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Books > Social sciences > Politics & government > Political structure & processes > Democracy
In 2017, the Government's attempt to trigger Article 50 and so leave the European Union resulted in a judgement by the Supreme Court, which stated that the Government was unentitled to do so without the consent of Parliament, directly citing the Bill of Rights in its judgement. Ironically, the Bill of Rights, enacted in 1689 to address abuses by the Crown, was successfully invoked in the twenty-first century to curb a perceived abuse by Government, acting in the name of the Crown. Passed shortly after the Glorious Revolution, the Bill sets out the balance of power between Parliament and the Crown, prohibiting the sovereign from levying taxes, recruiting troops or suspending laws without Parliamentary consent. Establishing Parliament as the ultimate source of power in the land and enshrining basic civil rights first set out in Magna Carta but subsequently abridged, the Bill document can justly claim to serve as the origin of Britain's democracy. Published here with an introduction by Jonathan Sumption providing the historical context of the document and its influence over the centuries - particularly on the United States Bill of Rights - this edition shows how a number of the original clauses find renewed relevance in contemporary events.
'Scintillating ... thought-provoking ... one of the very best of the great crop of recent books on the subject.' Andrew Rawnsley, Observer Democracy has died hundreds of times, all over the world. We think we know what that looks like: chaos descends and the military arrives to restore order, until the people can be trusted to look after their own affairs again. However, there is a danger that this picture is out of date. Until very recently, most citizens of Western democracies would have imagined that the end was a long way off, and very few would have thought it might be happening before their eyes as Trump, Brexit and paranoid populism have become a reality. David Runciman, one of the UK's leading professors of politics, answers all this and more as he surveys the political landscape of the West, helping us to spot the new signs of a collapsing democracy and advising us on what could come next.
Since the end of the Cold War, Europe has been the stage of a large-scale project of international socialization. European regional organizations such as the OSCE, the Council of Europe, NATO, and the EU assumed the task of inducting the transition countries to the liberal-democratic standards of the Western international community. How and when have Western organizations had an impact on the transformation of Europe? Why have they been successful in some countries but not in others? How can we adequately analyze and theorize international socialization in Europe? In a comparative analysis of nine countries, the book tests theoretical conditions and mechanisms of international norm promotion and shows that successful socialization has been a result of credible EU and NATO membership conditionality as well as moderate political costs of compliance for the target governments.
The editor of this work argues that the contemporary American political scene is increasingly driven by populist demands. This is the only book on American Politics which outlines this trend. Using primary sources and analyses from government and the media, the book examines the many aspects from all points of the political spectrum, of populism. It is divided into three sections, covering economic, cultural, and governmental populism. Each section contains unique stories, told through informative reporting, reasoned analysis, and passionate oratory. Freed from the traditional ideological conceptions of American politics, this work allows the reader to understand the diverse nature of contemporary populism.
This documentary collection traces the development and meaning of democracy in America from colonial times to the present. It includes classic writings and speeches such as Lincoln's Gettysburg Address as well as lesser-known gems such as Fannie Lou Hamer's testimony before the Credentials Committee of the Democratic Party convention and Cesar Chavez's Letter from Delano. Written or spoken by Presidents and ex-slaves, political theorists and poets, labor leaders and songwriters, Supreme Court justices and suffragettes, liberals and conservatives, these documents reflect the diversity and breadth of the American experience and the ongoing struggle to achieve the ideals on which the nation was founded. Forty-seven illustrations complement the text. The collection can be read as a succinct overview of American history and used as a reference or source book. The documents have been selected with the advice of a number of America's leading scholars and teachers. Arranged by historical era, the collection begins with Powhatan's Letter to John Smith and closes with Jesse Jackson's Common Ground and Common Sense. Each document is organized with a fact box, up-to-date commentary based on recent scholarship, and list of suggested readings. Nearly a fifth of the documents represent recent events in American history; women and minorities are well represented. Shorter documents are full text; longer ones have been judiciously edited by Professor Levy for the general reader. An appendix contains the full text of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States (including all the amendments). Markets for this work are school, public, and college and university libraries, and college courses on American history, American government and politics, and American political theory.
Native scholars offer clearly written coverage of the relationship between political parties and democracy in the nations of Europe. Political Parties and Democracy: Volume II: Europe is the second volume in this five-volume set. It offers clearly written, up-to-date coverage of the political parties of this diverse region from the unique perspective of distinguished indigenous scholars who have lived the truths they tell and, thus, write with unique breadth, depth, and scope. Presented in two parts, this volume first discusses the political parties in Western Europe, devoting a chapter each to France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom, Denmark, and Norway. It then explores the realities on the ground in Eastern Europe with chapters on Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic. Throughout, contributors explore the relationship between political parties and democracy (or democratization) in their respective nations, providing necessary historical, socioeconomic, and institutional context, and clarifying the balance of power among parties—and between them and competing agencies of power—today.
Parliament, and the House of Commons in particular, is increasingly held in contempt by the British public. From attending parties during the Covid-19 lockdown to taking payment for lobbying, MPs undermine their credibility by acting as if the rules they set for others should not apply to them. Still far from representative of the country they govern from the ancient and crumbling Palace of Westminster, MPs appear detached from the lives led by their constituents - conducting their business according to rules and procedures that have become too complex for many of them to understand. Hannah White offers a perceptive critique of the shortcomings of the House of Commons, arguing that the reputation of the Commons is in a downward spiral - compounded by government attempts to side-line parliament during Brexit and the coronavirus pandemic. At a time of populist challenge to representative democracy, this book is an essential rallying cry for Members of Parliament to reform the House of Commons - equipping it to fulfil its important role as a cornerstone of our democracy - or see it fade into irrelevance. -- .
"This book explores the intriguing idea that there is much more democracy in human history than is generally acknowledged. It establishes that democracy was developing across greater Asia before classical Athens, clung on during the 'Dark Ages', often formed part of indigenous governance and is developing today in unexpected ways"--
This title examines the political role of courts in new democracies in Latin America and Africa, focusing on their ability to hold political power-holders accountable when they act outside their constitutionally defined powers. The book also issues a warning: there are problems inherent in the current global move towards strong constitutional government, where increasingly strong powers are placed in the hands of judges who themselves are not made accountable.
In this study of the mechanisms of transitional justice in Poland, Frances Millard asks: How does society come to terms with its past? How should it punish the perpetrators of oppression and acknowledge its victims? In the former communist countries of Central and Eastern Europe the task of answering these questions came down to the need to eliminate the communist parties' hold over the state, the economy and society in order to move towards democracy. Millard argues that the key step in achieving this was uncovering the truth about the previous regime's past, prosecuting the perpetrators of past crimes and providing compensation and restitution for its victims. Through the specific case of Poland, Millard provides a comprehensive assessment of the mechanisms and institutions used to achieve this, such as lustration, law enforcement through a Constitutional Tribunal and institutions dedicated to dealing with the past such as the Institute of National Remembrance. Crucially, these processes have assumed new significance in recent years after the Law and Justice Party came to power in 2015, using transitional justice as a tool of political control which has enabled the restructuring of Polish democracy.
This book argues that the weakness of civil society in the post-Soviet Caucasus is a result not only of post-communist political and economic problems, but also of the effects of historical legacies. These influence both formal and informal civil societies and weaken the countries' ability to facilitate democratisation.
Looking into Brazil's recent experience of democracy is an arduous undertaking, given the complexities of a country of continental size and great regional contrasts, where areas of prosperity and wealth mingle with underdevelopment and poverty. This book looks at some of the important issues involved in building up a democracy and keeping it working. How should we assess Brazil's experience of democracy? To what extent has the emergence of a democratic regime improved Brazilians' social, economic, and political life? Has democracy been consolidated to the point of making a political breakdown unthinkable or improbable? These are questions that any student of Brazil has to address. The answers to them, however, are far from simple. Contributors include Edmund Amann (School of Economic Studies, University of Manchester, UK), Maria Celi Scalon (Insituto Universitario de Pesquisas do Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), Carlos Antonio Costa Ribeiro (Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brazil), Mauricio Coutinho (Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Brazil), Argelina Cheibub Figueiredo (Universidade de Sao Paulo, Brazil), James Dunkerley (Institute of Latin American Studies and Queen Mary, University of London, UK), Antonio Sergio A. Guimaraes (Universidade de Sao Paulo, Brazil), Anthony Hall (London School of Economics and Political Science, UK), Fernando Limongi (Universidade de Sao Paulo, Brazil), Fiona Macaulay (Centre for Brazilian Studies, University of Oxford and Institute of Latin American Studies, University of London, UK), Celso Martone (Universidade de Sao Paulo, Brazil), Leandro Piquet Carneiro (Universidade de Sao Paulo, Brazil), Mauro Porto (Universidade de Brasilia, Brazil), and Brasilio Sallum Jr. (Universidade de Sao Paulo, Brazil).
Although the score of countries comprising Russia's "near abroad" (the former non-Russian Soviet republics) and "far abroad" (the former non-Russian Warsaw Pact states) are behaving with variably increasing independence in their domestic and foreign policies, Russia continues to regard them as remaining within the same core-periphery sphere of influence formerly exerted by the Soviet Union within the same geographic space. Russia misinterprets bids by these countries to adopt liberalizing structural reforms and to join Euro-Atlantic organizations as foreign-inspired and inimical to Russia's security. Whether Russia can learn to recognize that such bids are in fact natural developments of national self-interest will determine whether healthy and mutually beneficial bilateral relations can develop between Russia and the states of her near and far abroad in the 21st century. No previous study of the dynamics of post-Soviet assertive sovereignty has as broad a geographic scope as Eurasia Rising, which considers the whole of Post-Soviet Space: DT Belarus, Moldova, Ukraine DT _ Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania DT Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia DT Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan DT Albania, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Slovakia
Explores the fundamental shift that has occurred in America and Britain as elites accumulate unprecedented capital and influence and a meritocracy has emerged to manage national affairs, a change that means opportunity, affluence, and power have gravitated away from most of the population. Stoesz connects present and past to look at the progressive-era, the history of professions, and questions of welfare state reform, post-neoliberalism, and marketization.
This text seeks to understand the problematic relationship between liberal democracy and contemporary citizenship by tracing the links between conceptual debates about these issues and the specific social, political and historical dynamics of a host of different countries. Offering a careful blend of theoretical discussion and case study material, it provides an introduction to both sociologies of citizenship and politics of democracy and a fascinating series of overviews of particular nation states. Class, race, gender and globalization are recurring themes in the book, which addresses the ongoing possibilities of politics and cultural meaning within nation states.
This volume explores South Korea's successful transition from an underdeveloped, authoritarian country to a modern industrialized democracy. South Korea's experience of foreign aid gives a unique perspective on how to use foreign aid for economic development as well as how to build a strong partnership between developed and developing countries.
There could hardly be a more appropriate time in world history to be revisiting the issues of globalisation and democracy. After almost two centuries of what might be regarded as globalisation in the current usage of the term, has fallen into disrepute. Voters have used the ballot box to reject both the concept of globalisation and the mainstream parties that promoted it. The UK voted to leave the EU, in the 2016 'Brexit' referendum, and the US elected Donald Trump as President. This three-volume collection brings together the key writings on globalisation and democracy exploring the progression of globalisation as well as themes such as employment, international trade, technology and the environment amongst other important issues. This collection provides both scholarly and lay readers an opportunity to analyze how globalisation has impacted the world we live in today.
In its first edition, "The Global Resurgence of Democracy" brought together essays on democratization written from 1989 to 1991 by internationally prominent scholars, intellectuals, and political leaders. This thoroughly revised and updated second edition extends that work with a wealth of fresh material on a wide range of conceptual, historical, institutional, and policy issues. "A useful compilation popularizing the work of an influential journal... "The Journal of Democracy "is an effective tribune for mainstream U.S. thinking on these issues."-- "Political Studies"
"Media, Economy and Democracy" offers a research-based exploration of the way the media portrays a range of political and economics-related topics and assesses the likely impact of that coverage. These include British domestic economy, anti-globalization protest, the Single Currency, and the European economy. Using both quantitative and qualitative techniques, Neil Gavin explores the implications that follow for journalism and the study of journalism, and for British and European democracy and politics.
Our society's institutional infrastructures--our democratic political system, economic structures, legal practices, and educational establishment--were all created as intellectual outgrowths of the Enlightenment. All our cultural institutions are based on the intellectual idea that an enlightened citizenry could govern its affairs with reason and responsibility. In the late 20th century, however, we are witnessing the disintegration of much of our cultural heritage. Wood argues that this is due to our evolution into a DEGREESUpost-intellectual society DEGREESR--a society characterized by a loss of critical thinking, the substitution of information for knowledge, mediated reality, increasing illiteracy, loss of privacy, specialization, psychological isolation, hyper-urbanization, moral anarchy, and political debilitation. These post-intellectual realities are all triggered by three underlying determinants: the failure of linear growth and expansion to sustain our economic system; the runaway information overload; and technological determinism. Wood presents a new and innovative social theory, challenging readers to analyze all our post-intellectual cultural malaise in terms of these three fundamental determinants.
Europe Undivided analyzes how an enlarging EU has facilitated a convergence toward liberal democracy among credible future members of the EU in Central and Eastern Europe. It reveals how variations in domestic competition put democratizing states on different political trajectories after 1989, and how the EU's leverage eventually influenced domestic politics in liberal and particularly illiberal democracies. In doing so, Europe Undivided illuminates the changing dynamics of the relationship between the EU and candidate states from 1989 to 2004, and challenges policymakers to manage and improve EU leverage to support democracy, ethnic tolerance, and economic reform in other candidates and proto-candidates such as the Western Balkan states, Turkey, and Ukraine. Albeit not by design, the most powerful and successful tool of EU foreign policy has turned out to be EU enlargement - and this book helps us understand why, and how, it works. |
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