This book analyzes parties beyond the national borders and their increasing institutionalization abroad, in order to understand their development, their organizational specificities, their functions, and their impact on the party system and national politics at home. With 12 contrasted case studies, it comparatively addresses a wide range of perspectives on political parties abroad and lays the foundation for a framework of analysis of political parties abroad, contributing to a better understanding of transnationalism and long-distance democracy. The generalization of overseas voting and the development of representative institutions for emigrants has transformed the civic and political links between states and their diaspora. This has also created new opportunities for political parties, with the task to reach out to citizens living abroad, mobilize them for elections, and even organize their representation at home. This book represents the first in-depth study of an emerging phenomenon. This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of political parties/party politics, immigration, and more broadly to democracy studies and comparative politics.

Why Liberals and Conservatives Clash offers an explanation for the extreme polarization between liberal and conservative that is the hallmark of the American political landscape today. It suggests that liberal thought is intrinsically different from conservative thought, and that each constitutes a self-subsistent world-view with its specific qualities and rules. The book offers a set of guidelines to predict a person's views based on other views s/he holds, given that each world-view is what it is for structural reasons, and is more than merely a sum of discrete positions. It explains, for example, why people who support gay marriage also typically support the woman's right to an early-term abortion, and why people who demand that citizens "support the military" understand this as meaning, support putting members of the military in harm's way. Because liberal thought and conservative thought each constitutes a closed world-view, neither side will ever convince the other in an argument. The most we can hope for is an acknowledgment by each side of the usefulness of the other, a goal Fleming proposes as the most reasonable one for our times.
Why Liberals and Conservatives Clash makes logical the most striking, and hitherto puzzling feature of the contemporary American political landscape: its acrimony, its air of being an argument between the deaf: neither side understands the other. Fleming suggests this is so because neither side accepts the bases underlying the other's particular positions. We can, however, understand that they are different, and that trying to force the other side into submission won't work. We need to go beyond liberals dismissing conservatives with horror andconservatives dismissing liberals with disgust. Conservatives aren't merely imperfect liberals, they're something else entirely. Liberals aren't merely potential conservatives, they actually think differently.

Why Liberals and Conservatives Clash offers an explanation for the extreme polarization between liberal and conservative that is the hallmark of the American political landscape today. It suggests that liberal thought is intrinsically different from conservative thought, and that each constitutes a self-subsistent world-view with its specific qualities and rules. The book offers a set of guidelines to predict a person's views based on other views s/he holds, given that each world-view is what it is for structural reasons, and is more than merely a sum of discrete positions. It explains, for example, why people who support gay marriage also typically support the woman's right to an early-term abortion, and why people who demand that citizens "support the military" understand this as meaning, support putting members of the military in harm's way. Because liberal thought and conservative thought each constitutes a closed world-view, neither side will ever convince the other in an argument. The most we can hope for is an acknowledgment by each side of the usefulness of the other, a goal Fleming proposes as the most reasonable one for our times.
Why Liberals and Conservatives Clash makes logical the most striking, and hitherto puzzling feature of the contemporary American political landscape: its acrimony, its air of being an argument between the deaf: neither side understands the other. Fleming suggests this is so because neither side accepts the bases underlying the other's particular positions. We can, however, understand that they are different, and that trying to force the other side into submission won't work. We need to go beyond liberals dismissing conservatives with horror andconservatives dismissing liberals with disgust. Conservatives aren't merely imperfect liberals, they're something else entirely. Liberals aren't merely potential conservatives, they actually think differently.

This volume of essays constitutes the first history of Labour and left-wing politics in the decade when Margaret Thatcher reshaped modern Britain. Leading scholars explore aspects of left-wing culture, activities and ideas at a time when social democracy was in crisis. There are articles about political leadership, economic alternatives, gay rights, the miners' strike, the Militant Tendency and the politics of race. The book also situates the crisis of the left in international terms as the socialist world began to collapse. Tony Blair's New Labour disavowed the 1980s left, associating it with failure, but this volume argues for a more complex approach. Many of the causes it championed are now mainstream, suggesting that the time has come to reassess 1980s progressive politics, despite its undeniable electoral failures. With this in mind, the contributors offer ground-breaking research and penetrating arguments about the strange death of Labour Britain. -- .

This book provides a thorough analysis of the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan (LDP), from a variety of perspectives including its factions, party presidential elections, the distribution of posts, national elections, local organisations, the policy making process and partner organisations. Drawing on comprehensive and up-to-date data, as well as a large number of interviews, internal party documents and quantitative data, The Liberal Democratic Party of Japan explains the machinery of the Japanese government and ruling party, exploring how policies are made. In so doing, the chapters also analyse the strengths and weaknesses of today's LDP through a comparison of Koizumi Juni'ichiro and Abe Shinzo, both having established long-lasting administrations through their strong leadership. Demonstrating how the LDP has changed significantly over recent years, particularly since the political reforms of 1994, this book will be extremely useful to students and scholars of Japanese and Asian politics.

We in the U.S. have deserved someone like Donald Trump as our president for some time. Until now, by a string of luck, we had mostly centrist presidents, both Republican and Democratic, some with only a modicum of intelligence and humanity. With Donald Trump, however, we finally ran out of luck and he is our sitting president. Now, the spotlight is focused on him, but we easily forget that he is, after all, a product of his own society. Trump's rise to power owes itself to its own social-historical circumstances: For decades now America's Consumer Society had prepared the American voters, mostly White, to find someone like Trump as their leader, by supplying them with around-the-clock distractions that made them feel good, happy and falsely powerful. Trump's ascendancy could not be possible without our consumption of daily entertainment which makes us selfish, childish and idiotic human beings. Such minds are easily affected by anxiety, anger and vengefulness. In our daily sea of popular entertainment of mass circulation, we have become trash cans--Mental Trash Cans--that exist just to process trash that enters and leaves our minds almost at the same time. This wasted mind, America's most celebrated symbol of success that is created by its best and brightest, keeps us away from one another as we become privatized citizens and neighbors in our individual cocoons, lonely, scared, dumbed down, living and dying our solitary unconnected lives. Into this vacuum of intelligence and humanity, enter Donald Trump, the entertainer-billionaire, now the President, who, with his brand of populist Fascism, challenges the powers of entrenched Corporate America and all of its mind-captivating arsenal. He successfully conquered White Americans by separating them from non-whites, thus revealing America's nationalism and racism, hitherto papered over in its Liberal-Capital consumer paradise. The common Americans, whether White or non-white, possess two prized items that Corporate and Political America covets and wants to take from them, the dollar and the vote: The American Masses, now as garbage-fed children, are neither smart nor united enough to protect the two critical weapons of their democracy. Trump's presidency proves it.

Marxism in Britain has declined, almost to the point of oblivion, since the Second World War. The Communist Party of Great Britain had more than 50,000 members in the early 1940s, but less than 5,000 when it disbanded in 1991. Dissenting and Trotskyist organizations experienced a very similar decline, although there has been a late flowering of Marxism in Scotland.
Based on the Communist Party archives at Manchester, "Marxism in Britain" examines the decline over the last sixty years. The book deals with the impact of the Cold War upon British Marxism, looking at how international events such as the Soviet invasions of Hungary and Czechoslovakia affected the Communist Party of Great Britain. The issues of Marxism and Britain's withdrawal from the Empire are also addressed, as are the Marxist influence upon British industrial relations and its involvement in the feminist movement. Keith Laybourn focuses very much on the current debate in British Marxist history which divides historiansover the influence of Moscow and Stalinism on the Communist Party, and he explores the ways in which this undermined Marxism in Britain.

First published in 1999, this volume why Europe's arguably most successful political party, the Swedish Social Democratic Party, become so divided over European integration. Why were its grass-roots so reluctant to embrace EU membership and why did a Social Democratic government decide to stand aside from the launch of the single European currency? What connection is there between Europe and the Swedish model of political economy? While much has been written in English on Swedish Social Democracy, little of this literature has dealt with its difficulties during the 1990s and especially with its acute problems over Europe. This book fills that gap. Using original, primary data, Nicholas Aylott addresses the topic from macro and micro-political perspectives, taking account of historical, cultural, geopolitical and economic constraints, but also the interests and calculations of key individuals at critical junctures. It places the experience of Swedish Social Democracy into a broad comparative framework, drawing especially from the experiences of its Scandinavian sister parties. Up-to-date analysis of the party's debate on EMU is included.

Contrary to the expectations of many people, China's recent economic growth has not led to the collapse of the Chinese Communist Party. In fact, the Party has recently carried out a peaceful and orderly transition to the so-called fourth generation of leadership, has revitalised itself, and created a new, younger and better trained cadre corps. Despite this successful transformation, there continue to be many problems that the Party will need to overcome if it is to remain in power, including pressures for democratization in both urban and rural areas, widespread corruption, the emergence of new social groups, and increasing dissatisfaction among workers who seem to be losing out in the present transition process. The Chinese Communist Party in Reform explores the current state of the Chinese Communist Party and the many challenges that it faces. It considers the dynamics of development in China, the Party organization, recruitment and management, and the Party's role in society more widely. It concludes by examining the prospects for the future of the Party, including whether it will continue to be able to accommodate socio-economic changes within China and pressures from abroad, and the likely nature of its evolution. Overall, this book provides a comprehensive assessment of the internal dynamics of the Chinese Communist Party and its role in Chinese society.

Originally published in 1985, New Nationalisms in the Developed West is a collection of interdisciplinary and insightful essays on modern nationalist movements. The book argues that these movements have challenged the power of Western nation-states not from without, but from within their frontiers. The book's focus remains predominately on Western societies and the nationalist movements of nations against states. The essays in this book are detailed and innovative and analyse nationalism through theory, methodology and empirical evidence. The book's use of research methods deepens the comparative explanation of nationalist movements, and advances understanding of Western nationalisms as social movements and examples of social change in the developed world. This book will appeal to social scientists, in political science and sociology.

First published in 1998, illuminating the principles and practices which impelled British Labour's international attitudes, this book focuses on relationships between social democratic and communist organisations in the troubled scene of Europe between the wars. Peace and disarmament were the first priorities, giving way to the fight against fascism after 1933; the Spanish Civil War was the watershed when disarmament ceased to be a tenable option. Against this background, contacts made with the Labour and Socialist International and the International Federation of Trades Unions are considered and the distinctive approaches of women and young people are discussed. The history of these formal organisations is balanced by an account of the wide-ranging contacts of the broad Labour Movement in fields such as sport, education, Esperanto, music and art. Its protagonists' belief in international socialism is seen to be a faith which survived fascism and war, and continued to give hope for the future. This book will be of interest to students of Labour history and politics, as well as international and European studies.

This edited collection examines the emergence of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in India and the ways in which its Hindu nationalist agenda has been affected by the constraints of being a dominant member of a coalition government.
Religious influence in contemporary politics offers a fertile ground for political-sociological analysis, especially in societies where religion is a very important source of collective identity. In South Asian societies religion can, and often has, provided legitimacy to both governments and those who oppose them. This book examines the emergence of the BJP and the ways in which its Hindu nationalist agenda has been affected by the constraints of being a dominant member of a coalition government. The collected authors take stock of the party's first full term in power, presiding over the diverse forces of the governing NDA coalition, and the 2004 elections. They assess the BJP's performance in relation to its stated goals, and more specifically how it has fared ina range of policy fields - center-state relations, foreign policy, defense policies, the 'second generation' of economic reforms, initiatives to curb corruption and the fate of minorities.
Explicitly linking the volume to literature on coalition politics, this book will be of great importance to students and researchers in the fields of South Asian studies and politics.

Presenting a detailed explanation of party politics in the European Union, this new book uses the Party of European Socialists (PES) as a key case study, and tests the relevance of existing theoretical work on the meaning, significance, and prospects for realising other 'Europarties'. This analysis operates from the assumption that the PES's main goal is to influence the outcome of EU public policy, rather than the more traditional party goals of vote maximisation or office seeking. Secondly, by subjecting the PES to careful scrutiny in two specific policy areas (employment and environment) and for specific treaties (in particular the Treaty of Amsterdam), it tests the PES's ability to construct policy to influence actual policy outcomes. Finally, it shows that whilst the PES was able to play a role in co-ordinating policy amongst the member parties since its formation in 1992, its influence has been exaggerated and the strength of the factors that limit its effectiveness have been underestimated. It argues that domestic policy imperatives and ideological differences between the member parties have hindered the development of the PES, thereby advancing our knowledge of Europarties and contributing to the literature on the Europeanization of political parties. This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of the European Union and party politics in general.

This is the first book to cover the centre-right in post-communist Eastern Europe.

It makes an vital contribution to the broader research agenda on the Central and East European centre-right by focusing on one specific question: why strong and cohesive centre-right formations have developed in some post-communist states, but not others. It also delves into the attempts to develop centre-right parties after 1989 in four nations: the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia. The authors of these fresh case studies use a common analytical framework to analyse and provide fascinating insights into the varying levels of cohesion in centre-right parties across the region.
This volume was previously published as a special issue of the Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics.

'IT'S THE SUN WOT WON IT', was the famous headline claim of Britain's most popular newspaper following the Conservative party's victory over Labour in the 1992 general election. The headline referred to a virulent press campaign against Neil Kinnock's Labour party, and dramatically highlighted one of the chief features of British politics during the twentieth century - the conflict between a socialist Labour party and a capitalist popular press. Labour's frequent complaints of the political and electoral unfairness of newspaper bias meant that some commentators considered that this dispute had a heritage as old as the party itself. Others, including the Labour leadership at the time, argued that despite past tensions, the 1992 election marked the culmination of an unprecedented campaign of vilification against the party.
Popular Newspapers, the Labour Party and British Politics assesses these competing claims, looking not only at 1992 but both back and forward to examine the continuities and changes in newspaper coverage of British politics and the Labour party over the twentieth century. The book explores whether the popular press has lived up to its claim of being a democratic 'fourth estate', or has merely, as Labour politicians have argued been a powerful 'fifth column' distorting the democratic process. Drawing on a range of previously unexamined sources this book offers the first original and comprehensive history of a fascinating aspect of British politics from Beaverbrook to Blair.

James Thomas is a lecturer at the Cardiff School of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies at Cardiff University, and has published articles and essays exploring the relationship between thepopular press and British politics.

The existence of noticeable 'unified' parties is central to the theory and practice of democracy in general, and to parliamentary democracy in particular. However, legislative studies scholars have good reason to cease treating parties as monolithic, unitary actors, for they evidently are not. The first step in this direction is to ask why one of the distinguishing features of modern political parties is their legislative unity. Do parties enter parliament as unified actors, or are they moulded into this model by the legislature? The answer depends on whether one is looking at cohesion or at discipline. The goal of this collection of articles is to present a conceptual delineation between these two key concepts. This book was previously published as a special issue of the Journal of Legislative Studies.

Although Canada is regarded as one of the least corrupt countries, this volume draws on wide ranging evidence and innovative research from scholars around the world to challenge this assumption. Corruption, defined as the "abuse of entrusted power for private gain," is often understood as being caused by internally motivated greed leading to prohibited acts in contravention of laws, rules and regulations. It can also be defined as "dishonest action that destroys people's trust." These traditional forms of corruption pose problems for Canada in a variety of policy domains, as well as "institutional corruption" evidenced by deception and financial inconsistency that undermine the effectiveness and transparency of policy objectives. This volume contains chapters that investigate various areas of corruption in Canada, ranging from corruption amongst the First Nations, to the armed forces, to the delivery of foreign assistance. It also offers suggestions to reduce future outbreaks of corruption. Each chapter provides detailed empirical analysis evidenced through real world examples that highlight key lessons amidst the numerous challenges posed by corruption. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Canadian Foreign Policy Journal.

New Labour is the most innovative and powerful political movement in Britain today. However, New Labour: A critique argues that its apparent pragmatism disguises an ideological commitment to particular forms of social science, deploying new institutionalism and communitarianism to respond to the New Right. Mark Bevir traces the impact of these forms of social science on the ideas and policies of New Labour, paying particular attention to the welfare state and the economy. New Labour, the new institutionalism and communitarianism typically objectify aspects of the social world to sustain claims to expert knowledge. Mark Bevir defends and enacts an alternative, interpretive approach to social science. This interpretive approach inspires a critique of New Labour as a contingent reworking of a particular socialist tradition rather than the necessary or pragmatic response that it portrays itself as. Key content includes: . Social science - a historical and philosophical critique . Institutionalism and communitarianism - impact on centre left think-tanks . traditions of British socialism, which could open the way to radical alternatives to New Labour based on participation, pluralism and dialogue.

This book examines the effect the Verbotzeit had on the leadership structure and on the consequent position of the party within the volkisch movement. Looking primarily at Bavaria and North Germany it examines the failed attempts that were made to prevent Hitler from filling the leadership void within both the NSDAP (the National Socialist German Workers' Party) and the volkisch movement.

This book explores the rise of Hizbullah as a direct consequence of both the Iranian Revolution and the entanglement of Lebanon in the Arab-Israeli conflict. Protracted civil war and overwhelming foreign intervention by Lebanon's neighbors enabled Hizbullah to emerge as the country's dominant politico-military force. Hizbullah disabled the Lebanese political system and, in its capacity as Iran's premier foreign proxy, allowed the Islamic Republic to take the lead in the regional tug of war with Israel. In its quest for achieving a distinguished regional status commensurate with its ambitions, Iran used Hizbullah to abort the Syrian uprising, actively contribute to its burgeoning influence in Iraq, and participate in its propaganda war against Saudi Arabia on a range of issues. The renewed U.S. sanctions on Iran coincided with a worldwide campaign to dry up Hizbullah's sources of funding and compromised its integrity as a critical provider of patronage to its Lebanese Shi'ite base of support. The emergence of Russia as the real power player in Syria made it extremely difficult for Hizbullah to justify the high human cost it incurred to salvage the regime of Bashar Asad. This book examines the rise of Hizbullah and the marginalization and repression of Shi'ites that made them susceptible to exploitation by their sectarian leaders.

Stalinism surveys the efforts made in recent years by professional historians, in Russia and the West, to better understand what really went on in the USSR between 1929 and 1953, when the country's affairs were shrouded in secrecy.

The opening of the Soviet archives in 1991 has led to a profusion of historical studies, whose strengths and weaknesses are assessed here impartially though not uncritically. While Joseph Stalin now emerges as a less omnipotent figure than he seemed to be at the time, most serious writers accept that the system over which he ruled was despotic and totalitarian. Some nostalgic nationalists in Russia, along with some Western post-modernists, disagree. Their arguments are carefully dissected here. Stalinism was of course much more than state sponsored terror, and so due attention is paid to a wide range of socio-economic and cultural problems. Keep and Litvin applaud the efforts of Soviet citizens to express dissenting views.

Developing a framework of analysis which enables a detailed empirical investigation of Scottish Green Party membership, this is a detailed assessment of why people become members of a green party. The questions are particularly relevant in the light of declining political participation. Lynn Bennie responds to the gap in the literature on green and small parties and builds on the work of other researchers who have used similar methods to explore membership of the larger parties. The volume incorporates an extensive review of participation literature; details the history of the Scottish Green Party; documents extensive survey data of party members; and develops an understanding of motivations behind membership of a green party. It will prove ideal for courses on political behaviour and green politics, and be of interest to sociologists and political science researchers.

In 1997 Tony Blair broke with tradition by naming education as a major priority for the General Election Manifesto. In the past, Labour leaders had tended to give education a much lower priority. Despite this, Blair has been greatly criticised for his educational programme 1997-2001. Was he taking education away from traditional labour values of fairness and equality? Was Blair's 'Third Way' just 'Thatcherism in Trousers'? Denise Lawton approaches such questions by analysing labour education policies since 1900 and shows that from the very beginning the labour Party lacked unity and ideological coherence concerning education. Specifically, there has always been a tension between those like the early Fabians who saw educational reform in terms of economic efficiency, and the ethical socialists whose vision of a more moral society stressed the importance of social justice in education. After an assessment of Labour ideologies in the past, this book concludes with an examination of New Labour and the 'Third Way' in education and suggests some changes that will be necessary in the near future.

In 1997 Tony Blair broke with tradition by naming education as a major priority for the General Election Manifesto. In the past, Labour leaders had tended to give education a much lower priority. Despite this, Blair has been greatly criticised for his educational programme 1997-2001. Was he taking education away from traditional labour values of fairness and equality? Was Blair's 'Third Way' just 'Thatcherism in Trousers'? Denise Lawton approaches such questions by analysing labour education policies since 1900 and shows that from the very beginning the labour Party lacked unity and ideological coherence concerning education. Specifically, there has always been a tension between those like the early Fabians who saw educational reform in terms of economic efficiency, and the ethical socialists whose vision of a more moral society stressed the importance of social justice in education. After an assessment of Labour ideologies in the past, this book concludes with an examination of New Labour and the 'Third Way' in education and suggests some changes that will be necessary in the near future.