Transnational Ideas and Connections: Understanding Asian Civil Society Activism

Whether one looks back at armed insurgency movements, the Philippines’ People Power, or Jakarta’s riots against Suharto, transnational ideas, models of collective action, and activists have been keys in inspiring and fostering civil society mobilization and organizations in Southeast Asia. What are some of the common characteristics of Asian civil society activism, and what are some of the differences? Can we explain these similitudes and differences across countries, especially within Southeast Asia? Are there themes for activism that are more dominant than others? To answer these questions, we first undertook a short historical and comparative review of social activism in the region before conducting a preliminary analysis of a database on NGOs, networks, and coalitions in various Southeast Asian countries. Our results seem to show that national organizations tend to be influenced by agenda setting on the part of regional organizations, to the point where it might trump the importance of national/local issues, such as the regime type, and might homogenize the issues on which organizations work across countries. At the same time, national/local animosities also influence regional organizations, whether they want it or not. In sum, regional and national organizations shape each other, and that the influence is far from going only in one single direction

Responsiveness in non-democratic regimes: The role of elections, legislatures and parties

The purpose of this thesis is to understand how authoritarian and semi-authoritarian regimes can become responsive in the absence of free and fair elections, sometimes even more so than democracies. To address this issue, the thesis focuses on cases drawn from Southeast Asia. Many semi-authoritarian and authoritarian regimes in the region seem to be responsive, such as Vietnam, Malaysia and Singapore, while democracies have often failed to respond in a similar manner. To account for these surprising results, the argument put forth in this thesis is that the presence of nominally democratic institutions - elections, legislatures and parties - can contribute greatly to the responsiveness of non-democratic regimes. Such institutions make important information about a population's preferences available, and responsiveness therefore becomes easier, while they can also improve a regime's capacity to implement responsive policies. To contribute to responsiveness in this way, elections need to be semi-competitive, legislatures have to allow for some representation, and parties must be institutionalized. Under these conditions, nominally democratic institutions favor responsiveness in non-democratic regimes. Meanwhile, the absence of some of these requirements in Southeast Asian democracies helps account for their low levels of responsiveness. Since responsiveness is deeply linked to the well-being of the populations living under different regimes, it seems crucial to understand how non-democratic regimes can become responsive, while democratic regimes can fail to become so.Le but de ce mémoire est de comprendre comment des régimes autoritaires et semi-autoritaires peuvent en venir à répondre aux besoins de leur population en l'absence d'élections justes et libres, et parfois même mieux que certaines démocraties. Ce mémoire, pour répondre à cette question, se concentre sur des pays situés en Asie du Sud-est. Plusieurs régimes autoritaires et semi-autoritaires dans la région ont démontré une forte tendance à répondre aux besoins de leur population, comme le Vietnam, la Malaisie et Singapour, alors que les régimes démocratiques ont souvent échoué à remplir une telle fonction. Pour expliquer ces résultats surprenant, l'argument avancé est que la présence d'institutions nominalement démocratiques, telles que des élections, parlements et partis, a grandement aidé les régimes non-démocratiques à répondre aux demandes de leur population. De telles institutions communiquent de l'information sur les préférences de la population, ce qui aide les régimes à savoir comment répondre à ses demandes et besoins, alors qu'elles peuvent également améliorer la capacité des régimes à mettre en œuvre des politiques à cet effet. Cependant, pour avoir un tel impact, les élections doivent être semi-compétitives, les législatures doivent représenter certains secteurs de la société, et les partis doivent être institutionnalisés. Dans de telles conditions, des institutions nominalement démocratiques aident les régimes autoritaires et semi-autoritaires à répondre à leur population. L'absence de certaines de ces conditions au sein des régimes démocratiques en Asie du Sud-est explique pour sa part leur faible tendance à faire de même. Puisque la mesure dans laquelle les régimes répondent aux besoins de leur population est fortement liée au bien-être de cette dernière, il semble crucial de comprendre comment des régimes non-démocratiques peuvent répondre de cette façon, alors que certains régimes démocratiques n'y parviennent toujours pas