COMPARATIVE POLITICS

Twenty second edition

Christian Soe

We know that in this past fifteen years, we can see so big restructuring of politics in many countries around the world. This restructuring develop along with generational shift in leadership. Even in time of political transform, there will be significant pattern of continuity as well as change. That’s why, we must see the politics that each country has and try to compare them.

This book shows so many articles from magazine, newspaper, and journal of the public press. The aims of this book are to provide current and first-rate educational information to readers. It also helps readers to understand the politics of foreign countries from comparative perspective and as the parameters for tomorrow’s developments in the political world. It will also lead to deeper insights into the American political process.

There are 5 units that we see in this book. Each unit has its own explanation and it can make readers easier to find information that we need. For example if they want to find information about Chinese politics, they can just go to section that explain about politic in China in unit 4.

In unit 1, there are some explanations about pluralist democracies especially county studies. We will see twelve articles that examine the current state of politics in United Kingdom, Germany, France, and Japan. These countries all belong with the United States among the six top economies in the world. Each of these modern societies has an individual tradition of politics and governance with particular institutional framework.

In United Kingdom, we can get information about the constitutional revolution in Britain and also Tony Blair era rules in there. Besides that, we can see the French tradition of secularity and ignoring strong criticism from the leaders of several million Muslim in France and also we can know the French attitude towards the United States show mixture of rejection and disappointment.

If we see the politics in German, we can know about the red-green government managed to be narrowly re-elected, modernize of federal structure, sluggish social and economic system in German, and also comments about “the sick man of Europe”. It will be a little different in Japanese politic because we can know about Japanese spirit and examines the origin that make them success and emphasizes that Japan has shown that modernization does not require embracing Western culture.

In unit 2, it is possible to point to some comparable patterns of political challenge and response among these and some representative democracies. The readers will see the functioning of Western European democracies with regard to political ideas and participation, money and politics, the role of women in politics, and the institutional framework of representative government.

Each part will give deeply information about the comparative perspective as pattern of democratic atrophy like about public disillusionment with institution and politicians and special-interest lobbying in modern democracies. Women in politics become something that people want to know more today. We can see the percentage of women in the lower or single legislative chamber and what factors that made women has moved to high elective office earlier and at higher rates in some countries that in others. The institutional framework will examine about modern representative democracies, the growth and many different forms of judicial review, and also about referendum. At the comparative perspective in America politics, we will see at the case for multi-party U.S. parliament.

Unit 3 examine about impact of two major changes that continue to transform the political map of Europe. It includes the European Union, Western European society, post-communist Central and Eastern Europe, Russia and the other post-Soviet Republics.

If we take a look at European Union (EU), it has grown to 15 member countries with nearly 300 million people. In 2004, ten more countries join EU and it become more and more countries join it. The other and closely related major change involves the politic and economic reconstruction of Central and Eastern Europe, including Russia. We can see it after the collapse of the Communist regimes in that country between 1989 and 1991. These developments is very important to the continuing the political in Europe.       

In unit 4, we will see the challenge of globalization among the countries in the world. We also can see the developing countries and regions that influenced by globalization. Not only about globalization but also examines the economic and politic development in those countries. It also gives understanding of the diversity of social and political conditions in those countries.

Those articles consist of the political system, democratic revolution, and economic side in Mexico and Latin America. In South Africa, we will know more about the end of apartheid and their democracy that makes trouble because it has not dealt effectively with the requirements of consolidation. Besides that, a strategy called “quiet revolution” become success in China and how it can happen and also what accomplishments that China get in the past twenty years. Not only that, but also the Indian and Iraq also have a new dimension in their democracy.

 The last unit consists of three major trends in contemporary politics from comparative perspective. First, over the past years we have seen spread of democratic forms of government in the world. The “wave of democratization” describes as the “third” of its kind in modern history and seems like to have a long effect on political process in some countries that previously know authoritarian government. Of course it will make the countries divided into deep ethnic, economic, religious, and dissolution.

Second, there has been a big shift in economy policy in believes on private enterprise and market in the 1980s besides that, there also a corresponding reduction in state ownership and regulation in some countries such as China. But there are some reactions in advanced industrial societies in many developing countries against inequalities, dislocations, and uncertainties associated with unbanned market economy.

Third, many parts of the world have seen what we called “identity politics”. This has brought group identities more strongly into play when differences are being defined, played out, and resolved in the political arena.

So, this book is very good for students, researchers, and professional to get the accurate, current material to help bridge the gap between principles and theories in the real world. It gives so many good information and analysis for readers to understand today’s political world.