Patrimonialism - Georgia and Cambodia - Coursework Example

Concept Analysis: Patrimonialism (Georgia and Cambodia) Name: Tutor: Course: Institution: Date: Concept: patrimonialism Country pair: Georgia and Cambodia Definition from text: An arrangement whereby a ruler depends on a collection of supporters within the state who gain direct benefits and in return for enforcing the ruler’s will Alternative definition: a system of leadership where all the ruler ship flows from a single leader and in which the private and the public sectors are blended into one. This kind of governance is exclusively for the higher class in the society and excludes the middles and the lower class. The lower and middles class serve the upper class and all allegiance including the army, police and all other institutions of power and governance is paid to the leader(s). Three Related Concepts: Totalitarianism- Totalitarianism is the kind of leadership where those in power assume total power in all aspects of community. This kind of governance is associated with use of propaganda; use of states mass media for protecting their power and single party political systems. Totalitarianism does not recognize any limits in administering its governance whether in the public sector or in the private sector. This kind of leadership and governance is related to patrimonialism in that it does not allow for a democratic space. While the patrimonialism is less oppressive than totalitarianism, it is related to patrimonialism in that it also does not allow the power to flow to the people and thus creates an environment of editorship, or at least benevolent dictatorship. Autocracy Autocracy refers to a way of governance where a single leader has absolute legislative and political powers. While autocracy may not necessarily mean editorship, it means a way of governance where a single leader has all the power to govern a nation, without the contribution of the masses in the power structuring. As a result, autocracy is related to patrimonialism in that it is build around non-democratic structures where power flows from an individual who rules over the masses. In both cases, the masses do not have the power to decide what is good for them and are there to be governed. Autocracy is however denoted with negative connotations due to its likeness to harmful editorship, unlike patrimonialism, which tries to create mechanisms for the inclusion of finding out what is good for the masses and trying to give them that. Benevolent dictatorship Benevolent dictatorship is a kind of leadership where an authoritarian leader exercises his imposed power for the benefit of the people. The difference between benevolent dictatorship and other forms of dictatorship is that benevolent dictatorship seeks the highest good of the people being governed and not just for the benefit of a few or the dictator leader. This governance method is related to patrimonialism in that a non-democratic leader who is seeking to deliver best interest on behalf of the people heads it. In wither cases, the leader feels that he knows the needs of the people better than they do and that if they were to be left to their own means they would be worse off. Comparing Georgia and Cambodia To understand how these two countries are aligned to patrimonialism, one needs to understand their history of governance. The modern governance in these two countries largely depends on the power structures that have been there before. These are some of the oldest countries on the face of the world and are therefore shaped by their history. Georgia is in fact the cradle of civilization and it has a long history of monarchical governance (Isaac, 2009). Cambodia has a similar history of monarchical governance and has had thousands of years of these structures of governance. Both Georgia and Cambodia are currently trying to align their leadership to the modern democratic model. Georgia for instance, probably due to its proximity to the European block, has been under pressure to align their governance with the European democratic structure. Georgia’s governance is based on a semi presidential a prime minister heads government system where the president is the head of state and the government. The executive powers lay on the president and the cabinet, which is made up of official handpicked by the president. However, the minister of defense and internal affairs do not make up the cabinet and are direct subordinates of the president. This form of government gives a lot of power to the president because of two reasons; one, the president has the power to erect and sack ministers, which means that they are loyal to him because their job depends on his good will. Secondly, the military, which is the might of the nation, are directly under him, which gives him all the military power in the power structure. The devolution of the governance is such that the prime minister is the head of the cabinet and because the cabinet is one that makes important decisions, is supposed to be a form of power devolution from the president. However, it is not true in Georgia’s case because the president is the one who employs the cabinet ministers and the defense ministry is not headed by the prime minister but headed is under the president. In comparison to Georgia, Cambodia’s history and geographic placement has put it on a quite different path when it comes to power. Based on a long history of monarchical history, Cambodia still maintains the idea of a king. Cambodia has a parliamentary representative democracy delivered through a constitutional democracy. It is governed based on a constitution of 1993. Cambodia’s geographical placement may have a greater effect on how the nation has evolved its power structures over time. Being closer to the Asian continent than the western front where democracy has matured, Cambodia’s governance has evolved around such power structures as authoritarian, patrimonialism and totalitarianism. Currently, the government has tried a number of efforts to deliver a constitutional government to the people of Cambodia. Cambodia’s devolution of power, as Gregory (2009) asserts, structure is quite similar to that one of Georgia where the king is the head of the state and the prime minister is the head of government. However, a closer look helps identify a number of things. First, the prime minister is appointed by the king, which makes him a subject of the king and thus powerless and useless in the devolution of power. A good indication of how this power structure is short of democracy is the fact that the current prime minster has been in office for over twenty-five years, since 1085. The bicameral parliament of Cambodia is made of a national assembly of 158 members who are elected for a five-year period on a proportional representation system. The king, on ht advice of the national assembly, however, appoints the senate. While the king does not govern but only reigns, all power seems to point back to him and he has patrimonial powers over the people. A good look at the power structure reveals why this is so. First, executive power is placed on the prime minister and the other ministers who make up the executive. Considering that the prime minster and the executive are subject of the king, it shows how and why he retains all governance power in an indirect way. At the same time, the legislative power is also shared between the executive (a subject of the king) and the national assembly. Not to mention the obvious, the national assembly is an elected on a fixed term basis while the king is a life leader. This gives the king a lot of power, without a proper mechanism with which he can be relieved of this power in case the people feel they are not comfortable with his leadership (Gibson, 2010). While Cambodia has done a lot in trying to democratize its governance system, a lot seems to be yet to be done. The devolution of power for instance is still a problem. The people are only able to elect members of parliament and not the head of the government himself. Even then, the parliament they elect may not exactly be able to be efficient in providing independent leadership since their legislative power is divided between them and the executive. The nature of the position of the king as a life leader is detrimental to democracy and shows that the governance is patrimonialism, with the king being the patriarch. The royal Cambodian Armed Forces, which is made of four main branches, is under the ministry of defense, which in turn is under the king, thus giving him some form of sovereign power. The king is in command of the whole armed forces and this shows that he is the patriarch leader. Comparing this with Georgia there is a big gap that reveals itself in the way these two countries have been able lean towards the modern democratic governance. Cambodia is definitely holding too tightly on patrimonialism while Georgia is less patrimonial in its governance. A number of compelling reasons has caused this difference. First, as James (2009) points out, Georgia has an ambition to join the NATO alliance. Therefore, it has been trying very hard to achieve a western standard of governance in order to qualify for the post. As a result, it is very clear that Georgia has a better or bigger determination to become more democratic. On the other hand, Cambodia is not in the same position as Georgia and is not really under pressure to change into a modern democratic system. This makes it easier for Cambodia to be more attached to its patrimonialism more tightly as compared Georgia, because as, Gorlizki (2002) says, this kind os system is made on the same bais of the power of a father in his own home. According to Schatz (2006), Asia stands on a solidly autocratic grond that has not been sucesfuly broken. Georgia can then be seen as a having peer pressure to rid off it patrimonialism and step into a new era of democratic leadership. As mentioned, the history of these nations has also shaped the way have adapted to governance. Georgia for instance, as a former soviet nation has a pressure to have the same political democratic development as the other former soviet members (Vujačić, 1996). For instance Georgia has been compared with Estonia where is Estonia has been credited with its ability to create a more democratic environment. Because Georgia has been trying to be at par or ahead of these almost 20 other states, it has made more and much stronger efforts to gain a democratic form of government. References Gibson, N. (2010). Understanding Hidden Forms of Autocratic Governance. Hoboken, NJ: Pearl Books. Gorlizki, Y. (December 2002). Ordinary Stalinism: The Council of Ministers and the Soviet Neopatrimonial State, 1946–1953. The Journal of Modern History, Vol. 74, No. 4 , 699-736. Gregory, K. (2009). Ddelivering a Stable Governance in Areas Where Democracy is Enstanged. New York, NY: Business Books Publishers. Isaac, N. (2009). Governace in a Shifting World. New York, NY: Business Books Publishers. James, M. (2009). Dimensions of Polictical Balancing adn Democracy. New York, NY: Guille Books Publishers. Schatz, E. (2006). Access by Accident: Legitimacy Claims and Democracy Promotion in Authoritarian Central Asia. International Political Science Review / Revue internationale de science politique, , 263-284. Vujačić, V. (1996). Historical Legacies, Nationalist Mobilization, and Political Outcomes in Russia and Serbia: A. Theory and Society, Vol. 25, No. 6 , 1-40. Précis Article written by: CARLOS M. VILAS Précis written by Source: Prospects for Democratization in a Post-Revolutionary Setting: Central America The issues that are faced by different countries vary from one country to the other. The way that the leaders and even the civilians in a country depend on the social cultural history of the country and thus, the issues of democratization should not be generalized. Democracy is lined with formalities as well as substantive structures. The substantive structures are the interconnections and the platforms that within which social political and social economic processes occur. Formal dimensions of democracy on the other hand, are the structures and institutions that make the substantive processes of a democratic regime to be possible. While there are no direct connections between the political systems and social cultural structures, these two have been seen to affect each other at certain levels especially within democratic spaces. For many centuries, political scientists such as Max Weber have always commented on the interconnection between socioeconomic structures, culture, and politics. These scholars believed that the interconnection between these different aspects of society is not only inevitable but also useful in a society. However, it would not be fair to look at a political system in terms of its structures alone because in a modern environment, the relationship between the economic structures and the political systems has ways to seek for balances until an autonomic structure is formed between them. This means that the political regimes are not solely powerful over the economic structures and can therefore not be blamed, or credit for all happenings in the in the economic front. Different groups even within the same social political systems and environment have viewed democracy differently. For example, in Central America during the political revolution, the different players regarded democracy differently. The insurgents for instance, looked at democracy was regarded as the tool for fighting oppressive regimes in countries like Guatemala, El Salvador etc. for this revolutionists, democracy was not just changes in the political regimes, but had to encompass much broader issues such as the economy and the social cultural dimensions. As a result, the revolutionists saw themselves as the agents of democracy in a non-democratic regime and believed they were the ones to return or install democracy. On the other hand, the political elites saw themselves as democratic and saw the existence of the revolutionaries were the biggest threat to the democracy. The American also did not see the Central American insurgents as the way to democracy but believed that democracy would be used to get rid of the revolutions that were threatening to tear away the countries. As was the case, the revolutions were did not achieve to install democracy but introduced changes in the governance that could hardly be said to be constructive in any way. If anything, the social economic issues that led to the revolutions by the insurgents, many decades later, have remained unchanged and in fact even much worse in some cases. As a result, this has raised the question of whether democracy can be achieved through revolutions. While most of the oppressive regimes have been drowned in their own pools, there are still a lot of economic issues that still sting the societies, indicating that democracy does not necessarily promise better economic conditions. While Central America has emerged from the oppressive regimes, social economic issues such as underemployment, diminishing wages, inflation and other issues have made life worse than it was decades ago. Structural issues in the governance One of Central America’s problems after the revolution remained to be its lack of participation on global economy. This affected it in a number of ways. One, these national ended up being price takers, meaning they have to bargain over the prices of goods they import. Secondly, this has denied their economies were denied a chance to grow along with other economies in the world. Growth of poverty Poverty has been a main feature of Central America even in countries where democracy has been installed. This has raised questions on how these problems can be solved if the introduction democratic space is not enough to do that. Poverty frustrates any chances of mature democracy and acts an agent for either dictatorship of inefficient democracy. As a result, the biggest problem with Central America is that while the insurgents were able to pull down the oppressive governments and restore democracy, what Central America lacked was ambassadors for economic revolution and therefore this was left behind. This trend has led to a very complex issue in the fight for democratic space. This is because poor people in their fight for democracy tend to be ill informed because they are fighting for survival and therefore not for democratic reforms. Extreme poverty leads to lack of faith in the government. When the revolutionist completely lack confidence in the government, the process of demanding for democracy takes another route and may not be lead to very positive ends. This is what leads to positives reforms that are not useful to the society because the basic needs of the society will not have been served even after the democracy or the political reforms have been achieved. Persistence of traditional rule Because the revolution in many poor countries don’t lead to economic revolutions but just deals with the political issues alone, the economic structures remain rather rigid, thus thrusting the political power in the hands of the rich elite. In many poor countries, the golden rule reigns, meaning that the poor will always be ruled, and may be oppressed by the rich elite class. As a result, changing the political systems without major economic shifts does not do a lot in creating an environment where all can enjoy political freedom. Political freedom, both at individual level as well as at the national level can only be enjoyed along with economic power. As a result, these Central American nations have not been able to gain total political freedom and because they are still economically insecure. After the revolutions, the number of Central Americans who have flocked to the United States has been very many as compared to there before. Read More