Comparative Politics Final Exam

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primordialist argument

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1. treat culture as something that is objective and inherited—something that has been fixed since primordial times
2. Clifford Geertz,

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constructivist argument

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1. treat culture as something that is constructed or invented rather than inherited
2. Przeworski

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Civic Culture

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1. is conceptualized as a shared cause of attitudes that includes things like a high level of interpersonal trust, a preference for gradual societal change, a high level of support for the existing political system, and high levels of life satisfaction

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Gabriel Almond and Sidney Verba.
2. The World Values Survey has done ongoing research in this area

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What scholars are associated with civic culture?

1. What organization and/or program conducts on-going research on this area?

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1. Parochial, Subject, Participant

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1. What primary types of civic culture exist?

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Subject Civic Culture

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1. were compatible with democracy, and were congruent with centralized authoritarian institutions like those seen in the Soviet-dominated Eastern Europe

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Participant civic Culture

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1. were compatible with democracy

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Parochial Civic Culture

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1. these cultures were compatible with the traditional political systems of African tribes
2.

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1. Some scholars argue that economic development produces cultural change that leads to democratization
2. Some scholars argue that economic development leads to democratization, which, in turn, leads to cultural change.

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1. What is the connection between various cultures and democratic survival and/or emergence?

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1. cultural modernization theory

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1. theory argues that socioeconomic development does not directly cause democracy; instead, economic development produces certain cultural changes, such as the emergence of a civic culture, and it is these cultural changes that ultimately produce democratic reform
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1. Early people saw democracy as a boon for society because they protect certain freedoms, more fair than dictatorships, protect individuals property rights, dictatorial autonomy, and the citizens’ incentive to consume rather than invest.
2.

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1. Why did early work believe democracy was a boon for society?

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1. The causal mechanism logic of property rights argument in favor of democracy is that democracy helps ensure the rule of law, that the rule of law then helps secure stable property rights, and that stable property rights then encourage growth-boosting investment.
2.

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1. Explain the causal mechanism between democracy and economic growth.

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1. The scholars that had argued that democracy leads to economic growth were Barro in 1989 and 1990, North in 1990, and Olson in 1991.
2. The scholars that had argued that democracy leads to lower levels of economic growth were de Schweintz in 1959, Galenson in 1959, Huntington in 1968, and Huntington and Dominguez in 1975.
3. The scholars that argued that the regime type had little to nor effect on economic growth were Przeworski and Limongi in 1993, Przeworkski et al. in 2000, and Sirowy and Inkeles in 1991.
4.

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1. Which authors allege that democracy is a boon for growth? Who refutes this argument
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1. The scholar Barro finds that the rule of law does significantly encourage economic growth when he examines from roughly one hundred countries between 1960 and 1995. Therefore he claims that because a similar relationship exists between the rule of law and the ration of of investment to gross domestic product (GDP), then “one route by which better rule of law promotes growth is by encourage investment. Everything seems good for that property rights argument linking democracy to economic growth.

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1. What evidence exists to suggest that there is a positive correlation between democracy and economics?

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1. Some scholars argue that democracies will enjoy higher levels of economic growth than dictatorships because democracies are characterized by the rule of law and the protection of property rights. According to these scholars, democracy places limits on the ability of governments to engage in the arbitrary seizure of private property. As a result, democracy encourages investment, and in turn, growth.
2. Also, empirical evidence suggest that although democracy is often sufficient for ensuring a high level of citizen material well-being, it is certainly not necessary; some dictatorships perform at relatively high levels as well.
3.

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1. Why might regime type not matter?

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1. One reason why the relationship between democracy and economic growth is not clear cut has to do with the fact that democratic governments appear to be more than capable of abrogating or abolishing property rights when they want. One explanation for why democracy might fail to protect property rights can be derived from a model of the size of government known as the Meltzer-Richard model.

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1. What is the relevance of the Meltzer-Richard Model in these discussions between regime type and economic growth?
2.

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1. The claim that dictators are not subjected to as many pressures from special interests as democratic leaders, leads to why some political scientist use the claim that dictators enjoy more autonomy from special interests than democratic leaders do in order to argue that dictatorships are better for economic growth.
2.

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1. What is the importance of autonomy here?
2.

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1. Selectorate theory

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1. characterizes all governments by their location in a two-dimensional institutional space. One dimension is the size of the electorate, and the second dimension is the size of the winning coalition.

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1. differentiates between different types of dictatorships as well as between dictatorships and democracies. The key factor that distinguishes democracies from dictatorships is the size of the winning coalition.
2. With democracies and authoritarians states and regimes,
3.

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1. How is germane to the conversation on regime type and its implications? How is it different from previous work on democracies or authoritarian states? (Selectorate theory)
2.

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1. Bueno de Mesquita, Smith, Siverson, and Marrow are responsible for selectorate theory.

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1. Who is responsible for selectorate theory?

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1. A presidential democracy is one in which the government does not depend on a legislative majority to exist
2. A parliamentary democracy is one in which the government depends on a legislative majority to exist and the head of state is not popularly elected for a fixed term
3. A semi-presidential democracy is one in which the government depends on a legislative majority to exist and the head of state is popularly elected for a fixed term
4.

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1. What are the various regime types operating in the world today?

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1. Presidential democracy: democracies in which the government does not depend on a legislative majority to exist are presidential
2. Parliamentary democracy: democracies in which the government depends on a legislative majority to exist and in which the head of state is not popularly elected for a fixed term are parliamentary
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1. How can we distinguish between presidential and parliamentary systems?

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1. The head of state, either a monarch or a president, presides over the government formation process, and ti is he who ultimately invests a government with the constitutional authority to take office. The extent to which the head of state actively become involved in the actual bargaining varies from country to country. In some countries, the head of state is limited to simply swearing in the government proposed by the party elites. If there is an investiture vote, then the proposed government must demonstrate that it has a legislative majority. Once this is done, the head of state simply appoints the government. This government stays in power until the next election, until it loses in a vote of no confidence, or until it resigns. In other countries, the head of state plays a more active role by choosing a particular politician to initiate the government formation process.
2.

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1. Discuss the government formation process in the various types of governments in contemporary democracies.

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formateur

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1. is the person designated to form the government in a parliamentary regime,
2. is often the prime minister designate

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1. In coalition cabinets, the discretion that the prime minister had in nominating cabinet members is obviously more constrained. Typically, party leaders in the proposed cabinet will nominate particular ministers to the subset of portfolios that have been allocated to their party during the initial stages of the government formation process. Although possible, it is rare to see the prime minister or party leaders veto a nomination by another party leader.We do not see nominations vetoed, though, does not necessarily mean that party leaders have full discretion over who they nominate. Given the considerable influence that cabinet members have over policy in their respective portfolios, party leaders will bargain hard, first over how many ministerial portfolios they get and second over who should be appointed to these posts, before deciding whether to support the purposed cabinet.
2. Office seeking incentives are more prevalent in contemporary democracies.

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1. What are the primary theories behind coalition formation? Are policy- or office-seeking incentives more prevalent in contemporary democracies?

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Property rights, gives individuals the opportunity to open a business, increase consumption

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Give one reason why democracy may be beneficial to economic growth.

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Presidential, Parlimentary, and Semi-Presidential

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What are two primary regime types discussed in the chapter?

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the amount/number of legislative seats in a district

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district magnitude

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Lijhpart

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Who is the author that came up with the notion of consociational system?

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single-party system, dominant party system, and multiparty system

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Give two example of party-systems in existence today.

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They do not have to worry about being influenced by their society, and they can make decisions quick, they can make quick economic policies that benefit short-term and long-term

- deal with social pressures to adopt measures for short-term and long-term beneficial

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Give one reason why dictatorships were thought to be better for economic growth.

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legislative supremacy, checks and balances, parliament, majoritarian electoral systems, unicameral legislative systems

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What are some institutional components of a majoritarian government?

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- to establish legitimacy between the people and the government

- to undercut their opponents

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Give two reasons why an authoritarian system would hold an election?

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Dominant means that there can be a multiparty system that always wins elections

One party system there is only one party that wins elections

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What is the differences between a dominant and a one party system?

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Great Britain

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Give an example of a country that has a parliamentary government.

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North & Debarro

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Who said that democracy is linked to higher economic growth?

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Urban-Rural, Secular-Clerical, Confessional, Post-Material, Ethnic and Linguistic Cleavages

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Describe 2 social and cultural basis of party systems.

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- states that single-member districts plurality systems encourages two-party systems

- link between electoral systems and the number of parties in a system

- states that PR systems lead to multiparty systems

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Explain Duvergor's Law.

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- you have more of an opportunity to influence the government at different levels

- you have more of a chance to have an impact on policy

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What is the relationship between federalism and ethnic conflict?

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- minimal winning coalition

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William Ricker's theory on coalition formation is best described as what?

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majoritarian, proportional, and mixed systems

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What are two broad electoral system families discussed in the chapter?

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- groom people to run for office

- offer voters informational shortcuts

- coordinating policy making

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Identify three functions that political party systems serve?

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Przworski

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Who discussed or came up with the idea of the structural dependence of the state on capital?

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- in a democracy, if you tax capital holders too heavily, then they could flee

- liquid asset threats holders have a quick exit threat than fixed asset holders

- you want to play nicely with the banks

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What are the implications of the idea of the structural dependence of the state on capital?

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Meltzer Richard Model

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Which model is potential predicts that democracy may be as financially harmful to elites as dictatorships?

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the d'Hondt and Sainte League models

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Identify two divisor systems?

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SMDP systems can disinfranchise minority voters, and thus lead to try to gain power outside the party system

- lead to more conflict where they might try to buck the system

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Describe the relationship between different electoral systems and ethnic conflict.

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predicts that proportion or portfolio positions should equal the % of seats held by respective parties

- example a party with 40% of the seats should have 40% of the cabinet

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What is Gamson's Law?

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political business cycle: you try to assume that you can manipulate the economy, and try to sure up economic growth right before you call for new elections

- signaling: expect some hard times coming your way, and call new elections so you can be in power and newly elected and not be penalized for the downturn

- surfing - not really controlling the economy.***

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Offer two reasons, why parliamentary states call new or early elections

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- rank your candidates in preferential order, and then when there is not a majority, then they drop the last ranked

- is found in plurality systems

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How does a SNTV system operate?

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SMD systems lead to more pork barreling and paroquial spending

- PR systems lead to more public goods spending, pension, universal healthcare, welfare, education

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Describe the relationship between electoral systems and government spending.

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- the presidential systems have a negatively significantly affect on democratic stability

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The book offers the relationship between regime type and democratic stability, what institutionally do the others find in their statistical model.

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1. Gamson’s law,

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1. states that cabinet portfolios will be distributed among government parties in strict proportion to the number of seats that each party contributes to the government’s legislative majority.
2.

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1. Single-Chain delegation model of parliamentary democracy: in each link of the chain (referring to Figure 12.10a), a principal, in whom authority is placed, delegates to an agent, whose the principal has conditionally authorized to act on her behalf. At each step of delegation chain, the agent is accountable to the principal to the extent that the principal exerts some control over the agent. Note that this chain of delegation is indirect in that voters get to directly choose their legislators, but all of the other agents are only indirectly accountable to the voters.
2. ex ante mechanism: helps principals to learn about their agents before these agents are chosen
3. ex post mechanism: is used to learn about agents actions after they have occurred. There are two basic types of ex post mechanism
4. Fire alarm system: the principal relies on information from others to learn about what te agent is doing
5. Police Patrol System: principals monitor the actions of their agents themselves
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1. How do parties overcome the principal-agent problem in parliamentary systems?
2.

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1. Minority Coaltions ~ 500 days; Surplus majority coalitions ~ 500 days; Single-Party minority ~ 591; All cabinets ~ 640 days; Minimal winning coalitions ~ 893 days; Single-party majority ~ 910 days.
2. Elections in presidential and parliamentary systems are held after the coalition is formed
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1. When do regimes end? When are elections held in presidential and parliamentary systems? Are the processes in each system the same or what differences exist?
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1. Political Surfing
2. Political Business Cycle
3. Signally

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1. Why would a government ever call for early elections?

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1. Signally

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1. the government is better informed about future economic performance than the voters and so can time elections to occur prior to any expected economic decline. The very act of calling an early election, however, effectively sends a signal to voters that the future performance of the economy looks bad. If voters are naive or have short-term memories, or if the opposition is unprepared, the government may prefer to call an early election because they want to avoid sending voters a signal that they don’t expect the good times to last.
2.

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1. Political Business Cycle

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1. The government actively manipulates the economy to engineer a short-term economic high and then calls an election. The election is then followed by an economic decline. Thus, the economy goes through cycles of boom and bust that are politically driven.
2.

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1. Political Surfing

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1. The government waits until the economic conditions are right before calling an election. The government does not actively manipulate the economy but waits until the economy, for whatever reason, is at a high point before announcing the election.

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1. Parliamentary systems are more effective than presidential systems when it comes to democratic regime survival

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1. What are the “Perils of Presidentialism”?
2.

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electoral system

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is a set of laws that regulate electoral competition between candidates or parties or both.

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electoral formula

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determines how votes are translated into seats.

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ballot structure

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is how electoral choices are presented on the ballot paper

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district magnitude

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is the number of legislative seats or representatives elected in a district.

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Suffrage

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is the civil right to vote and is sometimes referred to as the franchise

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universal suffrage

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is when the right to vote is not restricted by race, gender, belief, or social status

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Majoritarian electoral system

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is an electoral system in which the candidate or parties that receive the most votes win

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Single-member district plurality system

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is one in which individuals cast a single vote for a candidate in a single-member district. The candidate with the most votes is elected.

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Preference, or Preferential, voting

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involves voters ranking one or more candidate or parties in order of preference on the ballots

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Alternative Vote (AV)

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used in single-member districts, is an electoral system in which voters mark their preferences by rank ordering the candidates. A candidate who receives an absolute majority is elected. If no candidate wins an absolute majority, then the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated, and her votes are reallocated until one candidates an absolute majority of the valid votes remaining

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Borda count (BC)

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is a candidate-centered electoral system used in either single- or multimember districts in which voters must use numbers to mark their preference for all of the nominated candidates. These preferences are then assigned a value using equal steps to reflect the voters’ preference ordering. These values are then summed, and the candidate(s) with the most “valuable” votes is (are) elected

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proportional, mixed, majoritarian

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1. What are the two broad electoral system families covered in the book and in class?
2.

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majoritarian

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Is an electoral system in which the candidate or parties that receive the most votes wins

1.

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Proportional Electoral system

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1. Is a quota- or divisor-based electoral system employed in multimember districts
2.

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Mixed electoral system

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electoral system in which voters elect representatives through two different systems, one majoritarian and one proportional

1.

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1. Majoritarian: Single-member district plurality, alternative vote, two-round system, supplemenary vote, block vote, party block vote, single nontransferable vote, and Borda count
2. Proportional: List proportional representation, single transferable vote
3. Mixed: dependent, independent

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1. How, or on what grounds, can we distinguish between electoral systems?
2.

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1. Strategic voting means voting for your most preferred candidate who has a realistic chance of winning.
2. Sincere voting means voting for your most preferred candidate or party
3.

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1. What is the difference between sincere and strategic voting?

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1. SMDP systems creates incentive to vote strategically
2. Alternative Vote Systems create incentives to vote sincerely
3. Borda Count create incentives to vote strategically
4. Two Round System create incentives to vote sincerely
5.

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1. What are the implications of strategic and sincere? Which institutions lead to one or the other?
2.

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1. quota

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1. is the number of votes that guarantees a party a seat in a particular electoral district
2.

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1. Divisor or highest average system

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1. divides the total number of votes won by each party in a district by a series of numbers (divisors) to obtain quotients. District seats are then allocated according to which parties have the highest quotients
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1. A political party is an organization that includes officials who hold office and people who help get and keep them there. Parties help to structure the political world, recruit and socialize the political elite, mobilize the masses, and provide a link between rulers and the ruled.
2. They political parties provide some kind of order to the policymaking process
3.

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1. What functions do parties and party systems serve? Or, why do we need them?
2.

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1. nonpartisan democracy

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1. is a democracy with no official political parties

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1. single-party system:

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1. is one in which only one political party is legally allowed to hold power
2.

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1. one-party dominant system

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1. is one in which multiple parties may legally operate but in which only one particular party had a realistic chance of gaining power
2.

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1. two-party system

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1. is one in which only two major political parties have a realistic chance of holding power
2.

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1. Multiparty system

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1. is one in which more than two parties have a realistic chance of holding power
2.

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1. Urban-Rural Cleavages

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1. This cleavage involves a conflict between urban and rural interests, and this is one of the oldest conflicts in the world. This cleavages originated in the the early modern Europe between feudal lords on the one and town dwellers—an economic and a cultural dimension. The most basic point of conflict was over the price of food. The two dwellers were the consumers and the feudal lords were the producers. Also, much of the rural life took place through a barter system that involved that trading of goods and services. Reputation was an important element in making the complex set of commitments surrounding such trades “credible”. Also, economic exchange in towns tended to be monetized.
2.

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1. The Confessional Cleavage

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1. A conflict that centered on confessional, or religious differences. Conflict over religious differences emerged in European countries during the Protestant Reformation. The authority of the Roman Catholic Church was challenged by the rise of Protestantism. Religious conflict also fueled war in between political entities. The Protestant-Catholic cleavage has been important in many other European countries as well. Its salience continued, and it depended largely on whether or not one or the other side has been able to establish its dominance. the Confessional cleavage continued to be salient in many non-European countries as well. Conflict between Hindus and Muslims led to the partition of India into a predominately Hindu India and a Muslim-dominated Pakistan in 1947.
2.

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1. The Secular-Clerical Cleavage

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1. This conflict between the growing stage, which sought to dominate and the church tried to maintain its historic corporate rights, had been growing for a while. There was cooperation between the nobility and the Catholic clergy to maintain the Bourbon monarchy. The Roman Catholic church had the right to exact a tax of 10 percent on all agricultural products. Theses church taxes fueled resentment among many French people. Then, Louis 15th passed and abolished the church’s authority to levy taxes, and confiscated church property (because they was the biggest landowner) and canceled special privileges for the clergy. Clergymen became employees of the state, and the Roman Catholic Church became the French government which would later remove the power of the pope. This began the separation of the church and the state, and the cleavage between confessional and secular groups became increasingly salient.
2.

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1. The Class Cleavage

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1. This cleavage pits actors against each other over conflicting economic interest. Also, involves vertical conflicts within sectors between actors and those who derive their livelihood from the use of their labor and those who derive their livelihood from the use of their property or capital. Class conflicts take place mostly between workers and capitalists in industrial sectors of the economy. It also involves the attempts to use the state to redistribute wealth from the rich to the poor. This class cleavage became increasingly salient in most European countries during the 19th century as demands for franchise expansion, particularly from the working class grew.
2.

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1. The Post-Material Cleavage

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1. The main scholars that observed this cleavage was Lipset and Rokkan. They observed that the preceding cleavages were all activated during a period when new groups were in the process of being politically mobilized. Lipset and Rokkan argued that European party systems became frozen with the achievement of universal suffrage. Social structures might change, but there was no longer any untapped electoral base to be mobilized into new parties. Therefore, the barriers to successful entry for new parties seeking to represent emerging interests became too high after the 1920s. As a consequence, either poltical positions associated with new cleavages would go unrepresented or existing parties would alter their positions to capture “unrepresented” voters. Inglehart claims that new parties are a response to the relative decline in the salience of more traditional cleavages and the emergence of a new post-materialist cleavage.
2.

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1. The Ethnic and Linguistic Cleavages

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1. The source of conflict in many countries are ethnic or linguistic cleavages. Exactly what counts as an ethnic cleavage is not obvious because there are many different definitions of what makes a group an ethnic group. Members of ethnic groups share some characteristic more closely with fellow group members than with non group members. This characteristic is often inherited from the parents. An individual’s eligibility for membership in an ethnic group is based on or related to descent. In essence, given the salience of various ethnic cleavages around the world, it is little surprised that ethnic parties exist in many countries. In addition an ethnic party champion the interests of one ethnic category or set of categories to the exclusion of others, and does so as a central component of its mobilizing strategy.
2.

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1. Electoral system: majoritarian; party system: two parties; government type: single-party majority; federalism: Unitary; bicameralism: unicameral; constitutionalism: legislative supremacy constitution; regime type: parliamentary; interest-group relations: pluralism
2. Electoral system: proportional; party system: many parties; government type: coalition/minority; federalism: federal; bicameralism: bicameral; constitutionalism: high law constitution; regime type: presidential; interest group relations: corporatism
3.

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1. Distinguish between consensus and majoritarian systems. Discuss the implications of each.
2.

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1. Fiscal policy:

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1. involves the manipulation of tax and spending decisions to accomplish governmental goals
2.

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1. Debt levels

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1. the overall size of government spending, and by extension, the size of government debt and deficits
2.

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1. Ethnic conflict:

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1. this is an ethnic war or conflict between ethnic groups or against two or more sovereign states

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1. Party fragmentation

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1. If there are more than two parties in a system, and if there is not a party that is not close to obtaining an absolute majority in the legislature
2.