This project will improve understanding of democratic backsliding by considering the full range of intra-regime changes that occur within democracies, only some of which entail decline. The project explains (1) how different configurations of inclusive and exclusive institutions, vertical and horizontal accountability environments, and social and economic interests create distinct types of democratic regimes, (2) when within-democracy transitions occur from one democratic regime type to another, and (3) the distinct vulnerabilities of different democratic regimes to democratic backsliding

This research project focused on declines in the level of media freedom in democratic countries. The research conceptually and empirically distinguished media freedom from other aspects of democracy to avoid making tautological arguments. Ideally, in democracies, the media reinforce independent judiciaries and legislatures against executive overreach. However,
this research project argues that the decline of press freedom leads to a reduction in the independence of these government institutions and a decline in other aspects of democratic accountability. The findings demonstrate that declines in press freedom precede increases in electoral manipulation and decreases in institutional checks on executive power. The project also finds that changes in media freedom have lasting effects on democratic accountability over the long-run.

This research project investigated the formation and duration of political coalitions. The project theorized about the motivations that lead political parties to form partnerships in elections and in government, and demonstrated the consequences of parties’ coalitional strategies for political stability and democratic governance. The primary contribution of this research stems from its focus on non-programmatic political parties. Non-programmatic parties seek only particularistic benefits; they do not have public policy goals. Because their incentives differ from those of other parties, non-programmatic parties influence coalitional politics in ways not previously explained by the comparative politics literature. The empirical component of the project concentrated on the multiparty democracies of Latin America.

This research project did not proceed due to the Covid-19 pandemic. 

This grant supported ongoing research on the deterioration of democracy around the globe. A large component of this project focuses on the variation in the level of media freedom among democratic countries, and how changes in media freedom affect other institutions and accountability actors within democracy. In addition, the project also examines the effect of ideology – namely, populism – and institutions – specifically, large government majorities – on democratic decline. Thus, this research contributes to an expanding area of research within comparative politics that focuses on “democratic backsliding.”This grant supplemented funding from a JSPS Grant-In-Aid For Scientific Research C, thereby allowing me to hire an additional research assistant and cover increased travel expenses related to a symposium on “Democracy in Latin America.”  This symposium, held at Waseda University on November 29, 2019, brought together leading scholars and researchers from Latin America, the USA and Japan.  Democratic backsliding has been most dramatic in Latin America, and the symposium presentations emphasized a range of contributing factors including populism, executive power, legislative politics, clientelism, vote-buying, and electoral fraud. Through the symposium presentations, eventual publication of this research, and the development of related projects for future research, I aim to improve scholarly and societal understanding of democratic accountability worldwide.

This grant provided financial support for research on government-media relations and political accountability in democratic countries. The research contributes to a collaborative book project between the P.I. and Professor Elizabeth A. Stein, currently a postdoctoral scholar at the School of International and Global Studies at Indiana University (USA). The grant primarily funded travel for the primary investigator to spend one week at Indiana University for intensive writing and editing of the manuscript.This research project fills a gap in scholarly understanding of democratic leaders’ incentives and abilities to constrain the media’s autonomy.  The media play a vital role in democratic accountability by monitoring politicians’ behavior and policy performance, informing citizens, and sanctioning the abuse of power through their reporting. However, in the many young democracies around the globe, the autonomy of the media remains vulnerable and various political, economic, and legal conditions limit the freedom of the media. Severe conflicts between political leaders and the media – so called “media wars” – threaten the viability of democracy in some countries. On both theoretical and empirical grounds, the book project challenges the conventional wisdom that democratic institutions and procedures guarantee media freedom. 

This research grant (tokutei B) from Waseda University provided financial support for my research project on democratic accountability.  The goal of this project is to improve understanding of the deficit of accountability faced by many relatively young democracies in Latin America, Africa and Asia. Although free and fair elections occur with regular frequency in these countries, democratic elections do not in and of themselves guarantee accountability.  Accountability means that political leaders, once elected, remain responsive to their constituents and do not abuse their powers in office. This research project investigates, in particular, the relationship between the media and government accountability, highlighting diminished media freedom as both a consequence, and a cause, of accountability deficits in democracies.The grant funded travel to California, where I met my collaborator on this project, and together we consulted with professors of political science at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).  I also participated in the Western Political Science Association conference in San Diego, California. My co-author and I presented our research findings from this project and met with a book publisher to discuss our manuscript on media freedom and presidential accountability in Latin America.

The Waseda University Grant for Special Research Projects (for Newly-Hired Faculty) provided financial support for supplies and travel expenses related to my research on coalitional instability and government accountability. The goal of this project is the publication of a book which explains the role of non-programmatic political parties in electoral and governing coalitions and identifies the characteristics of partisan oppositions in the legislature that tend to strengthen their position as accountability actors relative to presidents in Latin America. With this goal in mind, during the 2013 fiscal year, I expanded my dataset on Latin American political parties and coalitions to include 12 countries through 2013, and carried out statistical analyses of these data. I presented preliminary results of this research at the American Political Science Association annual meeting in September 2013. I subsequently revised the analyses and edited the related manuscripts. Currently, I have one article-length manuscript that is under review, and much of this material will also appear as a chapter in the book. In addition, I am preparing to submit another co-authored article-length manuscript for review in March 2014. I believe that article publications related to the book will raise interest among publishers in the larger book project. I plan to meet with publishers in August/September 2014. Finally, I was awarded a KAKENHI grant (Research Activity Start-Up) for the funding period of September 2013 through April 2015 for research that builds upon this project.