Suchergebnisse

The purpose of this article is to address the issues of validity and reliability in existing additive indices measuring the strength of executives. Many data efforts, such as Frye et al. (2000) as well as Armingeon and Careja (2007), propose indices of presidential power based on a simple accumulation of a set of individual constitutional prerogatives allotted to the head of state according to the design proposed by Shugart and Carey (1992). These indices usually gather and count the powers of presidents on package and partial vetoes, decrees, budgetary powers, referenda provisions, initiation of legislation, cabinet formation, cabinet dismissal, censure, and the dissolution of assemblies. Despite the general acceptance of such measures of presidential power and their widespread use, empirical investigations to ascertain the degree to which existing indices measure a single latent construct, and are valid and reliable, were never conducted. In this article, I refute the assumptions of unimodality and unidimensionality underlying these indices, and challenge their usefulness in allowing researchers to differentiate between presidential, semi-presidential, and parliamentary institutional arrangements. [Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications Ltd., copyright, the International Political Science Association.]

The purpose of this article is to address the issues of validity and reliability in existing additive indices measuring the strength of executives. Many data efforts, such as Frye et al. (2000) as well as Armingeon and Careja (2007), propose indices of presidential power based on a simple accumulation of a set of individual constitutional prerogatives allotted to the head of state according to the design proposed by Shugart and Carey (1992). These indices usually gather and count the powers of presidents on package and partial vetoes, decrees, budgetary powers, referenda provisions, initiation of legislation, cabinet formation, cabinet dismissal, censure, and the dissolution of assemblies. Despite the general acceptance of such measures of presidential power and their widespread use, empirical investigations to ascertain the degree to which existing indices measure a single latent construct, and are valid and reliable, were never conducted. In this article, I refute the assumptions of unimodality and unidimensionality underlying these indices, and challenge their usefulness in allowing researchers to differentiate between presidential, semi-presidential, and parliamentary institutional arrangements.

Although postcommunist countries share a common past, the variability of outcomes in both democracy and economic reform is very large in the region. Only a few countries have become Western-type democracies in Central and Eastern Europe and the Baltic. By contrast, the norm is clearly not democracy for other Soviet successor states. In this article, the author attributes this variation to differences in the infrastructural capacity of the state. Using both quantitative and qualitative analyses within 26 postcommunist countries, the author argues that for democracy to flourish, the state must first possess the necessary means to maintain law and order and to protect the rights of citizens, in other words, to ensure the maintenance and delivery of essential public goods. The results show that the links between a strong state that has been able to apply a definitive set of rules and democratic institutions are clear. (author's abstract)

Although postcommunist countries share a common past, the variability of outcomes in both democracy and economic reform is very large in the region. Only a few countries have become Western-type democracies in Central and Eastern Europe and the Baltic. By contrast, the norm is clearly not democracy for other Soviet successor states. In this article, the author attributes this variation to differences in the infrastructural capacity of the state. Using both quantitative and qualitative analyses within 26 postcommunist countries, the author argues that for democracy to flourish, the state must first possess the necessary means to maintain law and order and to protect the rights of citizens, in other words, to ensure the maintenance and delivery of essential public goods. The results show that the links between a strong state that has been able to apply a definitive set of rules and democratic institutions are clear.

AbstractIn an attempt to bring together the research on state capacity, this article proposes a five‐item index to operationalise and measure the concept of state capacity. The index was constructed for 26 post‐communist countries on a yearly basis from their first year of independence from communist rule to 2006. Different states unavoidably display dissimilar levels of aptitude in the different domains of state capacity, but the aggregated index of state capacity presented is high in both validity and reliability. With the help of this index, the starting conditions as well as the evolution of state capacity within the countries included in this study are explored, with three conclusions. First, post‐communist countries emerged displaying very contrasting levels of state capacity. Second, the level of state capacity has remained relatively stable within most countries between 1989–1991 and 2006, which ties in the last conclusion that the initial level of state capacity is the strongest determinant of subsequent levels of state capacity. All three conclusions carry important implications for research using state capacity either as an independent or as a dependent variable.