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Lecture notes Democracies, Autocracies and Transitions
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Lecture notes from DAT at UvA from 2024. I also uploaded a document with a summary of all the readings.
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Democracies, Autocracies and TransitionsLecture 1
Introduction
Patterns of democracy
- Three waves
• WWI ending
• Decolonization
• Fall of communism
- Recent
- Mostly in western world
Why bother with democracy?
- Amartya Sen - Democracy as a universal value
• Most people see value (not everyone wants it)
• The value of democracy
o Intrinsic: on itself useful
o Instrumental: provides benefits (accountability)
o Constructive: understanding our wants and needs (positive feedback)
• Against economic or cultural preconditions for democracy
• Substantive view
- Adam Przeworski – Why bother with elections?
• More minimalist → competitive elections “as a mechanism by which we
decide who will govern us and how.”
• When repeated, voters can express dissatisfaction with how they are
governed.
• More cautious about the benefits
• Procedural view on democracy → Doesn’t want to confuse democracy with
outcomes of democracy
- E.g. India
• Democracy continuing to function in midst of social cleavages and large-
scale violence → how?
Democracy as an independent variable (an outcome)
- Democracy as outcomes (DV) vs democracy as cause (IV)
- Independent variable: democracy → economic performance, climate change,
peace
- Democracy → growth
• The Lee Hypothesis
o Democratic leaders are more short-term oriented (because of
elections) and are responsible to large group of people
o Autocratic leader that’s economic oriented is less short-term oriented
and responsible to smaller group of people (better → Singapore)
• Democracies often more growth, but not a large difference
o Singapore lot of growth, but also countries like North Korea
o Less similarities among non-democratic countries
, - Democracy → climate change
• Weak negative effect
- Democracy → peace
• Strongest evidence
• Higher number of democracies, less political violence
• Democracies are much less likely to experience severe violence
• Could be “baked into” definition
Lecture 2
What is democracy?
Democracy, then and new
- Etymology
• Democracy as rule by the people
- But who, what, how, when and where?
- Early theoretical treatments
• Plato, The Republic
o Government as realm of experts (ship of state)
o Democracy as mob rule
• Aristotle, The Politics
o Regime classification
▪ Number of rulers (one, few, many)
▪ Good and bad forms
• Seen as susceptible to class warfare, unstable and dangerous
• Same to Montesquieu, Locke, etc.
- Early experiments
• Athenian democracy
o Suffrage for free, adult males
o Free speech, political equality, direct participation
• Early ‘democracy’: council governance, village governance
• Very different
o Election by lot, and/or direct decision-making, limited in processes
and size
- Shift in mid-19th century
• French and American Revolutions
• Democracy as representative government
• Rapid expansion
• Ony white men with property
- Connection with liberalism (Parekh)
• Emphasis on individual
• Capitalism as democratization of economic system
- Resistance to expansion of democracy, including from liberals
• Proportioneel kiessysteem omdat arbeiders grootste deel van de samenleving
zijn en bij majoritan system verliest elite macht
, Conceptions of democracy
1. Substantive vs. Procedural conceptions
• Substantive or maximalist view
o Classifies regimes by the outcomes they produce
o However:
▪ Too many attributes → no empirical referents
▪ For some questions → limited analytical use
• Procedural or minimalist view
o Classifies regimes according to institutions and procedures
o However:
▪ Too few attributes → all cases become instances
• Procedural definitions more common
2. Electoral vs. liberal conceptions
• Electoral democracy (Dahl’s polyarchy)
o Contestation
▪ Classifies regimes by procedures of democratic competition
▪ However: are competitive elections enough?
o Inclusion
▪ Classifies regimes based on who participates in the democratic
process
▪ However: inclusion → little variation?
• Liberal democracy
o Adds democracy as limited government
▪ Maintain a system of rights based on principle of maximum
liberty
▪ However: imports liberalism
• Electoral conception most common
3. Other conceptual debates
• Dichotomous vs. continuous
o Democracy as a qualitative difference
• Beyond electoral vs. liberal democracy
o Varieties of Democracy project
o Electoral, liberal, majoritarian, participatory, deliberative, and
egalitarian conceptions
• National vs. subnational regime type
o Examples:
▪ US states
▪ Indian states
From concepts to measurements:
building democracy indices →
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