Democratic Consolidation in Eastern Europe: Volume 1: Institutional Engineering
Democratic Consolidation in Eastern Europe: Volume 1: Institutional Engineering

Author: Jan Zielonka

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2001

Total Pages: 506

ISBN-13: 0199241678

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This is the first volume in a series of books on democratic consolidation in Eastern Europe. The series focuses on three major aspects of democratic consolidation in Eastern Europe: institutional engineering, transnational pressures and civil society. This first volume analyses constraints on and opportunities of institutional engineering in Eastern Europe: to what extent and how elites in Eastern Europe have been able to shape, if not manipulate, the politics of democraticconsolidation through institutional means.The aim is to contrast a set of democracy theories with empirical evidence accumulated in Eastern Europe over the last ten years. The volume tries to avoid complex debates about definitions, methods and the uses and misuses of comparative research. Instead it tries to establish what has really happened in the region, and which of the existing theories have proved helpful in explaining these developments.The volume starts with a presentation of conceptual and comparative frameworks, followed by in-depth empirical analyses of the thirteen individual countries undergoing democratic consolidation. The first conceptual and comparative part contains three chapters. The first chapter explains what institutional engineering is about and describes our experiences with institutional engineering in former transitions to democracy. It also focuses on the import and export of institutional designs. Thesecond chapter analyses the utility of constitutions in the process of democratic consolidation. The third chapter compares constitutional designs and problems of implementation in Southern and Eastern Europe. The empirical case studies deal with the following countries: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania,Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, Russia, Belarus, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Hungary and Poland. And the conclusions evaluate the enormous impact of institutions on politics in Eastern Europe and show how central constitutional designs are to the institutional engineering in the societies undergoing transitions to democracy.

Democratic Consolidation and Constitutional Endurance in Asia and Africa
Democratic Consolidation and Constitutional Endurance in Asia and Africa

Author: Tom Gerald Daly

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2024-01-23

Total Pages: 401

ISBN-13: 0192899368

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What factors drive constitutional change and sustain positive transformation? How are democratic values recognised, restored, and preserved through constitutional change? Democratic Consolidation and Constitutional Endurance in Asia and Africa is a well-articulated response to the growing scholarly conversation on democratic backsliding and resilience. Bringing together leading and emerging voices in constitutional law, this groundbreaking new collection considers recent democratising events in Ethiopia, The Gambia, Malaysia, Maldives, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and Thailand. Across seven thematic chapters and seven case studies, the volume provides analytical insight into central topics arising from these events, including the role of political parties which depart from 'Western' frameworks; the often-marginalised place of courts; the centrality of civil-military relations; the explanatory power of constitutional culture; and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Offering a decolonising approach to constitutional law and democratisation studies, this book will be of keen interest to scholars, practitioners, and policymakers alike. It is essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the relationship between democratic decay and institutional endurance, and how such a relationship plays out in conditions of ongoing constitutional development.

Democratic Consolidation in Eastern Europe: Volume 1: Institutional Engineering
Democratic Consolidation in Eastern Europe: Volume 1: Institutional Engineering

Author: Jan Zielonka

Publisher: OUP Oxford

Published: 2001-06-14

Total Pages: 506

ISBN-13: 9780199241675

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This is the first volume in a series of books on democratic consolidation in Eastern Europe. The series focuses on three major aspects of democratic consolidation in Eastern Europe: institutional engineering, transnational pressures and civil society. This first volume analyses constraints on and opportunities of institutional engineering in Eastern Europe: to what extent and how elites in Eastern Europe have been able to shape, if not manipulate, the politics of democraticconsolidation through institutional means.The aim is to contrast a set of democracy theories with empirical evidence accumulated in Eastern Europe over the last ten years. The volume tries to avoid complex debates about definitions, methods and the uses and misuses of comparative research. Instead it tries to establish what has really happened in the region, and which of the existing theories have proved helpful in explaining these developments.The volume starts with a presentation of conceptual and comparative frameworks, followed by in-depth empirical analyses of the thirteen individual countries undergoing democratic consolidation. The first conceptual and comparative part contains three chapters. The first chapter explains what institutional engineering is about and describes our experiences with institutional engineering in former transitions to democracy. It also focuses on the import and export of institutional designs. Thesecond chapter analyses the utility of constitutions in the process of democratic consolidation. The third chapter compares constitutional designs and problems of implementation in Southern and Eastern Europe. The empirical case studies deal with the following countries: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania,Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, Russia, Belarus, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Hungary and Poland. And the conclusions evaluate the enormous impact of institutions on politics in Eastern Europe and show how central constitutional designs are to the institutional engineering in the societies undergoing transitions to democracy.

Designs for Democratic Stability
Designs for Democratic Stability

Author: Abdo I. Baaklini

Publisher: M.E. Sharpe

Published: 1997

Total Pages: 358

ISBN-13: 9780765600523

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Since the late 1980s and the collapse of communist, military, and race-based regimes across the world, the euphoria over democracy's triumph has given way to the practical question of how to enhance the viability of democratic constitutional government. That is the subject of this book, with particular attention to the following questions: -- What are the strengths and weaknesses of the available models of democratic governance and how adaptable are they to other societies? (Joel Aberbach; Bert Rockman; Gregory S. Mahler); -- What are the most effective mechanisms for ensuring the accountability of public officials? (Fred W. Riggs; James L. Sundquist); -- How does legislative structure enhance or diminish the prospects for democratic stabilization? (Abdo I. Baaklini); -- What can transitional societies learn from the experience of India, Turkey, and Russia? (T.V. Sathyamurthy; Ersin Kalaycioglu; Erik P. Hoffmann); -- How does the need for economic adjustment impact democractic consolidation? (Diane Ethier); -- How has globalization complicated the task of democratic state-building? (Philp G. Cerny).

Borrowing Constitutional Designs
Borrowing Constitutional Designs

Author: Cindy Skach

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2011-02-11

Total Pages: 168

ISBN-13: 1400832624

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After the collapse of communism, some thirty countries scrambled to craft democratic constitutions. Surprisingly, the constitutional model they most often chose was neither the pure parliamentary model found in most of Western Europe at the time, nor the presidential model of the Americas. Rather, it was semi-presidentialism--a rare model known more generally as the "French type." This constitutional model melded elements of pure presidentialism with those of pure parliamentarism. Specifically, semi-presidentialism combined a popularly elected head of state with a head of government responsible to a legislature. Borrowing Constitutional Designs questions the hasty adoption of semi-presidentialism by new democracies. Drawing on rich case studies of two of the most important countries for European politics in the twentieth century--Weimar Germany and the French Fifth Republic--Cindy Skach offers the first theoretically focused, and historically grounded, analysis of semi-presidentialism and democracy. She demonstrates that constitutional choice matters, because under certain conditions, semi-presidentialism structures incentives that make democratic consolidation difficult or that actually contribute to democratic collapse. She offers a new theory of constitutional design, integrating insights from law and the social sciences. In doing so, Skach challenges both democratic theory and democratic practice. This book will be welcomed not only by scholars and practitioners of constitutional law but also by those in fields such as comparative politics, European politics and history, and international and public affairs.

Democracy
Democracy

Author: Svante Ersson

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2013-04-15

Total Pages: 325

ISBN-13: 1135136424

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Jan-Erik Lane is a very experienced and well-known author Unique - no other book has such a systematic and global approach to their analysis of democracy (uses methodological positivism) Plenty of use of empirical evidence, so will be useful as a reference tool

Democratic Consolidation in Turkey
Democratic Consolidation in Turkey

Author: Cengiz Erisen

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-06-10

Total Pages: 347

ISBN-13: 131742736X

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While Turkey has made major strides in democratic reforms in the late 1990s and early 2000s, progress has, in many ways, stalled. Turkey remains "democratic" in the sense that attaining political power depends upon winning votes, but in recent years its leadership has taken a majoritarian view of democracy and the country has faced problems on issues such as rule of law, freedom of speech, and increased polarization. This book explores the understanding and practice of democracy in Turkey since the early 2000s, analyzing its evolution in light of the parliamentary elections held in 2015. Adopting a more holistic approach in line with the writing of Wolfgang Merkel, it recognizes that a successful, consolidated democracy has various micro and macro-level foundations. The former includes factors such as political values, tolerance, identity, and civil society, while the latter includes political economy, party competition, and institutional development. This volume rejects purely descriptive assessments and instead employs theoretical perspectives to analyze a dynamic political environment. It brings together a range of noted specialists on Turkish politics and society, who employ different methodological approaches and frameworks to offer a distinct scholarly work on democratization in Turkey. A thorough analysis of the problems of democratic consolidation, alongside an awareness of the theoretical and methodological debates in the discipline, make this book essential reading for students, scholars and policymakers interested in Turkish politics, as well as democratization and democratic transitions more generally.