Most countries around the globe have one or two levels of regional or intermediate government, yet we have little systematic idea of how much authority they wield, or how this has changed over time.

This book measures and explains the formal authority of intermediate or regional government in 42 advanced democracies, including the 27 EU member states. It tracks regional authority on an annual basis from 1950 to 2006. The measure reveals wide variation both cross-sectionally and over time. The authors examine four influences functional pressures, democratization, European integration, and identity to explain regionalization over the past half-century.

This unique and comprehensive volume will be a vital resource for students and scholars of comparative politics, public administration and public management, federalism, democratization, nationalism, and multilevel governance.

Most countries around the globe have one or two levels of regional or intermediate government, yet we have little systematic idea of how much authority they wield, or how this has changed over time.

This book measures and explains the formal authority of intermediate or regional government in 42 advanced democracies, including the 27 EU member states. It tracks regional authority on an annual basis from 1950 to 2006. The measure reveals wide variation both cross-sectionally and over time. The authors examine four influences - functional pressures, democratization, European integration, and identity - to explain regionalization over the past half-century.

This unique and comprehensive volume will be a vital resource for students and scholars of comparative politics, public administration and public management, federalism, democratization, nationalism, and multilevel governance.

Europe has experienced the most radical reallocation of authority that has ever taken place in peacetime over the past half-century. However, the ideological conflicts emerging from this development are only now becoming apparent. This collection brings together an authoritative group of scholars of European and comparative politics to investigate patterns of conflict arising in the European Union. The contributors to the volume conclude that political contestation concerning European integration is rooted in the basic conflicts that have shaped political life in Western Europe for many years.

In the early 1980s, many observers, argued that powerful organized economic interests and social democratic parties created successful mixed economies promoting economic growth, full employment, and a modicum of social equality. The present book assembles scholars with formidable expertise in the study of advanced capitalist politics and political economy to reexamine this account from the vantage point of the second half of the 1990s. The authors find that the conventional wisdom no longer adequately reflects the political and economic realities. Advanced democracies have responded in path-dependent fashion to such novel challenges as technological change, intensifying international competition, new social conflict, and the erosion of established patterns of political mobilization. The book rejects, however, the currently widespread expectation that 'internationalization' makes all democracies converge on similar political and economic institutions and power relations. Diversity among capitalist democracies persists, though in a different fashion than in the 'Golden Age' of rapid economic growth after World War II.

Capitalist democracies have always displayed considerable diversity in their key political and economic institutions, such as the organization of economic interest groups and private enterprises, the public sector and the welfare state, as well as political parties and social movements. This book asks whether the challenges of new technologies, citizens' preferences, and growing political and economic interdependence in the 1980s and 1990s force all polities to adopt similar institutional reforms. The authors argue that established arrangements have become difficult to sustain, but that countries choose unique trajectories of reform, not a common approach. The diversity among capitalist democracies persists in a new fashion.

Europe has experienced the most radical reallocation of authority that has ever taken place in peacetime over the past half-century. However, the ideological conflicts emerging from this development are only now becoming apparent. This collection brings together an authoritative group of scholars of European and comparative politics to investigate patterns of conflict arising in the European Union. The contributors to the volume conclude that political contestation concerning European integration is rooted in the basic conflicts that have shaped political life in Western Europe for many years.

Why do international organizations (IOs) look so different, yet so similar? The possibilities are diverse. Some international organizations have just a few member states, while others span the globe. Some are targeted at a specific problem, while others have policy portfolios as broad as national states. Some are run almost entirely by their member states, while others have independent courts, secretariats, and parliaments. Variation among international organizations appears as wide as that among states. This book explains the design and development of international organization in the postwar period. It theorizes that the basic set up of an IO responds to two forces: the functional impetus to tackle problems that spill beyond national borders and a desire for self-rule that can dampen cooperation where transnational community is thin. The book reveals both the causal power of functionalist pressures and the extent to which nationalism constrains the willingness of member states to engage in incomplete contracting. The implications of postfunctionalist theory for an IO's membership, policy portfolio, contractual specificity, and authoritative competences are tested using annual data for 76 IOs for 1950-2010. Transformations in Governance is a major academic book series from Oxford University Press. It is designed to accommodate the impressive growth of research in comparative politics, international relations, public policy, federalism, environmental and urban studies concerned with the dispersion of authority from central states up to supranational institutions, down to subnational governments, and side-ways to public-private networks. It brings together work that significantly advances our understanding of the organization, causes, and consequences of multilevel and complex governance. The series is selective, containing annually a small number of books of exceptionally high quality by leading and emerging scholars. The series targets mainly single-authored or co-authored work, but it is pluralistic in terms of disciplinary specialization, research design, method, and geographical scope. Case studies as well as comparative studies, historical as well as contemporary studies, and studies with a national, regional, or international focus are all central to its aims. Authors use qualitative, quantitative, formal modeling, or mixed methods. A trade mark of the books is that they combine scholarly rigour with readable prose and an attractive production style. The series is edited by Liesbet Hooghe and Gary Marks of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and the VU Amsterdam, and Walter Mattli of the University of Oxford.

Why do international organizations (IOs) look so different, yet so similar? The possibilities are diverse. Some international organizations have just a few member states, while others span the globe. Some are targeted at a specific problem, while others have policy portfolios as broad as national states. Some are run almost entirely by their member states, while others have independent courts, secretariats, and parliaments. Variation among international organizations appears as wide as that among states. This book explains the design and development of international organization in the postwar period. It theorizes that the basic set up of an IO responds to two forces: the functional impetus to tackle problems that spill beyond national borders and a desire for self-rule that can dampen cooperation where transnational community is thin. The book reveals both the causal power of functionalist pressures and the extent to which nationalism constrains the willingness of member states to engage in incomplete contracting. The implications of postfunctionalist theory for an IO's membership, policy portfolio, contractual specificity, and authoritative competences are tested using annual data for 76 IOs for 1950-2010. Transformations in Governance is a major academic book series from Oxford University Press. It is designed to accommodate the impressive growth of research in comparative politics, international relations, public policy, federalism, environmental and urban studies concerned with the dispersion of authority from central states up to supranational institutions, down to subnational governments, and side-ways to public-private networks. It brings together work that significantly advances our understanding of the organization, causes, and consequences of multilevel and complex governance. The series is selective, containing annually a small number of books of exceptionally high quality by leading and emerging scholars. The series targets mainly single-authored or co-authored work, but it is pluralistic in terms of disciplinary specialization, research design, method, and geographical scope. Case studies as well as comparative studies, historical as well as contemporary studies, and studies with a national, regional, or international focus are all central to its aims. Authors use qualitative, quantitative, formal modeling, or mixed methods. A trade mark of the books is that they combine scholarly rigour with readable prose and an attractive production style. The series is edited by Liesbet Hooghe and Gary Marks of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and the VU Amsterdam, and Walter Mattli of the University of Oxford.

European politics has been reshaped in recent decades by a dual process of centralization and decentralization. At the same time that authority in many policy areas has shifted to the suprantional level of the European Union, so national governments have given subnational regions within countries more say over the lives of their citizens. At the forefront of scholars who characterize this dual process as Omulti-level governance, OLiesbet Hooghe and Gary Marks argue that its emergence in the second half of the twentieth century is a watershed in the political development of Europe. Hooghe and Marks explain why multi-level governance has taken place and how it shapes conflict in national and European political arenas. Drawing on a rich body of original research, the book is at the same time written in a clear and accessible style for undergraduates and non-experts

A fresh alternative to traditional state-centred analyses of the process of European integration is presented in this book. World-renowned scholars analyze the state in terms of its component parts and clearly show the interaction of subnational, national and supranational actors in the emerging European polity. This multi-level politics' approach offers a powerful lens through which to view the future course of European integration.

The contributors' empirical exploration of areas such as regional governance, social policy and social movements underpins their broad conceptual and theoretical framework providing significant new insight into European politics.

Presenting a fresh alternative to traditional state-centered analyses of the process of European integration, Governance in the European Union clearly shows the interaction of subnational, national, and supranational actors in the emerging European polity. This "multilevel politics" approach offers a powerful lens for viewing the future course of European integration. The authors' empirical exploration of areas such as regional governance, social policy, and social movements underpins their broad conceptual and theoretical framework, providing significant new insight into European politics. Governance in the European Union will appeal to students and academics across the broad spectrum of political science, and will be of particular interest to those in European studies, public policy studies, comparative politics, and political theory.

No living political scientist or sociologist is more frequently cited by other scholars than Seymour Martin Lipset. He is one of the most prolific social scientists of this century--the author (or co-author) of 21 books and the editor (or co-editor) of 25 more. Lipset's influential Political Man has been published in 16 countries, including Israel, Japan, Vietnam, and Yugoslavia. Now, in this comprehensive and well-integrated selection of essays, an all-star cast pays tribute to Lipset's scholarship by exploring his core theme: the conditions, problems, dynamics, values, and institutions of democracy, both in the United States and comparatively throughout the world. Reexamining Democracy--like Lipset's own wide-ranging intellectual work--is devoted to rethinking the character and development of democracy in America and beyond. With the ongoing resurgence of democracy in the world and the faltering performances of many established democracies acting as an ironic backdrop, this collection of diverse thought offers fascinating perspectives on an ever potent and compelling social force.