The contemporary study of the welfare state began, along with World Politics, in the immediate postwar era, inspired by the near-collapse of democracy and the crucial role envisaged for public spending in stabilizing it after war. Over the following decades key scholarly questions focused on the normal welfare politics of the era—distributive politics, the effects of government policy on growth, and the capacity of social policies to create their own political constituencies. In a new era of more uncertain democratic resilience, we may need to return to older questions: of the coercive function of the welfare state, of its ability/inability to conserve democracy, and of the weaknesses of welfare policies to maintain political support.
{"title":"Welfare States in Wealthy Democracies","authors":"Jane Gingrich","doi":"10.1353/wp.0.a934240","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/wp.0.a934240","url":null,"abstract":"The contemporary study of the welfare state began, along with World Politics, in the immediate\u0000postwar era, inspired by the near-collapse of democracy and the crucial role envisaged\u0000for public spending in stabilizing it after war. Over the following decades key scholarly\u0000questions focused on the normal welfare politics of the era—distributive politics,\u0000the effects of government policy on growth, and the capacity of social policies to create\u0000their own political constituencies. In a new era of more uncertain democratic resilience,\u0000we may need to return to older questions: of the coercive function of the welfare state, of\u0000its ability/inability to conserve democracy, and of the weaknesses of welfare policies to\u0000maintain political support.","PeriodicalId":48266,"journal":{"name":"World Politics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":4.5,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141851267","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
abstract: Despite the growing interest in the economic backgrounds of mps in Western Europe, the evolution of working-class numerical representation before 1945 has not been systematically studied. Using data from England and Wales (1832–1944), Germany (1871–1930), and Norway (1906–1936), the authors show both that working-class mps were elected when barriers were lowered and that almost all working-class parliamentarians were affiliated with socialist parties. The authors further probe the conditions that determined the electoral success of workers using data about all candidates, constituencies’ occupational profile, and unionization in Norway between 1906 and 1936. They find that socialist parties nominated workers either in relatively uncompetitive elections in which unionization was high or in competitive races in which the party’s victory was possible but not guaranteed. Using information about mps in Germany and England and Wales, the authors find similar patterns. The article discusses the implications for research about democratization, the rise of social democracy, and the numerical representation of workers.
{"title":"Social Democracy and the Birth of Working-Class Representation in Europe","authors":"Maayan Mor, Carles Boix","doi":"10.1353/wp.2024.a933070","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/wp.2024.a933070","url":null,"abstract":"abstract: Despite the growing interest in the economic backgrounds of mps in Western Europe, the evolution of working-class numerical representation before 1945 has not been systematically studied. Using data from England and Wales (1832–1944), Germany (1871–1930), and Norway (1906–1936), the authors show both that working-class mps were elected when barriers were lowered and that almost all working-class parliamentarians were affiliated with socialist parties. The authors further probe the conditions that determined the electoral success of workers using data about all candidates, constituencies’ occupational profile, and unionization in Norway between 1906 and 1936. They find that socialist parties nominated workers either in relatively uncompetitive elections in which unionization was high or in competitive races in which the party’s victory was possible but not guaranteed. Using information about mps in Germany and England and Wales, the authors find similar patterns. The article discusses the implications for research about democratization, the rise of social democracy, and the numerical representation of workers.","PeriodicalId":48266,"journal":{"name":"World Politics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":4.5,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141841063","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
abstract: Despite Giovanni Sartori’s famous warning, contemporary academia has seen a new bout of conceptual stretching, as evident in the loose, expansive usage of terms such as coup and fascism . This concept creep reflects the normative progress of recent decades, which has ruled out true fascism and deterred full-scale coups. Because these normative advances have induced remaining nefarious actors to pursue their undemocratic goals through formally democratic procedures, ambiguity has blurred conceptual boundaries. The article posits that when examining this gray area, scholars may be tempted to overuse dramatic terms because concern about new threats to democracy has motivated a turn to public intellectualism and democratic engagement. Moreover, the proliferation of social media has fueled stiff competition for public attention, which may have helped to create a penchant for stark warnings. The author argues that the resulting conceptual stretching undermines the clarity and accuracy required for academic scholarship and that such imprecision can also be counterproductive for scholars’ normative concerns. The overuse of dramatic terms risks distorting problem diagnosis, exacerbating polarization, and thus reinforcing the danger facing contemporary democracy, which arises primarily from the specific challenges that illiberal populism poses.
{"title":"Concept Misformation in the Age of Democratic Anxiety: Recent Temptations and Their Downsides","authors":"Kurt Weyland","doi":"10.1353/wp.2024.a933072","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/wp.2024.a933072","url":null,"abstract":"abstract: Despite Giovanni Sartori’s famous warning, contemporary academia has seen a new bout of conceptual stretching, as evident in the loose, expansive usage of terms such as coup and fascism . This concept creep reflects the normative progress of recent decades, which has ruled out true fascism and deterred full-scale coups. Because these normative advances have induced remaining nefarious actors to pursue their undemocratic goals through formally democratic procedures, ambiguity has blurred conceptual boundaries. The article posits that when examining this gray area, scholars may be tempted to overuse dramatic terms because concern about new threats to democracy has motivated a turn to public intellectualism and democratic engagement. Moreover, the proliferation of social media has fueled stiff competition for public attention, which may have helped to create a penchant for stark warnings. The author argues that the resulting conceptual stretching undermines the clarity and accuracy required for academic scholarship and that such imprecision can also be counterproductive for scholars’ normative concerns. The overuse of dramatic terms risks distorting problem diagnosis, exacerbating polarization, and thus reinforcing the danger facing contemporary democracy, which arises primarily from the specific challenges that illiberal populism poses.","PeriodicalId":48266,"journal":{"name":"World Politics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":4.5,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141843870","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The social context of relations between states provides the foundation for cooperation within international institutions. In a departure from theories that focus on rational design of contracts and functional demand for institutions, increasingly scholars emphasize geopolitics. Both as a component of power and social context, geopolitics shapes multilateral cooperation. This article examines theories that bring new perspectives on cooperation as a process embedded within international society. It highlights innovative developments to include relational variables in empirical analysis to measure how geopolitical alignment between states impacts the design and effectiveness of international institutions. The relational politics that undergird multilateral cooperation also contribute to the proliferation of institutions as states build new clubs for cooperation
{"title":"THE SOCIAL CONTEXT OF INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTIONS","authors":"Christina L. Davis","doi":"10.1353/wp.0.a932837","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/wp.0.a932837","url":null,"abstract":"The social context of relations between states provides the foundation for cooperation within international institutions. In a departure from theories that focus on rational design of contracts and functional demand for institutions, increasingly scholars emphasize geopolitics. Both as a component of power and social context, geopolitics shapes multilateral cooperation. This article examines theories that bring new perspectives on cooperation as a process embedded within international society. It highlights innovative developments to include relational variables in empirical analysis to measure how geopolitical alignment between states impacts the design and effectiveness of international institutions. The relational politics that undergird multilateral cooperation also contribute to the proliferation of institutions as states build new clubs for cooperation","PeriodicalId":48266,"journal":{"name":"World Politics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":4.5,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141703399","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
How has the field of conflict studies evolved over the past three decades? This essay suggests an answer by posing three questions: Why do we study conflict? What do we understand as conflict? And how do we study conflict? The article proceeds with critical remarks, illustrated with articles that have appeared in World Politics during the past five years. It concludes by highlighting three key challenges for the future evolution of the field: the theoretically driven broadening of our understanding of conflict; the development of conceptual, theoretical, and empirical links between micro, meso, and macro levels of analysis; and a theoretically informed way of specifying the scope conditions that apply to findings.
{"title":"CONFLICT: Trajectories and Challenges","authors":"S. Kalyvas","doi":"10.1353/wp.0.a933012","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/wp.0.a933012","url":null,"abstract":"How has the field of conflict studies evolved over the past three decades? This essay suggests an answer by posing three questions: Why do we study conflict? What do we understand as conflict? And how do we study conflict? The article proceeds with critical remarks, illustrated with articles that have appeared in World Politics during the past five years. It concludes by highlighting three key challenges for the future evolution of the field: the theoretically driven broadening of our understanding of conflict; the development of conceptual, theoretical, and empirical links between micro, meso, and macro levels of analysis; and a theoretically informed way of specifying the scope conditions that apply to findings.","PeriodicalId":48266,"journal":{"name":"World Politics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":4.5,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141695176","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
abstract: In this article, the authors discuss and analyze how regime type and state capacity shape the abilities and incentives of political leaders to respond to covid-19. They suggest that a complementary relationship exists between democracy and state capacity, both in terms of mitigating the adverse consequences of the pandemic, such as deaths, and the honest reporting of these consequences. Using a recent global data set on officially reported covid-19 deaths and estimated deaths based on excess mortality, the authors present evidence that supports different implications from their argument. Empirically, democracies have much higher officially reported death tolls than do autocracies, a result driven by underreporting in autocracies. In high-capacity states, democracies have fewer covid-19 deaths than do autocracies. State capacity generally seems to mitigate both deaths and underreporting, but these relationships are stronger in democracies. Countries that combine democracy with high state capacity experience fewer covid-19 deaths and provide more accurate tolls of the pandemic’s consequences.
{"title":"Fighting the Disease or Manipulating the Data? Democracy, State Capacity, and the COVID-19 Pandemic","authors":"Carl Henrik Knutsen, Palina Kolvani","doi":"10.1353/wp.2024.a933071","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/wp.2024.a933071","url":null,"abstract":"abstract: In this article, the authors discuss and analyze how regime type and state capacity shape the abilities and incentives of political leaders to respond to covid-19. They suggest that a complementary relationship exists between democracy and state capacity, both in terms of mitigating the adverse consequences of the pandemic, such as deaths, and the honest reporting of these consequences. Using a recent global data set on officially reported covid-19 deaths and estimated deaths based on excess mortality, the authors present evidence that supports different implications from their argument. Empirically, democracies have much higher officially reported death tolls than do autocracies, a result driven by underreporting in autocracies. In high-capacity states, democracies have fewer covid-19 deaths than do autocracies. State capacity generally seems to mitigate both deaths and underreporting, but these relationships are stronger in democracies. Countries that combine democracy with high state capacity experience fewer covid-19 deaths and provide more accurate tolls of the pandemic’s consequences.","PeriodicalId":48266,"journal":{"name":"World Politics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":4.5,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141848743","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
abstract: How do dictators prepare for succession? Scholars have studied the determinants of succession, but we know little about the mechanisms, including elite management, of how succession occurs. The authors argue that incumbents prepare for succession by building a power base of elites outside their inner circle, for their preferred successor; doing so helps the successor to stabilize the regime. The authors test this argument by examining preparations for succession in the prominent but puzzling case of North Korea under Kim Jong Il, leveraging the plausibly exogenous shock that Kim suffered—a stroke—that caused him to prepare for succession. Quantitative analysis of 1,573 leadership events under Kim between 1994 and 2011, with original biographical data on 230 North Korean elites, supports the argument. Qualitative evidence of elites’ roles after Kim’s death is consistent with the argument’s logic. Rather than being atypical, as North Korea is often portrayed, the findings apply to other personalist autocracies.
{"title":"Elite Management before Autocratic Leader Succession: Evidence from North Korea","authors":"Edward Goldring, Peter Ward","doi":"10.1353/wp.2024.a933068","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/wp.2024.a933068","url":null,"abstract":"abstract: How do dictators prepare for succession? Scholars have studied the determinants of succession, but we know little about the mechanisms, including elite management, of how succession occurs. The authors argue that incumbents prepare for succession by building a power base of elites outside their inner circle, for their preferred successor; doing so helps the successor to stabilize the regime. The authors test this argument by examining preparations for succession in the prominent but puzzling case of North Korea under Kim Jong Il, leveraging the plausibly exogenous shock that Kim suffered—a stroke—that caused him to prepare for succession. Quantitative analysis of 1,573 leadership events under Kim between 1994 and 2011, with original biographical data on 230 North Korean elites, supports the argument. Qualitative evidence of elites’ roles after Kim’s death is consistent with the argument’s logic. Rather than being atypical, as North Korea is often portrayed, the findings apply to other personalist autocracies.","PeriodicalId":48266,"journal":{"name":"World Politics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":4.5,"publicationDate":"2024-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141852297","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Since the 1970s, international influences on democratization have received increasing attention from scholars and policymakers. Scholars pointed to multiple mechanisms by which international factors could influence the transition to and the consolidation of democracy. While the arguments mostly pointed to positive influences, the optimism of the post–Cold War era have given way to concern about international sources of authoritarianism and democratic backsliding. The authors provide a framework for thinking about what we know about international forces and democratization, outlining several unanswered questions. Several research challenges remain, including how to best assess mechanisms linking international processes and actors to democracy (and democratization); while others concern threats to those democratic transitions via democratic backsliding. The article concludes by calling for more integration of existing theoretical frameworks on international factors and democracy with the current wave of research on authoritarianism and democratic backsliding.
{"title":"International Dimensions of Democratization","authors":"Jon C.W. Pevehouse, Caileigh Glenn","doi":"10.1353/wp.0.a930436","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/wp.0.a930436","url":null,"abstract":"Since the 1970s, international influences on democratization have received increasing attention from scholars and policymakers. Scholars pointed to multiple mechanisms by which international factors could influence the transition to and the consolidation of democracy. While the arguments mostly pointed to positive influences, the optimism of the post–Cold War era have given way to concern about international sources of authoritarianism and democratic backsliding. The authors provide a framework for thinking about what we know about international forces and democratization, outlining several unanswered questions. Several research challenges remain, including how to best assess mechanisms linking international processes and actors to democracy (and democratization); while others concern threats to those democratic transitions via democratic backsliding. The article concludes by calling for more integration of existing theoretical frameworks on international factors and democracy with the current wave of research on authoritarianism and democratic backsliding.","PeriodicalId":48266,"journal":{"name":"World Politics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141412154","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The conventional paradigm in political economy routinely treats living, complex, adaptive social systems as machine-like objects. This treatment has driven political economists to oversimplify big, complex social processes using mechanical models, or to ignore them altogether. In development, this has led to theoretical dead ends, trivial agendas, or failed public policies. This article proposes an alternative paradigm: adaptive political economy. It recognizes that social systems are complex, not complicated; complexity can be ordered, not messy; and social scientists should be developing the concepts, methods, and theories to illuminate the order of complexity, rather than oversimplifying it. The author illustrates one application of adaptive political economy by mapping the coevolution of economic and institutional change. This approach yields fresh, important conclusions that mechanical, linear models of development have missed, including that market-building institutions look and function differently from market-sustaining ones.
{"title":"Adaptive Political Economy: Toward a New Paradigm","authors":"Yuen Yuen Ang","doi":"10.1353/wp.0.a927487","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/wp.0.a927487","url":null,"abstract":"The conventional paradigm in political economy routinely treats living, complex, adaptive social systems as machine-like objects. This treatment has driven political economists to oversimplify big, complex social processes using mechanical models, or to ignore them altogether. In development, this has led to theoretical dead ends, trivial agendas, or failed public policies. This article proposes an alternative paradigm: adaptive political economy. It\u0000recognizes that social systems are complex, not complicated; complexity can be ordered, not messy; and social scientists should be developing the concepts, methods, and theories to illuminate the order of complexity, rather than oversimplifying it. The author illustrates one application of adaptive political economy by mapping the coevolution of economic and institutional change. This approach yields fresh, important conclusions that mechanical, linear models of development have missed, including that market-building institutions look and function differently from market-sustaining ones.","PeriodicalId":48266,"journal":{"name":"World Politics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141045886","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Social scientists should be more deliberate in how they define and measure government efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The authors highlight key distinctions among three dimensions of climate policy: the commitments made by governments, the actions that governments take, and the outcomes they produce. In turn, the authors detail the challenges of measuring these dimensions, and discuss the tradeoffs of alternative measurement strategies, including how well they meet the accepted standards for measurement validity. The authors also identify promising avenues for further research.
{"title":"Government Responses to Climate Change","authors":"Evan Lieberman, Michael Ross","doi":"10.1353/wp.0.a929075","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/wp.0.a929075","url":null,"abstract":"Social scientists should be more deliberate in how they define and measure government efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The authors highlight key distinctions among three dimensions of climate policy: the commitments made by governments, the actions that governments take, and the outcomes they produce. In turn, the authors detail the challenges of measuring these dimensions, and discuss the tradeoffs of alternative measurement strategies, including how well they meet the accepted standards for measurement validity. The authors also identify promising avenues for further research.","PeriodicalId":48266,"journal":{"name":"World Politics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.0,"publicationDate":"2024-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141137787","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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