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141. Les usages pratiques du patriotisme en Russie

Author:
Myriam Désert, Marlène Laruelle, Françoise Daucé, Anne Le Huérou, and Kathy Rousselet
Publication Date:
06-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Internationales
Abstract:
Since the second half of the 1990s, the theme of national revival crystallized in Russia, notably in the form of a promotion of patriotism. The apparent convergence between an offer “from above” and a demand “from below” supports the idea that there exists a kind of patriotic consensus in Russia. This new tense and autarchic fusion between state and society summons old stereotypes about Russo- Soviet culture. This issue of Questions of Research seeks to go back over these stereotypes in order to show the diversity of “patriotic” practices in Russia today (which widely surpass the “militarist” variant generally evoked) and the connected social uses that are made of it. Following an overview of the existing literature on Russian nationalism and patriotism, as well as a presentation of the patriotic education curricula being implemented by the Russian state, our study on “patriotic” practices continues through several points of observation (patriotic summer clubs and camps for children and adolescents in Saint- Petersburg, Moscow and Omsk; ethno-cultural organizations; Orthodox religious organizations; and the discursive practices of economic actors). The examination of these different terrains reveals the diversity of everyday “patriotic” activities; and illustrates their utilization to multipleends (pragmatic concern for one's professional career, search for a personal source of inspiration, opportunities for enrichment, pleasure of undertaking activities with one's friend and relations…). In the end, these fieldwork surveys reveal motivations and commitments in which official patriotic discourse and the image of state are oft en secondary, sometimes even denied.
Topic:
Education, Politics, and Political Theory
Political Geography:
Russia

142. Marché, bureaucratie, formes de la domination politique: Une économie politique weberienne

Author:
François Bafoil
Publication Date:
04-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Internationales
Abstract:
From a broad perspective, political economy analyses economic and political exchanges proper to some social groups, embedded in particular historical periods. The great innovation of Max Weber's analysis is to highlight the intersubjective orientations that support these exchanges and characterize a particular period of history. This study firstly compares different features between free market economy and the soviet-type economy. Secondly, it measures their difference in accordance to the "ideal type" of "market", bureaucracy" and "forms of domination". Finally, it insists on the particular "hybrid" figures of "charisma" and "patrimonial bureaucracy".
Topic:
Economics, Markets, Political Economy, and Political Theory
Political Geography:
Russia and Europe

143. US Trade and Wages: The Misleading Implications of Conventional Trade Theory

Author:
Robert Z. Lawrence and Lawrence Edwards
Publication Date:
06-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Peterson Institute for International Economics
Abstract:
Conventional trade theory, which combines the Heckscher-Ohlin theory and the Stolper-Samuelson theorem, implies that expanded trade between developed and developing countries will increase wage equality in the former. This theory is widely applied. It serves as the basis for estimating the impact of trade on wages using two-sector simulation models and the net factor content of trade. It leads naturally to the presumption that the rapid growth and declining relative prices of US manufactured imports from developing countries since the 1990s have been a powerful source of increased US wage inequality.
Topic:
Economics, Political Theory, and Labor Issues
Political Geography:
United States

144. Die Herausforderung lokaler Vielfalt jenseits der westlichen Welt

Author:
Anke Draude and Sonja Neuweiler
Publication Date:
05-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Collaborative Research Center (SFB) 700
Abstract:
In this paper we intend to examine how postcolonial approaches can be used productively for governance research. The research of the research center (SFB) 700 focuses mainly on areas of limited statehood in postcolonial settings. Postcolonial theories are relevant to this research because they critique the application of Western categories to non-Western contexts. Eurocentric conceptions of governance tend to see the development of Western modernity as a norm by which social phenomena in the non-Western world are measured. By employing such a conception, SFB 700 risks overlooking the diversity of local governance configurations. In this paper we explore the potential of postcolonial critique, when applied to governance research, to better capture these alternative developments in non-Western contexts. The postcolonial discourse focuses on a variety of social, cultural and political developments in postcolonial settings. As a result, it seems particularly qualified to provide insights into concrete governance phenomena in the postcolonial world and to reveal the contingency of Western ideas about governance. To what extent can postcolonial approaches in the humanities and social sciences help us understand the geographical, institutional, and social diversity of governance in postcolonial areas of limited statehood?
Topic:
Political Economy, Post Colonialism, Political Theory, and Governance

145. The Iron Cage of Democracy: Institutional Similarity and Stasis in African Political Party Systems

Author:
Rachel Beatty Riedl
Publication Date:
11-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
This paper asks (a) how to understand the development of new institutions in nascent democracies, and (b) what explains the persistence of institutional forms that do not conform to rationalist expectations of competitive efficiency. Much scholarship focuses on the power of strategic coordination under formal rules to shape democratic institutions, such as the form of the party system. This article contends that strict rationalist explanations of party systems leave unexplored the ways in which individual politician's and voter's strategic calculations are bounded by the organizational imperatives of systemic competition. Sociological theories of institutional development better explain the organizational logic driving party system origin and endurance in new democracies. The article uses original interview data from three contrasting cases of party system development in Africa to highlight the empirical puzzle that drives this conclusion: despite seemingly analogous democratic origins, largely similar conditions of low economic development, high ethnic heterogeneity, and weak state capacity, as well as comparable formal electoral rules in pairwise combinations, the party systems across Africa demonstrate incredible cross-national variation in the ways in which political parties organize and compete for power. Additionally, party systems maintain these varied forms over time rather than converging on a “most efficient” model. A focus on the particular mechanisms of reproduction through institutional isomorphism contributes to the research agenda of explaining institutional development, change, and stability.
Topic:
Democratization, Political Theory, and Sociology
Political Geography:
Africa

146. In Search of an "Action Principle"

Author:
Patrick J. Glen
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Human Rights Human Welfare (University of Denver)
Abstract:
In his seminal work on the history of scientific development, Thomas Kuhn described the structure of that development as revolutionary in nature, occurring at that point in time “in which an older paradigm is replaced in whole or in part by an incompatible one.” The impetus for this paradigm shift is malfunction—“scientific revolutions are inaugurated by a growing sense … that an existing paradigm has ceased to function adequately in the exploration of an aspect of nature to which that paradigm itself had previously led the way…. [T]he sense of malfunction that can lead to crisis is prerequisite to revolution.” Kuhn himself analogized his conception of the theory and operation of scientific revolutions to political revolutions, drawing out parallels in genesis, form and function between the two. The notion of revolutionary change, or paradigm shifts, itself provides a useful framework to judge the evolution, current state, and potential future of international human rights and criminal law. Although the analogy must necessarily be incomplete, as is the analogy between scientific and political revolutions, it does go a long way in explaining how the current system of international justice has reached its present state, and what may need to occur before that system can develop further.
Topic:
Crime, Human Rights, Human Welfare, International Law, and Political Theory

147. Harmony and War: Confucian Culture and Chinese Power Politics

Author:
Yuan-kang Wang
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Book
Institution:
Columbia University Press
Abstract:
Confucianism has shaped a certain perception of Chinese security strategy, symbolized by the defensive, nonaggressive Great Wall. Many believe China is antimilitary and reluctant to use force against its enemies. It practices pacifism and refrains from expanding its boundaries, even when nationally strong. In a path-breaking study traversing six centuries of Chinese history, Yuan-kang Wang resoundingly discredits this notion, recasting China as a practitioner of realpolitik and a ruthless purveyor of expansive grand strategies. Leaders of the Song Dynasty (960–1279) and Ming Dynasty (1368–1644) prized military force and shrewdly assessed the capabilities of China’s adversaries. They adopted defensive strategies when their country was weak and pursued expansive goals, such as territorial acquisition, destruction of their enemies, and total military victory, when their country was strong. Despite the dominance of an antimilitarist Confucian culture, warfare was not uncommon in the bulk of Chinese history. Grounding his research in primary Chinese sources, Wang outlines a politics of power crucial to understanding China’s strategies today, especially its policy of “peaceful development,” which, he argues, the nation has adopted mainly because of its military, economic, and technological weakness in relation to the United States.
Topic:
International Relations, Political Theory, and History
Political Geography:
Asia
Publication Identifier:
9780231522403
Publication Identifier Type:
ISBN

148. How Are Markets Made?

Author:
Patrik Aspers
Publication Date:
02-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies
Abstract:
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the making of markets. The paper identifies two ideal-typical processes in which markets are made – organized making and spontaneous making – which are often combined in reality. Organized making is defined as a process in which at least two actors come together and decide on the order of the market. There are two ways of organized making of markets, called “state-governed market making” and “self-governed market making.” Spontaneous making is defined as a process in which the market is an unintended result of actors' activities. The attention sociologists have paid to the issue of market making has been directed largely at organized market making. This paper develops a sociological approach that integrates both spontaneous and organized market making, and identifies three phases of market making. This involves a discussion of empirical cases, and seven hypotheses are presented that make predictions for the two types of market making. The paper provides theoretical tools for studying the making of markets in history, as well as in our own time. Finally, a number of conditions are presented that must be in place if there is to be a market.
Topic:
Economics, Markets, Political Economy, and Political Theory

149. Pragmatismus und wirtschaftliches Handeln

Author:
Jens Beckert
Publication Date:
04-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies
Abstract:
What alternatives to rational choice theory do exist to explain economic phenomena? I argue that American pragmatism presents a viable alternative for the explanation of key economic incidences. First I illustrate the foundations of pragmatism using three problems regularly encountered in action theory. Then I show how innovation, institutional change, price formation and actors' preferences can be analyzed based on pragmatist premises. I conclude by reflecting on why pragmatism has found so little recognition in economics.
Topic:
International Relations, Economics, Political Economy, and Political Theory
Political Geography:
United States and America

150. Soziologie kapitalistischer Dynamik

Author:
Christoph Deutschmann
Publication Date:
05-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies
Abstract:
I address the "growth miracle“(William Baumol) of modern capitalism. The central point is that the historically unique social dynamics of modern capitalism cannot be conceptualized satisfactorily by theories of “economic growth”; instead, the explanation requires a genuinely sociological approach. The first part of the paper gives a critical summary of the existing modernization-theoretical approaches and outlines an alternative theoretical perspective which is based largely on the interpretations of money by Simmel and Marx. The second part delivers a multi-level approach of capitalist dynamics which culminates in the construction of three growth scenarios, one positive and two negative ones. These scenarios could contribute to illuminating the background of the actual economic crisis.
Topic:
Economics, Political Economy, Political Theory, and Sociology