verification and development of the theory of the Second Modern. It is established that it can be described with the help of four stages: the stage of actualization of the renewed essence of social and political; the stage of approval in scientific political science discourse; stage of development; a stage of empirical application and evolution.
 It is proved that among the features of the new form of modernity, which could be explained with the help of the theory of the Second Modern, the most important is the ambiguous in its consequences, the transformation of political signs, in particular, the increase in the degree of openness of national political systems, accompanied by growing uncertainty of the functioning of political institutions; strengthening of the absolutization of traditional value-normative systems of political regulation; strengthening the importance of political self-organization of citizens, the formation of new forms of democracy and civil society; the complication and differentiation of the space-time characteristics of the political, in particular, the «glocalization»of space and the «compression»of time.
 It is substantiated that the development of the theory of the Second Modern in modern political science reflects the transformation of the political essence in the new social conditions. All analyzed research interpretations of the Second Modernism state that the main direction of political change is the process of deinstitutionalization of political institutions, which takes place in sufficiently diverse forms: through new identification practices destroying the old institution; by forming «normal deviations», that is, due to a change in the notion of norms; changing the functions of the institution; weakening the legal form of institutionalization; changing the basis of legitimization, when instead of legal legitimization, social legitimization becomes more meaningful.
 Keywords: Political theory, theory of the Second Modern, stages of the development of the theory, political

Democratic Procedures in the CCP's Cadre Selection Process: Implementation and Consequences

AbstractSince the early 1990s, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has put in place a series of measures to allow more Party members to participate in the cadre selection process. “Intra-party democracy” was promoted as a remedy to solve the corruption and social tension that resulted from overly concentrated personnel power. How effective are these formal procedures in constraining the appointment power of core Party leaders and institutionalizing the influence of a larger group of cadres? Drawing on archival research, interviews and quantitative data, this paper examines two components of intra-party democratic reform: “democratic recommendation,” which serves as a gateway to cadre promotion, and the semi-competitive elections at Party congresses. This in-depth study finds that the efforts to expand bottom-up participation are hindered by loopholes in formal regulations, informal practices and the frequent rotation of Party officials. Meanwhile, the reform measures have brought changes to the personnel system by complicating the Party secretaries' exercise of appointment power and altering the incentives of ambitious cadres. The implementation of intra-party democracy could improve the vitality of one-party rule, and its ebbs and flows imply a divide within China's top leadership over the direction of political change.

Entrepreneurship: Catallactic and constitutional perspectives

The most important distinction between Virginia political economy (VPE) and the other branches of public choice scholarship is a close affinity of the former to Austrian economics. Contributions in both the Virginia and the Vienna (Austrian) traditions have emphasized this connection and highlighted the analytical and ideological interdependencies of the two schools. This paper argues that an application of the Austrian theory of political entrepreneurship to the VPE framework can provide important insights regarding the direction of political change. Kirzner’s theory of entrepreneurship explains that coordination of individual action is possible where price signals provide information. When price signals are absent the entrepreneurial process breaks down. There is common ground between Kirznerian entrepreneurship and Buchanan’s creative action. Scholars at the intersection of the Virginia and the Vienna traditions can use this common ground to make pattern predictions regarding the direction of political change.

Place, Space, and Agency: Moving Beyond the Homogenous "Ghetto"

In Urban Outcasts, Loïc Waquant has advanced our understanding of contemporary poverty through an international comparative analysis of Chicago and Paris that pays close attention to the role of the state in producing marginality. Yet, Wacquant's analysis falls short at more fully explaining recent changes in the United States or pointing us in the direction of political change because of limitations related to his theorizing of "the ghetto," the welfare state, and advanced marginality. Specifically, I argue that Wacquant essentializes place and space through his conceptualization of "the ghetto"; relies too heavily on the South Side of Chicago as representative of U.S. cities; ignores contemporary conditions such as the increasing diversification of poverty; minimizes the agency of poor people; and lacks attention to the role of the local state and the gendered nature of the state. As such there is no discussion of the actual or potential emancipatory politics that may come from diverse (both within and between) communities facing extreme marginalization.

Transnational Culture and the Political Transformation of East-Central Europe

In social scientific studies of Europe’s new democracies, there has emerged an analytical approach which transcends the teleology of ‘transitology’ and, focusing on the impact of culture and history, is sensitive to the contingencies and ‘eventfulness’ of social transformations. The main thrust of this article is that such a culturo-historical approach may prove useful not only in assessing the different results to which the processes of democratization lead at the national level, but also to assess the general direction of political change after 1989 towards democracy. Building on Eisenstadt’s notion of modernity as a cultural and political program, this article therefore attempts to understand the revolutions of 1989 not only as the mere sum of particular national events, but also as part of an ‘entangled history’, that is, as a common, transnational phenomenon which was based on and articulated a shared cultural understanding.

South Africa and Namibia: Domestic Politics and Decolonization

While the debate over the future direction of political change in South Africa heats up, the appearance of these two works on Namibia serve to remind us of a longstanding issue that has once again been shunted into the background. This is regretable not only for the long suffering people of Namibia but also for those specialists and others who are wont to speculate about or attempt to predict the probable course of political development within South Africa itself. Most South African specialists, it seems, choose to ignore the important lesson to be gleaned from the recent history of European decolonization, namely, that we can often learn as much from it about the patterns or parameters of political change with the decolonizing metropoles as we can about those within the colonies themselves. Were South Africanists to reflect on this, they would realize that a careful consideration of Pretoria's policy towards Namibia in recent years can offer very useful insights into the possible parameters of political change within South Africa. Strange as it may seem, the view from Namibia may actually help to dispell some of the cloudy thinking that has abounded of late concerning the likely direction and pace of political change within South Africa itself in the near future. This is surely the case with one of the volumes under consideration In Search of Namibian Independence by Geisa Maria Rochas. Although the primary purpose of this work by the former Secretary to the UN Commissioner for Namibia is to examine the failure of the United Nations to effect a settlement of the Namibian independence question, this book is far more interesting for the intriguing insights it offers into the political

Mobility and Political Orientation

Public attention recently has been drawn to the existence of a “gender gap” in public opinion and electoral politics in the United States. Yet the reasons for this sex difference in politics are unclear. Do men and women have differences of political orientation that are independent of social class differences or do sex differences in politics reflect different class experiences for men and women? This research uses national survey data to compare the political effects of social mobility for three groups of respondents: Males, women employed for wages outside the home, and housewives. I predict that women who are mobile by virtue of their own occupational status will have political orientations close to those of their class-of-destination, while women who are mobile by virtue of a spouse's occupation will retain political orientations similar to those of their class-of-origin. Further, I predict that the difference between the relationship of social mobility and political orientation for employed men and women will decline as women's overall labor force participation increases. In a log-linear analysis of presidential candidate selection from 1948 to 1980, I find that marital and occupational mobility do have different effects on women's political orientation, but the direction of political change across mobility statuses was not consistent. There is no convergence over time in the pattern whereby mobility status is related to political choice for men and women.

The Nature and Direction of Political Change in Pakistan

Politics in Pakistan: The Nature and Direction of Change by Khalid BinSayeed, Praeger Publishers, New York, 1980, pp. 194, price US. $21.95.In many respects, this is a significant work-and a controversial one.In terms of the data presented, analyses attempted, insights providedand conclusions drawn, it represents long years of research andreflection. And, it is not an easy book to review.In this reviewer’s view, any discussion on this work must necessarilybegin with a flashback to the author’s background and his earlier workssince it would help put the present work in perspective. Khalid binSayeed is not only the most widely known Pakistani writer on Pakistanpolitics, but also the foremost Pakistani political scientist, havingauthored numerous papers in journals and compilations, and two majorworks-Pakistan: The Formative Phase (1960) and The Political Systemof Pakistan (1967). Being original and analytical, they achieved instantfame, acquiring, in the process, the distinction of being the most frequentlycited works on Pakistan’s historical and political development.In the first work, a political history of Indian Muslims since 1858 andof Pakistan till 1958, Sayeed interpreted Pakistan in terms of Muslimnationalism and Jinnah’s charismatic leadership, and the interplay ofpolitical forces and the course of politics in Pakistan’s early years wereexplained in terms of the “viceregal system” of undivided India. Set inthe tradition of the developmental theorists, his second worknqxploiteddextrously the idiom and formulations of the behavioralists.Now, in this third major work, Sayeed turns his back on all this andsettles for a (modified?) Marxian approach. Page two alone features fourquotes from Marx and one from the Marxist Geoffrey Kay; in particular, ...

Legislative Turnover in British America, 1696 to 1775: A Quantitative Analysis

T S HE ongoing investigation of political development in Britain's American colonies has produced many excellent monographs on specific colonies during particular periods of their history, as well as a few hypothetical general essays.1 From these works, two competing lines of argument have emerged concerning the character and direction of political change during the eighteenth century. One group of studies has suggested that the political systems of the several colonies were coming apart; the other, that they were coming together. The absence of comparable data for many colonies in several areas has perhaps discouraged the sort of systematic comparative analysis necessary for the evaluation of these arguments. Because they can be computed for most of the period between i 696 and I 77 5 for each of Britain's twenty-two American colonies that had functioning legislatures before I 763, legislative turnover rates can serve as one reasonably firm quantitative base from which such an analysis may proceed.2

Urbanization and Italian Politics

E FFORTS TO ACCOUNT for the nature and direction of political change in the developing nations of Asia, Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East have produced the theory of political modernization. In these nations, observers have found the gradual emergence of modern political systems, characterized by (1) functionally specialized political institutions, such as parties, elections, pressure groups, schools, mass media, and legislatures; (2) political recruitment based on achievement; (3) mass awareness of national political events and allegiance to a national political system; (4) mass participation in national politics; and (5) a powerful, centralized, bureaucratic state, capable of performing a broad range of complex, sophisticated functions.' The development of the modern polity, according to this theory, is accompanied (or perhaps necessarily preceded) by the secularization of society, the growth of new social classes and the restructuring of class relations, industrialization and commercialization of the economy, and the growth of cities.2 In most developing nations, modern politics have tended to involve mostly the Westernized urban groups. Cities have not only been the principal arenas of politics, but also the principal means for the diffusion of nationalism and other modern political ideas and forms of behavior.3 Has this been the pattern of political development in Italy? It is difficult to say, given the ambiguities of the theory of political modernization, the lack of consensus on the nature of urban-rural relations in Italy, and the nature of Italian society.