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Network of Democracy Research Institutes
-Democracy Research News-No. 8, March-April 2005Welcome to Democracy Research News, the quarterly newsletter of the Network of Democracy Research Institutes (NDRI). The Network is a membership association of institutions that conduct and publish research on democracy and democratic development. It is also one of several functional networks associated with the World Movement for Democracy (www.wmd.org). This newsletter is one means of informing democracy scholars and others worldwide about the activities of and publications produced by NDRI member institutes. The newsletter will continue to evolve as the Network grows, and we invite readers' comments and suggestions of useful features they would like to see in future issues. Additional information about the Network and profiles of all member institutes are available at www.wmd.org/ndri/ndri.html. To submit comments or to inquire about joining the Network, please write to Thomas Skladony (). Subscribing to Democracy Research News Democracy Research News is distributed exclusively by e-mail. Subscriptions are available free of charge by writing to ndri@ned.org. We encourage readers to forward this newsletter to colleagues who may wish to subscribe. If you do not wish to receive Democracy Research News, send the message "unsubscribe" to ndri@ned.org and we will remove your name promptly. Contents 1. News and Announcements 2. New Publications and Recent Events by NDRI Members 2.1 Africa 2.2 Asia and the Pacific 2.3 Europe 2.4 Latin America and the Caribbean 2.5 Middle East 2.6 Russia and the Former Soviet Union 2.7 United States and Canada 1. NEWS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS The Institute for Democracy in South Africa (Idasa, South Africa, www.idasa.org.za) is one of eight civil-society organizations from around the world that have founded the Global Transparency Initiative (GTI), a collaborative project to strengthen public oversight of international financial institutions such as the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, World Trade Organization, and regional multilateral development banks. Idasa, which serves as the secretariat of the GTI, invites applications for its program of small grants to individuals and organizations working on transparency in the international financial sector. For more information visit www.idasa.org.za/programme_details.asp?RID=6. The East Asia Institute (ESI, South Korea, www.eai.org.kr) invites applications for the inaugural year of its Fellows Program on Peace, Governance, and Development in East Asia. The program, open to U.S.-based scholars in political science, international relations, and sociology, seeks to promote interdisciplinary, comparative research on East Asia. Fellows are expected to spend a minimum of three weeks in East Asia, during which they will prepare and present an original paper. For more information and an application form visit www.eai.or.kr/eng/program/fellows.html. The deadline for applications is May 31, 2005. The Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law, (CDDRL, U.S., http://cddrl.stanford.edu) invites applications for its Summer Fellows on Democracy and Development program. The program, which will run from August 1-19, 2005, is designed for policy makers and activists from countries undergoing political, economic, and social transitions. The Center anticipates recruiting 25-30 individuals, particularly from the Middle East, Northern and Sub-Saharan Africa, Afghanistan, Central Asia, and other parts of the former Soviet Union. Applications from other parts of the world are also welcome. CDDRL will pay the travel, accommodation, living expenses, and visa costs of the three-week program for a certain portion of applicants. Where possible, applicants are encouraged to cover some or all of their own expenses. Contact Ganka Hadjipetrova (Ganka@stanford.edu) or visit http://cddrl.stanford.edu/summerfellows/ for more information. The deadline for applications is April 1, 2005. In September 2004 the Center for Policy Studies (CPS, Hungary, www.ceu.hu/cps) launched its Master's Program in Public Policy. The program offers students an interdisciplinary grounding in public-policy analysis and opportunities to apply contemporary theories of public policy to real-world problems, especially those confronting postsocialist countries and other emerging democracies. For more information about the courses and application procedures visit www.ceu.hu/cps/mpp. The Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy (CSID, United States, www.islam-democracy.org) will hold its sixth annual conference on April 22-23 in Washington, D.C. This year's topic will be "Democracy and Development: Challenges for the Islamic World." Participants will examine the barriers to development, identify factors needed to ensure proper economic and political development, and focus on the interrelatedness of democracy and development in the Islamic world. For more information, contact Layla Sein at sein@islam-democracy.org or telephone +1-202-942-2185. A conference announcement is also available on CSID's Web site. Rights & Democracy (International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development, Canada, www.ichrdd.ca) invites nominations for the 2005 John Humphrey Freedom Award, presented each year to a person or organization that has made an outstanding contribution to the promotion of human rights and democratic development. The award consists of a grant of $25,000, as well as a speaking tour of Canadian cities to help increase awareness of the recipient's human-rights work. The deadline for nominations is April 15, 2005. Please contact Anyle Coté (acote@dd-rd.ca) or visit www.dd-rd.ca for more information. NDRI Welcomes Four New Members: We are pleased to welcome the following new members of the research network (whose activities are reported in the appropriate geographic sections of this newsletter):
2.1 AFRICA The latest Working Paper from the Afrobarometer (www.afrobarometer.org) is entitled "Democrats with Adjectives: Linking Direct and Indirect Measures of Democratic Support." In the 34-page study, Andreas Schedler and Rodolfo Sarsfield developed a new way to measure citizens' preferences for different types of regimes by linking direct but abstract questions about democratic support "with more indirect but concrete questions on essential components of liberal democracy." This technique, the authors asserted, allowed them to differentiate among persons "who are supportive of democracy in the abstract, while hostile to some of the essential principles or institutions of liberal democracy." The full text is available at www.afrobarometer.org/AfropaperNo45.pdf. The Ghana Center for Democratic Development (CDD, www.cdd-ghana.org) has greatly expanded the availability of publications on its Web site. The Center now provides full-text access to Democracy Watch, its quarterly newsletter, as well as to its Briefing Papers, Research Papers, and Election Observation Reports. CDD published ten Election Monitoring Reports in the runup to Ghana's December 2004 national elections. Among these was a study of the "Abuse of Incumbency and State Administrative Resources in Election 2004" that attempted to distinguish between credibile and noncredibile charges of electoral abuse and to showcase grey areas in Ghanian electoral laws. A full listing of CDD publications is available at www.cddghana.org/publications_shelf.asp?cid=3. Also in anticipation of those same elections, the Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD, Nigeria, www.cdd.org.uk) provided online access to "Democracy, Security, and Poverty in Ghana: A Mid-Term Review of the Kufuor Administration," an article by Kayode Fayemi, CDD's director; Thomas Jaye; and Zaya Yeebo that was originally published in CDD's Democracy & Development: The Journal of West African Affairs in 2003. The full text is available at www.cdd.org.uk/pdf/ghana.pdf. The Centre for Policy Studies (CPS, South Africa, www.cps.org.za), the Institute for Democracy in South Africa (Idasa, www.idasa.org.za), and the Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy published Southern Africa Post-Apartheid? The Search for Democratic Governance (2004). The 221-page book was edited by Chris Landsberg, director of CPS, and Shaun Mackay, manager of that same institution. Its contributors included leading African and European scholars, who wrote on democratic consolidation, political parties, women's rights, the evolution of liberation movements into ruling parties, state capacity, and economic development. The complete book is available at www.nimd.org/upload/publications/2004/quest_for_democratic_governance.pdf. The Institute for Democracy in South Africa (Idasa, www.idasa.org.za) organized seven roundtables in the summer of 2004 examining the progress made in the first ten years of democracy in that country. Among the issues addressed were citizen capacity, local government, parliament, budget transparency, education, and land reform. South Africa's Mail and Guardian newspaper published shortened versions of the roundtable presentations in November 2004 as a feature entitled "Lessons from the Field: A Decade of Democracy." To obtain full versions of the papers, write to Telele Mathinjwa at telele@idasa.org.za. On October 25-27, 2004 Idasa sponsored a conference on "Democratisation and Sustainable Policing in the Democratic Republic of Congo." The event was designed to facilitate the exchange of lessons learned by South African police and electoral officials with their DRC counterparts, and to improve the safety and fairness of the DRC elections scheduled for later in 2005. A 37-page conference report is available at www.idasa.org.za/gbOutputFiles.asp?WriteContent=Y&RID=1116. Idasa's Governance and AIDS Programme recently produced a number of important new studies of the effects of the epidemic on democratic governance in South Africa. These include the books HIV/AIDS: Illustrating the Impact on Electoral Processes (published in February 2005) and HIV/AIDS and Democratic Governance in South Africa (January 2005), plus a research report entitled "The Impact of HIV and AIDS on Electoral Processes." For a copy of this report, write to Marietjie Myburg (marietjie@idaa.org.za) or Shaila Gupta (shaila@idasa.org.za). In partnership with the Southern African Development Community Parliamentary Forum, the Governance and AIDS Programme also organized the third in a series of Regional Policy Dialogue Forums in October 2004. The meeting, entitled "National AIDS Councils and Parliaments: Oversight and Accountability," generated a conference report that was released in December 2004. 2.2 ASIA AND THE PACIFIC In October 2005 the Centre for Democratic Institutions (CDI, Australia, www.cdi.anu.edu.au) hosted seven representatives of Indonesia's major political parties during a ten-day working visit to Australia. The visit was the inaugural event of a CDI project to strengthen linkages between Australian and Indonesian parties. Participants attended a state council of Australia's Liberal Party in New South Wales, then met with senior federal representatives of that and other Australian parties in Canberra. Discussions focused on building and maintaining party structures, candidate recruitment, party discipline, internal party democracy, and political-party finance. Visit www.cdi.anu.edu.au/indonesia/Indonesia_Pol_Par_Study_Prog_Oct05.htm for a brief report on the mission. The Centre also organized its seventh annual Pacific Parliamentary Forum in December 2005 in the Fiji Islands, where participants from twelve Pacific countries, including many young and emerging leaders, discussed the "Foundations of Public Leadership." For more information on this and previous events in this series, visit www.cdi.anu.edu.au/asia_pacific_region/asia_pacific_region_7thPPF_Dec05.htm. The November 2005 issue of CDI News, the Centre's bimonthly electronic newsletter, reported on these and other CDI projects and provided a brief listing of new research on democracy available through the Internet. The newsletter is available at www.cdi.anu.edu.au/cdinews/cdinews.htm. The Centre for Policy Research (CPR, India www.cprindia.org/) published a report on its August 2005 symposium on "Restoring Peace and Democracy to Nepal: The Challenges Ahead." Conference participants, who included members of the media, political parties, and representatives of civil society and academia, discussed the likely future of Nepali politics and the role of the international community in restoring democracy in that country. The conference report is available at www.cprindia.org/admin/paper/NEPAL%20Conference%20Report%20(August%2012,%202005).pdf. Christine Loh, chief executive officer of Civic Exchange (Hong Kong, www.civic-exchange.org), wrote "Political Evolution: The Rise of Donald Tsang," a 20-page overview of the campaign promises, policy agenda, and political strategies of the new chief executive of Hong Kong. The complete text is available at www.civic-exchange.org/publications/2005/tsang.pdf. Civic Exchange published "Hong Kong Constitutional Reform: What Do the People Want?" (December 2005), a 73-page study conducted by the Hong Kong Transition Project that provides a wealth of survey data and analysis on attitudes toward democracy and reform in Hong Kong. For the complete text, visit www.civic-exchange.org/publications/2005/crdec05-E.pdf. Other recent Civic Exchange publications include "The Executive Council: Role, Responsibilities, and Scope for Reform" (www.civic-exchange.org/publications/2005/excoreform-e.pdf), "Taxation and Democracy in Hong Kong" by Richard Cullen and Tor Krever (www.civic-exchange.org/publications/2005/taxdemo-E.pdf), and a response by Civic Exchange to the most recent report of Hong Kong's Constitutional Development Task Force (www.civic-exchange.org/publications/2005/5TF-E.pdf). The Centre for Policy Alternatives (CPA, Sri Lanka, www.cpalanka.org) sponsored a series of four workshops on "The Future of Democracy and Good Governance in Sri Lanka" in September and October 2005. For more information write to Dr. Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu, executive director of CPA, at sara@cpalanka.org. 2.3 EUROPE The Access to Information Program (AIP, Bulgaria, www.aip-bg.org) organized its third annual commemoration of International Right to Know Day on September 28, 2005. The AIP ceremony, held at the National Palace of Culture in Sofia, featured the presentation of both positive and negative awards in seven categories to individuals and organizations that had helped or hindered free access to information in Bulgaria in the preceding year. Visit www.righttoknowday.net/ceremony_eng_05.htm for a listing of award recipients and for additional information about the event. AIP also cosponsored the International Freedom of Information Litigation Conference, which met November 25-26, 2005, in Sofia. Participants discussed lessons learned in recent litigation, the impact of freedom of information laws on national security, government contracting, and personal privacy; and opportunities for international cooperation in advancing national freedom of information regimes. For more information visit www.aip-bg.org/documents/confe2005/agenda_2005.pdf. Ivan Krastev, program director of the Centre for Liberal Strategies (CLS, Bulgaria, www.cls-sofia.org), participated in a November 2005 panel discussion entitled "Does Anti-Americanism Matter to American Foreign Policy?" The meeting was held at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, D.C., whose summary of the discussion is available at www.carnegieendowment.org/events/index.cfm?fa=eventDetail&id=826&&prog=zgp&proj=zdrl. Mr. Krastev also discussed "Enlargement of the Empire: EU and the Balkans" at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C., on November 9, 2005. Mr. Krastev and other speakers expressed concern that enlargement of the European Union has drawn foreign investment away from Bosnia and Serbia to the benefit of EU candidate states Romania and Bulgaria. A summary of the event is available at www.wilsoncenter.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=events.event_summary&event_id=149897. The Institute for Regional and International Studies (IRIS, Bulgaria, www.iris-bg.org) organized a November 17, 2005, discussion in Sofia on "The French 'Intifada:' Crisis of National Democracy and Perspectives on the Multicultural Model in Europe," featuring presentations by Ognian Minchev, executive director of IRIS, and other senior researchers from the Institute. Mr. Minchev participated in a November 2005 conference in Vienna entitled "The Black Sea Region: Setting a Safe Course on Democracy and Development." The meeting was organized by the Tblisi-based South Caucasus Institute of Regional Security. In December 2005 he also participated in a conference in Brussels organized by the German Marshall Fund of the United States on "Developing a Western Strategy Towards the Wider Black Sea Region." Four papers on the Black Sea region by IRIS scholars (including a study of democratic developments in Moldova by Diana Draganova) are available at www.iris-bg.org/events.html#pub31. The Centre for the Study of Democracy and Culture (CDK, Czech Republic, www.cdkbrno.cz) published Víceúrovnové vládnutí: teorie, prístupy, metody (Multilevel Governance: Theories, Approaches, and Methods), edited by Petr Fiala and Maxmilián Strmiska. The Czech-language anthology of essays focuses on how European Union enlargement affects politics in individual member states and alters the behavior of individuals, interest groups, and political parties. Visit www.cdkbrno.cz/knihy/194/viceurovnove-vladnuti-teorie-pristupy-metody/ for more information on the book. The January 2006 issue of Revue Politika, the Centre's monthly journal, includes several articles on Czech and EU politics, a report on privatization and capitalism in the Czech Republic, and a European view of the policies of the Bush administration. Visit www.cdkbrno.cz/rp/2006/1/ for complete contents information and selected full-text articles. The Centre continued work on its project on "Democratic Institution Building Process: Lessons from the Czech Republic" throughout the past year. Launched in 2004, the project seeks to inform Iraqi political and intellectual leaders about the successes and failures of democratization in the Czech Republic, and also to inform the Czech public about Iraq's transition from dictatorial rule. Two cohorts of Iraqis (most recently, in September 2005) visited Prague and Brno for meetings and discussions with elected officials, political-party leaders, university faculty, journalists, and representatives of civil society. In the fall of 2005 CDK published in Arabic a 350-page volume of essays entitled Transition to Democracy: Czech Experiences. The collection was designed for use as a textbook for promoting democracy in Iraq, and was distributed to state institutions, political parties, and civic organizations throughout the country. The Bertelsmann Transformation Index (BTI, Germany, www.bertelsmann-transformation-index.de/16.0.html?&L=1), the NDRI's newest member, organized a major international conference entitled "Political Management of Transition: Enhancing Governance Capacity" on October 5-7, 2005, in Berlin. More than 100 scholars, political leaders, and elected officials from Europe, Russia, Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and North and South America participated in plenary and breakout sessions on political management, measuring democratic and economic progress, and societal reform in the Arab world. The conference also marked the release of the Bertelsmann Transformation Index 2006, a biennial study of the state of political and economic transformation in 119 countries worldwide. The BTI 2006 includes numerical indices of democratic and market reforms, as well as in-depth evaluations of the management of the transformation process. The project includes a book (published in German and English), charts and tables ranking countries hierarchically, and thousands of pages of country reports and analysis (available online only). BTI scholars are also developing the Bertelsmann Transformation Atlas, an Internet-based interactive application that will allow users to compare countries according to political and economic criteria, and to see graphical visualizations of the results. Visit www.bertelsmann-transformation-index.de/16.0.html?&L=1 for an overview of the Bertelsmann Transformation Index 2006 and for instructions on its use. Numerous links from there take users directly to countries and regions of interest. The Fall 2005 issue of the Turkish Policy Quarterly (www.turkishpolicy.com/), published with the support and collaboration of the European Stability Initiative (ESI, Germany, www.esiweb.org), includes articles on the future of Turkish-U.S. relations, the expectations of Turkish Cypriots' from the European Union, Turkish foreign policy toward Israel, and a set of articles on the Armenian tragedy. To access complete texts visit www.turkishpolicy.com/default.asp?show=winter_2005. In December 2005 ESI published "Moment of Truth: Macedonia, the EU Budget, and the Destabilization of the Balkans," which argued against recent policy decisions by the French and British governments that, in the author's opinion, would "throw the entire European strategy in the Balkans into confusion." For the complete text visit http://www.esiweb.org/docs/showdocument.php?document_ID=73. The Institute of Public Affairs (ISP, Poland, www.isp.org.pl) organized an October 2005 seminar on how new member states of the European Union try to reconcile EU migration and border policies with their need to maintain good relations with non-EU neighbors to the east. The event also marked the publication by IPA of The Visegrad States between Schengen and Neighbourhood, a volume of essays edited by Piotr Kazmierkiewicz with a special focus on immigration from Ukraine and Moldova to Poland and other EU countries. For a summary and policy recommendations, visit www.isp.org.pl/files/20879431400488261001129641818.pdf. Visit www.isp.org.pl/?v=bookstore&ln=eng&action=book&id=7216&ln=eng for purchasing information. Krystyna Iglicka, Piotr Kazmierkiewicz, and Agnieszka Weinar published a 28-page case study of Poland's immigration policies for a project entitled "Current Immigration Debates in Europe," a collaborative effort of IPA, the Migration Policy Group, and the Center for International Relations that includes sixteen individual country reports. Visit www.isp.org.pl/files/16515571810750568001128350376.pdf for the complete text. IPA also organized a December 2005 conference on "European Perspectives on Turkey and the Ukraine," whose participants included Agnes Batory from the Center for Policy Studies, an NDRI member in Hungary. For an agenda and two conference presentations visit www.isp.org.pl/?v=page&id=279&ln=eng. The Institute of Political Studies (Instituto de Estudos Politicos, IEP, Portugal, (www.ucp.pt/site/custom/template/ucptplfachome.asp?sspageid=1750&lang=1), hosted a February 10, 2006, lecture by Noel Malcolm of All Souls College, University of Oxford, entitled "Hobbes and the Contemporary World Order," as part of its British Council Distinguished Guest Professor lecture series. The January-March 2006 issue of Nova Cidadania (New Citizenship), IEP's quarterly journal, features an analysis of the political ideas of Portugal's presidential candidates; an interview with Jung Chang, coauthor of Mao: The Untold Story; and an essay by Kay Hymowitz of the Manhattan Institute on cultural and academic trends in American universities. Alina Mungiu-Pippidi, president of the Romanian Academic Society (SAR, www.sar.org.ro), contributed the introductory essay to A Quest for Political Integrity (Polirom, 2005), a documentary account of the 2004 campaign organized by the Romanian Coalition for a Clean Parliament, in which SAR played a major role. The Coalition, an umbrella association of leading civil-society groups, developed formal criteria by which to judge the fitness of parliamentary candidates for office, collected and disseminated information about candidates, and eventually published a blacklist of 202 candidates declared to be unfit (of whom 98 withdrew their candidacies or lost their respective elections). The complete 120-page monograph is available at www.sar.org.ro/Romanian%20Coalition_for%20a%20Clean%20Parliament.pdf. SAR also published the Spring/Summer 2005 issue of the Romanian Journal of Political Science, whose special theme was "From Democratization to Normal Politics." It featured a lead article by Ms. Pippidi entitled "Democratization without Decommunization: The Balkans' Unfinished Revolutions," plus additional studies of political parties and voting behavior in Eastern Europe, and of democratization in Romania, 1989-2000. Visit www.sar.org.ro/pages/publications_rjps.php for contents and article abstracts. The Center for Liberal-Democratic Studies (CLDS, Serbia and Montenegro, www.clds.org.yu) organized a major conference entitled "Four Years of Transition in Serbia," held October 5, 2005, in Belgrade. Keynote speakers included Boris Tadic, president of Serbia; Miroljub Labus, deputy prime minister; Zoran Zivkovic, former prime minister; and other senior political and academic figures. The event marked the publication by CLDS of Four Years of Transition in Serbia, a study of that country's economic and political development in the post-Milosevic era. CLDS scholars Boris Begovic and Bosko Mijatovic edited the 471-page book, whose complete text is available at www.clds.org.yu/html/e0.html. The Center for Democracy and Human Rights (CEDEM, Serbia and Montenegro, www.cedem.cg.yu) and the Center for Regionalism (based in Novi Sad) cosponsored a January 2006 roundtable entitled "Montenegro and Serbia on the Eve and after the Referendum." Scholars, political leaders, and representatives of international organizations discussed the likely outcome and implications of the referendum on independence that will take place in Montenegro in April 2006. The October-December 2005 issue of CEDEM's newsletter (available at www.cedem.cg.yu/nletter/images/no15_eng.pdf) included a lead article on EU enlargement in the Balkans, plus the results of a December 2005 CEDEM poll on political party preferences and attitudes toward EU membership among Montenegran respondents. The Institute for Public Affairs (IVO, Slovakia, www.ivo.sk) published Slovakia's Euro-Atlantic Integration: A Year After in November 2005. The 91-page monograph was edited by Marek Stastný, Martin Bútora, and Olga Gyárfásová. Visit www.ivo.sk/info_p.php?nr=80-88935-81-41 for purchasing information. IVO researchers Olga Gyárfásová and Zora Bútorová prepared a report entitled "Slovakia on the Threshold of an Election Year" that summarized a November 2005 IVO opinion survey in which respondents compared their current personal financial situation with that of the year before, evaluated social developments since 2002 (the year of the most recent Slovak elections), and identified the main problems facing the country. The Slovak text is available at www.ivo.sk/vyskum_slovensko2005.pdf. On November 15, 2005, IVO and Philip Morris Slovakia cosponsored a workshop entitled "Violence against Women as a Problem of Public Policy." Approximately 150 participants representing government ministries, local elected leaders, women's rights organizations, and scholars discussed government policy on domestic violence, the effectiveness of public and private campaigns to reduce violence, and lessons learned from such efforts in neighboring Austria and the Czech Republic. Zora Bútorová's summary of the workshop is available (in Slovak) at www.ivo.sk/workshop_nasilie.htm. The Democratisation and Rule of Law Program of FRIDE (La Fundación para las Relaciones Internacionales y el Diálogo Exterior, Spain, www.fride.org) and Freedom House cosponsored a November 7-8, 2005, conference in Brussels entitled "Common Goals, Different Strategies? Options for a Transatlantic Agenda on Cuba." Participants debated the advantages and disadvantages of differing U.S. and European approaches to promoting democratization and liberalization in Cuba. For the conference agenda visit www.fride.org/eng/Activities/Activity.aspx?Id=929. In October 2005 the Program published its "Dossier Colombia," a collection of six essays on the political process, human rights, and the rule of law in that country. The full texts are available at www.fride.org/eng/Publications/publication.aspx?item=912. Manuel Alcántara of the University of Salamanca was the featured speaker at a November 2005 FRIDE forum on "The New Electoral Cycle and the State of Democracy in Latin America." Richard Youngs, codirector of the Program, and Haizam Amirah Fernández edited The Euro-Mediterranean Partnership: Assessing the First Decade, a 164-page volume of essays on the achievements and shortcomings of the EMP during the past ten years. The book was published jointly by FRIDE and the Real Instituto Elcano de Estudios Internacionales y Estratégicos, also based in Madrid. The complete text is available at www.fride.org/eng/Publications/publication.aspx?item=832. The UK Democratic Audit, a research project of the Human Rights Centre at the University of Essex (United Kingdom, www.democraticaudit.com), published "Parliamentary Approval for Making War," a brief paper by Andrew Blick, Paul Hunt, and Stuart Weir recommending greater parliamentary control over the government's war-making power in the United Kingdom. For the full text visit www.democraticaudit.com/download/breaking-news/DA-Paper-17.pdf. The Democratic Audit continues research on counterterrorism laws and policies in Britain, and their impact on democracy and human rights. Andrew Blick and Stuart Weir recently completed a brief study entitled "The Rules of the Game: The Terrorism Bill of 2005" (www.democraticaudit.com/download/breaking-news/Rules-of-the-Game-leaflet.pdf), and will release a longer report on this topic later in the spring. Stuart Weir, director of the Democratic Audit, was one of a team of authors who prepared "The Far Right in London: A Challenge for Local Democracy" (available at www.jrrt.org.uk/Far_Right_REPORT.pdf), a case study of trends in popular support for the British National Party in a changing neighborhood in East London. 2.4 LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN Pedro Isern, director of the economics and rule of law program at the Center for Opening and Development in Latin America (CADAL, Argentina, www.cadal.org/default.asp), published "1990-2010: Tres Etapas del Consenso en Chile en el Camino al Bicentenario" (1990-2010: Three Stages of Chilean Consensus Toward the Bicentenary), a report on the development and consolidation of democratic political institutions in Chile. The complete Spanish text, published in December 2005, is available at www.cadal.org/documentos/documento_45.pdf. CADAL also published "Freedom of the Press and Economic Development in Latin America 2005," a brief report by Hernan Alberro that updated earlier CADAL studies of the complex relationship among economic development, democratic consolidation, and freedom of the press. Visit www.cadal.org/informes/pdf/20051103_Hernan_Alberro.pdf for the complete Spanish text. In cooperation with the political science department of the University of Belgrano and the Friedrich von Hayek Foundation, CADAL organized a November 2005 seminar examining the East European transitions to democracy and their implications for Latin America. Diplomats from the Czech Republic, Poland, Romania, and Slovakia participated in the discussions with numerous Argentine scholars, political leaders, and journalists. The event also marked the release of Transitions: The Eastern Europe Experience, a major study of post-1989 Europe by Fredo Arias King. Visit www.cadal.org/libros/pdf/Transiciones.pdf for the complete Spanish text of this 464-page book. An English-language listing of its contents is available at www.cadal.org/english/nota.asp?id_nota=1047. The State of the Nation Program (Programa Estado de la Nacion, Costa Rica, www.estadonacion.or.cr) published the eleventh in its series of annual reports on Costa Rican human development. This year's study focused on equality and social integration, economic opportunities and stability, the environment, and the state of democracy. The authors conclude that Costa Rica is in danger of political and economic backsliding caused by a decline in foreign investment and annual income, as well as corruption scandals involving three former presidents. For the complete Spanish text visit www.estadonacion.or.cr/Info2005/Paginas/indice.html. State of the Nation also published "La Auditoría Ciudadana Sobre la Calidad de la Democracia" (Citizenship Audit on the Quality of Democracy), which drew on survey research to measure citizen's attitudes toward and support for democracy in Costa Rica. Visit www.estadonacion.or.cr/Calidad02/calidad.html for the complete Spanish text. Two additional reports on human development in Central America and Panama are available in Spanish at www.estadonacion.or.cr/Region2003/Paginas/indice.html. The Latinobarómetro (www.latinobarometro.org) released its Latinobarómetro Survey 2005 in Santiago, Chile, on October 28, 2005. The report summarized the findings of field surveys in eighteen Latin American countries on such topics as democracy, the rule of law, civic culture, and the performance of political leaders, and also included selected data from previous surveys dating back to 1995. The 82-page report is available in Spanish at www.latinobarometro.org/uploads/media/2005.pdf. Previous Latinobarómetro reports are also available at www.latinobarometro.org/index.php?id=101. FUNDAR (Center for Analysis and Research, Mexico, www.fundar.org.mx), published the Latin American Index of Budget Transparency 2005 in October 2005. Research centers and nongovernmental organizations in eight countries (Argentina, Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, Nicaragua, and Peru), including the NDRI-member State of the Nation Program in Costa Rica, designed and conducted surveys of the budgeting process among legislators, journalists, academics, and others experts as respondents; coded results; and issued reform recommendations based on their findings. "Most of the countries have unsatisfactory levels of transparency in public budgeting," the report notes. The complete 82-page report is available at www.fundar.org.mx/indice2005/docs/Regional%20Transparency%20Report%202005.pdf. FUNDAR researchers Juan Cepeda, David Dávila, and Jorge Romero published a report entitled "How to Strengthen the Participation of the Chamber of Deputies in Public Expenditure," part of a FUNDAR essay series on citizen monitoring of the Mexican Congress. Visit www.fundar.org.mx/secciones/publicaciones/PDF/gastopublico.pdf for the 17-page Spanish text. 2.5 MIDDLE EAST The Ibn Khaldun Center for Development Studies (ICDS, Egypt, www.eicds.org) organized and directed a coalition of sixteen Egyptian nongovernmental organizations that monitored the 2005 presidential and parliamentary elections in that country. The Independent Committee for Election Monitoring, part of the Egyptian Democracy Support Network, has issued a series of preliminary reports documenting incidents of voter intimidation and disenfranchisement, electoral fraud, and violence. These are all available at www.eicds.org, and a final report on these events is in preparation. The December 2005/January 2006 issue of Civil Society, the Center's magazine (www.eicds.org/english/publications/civilsociety/06/january/Jan06_engl.pdf), also includes several reports on the Egyptian elections, plus additional articles on elections in Iraq and Palestine, the deterioration in U.S.-Egyptian relations, popular demands for democracy in 2005, and the Lebanese challenge in confronting the Hezbollah movement. The Israel Democracy Institute (IDI, www.idi.org.il) released the 2005 Israeli Democracy Index on November 3, 2005, in a ceremony and conference held at the official residence of Moshe Katsav, president of the state of Israel. The Index, compiled by IDI scholars Asher Arian, Shlomit Barnea, Pazit Ben-Nun, Michal Shamir, and Raphael Ventura, includes an annual updating of survey results on support for political institutions and elected officials, trust in government, levels of tolerance, and national and religious tensions. In recognition of the tenth anniversary of the assassination of prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, the 2005 Index also includes survey data on how that tragic event is remembered in Israeli society and on how it continues to influence domestic politics to this day. A summary of the 2005 Index is available at www.idi.org.il/english/article.asp?id=14112005160449. The Hebrew text is available at www.idi.org.il/hebrew/catalog.asp?pdid=490&did=1&hom=1, and an English translation will be published soon. The Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PSR, www.pcpsr.org) conducted and analyzed opinion polls throughout the recent election cycle that culminated with the Palestinian parliamentary elections on January 25, 2006. The most recent study published by the Center (February 16, 2006) identified three key factors in the surprisingly strong support for Hamas in the election: widespread corruption and mismanagement in the Palestinian Authority, the waning of the peace process as a priority of Palestinian voters, and the fragmentation of the Fatah movement in numerous electoral districts, leading to wasted votes. For the full text (including graphs and tables) visit www.pcpsr.org/survey/polls/2006/exitplcfulljan06e.html. (Pre-election surveys and analysis are also available at the Center's Web site.) Khalil Shikaki, the Center's director, participated in an October 26, 2005, panel discussion on "Israel and the Palestinians: The Road ahead after Gaza Disengagement" at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars in Washington, D.C. A Webcast of the event is available at www.wilsoncenter.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=events.event_summary&event_id=150756#. The Lebanese Center for Policy Studies (LCPS, Lebanon, www.lcps-lebanon.org), the International Center for Transitional Justice, and the Sustainable Democracy Center cosponsored a December 2-3, 2005, workshop on "Dealing with the Past in Lebanon: Various Approaches to Transitional Justice." The workshop included five panel sessions and concluded with a roundtable discussion of how to create a system of reconciliation in Lebanon. The Center will publish papers from the workshop later in the year. Visit www.lcps-lebanon.org/web04/english/activities/2005/transitionaljus/about.html for more information. The Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy (CSID, United States, www.csidonline.org/) and Street Law, Inc. celebrated the publication of Islam and Democracy: Toward Effective Citizenship at a November 29, 2005, reception in Washington, D.C. The two organizations produced the Arabic-language text for nonspecialist audiences, and will use it in a civic-education campaign they will conduct together in Morocco, Algeria, Jordan, and Egypt. Visit www.csidonline.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=139&Itemid=1 for more information about the book and follow-up activities. Recent speakers and topics in CSID's monthly lectures include Reza Aslan ("Welcome to the Islamic Reformation: The Struggle to Define the Faith and Practice of Islam"), and Graham Fuller, Muqtedar Khan, Emad Shahin, and Joe Montville ("Ideas and Strategies for Democracy in the Arab/Muslim World: How Can CSID Help?"). Visit www.csidonline.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=section&id=17&Itemid=45 for summaries of these and previous lectures, and for selected lecture texts. The Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV, www.tesev.org.tr) organized an international conference in December 2005 on "Turkey's Minority Rights Questions: A Citizenship and Democracy Based Approach" that brought together scholars to discuss the question of minority rights within the context of citizenship in a democratic regime. More information and a conference program are available at www.tesev.org.tr/eng/events/conf_9-10aralik.php. TESEV also published "The Problem of Internal Displacement in Turkey: Assessment and Policy Proposals," a 33-page preliminary report by the Foundation's working group on internal displacement, restitution, and social rehabilitation. The study examined the ongoing effects of the forced displacement of large numbers of persons (mostly ethnic Kurds) that occurred between 1984 and 1999, critiqued current government policies on their return, and recommended policies that would facilitate their reintegration into their home communities. The complete text is available at www.tesev.org.tr/eng/events/ndemoc_intenal_disp.php. TESEV also convened an October 2005 international conference on "Citizens' Right to Information" that brought together experts and scholars from Turkey and international organizations that support access to information (including Gergana Jouleva, executive director of the Bulgaria-based Access to Information Program, another NDRI member). Visit www.tesev.org.tr/eng/events/conf_gg_cit_right_toinfo_18oct2005.php for more information about this event. 2.6 RUSSIA AND THE FORMER SOVIET UNION The Caucasus Institute for Peace, Democracy, and Development (CIPDD, Georgia, www.cipdd.org) and International IDEA released two related publications at an August 10, 2005, book presentation in Tbilisi cosponsored by the two organizations. The first volume, Constitutional-Political Reform Process in Georgia: Political Elite and Voices of the People, was published in Georgian. The Russian-language edition, with additional content, is entitled Constitutional-Political Reform Process in Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan: Political Elites and Voices of the People. An English edition of this 198-page book is available at www.idea.int/publications/cprp_georgia/upload/DCMEnglishDraft.pdf. The Carnegie Moscow Center (Russia, www.carnegie.ru) published Originality instead of Modernization: Paradoxes of Russian Politics in the Post-Stabilization Era by Andrei Ryabov, a study of the choices made by Russia's ruling elites that delay real modernization while also avoiding serious domestic reforms. The complete Russian text of this 65-page monograph is available at www.carnegie.ru/en/pubs/books/940005-2005-AR-final.pdf. In October 2005 Dmitri Trenin, deputy director of the Center, published "Reading Russia Right," a 12-page essay in the Carnegie Endowment's Policy Briefs series. Describing Russia as "free but not democratic," and president Putin's regime as "openly czarist," Mr. Trenin advocated policies that would institutionalize economic freedoms and help develop the rule of law, leading to the growth of a middle class that eventually would demand democracy. For the complete text visit www.carnegieendowment.org/files/pb42.trenin.FINAL.pdf The November/December 2005 issue of Pro et Contra, the Center's journal edited by Masha Lipman, was a special theme issue on the rise of China and its implications for Russia and the rest of the world. Visit www.carnegie.ru/en/pubs/procontra/ for contents information and www.carnegie.ru/en/pubs/procontra/vol9num2-full.pdf for the complete Russian text. The Global Development Network (www.gdnet.org), an association of research and policy institutes that focus on development issues, named the International Centre for Policy Studies (ICPS, Ukraine, www.icps.kiev.ua) "the most successful think-tank in Ukraine" in November 2005 for its outstanding work on a variety of economic and political policy issues. The Centre's regular publications include Quarterly Predictions, an analysis of economic trends; plus the monthly reports Political Commentary and Economic Statistics, all available by subscription. The weekly electronic ICPS Newsletter, available by free subscription, reports on important political and economic developments in Ukraine and publicizes new research from the Centre. For more information about all of these visit www.icps.kiev.ua/eng/publications/. 2.7 UNITED STATES AND CANADA Rights & Democracy (International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development, Canada, www.ichrdd.ca) has launched a new research project that will examine the effects of foreign direct investment on human rights. The research, entitled the Human Rights Impact Assessment, will begin with case studies of selected investment projects (such as waterworks, mining, and railroads) in Argentina, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Peru, the Philippines, and Tibet. The project seeks to establish a methodology for improving corporate accountability and ensuring that development project financing does not undermine international human rights laws and norms. Visit www.dd-rd.ca/site/media/index.php?lang=en&subsection=news&id=672 for more information. Diana Bronson, coordinator of Rights & Democracy's globalization program, participated in a series of September 2005 meetings in Tunisia for journalists and human-rights activists. Her report on the meetings (and on local efforts to obstruct them) is available at www.dd-rd.ca/site/publications/index.php?lang=en&subsection=catalogue&id=1428. The November/December issue of libertas, Rights & Democracy's newsletter, features a profile of Yan Christian Warinussy from Papua New Guinea, winner of the Centre's 2005 John Humphrey Freedom Award for his work promoting democracy and human-rights in his homeland. Visit www.dd-rd.ca/site/publications/index.php?lang=en&subsection=newsletter&id=1454&page=1 for the complete newsletter. The Center for Democracy and the Third Sector (CDATS, United States, www.georgetown.edu/centers/cdats/) launched its new survey project on Citizenship, Involvement, and Democracy (CID) with a December 2005 panel presentation at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, D.C. The project is a major study of American civic engagement that was designed to parallel the European Social Survey (http://europeansocialsurvey.org/), allowing the U.S. results to be compared with results from twenty-three European countries. Marc Morjé Howard from CDATS directs the project, whose advisory committee includes Russell Dalton from the Center for the Study of Democracy, an NDRI member at the University of California at Irvine. Visit www8.georgetown.edu/centers/cdats/cid.htm for more information about the CID project and www8.georgetown.edu/centers/cdats/cidlaunch.htm for a report on the launch event, including several presentations. On November 8, 2005, CDATS hosted a presentation entitled "Mexican Democracy and the 2006 Presidential Elections," featuring Sergio Aguayo, president of the board of FUNDAR, an NDRI member in Mexico. Mr. Aguayo's talk was the inaugural Ion Ratiu Democracy Lecture, an annual CDATS event made possible by the Ratiu Family Charitable Foundation of London. The Fall 2005 issue of Democracy and Society, the CDATS newsletter/journal, includes articles on "The Democratization of the Sacred" by Giuseppe Giordan; "Religion and the Authoritarian State: The Case of Syria," by Paul L. Heck; "Are Religious and Democratic Practices Compatible in the Middle East?" by Helen Rizzo, plus book reviews, a report from director Steven Heydemann, and highlights of the Center's activities. The complete 32-page text is available at www.georgetown.edu/centers/cdats/DemocracyAndSocietyF05.pdf. The Center on Democratic Performance (http://cdp.binghamton.edu/) published "Iron Fist or Kid Gloves? Repressive Targeting or Rebellious Responses" by Katri K. Sieberg and Claudia Dahlerus in its Working Paper series. The authors use game theory to develop a model of how government and dissident groups will respond to each other in the context of secessionist attempts, and then test the model using contemporary breakaway conflicts in Spain and Northern Ireland. The complete text of the 47-page paper is available at http://cdp.binghamton.edu/papers/Bat-Noire%200504.pdf. The Center also released its third annual report on the human-rights policies and preferences of the Bush administration, which this year received a grade of D (meaning "poor"). Visit the Center's Web site and follow the link for Human Rights Report Card for the methodology, results, and commentary. The Center for the Study of Democracy (CSD, United States, www.democ.uci.edu) recently added the paper "Contexts of Asian Democracy: A Cross-National, Within-Nation Analysis of Asian Nations," by Robert B. Albritton (University of Mississippi), Thawilwadee Bureekul (King Prajadhipok's Institute), and Guo Gang (also University of Mississippi) to its eScholarship repository, an online collection of new research and work in progress. The November 2005 study examines the relative impacts of cultural socialization and interactions with government on support for democracy and trust in government across eight Asian nations. The complete 25-page paper is available at http://repositories.cdlib.org/csd/05-13/. Mr. Albritton discussed "Measuring Democracy: Some Fallacies of a Critical Enterprise" at an October 26, 2005, Democracy Dinner organized by the Center, and also participated in a November 3, 2005, CSD colloquium on "Jihadi Terrorism in Thailand." Morris Fiorina of Stanford University delivered the annual Eckstein Lecture on January 26, 2006, when he presented "The Myth of Polarized America: Update." The lecture, cosponsored by CSD and the UC/Irvine department of political science, honors Harry Eckstein, cofounder of the Center and a seminal scholar of democracy in the twentieth century. On November 2, 2005, the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law (CDDRL, United States, http://cddrl.stanford.edu/) sponsored a lecture by Karla Hoff of the World Bank entitled "A Dynamic Model of the Demand for the Rule of Law in Post-Communist Economies." The talk, based on a paper Ms. Hoff wrote with economist Joseph Stiglitz of Columbia University (available at http://iis-db.stanford.edu/evnts/4231/The_creation_of_the_rule_of_law-resub_to_EJ.pdf), explained why the introduction of broadly beneficial legal reforms was often delayed or obstructed in the transition from communism to a market economy, when the rapid (and often corrupt) privatization of state assets created a new class of property holders who preferred the preservation of "a weak, corrupt state that would not interfere with their theft." The International Forum for Democratic Studies (United States, www.ned.org) hosted NDRI scholars Alina Pippidi from the Romanian Academic Society and Dogu Ergil from the Centre for the Research of Societal Problems (TOSAM) in Turkey from October 2005 to February 2006 in its Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellows Program. The Reagan-Fascell Program allows democracy scholars (and also practitioners) to conduct research and to develop professional contacts and networks through a residential fellowship at the International Forum. Ms. Pippidi used her fellowship to study anticorruption and public-integrity campaigns within the context of state building; Mr. Ergil prepared a handbook on citizenship training and continued his research on the Kurdish minority in Turkey. Grigorij Meseznikov, president of Institute for Public Affairs (IVO) in Slovakia, will serve as a Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellow from March to July 2006. His research will focus on the role of think tanks in democratic transitions, and on their influence in policy making in new democracies. Ms. Pippidi and Mr. Ergil joined Andrei Piontkovsky (another Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellow) and Charles King of Georgetown University for a November 29, 2005, roundtable discussion on the "Democratization of the Black Sea Area: A Roundtable on the Use and Abuse of Regional Constructs." Michael McFaul, director of the Center for Democracy, Development, and Rule of Law moderated the session, a summary of which is available at www.ned.org/events/events.html. Larry Diamond, codirector of the International Forum, delivered a lecture entitled "Can the Whole World Become Democratic?" on November 3, 2005, in New York City as part of the NED's New York Democracy Forum. A Webcast of this event is available at www.ned.org/events/events.html. Other fall events in the International Forum's luncheon seminar series included a November 17, 2005, presentation of the 2005 Israeli Democracy Index by lead author Asher Arian, and a November 18, 2005, discussion of the 2005 presidential and parliamentary elections in Egypt by Maye Kassem, assistant professor of political science at the American University in Cairo. Visit www.ned.org/events/events.html for summaries of these and other Forum events. |
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