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Dear
World Movement Participants, As
a service of DemocracyNews, we are pleased to send you the first issue
of Democracy Research News, the newsletter of the Network of Democracy
Research Institutes. The
Network of Democracy Research Institutes is a functional network of the
World Movement for Democracy that grew out of workshops organized at the
World Movement’s assemblies in India and Brazil. It consists of
organizations that conduct research on democracy, including both
self-standing institutes and research centers within larger
organizations. You may also visit the Network's Web site via the World
Movement's Web site (www.wmd.org). We
will be pleased to send Democracy Research News to you until the end of
this year. If you wish to receive Democracy Research news after December
2001, you must subscribe (free of charge) by sending an e-mail message
to Tom Skladony, Senior Program Officer at NED's International Forum for
Democratic Studies, at: skladony@ned.org. You can subscribe at any time. Please
note: If you do not subscribe to Democracy Research News, you will, of
course, continue to receive DemocracyNews, the newsletter of the World
Movement for Democracy. Sincerely,
World Movement for Democracy ****
********************** Democracy
Research News November
2001 Welcome
to the first issue of Democracy Research News, the newsletter of the
Network of Democracy Research Institutes. The Network, one of several
functional networks within the World Movement for Democracy, is a
membership association of organizations that conduct research on
democracy, democratization, and the policy and institutional challenges
of democratic development. Membership in the Network is open to
independent institutions, university-based study centers, and research
institutes affiliated with political parties, labor unions, democracy
and human rights movements, and other organizations. It was established
to facilitate interaction and exchanges among democracy scholars and
activists and to promote a greater awareness of the diversity and
vitality of democracy studies today. Through its Web site, this
newsletter, and other means, the Network provides information about the
research, conferences, publications, and other activities of its diverse
membership. The Network is administered by the International Forum for
Democratic Studies in Washington, D.C. For
a listing of member institutes and additional information, please visit
the Network’s Web site at www.wmd.org/ndri/ndri.html. For inquires
about membership, please write to Tom Skladony (skladony@ned.org),
senior program officer at the International Forum. Each
issue of the newsletter will feature brief announcements of new
publications by Network members, recent and coming events sponsored by
member Institutes, news and announcements about the Network and its
members, and notices and listings of new research on democracy (not
limited to Network member publications). We also expect that readers
will use the newsletter to initiate discussions, to pose questions on
research topics, and to announce or propose collaborative projects on
democracy. Contents
1. New Publications 2. Recent Events 3. News and Announcements 4. New
Research on Democracy 1.
New Publications The
Centre for Policy Studies (South Africa) recently published two policy
briefs: In Poor Voice: NCOP’s Weakness Flows from the Westminster
System by Thabo Rapoo, and A Future for the Provinces? New Rethink
Needed on Role of Provinces by Caroline Kihato and Thabo Rapoo. The
Centre has also released the first 2001 issue of its newsletter
Synopsis, featuring articles and analysis on the South African
parliament, privatization, and civil society. And its Social Policy
Series has published numerous new reports on such issues as social
capital and entrepreneurship, policy implementation, trade unions and
democracy, gender identity, and the impact of foreign aid on civil
society organizations in South Africa. Executive summaries of these
reports are available at www.cps.org.za/execsumm/execsumm.html. Thawilwadee
Bureekul of King Prajadhipok’s Institute (Thailand) and Robert B.
Albritton of the University of Mississippi presented a paper entitled
“Developing Democracy Under a New Constitution in Thailand: A
Pluralist Solution” at the annual meeting of the Midwest Political
Science Association, in Chicago, Illinois, April 18-22, 2001. The full
text of the paper is available at www.kpi.ac.th. Idasa,
the Institute for Democracy in South Africa, recently published three
important books. Money Matters 3: Women and Government Revenue by Debbie
Budlender and Karen Hurt examines how different forms of government
revenue affect women and men. Transparency and Participation in the
Budget Process by Isaac Shapiro, Alta Fölscher, and Warren Krafchik is
a collaborative project of Idasa’s Budget Information Service and the
International Budget Project of the Center for Budget and Policy
Priorities in Washington, D.C. And the Institute’s Practical Guide to
Local Government in South Africa by Lindiwe Ndlela, now in a revised
second edition, remains an invaluable resource for those studying and
working for democratic local governance. For more information about
these and other Idasa publications, visit www.idasa.org.za. The
Democracy Forum for East Asia, a partnership project of the NED’s
International Forum for Democratic Studies and the Sejong Institute
(South Korea), has published a report from the Democracy Forum’s
October 2000 conference in Bangkok entitled “The Role of Civil Society
in Promoting Democracy in East Asia.” The conference was cosponsored
by the International Forum, the Sejong Institute, the Asia Foundation,
and King Prajadhipok’s Institute, which also served as local host. The
report is available online at www.ned.org/asia/index.html. A limited
number of printed copies are available; please send a request to Tom
Skladony (skladony@ned.org). The
Access to Information Programme (Bulgaria) has published a handbook
entitled How to Apply the Access to Public Information Act in response
to the parliament’s passage in 2000 of a law providing such access, a
reform the Programme had long advocated as essential to the development
of democracy in that country. The full text of the handbook is available
at www.aip-bg.org/l_research.htm. The
International Centre for Policy Studies (Ukraine) recently published an
essay by Vira Nanivska, the Centre’s director, entitled “NGO
Development in Ukraine” and a background paper entitled “Achieving
Consensus on Reforms in Ukraine” for USAID Kiev. Both documents are
available at www.icps.kiev.ua/eng/academic_research.html. The
Caucasian Institute for Peace, Democracy, and Development (Georgia)
published the July-August issue of Army and Society in Georgia, a
bulletin of the Institute and its affiliated Center for Civil-Military
Relations and Security Studies. The full text of the bulletin, entitled
“Reform of the Georgian Defence Resources Management System,” is
available at www.cipdd.org/cipdd/index.htm. Rights
and Democracy (Canada), in cooperation with Amnesty International,
recently published “Investigating Women’s Rights Violations in Armed
Conflicts” by Agnès Callamard, the latest in the organization’s
series of human rights essays. Rights and Democracy also published a
report entitled “Human Rights and Statistics: Some Reflections on the
No-Man’s-Land between Concept and Indicator” by Nancy Thede as part
of its democratic development studies program. The document is available
at www.ichrdd.ca. Libert@s,
the new Rights and Democracy electronic newsletter, began publication in
September 2001. See www.ichrdd.ca/111/english/contentsEnglish.html for
the latest issue. The
October 2001 issue of the Journal of Democracy, copublished by the
International Forum for Democratic Studies (USA) and the Johns Hopkins
University Press, contains a symposium entitled “Ten Years After the
Soviet Breakup,” in which ten authors evaluate post-Soviet efforts at
democratization, the legacy of communism, and the critical obstacles to
future democratic success. Contributors include Zbigniew Brzezinski,
Charles Fairbanks, Lilia Shevtsova, Ghia Nodia, and Michael McFaul. The
October issue also includes articles on Hong Kong, Peru, the Asian
values debate, and an analysis of how Burma could democratize. For the
complete tables of contents of all Journal issues and a searchable
archive of past issues, please visit www.journalofdemocracy.org. 2.
Recent Events The Democracy Forum for East Asia organized a three-day
conference in Seoul in June 2001 entitled “Political Finance and
Democracy in East Asia: The Use and Abuse of Money in Campaigns and
Elections.” Participants included scholars, elected officials,
political party leaders, and representatives of several national
election commissions. A conference report and an edited collection of
papers presented at the conference are in preparation. For more
information, visit the Democracy Forum Web site at
www.ned.org/asia/index.html. The
Centre for Democratic Institutions (Australia), in collaboration with
the Commonwealth Secretariat’s Deepening Democracy Program, conducted
a workshop entitled “Accountability, Scrutiny, Oversight” in May
2001. The workshop’s background papers and report are available online
at www.cdi.anu.edu.au/research.html. Sir Anthony Siaguru, head of
Transparency International, Papua New Guinea, delivered the Centre’s
annual address, entitled “The Great Game: Politics of Democracy in
Papua New Guinea,” in Canberra in June 2001. See
www.cdi.anu.edu.au/index.html for the complete text. The
International Forum for Democratic Studies organized several colloquia
throughout the spring at its offices in Washington, D.C. Kayode
Soremekun, professor of international relations at Obafemi Awolowo
University in Nigeria (and, at the time, a visiting fellow at the
International Forum), delivered a lecture entitled “Democratization in
Kenya and Nigeria: The Washington Dimension” on March 1. Svante E.
Cornell, lecturer in peace and conflict research and East European
studies at Uppsala University in Sweden, discussed “Democracy and
Institution Building in the Caucasus” on March 20. Jacques Rupnik,
research director of the Center for International Studies and Research,
Foundation Nationale des Science Politiques, Paris, reported on
“Democratization in the Balkans: Past Failures, Future Prospects” on
April 5. And E. Gyimah-Boadi, executive director of the Ghana Center for
Democratic Development, described “Ghana’s Peaceful Transfer of
Power: Lessons for Africa’s Democrats” on April 9. On April 25 the
International Forum hosted a discussion entitled “Making Coalition
Government Work in Slovakia: Perspectives and Experiences,” featuring
František Šebej (Democratic Party) and Peter Weiss (Party of the
Democratic Left), both members of the Slovak parliament. Zora Bútorová,
a senior researcher at the Institute for Public Affairs in Bratislava
(and then a visiting fellow at the International Forum), delivered a
lecture entitled “Women in Slovakia: New Opportunities and Old
Problems” on May 1. And Liu Junning, researcher at the Institute of
Chinese Cultural Studies, Ministry of Culture, in Beijing, and Minxin
Pei, senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace,
discussed “The Prospects for Political Reform in China” on May 25. The
Ghana Center for Democratic Development (Ghana) organized a July 31
roundtable discussion entitled “Maintaining Internal Security in a
Constitutional Democracy” and an August 2 seminar entitled
“Conflict, Peace, and Reconciliation.” Two subsequent Center events
examined the Ghanian government’s national reconciliation exercise
(August 21) and democracy and conflict in Africa (August 22). And on
September 13 the Center sponsored the 2001 International Roundtable
Discussion on Crime and Security in the West Africa Subregion. The
Access to Information Programme organized several workshops in February
and March 2001 on the implementation of that country’s new Access to
Public Information Act. Representatives of local and regional
governments and other participants discussed how the new law would
promote greater civic awareness and help strengthen democracy in
Bulgaria. Brief summaries of the workshops are available at
www.aip-bg.org. 3.
News and Announcements The Network of Democracy Research Institutes is
pleased to announce the availability of a modest fund to support
professional exchange visits among network members. The fund will
provide partial financial support to allow individual researchers or
small teams from developing democracies to visit their counterparts at
other Network member institutes for brief working trips of (for example)
3-10 days duration. Typical expenses will include travel, housing, and
meals expenses or other costs directly related to these visits. Funds
may be requested for the following types of activities: •
travel to conduct research in another country, especially to use
research materials not available at home or to interview policy makers
and scholars in the country visited • travel to conduct or plan
collaborative research or to plan future conferences involving Network
members • exchange visits to observe firsthand the operations of
another member institute, with the goal of improving the managerial,
financial, research, and outreach practices of the visitor’s home
institute The
above list is not exhaustive. But since the purpose of this program is
to strengthen member institutes and the Network as a whole, all exchange
visits must involve at least two member institutes, and possibly more.
The visitor must come from a member institute in a developing democracy
but the host organization may be any other Network member. We expect
that both the visitor and the host institute will bear at least some of
the costs of the exchange visit wherever possible. Depending on the
available resources of the Network and the visitor and host
institutions, the Network might provide air tickets or other travel
costs while the visiting scholar provides for his or her own meals. The
host institute will be expected to provide suitable workspace (desk,
computer, Internet access, if possible) and to help secure (and perhaps
even provide) local housing. Individual circumstances will vary, and the
items above are merely examples. The
exchange visits program is brand new. There is no formal application
process. We encourage Network members to consult among themselves and,
when they have developed possible partnership ideas, to send a brief
letter of inquiry to Tom Skladony (skladony@ned.org). This letter need
not be more than two or three pages but should include a concise project
description, a timetable, and a budget. We anticipate that we will be
able to support four to six such professional visits in 2002 (or
possibly more, depending on the amounts requested). If successful, we
hope to continue and expand the program in future years. The
International Forum for Democratic Studies is pleased to announce the
establishment of the Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellows Program to enable
democracy activists, practitioners, scholars, and journalists from
around the world to deepen their understanding of and enhance their
ability to promote democracy. Reagan-Fascell Fellows are in residence at
the International Forum in Washington, D.C. The first cohort of
Reagan-Fascell Fellows arrived in Fall 2001. The
International Forum anticipates hosting 12-15 fellows per year for three
to ten months each. Each fellow will receive a monthly stipend for
living expenses plus health insurance and reimbursement for travel to
and from Washington, D.C. Applicants for Reagan-Fascell fellowships
choose between two tracks: a practitioner track (typically three to five
months) to improve strategies and techniques for building democracy and
to exchange information with counterparts in the United States; and a
research and writing track (typically five to ten months) to conduct
original research for publication. The
deadline for Fall 2002 fellowships is April 1, 2002. For more
information, contact Kristin Helz, International Forum for Democratic
Studies, National Endowment for Democracy, 1101 15th Street, NW,
Washington, DC 20005; Telephone: 202-293-0300; Fax: 202-293-0258;
E-mail: kristin@ned.org. The
Centre for Liberal Strategies (Bulgaria), in cooperation with the
Central European University, the New Europe College in Bucharest, and
Wissenschaftkolleg Berlin, recently launched a program entitled
“Agenda for Civil Society in Southeastern Europe (2000-2003)” or the
“Blue Bird Project.” The project’s goal is to create a policy
document by 2003 that will serve as the driving vision for the
development of the region over the next twenty years. The project will
address such issues as “How the Politics of Social Inclusion is
Possible in Southeastern Europe,” “How the Regional Economies Can Be
Integrated in the Global Economy,” “What is the Future of the Nation
States in SEE?” and “Is SEE Identity Possible?” For more
information, please visit www.cls-sofia.org. King
Prajadhipok’s Institute offers research support for graduate students
at the M.A. or Ph.D. level whose work considers such topics as
organizations that emerged following the adoption of the new Thai
constitution, the ethical society and the development of democracy, the
dispersion of authority, and conflict prevention through peaceful means.
Candidates must be graduate students in a Thai or foreign university who
are writing a thesis in Thai or English whose proposals have already
been approved by their universities. Proposals are due by November 15.
Please visit www.kpi.ac.th for more details. 4.
New Research on Democracy APSA
Annual Meeting Papers The full texts of all papers presented at the 2001
annual meeting of the American Political Science Association (APSA) in
San Francisco, including dozens of papers on democracy and
democratization, are available online at <http://pro.harvard.edu from
now until September 2002 (when they will be replaced by papers from the
2002 annual meeting). The Web site allows searches by subject, author,
and other fields. Users may also locate papers by browsing subject
headings such as political theory and comparative politics. Selected
Books Received by the Journal of Democracy Political
Theory Concepts and Theories of Modern Democracy. By Anthony H. Birch.
Routledge, 2001. Democracy:
A History of Ideas. By Boris Dewiel. University of Washington Press,
2000. Hard
Choices: Social Democracy in the 21st Century. By Christopher Pierson.
Polity, 2001. What
Does It Mean to Be Human?: A New Interpretation of Freedom in World
History. By Alan T. Wood. Peter Lang, 2001. Multiregional
or Global Issues After the Fall: 1989 and the Future of Freedom. Edited
by George Katsiaficas. Routledge, 2001. Beyond
Tocqueville: Civil Society and the Social Capital Debate in Comparative
Perspective. Edited by Bob Edwards, Michael W. Foley and Mario Diani.
University Press of New England, 2001. The
Democratic Experience and Political Violence. Edited by David C.
Rapoport and Leonard Weinberg. Frank Cass, 2001. Governance
in a Globalizing World. Edited by Joseph S. Nye and John D. Donahue.
Brookings Institution, 2000. Parties
without Partisans: Political Change in Advanced Industrial Democracies.
Edited by Russell J. Dalton and Martin P. Wattenberg. Oxford University
Press, 2000. Religion
and Democracy. Edited by David Marquand and Ronald L. Nettler.
Blackwell, 2000. Religion
and Mass Electoral Behaviour in Europe. Edited by David Broughton and
Hans-Martien ten Napel. Routledge, 2000. Rethinking
Democratic Accountability. By Robert D. Behn. Brookings Institution
Press, 2001. Africa
Communication and Democratic Reform in South Africa. By Robert B.
Horwitz. Cambridge University Press, 2001. Opposition
and Democracy in South Africa. Edited by Roger Southall. Frank Cass,
2001. Middle
East A Comparative Political Economy of Tunisia and Morocco: On the
Outside of Europe Looking In. By Gregory White. State University of New
York Press, 2001. Center
of the Storm: A Case Study of Human Rights Abuses in Hebron District.
Human Rights Watch, 2001. Post-Revolutionary
Politics in Iran: Religion, Society and Power. By David Menashri. Frank
Cass, 2001. State,
Power and Politics in the Making of the Modern Middle East. By Roger
Owen. Routledge, 2000. Asia
and the Pacific Elections and Democracy in Greater China. Edited by
Larry Diamond and Ramon H. Myers. Oxford University Press, 2001. From
Opposition to Power: Taiwan’s Democratic Progressive Party. By Shelley
Rigger. Lynne Rienner, 2001. State
and Nation in South Asia. By Swarna Rajagopalan. Lynne Rienner, 2001. Understanding
Korean Politics. Edited by Soong Hoom Kil and Chung-in Moon. State
University of New York Press, 2001. War
and Democracy: A Comparative Study of the Korean War and the
Peloponnesian War. Edited by David R. McCann and Barry S. Strauss. M.E.
Sharpe, 2001. Europe
Nations in Transit: Civil Society, Democracy and Markets in East Central
Europe and the Newly Independent States. By Adrian Karatnycky, Alexander
Motyl, and Charles Graybow. Freedom House, 1999. Creating
a Democratic Civil Society in Eastern Germany: The Case of the Citizen
Movements and Alliance 90. By Christiane Olivio. Palgrave, 2001. Latin
America Grassroots Expectations of Democracy and Economy: Argentina in
Comparative Perspective. By Nancy R. Powers. University of Pittsburgh
Press, 2001. Towards
Democratic Viability: The Bolivian Experience. Edited by John Crabtree
and Laurence Whitehead. Palgrave, 2001. When
the Hands Are Many: Community Organization and Social Change in Rural
Haiti. By Jennie M. Smith. Cornell University Press, 2001. The
United States and Mexico: Between Partnership and Conflict. By Jorge I.
Dominguez and Rafael Fernandez de Castro. Routledge, 2001. United
States and Canada America’s Choice 2000. Edited by William Crotty.
Westview, 2001. A
Companion to the United States Constitution and Its Amendments. By John
R. Vile. Praeger, 2001. Dry
Bones Rattling: Community Building to Revitalize American Democracy. By
Mark. R. Warren. Princeton University Press, 2001. Judicial
Power and the Charter: Canada and the Paradox of
Liberal-Constitutionalism. By Christopher P. Manfredi. Oxford University
Press, 2000. Presidential
Mandates: How Elections Shape the National Agenda. By Patricia
Heidotting Conley. University of Chicago Press, 2001. Representative
Americans: The Revolutionary Generation. By Norman K. Risjord. Rowman
and Littlefield, 2001. |