Revisiting Party Institutionalization, Party System Institutionalization, and Democracy with Ethnopolitics and Psychoanalysis: Cases of Asia and Europe
escrito por Dini Harmita
[Abstract]
System and institutionalization tend to be fascinating to research because they require a comprehensive study not only on the elements but also on the interactions between them. As entities, political parties are parts of at least one political system. Nonetheless, it doesn't always mean that Party Institutionalization is part of Party System Institutionalization. This paper argues that seeing both deeper with more meso-micro-minded methodologies such as ethnopolitics, psychoanalysis, and anthropology could help us understand the relationships better. By taking cases of Asia and Europe, this paper concluded that the provision of data is crucial for any analysis. Each methodology has its strengths and weaknesses. They should only be tools for us to reach our objective, not the goal itself. In the case of Europe, the data to be analyzed quantitatively is much more complete, and comprehensive than in Asia. Thus, it’s worth using those meso-micro-minded methodologies. Interestingly, it’s not only for understanding Asia; but also, to comprehend Europe better and eventually compare it with Asia accordingly. Revisiting Party Institutionalization, Party System Institutionalization, and democracy is only one of the ways to prove that. The author believes since everything in this universe is related and interacts similar methodologies could also be applied for other courses and discourses.
Keywords: Party Institutionalization, Party System Institutionalization, Democracy, Ethnopolitics, Psychoanalysis, Asia-Europe
I. Introduction
1.1 Party Institutionalization
Casal Bértoa (2017) summarized the dimensions of Party System Institutionalization (PSI) with stability as the main indicator; rootedness and behavioral routinization as the main indicators of Party Institutionalization (PI). He concluded that democracy tends to be less collapsed when the political parties (system) reach certain stability. That instability is further termed as democracy backsliding.
Some scholars including Kazantsev, Rutland, Medvedeva, Safranchuk (2020), and Bassin (2022) differentiated ethnopolitics and geopolitics based on the social units, entities, or universe of their research. Petsinis (2019) studied Serbia where the Party Institutionalization (PI) tended to be dynamic from 2000 – to 2021 and declined from 2011 (Fig. 1), and Latvia where Party Institutionalization tended to decline from 2001 (Fig. 2).
Fig. 1 Party Institutionalization in Serbia 2000 - 2021
Source: Casal Bértoa, F. (2024): Database on WHO GOVERNS in Europe and beyond, PSGo. Available at: whogoverns.eu
Fig. 2 Party Institutionalization in Latvia 2000 - 2021
Source: Casal Bértoa, F. (2024): Database on WHO GOVERNS in Europe and beyond, PSGo. Available at: whogoverns.eu
PI in both figures is measured by using the average party age and Electoral Party Dominance (EPD) index as the indicators. Also following PI graphs of Liechtenstein (Fig. 3) and Malta (Fig. 4) with the highest positive scores.
Fig. 3 Party Institutionalization in Liechtenstein2000 - 2021
Source: Casal Bértoa, F. (2024): Database on WHO GOVERNS in Europe and beyond, PSGo. Available at: whogoverns.eu
Interestingly, the PI in Latvia tends to decline since 2001 and Liechtenstein ten years after; like the term when the history tends to be repeated. Nonetheless, Liechtenstein had a slightly consistent improvement from 2013 to 2020 and Latvia had a brief rise in 2009.
Fig. 4 Party Institutionalization in Malta 2000 - 2021
Source: Casal Bértoa, F. (2024): Database on WHO GOVERNS in Europe and beyond, PSGo. Available at: whogoverns.eu
What a beautiful line Malta's PI from 2000 – to 2021 is; constant and consistent. Given that Asia's data is not yet available, it may be worth looking at the PI in Asia from different indicators. Comparing apples and pears will only result in a very shallow conclusion where pears have more water than apples, thus using the same methodology for the cases of both continents perhaps will bring brighter lights to understand better the relationships between party institution and PSI that will eventually be useful for any dimension of democracy.
1.2 Party System Institutionalization
Indicators used for measuring PSI by most scholars are different from PI because of the units. Nonetheless, they're related. PI is mainly measured with as micro and meso indicators as behavioral routinization while Party System Institutionalization with stability (Casal Bértoa2017; Harmita 2022).
From Fig. 1 – 4 we could already see that Malta has more stability than others. We could say the higher the PI the more stable the party system through its institutionalization is. Nonetheless, let's take a look at Spain’s case where PI tended to decline immensely in 2014 – 2015 (Fig. 5) and Portugal's (Fig. 6) case where the graph looks much more beautiful and interesting than Malta's.
Fig. 5 Party Institutionalization in Spain 2000 - 2021
Source: Casal Bértoa, F. (2024): Database on WHO GOVERNS in Europe and beyond, PSGo. Available at: whogoverns.eu
Fig. 6 Party Institutionalization in Portugal 2000 - 2021
Source: Casal Bértoa, F. (2024): Database on WHO GOVERNS in Europe and beyond, PSGo. Available at: whogoverns.eu
We could dig into the EU's accession of each country and its influence on PI, PSI, and eventually democracy but it's not that significant. For example, both Spain and Portugal were accessed in 1986 but they show different results. Malta and Latvia were assessed in 2004 but the scores are completely different. Nothing crucial happened in the same countries in 2011 and 2013 either, thus this paper is aimed at studying per case.
II. Research Question and Methodologies
2.1 Research Question
Upon the abovementioned explanations, this paper is trying to understand the relationships between PI and PSI better and deeper through methodologies where we could analyze the social units in micro and meso ways, levels, and scopes that could also explain its rootedness in behavioral routinization. Since 'better' is very subjective, the indicators used consist of indicators related to democracy such as behavioral routinization and stability. Henceforth the research question is formulated as 'how to better understand the relationships between PI, PSI, and democracy more microscopically?'.
2.2 Cases
As mentioned in the introduction, six European countries namely Serbia, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Malta, Spain, and Portugal cases were chosen to explain the varied cases. Liechtenstein and Malta are two small countries close to their ethnicity or locality characteristics. Serbia has a history as part of Yugoslavia with rich ethnicities. Without a doubt, the flavorful experiences of Spain and Portugal with their political parties and democracy including the monarchies consisting of diverse ethnicities could figure in the comprehension.
Lee and Casal Bertoa (2021) defined Asia as the home of democracy. Thus, to complete this, four Asian countries with similar cases are analyzed. Those four cases are Indonesia to represent South East Asia, Georgia for Central Asia, Nepal for South Asia, and Japan for East Asia. Notwithstanding, other country cases are also included simultaneously.
Indonesia is similar in the sense of tribe dominants and dynastic families. Georgia is classified as part of both Europe and Asia where the very current conflicting Crimea conflicts as part of Russia's aggression in Ukraine also influence. Among South Asian countries, Nepal has relatively fewer dramas yet deep and meaningful wisdom in its politics thus it is worth seeing rootedness as part of its behavioral routinization, Party Institutionalization, Party System Institutionalization, and eventually democracy. In East Asia, Japan, China, and South Korea have the strength to stabilize and sustain their politics though not necessarily democracy. Nevertheless, Japan with its dominant and traditional party is analyzed to also help answer the research question.
2.3 Methodologies
A literature review is the nucleus methodology for data collection and analysis. It includes analyzing the database as mentioned in Chapter I. It also comprises quantifying the qualitative data when it's necessary. The author doesn't use any particular software for both collecting and analyzing the data. Nonetheless, the cases could be treated as both collective and comparative cases for there are efforts to see the similarities and differences between cases before, during, and or after the cumulative process. Mathematically, the research result is going to be summarized in the form of diagrams with percentages.
2.4 Hypothesis
Since political parties are part of the PSI, it's only logical to say that PI is part of the PSI. Nonetheless, to which extent and how to describe the percentage, for example, would be analyzed using the following diagram as the framework.
Democracy
Fig. 7 Framework Diagram
Based on the aforementioned explanations and framework, the hypothesis would be that 'the relationships between Party Institutionalization, Party System Institutionalization, and democracy could be understood more microscopically by also analyzing its micro and meso indicators including behavioral routinization. To do so, at least two related detailed methodologies namely ethnopolitics and psychoanalysis will be utilized.
III. Ethnopolitics in Liechtenstein andPsychoanalysis in Nepal
Ethnopolitics and psychoanalysis in this paper are used for analyzing, describing, and analyzing rootedness in politics and democracy including party institutionalization and party system institutionalization. Term ‘meso-micro’ in social sciences is used to explain scopes. The idea is to understand the smaller level or entities than societies, be it nucleus group such as families or other such as communities, dyads, ethnicities, and kinships. Thus, this paper is using at least both to complete the other secondary data.
The smaller the area the easier to conduct the analysis;such as in Liechtenstein and Malta, two European microstates that were also discussed and edited by Casal Bértoa and Patrick Dumont (2022). Veenendaal (2022) tends to analyze Liechtenstein by comparing it mainly with Luxembourg and Swiss. The comparison results at least following distinctive characteristics of Liechtenstein, especially its party politics.
In addressing the Principality of Liechtenstein to the Czech Republic and the Republic of Austria, Kothbauer(2020) called the people of Liechtenstein as diligent, flexible, and logical. Despite the sovereignty issue challenges faced by the three countries, Liechtenstein citizens tend to be called successful economically. One of the indicators is that Research and Development as part of their education has led 9% GDP increase with mostly industrial sectors and 55% exports. Interestingly, the government is considered as brave enough to take unpopular issues. They're also well known to be having feasible solutions for the inhabitants.
Kothbauer (2020) also mentioned that those inhabitants have more job offers than their demands. Thus, they don't need to work full-time as Member of Parliaments(MPs). Their civil servant ratio is relatively low (21% from around 850) compared to Austria (48%), Germany (44%), Switzerland (33%), and Europe (46%). She also highlighted that Liechtenstein, the Czech Republic, and Austria are intertwined historically as the part of Danube Monarchy. Liechtenstein may not be part of the European Union (EU); nonetheless, it's connected with through European Economic Area (EEA).
On the contrary, Bhutanese Nepali communities delivered their hopelessness through their poems that were beautifully analyzed both through ethnography and psychoanalysis including its relation with cultural and political aspects by Timalsina (2020). One of the poems titled ‘My Many Ways’ represents how the trauma caused by mainly their homeland occupancy is not merely personal but also culturally and politically collective. The poem authors even called their homes as their wombs to make themselves feel the depth of their suffering mainly in the form of trauma. Since the trauma is perceived to be caused by wider entities than individuals, it becomes reality especially for them, as written by her as follows.
“Bhutanese Nepali diasporic community has gone through the same process and their poetic creations symbolize that historical reality”. (p144)
Timalsina (2020) mentioned that one of the poems even tells us how the author doesn’t want to be creative anymore because it tends to be dangerous for him. Thus, he tends to avoid any collaboration that involves ingenuities. It leads to distrust, as she stated below.
“Every man is an image of a carnivorous destroyer in his eyes. He believes that being away from the world is the single solution to the problems the world is undergoing these days”.(p141)
IV. Serbia as Part of the Balkans and Japan as Part of East Asia
Bjelić (2021) comprehensively discussed the Geo-Yugoslavian and eventually now called Balkan politics including Serbian not only with psychoanalysis but also pseudo-psychoanalysis. Having it summarized explains that symbolic capitals are indeed real, it’s a matter of how we analyze it. He first described the journeys of Julija Kristeva and Slavoj Žižek in using and developing the methodologies. Interestingly it involves their love and interest in linguistics. Likely, those who are in favor of the methodologies tend to like structured grammar, rich vocabularies, and soft and romantic pronunciations, such as French. Bourdieu’s indeed, not to mention also because Kristeva was at first Marx’s student. Like other countries in the Geo-Yugoslavia area, Serbia is not as liberal as Slovenia. It brings him to criticize the single market. The methodologies he learned from both Kristeva and Žižek, tend to transform each country’s potential into useless.
Okonogi (2022) briefly yet thoroughly described the history of psychoanalysis in Japan. Freud not only inspired European scientists and scholars including Kristeva and Žižek but also Heisaku Kosawa. Kosawaconcerned about WWII’s effects on Japanese society, before and after. Though Freud didn’t seem interested in Kosawa’s thesis when he met him in Austria, later on, Kosawa developed the methodology throughout the country based on what is applied in Europe and the United States. Nonetheless, there are also parts of rootedness developed in psychoanalysis in Japan. Those namely amae, Ajase, and Don’t Look. Amae is a Japanese word. It means sweet. Ajase complex represents two sides of coins where with desires come fears. While Don’t Look represents a deep indebtedness that eventually tends to lead to suicidal thoughts; like a child who is feeling guilty to be born but couldn’t do anything to repay it. Those bring the Japanese society to build, understand, and accept the concept of reincarnation as mentioned below.
“Whereas Freud based his Oedipus complex on a Greek tragedy, Kosawa developed his theory of the Ajase complex from stories found in Buddhist 11 A history of psychoanalysis in Japan scripture. The story of Ajase centers on the Buddhist concept of reincarnation”. (pp10-11)
For example, Ajase complex was explained as a woman who wants to have babies to secure the love and sweetness she gets from her husband. Nevertheless, because of that, she fears the babies at the same time to the point sometimes she wants to dismiss them. It’s lovely to read the conclusion of Okonogi (2022) where he said that hopefully the research with such methodologies will be continued and more useful for wider international communities; from Vienna to Europe, the United States (US), Japan, and the whole universe as he mentioned below.
“The psychoanalytic theory transmitted from the Vienna Psychoanalytic Institute via Kosawa forms the mainstream of psychoanalysis in Japan”. (p16)
As part of East Asia, Japan seems to make better use of psychoanalysis than China and South Korea simply because Japan takes it as part of medical methodology. While China and South Korea have their wisdom based on their rootedness. Though China may still have to suffer a bit from the world blaming them for COVID-19 they continue to develop their yin-yang balance nonetheless as parts of, not as the whole China; as explained by Hai (2023). He tried to see the positive sides of the minorities in the Inner Asian World as his research field or universe by reflecting on historical Chinese cases including Tibetan Buddhists, Uyghur Muslims, Taiwanese, and Mongols. As we know today media including TV has a huge influence especially since the media tends to be owned by the oligarchs. It happened since quite vintages ago. As mentioned by him below.
“The machinic synchrony of Tibetan TV-in-translation has a similar effect of political resocialization as obtained in the 476 Dalai Lama, HH (Tenzin Gyatso), Freedom in Exile: The Autobiography of the Dalai Lama (New York: HarperCollins, 1999): 232–33. 267 contexts of the Mandarinization of Uyghur classroom. Both are powerful crucibles of contemporary Chinese ethnopolitics, which favors the authoritarian certainty of a monocultural and a monoglot socio-political monolith with increasingly diminished space for pluralist cultural expression”. (pp66-267)
Nonetheless, the role of the minority when it’s discussed by also its inner tends to enable forms of government that are in favor of democracy and monarchy, not only oligarchy. Unlike the tyranny of the minority that caused democracy backsliding in the US discussed by Levitski and Ziblat (2023); Nevertheless, the small inners fixed it instead of the ‘great wall’ of China, as Hai (2023) described below.
“The minor dependency of Inner Asia arrived on scene not only as poor and needy, but also as unruly, seedy, and barbarizing. Over the last two-decades, screen images of barbaric space and China’s Wild West conjure up the imaginative terror of regions totally misaligned with the narrative of an ascendant nation-state. The rhetorical and discursive power such images generate is an Inner Asia out of synch with the modern world and thus requiring the Chinese state to develop it, fix it, and reform it”. (p273)
Hai (2023) also discussed his dissertation with the Ethnopolitics of Raison D’état. Sounds like Kristeva indeed. Somehow such analysis bridges and facilitates political surrealism and realism. When states have reasons, or when states become the reasons, the foreign and domestic policies become interconnected. Thus, though Hai (2023) discussed his arguments mostly and mainly by using domestic policies the readers understand the international relations; simply because the system institutionalization had happened.
None of us could stand such -tends to be barbaric- authoritarianism that long. One by one the inners of Asians in China declared their independence.
V. Spain, Georgia, Malta, and Portugal
Today is the era where we could lead from social media indeed, but it doesn’t feel right. Cancela and Goikoetxea (2023) mentioned that this tendency is currently happening in Spain. Cyberattacks are not something new. Nonetheless, it has become more severe since Russia’s aggression to Ukraine on 24 February 2022. Not only did it bring more trauma to certain people and more citizens, but also the far, extreme, and radical rights had spread their wings to join the crowd. Western Europe also gets the implication, including Georgia which is officially part of Europe in some contexts, and Asia in some other contexts.
Using Freedom House’s indicators, Malta’s freedom score in the world is 89/100 with immigration and asylum seekers becoming the current main challenges. Portugal’s is 96/100 with corruption as the primary concern. Spain is 90/100 with the rise of separatist groups as the crucial challenge. Georgia’s is 58/100 with corruption, transparency, and pressure towards journalism as the main concerns. According to Fig. 8 below, like Serbia and Liechtenstein, Georgia has tohave a declining Party Institutionalization score also since 2011.
Fig. 8 Party Institutionalization in Georgia 2004 - 2021
Serbia’s freedom score according to Freedom House is 60/100 with the rise of right wings and media as the main challenges. Interestingly, Liechtenstein’s is 90/100 with the monarchy’s role as one of the strengths.
VI. Comprehending Latvia
6. 1 The Latvians
Karklins (1994) wrote one book of comprehensive studies about Latvians in the 1990s especially 1989-1990 where they were in transition from the part of Soviet countries into Latvia. What she mentioned as Latvians as ethnicities represent the rootedness called local by Mansuri and Rao (2012). The difference is that Karklins used ethnology language while Mansuri and Rao have been in favor of development.
In institutionalization including PSI it is called part of behavioral routinization Harmita (2022) within rootedness to build a stable democracy Casal Bértoa(2017). Bourdieu (1986) called it a cultural capital. That’s why it’s institutionalized in the forms of education; when the education itself involves the exchange of knowledge and acquisition as how he described social capital is institutionalized with.
6.2 The Transition from Comparative until Ethnopolitics
Karklins (1994) discussed the transition of Latvia with historical timeline description. Like social movements in India that shaped their political parties, the transition in 1987-1991 was also filled with protests and demonstrations. Following the current conflicts in Eastern Europe, interestingly transition of Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia is different from the democratization process in Ukraine and Russia (Karklins 1994). One of the essential differences is in how they handle their foreign dominance.
Nineteen years later Levitski and Ziblatt(2023) mentioned that Vladimir Putin gathered the oligarchs to ensure them not to get involved in politics, especially democracy. The oligarchs are perhaps Russians, nonetheless their companies including manufacturing factories with billions of employees are scattered all over the world including in Latvia.
Karklins (1994) also discussed that the basis of the transition power comprises the military, police, and state. In 1994 when her book was written, agriculture was still the main sector everywhere, especially in Europe where it is taken care of, especially in developed countries. During the transition period, with a 4:3 ratio of population between Latvians and Russians, there were still more Latvians working in the agricultural sector as the dominant sector than the Russians. Nonetheless, during the same period, the Latvians had already been feeling uncomfortable with the interference of Russia especially in military and education.
6.3 Development in Latvia
When Dzenovska (2020) decided to title her paper “Emptiness: Capitalism without People in the Latvian Countryside’ it was predictable that their development would move in mainstream ways such as Japan. Interestingly, it doesn’t share the same political party dominance characteristics. There are no -one and only- dominant party, samurai, and yakuza in Latvia. Perhaps the last two are similar to the Russian oligarchy.
It’s in the eyes where we can see the blank space, that’s what Dzenovska (2020) explained as emptiness by analyzing the Latvian cases in the framework of global capitalism, especially Russian involvement. Even the apple trees and cemeteries next to the houses are abandoned.
In the case of other countries including Japan, the rural areas tend to be having such similar characteristics only when mortality and natality inequalities exist (Sen 1995). I genuinely thought that Russian large estate companies (Hess and Tammaru 2019) have nothing to do with democracy, unlike in developing countries such as Indonesia because the companies are different but of course, they have lots of things to do with.
It’s the common characteristic of real estate companies, especially the large ones, to approach the rural areas by buying and compensating the lands. Unfortunately, most of the time in less participatory ways and sometimes deceives the poor with temporary wealth.
In different ways, interestingly (Dahs, Berzins, and Krumins 2021) mentioned that nineteen years later in 2020 Latvians in their rural areas reached 600 times more. It causes other inequalities such as socio-economic including employment and basic facilities (Sen 1995). Nonetheless, it’s one of the indicators that democracy tends to be stable before Russia attacked Ukraine.
6.4 Routinization, Rootedness, and Democracy in Latvia
As mentioned by Rovney (2023), basically Latvians survived the stability because of their ethnic democracy, or localized development, and as closest to home: local democracy. The rise of right-wing parties in Europe including Le Pen could be triggered also by the awareness of the regeneration of local representations in their political parties. The right wings are learning from their mistakes to win. Nonetheless, learning from their previous awakening, the policies they produced tend to be still skeptical and worrisome that’s why we are all concerned.
In one of the graphs produced and described by Rovney(2023), Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia remain the stable ones; proving what Karklins (1994) mentioned nineteen years ago is still incredibly the same.
VII. Balancing Roles of Democracy and Monarchy and Ruling out the Oligarchy
According above passages, the countries tend to have stability when they have a balanced democracy and monarchy. Spanish politics and kingdom used to be the example some vintages ago but now Liechtenstein is. Latvia’s freedom score according to Freedom House is 88/100 with corruption and Russian ethnicities facing difficulties in finding jobs as primary concerns. Indonesia’s is the same as Georgia’s (58/100) with systemic corruption as the main problem. Nepal’s (58/100) is also the same as Indonesia's and Georgia’s, with corruption as the concern.
Corruption is attached to oligarchy. As a consequence, corruption doesn’t only happen in underdeveloped and developing countries but also in developed countries such as Japan though it has a 96/100 freedom score (Freedom House, 2023). Its challenge is the close relationship between government and business sectors. Nonetheless, when corruption in Indonesia is called systemic corruption, it sounds like it’s rooted as also part of its cultural and political life. Even the International Idea’s Global State of Democracy comprises the absence of corruption as part of the rule of law (International Idea, 2023). When corruption becomes systemic, it will take time to bring the wind of changes; not only in Indonesia.
In Nepal, the oppression was also used to silence people. They joined the UN in 1955 yet in 1996 they were still attacked with violence by the oligarchy system (Aryal, 2020).
VII. Rootedness, Behavioral Routinization, PI, PSI, and Democracy
The COVID-19 pandemic somehow shaped our behavioral routinization changes because we couldn’t go out and we accessed information by using the internet instead. False information is easily spread, especially from foreign governments with their interests of either protecting their countries or covering their flaws. Interestingly, the rating is high in Georgia but not in Taiwan as shown in Fig. 9 below.
Fig. 9 Foreign Governments Dissemination of False Information
Source: https://v-dem.net/gow.html
Thus, analyzing countries with both their domestic and foreign policies is worth the energy and time because both represent the rootedness and behavioral routinization inside out. Indonesia’s media censorship by the government in 2021 reached the highest among the countries in Southeast Asia as we can see in Fig. 10 below.
Fig. 10 Government Censorship Effort - Media
Source: https://v-dem.net/weekly_graph/government-media-censorship-efforts-in-southeast-a
Taiwan’s freedom score is 94/100 (Freedom House, 2023). Its main challenges are migrant worker’s exploitation and China’s interference in their democracy including through media. It is fascinating to know that Risteska and Trajanovska (2021) discussed sexual extortion or sextortion as an act of corruption in their report for The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe/Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (OSCE-ODIHR) by also learning from Taiwan’s experiences.
Eventually discussing the countries’ democracy including their party institutionalization and party system institutionalization requires us to also learn about populism and authoritarianism. China is well known, especially by scholars as one of the longest authoritarian countries with their communist party;besides Russia. That includes Kenji (2023) who wrote a paper about public participation between pro-environmental democracy and authoritarianism in China.
From the discussions chapter by chapter above we could recognize the following patterns.
China – (Oligarchy + Corruption) = Taiwan
Russia - (Oligarchy + Corruption) = Georgia
Indonesia - (Oligarchy + Systemic Corruption) = more democratized Indonesia
Portugal – (mainly Corruption) = more democratic Portugal = Portugal + Spain
I would like to try to confirm that populism – authoritarianism represented by mainly oligarchy and corruption = democracy + monarchy; with different levels because there are niches and nodes in every course and discourse. Nonetheless, we couldn’t say China and Russia are populist countries. Let’s take a look at the conceptual framework and keywords I put there as shown in following diagram in Fig. 11.
Fig. 11 Research Result Framework
Spain and Portugal used to be united in several kingdoms. Following the conflicts within Europe even until now such as between Russia and Ukraine, Fink (2024) gives an example of how dependency on authoritarianism towards weapons is severe. He stated that Russia used its weapons to attack Ukraine thus Myanmar needs to buy its ammunition from North Korea. Spain and Portugal have passed that dependency, nonetheless, the fights against democracy have changed following mainly the era of technology and responses to Russia’s aggression in Ukraine.
The aggression has made international, regional, and local entities at least realize a little bit more the importance of renewable energy and taking care of our mental health due to the misinformation, disinformation, and dissemination of false information. Spanish and Portugal governments are among the entities. Thus, the opposite sides have been feeling threatened. Some people even call it propaganda.
Nonetheless, borrowing Zelensky’s expression toward, propaganda or not people including innocent citizens died because of it. It takes scholars to ways of learning and trying to understand both authoritarian and populist characters a bit more. Nevertheless, few of us studied it with behavioral routinization.
Behavioral routinization is closed with formal-nonformal-informal education because our rootedness is shaped with; be it pedagogy or andragogy. Spanish and Portuguese are among the ancient civilizations that conquered Asia. Nonetheless, unlike Russia to Ukraine;they didn’t use such forces. Nevertheless, from time to time the oligarchy and corruption system that was threatened by the movement from mineral, oil, gas, and such energy touched European countries too, including Spain and Portugal. Not only far-radical-extreme rights and lefts in Spain and Portugal but in most European countries and the world were moved by any issues that would trigger them to keep the status quo. Tragically, the victims are the same as the corruption itself: the poor, vulnerable, and marginalized ones. Many of them didn’t know that they were being used for example for long marches of protest and demonstration.
Peasant movement such as in Poland is something else. They have a long history where the agrarian reform has been embedded in their blood. Spanish government could promote how good their tomatoes are, Indonesian farmers tend to always cry because the tomato’s price tends to be very cheap, but Polish farmers and their marketing-distribution system have proven how they could make the best use of their produce. From tomato soup to tomato ketchup and something in between, we can name it. Dramatically, it tends to be the governments who ruined it. Not only in Europe but also in Asia.
If the advanced European countries have such problems and challenges, how about Indonesia, Nepal, and Georgia with their 58/100 freedom score? Perhaps indeed through several collective and comparative cases, it’s proven that developed countries such as Japan tend to have higher freedom scores from Freedom House. Nonetheless, the Chinese case is different.
China has one communist party that led them to be called an authoritarian country. Though some of their citizens freak out of democracy we couldn’t call the country as one. Nonetheless, Taiwan with Chinese rootedness has it all to be one. They have one of the best herbal dried fruit and flower tea in the world, for balancing the Yin Yang. They respect Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer -or sometimes Questioning-, Intersex, Asexual, and others (LGBTQIA+) thus they legalized same-sex marriages; something that most Muslims in Indonesia couldn’t compromise with.
The multiparty system in Indonesia tends to be celebrated by most of the citizens, especially before elections with any kind of forms; attacks, promotions, supports, and or defenses. The little girls even want to be a president because of it. Nonetheless, if I were Freedom House, I would also score Indonesia below 60 for its freedom. First, because of the systemic corruption that has been embedded in even the right and left wings’ blood by justifying the corruption through the sharing of the ‘blessing’; especially given it’s the tax -citizens’ money- that tends to be corrupted.
Like the traumatic Nepalese, the individual corrupters were also driven predominantly by their behavioral routinization. China and Russia have similarities where they want to recruit back their ‘children’ countries. It tends to happen especially when they become successful in several aspects including capital focus and or accumulation; including in democracy. Authoritarian and populist leaders tend to want to learn democracy but are trapped by the idea of winning everything thus they would do anything to win elections and keep the status quo. Nevertheless, China is not that severe. It’s easy to negotiate with China. While with Russia, it takes the whole villages in the universe for them to fight against democracy. Thus, it takes at least the whole village too to defend it.
One of the interactions between and among rootedness, behavioral routinization, PI, PSI, and democracy is seen from the far-radical-extreme right and left wings. Russia’s Putin first asked -mainly from Christian ideologies- authoritarian countries and oligarchs to be their allies. Henceforth when he ran out of weapons and support, he asked Iran to support them with any issues mainly the defense system cooperation.
Foreign policies are fragile to be used indeed; that’s why the Nepalese diaspora and Inner Asian Worlds tend to be easily analyzed using them. Domestic policies can’t be separated solely from foreign policies because they are related. The most tragic one in Indonesia is when Jokowi was deceived by the oligarchs to enact a regulation where the plantation’s Land Use Right (Hak Guna Usaha/HGU) expiration period is extended from five to 25 years. It makes the companies escape the previously five-year renewal. Most of the companies belonged to Foreign Direct Investment or government projects that involve resources from outside.
Using psychoanalysis to study one of the big corruption cases in Indonesia namely the Beef Bribery Case that involved politicians from one of the right-wing parties; behavioral routinization also has a role in it. Popularly, we could call it a lifestyle.
Most of the time we need to judge books or papers by their covers indeed, but sometimes not. Allow me to use one of my very personal experiences when I was queuing at the backside of a poor farmer-looking lady in an Automatic Teller Machine (ATM). Accidentally, I saw her balance and it was 100,000,000 times from mine.
On the other hand, some women use their money to buy branded and expensive products. Little do we know that when we put our position on their husbands. The husbands may want to prove to the wives and families that they could make them happy with such forms of satisfaction. It’s not wrong at all. Nonetheless, like Spain which is accused of having fake online sovereignty; it doesn’t feel right when they’re using the corrupted money for that. Mafias may have a conceptual framework where the money could be shared with the poor indeed. Nevertheless, something too much tends to be less lasting.
It's also the cycle because what we read, what we watch, and what we listen, to tend to lead us to bring out the best versions of ourselves. Like projects and programs with their monitoring and evaluations, the media should take a role in providing and forming better shapes of their audiences. Learning from Russia and China, the roles of parents and wiser persons are also important in creating us.
Like Indonesians, every generation tends to have problems with their ‘parents’, mainly because of the ideology development be it theoretical or in practice. Okthariza (2023) discussed Indonesia’s PI and PSI by using several data including from the V-Dem Institute (V-Dem). It concluded that Indonesia relatively has a more stable pattern than Latin America. Nonetheless, compared to previous terms of analysis in the same country, the ideology issues and differences remain the main challenges.
Japan’s primary challenge in formulating and implementing PI and PSI is the competition of political actors. Vogel (2021) called competitions between political actors in Japan metaphorically like Rock Scissor Paper’s game. In Japanese, it’s called Jankenpon. It represents how each of them is waiting for their luck to win after counting the probabilities.
It happens everywhere. Nonetheless, something interesting is that perhaps indeed once they participate as political actors winning becomes everything and the only thing. Thus, for example in Indonesia, there’s a candidate named Prabowo who never won and keeps trying. Henceforth, political parties tend to prepare for the next elections to win once they lose. Not to mention, sometimes it takes too much money. Rumors in Indonesia say that even local politicians became crazy because of using much money they lost. Another interesting thing is to see the tendency of such a game. For example, Latin American politics tends to be analyzed with a football analogy; while Russians like to play chess.
Chetri (2020) discussed the interactions between political actors as part of PSI in Nepal as unholy relationships. She mentioned that political leaders tend to be trapped in receiving money from donors making the monarchy unconstitutional. Thus, whatever the type of the games, elections tend to be irregular, including the very current Serbia’s in December 2023. The election is commonly suspicious because there are phantom voters (Pavlović, 2024). The houses were emptied like in Latvia where Putin sent the immigrants to the borders. In Serbia, it is framed as the phantom voters.
Reading about Maltese rootedness as part of Europe makes me feel goosebumps at how deeply it tends to be discussed. Rotengruber (2022) as the editor of the book mentioned it as not merely interactions between PI, PSI, and democracy; but within individuals themselves. He mentioned that criticism towards others is as important as its reflection and practices by ourselves. Thus, to understand comprehensively a bit more, I put the abovementioned analyzed countries in the following table of summary (Table 1).
Table 1. Summary of Cases
a Mainly derived from Freedom House Country Report (2023) then combined with other sources mentioned and discussed in the text
b As mentioned in the main text, Taiwan’s freedom score is 96/100 (Freedom House, 2023)
c This is classified as positive part or strength instead of challenge. It’s mentioned there to be easily compared with others
From Table 1 we would be able to acknowledge that the distinctive differences between authoritarianism, populism, and democracy could be seen in Europe than in Asia. Authoritarianism and populism in Indonesia tend to be mixed up. As we can see from the table, it has a positive relationship with the freedom score.
In Fig. 11 Spanish and Portuguese were mentioned as having a long history yet tends to be repeated in other cases, including in Nepal where the political leaders tend to find it difficult to resist donations that make the monarchy less and unconstitutional. Henceforth, Liechtenstein with its success story is worth revisiting.
VIII. Conclusion
Casal Bértoa, Enyedi, and Mölder (2023) discussed which comes first, PI or PSI? Rotengruber (2022) made an analogy on eggs or chicken first. In the conclusion part, Casal Bértoa, Enyedi, and Mölder (2023) mentioned that the logics of interactions between systems need to be understood through performances of the abstraction, as Rotengruber (2022) concluded. Casal Bértoa, Enyedi, and Mölder (2023) also stated that to comprehend that we need to analyze the political system comprehensively like Rotengruber (2022) mentioned about the role of the brain and psychomotor. Casal Bértoa, Enyedi, and Mölder (2023) eventually described one of the ways to perform it is by holistically setting roles of parties and their systems in the political system, like Rotengruber (2022) described scholars as also a mass society.
To answer the question of 'how to better understand the relationships between Party Institutionalization, Party System Institutionalization, and democracy more microscopically?', we don’t need to research the relationships between PI, PSI, and Democracy deeper because it’s written in any paper by any scholar, though sometimes still indirectly. Nonetheless, the author hopes this paper will enrich at least the nuance and details of the ladders that confirm PI tends to be part of PSI and democracy. Since rootedness is part of behavioral routinization, automatically both become ingredients for cooking the systems and their components.
Last but not least, Rotengruber (2022) mentioned that freedom could be enjoyed as an illusion; nonetheless, the satisfaction is different. So, when democracy is still an illusion, given that freedom is part of democracy by any indicators, one will still need to fight for freedom too. Imagine that one is the force of one universe, not only one person. Wouldn’t it be lovely, to face the fears of heights together?
In the case of Europe, the data to be analyzed quantitatively is much more complete, and comprehensive than in Asia. Thus, it’s worth using those meso-micro-minded methodologies. Interestingly, it’s not only for understanding Asia; but also, to comprehend Europe better and eventually compare it with Asia accordingly. Revisiting PI, PSI, and democracy is only one of the ways to prove that. The author believes since everything in this universe is related and interacts similar methodologies could also be applied for other courses and discourses.
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