Democratization through the looking-glass

Democratization through the looking-glass
Author: Peter Burnell
Publisher: Manchester University Press
Total Pages: 294
Release: 2018-07-30
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1526137305

This electronic version has been made available under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-ND) open access license. Democratization is a major political phenomenon of the age and has been the focus of a burgeoning political science literature. This book considers democratization across a range of disciplines, from anthropology and economics, to sociology, law and area studies. The construction of democratization as a unit of study reflects the intellectual standpoint of the inquirer. The book highlights the use of normative argument to legitimize the exercise of power. From the 1950s to the 1980s, economic success enabled the authoritarian governments of South Korea and Taiwan to achieve a large measure of popular support despite the absence of democracy. The book outlines what a feminist framework might be and analyses feminist engagements with the theory and practice of democratization. It also shows how historians have contributed to the understanding of the processes of democratization. International Political Economy (IPE) has always had the potential to cut across the levels-of-analysis distinction. A legal perspective on democratization is presented by focusing on a tightly linked set of issues straddling the border between political and judicial power as they have arisen. Classic and contemporary sociological approaches to understanding democracy and democratization are highlighted, with particular attention being accorded to the post-1989 period. The book displays particularities within a common concern for institutional structures and their performance, ranging over the representation of women, electoral systems and constitutions (in Africa) and presidentialism (in Latin America). Both Europe and North America present in their different ways a kind of bridge between domestic and international dimensions of democratization.

Democratization Through the Looking-Glass

Democratization Through the Looking-Glass
Author:
Publisher:
Total Pages: 283
Release: 2003
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9781847790699

Democratization is a major political phenomenon of the current age. Democratization through the looking glass argues that our perspectives on democratization reflect the intellectual origins of the inquiry. How we see and understand it are influenced by w

Democratization Through the Looking-glass

Democratization Through the Looking-glass
Author: Peter Burnell
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 387
Release: 2018-02-06
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1351522787

In Democratization through the Looking-Glass, Peter Burnell provides a revealing image of how our knowledge and understanding of democratization could be improved by viewing the topic through a more multi- disciplinary lens and from the perspective of more broadly based comparative analyses. Burnell and his contributors encourage readers to both "look and think outside of the box," beyond the limited parameters that usually shape the study of democratization. The goal of Democratization through the Looking-Glass is to pursue a more comprehensive understanding of democratization as a process taking many forms rather than just as a political phenomenon. With a viewpoint from a wider multi-disciplinary stance, and broader global geopolitical knowledge base, the contributors hope to get readers to better recognize and address gaps in the political science literature on the subject of democratization. The contributors seek to do this by specifically: explaining what democratization is while also making sense of the wide variety of experiences undergone by different societies at different times going through this very process; anticipating the wider effects of democratization's consequences for all human conditions at all levels; and critically assessing strategies for extending and deepening democracy by improving its positive qualities and chances of being sustained in societies into which it is introduced. This volume takes readers in the direction of predicting and foretelling the future of democracy and democratization with greater accuracy. In all, Democratization through the Looking-Glass provides a wide-ranging review of themes, issues, and topics concisely written by leading experts in their fields while advancing its case for more inclusive comparative studies covering Europe and North America, as well as developing regions, showing precisely how multi-disciplinary approaches enhance a global vision and understanding of democratization.

Upside Down

Upside Down
Author: Eduardo Galeano
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
Total Pages: 359
Release: 2014-05-13
Genre: History
ISBN: 1466869380

From the winner of the first Lannan Prize for Cultural Freedom, a bitingly funny, kaleidoscopic vision of the first world through the eyes of the third Eduardo Galeano, author of the incomparable Memory of Fire Trilogy, combines a novelist's intensity, a poet's lyricism, a journalist's fearlessness, and the strong judgments of an engaged historian. Now his talents are richly displayed in Upside Down, an eloquent, passionate, sometimes hilarious exposé of our first-world privileges and assumptions. In a series of lesson plans and a "program of study" about our beleaguered planet, Galeano takes the reader on a wild trip through the global looking glass. From a master class in "The Impunity of Power" to a seminar on "The Sacred Car"--with tips along the way on "How to Resist Useless Vices" and a declaration of "The Right to Rave"--he surveys a world unevenly divided between abundance and deprivation, carnival and torture, power and helplessness. We have accepted a reality we should reject, Galeano teaches us, one where machines are more precious than humans, people are hungry, poverty kills, and children toil from dark to dark. A work of fire and charm, Upside Down makes us see the world anew and even glimpse how it might be set right. "Galeano's outrage is tempered by intelligence, an ineradicable sense of humor, and hope." -Los Angeles Times, front page

The State of Democratic Theory

The State of Democratic Theory
Author: Ian Shapiro
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 196
Release: 2009-01-10
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 140082589X

What should we expect from democracy, and how likely is it that democracies will live up to those expectations? In The State of Democratic Theory, Ian Shapiro offers a critical assessment of contemporary answers to these questions, lays out his distinctive alternative, and explores its implications for policy and political action. Some accounts of democracy's purposes focus on aggregating preferences; others deal with collective deliberation in search of the common good. Shapiro reveals the shortcomings of both, arguing instead that democracy should be geared toward minimizing domination throughout society. He contends that Joseph Schumpeter's classic defense of competitive democracy is a useful starting point for achieving this purpose, but that it stands in need of radical supplementation--both with respect to its operation in national political institutions and in its extension to other forms of collective association. Shapiro's unusually wide-ranging discussion also deals with the conditions that make democracy's survival more and less likely, with the challenges presented by ethnic differences and claims for group rights, and with the relations between democracy and the distribution of income and wealth. Ranging over politics, philosophy, constitutional law, economics, sociology, and psychology, this book is written in Shapiro's characteristic lucid style--a style that engages practitioners within the field while also opening up the debate to newcomers.

Politics in the Developing World

Politics in the Developing World
Author: Peter J. Burnell
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Total Pages: 440
Release: 2005
Genre: Political Science
ISBN:

"The past-fifteen years have seen a transformation in the politics of the developing world and the way we think about it. This textbook identifies and analyses the processes and events that are changing politics in developing societies and shaping our perceptions of them."--BOOK JACKET.

America Through the Looking Glass

America Through the Looking Glass
Author: Roger Milton Barrus
Publisher:
Total Pages: 300
Release: 1994
Genre: Political Science
ISBN:

In America Through the Looking Glass, 15 distinguished conservative political scientists argue that the 1992 presidential campaign introduced a number of important, and potentially dangerous, innovations in campaign methods that undermined the very system of representative government the candidates sought to lead. By focusing on the campaign's public events, they consider the ways in which a campaign shapes public opinion, informing the American people's understanding of the structure and functioning of government.

Building Democracy in South Asia

Building Democracy in South Asia
Author: Maya Chadda
Publisher: Lynne Rienner Publishers
Total Pages: 268
Release: 2000
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9781555878597

4. King vs. Parliament: Democratization in Nepal