State Crises and Regime Type

Guo, Gang
Department of Political Science
University of Rochester
December 1998

Barrington Moore. Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy.

Samuel Huntington. The 3rd Wave: Democratization in the Late 20th Century.

Theda Skocpol. States and Social Revolutions.

G. Bingham Powell, Jr. Contemporary Democracies.

These four classic works in comparative politics seems to deal with very different topics across different countries over long periods of time in history. Despite these superficial differences, common themes abound. In this paper I will try to cut across the common themes and concentrate on one of the interesting common topics covered by all these classics, that is, the causes and consequences of crises, the situation where the social order is at stake and the state is fundamentally threatened. Special attention will be paid to the differences in the operations of the mechanisms in democratic and non-democratic regimes. From this brief examination of the causes and consequences of crises in different political settings, I attempt to draw some linkage between state crises and regime type.

I. Causes of Crises

In this section, I will regard the state crises as the dependent variable and try to discern some common patterns proposed by these authors that end up in crises. However, since it is almost impossible to single out only one independent variable, and since almost all the authors of these classics employed varied explanatory variables, I suppose it would be desirable if these varied variables are categorized in a clear manner. One way to look at it, as Huntington (p. 36) and Kitschelt proposed, is to differentiate between structural and procedural causes. At this dimension, the dichotomy is between those (structural) variables that are exogenous constraints on the actors and those (procedural) variables that represent the actors?strategic moves. Another possible dimension, as pointed out in Skocpol (p. 47) and in the critiques to Moore, is the domestic (internal) versus international (external) causes of the crises. Thus we get the following table:

Causes of Crises	Structural variables	Procedural variables
Internal variables	economic development, social cleavages, institutions, etc.	political leadership, strategic efforts, etc.
External variables	international competition, military threat, etc.	foreign policy choice by major states and institutions, etc.

Apparently, according to the points made in the books, both the structural and procedural variables, and both the internal and external variables are necessary conditions for a state crisis. It would be more interesting, though, to look at these groups of variables from the perspective of regime type, that is, the actual working of the causal mechanisms in democracies and non-democracies.

Internal structure

Domestic economy is an important factor in bringing about crises in both democracies and non-democracies. On one hand, as pointed out by Powell (p. 37) and implicitly or explicitly raised by the other authors, "economic development and modernization are expected to be associated with a citizenry more easily engaged in the political process" and thus creating potential for state crises in non-democracies. On the other hand, economic crises or failure poses serious threat to both democracies and non-democracies, although according to Huntington (p. 61) and Powell (p. 41), economic failures are less likely to threaten richer democracies. Even in Moore's book (p. 459), we can draw the conclusion that the failure of commercialization in agriculture is a determinant of peasant revolutions that shook the state authority.

Another internal structural variable, somewhat linked with the economic variable, is the social cleavages. Again, Moore (p. 477) points to the class relationship between the peasantry and the landed upper class as the most important factor in causing state crises, while Powell (p. 42) also includes ethnic divisions in the discussion of political violence in democratic countries. Yet another kind of social cleavage that contributes to state crises is "the institutionalized relationships of the autocratic state organizations to the landed upper classes and the agrarian economies" as elaborated by Skocpol (p. 47). Here we don抰 see much differentiation between democracies and non-democracies, but two points are worth noting. First, the mechanism through which social cleavages cause state crises is their potential to be the basis for mobilization and organization for political ends. In democracies, these violent propensities, as Powell points out (p. 154), can be dampened and discontent channeled through legitimate and meaningful electoral participation, which are absent in non-democracies. Second, although it's possible for a non-democracy to suppress the effects of social cleavages through highly coercive means, the cleavages can still lead to devastating and bitter crises when the oppressive apparatus is weakened for some reason.

Internal process

One of the prominent internal procedural variables is political leadership. The strategic efforts by political élites can greatly increase the chance for a state crisis. Huntington even goes so far as claiming that "[h]istory, ? does not move forward in a straight line, but when skilled and determined leaders push, it does move forward" (p. 316). This is despite his previous chapters, which seem to put a little more emphasis on structural variables in bringing about crises in pre-democratization states. Moore (p. 479) also emphasized the role of political leaders as a necessary driving force in destructive peasant revolutions. The peasants had provided the "dynamite to bring down the old building"; however, only with the leadership from other classes can this revolutionary potential be realized. As to political leadership in democratic settings, Powell (p. 154) has made a compelling argument that deadly violence in democratic countries is a product of the strategic efforts of small groups of political élites. However, we can not thus draw the conclusion that political leadership works the same way in both democracies and non-democracies to bring about state crises, since in democratic settings, the role of leadership can have mixed effect. There are not only leaders striving for violence against the state, but also leaders aiming at the maintenance of democracy. The interactions between these two kinds of political leaderships largely determine whether the potential for crises can be realized.

External structure

Of all the authors, Skocpol probably relies most heavily on external structural variables, although the other authors also more or less make use of this dimension. In her discussion of the social revolutions, she expressly attributes the origin of the revolutionary crises to the inability of the old-regime states to meet the challenges of evolving international situations, such as the new military threats or the intensified competition from more economically developed powers abroad. Here it seems, again, that the differentiation between democracy and non-democracy is irrelevant. However, the external structural variables caused state crises only because those monarchical regimes discussed by Skocpol were constrained or checked in their adaptations to such new international situations by their domestically institutionalized relationships of the autocratic state organizations to the landed upper classes and the agrarian economies. In democratic regimes, this key chain in her explanation of the causal mechanism leading up to state crises would be missing, although it still requires further research whether democratic regimes would be better at adapting to changes in international structural situations.

External process

The most important external procedural variable that causes state crises is the foreign policy choices of the major states or international institutions. This point is made most forcefully by Huntington (p. 86), although he obviously only regard foreign actors as "hastening or retarding", but not deciding, the effects of economic and social development. A foreign actor committed to a cause different from the domestic status quo and who is also powerful enough to carry out actions would be a catalyst to state crises. For democratic states, the major external procedural influence leading up to state crises would have to be from a powerful authoritarian country or international institution. Such actors are becoming rare in world system. In today's world, with almost all the nations share a legitimate concept of democracy, only non-democratic nations would be likely to be affected by this external procedural variable.

II. Consequences of Crises

The most common and probably most obvious consequence of state crises would be the maintenance of the old regime. For whatever reason (but more often than not with force) the state, whether democracy or non-democracy, manages to survive the crisis. Huntington and Powell both discussed favorable conditions for the survival and consolidation of democracy.

However, since state crises significantly weaken the state, putting it under "cross-pressure", along Skocpol's reasoning (p. 47), non-democracies would lose its coercive power and be subject to social-revolutionary transformations. The consequences of such social revolutions are not necessarily a democratic state. As Moore points out (p. 414), only through the successful bourgeois revolutions which commercializes and modernizes the countryside and assimilates aristocracy and peasantry into the modern economy and polity will there be a liberal democracy like Britain, France, and the United States. There are certainly other ways for non-democracies to democratize as a consequence of state crises, as Huntington's accounts tell us. For democratic states, temporary or permanent military and executive coups occasionally replace democracies (Powell:170) and reverse waves occurred in each of the three waves of democratization (Huntington:290). However, considering all the common conditions weathered by both democratic and non-democratic states and the absolute and relative increase in the number of democracies, probably it's safe to say that democratic states are better at coping with state crises than non-democratic states do.

III. Conclusion

I have briefly discussed one of the common themes, the causes and consequences of crises under democracy and non-democracy, that cut across the four classics. The basic structure of my paper can be presented as the following figure:

From this examination, regime type really matters as concerns state crises. Democratic states not only can dampen or decrease the causal effect of the structural and procedural variables, but also can survive state crises at a better chance than non-democratic states.