A fundamental political-institutional question that has only recently received serious scholarly attention concerns the impact of different constitutional frameworks on democratic consolidation. Little systematic cross-regional evidence has been brought to bear on this question. This article reports the findings of the analysis of numerous different sources of data, all of which point in the direction of a much stronger correlation between democratic consolidation and the constitutional framework of pure parliamentarianism than between consolidation and pure presidentialism. The systematic analysis of these data leads the authors to conclude that parliamentarianism is a more supportive constitutional framework due to the following theoretically predictable and empirically observable tendencies: its greater propensity for governments to have majorities to implement their programs, its greater ability to rule in a multiparty setting, its lower propensity for executives to rule at the edge of the constitution and its greater facility in removing a chief executive if he or she does so, its lower susceptibility to a military coup, and its greater tendency to provide long party-government careers, which add loyalty and experience to political society. In contrast, the analytically separable propensities of presidentialism also form a highly interactive system, but they work to impede democratic consolidation by reducing politicians' degrees of freedom.

This article analyzes conflicts in the 1980s over the decentralization of bargaining between labor and capital in Sweden and Germany. The analysis highlights the role of institutional arrangements, some of them previously “dormant” politically, that mediated common pressures to enhance plant-level flexibility. Whereas the drive for plant flexibility in Sweden contributed to the demise of traditional bargaining arrangements, similar pressures in Germany were more successfully accommodated within its “dual” system. In both cases, institutional links among different levels and arenas of bargaining shaped the strategic interactions of labor and capital in ways that either complicated (Sweden) or facilitated (Germany) the search for compromise within traditional bargaining institutions. While confirming the central role of institutions in explaining cross-national variation in outcomes, the analysis also adds a dynamic element to institutional analysis, highlighting how changing substantive interests of political actors interact with preexisting institutions to produce distinctive patterns of stability and change.

Between the late 1970s and the early 1990s, after decades of trying to limit short-term international capital movements, advanced industrial states moved decisively in the direction of decontrol. What has driven this remarkable policy convergence? The answer lies not in ideological change or shifts in relative political power, but in the prior development of international financial markets and in the increasing globalization of business. In a policy environment fundamentally reshaped by these factors, financial institutions and multinational firms were able to threaten or implement strategies of evasion and exit. Thus, the usefulness of controls declined as their effective costs rose sharply. In this light, the cases of Japan, Germany, Italy, and France are examined. The analysis points to the tightening link between short-term capital movements and foreign direct investment, issues that have long been treated as conceptually distinct. It also underlines the intricate connection between national policies governing capital movements and those aimed at managing international financial markets.

After comparing the predictions of Marxist, moral economy, and rational-choice theories concerning collective actions by workers in Egypt in the period since the 1952 Free Officers coup, this article concludes that a moral economy perspective is best able to explain the nature and frequency of these protests. The supporting evidence is the correlation between labor protest and violations of workers' feelings of entitlement, as manifest in declining real wages or disruptions to established patterns of wage differentials. The targeting of state institutions, combined with the fact that workers have eschewed actual production stoppages in favor of symbolic protests, indicates a view of reciprocal rights and obligations between themselves and the state. The latter reinforces the moral economy by combining significant concessions with its repressive response to labor protests. Marxism proves unable to explain the largely defensive and reactive nature of labor protest, while rational-choice theory is reduced to efforts to quantify workers' reactions to this repression.

This review essay of four recent books on democratic transitions is written from the standpoint of contemporary South African politics. Each of the books takes the Schumpetarian model of democratic politics for granted, and in the course of evaluating them the author explores the advantages and limitations of that model for thinking about the prospects for democracy in South Africa. He concludes that the Schumpeterian model diverts attention from questions that should concern promoters of democracy. The most important such questions deal with the internal structure of political parties, public organizations, and civil institutions.