Archiv der Kategorie: English posts

The Myth of the “Democratic Coup” in Egypt

Veröffentlicht am 18. Februar 2014 von
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Originally published on this blog in German on November 12th, 2013.

After the fall of the Mubarak regime in February 2011 and the ensuing 18-month “transitional period,” during which Egypt was ruled by a military junta – the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) – the Egyptian army once again intervened in the political fortunes of the country on 2 July 2013. In a television address, the minister of defence and commander-in-chief of the armed forces General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi announced the dismissal of President Mohamed Morsi, democratically elected only a year earlier, and the suspension of the controversial new constitution. In December 2012, despite the withdrawal of left wing, liberal, and Christian representatives from the Islamist-dominated constitutional convention, this constitution had been accepted by referendum with a very low voter turnout. Instead of returning power to the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, General al-Sisi appointed the president of the Supreme Constitutional Court Adly Mansour interim president, instructing him to form a “technocratic government.” The army leadership wanted this government to remain in place for an indeterminate “transitional period” until early elections could be held. The measures were justified on the grounds that the president, who had emerged from the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood, had been unwilling to engage in a “national dialogue” to end weeks of mass opposition protests against Morsi’s increasingly authoritarian style of government and the bad economic situation in the country. ((For an English translation of the television declaration by General al-Sisi of 3 July 2013 see: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2013/07/201373203740167797.html))

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Below the Surface: Federalism and State Party Autonomy in the U.S.

Veröffentlicht am 15. Januar 2014 von und
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A key assumption coming out of the 2012 presidential election in the U.S. was that polarization of the party system was, once again, increasing dramatically. The 2012 campaign was immediately dubbed the most polarized and partisan yet – a familiar declaration given that 2008, 2004, and 2000 had also been dubbed the most polarized elections of their respective times. Uniquely, though, instead of justifying this declaration solely on the basis of presidential candidates‘ positions the platforms themselves were also held up as key evidence. ((See, e.g., NY Times 29.8.2012, 05.09.2012; Washington Times 27.08.2012; Chicago Tribune 27.08.2012, 05.09.2012.)) The question, then, is the extent to which the polarization of the 2012 election reported by media sources reflected actual levels of polarization. Using newly coded party manifesto data ((You can find a brief introduction to the manifesto project here))  from the 2012 national level elections, we show that (contrary to popular opinion) polarization levels for the 2012 elections were relatively stable. The overall trend in polarization for the U.S. remains unchanging and the party system is not suffering from great increases in overall polarization levels. Weiterlesen →

A shot across the bow or already sinking? The Free Democratic Party after the 2013 Federal Election

Veröffentlicht am 7. Januar 2014 von
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This is a crosspost from the Winter newsletter from eustudies.org. You can find the complete newsletter with more interesting reports on the last Federal Elections in Germany here .

The 2013 Federal Election in Germany brought a landslide victory for the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and her Bavarian sister party the Christian Social Union (CSU) – or maybe, more accurately, for Chancellor Angela Merkel. This success came only as a surprise regarding its magnitude. On the other hand, the fact that the Alternative for Germany (AfD), a new party rallying around EU- and Euro-skeptical issues, came close to the five percent threshold caused at least some public exclamation. Looking to the past and future of Germany’s party system and the nature of political competition in Germany, even the sudden success of the AfD was easily topped by the failure of the Free Democratic Party (FDP) to ensure parliamentary representation. Since the foundation of the Federal Republic of Germany, the FDP has won enough votes to enter parliament. Weiterlesen →

German Federal Elections: Voters Rock the Party System

Veröffentlicht am 12. Dezember 2013 von
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The result

The Germans have voted and rocked the German party system. The election night was like a thriller – including a murder. After the voting boots had closed at six o’clock in the evening, the first prognosis indicated that the liberal party (Free Democrats) would not make it into parliament. At about eight o’clock in the evening, it looked as if the Christian Democrats would even get an absolute majority of seats. Taken together, the Social Democrats and Greens who had fought for a change in government could not obtain as many seats as the Christian Democrats alone. The Left Party did make it, the Alliance for Germany, a right-wing conservative party, came close to the five-percent hurdle but finally missed it. The prognoses proved right except for the short time span in the evening when they assumed a majority for the Christian Democrats. Weiterlesen →

Are there Merkel supporters in Southern Europe? The results of the German general election viewed from Spain.

Veröffentlicht am 8. Oktober 2013 von
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The German general election of 22 September 2013 was closely followed in Spain. The degree of media coverage was comparable with that of a United States presidential election, probably because, as one Spanish newspaper put it in its editorial, the German elections “transcend the borders of Germany (
). Millions of people are aware of how much the results of the ballot box will affect their lives” (ABC, 23.09.13). Weiterlesen →

And they do differ! An analysis of the German parties‘ election programs 2013

Veröffentlicht am 17. September 2013 von , und
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In the run-up to next Sunday’s  German Bundestag election, there is much speculation about the anticipated low voter turnout. One of the commonly cited reasons for the dwindling willingness of voters to cast their ballots is because the main political parties do not differ, positional, in their political programs. How true is this assumption? Weiterlesen →

Which Policies Do Parties Really Advocate? – Introducing the Manifesto Project

Veröffentlicht am 17. September 2013 von
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One of the central and most interesting areas in the political party research agenda is the exploration of which positions parties take on single policy issues, policy fields and general ideological scales like the left-right continuum. Knowing these positions is the basis for assessing what parties stand for, whether they do what they stand for and, indeed, whether they stand for what citizens want them to do. Weiterlesen →