This dissertation examines the divergent trajectories of ethnic and national politics in the Tamil speaking regions of India and Sri Lanka. Despite comparable historical experiences and conditions, the south Indian Tamil speaking areas were peaceably accommodated within a pan-Indian framework whilst Sri Lankan politics was marked by escalating Tamil-Sinhala ethnic polarisation and violent conflict. The dissertation explains these contrasting outcomes by setting out a novel theoretical framework that draws on the work of Reinhart Koselleck and his analysis of the links between concepts and political conflict. It argues that in the era of popular sovereignty the nation and ethnicity have become central and unavoidable concepts of political order, but concepts that can be deliberately constructed through political activity in more or less inclusive ways. Setting out the conceptual connections between the nation, ethnicity and popular sovereignty, the dissertation shows how the conceptual tension between a unified national identity / interest and ethnic pluralism becomes a central and unavoidable locus of political contestation in the era of popular sovereignty. Tracing the politics of ethnicity and nationalism in India and Sri Lanka from the late nineteenth century to the late 1970’s, the analysis shows that the accommodation of Tamil identity within Indian nationalist frameworks and the escalation of Tamil – Sinhala ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka cannot be linked to differences in ethnic demography, political system, historical experiences or the structure of economic incentives. It reveals instead that these divergent outcomes are best explained as effects of contingent and competitive processes of political organisation and mobilisation through which deliberately more or less ethnically inclusive national identities are asserted, established and then contested.

This thesis is intended to contribute to the discussion on China’s socio-economic development during the post-socialist period of reform and opening up. It is aimed at providing an explanation of the Chinese contemporary development trajectory, by establishing an institutional and policy model, which China is believed to have been following. This model is also believed to offer some general solutions to the underdeveloped countries in systemic transformation. The thesis argues that China’s post-socialist development trajectory has been determined by the provisions of the Developmental State (DS) model, as far as state development policies, state ideology, and state institutional arrangements are concerned, and to the extent, that China has become a genus of the Post-Socialist Developmental State (PSDS) model – this model being an alternative to the post-socialist neoliberalism. In the course of scholarly enquiry, China’s development trajectory is analysed against the paths of historical developmental states, and against the general and developmental aspects of the process of post-socialist transformation. I start by analysing the features of the historical developmental states and by investigating whether the provisions of the DS model are viable contemporarily and how the model extends to the discussion on China’s development. I then examine China’s post-socialist transformation, partly in its DS context. Next, I analyse the features of China’s development trajectory in comparison with the features of historical developmental states, as far as ideology and political and economic arrangements as well as state development policies are concerned. Finally, based on the previous analyses, I explain the DS-determined postsocialist development trajectory of China, address the causal relation between the DS institutionalisation and post-socialist transformation, and construct the PSDS model, as a general guideline for states in transition.

The thesis investigates under what conditions the European Employment Strategy (EES) can influence the domestic employment policy of European Union member states. It aims to answer the question by examining two critical or ‘least likely’ cases: Greece and Portugal by focusing on three key areas of employment policy: public employment services, gender equality policies (mainstreaming, reconciliation and pay gaps) and ‘flexicurity’. The thesis employs the ‘Europeanization’ approach and tests the hypothesis that ‘if the EES altered Greek and Portuguese employment policy at all, it did so through one of three main Europeanization pathways: (i) policy learning; (ii) the domestic empowerment of policy entrepreneurs; (iii) financial conditionality.’ In examining the domestic impact of the EES the thesis does not presume an Europeanization effect a priori. Rather, the research begins from the domestic level (in a process-tracing method) and investigates whether, how and to what extent the EES had a role in the Greek and Portuguese domestic policy. The possibility of other variables, either external or internal, being pre-eminent is examined. The empirical study sought to triangulate a wide range of methods and sources. Although Greece and Portugal share a number of characteristics that may inhibit Europeanization in this type of area, empirical evidence largely supported the research hypothesis and suggested that two key conditions were conducive to the EES having a domestic impact in these cases: the existence of successful policy entrepreneurs who would actively use the EES as a policy window to promote their agenda and -when these were absent or lacked access to power and resources- the existence of the European Social Fund financial conditionality. Thus, soft power can be wielded in the world of neglect without policy learning which is considered the main ‘soft’ mechanism of domestic change in the literature.

The thesis analyses the phenomenon of party-based Euroscepticism with specific reference to radical right parties. It provides a bridge between the literatures on party behaviour, radical right parties and the study of Euroscepticism. Challenging the notion that parties belonging to the same party family display similar positions on European integration, it argues that radical right parties do not adopt a uniform EU stance. By putting forward a typology of radical right Euroscepticism, the thesis establishes that radical right European positions differ in terms of content, strength and motivation. In explaining this divergence, the thesis adopts a framework of party strategic behaviour and argues that party positions on Europe are related to the endogeneity of the party system and the dynamics of inter party competition. In particular, the thesis shows that a radical right party’s position on European integration as well as the way in which it accommodates the European issue in its discourse is a function of the party’s wider agenda in the national party system. The latter is developed with reference to (1) party type and (2) its predominant aims and objectives at the domestic level. The thesis demonstrates that the European issue is integral to the radical right’s discursive toolkit but the ways in which the party chooses to debate the issue and/or politicise it largely depend on the national context. This thesis employs a nested research design as a mixed methods strategy joining the study of the wider universe of European radical right parties with intensive case study qualitative analysis. It commences with an overview of the general patterns and dynamics of radical right Euroscepticism both across Europe and within the political arenas where the three party case studies operate. It proceeds by providing an in depth study of three radical right parties during the period 1999-2009, including the French National Front, the Greek Popular Orthodox Rally and the Italian National Alliance.

This thesis is a collection of three independent essays on policy-making incentives of government. The first essay examines whether citizens can indirectly control bureaucrats. If voters and bureaucrats prefer different types of politicians, i.e., they have a conflict of interest, incumbents need to increase the budget to prevent bureaucrats from information manipulation, which leads to an oversized government. If, instead, voters and bureaucrats prefer the same type of politicians, i.e., they have an alignment of interests, bureaucrats can send to voters a credible signal about the type of incumbents, which enhances the selection effect of election. Although political appointees enable politicians to implement the first-best policy in the case of the conflict of interests, they lead to the persistence of inefficient government in the case of the alignment of interests. The second and third essays study how autocrats commit not to confiscate private property. The second essay argues that the potential of economic growth would help the ruler to make a credible commitment. Since a predatory policy reduces the citizens’ income, it would reduce capital accumulation because of the income effect. Then, the ruler faces a trade-off between the current consumption with the predatory policy and the larger future consumption with the moderate policy, which would lead to economic growth. The third essay models endogenous judicial independence (JI) as a commitment device in the political commitment game. If information on JI is transmitted to citizens with positive probability, the ruler creates JI and does not renege on an announcement. Even if not, the ruler still can guarantee property rights by granting human rights as a signal on JI if the cost of the signal is low.

The thesis offers an examination of a distinct chapter in the era of economic reforms in India - the case of the state of West Bengal - and narrates the politics of an economic policy transition spearheaded by the Left Front coalition government that ruled the state from 1977 to 2011. In 1991, the Government of India began to pursue a far more liberal policy of economic development, with emphasis being placed on non-agricultural growth, the role of the private sector, and the merits of foreign direct investment (FDI). This caused serious political challenges for the Communist Party of India - Marxist (CPIM), the main party in the Left Front. Historically, the CPIM was committed to pro-poor policies focused on the countryside and had spoken out strongly against privatisation and FDI; however it could not ignore the stagnating industrial economy of the state, and was thus compelled to court private investment and take advantage of the liberalised policy environment. The nature of this dichotomy – one that characterised the political economy of West Bengal over the last two decades – is studied in this research as a set of why-how questions. Firstly, why did the CPIM/Left Front take upon itself the task of engineering a transition from an erstwhile landreform and agriculture based growth model to a pro-market development agenda post-1991? And secondly, how was such a choice justified to/negotiated with the various stakeholders (the rank and file of the CPIM itself, other coalition member parties, trade unions, the industrial class, etc.) while sustaining the party’s traditional rhetoric and partisan character? In examining the second part, the thesis also ventures into the recent cases of huge opposition to land acquisition for industrial plants at Singur and Nandigram, and demonstrates how the mandate of the top brass of party leadership in Calcutta was being implemented, translated or contested at the local levels. On the whole, this thesis attempts a reappraisal of the politicaleconomic history of the Left Front regime and particularly that of its majority partner, the CPIM, over the last two decades. It also places the case in a broader Indian context and contributes to wider debates on the changing nature of federalism in India and the politics of economic reforms

Germany’s support for the Eastern enlargement of the European Union was a key factor in the successful completion of this idea in 2004. Germany’s policy towards the enlargement was, however, ambivalent and for this reason perceived as controversial. This thesis examines and explains the reasons of this paradox. German policy makers endorsed the idea of the Eastern enlargement of the EU for the reasons deriving from the national identity, based on a history-related narrative, and from the fact of the successful unification of Germany. As Chancellor Helmut Kohl captured it — the unification of Germany and the unification of Europe were two sides of the same coin. Eastern enlargement was, however, a novel idea and was changing the existing European order and concepts of the European integration. It faced therefore powerful constraints both in the shape of still existing, though declining, Cold War structural grip, as well as of the conflicting with the enlargement interests of other member state of the EU and domestic economic preferences and interests. It caught German policy makers between powerful and mutually conflicting challenges and faced them with a need to choose strategic priorities for the foreign policy. The choice was continuity of multilateralism, the principle of the foreign policy of the West Germany. This choice turned the enlargement policy into one of the premises of the grand strategy of the German Europapolitik. Examining the ambivalence in the enlargement policy allows not only to explain its causes but also to observe a process of changing the concept of the European integration. This doctoral thesis is a result of the research conducted at the London School of Economics and Political Science under the supervision of Prof. William Wallace and Dr. Ulrich Sedelmeier.

The thesis provides a case study for how settler colonialism intertwined with ethnonationalism to shape social identification in the Israeli town of Kiryat Shemona. Jews from Arab and Muslim lands were categorized by Zionist nation-builders as Mizrahim and disproportionally placed on the geographic and socio-economic margins of Israeli society to Judaise territory, to prevent the return of the displaced indigenous Palestinian population and to provide cheap labour for Ashkenazi settlements. They were excluded from the Ashkenazi-dominated centre of power, yet included as essential members of a militaristic frontier ethos. The thesis explores how Mizrahim negotiated Israeliness from the margins within the dynamics of ethnocratic exclusion and inclusion, in what I have termed peripheral nationhood. It examines the Israeli State’s attempt to mould loyal subjects through Hebrew education, national ceremonies and military campaigns. In everyday life, Mizrahim contested the socio-economic and cultural hegemony of the Ashkenazi through ethnic and transnational identifications and practices. Simultaneously, their support for the nation-in-arms and creative self-fashioning as ‘strong’ and ‘civilized’ reinforced the dominant logic of ethno-nationalism. Mizrahi residents redeployed stereotypes and an Oriental stigma in their descriptions of Mizrahim, Russian-speaking Israelis and Arabs to elevate their own social status and position in the ethnocracy. The nation was only intermittently salient as a category of belonging, thus challenging theories of ‘everyday nationalism’ that consider it omnipresent. During the Israeli war on Gaza in 2008/2009, sentiments of national unity were heightened, and the border Mizrahim appeared to be move and/or moved themselves from the periphery to the centre of the nation as key actors in the moral legitimization of war. The dissertation argues that the qualities that make up peripheral nationhood are coeval with construction of national unity as a colonial practice by the centre.

Following 15 years of high policy attention to curbing corruption in developing countries, this thesis concerns the effects of polices induced by the international donor community on curbing corruption in sub-Saharan Africa. I approach this question by assessing, in three stand-alone empirical chapters, the effects increased political competition, economic liberalisation, and the use of judicial punishment for corruption-related crimes have had on curbing corruption in sub-Saharan Africa. In the first empirical chapter, I assess the effect on corruption from increased political competition following the third wave of democratisation. While popular theories propose that political competition helps curb corruption by inducing political accountability, I find instead, in the sub-Saharan African context that in times of tense political competition the incumbent ensures his victory by buying the loyalty of the elite through distributing state resources for private means. This prebendal politics is, in turn, associated with higher levels of corruption. In the second empirical chapter, which concerns economic liberalisation and its effect on corruption, I ask what happens to corruption as the formal institutions governing the market change. Using insights from a case study on Rwanda, I find that corruption transforms rather than disappears in the advent of economic liberalisation. The third empirical chapter concerns the use of punishment for corruption-related crimes. By using politically contextualised information on prosecutions, I find that such anti-corruption interventions risk being used for political ends instead of curbing high level impunity. The overarching conclusion from this research endeavour is that corruption in the subSaharan African context has a political function which makes the reforms prescribed by the donor community difficult, or illogical, to fully comply with. The political functionality of corruption must therefore constitute the analytical cornerstone when developing anti-corruption policies in order to set realistic expectations and avoid unintended consequences.

When the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) was launched in 2004 expectations of its potential were low because it lacks the ability to offer EU membership as an incentive, which was found to be pivotal for the EU to have influence in the Central and Eastern European Countries (CEECs). Nevertheless, progress reports have demonstrated that some convergence toward the EU standards has taken place in the neighbouring countries. This research seeks to understand under which conditions compliance takes place, what explains the variation in (non)compliance with the EU standards in the area of Justice and Home Affairs (JHA) and what influence does the EU have. It examines formal and behavioural compliance with the EU action plan recommendations in the area of border guard reform, readmission agreement, asylum and refugee protection, and criminalisation of human trafficking in Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine. The three states have all expressed interest in EU membership, but they vary in their potential to be considered as candidates and in their identification with the EU. Rather than assuming that the EU’s influence is low in the neighbourhood because it cannot offer a certain membership incentive, this research studies the problem by focusing on a combination of explanatory factors drawn from rational choice and sociological/constructivist institutionalism both at the macro level (strength of membership prospect and identification with the EU) and at the issue-specific levels. The research demonstrates that the EU’s influence is differential and dependent on domestic, external and issue-specific conditions. The results indicate that the EU is capable of eliciting influence in the JHA area without a certain EU membership prospect. However, when the country perceives that there is a possibility to accede to the EU, compliance with the EU standards has been more even across the four issue areas and at the formal and behavioural levels.