Democracy and Local Governance

Report of Seminar/Workshop in Minsk and World Congresses

September, 1994

During the summer researchers in the program had opportunities to meet at the XIII World Congress of the International Sociological Association in Bielefeld in July, a Seminar/Workshop in Minsk in August, and the XVI World Congress of the International Political Science Association in Berlin in late August.

 At the invitation of the Belarus State University, a seminar and workshop were held in Minsk, August 15-18. It was attended by members of the International Steering Committee and Research teams from Belarus, Hungary, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Switzerland, Ukraine, and the U.S.  

1. Minsk Seminar and Workshop Participants were received by the President Lukaschenko of Belarus and Metropolit Filaret, Head of the Belarus Orthodox Church. They also were visited by representatives of the Minsk business community.

The agenda of the Seminar included progress reports on the research and educational uses of the data and other materials of the research programs. The Workshop focused on the instruments and data gathering efforts in planning the re-take in 1995.

 Progress Reports

Professor Betty M. Jacob informed the participants about the creation of the International Center for Democracy at the University of Hawaii. The Center is designed to integrate three main dimensions of the program: research, education, and training of leaders. She also reviewed the current status of grant proposals.

The report from Switzerland was presented by Wolf Linder and Ruth Nabholz of the University of Bern. The written report was based on responses of 819 local leaders from 61 communes.

Krzysztof Ostrowski reported on the completion of data gathering and coding in Turkey and Uzbekistan and on the status of the international files. The files now have data from 15 countries, 6,345 leaders in the individual file, and 421 localities in the community file. Participants were also told that the research has just been completed in Iceland. All data are now covered by the Consortium Agreement to share the copyright for the data and organize its use.

Representatives from Belarus, Hungary, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, and Ukraine informed the Seminar about recent political developments in their countries, especially about the elections. It was agreed that in those countries that had elections a re-take on the same localities should be organized in 1995 with an expanded sample in Russia.

To broaden the comparative perspectives of the research, plans were made to proceed with the study in Western Europe with Germany, Great Britain, and Spain and in Asia with India, Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and other Republics of N.I.S.

 Education

Professor Alexander Ubarov of the Scientific Council of Cybernetics in Moscow outlined possible ways of the using the research as materials for high school education. The materials should be multi-national, using electronic communications so that students in different countries can communicate directly with each other. Since the experimental phase of this activity will start soon, it was agreed that the selection of relevant materials should be pursued within the GLOBE project at the University of Hawaii.

In addition to linking the research to high school education, training of local political leaders was discussed with the understanding that specific programs should be customized to the needs of specific sponsors.

 Publications

The publication by the Matsunga Institute of the first book was welcomed by the participants. Plans for its distribution were discussed.

It was decided to begin preparation of a second book of national reports to be published with the assistance of the University of Bern or University of Goteborg, to be printed in Belarus.

Plans for a comparative book on conflict were outlined. Texts with data from at least three countries should be sent to Professor Samuel Eldersveld of the University of Michigan by February, 1995, who will make the final selection of the papers to be edited and published.

Workshop on the Research Instruments

The Workshop started with an assessment of the theoretical relevance of the variables already included in the study. It was agreed that the program should be expanded in two directions: rule of law and political party formation.

The rule of law will be introduced in the questionnaire in the format of a value scale with items similar to the others and materials concerning local legislative actions will be collected in the field in the localities. Regarding party formation, leaders will be asked about their activities in their parties as well as for their evaluation of the political parties in their communities. In addition, data on party organization and election results will be collected at the community level.

In order to maintain the current length of the questionnaire, questions of little compelling theoretical relevance in the current instrument were dropped. The Workshop drafted new questions and guidelines for data collection at the community level. The new questions will be pre-tested in Belarus, Poland, and Switzerland in the fall, 1994.

The revised questionnaire and guidelines are attached to this report. Suggestions from all collaborators are welcome and should be submitted to the International Coordinator.

The participants expressed their appreciation to the Belarus State University and their hosts.

2. World Congress, the International Sociological Association Two Ad Hoc Sessions on Democracy and Local Governance were convened by the research program. Paper givers were: N. Abalovatskaya, A. Bohm, K. Ostrowki, E. Tall, and H. Teune. The sessions were chaired by Soledad Garcia of the University]y of Barcelona and Zdravko Mlinar of the University of Ljubljana. In addition to the papers, the sessions provided an opportunity to discuss the expansion of the research to Armenia with Professor Gevork Pogosyan, Great Britain with Professor Michael Goldsmith, and Spain with Professor Soledad Garcia.

 Scholars interested in the project joined in petitioning to establish a Working Group on the Sociology of Local-Global Relations within the International Sociological Association. K. Ostrowski and H. Teune will act as co-conveners of the meetings of this group.

3. World Congress, the International Political Science Association the project was presented by H. Teune to the II. Main Plenary Session of the Congress, The Deepening of Democracy, chaired by Candido Mendes. In addition, a detailed report on the research was presented by K. Ostrowski and H. Teune at the sessions of the Research Committees on Comparative Study of Local Government and Politics and Political Sociology. A special meeting on Democracy and Local Governance was convened at the end of the Congress.

 A. Bohm, S. Eldersveld, W. Pleschberger, E. Tall participated in the Congress. Plans to expand the research to Korea were discussed with Professor Chong-si Ahn of Seoul National University, to Taiwan with Professor Dachi Liao of National Sun Yat-Sen University, to Norway with Professor Francesco Kjellberg of the University of Oslo and to Germany with Scientific Center in Berlin.

 Interested scholars petitioned the Executive Committee of the International Political Science Association to establish a Study Group on the Politics of Local-Global Relations.

4. Other Meetings In July, 1994 K. Ostrowski and H. Teune met with Research Coordinators in Prague, Vienna, and Budapest to discuss further plans. It was decided that following decisions of the Workshop in Prague in October, 1993, a proposal to support cooperation in Central Europe will be submitted to Central European University.