Volume 39, Number 1, October 2006

In seminal events, not only policy but also the political processes through which policy evolves undergo dramatic, fundamental change. Seminal events are as important as they are uncommon. Why do they occur, and how comparable are they across political systems? These questions are answered through instances where government attempts to build large-scale dam projects were reversed after they aroused opposition and in the process gave birth to modern environmental movements. Two cases in the United States and Australia are a heuristic through which to analyze the case of Dujiangyan in China. The Chinese case parallels the other two and fits within Schattschneider’s notion of “expanding the sphere,” suggesting that this framework is not limited by regime type. Substantively, the Chinese state may be fundamentally changing the ways it governs itself.

Several influential scholars have argued that organized labor is a consistent champion of democracy and that consequently strong labor movements make democratic outcomes more likely. Evidence from Latin America calls this argument into question. Organized labor has frequently supported nondemocratic regimes. In a comparative analysis of nine countries in Latin America, variation in labor support for democracy after 1945 hinged on two factors, the nature of their partisan alliances and the perceived regime alternatives.

A growing portion of tax policy in postcommunist Europe is driven by external factors relating to regional and global economic integration. The EU accession process and global competition for capital have largely determined tax policymaking and the development of capitalist tax regimes in Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic. Eurostat data, OECD and EU reports, and interviews with political and bureaucratic officials support these conclusions. Recent trends in taxation in postcommunist Europe provide a striking example of the declining economic policy autonomy of states, in this case, newly autonomous states with a great sensitivity to issues of national sovereignty.

Why did India’s parliament repeatedly fail to enact the women’s reservation bill, which would have reserved one-third of legislative seats for women. Explanations cite poor drafting of the bill, caste politics, weaknesses of the women’s movements, and, simply, patriarchy. However, these explanations need to be supplemented by a comparative approach that draws on an expanding number of cross-national studies of gender quotas. These studies point to the important role of political parties and the electoral system, but in combination with the negative consequences of India’s “exceptional” democratic development.

Do transitions by pact restrict access to the political system and thus reduce the quality of democracy? A comparison of legislator continuity in Spain, where democracy was established by pact, and Argentina, which had a transition by collapse, demonstrates that, while Spain had greater continuity, continuity did not compromise the quality of democracy. The mode of transition shapes internal party rules, specifically candidate selection procedures, which influence the degree of continuity in nascent democratic regimes. A second comparison of the pacts in Spain, Colombia, and Venezuela demonstrates that transitions by pact vary with respect to how pacts are enforced, with potentially significant implications for the quality of democracy.

In 1969, in “Six Books in Search of a Subject or Does Federalism Exist and Does It Matter,” William Riker reached rather bleak conclusions concerning scholarship about federalism. This review looks at recent books on federalism to see if Riker’s verdict still applies. These books show that federalism indeed exists, so the aim is to evaluate current scholarship to see if federalism matters through four dimensions: democratic participation, representation, and accountability; the representation and accommodation of territorially based ethnic, cultural, and linguistic differences; public policy and governmental effectiveness; and the design of federal institutions.