Democratization and Financial Reform in Taiwan: The Political Economy of Bad-Loan Creation

This study shows that many bad loans now burdening Taiwan's financial institutions are interrelated with the society's democratization which started in the late 1980s. Democratization made the local factions and business groups more independent from the Kuomintang government. They acquired more political influence than under the authoritarian regime. These changes induced them to manage their owned financial institutions more arbitrarily and to intervene more frequently in the state-affiliated financial institutions. Moreover they interfered in financial reform and compelled the government to allow many more new banks than it had originally planned. As a result the financial system became more competitive and the qualities of loans deteriorated. Some local factions and business groups exacerbated the situation by establishing banks in order to funnel funds to themselves, sometimes illegally. Thus many bad loans were created as the side effect of democratization.

The Experience of the National Rainbow Coalition (NARC) : Political Parties in Kenya from 1991 to 2007

This paper first examines splits and mergers among Kenya’s political parties (and inner-party factions) from the restoration of a multi-party system in 1991 until 2007, before the turbulent 10th general elections were conducted. It then considers what functions “political parties” have in Kenya with special reference to the period since 2002, the year in which President Moi announced his intention to retire. A look back at NARC’s five years of rule reveals that, although it succeeded in changing the government, NARC, as a “political party,” remained throughout an organization without any real substance. The paper looks at (1) NARC’s de facto split after its overwhelming win in the ninth general election, (2) malfunctions of the anti-defection laws that were introduced in the 1960s, and (3) Kenya’s election rules that require candidates to be nominated by registered political parties in general elections. The paper proceeds to argue that as a result of the operation of these three elements, Kenya’s political parties, and especially the victorious coalition sides, tend to end up being nothing more than temporary vehicles for political elites angling for post-election posts.

「アラブの春」後の移行期過程 -- 帰結を分ける諸要因

Diverging outcomes are unfolding in the post-Arab Uprising countries' transitional processes. In January 2014, Tunisia successfully adopted a new constitution based on a consensus of the opposing political parties and factions. In contrast, Egypt abolished one constitution and hastily instituted another in a time span of slightly more than a year. Yemen has announced the final document of the National Dialogue Conference in the same month. Libyans finally voted for the long awaited and disputed elections of the Constitutional Drafting Committee in February 2014. The paper picks up three factors which seem to be influential in determining the modality of transitional political process in the four Post-Arab spring countries. The first is the initial conditions of the transitional politics.. Differences in the way the previous regimes collapsed are analyzed to illuminate the continuity and break of the ruling institutions and state apparatus. The second factor is the type of the interim government. In line with Shain and Linz typology, provisional, power-sharing, caretaker, and international interim government models are applied to clarify the types of interim governments in each four countries' different phases in transitional politics. The third is the "rules of the game," particularly those pertaining to the constitutional process. Who set what kind of rules and how are to be considered in each of four countries and possible influences of each set of the rules of the game to the diverging results of the transitional politics are considered.