In this paper, I assume that global intergovernmental organizations (GIGOs) function as “enablers” of interstate liberal politics by way of their multilateral institutional frame-works. To support this view, I recall and adapt the classical concept of “polyarchy,” coined in the early...

The aim of this study is to discover the role played by regimes of exception (RoEs) in contemporary Bolivian politics. RoEs have been seldom studied by political scientists, despite constituting a key legacy of authoritarian regimes that have survived the transitions to democracy in Latin...

Whereas the European Union (EU) favors a formal, binding, output-oriented, and to some extent supranational approach to cooperation, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is based on informal, non-binding, process-oriented intergovernmental forms of cooperation. This article...

The literature on institutional determinants of intra-state violence commonly asserts that the presence of multiple political parties reduces the conflict potential within countries; by co-opting oppositional groups into an institutionalized political arena, dissidents would prefer...

The contemporary politics of China reflect an ongoing effort by the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to claim the right to rule in light of the consequences of economic development, international pressures, and historical change. China stands out within the Asian region for the success the...

Since the sweeping (re)introduction of multiparty systems in the early 1990s almost all sub-Saharan countries have introduced bans on ethnic or – in more general terms – particularistic parties. Such party bans have been neglected in research, and this paper engages in a preliminary analysis...

Drawing on the history of statebuilding in Western Europe, fiscal sociology has proposed the existence of a mutually reinforcing effect between the emergence of representative government and effective taxation. This paper looks at the case of Benin, a low-income West African country that...