Assignment Code: BPSC-109/ASST/TMA/2022-23

Course Code: BPSC-109

Assignment Name: Political Processes and Institutions in Comparative Perspective

Year: 2022-2023

Verification Status: Verified by Professor

Answer all questions in the three Assignments and submit them together.

Assignment - I

Answer the following in about 500 words each. Each question carries 20 marks

Q1) Briefly describe the modernization, dependency and statist theories that shaped studies on political development.

Ans) The modernization, dependency and statist theories that shaped studies on political development are as follows:

Modernization Theory

A social theory related to how societies advance is known as modernization theory. It looks at a nation's internal dynamics, presuming that with a little help, more "traditional" nations can advance in a way similar to "more developed nations."

Evolutionary View: According to this theory, modernization is the process of moving from a traditional to a modern civilization. As a result of the Industrial Revolution and the development of science and technology, productivity increased. A new factory production system with a significant division of labour and the monopolisation of international markets constituted the new order. Increasing scale and differentiation are considered the fundamental trajectories of modernity. Societies that were most successful at creating a tight division of labour were able to achieve high levels of productivity. With the development of science and technology, the division of labour accelerated and altered the political structure as well.

Functional Theory: According to Parsons, society as a whole can be investigated similarly to a biological organism. The various components of a biological organism are comparable to the various social institutions. The institutions of a society, such as the economy and the government, are closely tied to one another, just like the components of a biological organism, such as the eye and the hand, are interrelated and interdependent in their interactions with one another. Parsons used the term "system" to refer to the seamless collaboration of several institutions. Similar to how each component of a biological organism serves a distinct purpose for the whole, each institution serves a specific purpose for the survival and development of civilization.

Dependency Theory

The political modernization strategy has been critiqued by dependency theory, which contends that instead of fostering social mobilisation and a democratic political system, economic progress may work to undermine them. According to dependency theory, the nation's historical contribution to the international economy can be used to explain how it has developed. Latin American studies scholars have noted that the conditions of trade have consistently favoured the world's economically developing nations in relations between highly industrialised rich countries and mostly primary good producing impoverished countries. Therefore, they have claimed, emerging nations are not suited for economic union. It suggests that unless they break their dependence on wealthy nations, stable economic progress will not be achievable. These nations have suffered as a result of decreased global financial investment.

Statist Theory

The state was viewed by Marxists as nothing more than a tool in the hands of the affluent classes. The states served as a stage for competing interests in the liberal vision of the nation-state. The state, in contrast, was viewed by Weber as "a human society which claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a specific region." According to this idea, states are just like any other human society and have their own interests. Instead of accommodating changes in the economic environment, either internally as recommended by modernization theory or externally as suggested by dependency theory, states pursue modernization and development goals. In order to improve their ability to deal with external challenges, including military threats and even economic threats, states prioritise economic growth and development. Thus, politics is given the most weight in the statist explanation of development. Because of the state's voluntaristic behaviour, economic transformation is conceivable.

Q2) What is a political party?

Ans) Irish statesman Edmund Burke described a political party as "a body of men united, for promoting by their joint endeavours the national interest, upon some particular principle in which they are all agreed.”

Scholars have developed a number of definitions of a political party over the 20th century. Political parties were described by German political scientist Sigmund Neumann as “the articulate organization of society's active political agents, those who are concerned with the control of governmental power and who compete for popular support with another group or groups holding divergent views. It is the great intermediary which links social forces and ideologies to official governmental institutions and relates them to political action within the larger political community.”

1. First, a political party requires a constituency in order to exist. Depending on the popularity of the party and the size of the country, a party can have anywhere from a few hundred to millions of members.

2. Second, a political party's basic components are its beliefs, standards, and ideologies. Political parties have a normative and ideational foundation that is based on and represents a certain ideology, identity, location, and issue. A party can be distinguished from another by how strictly they adhere to their values. Political parties in the Developing World and more recent parties in Europe and America are based on distinctive identities and issues like ethnicity, race, region, and environment. This is in contrast to the earliest political parties, such as the Liberal Party, Labour Party, Conservative Party, Socialist Party, and Communist Party, which were founded on ideology.

3. Thirdly, political parties often have an established structure with authorised members occupying positions of authority. Top leadership may choose the officeholders or party members may elect them. However, there is continuity inside the organisation, meaning that its lifespan extends beyond that of the present or one generation of leaders.

4. Fourth, political parties are created with predetermined objectives. A political party's primary objective is to win political power through the electoral process. They work to win and keep some level of popular support in order to accomplish their objectives.

5. Last but not least, political parties attempt to establish governments and exercise political influence through legal and constitutional means, i.e., by running in elections, rather than through extraconstitutional means like a coup.

Political parties are created at a specific historical point in a state's growth. According to Joseph LaPalombara and Myron Weiner, two American political scientists, a political party develops when the political system achieves a certain level of complexity. They claim that "the political party materialises when a tiny coterie of men unconcerned with public feelings can no longer undertake the tasks of recruiting political leadership and making public policy." Political parties also emerge when the governing class starts to believe that citizens should take part in the political process. The growing democratic consciousness, the increased desire to choose leaders, or the need to contain populist uprisings could all be contributing factors to the governing elite's shift in perspective.

Assignment - II

Answer the following questions in about 250 words each. Each question carries 10 marks.

Q1) Briefly describe Almond and Verba’s classification of political culture.

Ans) The classification of political culture by Almond and Verba is as follows:

Parochial political culture: This describes a political culture in which people have only a remote awareness of the presence of the central government, as in the case of remote tribes whose existence appears untouched by decisions made at the national level by the central government. Additionally, political orientation toward political objectives does not exist. People are uninformed and uninterested in politics. They don't have any political preferences at all.

A conventional political framework can coexist with this kind of political culture. This kind of mindset is typical of passive societies, where there is little role specialisation and people have little respect for governmental authority. People in this form of political culture are thus less knowledgeable, have lower expectations, and are less likely to participate.

Political Culture as Subjects: In this political culture, people regard themselves as subjects of the government, much like those who live in dictatorships, rather than as participants in the political process. Residents have preferences for the system's output-related features. People are aware of decision-making processes. Political knowledge exists, but there is no courage to express political opinions, hence there are no participatory standards. A centralised authoritarian system can coexist with this kind of political culture.

Political Culture of Participation: In this political culture, people think they can influence the system and are impacted by it. As a result, they have a positive reaction to all political ideas and a proactive attitude toward political activity. The biggest value is involvement, which this promotes to increase. It is possible to question authority while maintaining a favourable viewpoint of the political system.

Q2) What are the reasons behind chequered democratic process in post-colonial countries?

Ans) The reasons behind chequered democratic process in post-colonial countries are as follows:

Lack of a Vibrant Civil Society: When post-colonial nations began their democratic journeys, they almost entirely lacked the components now recognised as necessary for the development of a liberal democracy in a nation. The social, economic, and political systems of the "third world" countries had been warped by decades of colonial control. Other challenges came in the shape of the conventional social hierarchy, which resisted the idea of political equality, a necessary condition for a free government. The persistence of old institutions and values as the dominant force prevented the emergence of a thriving civil society.

Weak Institutions: The inability of the newly independent state to create its institutions and meet these needs and aspirations led to a crisis in governance. The ensuing unrest, protests, and even violence gave the military the chance to seize power or rule by proxy by installing a puppet civilian government, as happened in the case of Brazil after 1945. The military was given the chance to interfere, as it did in the cases of Uganda and Nigeria, as a result of the elected civilian government's subversion of democratic institutions and procedures, which led to a challenge to the legitimacy of the existing institutions and the governing class.

Widespread Poverty: The pervasive poverty present in these recently independent Asian, African, and American nations has also posed a significant challenge to the long-term survival of democracy. They are now considered "improbable democracies" because this has continued to be the case.

According to Przeworskiet al., income is the best indicator of democracy. According to these democratic theory proponents, "money does make democracies more durable, independently of education," therefore "the probability of democracy dying lowers with income." They frequently restate Lipset's earlier claim that "a nation's prospects of sustaining democracy increase with its level of wealth"

Q3) Explain the dominant approaches to nation and nationalism.

Ans) The dominant approaches to nation and nationalism are as follows:

The Primordialist Approach

This approach sees nation and nationalism as having existed since time immemorial. In other words, it believes that nations and nationalism have deep roots in human associational life. It takes ethnicity as an immemorial feature of groups and regards the categories of religion, ethnicity, race, language and territory as given and primordial organising principles and bonds of human association. On the basis of this assumption, the primordialist argue that nations and nationalism which are the extension of these primordial ties are perennial,  given and natural, not modern.

Modernist Approach

Modernists, unlike primordialism, maintain that nation and nationalism are the direct results of the processes of modernisation, such as industrialisation or capitalism, rationalisation of administration, the secularisation of culture, social mobility and modern state, and that they are purely modern phenomena. Against the primordialist assumption that nations and nationalism are given and natural, the modernists argue that nations and nationalism are constructed phenomena and therefore they must be distinguished, both historically and conceptually, from all manifestations of ethnicity.

Ethno-symbolism

The autonomous contributions of symbols, memories, values, and myths to the emergence of nations and nationalism are at the heart of this approach. The ethno-symbolists, including Anthony Smith and John Armstrong, understand the political ramifications of how modernization has changed pre-modern ethnic components. They contend, in contrast to modernists, that pre-modern ethnic components fundamentally influence the formation of nations and states. The ethno-symbolists share the primordialists' view that pre-modern ethnic identities are crucial to the development of nations and nationalism. Ethno-symbolism, which maintains that while nations and nationalism are contemporary phenomena, they evolve on the basis of pre-modern ethnic identities and elements, represents a middle ground between primordialism and modernity.

Assignment - III

Write a short note on the following in about 100 words each. Each short note carries 6 marks.

Q1) Relative autonomy thesis

Ans) The Relative Autonomy theory of the state is based on the Marxist understanding of the state. It believes that the state plays a limited autonomous role in maintaining and stabilising capitalist society. Nicos Poulantzas argued that the state, though relatively autonomous from the capitalist class, nevertheless functions to protect the interests of the capitalist class. Poulantzas explains that the capitalist state directly serves the interests of the capitalist class and the conditions of domination and exploitation. Based on Gramsci’s concept of Cultural Hegemony, Poulantzas argues that suppression and domination are not the only functions of the state; it also obtains the consent of the oppressed.

Q2) Decentralisation in Brazil

Ans) Brazil is an example of a more ‘robust federation’ compared to other federal countries of the world in decentralization. Few federal countries have given such a large share of the total tax revenue to the states and municipalities. The state governors have a lot of influence and power. After having suffered from the centralized military dictatorship in the past, the framers of the Constitution 1988 seem to have opted for decentralization, creating more powerful local leaders to balance any strong and ruthless president. Governors and mayors of wealthy states and cities compete with the federal president for power and resources. The Brazilian structure is often described as ‘cooperative federalism‘ since the distribution of powers and responsibilities is based on cooperation between the three federal entities: central, state and municipal authorities.

Q3) Federalism in Australia

Ans) Australian federalism came into existence on 1st January 1901, with six British colonies as its constituents. The province of Victoria was against free trade to protect its manufacturing sector. In Australian federalism, the province is called ‘state‘, while the national government is known as the ‘Commonwealth of Australia.‘

The constitutional amendment requires the majority of voters‘ support at the national level in a referendum and the majority of voters' support at least four out of the six states. The states have exclusive rights to make laws on the residual subjects. In addition to the listed and residual powers, the concurrent list identifies subjects over which both the Commonwealth and states can legislate. Australian Parliament is made of the Crown and two chambers, namely, the Senate and the House of Representatives. The High Court is the highest court in Australia. It has played an essential role in sustaining federalism for over a century.

Q4) Concept of popular sovereignty

Ans) Popular sovereignty posits that consent of the people is one of fundamental basis by which the authority of the state can be justified. Locke’s theory rested on his theory of natural rights where he asserted that human beings are born with the natural rights of life, liberty and property. Natural rights are those rights that apply to everyone irrespective of which place they belonged to and no institution/state/government can take away these rights.

Hence “the government rules, and its legitimacy is sustained, by the ‘consent’ of individuals”. Locke’s theory propounded that supreme power/sovereignty originates with the people and it is transferred by the people to the state for the objective of protecting their natural rights. This became the foundation for the concept of popular sovereignty.

Q5) Procedural and substantive democracy

Ans) According to the procedural definition of democracy, it essentially refers to a system of institutions and practises that aid in reaching decisions that must be carried out by elected officials who represent the majority. In order to "certify" a country as having a democratic system, special emphasis is being paid to procedural factors including the simple existence of democratic institutions.

However, many theorists who use a substantive definition of democracy argue that while these institutions and processes are necessary for a functioning democratic government, they are not sufficient. However, others who place a higher priority on the substantive concept of democracy would criticise the arbitrariness of equating electoral democracy with genuine democracy. They contend that unless everyone in a political society is allowed equal citizenship rights, the democratic enterprise is still unfinished.