Suchergebnisse

Based on conference paper. Elements in rural society likely to participate in "harembee," a self-help development movement.

In established electorates in developed countries, voting turnout has a familiar curvilinear relationship with age. In new electorates, however, lack of experience and supposed resistance to new behavior among middle-aged voters suggest that turnout might be greater among the young. In peasant societies, the start-up costs that reduce turnout among young adults might not apply because of immobility of the population and resulting familiarity with local politics. Data from an early election in rural Kenya and from rural Turkey show that the familiar relationship holds even in these circumstances. The results suggest that increased electoral experience and resistance to newly available behavior do little to shape turnout. Mobility of the young, even in peasant populations, and psychological factors associated with aging are more powerful elements.

Although the holding of founding and subsequent elections is essential for any transition from authoritarian to democratic rule, the comparative literature on electoral system design is limited on the experience of "Third Wave" democratizers. This is especially true with respect to the interactive effects between the choice of electoral system and the spatial, i.e., geographic, distribution of the vote—a critical factor that shapes electoral outcomes in all societies, but particularly in emerging democracies because many are plural and agrarian societies. Political elites in these countries have also rarely considered the impact of alternative electoral systems when selecting a system for their country. This article addresses these gaps in the literature and practice by presenting a computational model known as a spatial decision support system or SDSS that both explores these interactive effects and facilitates electoral design. The utility of the model is then demonstrated with data from Kenya and South Africa—two emerging democracies where issues posed by the spatial distribution of the vote have given rise to demands for redesigning or modifying the electoral system.

This report presents the "first findings" from the African Legislatures Project or ALP. The report is based on the preliminary coding and analysis of data obtained from research in six countries-Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia, Namibia and South Africa (MP survey findings from South Africa are not presented as that element of the project is still in progress). Because the purpose of ALP is to achieve a comparative understanding of legislative institutions across Africa, and is funded from multiple sources, we have adopted the practice of including data from as many countries as possible when we present findings from the project. Field research for ALP began in late February 2008 and is expected to continue through the end of 2010 as the work proceeds seriatim in 18 African countries.

At a time when most African countries are characterised as 'strong societies and weak states',1the tendency to afford the state 'ontological primacy' in explaining the nature of African political economy is being challenged. One manifestation of this has been a shift in scholarly attention to those intermediary and autonomous organisations which function and sometimes flourish in the space that exists between the state and the household – namely, the various groups which comprise 'civil society'.2

"August, 1975." ; "Prepared for a Conference on Legislatures and Development in Carmel, California, August 11-15, 1975"--T.p. verso. ; Includes bibliographical references. ; Mode of access: Internet.