The Nondemocratic Regimes - Book Report/Review Example

 History and Political Science   The Nondemocratic regimes Comparative politics compare two or more countries and try to draw conclusions based on the comparison.  The comparative politics mainly involve the systematic comparison and study of political systems. It explains the similarities and differences between countries. Authoritarianism and totalitarianism are two forms of the government that have shaped the world. Authoritarian is mainly used to describe a government where citizens are subject to the authorities of the government in various aspects of their lives. For instance, the government enforces what it considers as right and ignores the opposing side considering them as a threat to the countries interests. Authoritarian regime describes a government that implements strong measures against the population. Additionally, the regime ignores individual’s actions unless they are considered as a challenge to the government.   On the other hand, the totalitarian regime is revolutionary and tries to change the society’s structure. In a totalitarian regime the government has a right to control almost every aspect of the lives of individuals. In general, totalitarian government controls all life aspects of the population without pluralism or mobilization in the government. The main area of this review is about the nondemocratic regimes. The modern nondemocratic regimes were written by Alfred Stephan and Juan J. Linz. The breakdown of democratic regimes was established in 1978. Juan J. Linz and Alfred are manly focused on the question of how the modern democratic regimes should be eroded and craft the democratic regimes. They mainly reconceptualize the major types of nondemocratic regimes. Furthermore they also point out the possible paths to democratic transition and tasks of the democratic consolidation. Juan and Alfred argue that even though the democracy and nation state have conflicting logics, the complementary political identities are practicable under a common roof of state. In addition, they provide evidence to politicians and scholars to differentiate between the pseudo democratization and democratic consolidation. They also explained that being without an effective state means the citizens are also not effective and lack of successful privatization.    Democratic transition and consolidation mainly involve moving from a nondemocratic regime to a democratic government. In the book, Linz and Stephan concentrates on the problem of democratic breakdown to the troubles of transition and the consolidation of the democracy. Considering their previous work, they also duel in the events taking place in the east and therefore contribute to the ambitious task by producing a framework for the theories about the current changes both in Southern Europe and South America and further in the former soviet union and the eastern Europe. According to Linz and Stephan, the democratic transition can be completed when the main actors adhere to the rules laid. The rule laid may include those that regard the elected government, for instance, when and how the regime is formed through fair and free elections, when the government’s branches no longer share power with other organizations, and how the government has come up with new authorities to create new policies. In case the government abides by the principles and the rules it therefore becomes a democracy as illustrated by Linz and Stephan. In other words, consolidation is achieved when the system of democracy is viewed as the only game in the area, and the public subscribes to the institutions. In addition, they consider the consolidated democracy as a system of interaction parts and not as a regime. The parts that they are considered to be like involve political society, rule of law, civil society, bureaucracy, and the institutionalization of economic community. The authors used various variables when examining the democratic transition and consolidation. The variables categorized in three groups: the actor variables, including the leadership base of the prior regime type and the initiator and controller of the oppositions, macro variable that include the prior regime type and stateness, and lastly the context variables that include political economy of legitimacy, the international influences and environment of constitution-making. The two authors argue that democracy mainly needs statehood. For that reason, it is proper to note that a nation and a state are two different concepts. Therefore, achieving democracy can be very difficult in places with conflict between the nation and the state. In addition, the situation can lead to problems for the state thus making the concept of citizenship more imperative. The authors later explained that there can be complicated modern democracy without voting. In addition, the authors claimed that the task played by the prior regime figure the paths existing for transition. They also described the classic three regime typology and later examine totalitarian, authoritarian, sultanistic regimes and post-totalitarian. They further argue that the way in which the previous regimes prearranged pluralism, leadership and ideology and mobilization affect available pathway to democratic transition. They further describe five possible paths that can be taken towards democratic transition. The paths include, defeat in war, the interim government that is created after the regime termination not brought forth by the ancient regime, the formation of pacts, and the military led coup. Additionally, Linz and Stepan claim that the character of the state elite influences the democratic consolidation and transition. They further examine four forms of elites including civilian elite, sultanistic elite, nonhierarchal military and hierarchal military. Authoritarian or hierarchal military can be usurped by military as an institution that views the extrication from the military government. The old regime elite can enforce the reserve domains of control during the consolidation phase that can not allow then new regime to consolidate. However, they can fall to a democratic transition when problems appear in the processes of leading the country. Furthermore, they are likely to be observed operating out the sphere of the military meaning they can be punished by the military hierarchy or the state. Considering the post-totalitarian or civilian leadership, they possess the institutional and symbolic capacities to manage and initiate the democratic transition. On the other hand, in consolidation phase they confirm the benefit of working on the newly found system as opposed to fighting against it. In the sultanistic leadership, the government is too personalized that the sultan promptly demolishes the regime. However, when the democratic elections are held fast and the democratic organizations are developed, the chances of consolidation are weakened. In the category of actor variables, Linz and Stephan examines the impacts concerning the initiation and controlling of the transition on the democratic transition and consolidation. They explain that the transition that is initiated by the armed revolution, a nonhierarchal military led coup or by the civil society tend to ensure that the ruling party or institution is taken over by the interim government. The interim government however, can either consist of a democratic or nondemocratic agenda. Democracy can therefore arise if elections are held quickly. The democracy can be unlikely in case the interim government makes some decreases based on an assumed mandate. Additionally, the democracy is unlikely to appear due to the fact that the interim government normally doesn’t appear from the hierarchal military or the regime led changes. Furthermore, Linz and Stephan further examines the context where the transition occurs. They explained that there are some international forces that are capable of influencing the transition and consolidation. One of the factors is the use of force. For instances, they explained that a nondemocratic country or nation can overthrow a weak democratic state by the use of military. Likewise, a regional hegemon can certainly crash the democratic uprising in its periphery. A hegemon can either be a democratic or nondemocratic regime. Therefore, hegemon can alternatively use either incentives or sanctions in order to shape the political path countries or states in the periphery undertake. However, democracy or communism can only shape the political transitions outside of the force. On the other hand, political economic context can also be used to shape the democratic transition and consolidation. For instance, the nondemocratic regimes can easily be weakened by the extended periods of the economic prosperity. Prosperity can possibly make the coercive system pointless. Moreover, the economic prosperity mainly widens or expands the middle classes that lead to an enlargement in political demands. The down turns can affect both the democratic and nondemocratic regimes even though the economic prosperity can not weaken the democratic regimes. Nevertheless, due to the fact that the democratic regime has a larger level of legitimacy, as compared to the nondemocratic regimes, it is well insulated from the down turns. Finally, the two authors consider the constitution making environment to lead to either success or failure the democratic consolidated or transition. Actually, the book was written with various interesting information that makes it appear as engaging way. The book is well structured with very simple language that makes it very cheap to read. Most information the book is very enlightening. However, the book informs us about how most citizens view the question of democracy in their respective countries and the possible challenges that the countries face due to the democratic transition and consolidation. However, the book has the interest in most countries concerning the political science in general. According to Diamond in his article about Thinking about Hybrid Regimes, many nations or countries have adopted the form of democracy with very little substance. For this reasons, the classification of regimes becomes more difficult but very important. In the Nationalism and Market place of Ideas by Snyder and Bellentine, they argue that under the conditions of developing democratization, the sincerity of the public debate promotes the nationalists mythmaking and ethnic conflict. This is because the opportunistic government exploits the partial monopolies of segmented demand, supply and the weakness of the regular institutions in marketplace of idea. During incipient democratization, when the democratic institutions are not are not fully well-established and the civil society is burgeoning, the state including other elites are forced to involve in public debate so as to compete for mass allies in power struggle. Under such conditions, the governments and their rivals normally develop the motive to and opportunity to play a nationalist card. In case of such a situation, the unconditional freedom of speech becomes a doubtful remedy. This is the same compared to the economy, for instance, when economic competition produces the beneficial results in a well-institutionalized market place, where the false advertisement and monopolies are counteracted. In the same way, increase in debate in political market place leads to better outcomes only if the there are mechanisms that would correct the market imperfection. The article by M. Steven Fish, The Islam and Authoritarian that was published in 2002, in world politics describes the regime change, democracy and freedom among the Islamic community. The author describes the striking experimental finding most Of the Arab Muslim countries existed in the nondemocratic regimes, even after controlling for the potential factors such as the level of political violence, poverty, and oil wealth among others. The main question that the author asks himself is the link between Islam and authoritarianism. He tends to research the causal mechanism that lines Islam and the regime type. He finds his research through the condition of women in most Muslim societies. Most Muslims, more so the Arabs, have higher authoritarian rulers with lower political rights compared to the non-Arabs in the Muslim world. The study conducted by Fish .M. Steven concerning the link between the Islam and authoritarianism states that most Arabs in the Muslim societies are highly authoritarians with very low political powers. The article mainly presents a straightforward examination concerning the link between the Islam and the political regime. Fish’s main evidences suggest that most Muslim countries are democratic underachievers. He explains that the nature of the causal connection or association between the Islam and the political regime had been investigated. However, various conventional assumptions concerning the Islam and politics do not withstand the analysis or the study. Fish explained that only one major factor helps to describe the dearth of democracy in the world of Muslims. The factor is how the Muslim women and girls are treated.  The status of women and girls in the Muslim community tend to indicate other societal values in that may be associated with the authoritarian as it suppress a given group while authoritarian suppresses the mass. If the society allows a given group to be restrained, they open the way for restraint of others on larger number because it is recognized to treat people in that way. Once the Muslims allow women to be made equal to man, the human rights may become a concern. In the Authoritarian regimes, citizens are not given the rights such as freedom of speech therefore; it is probably not consistent to allow the equalization of all groups. Actually, religions support the concept of supreme power. The individuals who serve and follow the religion strictly can scarcely embrace the freedom or democracy ideas. According to various researches, it is not only the Islam that is linked to authoritarian regime but also other religions. For instance, in every institution, organization or political party, there are always people who do not think the same way as others. For instances, there are always people who normally rise against change. They usually want to remain the way they are. In Islamic religion, women and girls are treated unusually. Men appear to be dominants. Fish therefore explains that this kind of treatment can be associated with the type of their regime. Even though research has found that most Islam countries are improving in their regimes, some are still stuck to their religious values. The authoritarian regime situations in some countries are considered to have strict policies. The citizens are mainly subjected to strict rules and are given very low political power. In conclusion, according to the study, most nondemocratic regimes normally impose strict rules and conditions to the citizens. In a nondemocratic regime, citizens are normally denied most of their rights. For example, the citizens are denied the freedom of speech and the freedom of expression. Usually, the citizens are forced to adhere to the governments decisions even if it the decisions are against their wishes. The government on the other side ignores the opposing group and enforces the rules that it considers to be right for the government. The study therefore tries to find some possible ways that can help countries to introduce democratic regimes. Read More