Search

Begin New Search Topic Political Theory

131. We the Peoples? The Birth and Death of Self-Determination

Author:
Uriel Abulof
Publication Date:
05-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination, Princeton University
Abstract:
This paper traces the discourse of self-determination, its rise and possible demise. Self-determination evolved in three phases. The concept emerged from the intra-socialist debate on how to reconcile socialism and nationalism. The Bolshevik Revolution subsequently transformed this ideological debate into a “speech-act,” an act predicated, practically and ethically, on a specific speech. The concept was then universalized by Western diplomacy. Drawing on both content and discourse analysis, I argue that while self-determination as a political concept is still alive, as a universal speech-act it may be dying. Three trends undermine self-determination's ideal of duality (pertaining to both the individual and the collective) and mutuality (for the self as well as for others): (1) overshadowing the self-determination of peoples with the other-determination of states; (2) increasingly excluding non-colonized and ethnic peoples from the realm of eligible groups; (3) defending existing states while denying statehood to stateless peoples, due to both globalization and the rising emphasis on the state's functions, to protect and to represent, as prerequisites for self-determination. I conclude by suggesting that self-determination may be gradually developing to focus less on advancing new polities and more on justifying existing ones.
Topic:
Nationalism, Sovereignty, International Affairs, Political Theory, and Self Determination

132. Governance with/out Government: False Promises or Flawed Premises?

Author:
Tanja A. Börzel
Publication Date:
03-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Collaborative Research Center (SFB) 700
Abstract:
Governance with/out government has emerged as an alternative or functional equivalent to government. While there seems to be an increasing demand, the promise of governance to compensate for the weakness or failure of government rests on a major premise. Governments have to be strong enough so that non-governmental actors have an incentive to cooperate, and governments are not afraid of being captured. If this premise held, it would result in a serious dilemma for areas of limited statehood: The greater the demand for governance with/out government, the less likely it is to emerge and to be effective, precisely because government is weak.
Topic:
Government, Sovereignty, Political Theory, and Governance

133. The EU in Bosnia and Herzegovina: Powers, Decisions and Legitimacy

Author:
Bart M. J. Szewczyk
Publication Date:
03-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
European Union Institute for Security Studies
Abstract:
This Occasional Paper analyses the issue of the Bonn Powers in Bosnia – whereby the Office of the High Representative (OHR) can enact laws and remove elected officials – by comprehensively assessing the legitimacy of past OHR decisions. Adopting an established theory of legitimacy developed by Harold Lasswell and Myres McDougal, it argues that empirical legitimacy is best conceived as serving common interests of effective actors within an authorised process, and normatively prescribes that such process should be shaped to maximise values of human dignity. Given this theoretical framework, it examines the process authorised under the Dayton Agreement, which created the political structure that currently exists in Bosnia. It discusses the origins of the Bonn Powers and surveys the various criticisms that have been levelled against them. It then develops an overall analysis of all OHR decisions to date and provides a critique of those categories of decisions that appear inconsistent with the Dayton order and its proclaimed organising principles. Moreover, it provides a focused assessment of a sample of the most problematic decisions, e.g. the removal of elected officials, to show how their empirical legitimacy can be analysed. Finally, the paper concludes with policy recommendations, focusing on the issue of whether the Bonn Powers should be renounced or retained in the future.
Topic:
Government, Treaties and Agreements, International Affairs, and Political Theory
Political Geography:
Europe, Bosnia, and Balkans

134. Overmanaged Democracy in Russia: Governance Implications of Hybrid Regimes

Author:
Henry E. Hale, Nikolai Petrov, and Masha Lipman
Publication Date:
02-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
Can autocratic governments that incorporate elements of democracy provide good governance? The authors approach this question with an inductive study of Russia, which is widely regarded as a leading hybrid regime and an innovator in the field. They argue that for most of the past decade, and especially during Vladimir Putin's second term as president, Russia has been characterized by a hybrid regime that strongly resembles those in many other Eurasian states, as well as Venezuela and Iran. This type of regime combines a high degree of state centralization with the gutting of democratic institutions, and their sys-tematic replacement with substitutions that are intended to serve some of their positive functions without challenging the incumbent leaders' hold on power.
Topic:
Government, International Affairs, Political Theory, and Authoritarianism
Political Geography:
Russia and Eurasia

135. Discurso y narración en las dinámicas de cons-titución identitaria. La experiencia kirchnerista en Argentina

Author:
María Mercedes Patrouilleau
Publication Date:
02-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
CONfines de Relaciones Internacionales y Ciencia Política
Abstract:
The presidencial discourse has regained interest since the current theory of populism, and in Agentina spe-cially from discursive interpellation of its main leaders in last years, Néstor Kirchner y Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. This work examines discoursive interpellation of both leaders emphasizing the narrative dimension of discourse. Kirchnerismo as political subject proposes a new meaning of traditional elements of the national and popular (and peronism in particular), by the promotion of an “historic citizenship” for argentines and the arti-culation of a political history along a path marked by institutional disruption.
Topic:
Communications and Political Theory
Political Geography:
Argentina and South America

136. Eleştirel Gerçekçilik: Uluslararası İlişkiler Kuramında Post-Pozitivizm Sonrası Aşama

Author:
Faruk Yalvaç
Publication Date:
01-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Institution:
Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Abstract:
Critical realism is a philosophy of science that is increasingly occupying the center of discussion in the theory of International Relations. The most important aspect of critical realism is that it shifts the focus of controversy in international relations from epistemology to ontology. According to the materialist ontology of critical realism there exists a reality independent of our observations and experiences. This is an alternative to the dominant positivist as well as post-positivist conceptions of science which associate reality either with what can be observed or with what can be said and thought in discourse. Critical realism provides an understanding of science that overcomes the difficulties of both and explains international relations as part of a totality of social relations with varying ontological depths. By defining structures in terms of social relations, critical realism presents a structural analysis of international relations different from the structuralism of neorealism and develops a transformational model of social activity which tries to avoid both the voluntarism of individualist/unit based analyses and the determinism of structuralist analyses.
Topic:
Political Theory
Political Geography:
Global Focus

137. The Resource Curse and Rentier States in the Caspian Region: A Need for Context Analysis

Author:
Hannes Meissner
Publication Date:
05-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
German Institute of Global and Area Studies
Abstract:
Although much attention is paid to the Caspian region with regard to energy issues, the domestic consequences of the region's resource production have so far constituted a neglected field of research. A systematic survey of the latest research trends in the economic and political causalities of the resource curse and of rentier states reveals that there is a need for context analysis. In reference to this, the paper traces any shortcomings and promising approaches in the existent body of literature on the Caspian region. Following on from this, the paper then proposes a new approach; specifically, one in which any differences and similarities in the context conditions are captured. This enables a more precise exploration of the exact ways in which they form contemporary post-Soviet Caspian rentier states.
Topic:
International Relations, Democratization, Development, Political Theory, and Natural Resources
Political Geography:
Central Asia and Caspian Sea

138. From Rivalry to Mutual Trust: The Othering Process between Bolivia and Chile

Author:
Leslie Wehner
Publication Date:
05-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
German Institute of Global and Area Studies
Abstract:
Bolivia and Chile live in a culture of rivalry as a consequence of the Nitrate War (1879 ‐ 1883). In each country's case, the construction of the other as a threat, a rival and/or inferior has shaped the discursive articulation of the bilateral relationship. Whereas the culture of rivalry is more evident in Bolivia because of its aspiration to alter the border, Chile's status ‐ quo position, which stresses that there are no pending issues with Bolivia, as well as its construction of itself as superior, also represents rivalrous behavior. The perception of Chile as a threat and rival became especially evident in Bolivia during these two countries' bilateral negotiations to export gas to and through Chile (gas crisis from 2001 ‐ 05). However, since Evo Morales and Michelle Bachelet took office in Bolivia (2006 ‐ present) and in Chile (2006 ‐ 10), respectively, they have sought to change this culture of rivalry to one of friendship by constructing discursive articulations of self and other based on the principle of building mutual trust. Such a change in the form of othering is only possible to understand within the context of a crisis of meanings. The new approach of othering the counterpart as a friend has filled the void of meaning left by the crisis of discursive articulations of othering the counterpart as a rival, a threat and/or inferior.
Topic:
Political Theory and Bilateral Relations
Political Geography:
South America, Chile, and Bolivia

139. Necessary fictions: Indigenous claims and the humanity of rights

Author:
Peter Fitzpatrick
Publication Date:
02-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Human Rights Human Welfare (University of Denver)
Abstract:
To begin, not propitiously. When checking whether my title 'Necessary Fictions' was being used elsewhere, Google revealed that it was going to be used in a future talk, and by me. It transpired mercifuly that this use was going to be quite different to the present which suggested the prospect of a new academic genre: same title, different paper; rather than the standard combination of same paper, different title. Fortuitously, that contrast gave me the leitmotiv for this talk – that things ostensibly the same can be different, and that things ostensibly different can be the same.
Topic:
Human Rights, International Law, Political Theory, and Minorities
Political Geography:
United Arab Emirates

140. Exit During Crisis: How Openness, Migration, and Economic Crisis Affect Democratization

Author:
Joseph Wright
Publication Date:
05-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
Does economic crisis lead to authoritarian regime breakdown and democratization? In this paper, I argue that the availability of exit options for citizens conditions the relationship between economic crisis and democratization. Where citizens have more viable exit alternatives, economic crisis causes citizens to exit rather than protest, making democratization less likely. I measure exit options in three ways: a geographic instrument for bilateral trade; neighboring country GDP per capita; and past net migration. I use time series, cross - section data on up to 122 authoritarian regimes in 114 countries from 1946 – 2002 to test this argument and find evidence consistent with the hypothesis that more attractive exit options insulate dictators from the liberalizing effects of economic crisis.
Topic:
Democratization, Economics, Government, Political Theory, Financial Crisis, and Authoritarianism