Party Dictatorship Research Articles

Lo studio sulle organizzazioni giovanili fasciste: una chiave per penetrare nel sistema di potere del regime mussoliniano

This article focuses on the results of Niccolo Zapponi’s research on fascist youth organizations, a groundbreaking essay published in 1982. The author emphasizes the originality of the essay, the very first account of the history of youth fascist organizations based on previously unpublished archival material and, above all, one of the first historiographical attempts to describe and better assess the dynamic of power within the fascist regime. Faced with the well-established interpretation of the National Fascist Party as a bureaucratic institution lacking in any political weight, Zapponi highlighted, instead, the enduring dynamism of the party; he demonstrated the existence of a plurality of centers of power - often in conflict with each other - as a structural feature of the regime; he maintained, finally, that the system’s «internal logic» had determined its evolution toward a «party dictatorship». Based on these outcomes, the historian decisively put Italian fascism among contemporary totalitarianisms. In his conclusion, the author claims that credit should go to Zapponi for having adopted - even if not actually theorized - a new approach to the study of Fascism, based on his intuition of the relationship between ideology and organization, between the myth of the fascist «new man» and the institutions established to make the myth real.

STALINIST DEMOCRACY, OR HOW ELECTIONS WERE RIGGED IN THE SOVIET UNION

Systematic violations of electoral legislation and the use of manipulative technologies during election campaigns to the representative branch of government in the USSR are considered. The Soviet electoral system, which was formed in the Soviet Union after the adoption of the so-called Stalin Constitution, had nothing in common with democracy. The party's dictatorship prevented the free expression of the will of citizens based on universal direct equal suffrage declared in the Constitution, turning the election into a farce of voting for a single pro-government candidate. Examples of protests of citizens against violation of the election legislation by the regime leaders and non-transparency of election procedures are shown. The author gave the text of a document on falsifications committed by employees of the Zaporizhia party apparatus (Ukrainian SSR) during the preparations for the elections to the Verkhovna Rada of the Ukrainian SSR in February 1947. The document was found by Russian scientists in the Central Archives of the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation and published in the collection of documents "Lubianka. Stalin i MHB SSSR. Mart 1946 ‒ mart 1953: Dokumenty vysshykh orhanov partiinoi i hosudarstvennoi vlasti". The study demonstrated the need to falsify the election results in the Soviet Union came up from the specific role of the state democratic institutions, which were to legitimize the will of the only ruling Communist Party. Keywords Soviet electoral system, guided democracy, party dictatorship.

Strategies of legitimation in Central Asia: regime durability in Turkmenistan

ABSTRACTLocated in current debates on one party dictatorships and regime durability, this article explores continuity and disruptions within the Turkmen political elite in their transition from presidents Saparmurat Niyazov (1991–2006) to Gurbanguly Berdymuhamedov (2007-). We are particularly interested in how the change from an idiosyncratic system, based mainly on president Niyazov's personality cult and visible repression of potential opponents, evolved into a more refined system under his successor, Berdymuhamedov. We will thus look at regime efforts to re-brand Turkmenistan without substantially changing the domestic political structures and dynamics. These include the manufacture of ‘opposition parties’ and holding of formal elections every five years while retaining absolute control over the most important political aspects of the country. We suggest the existence of a two-fold strategy to maintain the status quo based on authoritarian tendencies and learning. Whilst the shift from the first to the second president has brought significant changes, it also demonstrates essential continuities that helped the formation of an official domestic and international narrative proclaiming commitment to a number of international standards and national values; and strict control of most, if not all, aspects of national political life.

당독재와 개인독재의 개혁정치 비교연구

당독재와 개인독재의 개혁정치 비교연구

Impact of One Party Dictatorship in the Republic of Congo, A Synopsis to Development

The fight against colonialism in Africa was followed by the independence movement. However, colonialism brought within it its own plagues that caught the attention of the African elite. One such plagues has been the Balkanization of the African continent into multiple states without taking into account ethnic groups and the borders of the African states. In addition, colonization rather than developing the African states seems to have underdeveloped them because the colonizer has looted the African raw materials and violated the land of Africa. As people became divided and the African states underdeveloped, how the new African elite would deal with these issues became very challenging in a world of competition with the West that already implemented a coherent system of governance. In the attempt to deal with these challenges, the African leaders have decided to implement a single party state as a strategic tool to better unite their people and better contain the plagues of colonialism. Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana was the first to introduce the single party state in Africa. Later on, most African states adopted the single party in their countries. The Republic of Congo was one them. However, the single party state became a serious threat to Africa as it turned into dictatorship and cult of personality of political leaders in Africa. Such was the case of the Republic of Congo. This article argues the effects of One Party Dictatorship in Africa with particular focus on the Republic of Congo.

ECONOMIC PERFORMANCE AND ELITE DEFECTION FROM HEGEMONIC PARTIES

Hegemonic party regimes are non-democratic regimes that [1] rule with the aid of a dominant political party and [2] hold multi-party elections. Elite coalitions organized under the aegis of a hegemonic party are most vulnerable in elections that coincide with poor economic performance. A declining economy provides elites with a platform around which they can mobilize support to challenge incumbents in elections. As a result, the likelihood of defections from hegemonic parties increases as income declines. This study’s original dataset, which includes 227 elections for the chief executive in hegemonic party dictatorships from 1946 to 2004, and its case studies of defections in Zimbabwe under ZANU-PF in 2008 and Turkey under the Democratic Party in 1955 provide evidence for this proposition.

Vietnam's Online Petition Movement

In July 2014, sixty-one members of the Vietnamese Communist Party (VCP) posted online an open letter to the party leadership and all of its members. While decrying the Party's response to China's bullying in the South China Sea, the letter called on the Party to “leave off from the mistaken path of socialism for a definitive change to the path of the people and democracy” (Para 6). It was a bold statement for a country where public expressions of opposition to the authoritarian regime are strongly discouraged and sometimes harshly punished. Later in October, another online statement by a new generation of self-declared independent “civil society organizations” declared their support for prodemocracy demonstrators in Hong Kong and made an appeal to Vietnamese youth to take on a similar struggle at home. These initiatives were examples of a new movement in Vietnam of using online petitions to publicize social grievances while also directly or indirectly promoting liberal democratic ideas and challenging authoritarianism. The online petition movement is a recent development in Vietnam's domestic politics. It has helped generate open and critical commentary on the most controversial topics of the moment, in contrast to the state's tendencies to hide and censor them. In doing so, it has also advocated for liberal constitutional freedoms of speech, assembly and private property, rule of law, and opposition to party dictatorship. Furthermore, the people leading the petitions have included many renowned public figures — loosely referred to as “prominent intellectuals” ( nhân sў tri thuc ) — and those signing onto them have come from all walks of life. While their total numbers still only reach a few thousand — with the notable exception of the 15,000 that signed the petition on constitutional reform in 2013 — they are a leading edge in a country where, traditionally, only the boldest and most radical individuals expressed their opposition to party dictatorship. This article retraces the emergence of Vietnam's online petition movement and examines its significance. The Internet and Domestic Politics The emergence of Vietnam's online petition movement partly reflects the rapid expansion of the Internet in Vietnam. However, the Internet should not be seen strictly as a technological miracle that automatically makes societies more democratic. Rather, it has been used both to support and resist democratization efforts. Scholarly literature on the topic has warned against unilineal assumptions on the causal relation between the Internet and democratization.

Understanding China's Officials Accountability: What Makes Provincial Officials Might Not Be Absent from Accountability for a Coal Mine Accident in China?

Unlike oil exploitation, most behavior of coal mine exploitation is out of the government’s control in contemporary China, but this is not enough to admit that officials can be absent from the accountability for a coal mine accident. Existing literatures to this puzzle pay more emphasis on the collusion among provincial officials, substrate officials and coal mine owners, but these researches neglect the facts that not all accidents involve in the provincial officials’ accountability. In this research we proposed an argument to probe into the puzzle on the basis of the institution of authoritarian regime, we found that the right division of coal mine safety regulation and its strategic decentralization under hierarchy can not only maintain the one party dictatorship, it also can avoid the political risk in the public goods supply of the regime, Then the provincial officials might be objects of the accountability as the result of this institution of risk aversion.

Cross‐class Coalitions and the Making of the Arab Revolts of 2011

Theorists of social movements and revolutions have given great attention to the factors creating vulnerability for the state – including elite divisions, loss of foreign support, and economic problems. Substantial attention has also been given to factors facilitating the mobilization of protest actors, including framing, prior network ties, social and public media, and political openings. Somewhat less evident has been the role of cross-class coalitions, which play a vital role in affecting both the strength of the state and mobilization, and in shaping the outcomes of protest and revolutionary change. If a protest draws support mainly from just one class or group (peasants, workers, students, urban shopkeepers, professionals), the state can confront that group as a disruptive force, and seek to unify elites from other sectors against that threat. However, if protestors represent many different groups, it is much harder for the state to find allies against them. Moreover, while a state can claim to be preserving society by acting against isolated disruptive elements, it is far more difficult to maintain legitimacy when acting against a broad cross-class coalition. Elites are more likely to desert the state, creating crippling elite divisions, if protestors represent a broad spectrum of society. In addition, a broad cross-class coalition facilitates further mobilization by creating ‘meganetworks’ linking prior, tightly-linked within-group networks to each other. The impact of public media in favor of the protestors is also greater if media representation shows protestors as representative of the whole society, rather than as one particular group seeking partisan advantages for itself. For these reasons, virtually all successful revolutions were forged by cross-class coalitions that bridged the diverse goals and interests of different groups, thus pitting society as a whole against the regime and its loyalist supporters. Conversely, revolts rooted in the needs and organization of one particular class or group – peasant revolts, urban uprisings, student protests, regional rebellions – have usually been effectively repressed by regimes able to draw on other groups for support. The three successful revolutions in the Arab world in 2011, in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya, all demonstrate the crucial role of cross-class coalitions.

Economic Performance and Elite Defection from Hegemonic Parties

Hegemonic party regimes are non-democratic regimes that (1) rule with the aid of a dominant political party and (2) hold multi-party elections. Elite coalitions organized under the aegis of a hegemonic party are most vulnerable in elections that coincide with poor economic performance. A declining economy provides elites with a platform around which they can mobilize support to challenge incumbents in elections. As a result, the likelihood of defections from hegemonic parties increases as income declines. This study’s original dataset, which includes 227 elections for the chief executive in hegemonic party dictatorships from 1946 to 2004, and its case studies of defections in Zimbabwe under ZANU-PF in 2008 and Turkey under the Democratic Party in 1955 provide evidence for this proposition.

Modeling authoritarian regimes

In the past few years, a body of ideas based on political economy theory has been built up by North and Weingast, Olson, Przeworski, and Acemoglu and Robinson. One theme that emerges from this literature concerns the transition to democracy: why would dominant elites give up oligarchic power? This article addresses this question by considering a formal model of an authoritarian regime, and then examining three historical regimes: the Argentine junta of 1976—83; Francoist Spain, 1938—75; the Soviet system, 1924—91. We argue that these historical analyses suggest that party dictatorships are more institutionally durable than military or fascist ones.

Transformacja, tranzycja, okres przejścia. Białoruś przełomu wieków

The terminology developed to serve the needs of stableWestern democracies fails with respect to the republics that emerged following the collapse of the USSR. This may be confirmed by the notion of the ‘grey zone’, assisted democracy, managed democracy or electoral democracy. The Belorussian transition process seems to be work in progress. Its closure would demand that the current state be acknowledged as being stable rather than transitional. Aunanimous assessment is not assisted by the terminological divergence that is indispensably accompanying transformation, transition or the period of transition, as termed in the Russian language, which seems to be the best description of the process. The analysis does not apply the dichotomist approach to democracy, either, where democracy is considered to be either present or absent, since it is impossible to identify the nondemocratic elements of the system unanimously. T. Carothers, who was critical of Huntington’s Third Wave, claims that when the key elements of a political system are appropriately manipulated for the benefit of a heuristic analysis it results in a political system of managed democracy to be a priori acknowledged to be a democratic one. The tools of analysis developed for the needs of stableWestern democracies fail when faced with a new type of personal, party or military dictatorship, or with neoauthoritarianism, understood as authoritarianism altered by the irreversible globalization processes.

The International Conflict Behavior of Dictatorships from an Audience Cost Perspective

In this study, I look at the consequences of variations in authoritarian elite coalitions for international conflict behavior, using Fearon's audience cost theory to frame my argument. In dictatorships, the elite coalition is the group that has the power to oust the dictator. Because of this, the coalition plays the role of the domestic audience. Just as voters can make democratic leaders pay for failing to follow through with their commitments, so can the elite coalition in authoritarian regimes. In personalist regimes the elite coalition is the personalist clique, in military regimes it is the military junta, and in single party regimes it is the party cadre. Differences in the institutional nature of the elite coalition affect the ability of the coalition to impose costs upon the leader. Leaders face higher costs for reneging on commitments in regimes in which the elite coalition can more effectively constrain the leader's behavior. In single party and military dictatorships, leaders confront an elite coalition that is unified by a pre-existing party or military. In these regimes, being part of unifying institution increases the ability of the elite coalition to collectively constrain the actions of the dictator. Personalist dictators face a different scenario. There is no pre-existing institution that serves to unify elites, leaving personalist dictators to rule relatively unconstrained. In addition, in military regimes, the military elite have greater access to the security apparatus than do elites in other forms of dictatorship. This increases their ability to stage a coup and thereby impose costs on the military dictator for poor leadership. Due to institutional differences in the nature of the elite coalition, I argue that personalist dictatorships should be the least able to generate audience costs, followed by single party regimes, and lastly military regimes. I also add to Fearon's theory and posit that audience costs are only effective as a signal of commitment when the target regime can correctly identify the signal. Differences in the nature of the elite coalition affect the extent to which leaders correctly identify signals. I argue that personalist leaders tend to receive lower quality intelligence than do leaders in military or single party regimes and as a result. As a result, personalist leaders should be more likely to ignore what are credible threats. To test my predictions, I use quantitative tests. I look at whether or not target states choose to reciprocate initiators' challenges. States that are able to generate high audience costs should yield low rates of reciprocation from their targets. I find substantial support for my argument.

Breaking Down the Residual Category: Policy Stability among Dictatorships from a Veto Players Perspective

In this paper, I argue that policies in dictatorships require the tacit support of two actors: the leader of the regime (an individual veto player) and the individuals the leader relies on for support (a collective veto player). I show that the collective veto player differs across personalist, military, and single party dictatorships in important ways. Due to such differences, it should be easiest to change policy in personalist regimes and most difficult in single party regimes. I test this statistically by comparing responses to exogenous economic shocks and fluctuations in inflation rates across dictatorships. I find substantial support for my argument.

Kirchenangehörige Parlamentarier in den neuen Bundesländern nach dem Systemumbruch

The proportion of East German representatives in the state parliaments as well as in the Bundestag who are church members contrasts sharply with the proportion of Christians in the population at large. A two-thirds majority of MPs are Protestants or Catholics, while only 25 percent of the East German population are followers of the Christian faith. Above and beyond church membership, surveys show that a high number of MPs found their way into politics via their church activities. The massive over-representation of Christians in political positions is not the result of a well-prepared attempt by the churches to reach out and grab power, rather an unintended side-effect of the conflict with party and state that was forced upon the churches during the GDR-era. The fact that an independent elite developed outside the ruling elite of the party cadres proved beneficial for the founding of a new, democratic system: After the collapse of the party dictatorship, a large reservoir of qualified leadership personnel was ready to be recruited.

Orthodox Christianity, Civil Society, and Russian Democracy

Abstract: Scholars have identified numerous obstacles that appear to stand in way of democracy taking root in Russia, including country's religious heritage. In an attempt to understand role of Orthodoxy in Russian society more accurately, this article explores civic, political, and democratic values of devout Orthodox Christians and more secular-leaning Orthodox. The findings suggest that whereas Russian citizens are only loosely predisposed toward democratic governance, devout Orthodox Christians as a group are somewhat more favorably inclined toward democracy than are other Russians. Moreover, religious belief and practice have virtually no impact on democratic values, suggesting that Orthodoxy may not be obstacle to democracy that some have made it out to be. Key words: Christianity, religion, Russia ********** During Soviet era, many people assumed that Communist Party dictatorship was all that stood in way of democracy in Russia. Once Soviet Union entered dustbin of history, however, path to democracy in Russia was clearly plagued by other, perhaps more formidable obstacles than decaying monolith of Soviet state. Indeed, body of scholarship on Russian democratization since collapse of Soviet Union has been a virtual enterprise of identifying many obstacles to democracy in Russia. The range of such obstacles is dizzying and seemingly endless, extending from country's autocratic past, to authoritarian tendencies of President Putin, and even to some regional leaders, such as Novgorod Governor Mikhail Prussak and Tatarstan President Mintimer Shaimiev, not to mention debate over absence or existence of a democratic political culture and civil society in Russia. It is not surprising, therefore, that Russia's religious heritage has had its share of blame for country's woes. Shortly after collapse of Soviet Union, Samuel Huntington proclaimed that the cultural division of Europe between Western Christianity ... and Orthodox Christianity and Islam was reemerging, and that the eastern boundary of Western Christianity in year 1500 was the most significant dividing line in (1) Huntington not only predicted that Orthodox world would clash with rest of Europe, but that Orthodox societies seemed much less likely to develop stable democratic political systems. In a similar vein, Michael Radu later announced burden of Eastern Orthodoxy, arguing that Eastern churches were only interested in promoting nationalism and could not contribute in any meaningful way to construction of civil society and democracy in postcommunist Europe. (2) As Prodromou has argued, such ideas are not exception, but rather part of a map that has been drawn, dividing Europe between modern and civilized West and anti-modern and uncivilized East, with region's Orthodox religious tradition serving as a major defining characteristic. (3) Given seriousness of implications that follow from such characterizations, topic certainly warrants a more detailed and robust examination than that offered by Radu, Huntington, and others. If we are to understand role of Orthodoxy in Russian society accurately, we must do more than analyze political maneuverings of Moscow patriarchate and religious rhetoric of pragmatic politicians who seek to appeal to spirituality of Russian citizens; we must look to actual civic, political, and democratic orientations of Russian Orthodox Christians themselves. This is what I do in pages that follow, as I explore civic, political, and democratic values of devout Orthodox Christians and more secular-leaning Orthodox, whose connections to church are more cultural than religious. The findings suggest that although Russian citizens are only loosely predisposed toward democratic governance, devout Orthodox Christians as a group are more favorably inclined toward democracy than are other Russians. …

Civil Society, Constitution, and Legitimacy. By Andrew Arato. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000. 352p. $72.00 cloth, $26.95 paper.

Recent years have witnessed momentous political transformations across the globe. From Eastern and Central Europe and the former Soviet Union to South Africa, these changes are often described as transitions from state bureaucracies, party dictatorships, and authoritarian rule to liberal constitutional democracies and market economies. Andrew Arato, moving gracefully among the fields of political theory, sociology, history, constitutionalism, and comparative politics, redirects our attention to the originary moment of constitutional creation, when ordinary lawmaking recedes in favor of extraordinary politics and higher lawmaking. It is also a moment when fundamental constitutional norms emerge as the main point of contest within political debate and action. Combining empirical and descriptive analysis with normative considerations, Arato persuasively demonstrates how the mode of creation of new constitutions affects the democratic and institutional content of these transformations as well as the prospects for future consolidation of the newly developed constitutional norms.

Will China Democratize? Disruption without Disintegration

Will China Democratize?Disruption without Disintegration Zbigniew Brzezinski (bio) Given the pace of change in our time, it is very difficult to make predictions about what will happen ten years hence. If forced to hazard a judgment, I would predict that a decade from now there will still be a state calling itself the People’s Republic of China. More likely than not, however, it will no longer be governed solely by the Chinese Communist Party. In other words, I think that there is going to be significant change, even disruptive change, but probably not disintegrative change. While it would be unrealistic to expect China’s future pace of economic development to be sustained at recent levels, it is quite likely that China will achieve reasonably impressive economic growth over the next decade. That growth may decelerate, and at some point the economy may even encounter serious difficulties. But in all probability, the overall economic condition of China will continue to improve. For that very reason, however, I envisage some significant discontinuity in the character of China’s political system—though without there necessarily being a dramatic change in the designation or even the external appearance of that political system. Let me put it differently. I think it is highly unlikely that Communist Party dictatorship and increasing socioeconomic pluralism can long co-exist. Therefore, some significant discontinuities from the current situation are likely. At the same time, the extent of these discontinuities—and particularly their sharp edge—is likely to be dulled by relatively successful and continuing economic progress. In that [End Page 4] context, some tension and conflict between the socioeconomic system and the political system will become inevitable. Moreover, China is likely to be thrown increasingly into the global community simply through the impact of international communications. I am told that there are now several million satellite dishes in China capable of receiving television programs from abroad. I am also told that, as of 1997, some one hundred thousand Chinese actively participate in the Internet. There are hundreds of thousands of Chinese traveling or studying abroad. In brief, communist dogmatism cannot continue to be maintained in its present form. At some point, the party dictatorship will have to crack, and the party itself will have to share a significant portion of its authority with other social forces in Chinese society. That necessity may create a period of political tensions and acute dislocations. The likely outcome will be a situation in which the Chinese Communist Party, by itself and in its present form, will no longer be able to govern China. I do not think, however, that the changes are likely to be acute or intense enough to result in the overt and dramatic overthrow of the Communist Party and the termination of the People’s Republic of China. Instead, we are likely to witness a process of political change that is much more complex, perhaps in some respects even more difficult, and certainly at times very tense, one that will probably culminate in the present Chinese state continuing in name, but no longer in form and substance. I do not mean to suggest that the party is going to embrace this kind of change voluntarily. The process that I envisage will involve political unrest or other circumstances that impose upon the party the necessity of change; the party will have to come to an accommodation with these pressures, or else eventually face a revolutionary situation. To some extent, I am betting on the prospect that the Chinese political elite will be intelligent and realistic enough to see that it must make the necessary accommodations. Of course, the party will have to invent a lot of new ideological formulas to justify these accommodations, but it has already invented plenty to justify the present situation. President Jiang Zemin told me in July 1997 that joint-stock ownership of state industries is permissible according to the thought of Marx and Engels because it is a form of public ownership. He is playing with words to justify ownership by individual stockholders. He and his successors will find other formulas to justify whatever concessions the party is compelled to adopt. At some point...

Lenin, the proletariat, and the legitimation of dictatorship

This article examines the arguments Lenin employed after the October Revolution in order to justify party dictatorship over the working class. It challenges the conventional view that Lenin defended constraints on proletarian choice by appealing to the paternalistic vanguard theory set forth in What Is To Be Done? A systematic review of Lenin's revolutionary writings indicates that his legitimation strategy was based instead on an essentialist interpretation of class identity that made it possible to deny proletarian status, and thus democratic rights, to wage‐laborers who opposed Bolshevik rule. It is Lenin's theory of class, therefore, not his theory of the party per se, that is vital for an understanding of his authoritarian politics.

Les musulmans de Bosnie-Herzégovine, mise en place d'une guerre civile

The Muslims of Bosnia-Herzegovina - the making of a civil war. From the spring of 1992 to the fall of 1995, a heinous civil war ravaged Bosnia-Herzegovina. Three autochthonous populations (approximately 44 % Muslim, 33 % orthodox Serbe and 18 % Catholic Croat at the start of the war), divided by their ethnie and/or religious origins, massacred each other under the guidance of their respective «extremists », who managed to drag into this unspeakable slaughter (against a backdrop of 47 years of Communist Party dictatorship, an economically bankrupt State and a devastated civil society) not only yesterday's and the day before's apparently peaceful citizens of each of the three groups, but sometimes those born of mixed marriages, not to mention atheists, laymen and a-religious people of every stripe. How did it corne to this? What destructuring elements produced this catastrophe? What were the warning signs, the remote and proximate causes ? As it is beyond the capacity of this article to detail the history of the entire population of this region, it will merely present an overview of the history of the Muslim community of Bosnia-Herzegovina (and of the ideas used by a portion of the local Muslims to manufacture, as do all human groups, its own mythology), as an aid to the reader who does not know Serbo-Croatian and therefore is unfamiliar with the basic sources and texts.