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THEORY AND PRACTICE OF POLITICS STATE STRENGTH State: an entity that relies on coercion and the threat of force to rule in a given territory. State Strength: a ability to coerce and control the inhabitants of a given territory. Other definitions of state strength: The effectiveness with which a stat...

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THEORY AND PRACTICE OF POLITICS

#1: STATE STRENGTH State: an entity that relies on coercion and the threat of force to rule in a given territory. State Strength: a state’s ability to coerce and control the inhabitants of a given territory. Other definitions of state strength:  The effectiveness with which a state is able to convert policy intentions into actions.  

Contractarian view of the state  The ability of the state to legislate, to provide public goods Predatory view of the state  The ability of the state to dictate public actions and to extract wealth from the public in order to ensure the continued existence of the state

Therefore, when does a state “fail”? 

When the state is transformed into an “instrument of predation” and politicians employ political power to channel resources to their own interests rather than to those who need it. (Bates, 2008)

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Unable to provide the public goods that they are supposed to

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When a state has lost its ability for coercion and successful control of inhabitants in the territory

E.g. Somalia  From 1991 to 2012, at least 14 attempts to establish a national government in Somalia all failed.  Until August 2012, The Transitional Federal Government (TFG) – recognized by foreign powers as the legitimate government – only controlled a small part of the capital Mogadishu  Was a safe haven for terrorists, in part due to its geographical proximity to Al-Qaeda strongholds but also due to the absence of a strong central government which meant that foreign countries had very little leverage over terrorist activities within Somalia

Factors Influencing State Strength: INSTITUTIONAL 1. Acemoglu & Robinson (2012) It is primarily the nature of institutions within the state that determines state strength. When a state exists in poverty, that poverty ultimately breeds discontent, which in turn undermines the stability of a state. The key factor to strength and stability in a country therefore lies in its institutional frameworks, for it is these frameworks that determine the prosperity of a state.  E.g. in the late 18th century, the generosity of banks in the USA in doling out capital to young entrepreneurs facilitated rapid growth and industrialisation.  In contrast, the lack of banking institutions in Mexico led to high interest rates and confined moneylending to a small sector of society, inhibiting the same sort of socioeconomic mobility that had occurred in the USA.

THEORY AND PRACTICE OF POLITICS 2. Extractive vs. Inclusive Institutions 

Countries differ in their economic success because of their different institutions, the rules influencing how the economy works, and the incentives that motivate people

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Extractive political institutions concentrate power in the hands of a small sector of society, which often results in this power being exploited to benefit the few that hold it.

 Inclusive political institutions enable power to be more evenly distributed in society, where those possessing power are limited in their ability to abuse it. Because the nature of a state’s political institutions often also effectively dictate its other institutions, such as economic institutions (see: Nogales) it therefore has an integral part to play in explaining variations in state strength.

E.g. North and South Korea exhibit limited geographical and cultural differences yet… North:  Kim Il-Sung, Kim Jong-Il, and their cronies had no intention of reforming the system, or introducing private property, markets, private contracts, or changing economic and political institutions. North Korea continues to stagnate economically. South:  Established economic institutions that encourage investment and trade.  Invested in education, achieving 97.9% literacy as of 2015.  Policies encouraging investment and industrialization, exports, and the transfer of technology.  One of East Asia’s “Miracle Economies,” one of the most rapidly growing nations in the world.

COUNTER ARGUMENTS: Mancur Olson (2000) Not always the case that extractive political institutions necessarily result in weak states.

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The Mafia Gang analogy: A Mafia gang collects protection money from every business in town, threatening to destroy the place if not appeased. Actually destroying the business is not its incentive. To do so, it would lose a source of income altogether, and would even frighten away other legitimate businesses from whom more protection money could be extorted.

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Best interest of the Mafia is to be a ‘benefactor to those he robs’, offering legitimate protection against other gangs, or even providing public goods such as street lighting and roads to improve the conditions of its domain  promotes business  gives the Mafia a larger margin to extract.

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Insofar as the Mafia is secure in their position their interest aligns with the long-term success of their domain. But should the Mafia begin to lose monopoly over the domain, they would simply decide to plunder the region and extort as much as possible in the short-term while they still can.

THEORY AND PRACTICE OF POLITICS 

Therefore, destructive extraction only occurs in those states where the ruling power deems that they are at a risk of being replaced. During periods of regime stability, a ruling power’s best interest is in sharing the benefits of growth through inclusive economic institutions.

E.g. China is a state of extractive institutions. The Communist Party is all-powerful in China and controls the entire state bureaucracy, the armed forces, the media, and large parts of the economy. Chinese people have few political freedoms and very little participation in the political process. However, its 7% GDP growth rate in 2015 and rapid improvements in technology and infrastructure are far cry from what A&R might expect from a state comprised of predominantly extractive institutions. This is b/c China consists of extractive political institutions, but has decisively inclusive economic policies, which were established after Deng Xiaoping’s reform movement. Today, China’s leaders are incentivized by the personal benefits they reap from China’s growth to implement the necessary inclusive economic policy and institutions to cultivate it. BUT extractive political institutions causing state failure is a reality: 

It is still usually the case that inclusive political institutions support inclusive economic institutions, and vice versa.

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Extractive economic institutions do not create the incentives needed for people to save, invest, and innovate. Extractive political institutions support these economic institutions by cementing the power of those who benefit from the extraction. Extractive economic and political institutions, though their details vary under different circumstances, are always at the root of this failure.

E.g. In Sierra Leone and in much of sub-Saharan Africa, a vicious circle of persisting extractive institutions is caused by post-independence leaders taking over the extractive institutions set up by colonial powers. Sociological Cleavages E.g. In societies where deeply ingrained cleavages and prejudices exist such as India or Cambodia, division along religious, ethnic, or class boundaries cause inclusive institutions to not function as expected. States are inherently weakened when societies are divided, for no matter the form of institution, there will always be an internal instability within the state. Dictatorship is ineffective because the side not represented in government will always be marginalised (and unhappy), and democracy would simply result in inefficient policy passing. Presidential vs. Parliamentary Linz argued with reference to democracies within Latin America that a comparison of parliamentarism with presidentialism leads to the conclusion that, on balance, the former is more conducive to stable democracy than the latter. He tried to explain this phenomenon by stating that presidentialism inherently creates instability within a state because in presidentialism, cross‐branch coordination is neither encouraged nor guaranteed, even given preference overlap between the president and his legislative majority. Furthermore, the lack of a vote of no-confidence procedure means that the firstly, the President cannot appeal to motion for confidence to ‘ensure’ legislature support, and fixed terms of mean that grievances with the President cannot be properly expressed (vote of no-con), which could breed internal

THEORY AND PRACTICE OF POLITICS dissent. Cheibub argued against this by stating that the observed fragility of presidential democracies is a function not of presidentialism per se, but of the fact that presidential democracies have existed in countries where the environment is inhospitable for any kind of democratic regime. Democracies that are preceded by military dictatorships are more unstable than those that are preceded by civilian dictatorships  PRES more likely to follow military dictatorships. Examine: USA, one of the most established states in the world is a presidential democracy of the purest kind.

CULTURAL The culture hypothesis stresses that a state’s religion, values, and other beliefs are either conducive or inconducive for the formation of a strong state. E.g. some might suggest that Africa is a weak state because African culture lacks the attitudes and ethics for stable state formation and development. COUNTER-ARGUMENTS: Besides the fact that this theory is vaguely offensive… E.g. China, Hong Kong, and Singapore experienced rapid economic growth amidst beliefs that Chinese culture and/or Confucian values are detrimental to economic growth. Furthermore, it is often the case that culture is a result rather than a contributing factor to a state’s history and the institutions that arose throughout this history. E.g. if Africans trust each other less readily than other nationalities, it could very well be a sociological result of the state’s long history with slavery, rather than a standalone phenomenon to be used to explain state weakness. + The cultural hypothesis cannot explain variations of state strength between countries of similar culture. E.g. North & South Korea have very little differences geographically and culturally. E.g. The city of Nogales is a city divided between the United States and Mexico. Nogales, Arizona and Nogales, Sonora are incredibly similar both geographically and culturally, but have contrastingly different standards of living and political structures. (Acemoglu & Robinson, 2012)

GEOGRAPHICAL 1. Charles Tilly (1990) The development of modern European states is an unintended consequence of strategies employed by lords and kings to maintain grasp on power amidst highly dense populations coming into conflict over scarce (and therefore high-value) land. If states did not prepare for war, they would have become extinct. It is the preparation for war that resulted in the establishment of states and the internal structures within such states. This is because war required a substantial military, and the development of a substantial military necessarily meant the rise of various other institutions and services in the state. Additionally, to get money for wars, kings had to build bureaucracies, gather information, and map their territory and people. They also had to make concessions— such as creating regular parliaments where citizens could have a voice. An alternative to concessions was to crush domestic opponents who resisted the demands of kings.

THEORY AND PRACTICE OF POLITICS In a ‘multiplier’ effect, all of these eventually established a reasonably “durable” state structure in the form of the state’s internal institutions.

2. Jeffrey Herbst (2000) – Inspired by Tilly Looks specifically at African states in his analysis. He attributes Africa’s lack of consolidated power to its low population density and starkly varying internal geography. He notes that Africa’s surplus of land results in land commanding a low value. Unlike in Europe and Asia where limited land gave birth to modern farming implements such as the plough, farmers in Africa did not feel compelled to fully utilise the spaces of land that they occupied, as land was not scarce. Power was not synonymous with the control of land in Africa. Zulu rulers believed that their authority extended anywhere “people had pledged obedience to the king”, rather than in accordance to any sort of geographical or territorial boundary. Also, the decentralised nature of African states meant that expanding territory over extensive geographical space would have been necessary to exert power over communities such as the Ibo, whose people group inhabit absolutely vast areas of land. This would have been far too logistically costly for the Dutch. Hence, since there was no war over land in Africa, states did not need to invest in bureaucracies, taxes or armies. Since states never had to fight to survive they never had to build effective fiscal institutions. Therefore they have no tax bases and instead have to engage in highly distortionary methods of raising taxes (such as taxing trade) or redistributing income (for example via employment in parastatals). Since states never had to fight to survive, rulers never had to consolidate their rule and crush domestic opposition; hence the incidence of warlordism so evident in countries ( E.g. Angola, Liberia, and Sierra Leone). States never had to make political concessions to their citizens, hence the lack of functioning domestic political institutions such as parliaments and the completely unconsolidated nature of democracy in Africa. Moreover, the lack of these institutions can help explain the extent of venality and state corruption in Africa since these institutions provide key checks on such abuses. COUNTER ARGUMENTS: James A. Robinson (2002) Herbst fails to sufficiently consider the impact of colonialism on Africa’s states. Although Herbst suggests that it was “impossible for Europeans to have changed everything” during their period of rule, this discounts the sustained influence that European colonialism, and particularly the Atlantic slave trade, had on Africa far beyond periods of colonial rule. Colonialism, in fact, stimulated the formation of predatory institutions and halted development in African states. E.g. One could also observe a similar, although more positive phenomenon in Britain’s colonisation of Hong Kong or Singapore. These countries experienced growth and stability after independence partly due to the establishment of the foundations of a stable state set down by the British.

THEORY AND PRACTICE OF POLITICS

#2: DEMOCRACY Assessing Levels of Democracy There are two main differences diving theories of democracy classification: (1) Minimalist vs. Substantive The minimalist view of democracy classifies political regimes only in regard to their institutions and procedures. Minimalist: Most established: Robert Dahl’s 7 “procedural minimal” conditions for “polyarchies” (or liberal democracies), which can broadly be divided into two dimensions:  

Contestation - the extent to which citizens are free to challenge or contest incumbent rulers Inclusion - the universality of whom within a regime is entitled to vote. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

Elected officials Free and fair elections Frequent elections Freedom of expression Access to alternative sources of information Associational autonomy Inclusive citizenship/ universal suffrage

Polity IV scale (Marshall, et al. 2010) 

Democracy on a scale of -10 to 10 (10 being the most democratic), scoring countries based on 5 different attributes: the competitiveness & openness of executive recruitment, the constraints that exist on the executive, the regulation of political participation, and the competitiveness of political participation.

Substantive: Freedom House

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Assesses whether or not there is academic freedom, freedom from war, and freedom from socioeconomic inequalities (Clark, Golder & Golder, 2009)

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Freedom House is not in itself a democracy indicator but is widely used by scholars as if it were. This is problematic because threats to freedom can come from other origins other than authoritarian rule, such as from organised crime or militant sectarian and fundamentalist groups.

Schmitter & Karl 

Democracy “does not consist of a single unique set of institutions” and is also contingent upon a country's socioeconomic conditions in addition to its state structures and policy practices.

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Regimes moving away from authoritarian rule can aggregate different components of institutions, practices, or values to produce different types of democracies. No particular democracy is intrinsically more democratic than another, just differently so.

THEORY AND PRACTICE OF POLITICS 

Characteristics of regimes are not so much as components for democracy, but rather indicators of a specific form of democracy, or useful standards for evaluating the performance of particular regimes.

(2) Dichotomous vs. Continuous Simply dividing states as democratic or non-democratic vs. identifying them along a continuum Continuous: Dahl and Polity IV Dichotomous: Democracy-Dictatorship (DD) Measure Regimes are either a democracy, or a dictatorship, with no point in between where a country can be simultaneously and equally democratic and dictatorial (Cheibub, Gandhi, and Vreeland, 2010). Neither Dichotomous nor Continuous: Steven Levitsky (Theory of Competitive Authoritarianism) 

Some regimes are not ‘transitional’ democracies on a path away from authoritarianism, but are a form of hybrid regime that fall short of fulfilling the criteria necessary to be democratic, but also of those that would make them authoritarian.

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Competitive authoritarian regimes fail to meet conditions for democracy as they are characterised by frequent and “serious enough” violations of democracy’s fundamental conditions, which creates an uneven playing field between government and opposition.

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Elections are regularly held and are generally free of massive fraud but incumbents regularly utilise other means of manipulating electoral results i.e. through abusing state resources, denying opposition candidates adequate media coverage, and harassing opposition supporters.

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However, competitive authoritarian regimes do not qualify as completely authoritarian either, because although the opposition in such regimes may be inherently disadvantaged, there still exists meaningful contestation for power.

E.g. In the 1990’s, polities across much of Africa (Kenya, Mozambique, Zambia, Zimbabwe), post-communist Eurasia (Croatia, Russia, Ukraine), Asia (Malaysia, Taiwan, Singapore), and Latin America (Haiti, Mexico, Peru) combined democratic rules with authoritarian governance

Schmitter & Karl 

Regimes are unique combinations of institutions, practices, and values, and therefore form “differently democratic” institutions. Hence, they cannot be viewed as distinct points along a single continuum of improving performance. Rather, they should be conceptualised simply as a matrix of potential combinations of differently democratic regimes.

Do the results of these indicators agree? Yes, for ‘extreme’ cases:

THEORY AND PRACTICE OF POLITICS A 2008 comparison of the DD, Polity IV, and Freedom House scores saw a general agreement across the three measures that most countries in North America, Europe, and Australasia are democracies and that most countries in the Middle East are dictatorships. (Clark, Golder, & Golder, 2009) But generally, no lol: Much disagreement over regimes that occupied the middle of the distribution in Polity IV and Freedom House measures, such as the mixed and...