Global Politics Exam 2

Democracy

Meaning “rule by the people”; more elaborate definitions typically incorporate concepts, procedures, and/or principles; Robert Dahl suggested that democracies guarantee the following:

1.Freedom of association

2. Freedom of expression

3. The right to vote

4. Broad citizen eligibility for public office

5. The right of political leaders to compete for support

6. Alternative sources of information

7. Free and fair elections

8. Institutions that make government policies depend

on votes and other forms of citizen preferences

Outside-In Approaches to Democracy

• Democracy promotion on the part of wealthier democratic countries in the world

• Demonstration effect (or diffusion): process by which actors in one country watch and initiate political process in the other country

Inside-Out Approaches to Democracy

A. bottom-up, or inside-out approach locates democratic

initiation to domestic forces.

B. Often explanations highlight the role of social

movements, sustained campaigns of pressure and

claim-making that involve multiple actors working

together to generate change

Points Highlighted by Theories of Democratic Consolidation

1. The relationship between economic growth, average income levels and democratic consolidation.

• Przeworski et al. (2000) they found that almost all countries with an average per capita income of $4000

where there had been a transition to democracy remained a democracy.

2. A strong middle class is essential for maintaining a democracy

• Moore argues that middle classes have economic and political interests that are different from those of

landed elites, they thus see a benefit to the distribution of political power.

3. Less unequal societies are more likely to stay democracies

• The relationship to inequality is U shaped in the sense that with high degrees of equality, the

incentives for democratization are fewer, citizens who are not in government are less concerned with

the need for democracy and therefore do not threaten major unrest to achieve it (Acemoglu and

Robinson 2006)

4. A stronger civil society is better for democratic consolidation

5. Under certain circumstances, religious and/or ethnic diversity may hinder democratic consolidation.

Some researchers have suggested that this is particularly the case when they compete for resources or land.

John Markoff: Waves of Democratization

transitions toward democracy have taken place in

time-bound clusters, or waves, followed by reversals.

The FIRST WAVE:

• Took place between 1828 through 1926, influenced by the American

and French revolutions of the late 18th century.

• The US extended the right to vote to a large portion of the white male

population.

• This long wave also included transitions to democracy in Finland,

Iceland, Switzerland, France, the UK, Australia, Canada, and

eventually some Latin American countries.

THE SECOND WAVE (1943 – 1962) took

place as formerly fascist states turned

democratic. Also some Latin American

nations reasserted their democratic

credentials. Many of the new countries born

after decolonization started off as formal

democracies, including India, Malaysia,

Nigeria and Kenya.

• THE THIRD WAVE began in the 1970s

and continued through the 1990s. The trigger

was the end of dictatorships in southern

Europe, notably Spain, Portugal and Greece

Within a decade several Latin American

countries returned to civilian multiparty

rule, such as in Brazil, Argentina, Chile and

Uruguay .

Carothers’ (2002) Critique of the “Transition Paradigm”

By the early 2000s, “Of the nearly 100 countries considered as transition in recent years, only a small number,

probably fewer than 20, were clearly on route to becoming well-functioning democracies” (Carothers 2002).

Five core assumptions of the transition paradigm:

1. Any country moving away from dictatorial rule can be considered a country in transition toward democracy.

2. Democratization tends to unfold in a set sequence of states.

3. Elections equal democracy.

4. Underlying structural conditions (economic system, political history, institutional legacies, ethnic make-up,

etc.) will not be major factors in either the onset or the outcome of the transition process.

5. New democracies are being built on coherent functioning states. State-building and democracy-building

would be mutually reinforcing.

Political Accountability

The ability of the citizenry to directly or indirectly control political land institutions

Vertical Accountability

The ability of individuals and groups to hold their state’s institutions accountable directly; greater vertical accountability is typically held by Majoritarian democracies; greater amounts means:

• Power is concentrated: fewer institutions to check executive power

• Single-party executive

• Executive dominance over legislature

• Single legislative branch

• Easily amended constitutions

• Key example = UK’s Westminster

Horizonal Accountability

The ability of the state’s institutions to hold one another accountable; greater horizontal accountability is typically held by Consensus democracies; greater amount means:

• Power and decision making are more dispersed

• Multiparty executives (coalition government)

• Executive-legislative balance

• Bicameral legislatures

• Hard-to-amend constitutions

• Key examples = coalition government in Israel or divided government in the U.S.

Lijphart (1999)

Argued that each system has trade-offs among accountability, efficiency and stability:

○ More majoritarian systems, with concentrated power and fewer veto players, may provide less

representation and accountability but more efficient policymaking and perhaps fewer crises.

○ More consensual systems tend to be just the opposite, the distribution of power among major parties and

institutions makes more robust horizontal accountability but may threaten policymaking.

○ The level of accountability, efficiency, and stability vary within each type of institutional structure,

depending in part on the electoral system and the number and strength (discipline in voting together as

a bloc) of political parties in a given country.

The Judiciary

The branch of government responsible for interpreting laws, settling legal disputes, and

administering justice through a system of courts.

• In the US, it is meant to be a co-equal branch that

acts as a check on the legislative and executive

branches by ensuring laws and actions comply with

the constitution

Judicial Review

The authority, vested in (typically) unelected judges, to decide whether a specific law contradicts a country’s Constitution.

• This makes the judiciary a potentially powerful veto

player.

• The judiciary’s actual power in different countries

varies considerably.

When Judicial Review Matters and What it Requires

Judicial review only matters in practice to the extent that key courts are willing and able to act independent of the other branches of government.

This requires:

1. Judicial independence: The belief and ability of judges to decide

cases as they think appropriate, regardless of what other politically

powerful officials or institutions desire.

2. Legitimacy: Without legitimacy, the judiciary has little power, given

that it does not control a military nor financial resources.

3. Institutional strength: As seen in the degree to which judicial

processes and procedures are established, predictable, and routinized

Common Law

Judges base decisions not only on their understanding of the written law but also on their understanding of past court cases

Code Law

Judges may only follow the law as written, interpreting it as little as necessary to fit the case. Past decisions are irrelevant

Judicial Review in Common Law Countries

Decentralized judicial review: the same courts that handle everyday criminal cases also

decide constitutional issues and can do so at any level.

● - Concrete judicial review: only someone who has actually been negatively affected by

the law in question can initiate a case

Judicial Review in Code Law Countries

Centralized judicial review: A special court handles constitutional questions.

Mexico Case Study

• Andres Obrador pushes to change the judiciary system by making it where judges are elected rather than appointed

• Judges are typically appointed based on training, qualifications, and tests

• This would impact judges in the supreme court and judges in the local district courts

• Those with a low degree of judicial experience could become a judge

• Obrador believes that this will hold judges accountable, instill trust in the judiciary, and help fight corruption

• People argue that this will make the judiciary loyal to the ruling party and could support organized crime

Unitary Systems

The central government has sole constitutional sovereignty and power

Federal Systems

The central government shares constitutional sovereignty and power with subunits, such as states, provinces, or regions

The upper and weaker house of the legislature in a federal system is usually designed to represent the state or provincial governments, while the lower and more powerful house represents individual

voters. Because states or provinces are usually of different sizes, smaller ones are often overrepresented in the upper house

Why Countries Adopt Federalism

1. Larger countries tend to adopt federal systems in part to provide some level of government closer

to the populace than the national government.

2. To limit the power of the majority by decentralizing and dividing governmental power.

3. Thought to be a means to protect the interests of religious or ethnic minorities.

Symmetrical Federal System

All states have the same relationship with and rights in relation to the national government. (like US)

Asymmetrical Federal System

Many federal systems in ethnically divided societies are asymmetrical, some states or provinces have

special rights or powers that others do not.(Ex: Canada, India)

Electoral Systems

Formal, legal mechanisms that translate votes into control over political offices and shares of political

power

Single-Member Districts (SMDs)

A state’s territory is divided into geographic units, and each unit elects one or more representatives. SMD can use plurality or majoritarian rules to determine who is elected.

Plurality System

Whoever gets the most votes wins the election, even if they don’t have majority. This is also referred to as the “first-past-the-post” system

Majoritarian System

The winner must gain an absolute majority of the votes (50%, plus one) rather than just a plurality (the most). If no candidate wins an absolute majority, a second election takes place between the top two

candidates to produce a winner.

Duverger’s Law

Maurice Duverger contended that the logic of competition in SMD electoral systems tends to

result in the long-term survival of only two parties

Proportional Representation (PR)

Representatives are chosen nationally or in large electoral districts with multiple representatives

for each district. Most PR systems include a minimal electoral threshold. For example, 3% or 5% of the vote to gain representation in parliament; PR systems tend to be part of and support consensus models of democracy; multiple voices via multiple parties are likely to be represented in the legislature, and coalition government is common

Closed List Proportional Representation

Each party presents a ranked list of candidates for all the seats in the legislature. Voters can

see the list and know who the “top” candidates are, but they actually vote for the party. (This is the version of PR most dissimilar to SMD)

Open-List Proportional Representation

Voters are presented with a list of candidates and vote for the candidate of their choice

Mixed or Semi-Proportional Systems

Combine single-member district representation with overall proportionality. Voters cast two ballots: One for a representative from their district, with the winner being the individual who gains a plurality, and a second for a party list

Dominant-Party System

Multiple parties contest free and (more or less) fair elections following the electoral rules of the country,

but one party is popular enough to win every election

Two-Party System

In a two-party system, only two parties are able to garner enough votes to win an election, though more may compete.

Multiparty System

Multiparty systems are those in which more than two parties could potentially win a national election and govern.

Social Policy

In the broadest terms, social policy seeks to reduce poverty and income inequality and to stabilize

individual or family income.

• Countries that spend more on social policy do tend to have less inequality and poverty

Universal Entitlements

Benefits that governments provide to all citizens to, usually funded through general taxation.

• Examples: universal healthcare, universal primary education, Universal Basic Income (UBI).

Social Insurance

Provides benefits to categories of people who have contributed to a (usually mandatory) public

insurance fund.

• Examples: social security, some pensions

Means-Tested Public Assistance

Programs that individuals qualify for when they fall below a specific income level.

• Examples: Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP; known as “food stamps”), subsidized public housing, and Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF); conditional cash.

Tax Expenditures

Targeted tax breaks for specific groups of citizens or activities in an attempt to reduce poverty and/or

inequality.

Hilson (2020)

A welfare state is a state that is committed to providing basic economic and social well-being for its citizens.

• “The welfare state is not a Nordic invention. All societies have had to make some provision to take care of individuals who for reasons such as youth, old age, illness or accident are temporarily or permanently prevented from looking after themselves” (p. 71).

• “It is thus not until the mid-twentieth century that we can really begin to speak of welfare states as such, with the emergence ofsystems where the state became a major or even the main provider

of welfare.” (p. 71).

• For Esping-Andersen, ”welfare states differed from each other in the extent to which they ‘decommodified’ social relations; in other words, the extent to which individuals were forced to rely on the market to meet their material needs (through selling their labor and buying goods and services), or were entitled to receive benefits and transfers as citizens.” (p. 72)

Esping-Anderson’s Typology of Welfare States

Esping-Andersen’s (1990) book The Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism triggered dynamic comparative research on welfare state design.

• Esping-Andersen argued that there were three different types of welfare states: (1)

liberal, (2) conservative (what Orvis and Drogus call Christian democratic), and (3) social-democratic welfare states.

• Each type decommodifies social existence to different degrees and uses distinct combinations of social policy instruments to address poverty and inequality.

Orvis and Drogus Typology of Welfare States

I. SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC

• Emphasizes universal entitlements to achieve greater social equality and promote equal citizenship.

• Tend to include paid maternity leave, preschool, child allowances, basic retirement pensions, and job

training.

II. CHRISTIAN DEMOCRATIC (“conservative” for Esping-Andersen)

• Primarily emphasizes income stabilization to mitigate the effects of market-induced insecurity.

• Benefits are usually tied to contributions, and financing is mainly through employer and employee

payroll taxes rather than general taxation.

III. LIBERAL

• The focus is on ensuring that all who can work and gain their income in the market do so. They are

more concerned about preserving individual autonomy via market participation than reducing poverty

or inequality.

• Means-tested public assistance is the major mechanism of poverty alleviation.

Gini Coefficient and Inequality Index

Compares the wealth and income distribution of a perfect society, and a country with equality, and doubling it to get a score; gives no information about how wealth and inequality across genders, races, and demographics, or how hard it is to escape poverty

The Dictator’s Dilemma (Masaaki Higashijima)

Because of the repression authoritarian regimes practice, they lack accurate information on how much

political support they actually have. This often leads them to try to co-opt potential opposition and to try to build their legitimacy through various strategies, including elections and political parties.

All authoritarian regimes rule through some combination of repression, co-optation (via patronage and appointment to official positions), and efforts at legitimation

Full Authoritarianism vs. Competitive Authoritarianism (Levitsky and Way 2010)

1. Full authoritarianism: “A regime in which no viable channels exist for opposition to contest legally for executive power.”

2. Competitive authoritarianism: “Civilian regimes in which formal democratic institutions exist and are widely viewed as the primary means of gaining power, but in which incumbents’ abuse of the state places them at a significant advantage vis-a-vis their opponents. Such regimes are competitive in that opposition parties use democratic institutions to contest seriously for power, but they are not democratic because the playing field is heavily skewed in favor of incumbents. Competition is thus real but unfair” (p. 5)

Competitive Authoritarianism in Mexico (1929-2000)

From 1929 to 2000, the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) in Mexico operated a "competitive authoritarian" system, a hybrid regime with democratic elements but an authoritarian core. While elections were held, the PRI controlled the political landscape through corruption, media manipulation, and co-optation, creating an uneven playing field that prevented meaningful opposition

Pereira (2012)

Defines military regimes as “authoritarian regimes in which the military as an organization holds

a preponderance of power.” They usually have the following characteristics:

• Key political leadership held by military officers

• lack of central, civilian political control over the armed forces

• application of military law to civilians

• the threat or use of extrajudicial repression (such as torture, disappearances, and killings) by the state’s security forces

Start of Repression and State Violence in Latin America

“The most important US anticommunist allies, by far, were the armed forces. The working alliance

between the US military and Latin American armed forces, dating from WWII had become an explicitly

anticommunist alliance after the way. It involved permanent US military aid for Latin American armies, as well as training at the US military’s School of the Americas, where the basic curriculum could be summed up as counterinsurgency – how to fight guerrillas.” (Chasteen, p. 304).

• Latin American militaries were trained in secret kidnapping, torture and murder as valid counterinsurgency techniques against the nation’s “internal enemies.”

State Terrorism in Latin America

“The apocalyptic language that laced the discourse of ranking officers-the medical references and the oft-repeated belief that Argentina was on the front lines of a world war between Western Christian civilization and communism-reflected their will to mount a campaign of eradication, unfettered by limitations on the use of force or barbarity, while the armed forces held the reins. This was the driving force behind the dirty war.” (Wright 2007) Roughly 30,000 people were killed or disappeared.

Three major categories of repression and state terror were part of the Proceso:

1. “Detenidos” (detained): Unclear who they were, where they were being held, why.

2. “Desaparecidos” - the detained that were never released, nor proof of their existence alive nor

dead.

3. Children of the disappeared—pregnant women giving birth in prison, young children kidnapped—all adopted

Non-Violent Resistance and the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo

Mothers pressured and gathered to walk and perform a peaceful protest trying to find their children who had ‘disappeared’, tortured or killed or detained (Argentina)

Operation Condor

• Trials against top military hierarchy in Argentina, specifically those who led the repression 

• More people put in jail from Chile and Argentina who led the repression; no where else 

• A collaboration across different dictatorships to maintain control and repression

• Domestic courts in Argentina

• Born in 1970s; right wing military coups across Latin America; 1975 created an intelligence network that had the backing from the United States

Transitional Justice

“Transitional justice refers to those measures taken after the end of an authoritarian regime or war to address past human rights abuses. These measures can include:

• investigation of those abuses;

• reparations for the victims and/or their families;

• The construction of memorials to the victims;

• amnesty for and/or punishment of the perpetrators of violence;

• the production of new histories that are critical of the authoritarian past;

• and reforms, including purges of authoritarian-era public sector personnel, that push the new regime closer to the ideals of the rule of law.” (Pereira 2012)

Trials, truth commissions, and reparations have been the preferred mechanisms in many countries.

Populist Mobilization

“Appealing to citizens directly, often threatening established institutions, parties, and elites; emphasizing a united and morally superior ‘people’ battling corrupt elites; engaging in ‘bad manners’; and focusing rhetoric around a sense of ‘crisis’ that threatens ‘the people.’” (Orvis and Drogus)

Who Is a Populist

“It is necessary but not sufficient condition to be critical of elites in order to count as a populist… In addition to being anti-elitist, populists are always antipluralist. Populists claim that they, and they alone, represent the people… when ruling, they refuse to recognize any opposition as legitimate” (Muller 2016, 2-3)

Populism

• Claim that a person alone represents the people (populism)

• Doesn’t lean left or right 

• Make an appeal to the people against the elite, use crises or manufacture them to make a point, inflammatory language is used 

• Populism often motivates people's fear and anger 

• Democracies are not going to be weakened or ended (Diamond), but it will be more gradual due to elected executives who want to weaken the institutional checks and balances

Judis on Left vs. Right Populism

“Judis sees the post-2008 economic crisis as the event that touched off today’s populist challenge. The Great Recession, as it has become known, helped ignite the Tea Party right and the Occupy Wall Street left. Both were opposed to what they viewed as a coalition of political and financial elites against ordinary people.” (Purdy 2016)

He distinguishes between left and right-wing populism as follows:

“Leftwing populists champion the people against an elite or an establishment…Rightwing populists champion the people against an elite that they accuse of coddling a third group, which can consist, for instance, of immigrants, Islamists, or African American militants. Leftwing populism is dyadic. Rightwing populism is triadic. It looks upward, but also down upon an out group.”

Emotions and Populism for Diamond (2020)

Diamond (2020) argues that classic populist politicians ride to power “by inflaming divisions and mobilizing the good, deserving “people” against corrupt elites… as well as a host of alien threats, such as international institutions, refugees and migrants, and ‘undeserving’ minorities who really don’t ‘belong’ in the country.”

• He further suggests that the skills of authoritarian populists “involve an ability to generate or manipulate fear of and hostility to established elites and outsiders (both “enemies of the people”). Populist leaders typically do so through charismatic appeal to emotions, such as fear and anger. Populism may appeal to rational interests, but its generation of images of threat, corruption, and cultural pollution has a strong non-rational or even irrational component.”

Democratic Backsliding in the 21st Century and Diamond (2020)

DIAMOND (2020) points to four global socio-economic trends (amongst other issues) that he thinks have implications for the erosion of democracy and the growing power of populist leaders:

1. Rise of the internet and social media

2. Growing income inequality

3. The acceleration of globalization and the displacement of labor in industrial economies aggravated social and economic insecurities and resentments.

4. Neoliberal policies, financialization of the economy and economic instability have contributed to feelings of dissatisfaction amongst people that have been negatively affected.

“The principal method of democratic regression has been incremental strangulation of democracy by elected (typically populist) executives who gradually eviscerate institutional checks, political opposition, independent media, and other forces of scrutiny and resistance in civil society.”

How Democracies Die (Levitsky and Ziblatt)

Their broad argument is that modern slides into authoritarianism are not the result of

revolutions or military coups, but rather the consequence of a steady erosion of political

norms and the assault on such fundamental democratic institutions as an independent

judiciary and a free press.”

• They highlight two major causes of the gradual erosion and death of democracy: (1) the

evaporation of the norms of mutual toleration, and (2) forbearance, the idea that politicians

should exercise restraint in deploying their institutional prerogatives. These, they suggest, are

the crucial “guardrails of democracy.”

Primordialism

People’s identities are perceived to be “natural,” “God given,” and/or biological. Groupings are

considered to fixed, natural, and pre-political; they are things in and of themselves

Constructivism

Argues that identities are socially constructed. Discourses, culture, storytelling, symbols and

social relations are crucial for constructing identities and learning about who “we” are.

Why Some Identities Matter More Than Others

1. Identities that are “sticky” tend to matter more (those that are more difficult to change).

2. Identities that are visible are particularly powerful.

3. Identities that have symbolic and emotional power are the ones that exercise the strongest pull on people. National, ethnic, religious, gender and class identities tend to be the most politically salient, though their relative importance varies in time and space.

 “A nation is a community of people who, believing they hold a common bond, make a claim to have a sovereign state of their own.” (Straus and Driscol p. 159)

 “Ethnicity: Named human population with myths of common ancestry, shared historical memories, one or more elements of common culture, a link with a homeland, and a sense of solidarity among at least some of tis members” (p. 161)

Nations as “Imagined Communities” by Anderson (1983)

• Anderson (1983) argued that nations are not ancient communities united by history, but rather

the modern product of our collective imaginations. They are “imagined” in the sense that they are

simply too large for all of their members to actually know one another.

• The fact that they are imagined doesn’t mean they are not real; in fact, they are very real.

• Nationalism filled the political and existential void that arose after the decline of the great religious

communities. The circulation of books and newspapers made it possible for scattered individuals to relate to each other and develop a common awareness of their shared nationality.

• The nation is consistently imagined as a limited and sovereign form of community.

Ethnic/Cultural Nationalism

National unity based on a common cultural heritage.

• Tends to advocate a legal definition of citizenship based on JUS SANGUINIS: descent rather than

residence.

• Germany exemplifies this form of nationalism: They have an essentially blood/biological notion of

citizenship; you are German because your parents were. Ethnic Germans precede the German state.

Civic/Political Nationalism

The sense of national unity and purpose is based on a set of commonly held political beliefs.

• Tends to advocate a legal definition of citizenship based on jus soli: residence on the state’s “soil.”

• France is an example of state that preceded ideas of a nation. The French state “created” French people.

Right Wing Populism and Nativism (Friedmann 2017)

 For Mudde, NATIVISM is “xenophobic nationalism.” It is “an ideology that wants congruence of state and nation—the political and the cultural unit. It wants one state for every nation and one nation for every state. It perceives all non-natives … as threatening. But the non-native is not only people. It can

also be ideas.”

 Eric Kaufmann describes NATIVISM as “majority-ethnic nationalism” or a boundary-based nationalism.

 The key question posed by the rise of nativism at a time of demographic upheaval, according to Kaufmann, is “What is the future of ethnic-majority communities in the West?” The question isn’t “Who are we as a nation-state?” he said. It’s “Who are we as an ethnic majority?” It’s not, What does it mean to be British or American? It’s, What does it mean to be white British or white American?

Right Wing Populism and Gender Politics (Tobias and Stein 2022)

The “defense” of hegemonic masculinity and “traditional” gender norms has become crucial for contemporary right-wing populism

“Rage against the political system is frequently articulated in gendered terms as a defense of hegemonic masculinity, reinforcing gender binaries and hierarchies and punishing those who transgress them.”

“Calling for the preservation of gender hierarchies, contemporary right-wing populist movements around the world embrace the heteronormative nuclear family and attack reproductive rights, sex

education, and LGBTQ+ rights.”

“Antigender advocates argue that feminist and queer notions of gender threaten a presumed natural social order, promote homosexuality, and induce gender confusion. They use secular and faith-based arguments to assert that efforts to question the essential nature of gender and sexuality are unscientific, indeed dangerous.”

Indigenous Rights as a “Post-Liberal Challenge” (Yashar)

• Multicultural models of citizenship do not assume a culturally homogeneous population and establish differentiated rights for certain populations.

• This has led to heated debate about whether rights on the basis of group identity contradict a more liberal and individualistic understanding of rights. Is there a tension between collective rights and individual rights?

• “Indigenous movements pose a postliberal challenge. They challenge the homogenizing assumptions that suggest that individuals unambiguously constitute the primary political unit and that

administrative boundaries and jurisdictions should be uniformly defined throughout a country. And they call instead for more differentiated forms of citizenship and political boundaries, ones that grant individuals rights as citizens but that also grant collective rights and political autonomy at the local level. Finally, in calling for the constitutional recognition of pluriethnic and multicultural states, they challenge the idea that the state (democratic or otherwise) should correspond to a presumed homogeneous nation” (Yashar 1999).

Arguments For Group Rights

• Individual rights, no matter how fully respected, will never allow full inclusion of culturally distinct or socially marginalized groups.

• Social or cultural differences, as well as histories of exclusion and repression, mean that legal equality alone is not enough. Sometimes compensation or reparations might be needed.

• Collective rights for minority cultures are justified “to limit the economic or political power exercised by the larger society over the group, to ensure that the resources and institutions on which the minority depends are not vulnerable to majority decisions.” (Kymlicka)

Arguments Against Group Rights

• Only individuals can have rights and all individuals should have them equally.

• Once legal equality is achieved, individuals are and should be free to pursue political participation as they desire and are able, without further state action.

• Group rights could undermine political stability and democracy. National cohesion can be threatened or weakened

Becoming Black Political Subjects (Paschel)

Paschel asks: “Why did the Colombian and Brazilian states go from citizenship regimes based in ideas of the universal and formally unmarked citizen to the recognition of black rights? I argue that in both cases they do so in the face of pressure from black social movement organizations.” (p.2)

• She argues that “black movements in Colombia and Brazil successfully pressured their respective states to adopt ethno-racial reforms because they acted strategically in the context of this consolidated global ethno-racial field oriented around multiculturalism, indigenous rights, and anti-racism, which converged with profound changes in the domestic political fields in these countries.” (p. 3)

Paschel also asks: Why have black rights taken such distinct forms in different countries in Latin America? She states: “I do not see these reforms all as making up a singular ‘multicultural turn.’ Instead I argue that it is more useful to view these changes as constituting two distinct moments of interplay between domestic and global politics.” (p.3)

1. “The first of these began to unfold in the late 1980s with the shift to what Van Cott (2000) called ‘multicultural constitutionalism.’ In this period Latin American states reformed their constitutions in ways that recognized the ‘pluri-ethnic’ and ‘multicultural’ character of the political community while at the same time they extended specific rights to indigenous peoples and in some cases to black populations” (p. 4)

2. “About a decade later, Latin American states initiated a new wave of ethno-racial reforms aimed at combating racial discrimination and bringing about racial equality.” (p. 4)

“The dominant discourse of black rights in Colombia has been one of collective territorial rights, rural black communities, and the ‘right to difference,’ whereas ‘racial equality’ and a focus on urban black populations saturated Brazil’s political field. In Colombia, this black political subject has come to be embodied in the figure of the rural black farmer from the Pacific Coast, whereas in Brazil it is personified in urban disenfranchised blacks” (12)

Rocha and Parental Leave Politics (2021)

Parental leave regulation is not gender-neutral. Policies that encourage fathers’ leave-taking relate to the enhancement of child well-being, caring fatherhood, and gender equality among the couple and in the workplace. There are various designs of parental leave policies, depending on a combination of factors, such as length, income replacement rate and the compulsory nature of leave. This article draws on data from the 16th International Review of Leave Policies and Related Research (2020) and analyses main features of parental leave policies in seven countries (Germany, Poland, Portugal, Sweden, Israel, Japan and the United States), confronting it with recent research on the use of parental leave in those countries. Subsequently, the article provides evidence for the benefits of fathers’ uptake of paternity and parental leave and points out three features that leave policies must incorporate to promote gender equality and notes the importance of employers’ self-regulation.