Here, Conor O'Dwyer introduces the phenomenon of runaway state-building as a consequence of patronage politics in underdeveloped, noncompetitive party systems. Analyzing the cases of three newly democratized nations in Eastern Europe—Poland, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia—O’Dwyer argues that competition among political parties constrains patronage-led state expansion. O’Dwyer uses democratization as a starting point, examining its effects on other aspects of political development. Focusing on the link between electoral competition and state-building, he is able to draw parallels between the problems faced by these three nations and broader historical and contemporary problems of patronage politics—such as urban machines in nineteenth-century America and the Philippines after Marcos. This timely study provides political scientists and political reformers with insights into points in the democratization process where appropriate intervention can minimize runaway state-building and cultivate efficient bureaucracy within a robust and competitive democratic system.

This book argues that Putin's strategy for rebuilding the state was fundamentally flawed. Taylor demonstrates that a disregard for the way state officials behave toward citizens - state quality - had a negative impact on what the state could do - state capacity. Focusing on those organizations that control state coercion, what Russians call the 'power ministries', Taylor shows that many of the weaknesses of the Russian state that existed under Boris Yeltsin persisted under Putin. Drawing on extensive field research and interviews, as well as a wide range of comparative data, the book reveals the practices and norms that guide the behavior of Russian power ministry officials (the so-called siloviki), especially law enforcement personnel. By examining siloviki behavior from the Kremlin down to the street level, State Building in Putin's Russia uncovers the who, where and how of Russian state building after communism.

Here, Conor O'Dwyer introduces the phenomenon of runaway state-building as a consequence of patronage politics in underdeveloped, noncompetitive party systems. Analyzing the cases of three newly democratized nations in Eastern Europe—Poland, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia—O’Dwyer argues that competition among political parties constrains patronage-led state expansion. O’Dwyer uses democratization as a starting point, examining its effects on other aspects of political development. Focusing on the link between electoral competition and state-building, he is able to draw parallels between the problems faced by these three nations and broader historical and contemporary problems of patronage politics—such as urban machines in nineteenth-century America and the Philippines after Marcos. This timely study provides political scientists and political reformers with insights into points in the democratization process where appropriate intervention can minimize runaway state-building and cultivate efficient bureaucracy within a robust and competitive democratic system.

This book examines new member states’ problems with the absorption of EU funds. Since accession, many new member states from Central and Eastern Europe struggle to access their billions of development funds from Brussels. While existing research mostly emphasizes the role of states’ administrative capacities to account for absorption problems, this study adds the so far neglected role of politics as party politicization to the equation. The argument is tested using a combination of fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA) with two detailed process tracing case studies. This book will appeal to scholars interested in EU cohesion policy, post-accession compliance, and post-communist politics.

This book argues that development aid in small post-conflict states, particularly in the educational field, benefits from a commitment to a shared vision, fostering co-operative relationships and working within local capacity, credibility, and attentiveness to immediate and longer-term development goals. It uses Timor-Leste as its case study of a faith-based partnership in the development of the Instituto Católico para a Formação de Professores (ICFP) at Baucau. The people of what was then East Timor voted overwhelmingly for independence in 1999 and the nation building, including reforming education, in this post-conflict small state began. The book reports how, through the commitment of the partners to capacity building and transforming education, East Timorese staff have assumed positions of responsibility in the Institute. ICFP has received very positive accreditation reports from the national authority in terms of its vision, courses, staff and student quality, and infrastructure. The significance of the challenge and what has been achieved in this teacher education institute is studied against the history of the East Timorese people and the educational policies of their former colonial powers. The history, scope and responsibilities of the partnership reveal how the partners were of one mind in terms of foundational values, institutional deliverables, infrastructure and sustainability for the Institute. This educational capacity building and its outcomes are testimony to the relevance of the development principles of the Paris Declaration and the Accra Accord as well as to the partners’ shared vision as faith-based people and organisations and their commitment to Catholic social teaching.

Across the globe, more powers are being devolved to local and regional levels of government. This book provides an innovative analysis of such decentralisation in transition states in the Balkans. Using new and rich data, it shows how political elites use decentralisation strategically to ensure their access to state resources.

In many recent democracies, candidates compete for office using illegal strategies to influence voters. In Hungary and Romania, local actors including mayors and bureaucrats offer access to social policy benefits to voters who offer to support their preferred candidates, and they threaten others with the loss of a range of policy and private benefits for voting the "wrong" way. These quid pro quo exchanges are often called clientelism. How can politicians and their accomplices get away with such illegal campaigning in otherwise democratic, competitive elections? When do they rely on the worst forms of clientelism that involve threatening voters and manipulating public benefits? Conditionality and Coercion: Electoral Clientelism in Eastern Europe uses a mixed method approach to understand how illegal forms of campaigning including vote buying and electoral coercion persist in two democratic countries in the European Union. It argues that we must disaggregate clientelistic strategies based on whether they use public or private resources, and whether they involve positive promises or negative threats and coercion. We document that the type of clientelistic strategies that candidates and brokers use varies systematically across localities based on their underlying social coalitions. We also show that voters assess and sanction different forms of clientelism in different ways. Voters glean information about politicians' personal characteristics and their policy preferences from the clientelistic strategies these candidates deploy. Most voters judge candidates who use clientelism harshly. So how does clientelism, including its most odious coercive forms, persist in democratic systems? This book suggests that politicians can get away with clientelism by using forms of it that are in line with the policy preferences of constituencies whose votes they need. Clientelistic and programmatic strategies are not as distinct as previous have argued. Oxford Studies in Democratization is a series for scholars and students of comparative politics and related disciplines. Volumes concentrate on the comparative study of the democratization process that accompanied the decline and termination of the cold war. The geographical focus of the series is primarily Latin America, the Caribbean, Southern and Eastern Europe, and relevant experiences in Africa and Asia. The series editor is Laurence Whitehead, Senior Research Fellow, Nuffield College, University of Oxford.