eprintid: 13455
rev_number: 28
eprint_status: archive
userid: 1
dir: disk0/00/01/34/55
datestamp: 2012-07-02 07:35:08
lastmod: 2015-12-27 20:12:46
status_changed: 2012-08-15 09:06:15
type: article
metadata_visibility: show
creators_name: Gallenkamp, Marian
title: When Agency Triumphs Over Structure: Conceptualizing Bhutan’s Unique Transition to Democracy
ispublished: pub
subjects: 320
divisions: 702000
keywords: Bhutan , Democracy , Transition Theory , Democratization , Agency , Structure
abstract: There a few absolutes in political science, but the historical observation that democracy does not just evolve without any form of struggle or demand for it, and the theoretical assumption that countries do not simply embark on the path of transition to democracy without a crisis of legitimacy for the old regime, are closest to being universally accepted. However, this paper will demonstrate how historic precedence can prove theory wrong by analyzing Bhutan’s transition to democracy. Assembling the basic assumptions of the most popular approaches to regime transitions, it will be shown that none of them can fully or even partly account for democratization in Bhutan. It will be shown that a paramount centrality of agency rather than structure was the driving force behind a transition to democracy that can very well be characterized as being unique. At least for the case of Bhutan, the long ongoing structure-agency-debate has been clearly decided in favor of the latter.
abstract_translated_lang: eng
date: 2012
date_type: published
id_scheme: DOI
id_number: 10.11588/heidok.00013455
portal_cluster_id: p-hdpaper
portal_order: 68
ppn_swb: 1651529477
own_urn: urn:nbn:de:bsz:16-opus-134556
language: eng
bibsort: GALLENKAMPWHENAGENCY2012
full_text_status: public
publication: Heidelberg Papers in South Asian and Comparative Politics
volume: 68
issn: 1617-5069
citation:   Gallenkamp, Marian  (2012) When Agency Triumphs Over Structure: Conceptualizing Bhutan’s Unique Transition to Democracy.  Heidelberg Papers in South Asian and Comparative Politics, 68.   ISSN 1617-5069     
document_url: https://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/13455/1/Heidelberg_Papers_68_Galenkamp.pdf