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242. After Hegemony: Japan’s role and dilemma in maintaining the rules-based order
- Author:
- Yu Inagaki
- Publication Date:
- 11-2022
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- East-West Center
- Abstract:
- The phrase “rules-based order” has recently become a recurring theme in the Japan-US alliance . This is based on the recognition that the liberal international order (LIO)—which the United States built and maintained, and that Japan has significantly benefited from—is now being challenged. While the war in Ukraine has heightened the sense of crisis over global power dynamics, China has been considered the main threat to the LIO. The United States has identified China as not just a security threat but a “ most consequential strategic competitor and the pacing challenge ,” and Japan has come to view the current international environment from a larger perspective, international order. In fact, Japan has expected to play a leading role in maintaining the LIO as US international engagement weakened under the Trump administration. However, is it possible for Japan, a constrained middle power, to maintain the existing order in the face of a declining hegemon and rising challengers? This raises a classic question in international relations: What will happen to the international order after hegemony; and what can and will Japan, occupying a particular place and role in the international system, be able and willing to do regarding international order?
- Topic:
- International Relations, Foreign Policy, Politics, Hegemony, and International Order
- Political Geography:
- Japan, China, Asia, North America, and United States of America
243. Taiwan Matters for America/America Matters for Taiwan
- Author:
- East-West Center
- Publication Date:
- 09-2022
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- East-West Center
- Abstract:
- The inaugural edition of Taiwan Matters for America/America Matters for Taiwan, part of the Asia Matters for America initiative, maps the trade, investment, employment, business, diplomacy, security, education, tourism, and people-to-people connections between the United States and the Taiwan at the national, state, and local levels. This publication and the AsiaMattersforAmerica.org website are resources for understanding the robust and dynamic US-Indo-Pacific relationship.
- Topic:
- International Relations, Climate Change, Economics, Education, Environment, Politics, Science and Technology, Governance, Culture, Population, and Travel
- Political Geography:
- Taiwan and Asia
244. New Opportunities for the United States-Kingdom of Thailand Alliance in the Indo-Pacific
- Author:
- Lance D. Jackson
- Publication Date:
- 09-2022
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- East-West Center
- Abstract:
- In March 2022, the East-West Center in Washington (EWCW), in collaboration with the Royal Thai Embassy, Washington, DC, convened a two-day seminar in which experts from Thailand and the United States discussed issues and opportunities for the US-Thailand alliance. The workshop included a diverse array of discussants hailing from government, military, academic, think tank, and private sector backgrounds. This report, which adheres to the “Chatham House Rule” under which observations referred to in the report are not attributed to any individual participant, is a summary of the group discussions and the key themes from the seminar. The recent signing of the United States-Thailand Communique on Strategic Alliance and Partnership and a memorandum of understanding (MOU) focused on promoting supply chain resilience on July 10, 2022, highlight the pertinence of this report and the associated seminar. The topics detailed in this report aligned with many of the pressing issues addressed in the Communique and MOU, including expanding law enforcement cooperation, deepening cybersecurity collaboration, supporting resilient transportation corridors, advancing military modernization, and catalyzing Thailand’s bio-circular-green (BCG) economy. The report also covered topics and key themes from a series of jointly produced public webinars and an Asia Pacific Bulletin series of policy briefs on US-Thai affairs.
- Topic:
- International Relations, Climate Change, Economics, Education, Environment, Politics, Science and Technology, Governance, Population, Leadership, Public Health, and Travel
- Political Geography:
- Asia, North America, Thailand, Southeast Asia, United States of America, and Indo-Pacific
245. Measuring the impact of self-censorship on political party support in Afrobarometer data using machine learning
- Author:
- Paul Friesen
- Publication Date:
- 08-2022
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Afrobarometer
- Abstract:
- Measures of political party support are viewed suspiciously in hybrid and authoritarian regimes where the two core indicators of political support – elections and public opinion polling – cannot be readily trusted. More accurately, the degree of measurement error is unknown, though scholars presume support for incumbent leaders and parties is exaggerated. This paper scrutinizes the degree to which political opinions on Afrobarometer surveys can be trusted by re-estimating voting preferences for 34 African countries. First, a range of demographic and interview metadata are regressed upon vote choice to see if they systematically influence vote-preference responses. Next, key markers of potential self-censorship are identified and used to create pools of “clean” and “polluted” data. Clean data are used to train a machine learning model to predict voting intentions, and then all data with self-censorship markers are recalculated. The results show that ruling party support is broadly similar in most countries but exaggerated by more than 10 percentage points in Sudan and Uganda and by between 5 and 10 points in Burundi, Tanzania, Togo, and Zimbabwe. Declines in ruling party support due to self-censorship are concurrent with increases in both non-responses and opposition party support.
- Topic:
- Politics, Censorship, Party System, and Partisanship
- Political Geography:
- Africa
246. Unresponsive and corrupt? Ugandan MPs hold key to how citizens perceive them
- Author:
- Matthias Krönke and Ronald Makanga Kakumba
- Publication Date:
- 08-2022
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Afrobarometer
- Abstract:
- Uganda’s legislature is made up of 556 members of Parliament (MPs) who are meant to represent and serve their constituents and oversee the government’s actions. Since President Yoweri Museveni and the National Resistance Movement (NRM) party came to power in 1986 and appointed all members of Parliament, the country’s legislature has changed in several important ways (Kasfir & Twebaze, 2009). First, today all MPs are either directly elected via a first-past-the-post system or indirectly elected via special electoral colleges. Second, the number of parliamentarians has almost doubled over 25 years, from 295 in the 6th Parliament (1996-2001) to 556 in the current 11th Parliament (Inter-Parliamentary Union, 1996; Parliament of Uganda, 2022).1 This drastic increase can be attributed to the continued creation of new constituencies and the allocation of parliamentary seats for special-interest groups. Proponents of this development say it reflects citizens’ demands, but critics describe it as part of a political strategy to protect and grow the ruling party’s seat share in Parliament by increasing the number of constituencies in NRM strongholds (Nakatudde, 2020; Tumushabe & Gariyo, 2009). This debate has now entered a new phase with the recent ruling by the country’s Constitutional Court that Parliament and the Electoral Commission violated articles 51 and 63 of the Constitution by creating new constituencies that do not meet the population quota, based on data from the 2002 and 2014 census counts. The upshot of this ruling are proposals to downsize Uganda’s Parliament and redraw constituency boundaries (Barigaba, 2022). Third, the operating costs of the growing Parliament (MP and staff salaries, allowances, etc.) have increased drastically over the past two decades. Today Ugandan MPs’ salaries (35 million Uganda shillings, or about USD 9,700, per month) surpass those of most MPs elsewhere in Africa and in the European Union (BusinessTech, 2017; Olukya, 2021; Tumushabe & Gariyo, 2009). The cost of running Uganda’s 11th Parliament was expected to increase by more than 50 billion Ugandan shillings (USD 14.1 million), a substantial increase compared to the previous Parliament (Mufumba, 2021). Fourth, the share of MPs who return to Parliament after their first term in office continues to decrease. While about 50% of MPs did not return for a second term in the 6th (1996-2001) and 7th (2001-2006) Parliaments, this rate has increased to 53% (2006-2011), 55% (2011-2016), and 58% (2016-2021) in subsequent Parliaments. Most recently, of the 457 MPs in the 10th Parliament, 319 were not voted back to the 11th Parliament (2021-2026), while 31 did not contest or chose to run for other offices, and only 107 MPs returned (Kasfir & Twebaze, 2009; Forum for Women in Democracy, 2016; Independent, 2021). How do these changes affect 1) how citizens relate to their elected representatives and 2) how MPs address the needs of ordinary citizens? More broadly, are citizens being served by their MPs? To answer these questions, this policy paper begins by clarifying the foundations of the citizen-MP relationship and outlining the four key roles that MPs are generally expected to fulfil. The subsequent sections assess their performance in these roles against citizen expectations and other indicators. We find that Ugandans are becoming increasingly aware of their role in holding their MPs accountable. Most citizens are dissatisfied with how their MPs are doing their jobs, perceive them as corrupt, and say MPs don’t listen to constituents’ concerns. Residents of the Central region and Kampala are particularly critical of their MPs’ performance, probably due at least in part to high constituent-to-MP ratios in those areas. Citizens’ assessments of MP performance are associated with MPs’ perceived responsiveness and corruption as well as whether citizens have had contact with their MPs. In contrast, citizens’ demographic characteristics and views about democracy do not seem to drive their views of their elected representatives. There are two clear policy implications of these findings. First, at the institutional level, it is important to even out the citizen-to-MP ratios across the country. This is in line with the recent constitutional court ruling to base the creation of constituencies on census data. The second policy implication of our findings is that MPs have it in their own hands to change how citizens view their performance by improving on how they engage with them.
- Topic:
- Corruption, Politics, Governance, and Leadership
- Political Geography:
- Uganda and Africa
247. Global Food Insecurity – The Danger of Misguided Food Production Policies: The Case of Sri Lanka
- Author:
- Paul Teng and Jose M. L. Montesclaros
- Publication Date:
- 10-2022
- Content Type:
- Commentary and Analysis
- Institution:
- Centre for Non-Traditional Security Studies, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies
- Abstract:
- The Russia-Ukraine conflict has aggravated food insecurity worldwide and encouraged various countries to find new ways to manage this threat, including policies to substitute costly imported agricultural inputs like synthetic fertilizers and pesticides. Sri Lanka’s recent experience shows that drastic policy changes can have disastrous political and societal consequences.
- Topic:
- Politics, Food, Food Security, and Russia-Ukraine War
- Political Geography:
- Asia and Sri Lanka
248. A Green Wave?
- Author:
- Jessica Drun
- Publication Date:
- 11-2022
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)
- Abstract:
- Edited by Jude Blanchette of CSIS and Hal Brands of SAIS, the Marshall Papers is a series of essays that probes and challenges the assessments underpinning the U.S. approach to great power rivalry. The Papers will be rigorous yet provocative, continually pushing the boundaries of intellectual and policy debates. In this Marshall Paper, Jessica Drun examines how political and identity trends within Taiwan are likely to affect cross-strait relations. Primarily a reaction to assertive actions and policies from Beijing, Drun argues, these trends are moving away from Beijing’s preferences and in Drun’s view are likely to fuel rising PRC belligerence through 2027 and beyond. With this in mind, she suggests the United States should proceed with a long-overdue review of its Taiwan policy, built on a more nuanced understanding of domestic political realities within Taiwan, changes in the cross-strait military balance, growing PRC influence in international organizations, and the broader geopolitical environment.
- Topic:
- Security, Politics, Military Strategy, Conflict, and Strategic Interests
- Political Geography:
- China, Taiwan, and Asia
249. Consistent Partiality: US Foreign Policy on Palestine-Israel
- Author:
- Sarah Whitson and Peter Beinart
- Publication Date:
- 09-2022
- Content Type:
- Video
- Institution:
- Center for Security, Race and Rights (CSRR), Rutgers University School of Law
- Abstract:
- Although the Biden administration talks about supporting democracy and human rights, it has maintained unconditional US support for Israel even as human rights organizations label it an apartheid state. What are the political and ideological foundations of America’s hostility to Palestinian freedom? And what would it take to change them? Does the US’s unconditional support for Israel serve America’s national interests? Join the Center for Security, Race and Rights as we address these questions with two internationally known experts.
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, Apartheid, Human Rights, Politics, Democracy, Ideology, and Strategic Interests
- Political Geography:
- Middle East, Israel, Palestine, North America, and United States of America
250. One world, many knowledges: Epistemological pluralism and African scholarship (Full Issue)
- Author:
- Moliehi Ramonate, Nnaemeka Ohamadike, Helen Acton, Malvern Kudakwashe Marewo, Senzo Ncube, Nene-Lomotey Kuditchar, Ross Harvey, Terence Corrigan, Kendra Connock, Jordan McLean, and Laura Rubidge
- Publication Date:
- 10-2022
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- The Africa Governance Papers (TAGP)
- Institution:
- Good Governance Africa (GGA)
- Abstract:
- This issue reflects something of the journal’s multi- and interdisciplinary ambitions, with articles employing a range of research methodologies and looking at very different topics in Lesotho, Zimbabwe and South Africa, as well as broader-ranging issues in West Africa and the continent.
- Topic:
- Politics, Governance, Research, Populism, Maritime, Accountability, Innovation, Oversight, Pluralism, Epistemology, and Traditional Leaders
- Political Geography:
- Africa, South Africa, and Zimbabwe
251. The Urbanization of People- The Politics of Development in the Chinese City
- Author:
- Eli Friedman and Yao Lu
- Publication Date:
- 12-2022
- Content Type:
- Video
- Institution:
- Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
- Abstract:
- The Urbanization of People (May 2022, Columbia University Press) reveals how cities in China have granted public goods to the privileged while condemning poor and working-class migrants to insecurity, constant mobility, and degraded educational opportunities. Using the school as a lens on urban life, Eli Friedman investigates how the state manages flows of people into the city. He demonstrates that urban governments are providing quality public education to those who need it least: school admissions for nonlocals heavily favor families with high levels of economic and cultural capital. Those deemed not useful are left to enroll their children in precarious resource-starved private schools that sometimes are subjected to forced demolition. Over time, these populations are shunted away to smaller locales with inferior public services. Based on extensive ethnographic research and hundreds of in-depth interviews, this interdisciplinary book details the policy framework that produces unequal outcomes as well as providing a fine-grained account of the life experiences of people drawn into the cities as workers but excluded as full citizens.
- Topic:
- Development, Politics, Urbanization, and Cities
- Political Geography:
- China and Asia
252. Assessing the Chinese Communist Party 20th Party Congress
- Author:
- Thomas J. Christensen, Shang-Jin Wei, Junyang Jiang, Xiaobo Lü, Sun Zhe, and Andrew J. Nathan
- Publication Date:
- 11-2022
- Content Type:
- Video
- Institution:
- Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
- Abstract:
- Assessing the political and foreign policy implications of whatever happens at the 20th Party Congress, presumably including Xi Jinping’s election to a third term as party General Secretary.
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, Politics, and Chinese Communist Party (CCP)
- Political Geography:
- China and Asia
253. Religion and Politics in Japan after the Abe Assassination
- Author:
- Levi McLaughlin and Benjamin E. Goldsmith
- Publication Date:
- 10-2022
- Content Type:
- Video
- Institution:
- Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
- Abstract:
- Turmoil following the shocking murder of former Prime Minister Abe Shinzō on July 8, 2022 by a gunman who bore a grudge against the Unification Church (UC) has reinforced the fact that we must attend to religion in order to understand politics in Japan. In this talk, Levi McLaughlin (North Carolina State University) will contextualize revelations about the UC and its political connections as he surveys how religions and religion-adjacent activists in Japan exert a decisive impact on vote-gathering, policymaking, and party politics. McLaughlin will draw on his ethnographic and historical research to provide an overview of Shinto-affiliated nationalists (including the lobby organization Nippon Kaigi and its signatories), Buddhists (including Soka Gakkai and its affiliated party Komeito), and other actors to reconcile the incommensurate image of Japan as non-religious with the persistence of Japan's religiously-inspired political engagements, and he will discuss precedents for the moral panic that has surged in the wake of Abe's assassination to interpret ways Japan's religion/politics nexus is now developing.
- Topic:
- Politics, Religion, Assassination, and Shinzo Abe
- Political Geography:
- Japan and Asia
254. To Prevent the Collapse of Biodiversity, the World Needs a New Planetary Politics
- Author:
- Stewart Patrick
- Publication Date:
- 11-2022
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- The planet is in the midst of an environmental emergency, and the world is only tinkering at the margins. Humanity’s addiction to fossil fuels and voracious appetite for natural resources are accelerating climate change and degrading ecosystems on land and sea, threatening the integrity of the biosphere and thus the survival of our own species. Given these risks, it is shocking that the multilateral system has failed to respond more forcefully. Belatedly, the United States, the EU, the UK, and some other advanced market democracies have adopted more aggressive greenhouse gas reduction targets, but their ability to deliver is suspect, while critical emerging economies like China and India have resisted accelerating their own decarbonization.1 Even more concerning, existing multilateral commitments, including on climate change, fail to address the other half of the planet’s ecological crisis: collapsing biodiversity, which the leaders of the Group of 7 nations rightly call an “equally important existential threat.”
- Topic:
- Climate Change, Environment, Politics, Multilateralism, and Biodiversity
- Political Geography:
- Global Focus
255. Closing the Gap Between Citizen Participation and Mainstream Politics
- Author:
- Richard Youngs
- Publication Date:
- 12-2022
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- Over the last several years, citizen assemblies, juries, and panels have spread across Europe. Most of these have been run at the local or subnational level, a few at the national or even transnational level. Most have been called by public authorities, a smaller number created in more bottom-up fashion by civic groups. They all share a distinguishing feature: citizens are randomly selected to participate in debates about specific policies. In aggregate, these initiatives can be referred to as selection- or sortition-based participation. As this wave of sortition-based participation consolidates, attention has turned to its wider political effects. While there is generally much to celebrate about this rise in participation, there remains a widespread feeling that the practice is not yet strongly enough embedded in mainstream politics to move the needle on overall democratic quality. Indeed, experiences suggest that standard channels of decisionmaking and political debate often undercut the influence of sortition initiatives. This paper examines how sortition-based deliberation might be embedded more firmly and effectively within other democratic arenas. Its focus is not on the design and process of sortition forums themselves—many other publications have offered this level of evaluation in recent years.1 Rather, it explores options for building sortition-based forms of participation more fully into longer-standing channels of mainstream politics. If selection-based citizen participation is to have wider relevance to democratic renewal, it is important to identify the political factors that can either stifle or oxygenate its potential. This paper assesses what steps might be taken better to prevent politics from pushing sortition-based participation to the margins and what can be done to infuse politics more widely with the benefits of such participation. The first section of this paper distinguishes between two levels of embedding sortition-based participation. One relates to a relatively focused agenda of so-called institutionalization; the other to more general shifts in political dynamics. The paper then considers progress and obstacles to embedding sortition-based participation at each of these two levels—while suggesting that it is the second, wider political understanding that is especially important. The final section offers five guidelines for assessing how the gap between sortition-based participation and other sites of political activity might in the future be narrowed.
- Topic:
- Politics, Citizenship, and Participation
- Political Geography:
- Europe
256. How Malaysian Politics Shaped Chinese Real Estate Deals and Economic Development
- Author:
- Guanie Lim
- Publication Date:
- 06-2022
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- Iskandar Malaysia is the oldest and by far the most prominent economic corridor in Malaysia. Located in the southernmost state of Johor, the corridor came to host several real estate developments (such as Princess Cove and Forest City) involving multinational corporations (MNCs) from China almost immediately after the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) was launched in 2013. On one level, the infrastructure-spending spree associated with the BRI helped boost Malaysia’s economy as Chinese real estate MNCs invested in Iskandar Malaysia to grow their overseas portfolios. However, their involvement in the corridor disrupted the existing dynamics between Malaysia’s central and local governments. Although these Chinese projects offered an opening for Johor’s state government to counter Putrajaya’s dominance in the economic corridor, some swiftly became a magnet for divisive electoral campaigning and voter anger. Combined with several socioeconomic issues, the discontent generated by these Chinese real estate projects contributed to the unexpected defeat of the long-ruling United Malays National Organization (UMNO) in Malaysia’s May 2018 general election. Chinese real estate MNCs have sought to adapt to these shifting dynamics, yet it is uncertain to what degree their adaptive strategies will bear fruit amid a looming real estate crisis back in China and other related issues. Ultimately, Chinese real estate investment has been both a tool and an enabler of efforts undertaken by various Malaysian stakeholders, rather than the all-powerful China-imposed juggernaut that some commentators on Malaysia’s development over the last two decades have tended to see. Despite the allure of lucrative real estate deals, it is equally important to recognize the potential pitfalls when local politics go awry. Events in Iskandar Malaysia demonstrate that it is politically unsustainable to push real estate projects that are too expensive for most local residents to afford.
- Topic:
- Politics, Entrepreneurship, Risk, Economic Development, and Real Estate
- Political Geography:
- China, Malaysia, and Asia
257. Reducing Pernicious Polarization: A Comparative Historical Analysis of Depolarization
- Author:
- Jennifer McCoy, Benjamin Press, Murat Somer, and Ozlem Tuncel
- Publication Date:
- 05-2022
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- The global rise of political polarization has fueled concerns about its detrimental impact on politics and society. From an increase in political violence to a decrease in the quality of democracy and governance, the threats posed by pernicious polarization—the division of society into two mutually antagonistic political camps—are diverse and acute. Determining how to reduce these tensions is therefore an urgent challenge. Using data on political polarization from the Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) data set, this working paper assesses various instances of depolarization around the globe since 1900 and analyzes their long-term sustainability. Polarization is increasing worldwide. When broken down by region, V-Dem data suggest that every region except Oceania has seen polarization levels rise since 2005. Africa has had the smallest increase during this period, although it has long had high levels of polarization. Rising polarization in Europe is being driven by deepening political divisions in Eastern and Central Europe, Southern Europe, and the Balkans. In the Western Hemisphere, the largest democracies—Brazil, Mexico, and the United States—are all experiencing extreme levels of polarization. East Asia’s polarization levels have traditionally been low, though increasing political tensions in places like South Korea and Taiwan are driving up the region’s score. And in South Asia, India’s polarization has skyrocketed since 2014. Jennifer McCoy Jennifer McCoy is a nonresident scholar in the Democracy, Conflict, and Governance Program, where she focuses on political polarization and democratic resilience in the U.S. and around the world. To better understand the various paths by which polarized societies might overcome or reduce their political divisions, this working paper examines perniciously polarized countries that have successfully depolarized, at least for a time. Through a quantitative analysis of the V-Dem data set, this study identifies 105 episodes from 1900 to 2020 where countries were able to reduce polarization from pernicious levels for at least five years. These 105 episodes represent roughly half of the total episodes of pernicious polarization during the time period, thus indicating a fairly robust capacity of countries to depolarize. If considered in terms of country experiences rather than episodes (because many countries have experienced multiple episodes in a cycle of polarization and depolarization), then the data indicate that two-thirds of the 178 countries for which V-Dem provides polarization data have experienced one or more episodes of pernicious polarization, but only thirty-five countries (20 percent) have failed to experience any depolarization to below-pernicious levels. Given this apparent capacity among the majority of the world’s countries to depolarize from pernicious levels at least some of the time, this analysis seeks to identify the contexts and sustainability of those experiences and to encourage further research into their causal mechanisms and outcomes for democracies. The analysis offers a preliminary discussion of the potential meaning and normative implications of depolarization as a concept and policy goal. It then uses qualitative analysis to identify patterns in the contexts of various depolarization cases and gauge the sustainability of these trends. Most of these depolarization episodes were associated with dramatic changes in a country’s political life. An analysis of contextual factors showed that almost three-quarters of the cases came after major systemic shocks: a foreign intervention, independence struggle, violent conflict, or regime change (primarily in a democratizing direction). In the remainder of cases, countries depolarized within a given regime structure, whether democratic or autocratic. Tellingly, the authors identified no cases of depolarization from pernicious levels among liberal democracies. This is because very few countries classified as full liberal democracies have ever reached pernicious levels; the United States stands out today as the only wealthy Western democracy with persistent levels of pernicious polarization. Just under half of all depolarizing cases were able to sustain depolarization for a decade or longer. In a second sizeable group of cases, countries managed polarization to some degree, either living with chronic near-pernicious levels after depolarizing, or else repolarizing to near-pernicious levels within ten years. Finally, 15 percent of the cases returned to pernicious levels within the first decade. Troublingly, when the authors analyzed the entire time period from 1900 to 2020, nearly half of the countries that had sustained depolarization or managed polarization for at least a decade later returned to pernicious levels of polarization. These outcomes illustrate the difficulty of sustaining low levels of polarization, and they indicate that a cyclical pattern of polarization, depolarization, and repolarization may be a characteristic feature of political life in many places. Only a fraction (14 percent) of cases resulted in sustained depolarization over the long term.The mechanisms and strategies that enable such sustained depolarization in democracies will be the subject of future research. But given the small number of democracies (eleven) able to accomplish this feat amid the larger pattern of cyclical polarization and depolarization, it will be crucial to also understand strategies of managing polarization at moderately high levels while avoiding democratic erosion, government dysfunction, or returns to pernicious polarization and potential violence.
- Topic:
- Politics, History, Polarization, and Society
- Political Geography:
- Global Focus
258. Political Change and Turkey’s Foreign Policy
- Author:
- Alper Coşkun and Sinan Ülgen
- Publication Date:
- 11-2022
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- Turkey is heading toward a set of twin elections that could have momentous consequences for the country’s future. In June 2023 at the latest, Turkish voters will be asked to choose a new president and a new parliamentary majority. For the past two decades, the Turkish political landscape has been dominated by the Justice and Development (AK) Party and its uniquely successful leader, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. After having ruled the country single-handedly since 2002, Erdoğan became the first executive president of Turkey in 2018, following a tightly contested constitutional change. He has come out victorious in every round of elections since the start of his political career. And yet, after two decades, his popularity is faltering, raising the prospect of political change. The turning point for Turkey’s political system has been the transition to a presidential system with the constitutional amendment of 2017.1 Since the start of multiparty elections in 1946, Turkey had had a parliamentary system, and since 2002 it has had single-party governments. With Erdoğan at the helm, the AK Party has won nearly all elections over the past two decades. It only failed to win a parliamentary majority in the most recent elections,2 in June 2018, and since then has been forced to rely on the support of the hyper-nationalist Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) to secure control of the legislature.3 Alper Coşkun Alper Coşkun is a senior fellow in the Europe Program and leads the Türkiye and the World Project at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, DC. @IACOSKUN The transition to the presidential system forced a realignment of the political constellation. The structural impact of this transition has led to the creation of two major political alliances. The Cumhur, or People’s, Alliance is led by the AK Party and includes the MHP and a small number of marginal parties. The Millet, or Nation, Alliance is led by the main opposition, the center-left Republican People’s Party (CHP); it also includes the center-right/nationalist İYİ Party as well as the Saadet and Demokrat parties, which appeal to a smaller electoral base. The first real test of this alliance-based politics was the municipal elections of March 2019, where the opposition alliance performed markedly better. Millet-backed opposition candidates won the electoral race in nine out of Turkey’s ten major metropolitan cities, including Ankara and Istanbul. These cities had been ruled by mayors linked to the AK Party and its predecessors since 1994. Now the alliances are gearing up to contest the critical 2023 elections. The ruling Cumhur Alliance’s candidate will be Erdoğan, who will try to win a third term as Turkey’s president. The candidate of the Millet Alliance is still unknown. Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, as the leader of the main opposition party, is intent on becoming the Millet candidate, but there are doubts about his electability against Erdoğan. Meral Akşener, the chairwoman of İYİ—the second-largest opposition party—has so far sidelined herself from the presidential race. Ekrem Imamoğlu, the mayor of Istanbul, and Mansur Yavaş, the mayor of Ankara, are also possible presidential candidates for the opposition. At present, all four potential candidates for the opposition are polling better than Erdoğan—fueling speculation about political change.
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, Politics, Public Opinion, Elections, and Political Parties
- Political Geography:
- Turkey and Middle East
259. Political and Ideological Orientations of Ukrainian Citizens in the Conditions Of The Russian Aggression
- Author:
- Yuri Yakymenko, A. Bychenko, V. Zamiatin, M. Mishchenko, O. Ruzumnyi, P. Stetsiuk, and L. Shanghina
- Publication Date:
- 12-2022
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- National Security and Defence
- Institution:
- Razumkov Centre
- Abstract:
- The all-out Russian armed aggression against Ukraine that began on February 24, 2022, has fundamentally changed the situation in Ukraine and the world. Thousands of Ukrainians were killed, many fell victims to torture and inhuman treatment, millions left the country, saving their lives from the war, the aggressor forcibly deported from Ukraine thousands of adults and children.
- Topic:
- Politics, Public Opinion, Ideology, Civilians, Social Cohesion, and Russia-Ukraine War
- Political Geography:
- Russia, Europe, and Ukraine
260. The Scowcroft Center’s project on twenty-first-century diplomacy
- Author:
- Jeffrey Cimmino and Amanda J. Rothschild
- Publication Date:
- 06-2022
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Atlantic Council
- Abstract:
- How should US diplomacy adapt for the twenty-first century? The practice of diplomacy has changed drastically over the past several decades, with the return of great power rivalry, the emergence of the new technologies of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR), and the rise of other important developments. Yet, while scholars and strategists have devoted enormous attention to how these new developments affect other domains, such as the future of warfare, they have devoted scant attention to the changing nature of diplomacy. If we believe, however, that diplomacy is a—if not the—most important tool of American statecraft, then twenty-first-century diplomacy deserves the same level of sustained attention. This paper will seek to characterize the changing nature of diplomacy with the objective of helping US and allied diplomats more effectively practice strategy and statecraft. This issue brief considers two key questions. How is the context of twenty-first-century diplomacy different from that of the past? How can US diplomacy begin to adapt for the twenty-first century? In answering the first question, this issue brief will focus on the most salient change in the international balance of power—the rise of China—in addition to the current technological revolution. After outlining how these changes have affected the context in which the United States conducts diplomacy, this issue brief will suggest several proposals to adapt US diplomacy to the twenty-first century. These suggestions will address both how changes in the global context—especially technology—have affected the conduct of US diplomacy and how US diplomacy can best respond to China’s rise and the 4IR.
- Topic:
- Diplomacy, International Organization, Politics, Science and Technology, and Innovation
- Political Geography:
- China, Asia, and United States of America