The Transnational Protection Regime and Taiwan's Democratization

2009 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 57-85 ◽  
Author(s):  
Su-Mei Ooi

On September 28, 1986, the Democratic Progressive Party was formed in defiance of restrictions set by a decades-old authoritarian regime, heralding the emergence of a fully competitive multiparty electoral system in Taiwan. Existing literature on Taiwan's democratic breakthrough suggests that international factors have played a significant role in bringing about democracy on the island. But what exactly were these external factors and how have they effected political change in Taiwan? A reexamination of the changing geopolitical and normative environments surrounding Taiwan suggests that they were crucial in shaping political development on the island in ways that have not been described in the literature. This article examines how the geopolitical and international normative environment enabled myriad external substate and nonstate actors to form a transnational “protection regime” around the political opposition, preserving the democratic movement and allowing it to reach its full mobilizational potential in time.

2013 ◽  
Vol 28 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 217-224
Author(s):  
Ram Krishna Tiwari

This paper deals with the political development of Nepal and its history of armed conflict. The formation of Nepali nation-state is not very long, again throughout its political history Nepal remained an independent country, but this country experienced a decade long political conflict from 1996 to 2006. The failure of political change of 1951 and 1990 prepared a political ground for the official beginning the People’s War, and after 2006 the country is moving into the path of peace process. Similarly, the formation of political parties has not a long history compared it with the beginning of democratic movement in India, China and other countries of the world. The poor political vision of the political leaders failed to institutionalize the political change of Nepal, and now the ongoing peace process of Nepal should erase all the weaknesses and conclude it for building prosperous nation.


1972 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 271-292 ◽  
Author(s):  
Raymond F. Hopkins

Although the literature on political development has been remarkably insightful, hopes for a science of “nation-building” have not been realized. While numerous works have described the effects of traditional patterns, ethnic and linguistic cleavages, and rapid mobilization, and have investigated factors such as culture, bureaucracy, ideology, and parties, we have learned very little about how to alter favorably the political conditions these have fostered. Political scientists, more often than not, have documented obstacles to, and failures in, political change desired by leaders in new states, rather than explored strategies whereby such change might be realized.


Author(s):  
Joy K. Langston

This chapter provides a description of the political and economic crises of the mid-1990s that led to the loss of the PRI’s majority in the Chamber and the presidential defeat in 2000. Even as leaders of the authoritarian regime grappled with downward electoral trends, groups within the party began to battle among themselves over the timing and scope of the transition and of party change. The PRI adapted to the rigors of electoral competition because vote-winning groups within its ranks took over the party and defeated their internal rivals, who were less able to respond to the challenges of the ballot box. Political institutions such as federalism and the two-tiered electoral system helped define winners and losers within the party and gave the winning groups—the party’s governors and the national party officers—ways of controlling resources (candidacies and finances) that did not come into direct conflict.


1985 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 299-325 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Seed

Conventional wisdom has long maintained that eighteenth-century religious dissent was a significant source of opposition to the Hanoverian status quo. For Trevelyan, for instance, dissenters were ‘vigilant champions of liberty and critics of government’. The high political visibility of rational dissenters in oppositional movements in the 1770s and 1780s – in opposition to the American war, the Test and Corporation Acts, slavery and the slave trade, the existing electoral system – has been particularly noted. However in recent years the political significance of religious dissent has been questioned. Roy Porter warns that the zeal for reform among dissenters should not be overestimated: ‘Not till the 1780s, and then only amongst a hothead minority, did Nonconformity show a potential for political radicalism.’ John Brewer has argued that the dissenting group associated with Hollis, Price, Priestley and ‘the small, snug, dissenting coterie of Newington Green’ marks one tradition of political opposition in the eighteenth century. But, largely confined to intellectual critique, remarkably uninvolved in the day-to-day cut-and-thrust of political action even evincing a patrician alarm at popular direct action, its contribution to political change was far less significant than the Wilkite movement.


Significance Incumbent President Peter Mutharika of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) narrowly won re-election, ahead of the main opposition candidates, Lazarus Chakwera of the Malawi Congress Party (MCP) and former Vice-President Saulos Chilima of the United Transformation Movement (UTM). The elections were marred by accusations of rigging, and both Chakwera and Chilima have launched court cases to overturn the result amid sizable post-poll protests. Impacts The opposition has ruled out power-sharing, but this may re-emerge as a compromise option should legal challenges fail. Opposition and civil society groups will increase calls for an amendment to the electoral system, with likely increased public backing. International donors will maintain pressure on the government over persistent budget overruns and elite-level corruption.


2018 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-115 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aram Hur

AbstractDefection from North Korea to South Korea has increased dramatically, but little is known of its political consequences. Do North Korean defectors successfully adopt democratic norms, and if so, what factors aid this process? Through a novel survey of defectors, I find that national identification plays a significant role in motivating their fledgling sense of democratic obligation. Greater feelings of national unity with South Koreans lead to a stronger duty to vote and otherwise contribute to the democratic state. This effect is more powerful than that of conventional contractual factors, on which most state resettlement policies are based, and is surprising given that defectors’ nationalist socialization mostly took place under the authoritarian North. The findings suggest the need to reconsider integration approaches toward North Korean defectors and similarly placed refugees elsewhere.


1993 ◽  
Vol 136 ◽  
pp. 805-839 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shao-chuan Leng ◽  
Cheng-yi Lin

Samuel P. Huntington categorized Taiwan's path to democracy as “transformation,” by which he meant that “the elites in power took the lead in bringing about democracy.” The ruling Kuomintang (KMT) would agree with this explanation, although the opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which was established in 1986 in defiance of martial law, would argue that Taiwan's liberalization and democratization was carried out through a process of transplacement, in which “democratization resulted largely from the joint action by government and opposition groups”.


2018 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 324-352
Author(s):  
Jinyoung Park

Abstract Drawing on data from archives and fieldwork in Myanmar, a country in political change from a five-decade authoritarian regime to a quasi-civilian one, this study explores the reasons for a prevalence of corporatist aspects at the early stage of reforms. The early introduction of corporatism in Myanmar diverges from other Asian countries that experienced transitions accompanied by labour militancy, and only later embraced corporatism when political power shifted to elected pro-labour parties. This article argues, first, that corporatism prevails in the rhetoric of the labour movement and in Myanmar’s industrial relations institutions, while labour militancy has simultaneously increased; second, corporatism in Myanmar has few historical precedents but has recently been promoted primarily by the International Labour Organisation (ILO); and third, while corporatism has failed to bring about industrial peace, the rhetoric and institutions of corporatism may limit the political potential of Myanmar’s labour movement by restricting unions’ activities to economic concerns.


1970 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 43-61 ◽  
Author(s):  
Duncan B. Forrester

A Complex stratified polity such as that of India, containing a variety of political cultures and a great diversity of political structure, inevitably produces a multitude of styles of political behaviour. Such styles may be the product of different political cultures and processes of recruitment and training, and they interact with each other in significant ways. In particular, the new integrated political system encourages what I call the ‘percolation of style’ from one stratum of the system to another. The percolating process flows in two-ways—from the national arena to the local, and vice versa—and the process itself affects the nature of political styles. A style which was appropriate and effective in one arena will need adaptation if it is to meet the distinctive challenges of a different stratum in the political system. Percolation thus involves modification of style, and the whole process may be viewed as the gradual development of new styles responsive to the demands of new situations. Inevitably this leads to multitudinous tensions, destructive or creative, but the process is thus an integral part of political change and an understanding of stylistic percolation is an important key to the understanding of the nature and direction of political development.


1976 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 203-216 ◽  
Author(s):  
Francis G. Castles

Despite the greatly enhanced interest in processes of political change that political scientists have shown in recent years, there are still areas that have received attention in only the most speculative manner. Modernization, political development and comparative history are becoming established subdisciplines, reflecting ‘the change to change’. But the political processes involved in the transformation of advanced industrial societies have as yet received only cursory empirical treatment.


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