http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/7870 Thu, 23 May 2013 05:21:33 GMT 2013-05-23T05:21:33Z http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/77829 Democratization and the development of Japan's uneven welfare state Shimabukuro, Yumiko T Comparative data reveal that Japan consistently has had one of the highest poverty rates among advanced industrialized nations, yet its government taxes the poor more heavily and gives them less in public cash transfers than its peers. Why does a country, endowed with democratic institutions, deep pockets, and a sizable social welfare system provide so little public assistance to the poor? I identify two features of Japan's political and economic development that gave rise to a distinctively threadbare safety net. First, the country's late-developer status paired with state-led industrial development incentivized the primary interest groups-namely, the agrarian landlords, industrialists, and organized labor-to oppose redistribution. Second, the manner in which democratic institutions were introduced in the late nineteenth century and the subsequent expansion of suffrage enabled these groups to gain political influence and block expansion of poor relief in the Diet. Beyond formulating redistributive policies, they locked in the minimalist pattern of redistribution by denying the poor the right to vote (pre-1945) and adopting an electoral system that muted their political voice after suffrage was obtained (post-1945). Consequently, Japan's welfare state developed unevenly, featuring a heavy layer of social insurance programs that benefit well-organized interest groups and an exceptionally minimalist public assistance program for the poor. Thus, contrary to extant theories that associate democracy, economic modernization, and a robust labor movement with higher social spending for the poor, I show that these factors stifled redistribution in the case of Japan. My findings strongly suggest that how a country built its democracy and wealth influences whether a welfare state reinforces or ameliorates existing inequality. Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Political Science, 2012.; Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.; Includes bibliographical references (p. 320-343). Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/77829 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/77824 States of the nations : nationalism, narratives and normative change in Postwar Japan Boyd, James Patrick, 1971- This dissertation evaluates claims that nationalism is rising in post-Cold War Japan by first noting the disconnect between existent social science conceptions of nationalism and those needed to examine how nationalism might change in contemporary, peaceful, wealthy, and stable democracies such as postwar Japan. This study defines nationalism as a discourse that constructs and reconstructs points of identification and differentiation that define both a political community (i.e. "nation") and the form of its domain over a modern territorial state. It argues nationalism is best understood as reoccurring "nation-state narratives" that tell the story of how the nation's putative qualities or past experiences define the present nature of its territorial state. Change in nationalism is evaluated through content and discourse analysis of five narratives expressing the relationship between the Japanese people and their state in a sample of elite discourse drawn from the period 1952-2007. The analysis reveals that references to all five narratives peak in the immediate postwar period and again in the 1980s before declining to lows in the post-Cold War period, which also saw the highest level of contestation over these narratives in the nearly sixty years of the study. In particular, the narrative depicting Japan as an anti-militarist/pacifist nation-state as well as the narrative emphasizing Japan as an ethnically homogeneous nation-state proved the most contested during this period, while the narrative affirming Japan as a democratic nation-state went uncontested. Political struggles over reforming institutions associated with the narratives were found to be the major drivers behind these changes, although characteristics of the narratives, especially the specificity of their normative claims, also shaped this process. The post-Cold War period is thus one of transition in nationalist discourse in Japan, although the scale of change is somewhat limited. For example, while the anti-militarist/pacifist narrative saw exceptions attached to many of its normative claims, its anti-nuclear components and cognitive claims remained unchallenged. Finally, Japanese nationalist discourse continued to legitimate democracy and was found to shape important electoral reforms, even as it shifted away from more insular and exclusionary forms, which may create space for more open immigration policies moving forward. Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Political Science, 2012.; Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.; Includes bibliographical references (p. 447-467). Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/77824 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/77643 Playing favorites : Washington's meddling for peace in the politics of Israel and the Palestinian Authority Weinberg, David Andrew Governments often try to use their foreign policies to influence the choice of who will rule in other countries. However, scholars know strikingly little about this commonplace and consequential phenomenon, especially when it is scoped down to the use of diplomatic tools short of force. Indeed, this lacuna is especially striking in comparison to the voluminous literatures on other forms of international meddling such as military intervention or coercive diplomacy for producing policy change. This project seeks to contribute to the nascent research program on partisan intervention by drawing on the historical record to pose tentative answers to two pertinent research questions in the context of America's Mideast policies. The first topic focuses on occurrence: when are sender states likely to engage in this behavior, and when are they less likely to do so? The second topic focuses on efficacy: when does this policy help achieve the sender state's objectives, and when does it fail? This project seeks to answer these questions by drawing on Washington's peace process diplomacy. It uses official archives and expert interviews to supplement the existing historiographic record, documenting America's efforts to bolster perceived pro--peace leaders in Israel since 1977 and among the Palestinians since 1986. It also explores U.S. decision--making toward Iran as a shadow case for leverage over additional study variables, along with other instances of outside intervention into Israeli politics by European or Arab states. It finds that the issue area of leadership selection intervention is unusually subject to the individualistic preferences of top leaders in the sender state. Because exceptionally blatant meddling of this sort tends to elicit a backlash, self-admitted LSI is therefore discouraged. Instead, practitioners go to great lengths to maintain alternative pretenses that prevent revelation of their true intentions. This inherently complicates the task of legislative oversight, decreases points of leverage for lobbyists or working--level bureaucrats, and magnifies these leaders' subjective interpretation of international circumstances. In short, LSI is intensely personal. Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Political Science, 2012.; This electronic version was submitted by the student author. The certified thesis is available in the Institute Archives and Special Collections.; Cataloged from student-submitted PDF version of thesis.; Includes bibliographical references (p. 819-878). Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/77643 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/74462 The limits of state building : the politics of war and the ideology of peace Radin, Andrew M. (Andrew Marc) When can the international community build strong state institutions - such as security forces or electoral institutions - in post-conflict societies? An influential technical perspective argues that authority, resources, and expertise enable the international community to build its preferred institutions. In Bosnia, East Timor, and Kosovo, the international community established international administrations with executive powers and a state building mandate. Each international administrations had extensive authority, resources, and expertise, which make them crucial test cases for the technical perspective. I examined seventeen reform efforts in these societies related to security, representation, and revenue. While some institution-building efforts succeeded, many failed and provoked violence or undercut political development. To explain this variation, I propose a theory that specifies the mechanisms of the reform process. The theory is based on the interaction between the international administration, local elites, and the mass public of the post-conflict society. The mass public will protest when demands threaten nationalist goals, such as independence. Local elites, on the other hand, will privately obstruct reform to protect their informal patronage and corruption networks. International officials are ideologically committed to human rights and bureaucracy, which lead them to make overambitious demands. Moreover, competing goals and political friction among international organizations causes disagreement about which demands to make to local elites. The theory predicts that reform efforts only fully succeed when the international administration is unified and its demands threaten neither nationalist goals nor informal networks. I test the theory by conducting causal process tracing in the seventeen reform efforts. The case studies draw from fieldwork in each of these societies, as well as primary and secondary sources. Within these seventeen efforts, I identify fifty-seven stages of reform. Of these, forty confirm the theory's predictions and thirteen partially confirm the predictions. The case studies also demonstrate that the technical perspective, and other alternative hypotheses, cannot consistently explain state building. The dissertation has implications for broader state building efforts by the international community, and urges the adoption of an incremental approach to institution building that takes account of the realities of local politics and the corresponding limits of international authority. Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Political Science, 2012.; Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.; Includes bibliographical references. Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/74462 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z