Examining likelihoods in 2012: autocratic & democratic regime change

Events throughout 2011 have demonstrated that terrorism remains a high priority for nation-states through the world. Regime and nation-state stability have played an influential role, particularity in the Middle East and Africa in affecting global terrorism. In an attempt to map out what 2012 may bring, examining regime political stability is a useful starting point for a look at global terrorism in 2012. Here Jay Ulfelder provides an engaging and thought-provoking examination into the likelihood of transitions in 2012 of autocracies into democracies

Churches as firms : an exploration of regulatory similarities

Regulatory states manage religious activity within their jurisdiction in the same way they manage economic activity, in an alignment pattern that reflects institutionally embedded processes. Relying on regulatory institutional options to trace consistencies in the way a regime manages economic and religious activity, the article develops and tests theoretical accounts of the presence and content - in terms of comparative variation - of this alignment. The empirical setting, primarily OECD countries in recent decades, allows us to reverse the conventional causal view and treat religious regulation as causally embedded in the logic and practice of economic regulation. If reliance on regulation as a means of social control is bound by the same processes across domains, this may even suggest the existence of national cross-sectoral models of coordinating competition. The study elaborates a broad conceptualisation of regulatory governance with potentially wide applicability

Increasingly unequal turnout in Eastern European new democracies: Communist and transitional legacies versus new institutions

The thesis examines whether income inequality in post-Communist Eastern Europe depresses political engagement or increases the potential for conflict and instability. The thesis finds that while overall income inequality is correlated with lower political engagement and political engagement is stratified by income, income inequality does not appear to depress political engagement among the poor in post-Communist Eastern Europe. I use multilevel modeling to examine mass survey data from the survey done by Professors Whitefield and Evans as part of an ESCR-funded project as well the World Values Surveys

Using Analytic Narratives in Policy Analysis: An Explanation of the Implementation of the Water Reform in Italy (1994-2002)

Various critiques have been made of the analytic narrative, which is a methodological approach that combines historically oriented research with rational choice models. This paper discusses strengths and limitations of the approach and provides some suggestions for its inclusion in the repertoire of methodological tools at disposal for comparative policy studies. The argument is supported by evidence provided by the case study of the implementation of the water reform in Italy in the period 1994-2002. The case study shows how the interplay of game theoretic modeling and historical analysis results in the formulation of tentative hypotheses for explaining variation in the observed trajectory of policy reform implementation across time and space

International Political Science Review Contentious Collective Action and the Breakdown of Authoritarian Regimes Contentious Collective Action and the Breakdown of Authoritarian Regimes

ABSTRACT. Prior research indicates that different types of authoritarian regimes break down in different ways because key cadres in those regimes have different interests and face different strategic environments. Building on that theoretical foundation, I use event history models to examine the effects of contentious collective action on the likelihood of authoritarian breakdown. This analysis shows that some kinds of autocracy are more vulnerable to breakdown in the wake of contentious events than others, and that the strength and direction of this effect varies not only across types of authoritarianism, but across forms of collective action as well