International Political science Review. Special issue: The quality of Democracy in Asia Pacific

This issue of IPSR is a departure from our recent practice of providing a yearly issue devoted to reviews of recent books on significant topics in political science. We have invited Leonardo Morlino, Björn Dressel and Riccardo Pelizzo to be guest editors of a special issue devoted to analyzing the quality of democracy in East Asia. As readers of IPSR know, while the analysis of transitions to and consolidation of democracy continues to be of great current theoretical and political relevance (as witness, the Arab Spring), political scientists have broadened our focus to considering the extent or quality of democracy. Interest in the topic was prompted by the discovery that many authoritarian regimes have adopted the trappings and to some extent the reality of democratic institutions while retaining important elements of authoritarianism. In brief, in many cases what has been consolidated is not democracy but a hybrid regime. Leonardo Morlino, one of the guest editors of the special issue, was among the early contributors to our understanding of this question — at the same time that he has sought to understand how to tip the balance of hybrid regimes toward more democracy. The editors of IPSR decided to provide an opportunity for Leonardo and his colleagues to apply the framework that he had developed to analyzing the quality of democracy among a cluster of East Asian regimes. This one-off special issue is the result. We would like to repeat two important announcements made in past issues of IPSR. First, Yvonne Galligan is stepping down as co-editor of IPSR and IPSA, IPSR’s sponsoring organization, has organized a search for her replacement. The new editor will be expected to continue contributing to the journal’s efforts to improve the quality of scholarship that it publishes and the breadth of its audience throughout the world. IPSA’s Publications Sub-committee, chaired by Mikhael Ilyin, will be interested in knowing what plans the new editor has for building on this success and further raising the profile and standing of the journal during her/his term of office.