Norms have never been absent from the study of international politics, but the sweeping “ideational turn” in the 1980s and 1990s brought them back as a central theoretical concern in the field. Much theorizing about norms has focused on how they create social structure, standards of appropriateness, and stability in international politics. Recent empirical research on norms, in contrast, has examined their role in creating political change, but change processes have been less well-theorized. We induce from this research a variety of theoretical arguments and testable hypotheses about the role of norms in political change. We argue that norms evolve in a three-stage “life cycle” of emergence, “norm cascades,” and internalization, and that each stage is governed by different motives, mechanisms, and behavioral logics. We also highlight the rational and strategic nature of many social construction processes and argue that theoretical progress will only be made by placing attention on the connections between norms and rationality rather than by opposing the two.

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International Norm Dynamics and Political Change

This book demonstrates that people's basic values and beliefs are changing, in ways that affect their political, sexual, economic, and religious behaviour. These changes are roughly predictable: to a large extent, they can be interpreted on the basis of a revised version of modernisation theory presented here. Drawing on a massive body of evidence from societies containing 85 percent of the world's population, the authors demonstrate that modernisation is a process of human development, in which economic development gives rise to cultural changes that make individual autonomy, gender equality, and democracy increasingly likely. The authors present a model of social change that predicts how the value systems play a crucial role in the emergence and flourishing of democratic institutions - and that modernisation brings coherent cultural changes that are conducive to democratisation.

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Modernization, Cultural Change, and Democracy: The Human Development Sequence

List of Figures ix List of Tables xi Preface and Acknowledgments xiii Introduction 1 PART I: VETO PLAYERS THEORY 17 One: Individual Veto Players 19 Two: Collective Veto Players 38 PART II: VETO PLAYERS AND INSTITUTIONAL ANALYSIS 65 Three: Regimes: Nondemocratic, Presidential, and Parliamentary 67 Four: Governments and Parliaments 91 Five: Referendums 116 Six: Federalism, Bicameralism, and Qualified Majorities 136 PART III: POLICY EFFECTS OF VETO PLAYERS 161 Seven: Legislation 165 Eight: Macroeconomic Policies 187 PART IV: SYSTEMIC EFFECTS OF VETO PLAYERS 207 Nine: Government Stability 209 Ten: Judiciary and Bureaucracies 222 Eleven: Veto Players Analysis of European Union Institutions 248 Conclusion 283 Bibliography 291 Index 309

Veto Players: How Political Institutions Work

This article introduces a large new cross-country database, the database of political institutions. It covers 177 countries over 21 years, 1975-95. The article presents the intuition, construction, and definitions of the different variables. Among the novel variables introduced are several measures of checks and balances, tenure and stability, identification of party affiliation with government or opposition, and fragmentation of opposition and government parties in the legislature.

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New tools in comparative political economy : the database of political institutions

The history of international political orders is written in terms of continuity and change in domestic and international political relations. As a step toward understanding such continuity and change, we explore some ideas drawn from an institutional perspective. An institutional perspective is characterized in terms of two grand issues that divide students of international relations and other organized systems. The first issue concerns the basic logic of action by which human behavior is shaped. On the one side are those who see action as driven by a logic of anticipated consequences and prior preferences. On the other side are those who see action as driven by a logic of appropriateness and a sense of identity. The second issue concerns the efficiency of history. On the one side are those who see history as efficient in the sense that it follows a course leading to a unique equilibrium dictated by exogenously determined interests, identities, and resources. On the other side are those who see history as inefficient in the sense that it follows a meandering, path-dependent course distinguished by multiple equilibria and endogenous transformations of interests, identities, and resources. We argue that the tendency of students of international political order to emphasize efficient histories and consequential bases for action leads them to underestimate the significance of rule- and identity-based action and inefficient histories. We illustrate such an institutional perspective by considering some features of the coevolution of politics and institutions, particularly the ways in which engagement in political activities affects the definition and elaboration of political identities and the development of competence in politics and the capabilities of political institutions.

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The Institutional Dynamics of International Political Orders

Incentives to cultivate a personal vote: A rank ordering of electoral formulas☆

Part I. Presidential and Parliamentary Democracy: 1. Basic choices in democratic regime types 2. What is presidentialism? Criticisms and responses 3. The constitutional origin and survival of assembly and executive 4. Legislative powers of presidents: veto and decree Part II. Electoral Dynamics of Presidential Democracy: 5. Electoral dynamics: efficiency and inefficiency 6. Electoral rules and the party system 7. Electoral cycles and the party system Part III. Institutiona: Engineering: 8. Semi-presidentialism: the third alternative 9. Electoral cycles in semi-presidential regimes 10. Divided polities and collegial presidencies 11. Conclusions Appendices.

Presidents and Assemblies: Constitutional Design and Electoral Dynamics

This 1997 book addresses the current debate regarding the liabilities and merits of presidential government. Does presidentialism make it less likely that democratic governments will be able to manage political conflict? With the unprecedented wave of transitions to democracy since the 1970s, this question has been hotly contested in political and intellectual circles all over the globe. The contributors to this volume examine variations among different presidential systems and skeptically view claims that presidentialism has added significantly to the problems of democratic governance and stability.

Presidentialism and democracy in Latin America

Part 1 Placing mixed-member systems in the world of electoral systems: Matthew Soberg Shugart and Martin P. Wattenberg, mixed-member electoral systems - a definition and typology Matthew Shugart, extreme electoral systems and the appeal of the mixed-member alternative. Part 2 Origins of mixed-member systems: Susan E. Scarrow, Germany - the mixed-member system as a political compromise David Denemark, choosing MMP in New Zealand - explaining the 1993 electoral reform Richard S. Katz, reforming the Italian electoral law, 1993 Gideon Rahat, the politics of reform in Israel - how the Israeli mixed system came to be Steven R. Reed and Michael F. Thies, the causes of electoral reform in Japan Brian F. Crisp and Juan Carlos Rey, the sources of electoral reform in Venezuela Rene Antonio Mayorga, electoral reform in Bolivia - origins of the mixed-member proportional system Juan Molinar Horcasitas and Jeffrey Weldon, reforming electoral systems in Mexico John W. Schiemann, hedging against uncertainty - regime change and the origins of Hungary's mixed-Member system Robert G. Moser and Frank C. Thames Jr, compromise amidst political conflict, the origins of Russia's mixed-member system. Part 3 Consequences of mixed-member systems: Hans-Dieter Klingemann and Bernhard Wessels, the political consequences of Germany's mixed-member system - personalization at the grass roots? Fiona Barker, Jonathan Boston, Stephen Levine, Elizabeth McLeay and Nigel S. Roberts, an initial assessment of the consequences of MMP in New Zealand Roberto D'Alimonte, mixed electoral rules, partisan realignment, and party system change in Italy Reuven Y. Hazan, the Israeli mixed electoral system - unexpected reciprocal and cumulative consequences Steven R. Reed and Michael F. Thies, the consequences of electoral reform in Japan Michael R. Kulisheck and Brian F. Crisp, the legislative consequences of MMP electoral rules in Venezuela Rene Antonio Mayorga, the mixed-member proportional system and its consequences in Bolivia Jeffrey Weldon, the consequences of the Mexicos mixed electoral system, 1988-1997 Kenneth Benoit, evaluating Hungary's mixed-member electoral system Robert G. Moser, the consequences of Russia's mixed-member electoral system. Part 4 Prospects for reform in other countries: David M. Farrell, the United Kingdom comes of age - the British electoral reform revolution of the 1990s R. Kent Weaver, electoral rules and electoral reform in Canada Matthew Soberg Shugart and Martin P. Wattenberg, are mixed-member systems the best of both worlds?

Mixed-member electoral systems : the best of both worlds?

Proportional representation systems affect the extent to which elected legislators exhibit various attributes that allow them to earn a personal vote. The sources of variation in personal vote-earning attributes (PVEA) lie in informational shortcuts voters use under different electoral rules. List type (closed or open) and district magnitude (the number of legislators elected from a district) affect the types of shortcuts voters employ. When lists are closed, legislators' PVEA are of decreasing usefulness to voters as magnitude (and hence the number of candidates on a list) increases. When lists are open, legislators' PVEA are increasingly useful to voters as magnitude increases, because the number of candidates from which voters must choose whom to give a preference vote increases. As predicted by the theory, the probability that a legislator will exhibit PVEA—operationalized as local birthplace or lower-level electoral experience—declines with magnitude when lists are closed, but rises with magnitude when lists are open.

Matthew Soberg Shugart

Papers

Incentives to cultivate a personal vote: A rank ordering of electoral formulas☆

Presidents and Assemblies: Constitutional Design and Electoral Dynamics

Presidentialism and democracy in Latin America

Mixed-member electoral systems : the best of both worlds?

Looking for Locals: Voter Information Demands and Personal Vote‐Earning Attributes of Legislators under Proportional Representation