Process Of State Formation Research Articles

ТЕОРІЇ ПОХОДЖЕННЯ ДЕРЖАВИ: ДОКТРИНАЛЬНИЙ РІВЕНЬ ПІЗНАННЯ

An important aspect of knowing the state is finding out the laws of its formation. The substantiation of such regularities requires the analysis of ideas, concepts and theories existing in general theoretical science, devoted to the problems of researching the factors and causes of formation. The article clarifies the relevance of the selected problem, its theoretical and practical significance. Attention is focused on the lack of unity among scientists in their views on the process of the origin of the state. The main reasons for the variety of existing theories are determined. On the basis of elucidating the etymological meaning of the categories "theory" and "doctrine", the author's vision of the category "theory of the origin of the state" is substantiated and their features are distinguished. Special attention is paid to the classification of theories of the origin of the state and their characteristics from the point of view of the purpose, content and significance of the laws of state formation. The purpose of the publication is to clarify the doctrinal aspects of the process of the emergence and formation of the state as a special means of organizing society and to give it features of systematicity. The objectivity of the obtained research results was ensured by the application of a system of scientific approaches, principles and methods of cognition. In the process of achieving the set goal, synergistic, systemic, axiological, phenomenological approaches were used, which formed the worldview basis of the study of theories of the origin of the state. The principles of comprehensiveness, historicism, comprehensiveness, professionalism, and systematicity were of great importance in the research process. It should also be mentioned such philosophical-light ice methods as the materialistic one, which emphasizes the knowledge of statehood depending on the economic conditions of social reality and their objectivity; dialectical that studies the formation of the state as a natural result of the development of society, and idealistic one connecting the formation of the state with the subjective consciousness of scientists-authors of theories of the origin of the state. As a result, a conclusion was made about the importance of the doctrinal analysis of the process of state formation and its significance for substantiating the laws of state formation.

РОЗВИТОК І СТАНОВЛЕННЯ ПРОКУРАТУРИ УКРАЇНИ ЯК СУБ’ЄКТА ВЛАДНИХ ПОВНОВАЖЕНЬ: ІСТОРИКО-ПРАВОВИЙ АСПЕКТ

The study of the historical origins of the prosecution in Ukraine is a mandatory component of its study not only as a socio-legal phenomenon of public law, but also as a specific subjective institution endowed with an appropriate array of powers. The activities of the prosecution and its officials have always been included in the permanent process of state formation, so the context of finding the prerequisites for such a body and its development is a structural part of research aimed at researching the current legal status of the prosecution bodies of Ukraine and its formation. At the same time, given the staged development of the prosecution in Ukraine in different historical periods, it should be noted the accumulation of interest of the scientific community in comparative academic research to compare the current process of development of the prosecution bodies within the general changes in Ukraine. Therefore, given this and the continuous process of public law reform, it is not superfluous to trace the nature of structural and functional metamorphoses of the prosecution, as well as their analogues and prototypes, in previous historical times, including from the standpoint of the rule of law. to date. Based on the analysis of the genesis of the historical development of the prosecution in Ukraine of different epochs, research approaches to understanding the concept of the prosecution as such and its functional load in different historical periods, outlined the main stages in the periodization of the history of development, its place and role in historical and state formations, the main model approaches to the organization of activity and functioning of prosecution, interrelation of prosecution bodies in Ukraine and other branches of power in different times from emergence of prototypes of bodies of prosecution bodies to the present are found out.

PERSISTENT STATES: LESSONS FOR SCOTTISH DEVOLUTION AND INDEPENDENCE

AbstractThe equilibrium size of a nation state is, in part, the result of a trade-off between the gains from scale economies in the provision of public services and the costs of applying uniform policy to heterogeneous cultural, institutional and geographical fundamentals. Changes in such fundamentals can thus place pressure on states to reform over time. We consider this dynamic state formation process in the context of Scotland within the United Kingdom. First, we review the recent research in economic history on the persistence and evolution of such fundamentals. Second, we consider the history of Scotland both before and after the 1707 Act of Union in the light of that broader economic history literature. We conclude with some implications of fundamental persistence for current debates on the place of Scotland within the United Kingdom.

DEVELOPMENT OF THE IDEA OF CITIZENSHIP FORMATION IN DOMESTIC PEDAGOGICAL THOUGHT

This article examines the problem of developing the idea of forming citizenship in domestic pedagogical thought. The need for the formation of citizenship is motivated, aimed at educating the individual, developing personal traits and qualities, world-view, feelings, actions and norms of behaviour, way of thinking aimed at self-development and development of democratic civil society in Ukraine. The categories “citizenship”, “civil position”, “rule of law” are specified in pedagogical and socio-pedagogical aspects.Today in Ukraine, we can observe both trends in the development of ideas of citizenship – on the one hand, the processes of state formation require unity based on the formation of civic qualities of the community, manifestations of citizenship and appropriate actions towards the idea of statehood. It is considered that these tendencies can develop in two ways – confrontation, intolerance or dialogue, a constructive approach to solving problems. The analysis of civic education development in the national pedagogical thought is provided by the author.Civic education is illustrated by changes in the goals, content and methods of organizing the activities of the subjects of the educational process. The essence of civic education is characterized by systematic, purposeful, social, planned and systematic motivation. As shown in the article, most of the existing educational systems and programs for the education of student youth are focused on the development of critical thinking, independent search for meaning in life and the development of skills of active behaviour. These changes make new demands on the implementation of the process of civic education of student youth in higher education, on the individual as a whole, able to understand and independently implement the basic ideas of competence-oriented education. Accordingly, the formation of citizenship aims at educating the individual, developing personality traits and qualities, world-view, feelings, actions and norms of behaviour, way of thinking aimed at self-development and development of democratic civil society in Ukraine.
 Keywords: citizenship; civic education; civic self-awareness; civil position; civic behaviour; rule of law; personality education; democratic civil society.

Thermal relic of self-interacting dark matter with retarded decay of mediator

The existence of a light mediator is beneficial to some phenomena in astroparticle physics, such as the core-cusp problem and diversity problem. It can decouple from Standard Model to avoid direct detection constraints, generally realized by retard decay of the mediator. Their out-of-equilibrium decay process changes the dark matter (DM) freeze-out via temperature discrepancy. This type of hidden sector (HS) typically requires a precision calculation of the freeze-out process considering HS temperature evolution and the thermal average of the cross-section. If the mediator is light sufficiently, we can not ignore the s-wave radiative bound state formation process from the perspective of CMB ionization and Sommerfeld enhancement. We put large mass splitting between DM and mediator, different temperature evolution on the same theoretical footing, discussing the implication for DM relic density in this HS. We study this model and illustrate its property by considering the general Higgs-portal dark matter scenario, which includes all the relevant constraints and signals. It shows that the combination of BBN and CMB constraint favors the not-too-hot HS, rinf< 102, for the positive cubic interaction of mediator scenario. On the other hand, the negative cubic interaction is ruled out except for our proposed blind spot scenario.

СТАНОВЛЕННЯ ДЕРЖАВНОСТІ ТА ПРАВА НА ТЕРИТОРІЇ СУЧАСНОЇ УКРАЇНИ В ПРАДАВНЮ ДОБУ

The preconditions for the formation of statehood and law on the territory of modern Ukraine in ancient times are analyzed. The place and role of ancient states and the right to the territory of Ukraine in the centuries-old history of nation-building are determined. Emphasis is placed on the fact that in the first millennium BC, the lands of modern Ukraine were inhabited by various ethnic communities, peoples, tribes, waves of numerous nomads who came into contact with each other, influenced economic, social, cultural development, including the early Slavic population of the Middle Dnieper. It is shown that an important role in this process of mutual influence and enrichment was played by the state formations that were formed at this time on the territory of Ukraine: the Scythian state, the Greek city-states of the Northern Black Sea coast, the Bosporus Kingdom. It is noted that stable economic and political relations between these state centers and militant steppes, as well as farmers of the Ukrainian Polissya and Forest-Steppe arose and developed, which in turn required legal regulation of civil and other legal relations. It is emphasized that at that time the elements of norms and institutions of legal regulation of civil, criminal and procedural relations are emerging and developing. An important place in the formation of legal regulation of social relations in the Ukrainian lands in the period under study was played by the highly developed Roman private law at that time. It is substantiated that a significant place in the history of the development of statehood and law on the territory of modern Ukraine in ancient times was occupied by the Slavs, who were first mentioned in written sources at the turn of our era. They were indigenous to Eastern Europe and lived here in the Early Iron Age. However, in historical sources of the time they were called Scythians. Yet, some researchers believe that the Scythians were Slavs. From the beginning of the 1st millennium BC, the Slavs appear in written sources under the name of the Venetians. According to the ancient authors, the Venetians occupied lands in the Vistula basin, from the northern slopes of the Carpathians to the Baltic, and were neighbors of the Germanic, Sarmatian and Finnish tribes. The entire northern and western parts of modern Ukraine at that time were inhabited by Slavic (Venetian) tribes. A bit later, along with the Venetians, two new names for written Slavs appeared in written sources: Antes and Sclaveni. Although the meaning and origin of these terms are still unclear, they are the first to reflect the division of the Slavs into Western (Sclaveni) and Eastern (Antes). The latter lived on lands between the Dnieper and the Dniester, their territory also covered the Left Bank of the Dnieper. In fact, researchers consider Antes-Slavs to be the first reliable ancestors of Ukrainians. Thus, a well-known ethnologist and archaeologist, professor with a world authority U.V. Shcherbakovsky (1856–1957) believed that the name «antes» was called a group of Ukrainian tribes, and the Antes, according to M. Hrushevsky (natives of Trypillia tribes), were the ancestors of Ukrainians. The process of state formation of the Ants did not find its end. The Slavic-Avar wars, in which the Antes took an active part, led to the beginning of the 7th century. before the collapse of the Antes state. Under the blows of the Avars, the state of Antes ceased to exist in 602. It is noted that the most active state-building processes in the Ukrainian lands in the early Middle Ages took place in the 8th – 9th centuries which resulted in the formation of the Kyivan-Rus’ state – Ukraine-Rus’ with its center in Kyiv.

Pedagogies of Culture: Schooling and Identity in Post-Soviet Tatarstan, Russia (by Dilyara Suleymanova)

Reviewed by: Pedagogies of Culture: Schooling and Identity in Post-Soviet Tatarstan, Russia by Dilyara Suleymanova Elmira Akhmetova Pedagogies of Culture: Schooling and Identity in Post-Soviet Tatarstan, Russia Dilyara Suleymanova Palgrave Macmillan, 2020, 208 pages School education is one of the critical structures where the state implements its projects of social and political transformation. Governments commonly seek to shape political subjectivities and to inculcate a new set of civic values and commitments through public education. Hence, public education is a strategic arena for the state in its aspirations to shape loyalties and construct categories of identification that go beyond local, ethnic, or religious affiliations toward an institutionalized state-centered national identity. It is crucial for the processes of state formation not only to create bureaucratic institutions, but also to induce in individuals the belief that they are citizens of the state and they belong together. At the same time, the centralized educational system with its state-level aspirations may cause a dilemma for the cultural and ethnic minorities as their own local and regional appeals could be overshadowed under the state-centered national identity formation process. Such a dilemma is explored by Dilyara Suleymanova in the new book entitled Pedagogies of Culture: Schooling and Identity in Post-Soviet Tatarstan, Russia. The discussion is based on an ethnographic fieldwork research conducted in two schools (one Russianmedium and the other Tatar-medium) and a madrasah in a small semi-urban settlement in the northeastern part of Tatarstan, a Muslim-majority autonomous region within Russia. This new volume accordingly offers insights into the life of a peripheral location in post-Soviet Russia, marked by ethnic, religious, and linguistic diversity. Education here is envisaged as an institution that seeks to form, transform, and reproduce the sense of identification and belonging among children and youth, thus envisioning to shape political attitudes and cultural attachments within society. The book consists of seven chapters. In chapter 1, the author introduces the reader to Tatarstan and its educational projects. Chapter 2 provides [End Page 113] a comprehensive observation of educational policies, developments, and projects that have been implemented in Tatarstan since the collapse of the Soviet Union to promote regional and ethnic identity formation. The author divided this period into two parts: (a) the era of sovereignization and ethno-cultural revitalization (from the 1990s to the early 2000s), and (b) the era of centralization of public education under the presidency of Vladimir Putin. During the first period, educational policy projected to construct a distinct regional identity and post-Soviet Tatar nationhood that involved the revitalization of the Tatar language, culture, and religion. The regional components such as Tatar language lessons and the course on the history of the Tatars became one of the focus areas of the republic's educational policy and curriculum. School knowledge and textbooks became more localized with local and regional cultural, religious, and historical cases. Students got involved in various classroom and extracurricular activities related to their immediate locality (city, town, village) and their region. Thus, Suleymanova observes that, in the case of post-Soviet Tatarstan, the regional component created an institutional framework and a discursive space within which regional, local, and ethnic notions of belonging could be promoted and forged. In this way, as the author suggests, the regional component presented one of the most important instruments in forging and constructing not only a regional identity, but also an ethno-national identity among school students. A person with a consolidated ethnonational consciousness will naturally strive to learn his/her ethnic language, culture, and traditions and thus contribute to the Tatar ethnonational revival. As a result, this era produced a new cohort of young people with a strong sense of ethnic and regional identity and high levels of activism. The same chapter also observes the failure of all these achievements in constructing ethno-national identity in Tatarstan due to the new policies of centralization and homogenization under the presidency of Putin, which resulted in the elimination of the regional component and the introduction of the new federal education standards. Chapter 3 discusses the role of schools in the practices of "reinventing ethnic cultures" of local communities. Based on the experience of two particular...

Making or un-making states: when does war have formative effects?

“War made the state, and the state made war” is Charles Tilly’s famous dictum that has become highly influential both in comparative macrosociology and in International Relations. An extensive literature suggests that this mechanism has played a pivotal role in European processes of state formation. However, its applicability to warfare in the Global South is controversial. While some argue that the relationship remains the same, others are skeptical of the effects of the bellicist mechanism. Against the background of the debate as to whether war makes or un-makes states in the Global South, this paper examines the conditions under which wars have formative effects and result in state-making. Revisiting the war-making/state-making paradigm, I argue that the mode of economic reproduction of “wielders of coercion” determines whether war has formative effects. Wielders of coercion, or more specifically, non-state armed movements may draw on (1) rents, (2) indirect extraction, or (3) direct extraction to sustain their economic base and organize coercion. However, they institutionalize and develop into a state-like organization only when they rely on direct extraction. To support these claims, I conduct a plausibility probe drawing on evidence from highly successful armed insurgencies: Eritrea’s EPLF, Somaliland’s SNM, and Namibia’s SWAPO. In sum, the bellicist relationship remains valid for the Global South, even if the conditions under which war makes states are rare. A more nuanced reading of the bellicist theory improves our understanding of the dynamics of state formation and decay in the post-colonial world.

Making Constitutionalism Progressive Again: A Primer on City Constitutionalism and State (Re)Formation in a New Constitutional Geography

Constitutionalism has been thinned with the idea of progress fading to the background of today’s polytheistic constitutional landscape, while cities become the symbol of progressive values. Putting cities – megacities in particular – at the centre of the global constitutional map, Ran Hirschl’s City, State: Constitutionalism and the Megacity, not only opens a new frontier for comparative constitutional studies but also suggests a progressive constitutional agenda with implications to re-imagination of political spaces. Challenging what he calls ‘spatial statism’ that conceives constitutional geography on the basis of nation-states, City, State envisages a bi-focal mapping of constitutional space where the city finds its own constitutional place vis-a-vis the corporate body of the state and suggests a radical departure from the modernist constitutional tradition moulded in the long process of state formation in Europe. Engaging with Hirschl’s manifesto for the urban turn in comparative constitutional law, this essay advances an alternative version of city constitutionalism aimed at reconnecting constitutionalism and progressive values through a shift of focus from cities to what makes cities attractive and progressive. It argues that Hirschl falls short of giving full expression to a progressive city-oriented constitutional agenda as he shifts focus between cities in general and megacities and implicitly inherits the underlying territoriality of spatial statism in his constitutional prognosis – the recognition of cities in the territorial constitution. As an alternative to Hirsch’s formalist prescription, this essay suggests conceiving of constitutional space imaginatively to put cities as an incubator of progressive values on a new constitutional agenda. With attention shifting from cities as territorial units of constitutional ordering to what Iris Young called ‘urbanity’ in addressing contemporary urban challenges in constitutional terms, an aterritorial city constitutionalism can emerge, envisaging a changing constitutional geography driven by human flow under which state formation can be reconceived in a progressive way.

Политико-правовой опыт становления новых государств в современном мире: социологический дискурс

The modern stage in the history of mankind is one of those rare time periods when the process of state formation is distinguished by a special intensity due to the formation of historical prerequisites and socio-political conditions for the emergence of new states in the world political space. As a result, the world community over the last quarter of a century has been observing various scenarios of the process of state formation, which has covered many regions of the world.

Relational governance of territorial resources in post-colonial Africa – A new analytic framework

Current political sociology scholarship suggests that limited state autonomy from societal organisations undermines state enforcement capacity throughout the national territory, and therefore does superficial separation of the state from civil society (or formal from informal institutions) in the conceptualisation of what effective state system ought to be. These conceptions contradict realities in post-colonial Africa where societal organisations have evolved to bear ‘state-like’ qualities in resource governance, especially in remote locations where the state has no promising alternative to accommodating inputs from revered institutions or charismatic actors to complement its functions. Colonial experiences in Africa have produced institutional pluralism and a consequential split loyalty to the state in the post-independence era. Apparently, limited state autonomy sometimes refract or obstruct state visions; the resultant co-governance regime does not imply ‘wishy-washy’ state leadership. This is because state formation processes have produced an intermeshed governance of people, places, and resources through a complicated interplay between entities which have become indistinct in terms of functions, and hence cannot be simplistically categorised as either formal or informal, state or non-state. In this sense, the activity of regulating affairs in the post-colonial regime is characterised by relational governance – a form of governance sutured via reciprocal relation(s) between multiple actors across differentspatial scales and milieus. Drawing on an empirical study of biofuel projects in Ghana, we believe a relational governance approach provides an analytic framework to challenge this orthodoxy in governance studies and refresh discussions on the nature of state-society relations required for effective governance of territorial resources in postcolonial regimes characterised by institutional pluralism.

The Study of the 10th Century BCE in the Early 21st Century CE: An Overview

This introduction presents a context for the collection of 15 articles published in the first volume of the new journal: Jerusalem Journal of Archaeology. These publications are the outcome of the conference on state formation processes in the 10th century BCE Levant

The “United Monarchy” on the Ground: The Disruptive Character of the Iron Age I–II Transition and the Nature of Political Transformations

It is commonly agreed that the Iron Age I–II transition was gradual and that processes of social complexity initiated in the Iron Age I simply matured in the Iron Age II. The emergence of Levantine kingdoms – whether the so-called “United Monarchy” (i.e., the highland polity) or other polities – was therefore seen as an outcome of this gradual maturation, even if the date of their emergence is hotly debated. The present paper challenges both the perceived gradual nature of Iron Age complexity and the dated understanding of state formation processes that lies behind the common scholarly reconstructions of Iron Age political developments. Instead, the paper shows that the Iron Age I–II transition was troubled and was accompanied by drastic changes in many parameters, whether settlement patterns, settlement forms, or various material traits. Acknowledging these transformations is therefore the first step in understanding the process through which local kingdoms emerged.

Rethinking the Social Complexity of Early Iron Age Nomads

Recent evidence from the Aravah Valley challenges the prevailing assumption that Bedouin ethnography and inferences from ancient Near Eastern archives can adequately compensate for the archaeological lacuna in the study of biblical-era nomads. The evidence indicates that nomadic social organization at the turn of the 1st millennium BCE could have been – and in at least one case was – far more complex than ever considered before. This paper discusses the implications of the now extended spectrum of possible interpretations of nomads to the archaeological discourse on early Iron Age state formation processes in the Southern Levant.

Chechen Refugees: A Forgotten History of Caucasus; Who Remembers &amp; Who Cares?

Refugees; a term of fears, tensions, worries, crisis, fairy tales, stereotypes, and lots of fearful things. But if we observe the background history of refugees, a rich and wealthy history drifted in front of us. Chechen refugees are one of them. Right now, Chechnya is Russian federal territory and located in the eastern part of northern Caucasus region. If there would be a statistic of deportation from the homeland; Chechnya might be got the first rank over the world. They have exiled several times and replaced again and again exiled. This study will analyse Chechen refugees’ situation from a historical background to the present time with references. After a momentary description this study focuses on Chechens failed state formation process followed by the recent scattered situation of Chechens in different countries and finally discusses a recommendation on them.

Сецессионные тенденции современного процесса государствообразования

An analysis of some of the events taking place in the modern socio-political environment shows that the processes of state formation, the preconditions for which were laid down in the 20th century, are acquiring new impulses and continuation in the modern world. At the same time, the political technologies used in the construction of new states are diverse, but the most common form of the state formation process in the modern world is secession.

Democracy and State Formation Nexus: Experiences in Somaliland

ABSTRACT For democracy to be implemented, there should be a peaceful, functioning, and defined sustem of governance. Though scholars have different perspectives on the nexus between state formation and democracy, this article uses Somaliland as a case. Somaliland, a former British Protectorate and now de facto state in the Horn of Africa, has adopted a hybrid system of governance—traditional, religious, and modern democratic systems of governance. The democratization process in Somaliland started decades back. As per the literature reviewed, most of the researchers have studied the peace-building process and the state formation processes separately. They did not specifically investigate the nexus between democracy and state formation in Somaliland. To fill that gap, this article examines the experiences of Somaliland’s democratization process and its impact on state formation. It clarifies how a clan-based system of governance turned into a democratic multiparty system. The major findings of this article include that democracy has had a huge impact on Somaliland’s state formation process. Not only that, it contributed to the peace-building process as well. Above all, the people of Somaliland were keen on building trust among themselves with democratic principles during the state formation. The application of democracy has permitted Somaliland people the right of accountability where they can change the leaders by casting votes in elections. The characteristics and principles of democracy had emerged in Somaliland’s ruling systems even before it reclaimed its internationally fully recognized independence.

Mobility and Social Change: Understanding the European Neolithic Period after the Archaeogenetic Revolution

This paper discusses and synthesizes the consequences of the archaeogenetic revolution to our understanding of mobility and social change during the Neolithic period in Europe (6500–2000 BC). In spite of major obstacles to a productive integration of archaeological and anthropological knowledge with ancient DNA data, larger changes in the European gene pool are detected and taken as indications for large-scale migrations during two major periods: the Early Neolithic expansion into Europe (6500–4000 BC) and the third millennium BC “steppe migration.” Rather than massive migration events, I argue that both major genetic turnovers are better understood in terms of small-scale mobility and human movement in systems of population circulation, social fission and fusion of communities, and translocal interaction, which together add up to a large-scale signal. At the same time, I argue that both upticks in mobility are initiated by the two most consequential social transformations that took place in Eurasia, namely the emergence of farming, animal husbandry, and sedentary village life during the Neolithic revolution and the emergence of systems of centralized political organization during the process of urbanization and early state formation in southwest Asia.

Cemeteries and State Formation in the Early-Medieval Northwestern Iberian Peninsula

BASED ON A SIGNIFICANT REVIEW of the literature on early-medieval burials in the Northwestern Iberian Peninsula, this paper aims to offer, for the first time, a comprehensive interpretation of funerary practices and their transformations between the 8th and 10th centuries ad, and to discuss their role as useful indicators of the non-linear processes of state formation in this area. Despite some important regional differences, a general trend toward uniformity and centralised control of funerary behaviours can be detected during this period. However, cemeteries also inform us about the complexity and diversity of social agency at local levels behind the wider trend towards uniformity. It is argued here that both local and regional elites in the Kingdom of Asturias promoted this important change in funerary practices, as they did with the network of churches, given the importance of cemeteries as places of power, and the implications that lay behind the creation and control of a common place of inhumation for local communities.

The Roots of Resilience: Party Machines and Grassroots Politics in Singapore and Malaysia by Meredith L. Weiss

Reviewed by: The Roots of Resilience: Party Machines and Grassroots Politics in Singapore and Malaysia by Meredith L. Weiss Bridget Welsh The Roots of Resilience: Party Machines and Grassroots Politics in Singapore and Malaysia, by MEREDITH L. WEISS, NUS Press/Cornell University Press, 2020, 271 pp. ISBN 9789813251212 Meredith Weiss's Roots of Resilience is essential reading for those grappling with two persistent questions about politics in Malaysia and Singapore. First, why have [End Page 238] those in power stayed in power for so long. Second, what are the sources of change in these political systems. Both questions are timely given the ongoing transformations taking place. Malaysia has experienced three different governments in three years (2018–20), all led by different parties, and Singapore has lost ground electorally in the 2020 general election and its current leadership transition is arguably the most uncertain in history. Arguing that attention needs to move away from looking at politics as elections, Weiss's book provides her answer to these questions. She argues that the answers lie within the parties themselves, their history, the nexus with the state apparatus, including local government/party organs, and effective use of clientelism/patronage. These arguments are sound and robustly discussed as she contextualizes how both these hybrid political systems led by UMNO/BN and the PAP in Malaysia and Singapore respectively have strengthened and maintained their hold on power. Her use of archival material and interviews are both rich and carefully done, with the historical discussions the strongest in her book. The book is yet another example of Weiss's fine scholarship on Malaysian politics. Weiss's analysis both compliments and contrasts with other broad interpretations of politics that adopt a focus on party institutions. Dan Slater's Ordering Power (2010) argued that power came from the state formation process and state revenues. Edmund Terence Gomez (2018) highlighted the centralization of power and institutionalized involvement in business in his Minister of Finance Incorporated. These works share a focus on how the fusing of party and the state explain the longevity of the parties in power. Weiss's special contribution in this collection is to highlight the role of party organizations and patronage practices. Beyond her macro accounting of drivers of national politics, her analysis enriches studies of the dominant political parties in both countries, a scholarship that largely focuses on party leaders and legacies. While bringing greater depth to the analysis of the politics of Singapore and Malaysia, Weiss's analysis is still top-down. The engagement with voters, the operations of the party organizations (with their diversity) and the grassroots themselves are missing. They are acted upon rather than in a dynamic exchange. There are no meaningful voices explaining how voters or society has responded to the fusion of party, state, and patronage. As such, the discussion does not fully capture how the parties are rooted—both the expansion and contraction of the rootedness of the parties in Malaysian and Singaporean society require further elaboration. This speaks to a weakness in her analysis, its inability to effectively explain current changes taking place, as the power of both dominant parties has eroded and, in the case of Malaysia's UMNO, been displaced from power. While there is acknowledgment that the practices of patronage persist and the systems remain resilient for this reason, the top-down analytical lens leaves the reader wanting more, especially in light of the greater political instability and current tests of the resilience of the political systems. This perhaps is the subject of a subsequent study. The book appears to have been written for political scientists. The terminology and jargon speak to ongoing debates within the field and can be difficult to follow for the unfamiliar. The details in the careful accounting of political history and [End Page 239] the bold argument presented, however, make the book a valuable read and a much-needed contribution to deepen analysis of how politics in both countries are changing, now with weaker dominant parties decaying at their roots. [End Page 240] Bridget Welsh University of Nottingham Malaysia Copyright © 2021 Malaysian Branch of The Royal Asiatic Society