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Review of Oligarchic Politics: Elections and Party-List System in the Philippines.

This paper investigates the origins, development, and consolidation of political oligarchy in the Caribbean island nation of St. Maarten. It investigates why oligarchies develop in small settings despite the democracy-stimulating tendencies of smallness posited by the academic literature. It offers an historical analysis of St. Maarten politics, and investigates how the smallness of St. Maarten has contributed to oligarchies on the island. The article analyses the political dynamics that buttress and sustain oligarchic rule in small island societies. St. Maarten is an interesting case study because it is typical of the islands of the Eastern Caribbean, including historically high levels of migration, and is understudied. Additionally, the island has experienced oligarchic politics for centuries, which makes St. Maarten a perfect case to study the link between smallness and oligarchy. Finally, because St. Maarten is nonsovereign, our analysis could yield insights into the effects of non-sovereignty on the formation of oligarchies.

AbstractOne of the central issues in Latin American political history is the role played by oligarchies. In the case of Brazil, students of oligarchy have focused on elite family networks and coronelismo, the often violent manifestation of oligarchic politics at the local level. Drawing on the substantial body of literature on the family in Latin America, this essay proposes an interpretation of oligarchical politics in which changing family structures interacted in new political and economic contexts to produce distinctive types of oligarchy in a sequential rather than synchronic or functional manner. The dominance of traditional elite families on the Brazilian frontier was challenged during periods of social and economic change, resulting in the rise of transitional and new oligarchies with substantially different socioeconomic origins, career paths, and family structures.

This paper investigates the origins, development, and consolidation of political oligarchy in the Caribbean island nation of St. Maarten. It investigates why oligarchies develop in small settings despite the democracy-stimulating tendencies of smallness posited by the academic literature. It offers an historical analysis of St. Maarten politics, and investigates how the smallness of St. Maarten has contributed to oligarchies on the island. The article analyses the political dynamics that buttress and sustain oligarchic rule in small island societies. St. Maarten is an interesting case study because it is typical of the islands of the Eastern Caribbean, including historically high levels of migration, and is understudied. Additionally, the island has experienced oligarchic politics for centuries, which makes St. Maarten a perfect case to study the link between smallness and oligarchy. Finally, because St. Maarten is non-sovereign, our analysis could yield insights into the effects of non-sovereignty on the formation of oligarchies. Resumen: 'Nos ocupamos de lo nuestro': Los orígenes de la política oligárquica en Sint Maarten Este artículo investiga los orígenes, el desarrollo y la consolidación de la oligarquía política en la nación insular caribeña de Sint Maarten. Analiza por qué las oligarquías se desarrollan en escenarios pequeños a pesar de que la tendencia, según la bibliografía académica, es que el tamaño pequeño de una jurisdicción estimule la democracia. Ofrece un análisis histórico de la política de Sint Maarten e investiga hasta qué punto las dimensiones pequeñas de Sint Maarten han contribuido a las oligarquías en la isla. El artículo profundiza en la dinámica política que refuerza y mantiene la oligarquía en sociedades insulares pequeñas. Sint Maarten es un estudio de caso interesante porque es característico de las islas del Caribe oriental, incluidos los niveles históricamente altos de migración, y porque es un tema que se ha estudiado poco. Además, la isla ha experimentado una política oligárquica durante siglos, debido a lo cual Sint Maarten es un caso perfecto para estudiar el vínculo entre el tamaño pequeño de la isla y la oligarquía. Por último, puesto que Sint Maarten no es una isla soberana, nuestro análisis podría ofrecer una visión de los efectos de la no soberanía en la formación de las oligarquías.

What is the relationship between constitutional order and the emergence of oligarchic politics in contemporary democratic societies? How and to what extent does constitutional design contribute to oligarchic politics in contemporary liberal democratic states? Focusing on constitutional discourses, rather than the legal positivist interpretation of the constitution (or constitutions as text), I maintain that state constitutions should be understood as an ideational-discursive realm of competing discourses, paradigms, and interpretations of an ideal state. My main argument states that oligarchic democracies emerge because a coalition of stakeholders that promote neoliberal understanding of the constitution has taken hold of this discursive realm of constitutional interpretation both within the state apparatus and the public sphere. Thus, the crisis of democratic representation and its relationship to constitutional design represents ideational and materialist aspects: oligarchs promote, reinforce, and sustain self-serving constitutional interpretations and discourses that reinforce the political logic of oligarchic wealth accumulation while suppressing the politics of peaceful dissent and distributive justice.

The disintegration of the Roman republic is presented as resulting from the excesses of the Roman oligarchy. The aristocracy of the period used exploitation & corruption to amass tremendous fortunes, & created an atmosphere of conflict & rivalry resistant to the development of a strong state. Growth of the empire enlarged the oligarchic competition, causing a breakdown of order that was reversed only by the dissolution of oligarchic democracy & the establishment of an imperial state by Julius Caesar. Arthur D. Kahn's The Education of Julius Caesar: A Biography, a Reconstruction(New York: Shocken Books, 1986) is referenced frequently in discussion of Caesar's role in reform of the Roman government & the myth of Roman republican virtue. Some merit is found in Kahn's analogy of the corruption of the Roman republic & the degeneration of US politics. Examined in conclusion is the Roman preoccupation with property & its role in the republic's decline. D. Generoli

It is contended that the reformasi movement within Malaysian politics is a combination of democratization & oligarchic restructuring. An overview of the role of Anwar Ibrahim, a former official in the United Malays National Organization who was subsequently detained by the state, in the movement is presented; Ibrahim's political ideology is also reviewed. Although the reformasi movement adopted Ibrahim's understanding of social justice, it is asserted that several domestic & external factors gave strength to the movement, eg, Malaysia's increased reliance upon Japan & the West for certain resources. Despite his commitment to democratization, it is claimed that certain aspects of Ibrahim's philosophical beliefs support the reading of Malaysia's democratization as an oligarchic restructuring of the national political system. The prospects for a mass overthrow of the current government & of Ibrahim's ascendancy to prime minister are considered. J. W. Parker

Malaysia's impact on World Politics Exceeds the usual level of inf luence expected of a small state in an international system. It has exercised a leadership role in the Commonwealth, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the Non-aligned Movement and South-South Cooperation, and has tried to modify the agenda of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation through the East Asian Economic Caucus. In addition, Malaysia has championed selfdetermination, articulated an 'Asian' approach to the issues of human rights and democratization, and has contributed to international peace-keeping operations under the aegis of the United Nations, where it has also served as a non-permanent member of its Security Council and chaired its General Assembly. These achievements in themselves are sufficient to draw scholarly attention to Malaysia although, it must be admitted, that the arena of foreign policy itself is part of domestic politics. In this domain too, Malaysia has long been of interest to political scientists. For an ethnically divided society, Malaysia has maintained a remarkable record of political stability. This in turn had contributed to sustained development, and up till the advent in 1997 of the Asian financial crisis, Malaysia was poised to be the next newly-industrialized country in the Asia-Pacific.

This Open Access Edition of The Politics of Annexation presents a newly formatted version of the original 1982 edition. The text itself has been edited only for non-substantive style changes and corrections. The Preface, the new Introduction ("Fifty Years Later"), and the index were prepared especially for this edition. The original edition was published by Schenkman Publishing Company, Cambridge, Massachusetts, and is available online through the UR Scholarship Repository at https://scholarship.richmond.edu/bookshelf/307/ The Politics of Annexation examines the process of American cities using annexation of suburban areas as a tool to increase their tax base and generate new revenue. The authors find that the annexation by Richmond, Virginia of part of Chesterfield County in 1970 was in fact racially motivated, and a way to dilute the black vote. They examine the details behind the annexation as well as its aftermath in subsequent litigation, leading to the Supreme Court. They also study annexation cases in Houston and San Antonio, drawing parallels with Richmond regarding their racially-based annexation efforts. "The Politics of Annexation is one of the first scholarly attempts to explain the uniqueness of civil rights activism in Richmond"--Julian Maxwell Hayter, from his Preface. ; https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/politics_annexation/1000/thumbnail.jpg

American central cities have long faced problems associated with population losses and deteriorating economies. As middle-class citizens move to the suburbs and as shopping centers and industry join them, the city experiences considerable difficulty raising money to fund the services needed by its growing low-income population. Just as the dwindling middle class produces strains in the city's economy, it also alters and reshapes the contours of the city's politics. This was particularly true of the 1960s since the vast majority of the out-migrants was white and a large proportion of the growing number of low-income city residents was black. Cities that historically were dominated by the white elite were so changed demographically that the political status quo was threatened. Quick, effective remedies were necessary for the white elite to achieve political stability and to reduce the dangers confronting the established order. A strategy traditionally employed by most cities and still available to some cities is annexation. Such a strategy works equally well for cities faced with an erosion of established power as for cities encumbered with declining bases of public revenue. For those cities surrounded by suburban municipalities, annexation is a useless device. Other cities, however, by expanding their boundaries to include unincorporated suburban areas, can acquire additional land, commercial/industrial enterprises, and people, all of which may generate new revenue to match their increased expenditures. Furthermore, additional population drawn from predominately white suburbs may represent new votes for a city faced with an increasing black population. This strategy has proven to be particularly useful in the South where, generally, the annexation laws are less restrictive than those in other parts of the country, where the cities are less likely to be hemmed in by other municipalities, and where racial politics over the years has been most acute. After an eight year effort to expand its boundaries, the City of Richmond, Virginia, on January 1, 1970, annexed twenty-three square miles and 47,000 people from Chesterfield County. At first glance, apart from the length of time involved in the land acquisition, this 1970 Richmond annexation could be viewed as one of hundreds of municipal annexations since 1945. In fact, however, the boundary expansion was unique. It so captured the attention of public officials and academicians across the nation that it may now constitute the most celebrated municipal annexation in recent American history. Apart from the legal issues raised during the litigation following the annexation (U.S. District Court Judge Robert E. Merhige once classified the case as the most complex since the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka), and the questions which the case poses for urban planners, economists, and political and social thinkers, the annexation primarily reflects an intense power struggle between establishment whites and the city's activist blacks. It is the politics surrounding the Richmond annexation that invokes such interest among scholars and the lay public as well. This book constitutes a political analysis of the 1970 annexation. Specifically, this study explores the political rationale for annexation, the process by which the intent was converted into public policy and the political actors involved in the process. Though the study of. the annexation includes legal, economic, and urban planning issues, those issues are only peripheral to the central concern-power. ; https://scholarship.richmond.edu/bookshelf/1325/thumbnail.jpg