Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: The analysis proves that bicameralism and presidentialism are "children" of the separation of power-tradition. There is no empirical connection between the frequency of a bicameral system and the form of government, but strong connections are found between the arrangement of the bicameral system and the form of government. The second chambers in presidential democracies, called senates, are usually stronger than the second chambers in parliamentary democracies. Besides, they have clearly frequent a stronger democratic legitimization and an independent function, specifically the representation of certain regions of the nation. The differences become especially eviden when the Westminster-model as a prototype of (majoritarian) parliamentarianism is confronted with presidentialism.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: In her book, After Utopia, Judith Shklar argues that “since we know too little to feel justified in solid despair and we know too much to fall into even the slightest utopianism, a reasoned skepticism is the sanest attitude for the present.” Almost 50 years later, her defense of a reasoned skepticism remains relevant. Indeed it is hard to imagine any alternative attitude by which liberal democracy might withstand the fatalism, alienation and despair that corrupt our political actions and impoverish our moral commitments, without indulging the illusions of grandeur and ambitions of idealism that tempt us to pursue (and be disappointed in) utopian projects. And yet at the same time, however reasonable this skeptical stance is, it regularly comes under attack (or is experienced) as being inadequate to the task of defending and cultivating the liberal democratic commitments. How can reasoned skepticism give us enough to live by? What positive commitment or aspiration is affirmed by emphasizing the “uncertainty as to what we ought to do [and] a distrust of the value of what we do”? What remains worthy of our protracted efforts and what significance do those efforts retain, when we adopt the skeptical stance?
Motivated by these concerns, I wish to defend Shklar’s reasoned skepticism by embellishing it a bit, by considering the democratic commitments such a doubting and distrusting stance possesses and practices. To do this, I consider how democratic commitments encourage a kind of cynicism that chafes at both the hubris of democratic idealism and the humility of democratic resignation in order to examine how Shklar’s reasoned skepticism might be transformed into a positive, even passionate, commitment to democratic ideals that is expressed in a way that guards against both the danger of dogmatism and despondency.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: This paper examines the relationship between citizenship policies and noncitizen political behavior, focusing on extra-electoral forms of political participation by Korean residents in Japan. I analyze the institutional factors that have mediated the construction of Korean collective identity in Japan and, in turn, the ways that Korean community activists have re-conceptualized possibilities for their exercise of citizenship as foreign residents in Japan. My empirical analysis is based on a theoretical framework that defines citizenship as an interactive process of political incorporation, performance, and participation. I posit that the various dimensions of citizenship—its legal significance, symbolic meaning, claims and responsibilities, and practice—are performed, negotiated, and restructured in a triangular interactive relationship between the state, citizens, and noncitizens.
I address a puzzle that is both specific to Koreans in Japan and generalizable to foreign permanent residents in other advanced industrial democracies: Given their high levels of cultural assimilation, why does citizenship remain the last vestige of identity within the Korean community in Japan? Unlike previous studies that have focused on stringent citizenship policies at the level of the state alone, this paper explores the interactive process between institutions and communities. Based on their legal status, we would expect social movements in Japan’s Korean community to center around the quest for citizenship acquisition. Yet, the findings of this paper demonstrate that Korean organizations have concentrated their efforts on securing the community’s foreign citizenship status. I argue that postwar Japan’s ethnocultural citizenship policies both shaped Korean political identity in Japan and structured political opportunities for Korean activists to negotiate the terms of their community’s incorporation. Especially in recent years, new generations of Korean activists have reinterpreted the meaning of Korean citizenship as identity and practice in movements to democratize Japanese society. Rather than naturalize and become a small section of the voting population, Korean activists have increasingly used their noncitizen status as their “voice” to express their opposition to state policies. Based on ethnographic research conducted in Tokyo, Kawasaki, and Osaka over a twelve-month period, this paper explores how citizenship policies affect the political identities, claims, and strategies of noncitizen communities.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: This paper represents an exploratory analysis of the relationships between democracy
and different forms of ethnic conflict. Only recently have scholars sought to unpack ethnic
conflict and take seriously the variations in causes and dynamics of different forms of dissent.
This article continues in this direction by considering how institutions interact with various kinds
of ethnic strife. We consider three different forms of ethnic conflict—protest, conflict among
groups, and violence against the state. We focus on whether ethnic conflict rises or falls due to
the dynamics of election cycles, and find that each form of dissent is, indeed, distinct, and that
elections are not as destabilizing as expected. We discuss our results and the implications for
broader debates about political institutions and ethnic conflict.

Publication Type: Proceeding