The German Political Foundations As Actors in Democracy Assistance

The German Political Foundations As Actors in Democracy Assistance
Author: Alexander Mohr
Publisher: Universal-Publishers
Total Pages: 442
Release: 2010
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1599423316

In Germany, political foundations (Stiftungen) play an important role in shaping civil society through political democracy education. The foundations, however, have also committed themselves to strengthening democratic political and societal structures abroad. Their joint mission abroad is the contribution to democratic structures, information and debate in the countries and regions they are working in. They complement the official German foreign policy, but choose their own priorities and strategies. The focus of this thesis is the German political foundations as actors in democracy assistance. 'Democracy assistance' focuses less on the aspects of technical assistance but much more on political parties and the promotion of civil society as the backbone of democracy. Democracy assistance is a relatively recent international development activity of governments and international organizations. In recent years the international community has come to realize the importance of political parties and a well-functioning political party system for the process of democratisation. Here the German political foundations are working internationally as actors in democracy assistance - independent from the German government but at the same time fully state-funded. The objectives of this dissertation are to understand the work and strategies of the German political foundations as actors in the context of democracy assistance abroad, research their partner spectrums on selected countries, to identify their short comings and to give an outlook of the foundations work in the future in the fast-changing global political environment.

Democracy Assistance

Democracy Assistance
Author: Peter Burnell
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 388
Release: 2013-10-23
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1135309612

This examination of how Western governments support democracy worldwide considers how countries use this aid. Attention is paid to post-conflict situations and semi-authoritarian regimes where democratization has stalled, and international support of democratic decentralization is assessed.

The Comparative International Politics of Democracy Promotion

The Comparative International Politics of Democracy Promotion
Author: Jonas Wolff
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 374
Release: 2013-09-11
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1134509626

Though scholarly attention to democracy promotion is increasing, there is still little comparative and theoretically-based work on the protagonists of democracy promotion. This book investigates the motives that drive democracy promotion in a comparative and theoretically oriented manner, exploring how democracy promoters deal with conflicting objectives and the factors that shape their behaviour. It also addresses the more policy-oriented debate on the contemporary challenges to democracy promotion, focusing on US and German policies towards three kinds of challenges: the emergence of ‘radical’ leftist governments in Bolivia and Ecuador, the political rise of Islamist movements in Turkey and Pakistan, and the consolidation of (semi-)authoritarian rule in Belarus and Russia. In each case, North-Western democracy promoters have been confronted with serious conflicts of objectives between security, economic interests and democracy promotion. The analysis and comparison of such situations in which democracy promoters have to deal with competing objectives and make tough decisions provides powerful evidence as to the factors that shape democracy promotion. The Comparative International Politics of Democracy Promotion will be of interest to students and scholars of international relations, comparative politics, democratization studies and foreign policy.

The Weimar Century

The Weimar Century
Author: Udi Greenberg
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 288
Release: 2016-09-13
Genre: History
ISBN: 0691173826

How ideas, individuals, and political traditions from Weimar Germany molded the global postwar order The Weimar Century reveals the origins of two dramatic events: Germany's post–World War II transformation from a racist dictatorship to a liberal democracy, and the ideological genesis of the Cold War. Blending intellectual, political, and international histories, Udi Greenberg shows that the foundations of Germany’s reconstruction lay in the country’s first democratic experiment, the Weimar Republic (1918–33). He traces the paths of five crucial German émigrés who participated in Weimar’s intense political debates, spent the Nazi era in the United States, and then rebuilt Europe after a devastating war. Examining the unexpected stories of these diverse individuals—Protestant political thinker Carl J. Friedrich, Socialist theorist Ernst Fraenkel, Catholic publicist Waldemar Gurian, liberal lawyer Karl Loewenstein, and international relations theorist Hans Morgenthau—Greenberg uncovers the intellectual and political forces that forged Germany’s democracy after dictatorship, war, and occupation. In restructuring German thought and politics, these émigrés also shaped the currents of the early Cold War. Having borne witness to Weimar’s political clashes and violent upheavals, they called on democratic regimes to permanently mobilize their citizens and resources in global struggle against their Communist enemies. In the process, they gained entry to the highest levels of American power, serving as top-level advisors to American occupation authorities in Germany and Korea, consultants for the State Department in Latin America, and leaders in universities and philanthropic foundations across Europe and the United States. Their ideas became integral to American global hegemony. From interwar Germany to the dawn of the American century, The Weimar Century sheds light on the crucial ideas, individuals, and politics that made the trans-Atlantic postwar order.

Routledge Handbook of Civil and Uncivil Society in Southeast Asia

Routledge Handbook of Civil and Uncivil Society in Southeast Asia
Author: Eva Hansson
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 507
Release: 2023-02-28
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1000841065

The Routledge Handbook of Civil and Uncivil Society in Southeast Asia explores the nature and implications of civil society across the region, engaging systematically with both theoretical approaches and empirical nuance for a systematic, comparative, and informative approach. The handbook actively analyses the varying definitions of civil society, critiquing the inconsistent scrutiny of this sphere over time. It brings forth the need to reconsider civil society development in today’s Southeast Asia, including activist organisations' and platforms' composition, claims, resources, and potential to effect sociopolitical change. Structured in five parts, the volume includes chapters written by an international set of experts analysing topics relating to civil society: Spaces and platforms Place within politics Resources and tactics Identity formation and claims Advocacy The handbook highlights the importance of civil society as a domain for political engagement outside the state and parties, across Southeast Asia, as well as the prevalence and weight of 'uncivil' dimensions. It offers a well-informed and comprehensive analysis of the topic and is an indispensable reference work for students and researchers in the fields of Asian Studies, Asian Politics, Southeast Asian Politics and Comparative Politics. The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license. Funded by The Research Foundation for State University of New York, USA and The Stockholm Center for Global Asia, Sweden.

Towards a Collaborative Memory

Towards a Collaborative Memory
Author: Sara Jones
Publisher: Berghahn Books
Total Pages: 254
Release: 2022-08-12
Genre: History
ISBN: 1800735960

Focusing on the memory of the German Democratic Republic, Towards a Collaborative Memory explores the cross-border collaborations of three German institutions. Using an innovative theoretical and methodological framework, drawing on relational sociology, network analysis and narrative, the study highlights the epistemic coloniality that has underpinned global partnerships across European actors and institutions. Sara Jones reconceptualizes transnational memory towards an approach that is collaborative not only in its practices, but also in its ethics, and shows how these institutions position themselves within dominant relationship cultures reflected between East and West, and North and South.

The Americanization of European Union Democracy Promotion

The Americanization of European Union Democracy Promotion
Author: José M. Magone
Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing
Total Pages: 301
Release: 2023-11-03
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1788113187

The Americanization of European Union Democracy Promotion: Ideology, Diversity, and United States Hegemony is a timely and thought-provoking exploration of the origins, development and growing prominence of international democracy promotion in the past hundred years.

States in the Developing World

States in the Developing World
Author: Miguel A. Centeno
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 493
Release: 2017-02-27
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1107158494

An exploration of how states address the often conflicting challenges of development, order, and inclusion.

Bounded Knowledge

Bounded Knowledge
Author: Daniele Cantini
Publisher: American University in Cairo Press
Total Pages: 299
Release: 2021-03-23
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1649030452

An ethnographic study of how doctoral-level research in the social sciences and humanities is produced in Egypt Much scholarship has been devoted to debates around how global inequalities of knowledge production arise from asymmetric power relations and disparities in access to material resources, as well as values and practices that prioritize certain academic disciplines and research outputs over others. The central role played by universities in producing both knowledge and researchers is similarly acknowledged, with the doctorate increasingly recognized as a crucial phase in establishing both. Bounded Knowledge: Doctoral Studies in Egypt explores these debates from a uniquely Egyptian perspective. It provides a fresh, historical analysis of how doctoral studies evolved in Egypt and an ethnographic inquiry into the actual conditions of knowledge production in the country’s public universities, with focus on the humanities and social sciences. Although it is commonplace to speak of international collaborations in knowledge production, institutional settings and material conditions are so uneven as to make the fiction of equality impossible to sustain. The chapters in this book, by social scientists within and outside Egypt, look closely at how such academic hierarchies are reinforced in the context of the internationalization of research. They also look at the ways in which notions of socially responsible research, common the world over, are translated in the particularly Egyptian context: how research topics are discussed, how doctoral studies are organized, and ultimately, how society thinks about research. Contributors Mona Abaza, The American University in Cairo, Egypt Daniele Cantini, Martin-Luther-University of Halle/Wittenberg, Germany Nefissa Dessouqi, Cairo University, Egypt Hala Kamal, Cairo University, Egypt Jonathan Kriener, Ruhr-University Bochum, Germany Ola Kubbara, Cairo University, Egypt Ahmed Mansour, University of Alexandria, Egypt David Mills, University of Oxford, England