Democratization, Civil Society, and Illiberal Middle Class Culture in Pacific Asia

Jones, David Martin

doi:10.2307/422285

Cited by 64 publications

(47 citation statements)

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“…They would not demand regime change if it jeopardized their interests. In other words, for the middle class, the equilibrium that could arise from modernization is a preference for political security and the status quo via cozy relationships with political elites or bureaucrats [16]. For this reason, although it may be true that the middle class is a product of economic development, it does not necessarily follow that it would act as the agent of democratization.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 97%

The Attitudes of the Chinese Middle Class Towards Democracy

Tang

Woods

Zhao

2008

J OF CHIN POLIT SCI

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Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen. Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Abstract Beyond the hopes placed in Africa's emergent middle class as an engine of economic growth, some analysts see this group as a bastion of political stability and enduring de-mocratisation across the continent. This paper's approach differs from that of most studies, which treat the middle class as a homogeneous group, through two key contributions. First, using cluster analysis, I propose a novel way of conceptualising social class that broadly draws on the Weberian idea of shared life chances. I apply this method to South Africa and identify five social classes characterised by their members' living standards, overall life satisfaction, and self-perceived upward mobility. Second, the empirical analysis reveals significant discrepancies in attitudes towards democracy between the downwardly and upwardly mobile strata of the middle class, which I term the "anxious" and the "climbers," respectively. On the one hand, the "climbers" show the highest generic support for democracy as a form of government, whereas the "anxious" middle class displays feelings of resignation. On the other hand, I find indicative evidence of a status-quo bias among the "climbers." Rather than assuming a more demanding or critical stance in politics, they allow their political priorities to be at least partly shaped by an interest in securing and expanding attained living standards; being upwardly mobile is even associated with a higher tolerance for government attempts to constrain freedom of information, opinion, or expression. Simone Schotte, M.A. is a doctoral research fellow at the GIGA and a member of the Globalisation and Development (GlaD) research training group at the University of Göttingen. In her dissertation she investigates the economic and political role played by the new middle classes in emerging and developing countries with a focus on South Africa. GIGA Working Papers 304/2017

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Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 97%

The Attitudes of the Chinese Middle Class Towards Democracy

Tang

Woods

Zhao

2008

J OF CHIN POLIT SCI

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“…The ambiguous role of the middle class in democratization has been noted by various case studies around the world [13,26,42,43]. Scholars have primarily attributed this to the dependency nature of the middle class [25,40,44]. That is, the middle classe in late developers relies on the cozy connection with state agencies and political elites for their survival and prosperity and thus is reluctant to challenge the existing political economic arrangement.…”

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confidence: 94%

The Political Behavior of the Chinese Middle Class

Tang

2011

J OF CHIN POLIT SCI

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For many, the future of China's political development hinges upon the role of the newly rising middle class. However, little has been done to empirically examine the characteristics of the Chinese middle class. This paper is an effort to fill in this gap. It shows that, the Chinese middle class pays greater attention to politics and engages more in informal/personal activities in dealing with conflicts with government policies or officials. However, the behavior of the middle class as an aggregate is not significantly different from that of other classes when it comes to political activities that require greater civic engagement or greater courage to confront the political system. The members of the Chinese middle class are not ready to be agents of political development in action although they hold higher democratic attitudes in mind as shown in previous studies.

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“…Even in genuine democracies, there is increasing evidence that South-East Asia's middle classes are less committed to democracy than political theory would have us believe (Dore et al 2014). In Thailand, for instance, the Bangkok-based elite have confounded democratic theory by showing themselves to be actively hostile to majority rule, both before and after the military coup of 2006 (Jones 2005). Particularly since Thaksin Shinawatra rewrote the rule book for winning elected office, the Thai middle classes' distaste for majority rule has been on full display, at one stage occupying the main airport to campaign against the elected government and demonstrating repeatedly against one-man, one-vote democracy.…”

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confidence: 99%

An Elephant’s Graveyard? Democracy and Development in East Asia

Reilly

2016

Gov. & oppos.

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Using Przeworski et al.’s paradigmatic work on democracy and development as a touchstone, this review examines East Asia’s lessons for comparative politics. It focuses particularly on the challenges that China and South-East Asia present for modernization theory, a foundation stone of political science. In most of the rich world, including north-east Asian cases of modernization such as Korea and Taiwan, economic development and democratization have tended to go hand in hand. In South-East Asia, by contrast, almost none of the expected relationships between democracy and development seems to work. The most striking anomaly of all today is China, which appears to be moving ever further away from democratic reform as it grows richer. This disjuncture between theory and practice is explored, along with other, more positive, East Asian contributions to scholarship on democracy and development.

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Democratization, Civil Society, and Illiberal Middle Class Culture in Pacific Asia

Cited by 64 publications

References 0 publications

The Attitudes of the Chinese Middle Class Towards Democracy

The Attitudes of the Chinese Middle Class Towards Democracy

The Political Behavior of the Chinese Middle Class

An Elephant’s Graveyard? Democracy and Development in East Asia

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