polsci midterm

Bureaucratic Authoritarianism

military rule but there’s a facade

collective action problem

collectively we benefit, but there are individual costs —> less incentive to do

competitive authoritarianism

free and fair elections BUT abuse of state power and media skewes election towards ruling party, ruling party almost always wins

hybrid regime

democracy with authoritarian tendencies and vice versa

delegate vs trustee

delegate always votes with constituency, trustee votes in their own best interest

direct democracy

vote on everything 100% of people vote on 100% of things, they themselves carry out the decisions

Dynamic between anarchy and dictatorship

stability is better than nothing

ecological fallacy

taking information from one level of analysis and applying it to another level of analysis

electoral democracy

rule of law is missing, bureaucracy doesn’t work. different from competitive authoritarianism

event horizon problem

think contracts. once putin dies, do contracts mean anything? unpredictable outcomes during transitions based on previous leadership or system

gerrymandering

drawing up districts, reps choosing their own voters. consequence, ruling party stays in power even if they are not really favored by the majority

how do dictators stay in power?

1. Built in support (20% of people actually believe in authoritarianism)

2. violence and surveillance (random killing and watching and jail)

3. cooptation (incorporating opposition into your regime with bribes jobs or benefits)

4. personality cult (kim jon un)

how does democracy happen?

top down: system shock to top of power (invasion, death of leader etc where they are forced to open up the system) bottom up: slowly but usually a revolution or rebellion by the people to change to regime

imagined community

who we tell ourselves we are, our origin story, who we see ourselves as a nation

issues of representation

local vs. national, party vs. national. tension

kleptocracy

system in which state exists only to steal from their citizens, not solve collective action problems

liberal democracy

system with rule of law. rights are protective of the people, bureaucracy works in favor of its citizens

malapportionment

particular constituency that is overrepresented (can be natural unlike gerrymandering)

most different system

outcome is the same most different origins, systems, resources

most similar

similar people, culture, origins, different outcomes

path dependency

past decisions constrain future decisions

patronage and clientelism

when reps give someone something in exchange for votes (ex. construction workers getting state jobs) patronage is the same but does not have to be legislative

principal agent problem

exists when someone makes a decision, someone else carries it out (agent might not care or have the resources, they do something different from what principal wants)

proportional representation

10% of vote = 10% of seats so on and so forth. leads to more parties because votes count more than in a two party system

role of government

solve collective action problems

state

monopoly of power over a territory

totalitarian regime

when state gets involved in every aspect of everyday life (ex. North Korea)

waves of democracy

when lots of countries become democratic at once, like french and US revolutions were example of first wave leading to surrounding countries doing it too

weber’s sources of authority

1. charismatic

2. traditional (handed down, monarchy)

3. rational (some kind of rule, merit)

what is politics?

how we make decisions, art of who gets what

why is bad democracy better than dictatorship for wealth in the long run?

there is a feedback loop in democracy! more self-correcting system, you need 51% of approval to do things

why would dictators provide public goods or solve collective action problems?

to benefit themselves

winner takes all system

person wins by having one more vote than other parties, often leads to 2 dominant parties (don’t want to waste our vote, like the US)