Consolidation & Civil Society Plan for Today

1. Consolidation & Civil SocietyPlan for Today • Summarizing Diamond’s tasks for consolidation. • Evaluating concept of consolidation. • Distinguishing among civil society definitions and their pros/ cons.

2. Necessary Developments to Promote Consolidation(Linz & Stepan, Diamond)

3. Tasks to Foster Consolidation(Diamond) • Democratic deepening. • Political institutionalization. • Regime performance.

4. Democratic Deepening • Making formal institutions more liberal, accountable, representative, accessible. • No illiberal, electoral democracies during third wave have achieved consolidation. • E.g. Russia, Venezuela: deconsolidation.

5. Political Institutionalization • Movement to routinized, predictable patterns of political behavior around common rules and procedures. • 3 types of institutions involved: • State apparatus. • Institutions of democratic representation and governance. • Structures that ensure rule of law.

6. Regime PerformanceEconomic Performance • Long record of economic performance can build “reservoir of legitimacy” to weather crises. • Cannot be widespread perception that few are benefiting disproportionately. • E.g. South Africa. • Economic hardship generally doesn’t topple democracies.

7. Regime PerformancePolitical Performance • People care about political goods as well as economic. • Order: physical safety, peace. • Prestige of country in international affairs (sometimes). • Political freedom, accountability, lack of corruption.

8. Is Consolidation an Appropriate Concept?

9. Problems with the concept of consolidation • How can consolidated democracies become deconsolidated?

10. Problems with the concept of consolidation • How do we know when threshold of consolidation is crossed? • How many people have to believe and how strongly?

11. Problems with the concept of consolidation • Teleological aspect. • Assumption that events are naturally meant to follow this path. • Mirroring modernization theory. • Unclear where definition of consolidation comes from.

12. Problems with the concept of consolidation • Persistence of stable unconsolidated regimes. • “Delegative democracies” (O’Donnell).

13. Problems with the concept of consolidation • Definition of institutionalization (O’Donnell). • “Institution”: “regularized pattern of interaction that is known, practiced, and accepted by actors…” (O’Donnell)

14. Problems with the concept of consolidation • Definition of institutionalization (O’Donnell). • Neglect of strong informal institutions. • E.g. Patron-client relations.

15. Problems with the concept of consolidation • Solution may be to develop typologies of democracy, without assuming stages to consolidation. • E.g. (Collier & Levitsky) • “Electoral” democracy. • “Delegative” democracy. • “Limited” democracy. • “De facto one-party” democracy.

16. Civil Society

17. Emblematic images of civil society in Democratization: • Prior to/ during transition: protests to push authoritarian regimes out of power. • Video of opposition protests in Belarus, March 2006 (Ukrainian TV footage) • Following transition: professionalized organizations with narrower specialization, sometimes seeing role in democracy. • Video on Maria Rikhvanova, Russian environmental activist.

18. Defining Civil Society

19. Defining Civil Society • Civil society as a collective noun: • NGOs • Political parties? (e.g. Fish def’n.) • Religious organizations? • State-funded organizations?

20. Defining Civil Society • Civil society as a space. • John Hall: Civil society a social space for human experimentation with identities. • Larry Diamond: “Realm of organized social life…”

21. Larry Diamond • Different from society in general – citizens acting collectively in public sphere. • Intermediary between private life and the state. • Publicly oriented rather than private ends.

22. Defining Civil Society • Civil society as values or norms. • Values that bind people together collectively to promote democratic attachment.

23. Robert Putnam • Values of trust, tolerance, mutual cooperation. • Not necessarily political advocacy organizations. • Building “social capital.”