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20221. Myanmar's Post-Election Landscape

Publication Date:
03-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
The November 2010 elections in Myanmar were not free and fair and the country has not escaped authoritarian rule. Predictably, in such a tightly controlled poll, the regime's own Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) won a landslide victory leaving the military elite still in control. Together with the quarter of legislative seats reserved for soldiers, this means there will be little political space for opposition members in parliament. The new government that has been formed, and which will assume power in the coming weeks, also reflects the continued dominance of the old order with the president and one of the two vice presidents drawn from its ranks and a number of cabinet ministers recycled.
Topic:
Civil Society, Democratization, and Human Rights
Political Geography:
South Asia, Asia, and Myanmar

20222. The Politics of International Media Rankings

Publication Date:
03-2011
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
The Harriman Institute
Abstract:
Participants: Lee Becker (Professor and Director, James. M. Cox Jr. Center for International Mass Communication Training and Research, University of Georgia), Karin Karlekar (Senior Researcher and Managing Editor, Freedom of the Press Index, Freedom House), Anne Nelson (Adjunct Associate Professor, Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs and former Executive Director, Committee to Protect Journalists) This event is part of the "Human Rights in the Post-Communist World: Strategies and Outcomes " series (Harriman Core Project 2010-2011).
Topic:
Democratization, Science and Technology, International Affairs, and Mass Media
Political Geography:
Georgia

20223. Tribunes versus experts: an analysis of the Romanian questions

Author:
Mihail Chiru and Valentina Dimulescu
Publication Date:
02-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Central European University Political Science Journal
Institution:
Central European University
Abstract:
The article proposes an original framework for analyzing all the questions addressed to the European Council and Commission by the thirty-three Romanian Members of the European Parliament (EP) in the first year of their European mandate. We rely on a complex dataset that includes the parliamentarians' age, gender, previous experience in the European legislature, position on the party list, when elected and the party national status (in opposition or government). The nearly 400 interpellations are content-analyzed and then multivariate statistical techniques are applied in order to explain first, the questions' frequency and second, their connections to topics related either to Romania or to the MEPs' committee work. Our results reflect the Romanian MEPs' adaptation to the major patterns of interpellation in the EP, while at the same time emphasizing the importance of re-election seeking motivations, as well as a rather novel gender-related difference in parliamentary behaviour.
Political Geography:
Europe

20224. The use of gendered victim identities before and during the war in former Yugoslavia

Author:
Tamara Banjeglav
Publication Date:
02-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Central European University Political Science Journal
Institution:
Central European University
Abstract:
The article discusses the construction of the self-victimization identities of former Yugoslav nations, which were developed through certain discourses and representational practices of the media controlled by nationalistic political elites. The victim identities analysed were largely constructed in gendered terms. Thus, the article analyzes examples of media reporting which used gendered victimization practices, in an attempt to reveal how national identity can be constructed as victim identity and how gender can be used to achieve this. In order to do this, the article looks at examples of articles published in some of the most prominent printed media from countries involved in the war (Serbia, Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina) reporting about gender-based sexual violence. It discusses the way in which the media covered events happening before the outbreak of war, which had consequences for later developments as it introduced the idea that sexual violence could be used as ethnic violence and as an effective tool of war.
Topic:
Mass Media

20225. Dual convergence or hybridization? Institutional change in Italy and Greece from the Varieties of Capitalism perspective

Author:
Andreas Kornelakis
Publication Date:
02-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Central European University Political Science Journal
Institution:
Central European University
Abstract:
The article tracks institutional changes within two central spheres for Varieties of Capitalism (VoC) theory: the industrial relations system and the finance/corporate governance system. Italy and Greece are examined in comparative perspective vis-à-vis CME and LME paradigm cases. The review of recent developments reveals that while industrial relations in both countries show signs of greater coordination, the finance/corporate governance system acquired increasingly liberal market characteristics. Thereby, this analysis casts doubt to the dual convergence thesis, arguing that the hybrid character of the two countries was exacerbated over the last two decades.
Political Geography:
Greece and Italy

20226. Agency theory and agency environment: elements and relations within British civil service

Author:
Önder Kutlu
Publication Date:
02-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Central European University Political Science Journal
Institution:
Central European University
Abstract:
This article examines an important tool of politics, the dichotomy between politics and administration, to reform administrative systems. Due to its success and the pioneering role in the implementation of agency reform and resultant provision of lessons for many countries (i.e. Netherlands and Norway) the British case is selected for evaluation. The British Next Steps Agencies Reform is examined by deploying historical reconstruction model, and intended to find out its basic elements and interactions between different such actors of the initiative as politicians, bureaucrats, agencies and departments. This illustrates the scale and scope of the relations with the idea of having shed light on Agency theory. Having examined the essential elements the study wishes to focus on the mechanism which has been introduced by the initiative dispenses certain degree of power to agencies. In doing so, the paper targets a balance between two actors of political systems, bureaucrats, and politicians.
Political Geography:
Turkey

20227. "Join a party or I cannot elect you": The independent candidate question in Tanzania

Author:
Alexander B. Makulilo
Publication Date:
02-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Central European University Political Science Journal
Institution:
Central European University
Abstract:
Independent candidates are not allowed in Tanzania. This restriction has raised debate which dominates multipartism and its efficacy in the country. Since the inception of multipartism in 1992, there have been three major cases on independent candidates. In the first two cases, the High Court ruled in favour of independent candidate. However, in the third case, the Court of Appeal, while subscribing to the need of independent candidates, it nullified the previous judgments by the High Court on the ground that the court had no jurisdiction in declaring a constitutional provision to be unconstitutional; and that the independent candidate issue being political and not legal should be resolved by the parliament. I argue that the Court of Appeal failed to exercise its mandate in administering justice. I further argue that such failure is attributed to the fear by the justices from the ruling party and its government.
Political Geography:
Tanzania

20228. Jagannath P. Panda, China's Path to Power: Party, Military and the Politics of State Transition (New Delhi: Pentagon Press Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, 2010).

Author:
Dinoj Kumar Upadhyay
Publication Date:
02-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Central European University Political Science Journal
Institution:
Central European University
Abstract:
The unprecedented rise of China as a global power in the international arena has prompted many global scholars and researchers to embark on critical studies of its dynamism and transition. Though much valuable literature is available on Chinese economic and social transformation for the interested readers, the vast majority does not depict a clear picture of “how, where and when China was transformed exactly?” There are several misperceptions associated with Chinese transformation, the nature of its polity, its decision-making processes, economic development and the civilian-military relationship. With his most recent work, China's Path to Power: Party, Military and the Politics of State Transition, Jagannath P. Panda seeks to explain, explore and conceptualize the Chinese transition design, “systemic incrementalism”, and provide a substantial contribution to the various facets of the never-ending debate on the rise of China. Panda argues that much of the analysis on the Chinese issues has been done through a prism of ideology and focused narrowly on its world view and economic growth. A scientific and comprehensive analysis of its gradual progressive reforms in the realm of politics and economics is missing.
Topic:
Military Strategy
Political Geography:
China

20229. Vĕra Stojarová and Peter Emerson (eds.), Party Politics in the Western Balkans (London and New York: Routledge, 2010).

Author:
Jelena Dzankic
Publication Date:
02-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Central European University Political Science Journal
Institution:
Central European University
Abstract:
Party Politics in the Western Balkans, edited by Vĕra Stojarová and Peter Emerson is a much-needed publication in the study of the political parties in the region. Although the Balkans area has attracted immense academic interest due to two turbulent decades, the examination of the political parties in the Western Balkans is limited to a handful of sources.Consequently, by overcoming the possible biases of the local literature and the vagueness of the more general analyses, Party Politics in the Western Balkans lays the basic pillar for the development of further and more detailed studies on the structure of political cooperation and competition in the region. The book does not offer an advanced conceptual framework for the development of analytical models of party politics in the transitional countries. Rather, after describing the political parties, it attempts to 'analyse the different outcomes of similar situations on the level of inter-ethnic or inter-party cooperation and competition' (p.3) in each of the countries in the region.
Political Geography:
New York and London

20230. Daniel J. Galvin, Presidential Party Building. Dwight D.Einsenhower to George W. Bush (Princeton University Press, 2010).

Author:
Rasa Balockaite
Publication Date:
02-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Central European University Political Science Journal
Institution:
Central European University
Abstract:
Finding terra incognita in a world exposed for academic gaze, a place of earth, an area of life, still not trampled down by the shoes of the theorists, still not torn into parts by their academic instruments – that's the task. The relationship between the US President and his party is territory of that kind. One can enter here with a pioneering gaze talk about it unburdened by the heavy weight of academic authorities or big names in the field, undisturbed by previous famous dictums and quotations and taking all the pride (or failure) for himself.
Political Geography:
United States