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Books > Social sciences > Politics & government > Political structure & processes > Totalitarianism & dictatorship

Military Cultures in Peace and Stability Operations - Afghanistan and Lebanon (Hardcover): Chiara Ruffa Military Cultures in Peace and Stability Operations - Afghanistan and Lebanon (Hardcover)
Chiara Ruffa
R1,655 Discovery Miles 16 550 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

As of September 2017, the United Nations alone deployed 110,000 uniformed personnel from 122 countries in fifteen peacekeeping operations worldwide. Soldiers in these missions are important actors who not only have considerable responsibility for implementing peace and stability operations but also have a concomitant influence on their goals and impact. Yet we know surprisingly little about the factors that prompt soldiers' behavior. Despite being deployed on the same mission under similar conditions, various national contingents display significant, systematic differences in their actions on the ground. In Military Cultures in Peace and Stability Operations, Chiara Ruffa challenges the widely held assumption that military contingents, regardless of their origins, implement mandates in a similar manner. She argues instead that military culture-the set of attitudes, values, and beliefs instilled into an army and transmitted across generations of those in uniform -influences how soldiers behave at the tactical level. When soldiers are abroad, they are usually deployed as units, and when a military unit deploys, its military culture goes with it. By investigating where military culture comes from, Ruffa demonstrates why military units conduct themselves the way they do. Between 2007 and 2014, Ruffa was embedded in French and Italian units deployed under comparable circumstances in two different kinds of peace and stability operations: the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon and the NATO mission in Afghanistan. Based on hundreds of interviews, she finds that while French units prioritized patrolling and the display of high levels of protection and force-such as body armor and weaponry-Italian units placed greater emphasis on delivering humanitarian aid. She concludes that civil-military relations and societal beliefs about the use of force in the units' home country have an impact on the military culture overseas, soldiers' perceptions and behavior, and, ultimately, consequences for their ability to keep the peace.

The Ambivalence of Power in the Twenty-First Century Economy - Cases from Russia and Beyond (Paperback): Vadim Radaev, Zoya... The Ambivalence of Power in the Twenty-First Century Economy - Cases from Russia and Beyond (Paperback)
Vadim Radaev, Zoya Kotelnikova
R777 Discovery Miles 7 770 Ships in 9 - 15 working days
On Tyranny Graphic Edition - Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century (Hardcover): Timothy Snyder On Tyranny Graphic Edition - Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century (Hardcover)
Timothy Snyder; Illustrated by Nora Krug
R542 R448 Discovery Miles 4 480 Save R94 (17%) Ships in 9 - 15 working days

A captivating graphic edition of Timothy Snyder's bestselling book of lessons for surviving and resisting the arc toward authoritarianism. Timothy Snyder's On Tyranny is one of the essential books of recent years, using the darkest moments in twentieth-century history to teach twenty lessons on resisting modern-day authoritarianism. These include a warning to be aware of how symbols used today could affect tomorrow, an urgent reminder to research everything for yourself and to the fullest extent, and an encouragement to use personalised and individualised speech rather than cliched phrases when arguing a point In this graphic edition, Nora Krug draws from her highly inventive style in Heimat - at once a graphic memoir, collage-style scrapbook, historical narrative and trove of memories - to breathe new life, colour and power into Snyder's modern classic, turning a quick-read pocket guide of lessons into a visually striking rumination and call for action. 'On Tyranny is a must read, a clear-eyed guidebook' Ken Burns History does not repeat, but it does instruct. In a time of great uncertainty and instability, this edition of On Tyranny emphasises the importance of being active, conscious, and deliberate participants in resistance.

Regime Consolidation and Transitional Justice - A Comparative Study of Germany, Spain and Turkey (Hardcover): Anja Mihr Regime Consolidation and Transitional Justice - A Comparative Study of Germany, Spain and Turkey (Hardcover)
Anja Mihr
R3,224 R2,732 Discovery Miles 27 320 Save R492 (15%) Ships in 12 - 17 working days

Regime Consolidation and Transitional Justice explores the effect of transitional justice measures on 'regime consolidation', or the means by which a new political system is established in a post-transition context. Focusing on the long-term impact of transitional justice mechanisms in three countries over several decades, the gradual process by which these political systems have been legitimatised is revealed. Through case studies of East and West Germany after World War II, Spain after the end of the Franco dictatorship in 1975 and Turkey's long journey to achieving democratic reform, Regime Consolidation and Transitional Justice shows how transitional justice and regime consolidation are intertwined. The interdisciplinary study, which will be of interest to scholars of criminal law, human rights law, political science, democracy, autocracies and transformation theories, demonstrates, importantly, that the political systems in question are not always 'more' democratic than their predecessors and do not always enhance democracy post-regime consolidation.

How Autocrats Compete - Parties, Patrons, and Unfair Elections in Africa (Hardcover): Yonatan L. Morse How Autocrats Compete - Parties, Patrons, and Unfair Elections in Africa (Hardcover)
Yonatan L. Morse
R2,638 R2,355 Discovery Miles 23 550 Save R283 (11%) Ships in 12 - 17 working days

Most autocrats now hold unfair elections, yet how they compete in them and manipulate them differs greatly. How Autocrats Compete advances a theory that explains variation in electoral authoritarian competition. Using case studies of Tanzania, Cameroon, and Kenya, along with broader comparisons from Africa, it finds that the kind of relationships autocrats foster with supporters and external actors matters greatly during elections. When autocrats can depend on credible ruling parties that provide elites with a level playing field and commit to wider constituencies, they are more certain in their own support and can compete in elections with less manipulation. Shelter from international pressure further helps autocrats deploy a wider range of coercive tools when necessary. Combining in-depth field research, within-case statistics, and cross-regional comparisons, Morse fills a gap in the literature by focusing on important variation in authoritarian institution building and international patronage. Understanding how autocrats compete sheds light on the comparative resilience and durability of modern authoritarianism.

Contemporary Nigerian Politics - Competition in a Time of Transition and Terror (Paperback): A. Carl LeVan Contemporary Nigerian Politics - Competition in a Time of Transition and Terror (Paperback)
A. Carl LeVan
R806 Discovery Miles 8 060 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

In 2015, Nigeria's voters cast out the ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP). Here, A. Carl LeVan traces the political vulnerability of Africa's largest party in the face of elite bargains that facilitated a democratic transition in 1999. These 'pacts' enabled electoral competition but ultimately undermined the party's coherence. LeVan also crucially examines the four critical barriers to Nigeria's democratic consolidation: the terrorism of Boko Haram in the northeast, threats of Igbo secession in the southeast, lingering ethnic resentments and rebellions in the Niger Delta, and farmer-pastoralist conflicts. While the PDP unsuccessfully stoked fears about the opposition's ability to stop Boko Haram's terrorism, the opposition built a winning electoral coalition on economic growth, anti-corruption, and electoral integrity. Drawing on extensive interviews with a number of politicians and generals and civilians and voters, he argues that electoral accountability is essential but insufficient for resolving the representational, distributional, and cultural components of these challenges.

How to Critique Authoritarian Populism - Methodologies of the Frankfurt School (Paperback): Jeremiah Morelock How to Critique Authoritarian Populism - Methodologies of the Frankfurt School (Paperback)
Jeremiah Morelock
R1,380 Discovery Miles 13 800 Ships in 10 - 15 working days

How to Critique Authoritarian Populism: Methodologies of the Frankfurt School offers a comprehensive introduction to the techniques used by the early Frankfurt School to study and combat authoritarianism and authoritarian populism. In recent years there has been a resurgence of interest in the writings of the early Frankfurt School, at the same time as authoritarian populist movements are growing in Europe and the Americas. This volume shows why and how Frankfurt School methodologies can and should be used to address the rise of authoritarianism today, bringing together critical theory scholars from a variety of disciplines to discuss Frankfurt School approaches to dialectical philosophy, psychoanalytic theory, human subjects research, discourse analysis and media studies. Contributors include: Robert J. Antonio, Stefanie Baumann, Christopher Craig Brittain, Dustin J. Byrd, Mariana Caldas Pinto Ferreira, Panayota Gounari, Peter-Erwin Jansen, Imaculada Kangussu, Douglas Kellner, Dan Krier, Lauren Langman, Claudia Leeb, Gregory Joseph Menillo, Jeremiah Morelock, Felipe Ziotti Narita, Michael R. Ott, Charles Reitz, Avery Schatz, Rudolf J. Siebert, William M. Sipling, David Norman Smith, Daniel Sullivan, and AK Thompson.

Revolutionary Nativism - Fascism and Culture in China, 1925-1937 (Paperback): Maggie Clinton Revolutionary Nativism - Fascism and Culture in China, 1925-1937 (Paperback)
Maggie Clinton
R720 R683 Discovery Miles 6 830 Save R37 (5%) Ships in 12 - 17 working days

In Revolutionary Nativism Maggie Clinton traces the history and cultural politics of fascist organizations that operated under the umbrella of the Chinese Nationalist Party (GMD) during the 1920s and 1930s. Clinton argues that fascism was not imported to China from Europe or Japan; rather it emerged from the charged social conditions that prevailed in the country's southern and coastal regions during the interwar period. These fascist groups were led by young militants who believed that reviving China's Confucian "national spirit" could foster the discipline and social cohesion necessary to defend China against imperialism and Communism and to develop formidable industrial and military capacities, thereby securing national strength in a competitive international arena. Fascists within the GMD deployed modernist aesthetics in their literature and art while justifying their anti-Communist violence with nativist discourse. Showing how the GMD's fascist factions popularized a virulently nationalist rhetoric that linked Confucianism with a specific path of industrial development, Clinton sheds new light on the complex dynamics of Chinese nationalism and modernity.

Children of the Night - The Strange and Epic Story of Modern Romania (Hardcover): Paul Kenyon Children of the Night - The Strange and Epic Story of Modern Romania (Hardcover)
Paul Kenyon; Narrated by Paul Kenyon
R779 R640 Discovery Miles 6 400 Save R139 (18%) Ships in 9 - 15 working days

An utterly compelling, wickedly sharp narrative history of one of the strangest countries in Europe, by the bestselling author of Dictatorland. The only country in Eastern Europe to speak a Latin language, Romania has always felt itself different, and its unique fate has been to experience some of the most disastrous leaderships of the last century. In the First World War her German king remained neutral until 1916. The interwar rulers form a gallery of bizarre characters and movements: the corrupt King Carol; the antisemitic Iron Guard led by Corneliu Codreanu; the vain general Ion Antonescu who seized power in 1940 and led the country into alliance with Nazi Germany. After 1945 power was handed over to Romania's tiny communist party, under whom it experienced severe repression, purges and collectivisation. Then in 1964, Nicolae Ceausescu came to power. And thus began the strangest dictatorship in recent European history. Children of the Night is also a personal discovery of this extraordinary country, bringing together Paul Kenyon's eye for the private vices and kleptocratic tendencies of despots with a heartfelt exploration of the fate of one Romanian family in particular.

Warlords - Strong-arm Brokers in Weak States (Hardcover, BB): Kimberly Marten Warlords - Strong-arm Brokers in Weak States (Hardcover, BB)
Kimberly Marten
R1,296 Discovery Miles 12 960 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

Warlords are individuals who control small territories within weak states, using a combination of force and patronage. In this book, Kimberly Marten shows why and how warlords undermine state sovereignty. Unlike the feudal lords of a previous era, warlords today are not state-builders. Instead they collude with cost-conscious, corrupt, or frightened state officials to flout and undermine state capacity. They thrive on illegality, relying on private militias for support, and often provoke violent resentment from those who are cut out of their networks. Some act as middlemen for competing states, helping to hollow out their own states from within. Countries ranging from the United States to Russia have repeatedly chosen to ally with warlords, but Marten argues that to do so is a dangerous proposition.

Drawing on interviews, documents, local press reports, and in-depth historical analysis, Marten examines warlordism in the Pakistani tribal areas during the twentieth century, in post-Soviet Georgia and the Russian republic of Chechnya, and among Sunni militias in the U.S.-supported Anbar Awakening and Sons of Iraq programs. In each case state leaders (some domestic and others foreign) created, tolerated, actively supported, undermined, or overthrew warlords and their militias. Marten draws lessons from these experiences to generate new arguments about the relationship between states, sovereignty, "local power brokers," and stability and security in the modern world.

The Great Terror - Stalin's Purge of the Thirties (Paperback): Robert Conquest The Great Terror - Stalin's Purge of the Thirties (Paperback)
Robert Conquest
R691 R568 Discovery Miles 5 680 Save R123 (18%) Ships in 9 - 15 working days

Robert Conquest's The Great Terror is the book that revealed the horrors of Stalin's regime to the West. This definitive fiftieth anniversary edition features a new foreword by Anne Applebaum. One of the most important books ever written about the Soviet Union, The Great Terror revealed to the West for the first time the true extent and nature Stalin's purges in the 1930s, in which around a million people were tortured and executed or sent to labour camps on political grounds. Its publication caused a widespread reassessment of Communism itself. This definitive fiftieth anniversary edition gathers together the wealth of material added by the author in the decades following its first publication and features a new foreword by leading historian Anne Applebaum, explaining the continued relevance of this momentous period of history and of this classic account.

Against Redemption - Democracy, Memory, and Literature in Post-Fascist Italy (Hardcover): Franco Baldasso Against Redemption - Democracy, Memory, and Literature in Post-Fascist Italy (Hardcover)
Franco Baldasso
R2,876 Discovery Miles 28 760 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

Discloses the richness of ideas and sheds light on the controversy that characterized the transition from fascism to democracy, examining authors, works and memories that were subsequently silenced by Cold War politics. How a shared memory of Fascism and its cultural heritage took shape is still today the most disputed question of modern Italy, crossing the boundaries between academic and public discourse. Against Redemption concentrates on the historical period in which disagreement was at its highest: the transition between the downfall of Mussolini in July 1943 and the victory of the Christian Democrats over the Left in the 1948 general elections. By dispelling the silence around the range of opinion in the years before the ideological struggle fossilized into Cold War oppositions, this book points to early postwar literary practices as the main vehicle for intellectual dissent, shedding new light on the role of cultural policies in institutionalizing collective memory. During Italy’s transition to democracy, competing narratives over the recent traumatic past emerged and crystallized, depicting the country’s break with Mussolini’s regime as a political and personal redemption from its politics of exclusion and unrestrained use of violence. Conversely, outstanding authors such as Elsa Morante, Carlo Levi, Alberto Moravia, and Curzio Malaparte, in close dialogue with remarkable but now-neglected figures, stressed the cultural continuity between the new democracy and Fascism, igniting heated debates from opposite political standpoints. Their works addressed questions such as the working through of national defeat, Italian responsibility in World War II, and the Holocaust, revealing how the social, racial, and gender biases that characterized Fascism survived after its demise and haunted the newborn democracy.

Fascism (Hardcover): R. Griffin Fascism (Hardcover)
R. Griffin
R1,314 Discovery Miles 13 140 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

The word 'fascism' sometimes appears to have become a catch-all term of abuse, applicable to anyone on the political right, from Hitler to Donald Trump and from Putin to Thatcher. While some argue that it lacks any distinctive conceptual meaning at all, others have supplied highly elaborate definitions of its 'essential' features. It is therefore a concept that presents unique challenges for any student of political theory or history. In this accessible book, Roger Griffin, one of the world's leading authorities on fascism, brings welcome clarity to this controversial ideology. He examines its origins and development as a political concept, from its historical beginnings in 1920s Italy up to the present day, and guides students through the confusing maze of debates surrounding the nature, definition and meaning of fascism. Elucidating with skill and precision its dynamic as a utopian ideology of national/racial rebirth, Griffin goes on to examine its post-Second World War mutations and its relevance to understanding contemporary right-wing political phenomena, ranging from Marine Le Pen to Golden Dawn. This concise and engaging volume will be of great interest to all students of political theory, the history of political thought, and modern history.

Paediatrics in the Reichsuniversität Straßburg - Children's Medicine at a Bastion of Nazi Ideology (Hardcover): Aisling... Paediatrics in the Reichsuniversität Straßburg - Children's Medicine at a Bastion of Nazi Ideology (Hardcover)
Aisling Shalvey
R2,247 Discovery Miles 22 470 Ships in 9 - 15 working days

This sensitive yet incisive book addresses the medical treatment of children in the occupied city of Strasbourg during Nazi occupation. Exploring more than 1,000 previously undocumented patient files, it illuminates starkly the workings of paediatric care at a pivotal moment in history. Issues of nationality, social class, and diagnosis all contributed to the experience of each child, and here extensive data analysis is deployed to back up poignant individual stories. This is the first ever demographic overview of a vulnerable group who were treated in the hospital of the Reichsuniversität Straßburg. Veering away from the well-established, top-down approach of examining the doctors, instead it makes the patient central to the analysis. A vivid picture emerges of the practical impact that war and occupation had on children who were suffering from illness, revealing how they were affected by Nazi ideology. Establishing a chronology of this important paediatric clinic, the author situates the core historical developments which brought it from establishment with optimistic and idealistic goals, to downfall just three years later when the Allies liberated the city. Based on previously under-utilized primary sources, this volume employs a novel and distinctive analytical framework, using Alltagsgeschichte (the history of everyday life) and patient experience theory to frame medical records and accounts. The book will be relevant to those interested in the history of childhood, politics, occupation and border disputes, psychiatry, medicine, denazification and the postwar era, the history of National Socialism, patient history and the Second World War.

Social Dictatorships - The Political Economy of the Welfare State in the Middle East and North Africa (Hardcover): Ferdinand... Social Dictatorships - The Political Economy of the Welfare State in the Middle East and North Africa (Hardcover)
Ferdinand Eibl
R2,959 Discovery Miles 29 590 Ships in 10 - 15 working days

Why have social spending levels and social policy trajectories diverged so drastically across labour-abundant Middle Eastern and North African regimes? And how can we explain the marked persistence of spending levels after divergence? Using historical institutionalism and a mix of qualitative and quantitative methods Social Dictatorships: The Political Economy of the Welfare State in the Middle East and North Africa develops an explanation of social spending in authoritarian regimes. It emphasizes the importance of early elite conflict and attempts to form a durable support coalition under the constraints imposed by external threats and scarce resources. Social Dictatorships utilizes two in-depth case studies of the political origins of the Tunisian and Egyptian welfare state to provide an empirical overview of how social policies have developed in the region, and to explain the marked differences in social policy trajectories. It follows a multi-level approach tested comparatively at the cross-country level and process-traced at micro-level by these case studies.

PC on Earth - The Beginnings of the Totalitarian Mindset (Paperback): Jabbar Moradi, Jasmin Dall'Agnola, Josette Baer PC on Earth - The Beginnings of the Totalitarian Mindset (Paperback)
Jabbar Moradi, Jasmin Dall'Agnola, Josette Baer
R615 Discovery Miles 6 150 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

What is political correctness? What is conformism? And could one say that pre-emptive obedience is a part of the increasingly prevalent climate of political correctness encountered today? The authors of "PC on Earth" take issue with a fashionable phenomenon emerging from North American campuses that is beginning to take hold in Europe, too: the dangerous consequences of identity politics and pre-emptive obedience, which they define as an essential element of political correctness. This book is a collection of satire, philosophical analysis, travel reports, political analysis, and personal experiences. The authors, all Europeans, present diverse views on a controversial topic. This collection offers readers independent and free-thinking opinions they will get nowhere else.

Dictatorship and Daily Life in 20th-Century Europe (Paperback): Lisa Pine Dictatorship and Daily Life in 20th-Century Europe (Paperback)
Lisa Pine
R767 Discovery Miles 7 670 Ships in 9 - 15 working days

Bringing together leading scholars from across the UK, North America and mainland Europe, this book provides a uniquely comparative exploration of daily life under dictatorship in 20th-century Europe. With coverage of well-known regimes and some that are relatively underrepresented in the literature from right across the continent, it examines the impact felt on people's lives amidst political administrations characterised by some or all of the following: a one-party state, in which opposition or multiple parties were banned; a cult surrounding the leader; the censorship of the press and other publications; the widespread use of propaganda and political persuasion; and the threat or use of force by the regime and its agents. The chapters investigate crucial questions in relation to life under dictatorships as follows: * What was the impact of censorship on access to news or entertainment? * How was leisure time conducted? * What was the impact of the regime on working life? * What was the scope for dissent and resistance? To what extent were these possible? * How much did the regime coerce the population and how much did it try to indoctrinate? * What was the difference for Party leaders, comrades and members in terms of the possibilities and opportunities that opened up, compared to everyone else in society? * With the shutting down - to a large extent - of civil society and state intrusion into private life, what restrictions were placed on ordinary and day-to-day activities? * What happened to religious life and to cultural life and the arts? * How were personal choices in aspects of life such as reproduction, education and even eating affected by these regimes? * What was the impact of different political ideologies on people's way of life - whether Fascist, Nazi or Communist? Dictatorship and Daily Life in 20th-Century Europe addresses these issues and more, striking to the heart of European life in the darkest episodes of its recent history.

Ancient Tyranny (Hardcover, New): Sian Lewis Ancient Tyranny (Hardcover, New)
Sian Lewis
R3,228 Discovery Miles 32 280 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

Tyrants and tyranny are more than the antithesis of democracy and the mark of political failure: they are a dynamic response to social and political pressures. This book examines the autocratic rulers and dynasties of classical Greece and Rome and the changing concepts of tyranny in political thought and culture. It brings together historians, political theorists and philosophers, all offering new perspectives on the autocratic governments of the ancient world. The volume is divided into four parts. Part I looks at the ways in which the term 'tyranny' was used and understood, and the kinds of individual who were called tyrants. Part II focuses on the genesis of tyranny and the social and political circumstances in which tyrants arose. The chapters in Part III examine the presentation of tyrants by themselves and in literature and history. Part IV discusses the achievements of episodic tyranny within the non-autocratic regimes of Sparta and Rome and of autocratic regimes in Persia and the western Mediterranean world. Written by a wide range of leading experts in their field, Ancient Tyranny offers a new and comparative study of tyranny within Greek, Roman and Persian society.

Facing the Khmer Rouge - A Cambodian Journey (Paperback): Ronnie Yimsut Facing the Khmer Rouge - A Cambodian Journey (Paperback)
Ronnie Yimsut; Foreword by David P. Chandler; Afterword by David Savin
R1,035 Discovery Miles 10 350 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

As a child growing up in Cambodia, Ronnie Yimsut played among the ruins of the Angkor Wat temples, surrounded by a close-knit community. As the Khmer Rouge gained power and began its genocidal reign of terror, his life became a nightmare. Teenaged Ronnie was left orphaned, literally buried under the bodies of his family and friends. In this stunning memoir, Yimsut describes how, in the wake of death and destruction, he decides to live. Escaping the turmoil of Cambodia, he makes a perilous journey through the jungle into Thailand, only to be sent to a notorious Thai prison. Fortunately, he is able to reach a refugee camp and ultimately migrate to the United States, another frightening journey to the unknown. Yet he prevailed, attending the University of Oregon and becoming an influential leader in the community of Cambodian immigrants. Facing the Khmer Rouge shows Ronnie Yimsut's personal quest to rehabilitate himself, make a new life in America, and then return to Cambodia to help rebuild the land of his birth.

Citizen Support for Democratic and Autocratic Regimes (Hardcover): Marlene Mauk Citizen Support for Democratic and Autocratic Regimes (Hardcover)
Marlene Mauk
R3,045 Discovery Miles 30 450 Ships in 10 - 15 working days

Citizen Support for Democratic and Autocratic Regimes takes a political-culture perspective on the struggle between democracy and autocracy by examining how these regimes fare in the eyes of their citizens. Taking a globally comparative approach, it studies both the levels as well as the individual- and system-level sources of political support in democracies and autocracies worldwide. The book develops an explanatory model of regime support which includes both individual- and system level determinants and specifies not only the general causal mechanisms and pathways through which these determinants affect regime support but also spells out how these effects might vary between the two types of regimes. It empirically tests its propositions using multi-level structural equation modeling and a comprehensive dataset that combines recent public-opinion data from six cross-national survey projects with aggregate data from various sources for more than 100 democracies and autocracies. It finds that both the levels and individual-level sources of regime support are the same in democracies and autocracies, but that the way in which system-level context factors affect regime support differs between the two types of regimes. The results enhance our understanding of what determines citizen support for fundamentally different regimes, help assessing the present and future stability of democracies and autocracies, and provide clear policy implications to those interested in strengthening support for democracy and/or fostering democratic change in autocracies. Comparative Politics is a series for researchers, teachers, and students of political science that deals with contemporary government and politics. Global in scope, books in the series are characterised by a stress on comparative analysis and strong methodological rigour. The series is published in association with the European Consortium for Political Research. For more information visit: www.ecprnet.eu. The series is edited by Susan Scarrow, Chair of the Department of Political Science, University of Houston, and Jonathan Slapin, Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Zurich

Contemporary Nigerian Politics - Competition in a Time of Transition and Terror (Hardcover): A. Carl LeVan Contemporary Nigerian Politics - Competition in a Time of Transition and Terror (Hardcover)
A. Carl LeVan
R2,404 Discovery Miles 24 040 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

In 2015, Nigeria's voters cast out the ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP). Here, A. Carl LeVan traces the political vulnerability of Africa's largest party in the face of elite bargains that facilitated a democratic transition in 1999. These 'pacts' enabled electoral competition but ultimately undermined the party's coherence. LeVan also crucially examines the four critical barriers to Nigeria's democratic consolidation: the terrorism of Boko Haram in the northeast, threats of Igbo secession in the southeast, lingering ethnic resentments and rebellions in the Niger Delta, and farmer-pastoralist conflicts. While the PDP unsuccessfully stoked fears about the opposition's ability to stop Boko Haram's terrorism, the opposition built a winning electoral coalition on economic growth, anti-corruption, and electoral integrity. Drawing on extensive interviews with a number of politicians and generals and civilians and voters, he argues that electoral accountability is essential but insufficient for resolving the representational, distributional, and cultural components of these challenges.

The Autocratic Middle Class - How State Dependency Reduces the Demand for Democracy (Hardcover): Bryn Rosenfeld The Autocratic Middle Class - How State Dependency Reduces the Demand for Democracy (Hardcover)
Bryn Rosenfeld
R2,328 Discovery Miles 23 280 Ships in 12 - 17 working days

How middle-class economic dependence on the state impedes democratization and contributes to authoritarian resilience Conventional wisdom holds that the rising middle classes are a force for democracy. Yet in post-Soviet countries like Russia, where the middle class has grown rapidly, authoritarianism is deepening. Challenging a basic tenet of democratization theory, Bryn Rosenfeld shows how the middle classes can actually be a source of support for autocracy and authoritarian resilience, and reveals why development and economic growth do not necessarily lead to greater democracy. In pursuit of development, authoritarian states often employ large swaths of the middle class in state administration, the government budget sector, and state enterprises. Drawing on attitudinal surveys, unique data on protest behavior, and extensive fieldwork in the post-Soviet region, Rosenfeld documents how the failure of the middle class to gain economic autonomy from the state stymies support for political change, and how state economic engagement reduces middle-class demands for democracy and weakens prodemocratic coalitions. The Autocratic Middle Class makes a vital contribution to the study of democratization, showing how dependence on the state weakens the incentives of key societal actors to prefer and pursue democracy.

Enver Hoxha - The Iron Fist of Albania (Paperback): Majlinda Nishku Enver Hoxha - The Iron Fist of Albania (Paperback)
Majlinda Nishku; Blendi Fevziu; Edited by Robert Elsie; Introduction by Robert Elsie
R534 Discovery Miles 5 340 Ships in 9 - 15 working days

Stalinism, that particularly brutal phase of communism, came to an end in most of Eastern Europe with the death of Josef Stalin in 1953 or at least with the Khrushchev reforms that began in the Soviet Union in 1956. However, in one country - Albania - Stalinism survived virtually unscathed until 1990. The regime that the Albanian dictator Enver Hoxha led from the time of the communist takeover in 1944 until his death in 1985, and that continued unabated under his successor Ramiz Alia until 1990, was incomparably severe. Such was the reign of terror that no audible voice of opposition or dissent ever arose in the Balkan state, a European country that became as isolated from the rest of the world as North Korea is today. When the Albanian communist system finally imploded, it left behind a weary population, frightened and confused after decades of purges and political terror. It also left behind a country with a weak and fragile economy, a country where extreme poverty was the norm. In the decades since Hoxha's death, Albania has made substantial progress in political and economic terms, yet the spectre of Hoxha still lingers over the country. Despite this, many people - inside and outside Albania - know little about the man who ruled the country with an iron fist for so many decades. This book provides the first biography of Enver Hoxha available in English, from his birth in GjirokastEr in southern Albania, then still under Ottoman rule, to his death in 1985 at the age of 76. Using archival documents and first-hand interviews, Albanian journalist Blendi Fevziu pieces together the life of this tyrannical ruler, in a biography which will be essential reading for anyone interested in Balkan history and communist studies.

Political Plasticity - The Future of Democracy and Dictatorship (Paperback): Fathali M. Moghaddam Political Plasticity - The Future of Democracy and Dictatorship (Paperback)
Fathali M. Moghaddam
R747 Discovery Miles 7 470 Ships in 9 - 15 working days

Political plasticity refers to limitations on how fast, how much, and in what ways political behavior does (or does not) change. In a number of important areas of behavior, such as leader-follower relations, ethnicity, religion, and the rich-poor divide, there has been long-term continuity of human behavior. These continuities are little impacted by factors assumed to bring about change such as electronic technologies, major wars, globalization, and revolutions. In addition to such areas of low political plasticity, areas of high political plasticity are considered. For example, women in education is discussed to illustrate how rapid societal change can be achieved. This book explains the psychological and social mechanisms that limit political plasticity, and shape the possibility of changes in both democratic and dictatorial countries. Students, teachers, and anyone interested in political behavior and social psychology will benefit from this volume.

Everyday Denazification in Postwar Germany - The Fragebogen and Political Screening during the Allied Occupation (Hardcover):... Everyday Denazification in Postwar Germany - The Fragebogen and Political Screening during the Allied Occupation (Hardcover)
Mikkel Dack
R2,544 Discovery Miles 25 440 Ships in 9 - 15 working days

In the wake of World War II, the victorious Allied armies implemented a radical program to purge Nazism from Germany and preserve peace in Europe. Between 1945 and 1949, 20 million political questionnaires, or Frageboegen, were distributed by American, British, French, and Soviet armies to anxious Germans who had to prove their non-Nazi status to gain employment. Drafted by university professors and social scientists, these surveys defined much of the denazification experience and were immensely consequential to the material and emotional recovery of Germans. In Everyday Denazification in Postwar Germany, Mikkel Dack draws the curtain to reveal what denazification looked like on the ground and in practice and how the highly criticized vetting program impacted the lives of individual Germans and their families as they recovered from the war. Accessing recently declassified documents, this book challenges traditional interpretations by illustrating the positive elements of the denazification campaign and recounting a more comprehensive history, one of mid-level Allied planners, civil affairs soldiers, and regular German citizens. The Fragebogen functions as a window into this everyday history.

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