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Open Access Publications from the University of California

Scholarly Works (84 results)

  • Article
  • Peer Reviewed
UC Irvine Previously Published Works (2005)
For parties of unequal seat shares (si), the widely used effective number of parties (N = 1/Σsi2) offers an equivalent in equal-sized parties, but it needs a supplement to express the imbalance in actual shares. This is akin to supplementing the mean with the standard deviation. A suitable 'index of balance' is b = -log s1/log p, where S1 is the largest share and p is the number of seat-winning parties. It can range from 0 (utter imbalance) to 1 (perfect equality of all parties). In most individual countries, the median balance is between 0.4 and 0.6, and the worldwide median balance is close to 0.50 for any number of seat-winning parties except 2, in line with a simple logical model. Independent of electoral systems used, a rule of conservation emerges: the median product of the largest party's fractional share and the square root of the number of seat-winning parties is conserved: s1p0.5 = 1. The worldwide median for 603 elections is within 2 percent of 1.00. © 2005 SAGE Publications.
    Cover page: Conservation of Balance in the Size of Parties
    • Article
    • Peer Reviewed
    UC Irvine Previously Published Works (2013)
      Cover page: Tina Tamman, The Last Ambassador: August Torma, Soldier, Diplomat, Spy. Amsterdam: Rodopi B. V., 2011. xvii + 251 pp.Creative Commons 'BY' version 4.0 license
      • Article
      • Peer Reviewed
      UC Irvine Previously Published Works (1978)
      Area changes of about 30 best known empires and states are compiled and tabulated. Superimposed and juxtaposed graphs (size versus time) help to visualize the relative size and location in time of these empires. Size-time integral, maximum stable size, adulthood date, and duration are defined operationally and are listed for 20 empires. A criterion is given for distinctness of successive empires. The size-time integral is a direct measure of an empire's impact on history insofar as that impact depends on sheer size and duration. The integral is largest for the Chinese Hsia-Shang, Egyptian New, Old, and Middle, Assyrian New, and Hittite empires. A world-wide territorial concentration index is tabulated. It increases during the period considered from 0.08 to 1.4% of the world dry land area. © 1978.
        Cover page: Size and duration of empires growth-decline curves, 3000 to 600 b.c.
        • Article
        • Peer Reviewed
        UC Irvine Previously Published Works (1989)
          Cover page: Estonia in September 1988: Stalinists, centrists and restorationists
          • Article
          • Peer Reviewed
          UC Irvine Previously Published Works (1999)
          The effective number of parties, N = 1/Σp(i)2 (where p(i) is the fractional share of the ith party), usually suffices to describe adequately a constellation of parties of different strengths. Difficulties arise when disparity in party sizes is such that the largest share (p1) surpasses 0.50 (meaning absolute dominance), while N still indicates a multi-party constellation. In such cases N(∞) = 1/p1 is proposed as a supplementary indicator: a value less than 2 indicates absolute dominance. An 'NP' index proposed earlier is a combination of N and N(∞); its values are close of those of N(∞), but NP sometimes falls below 2 even when many parties are relevant for coalition formation. Appendix A offers an alternative approach based on indices of deviation from a norm, but it proves cumbersome.
            Cover page: Supplementing the effective number of parties
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            • Peer Reviewed
            UC Irvine Previously Published Works (1990)
              Cover page: The Baltic states
              • Article
              • Peer Reviewed
              UC Irvine Previously Published Works (2010)
                Cover page: Le macro-agenda duvergérien, à demi-achevéCreative Commons 'BY' version 4.0 license
                • Article
                • Peer Reviewed
                UC Irvine Previously Published Works (2002)
                This note helps to explain how cabinet-level concentration of power is constrained by party level concentration of seats. Arend Lijphart's Patterns of Democracy (1999) measures concentration of executive power by the frequency of minimal winning and one-party cabinets (MW/OP), and party concentration by the effective number (N) of legislative parties. In his factor analysis, these highly correlated indices are the central features that distinguish consensual from majoritarian systems. The present study establishes a quantitative logical relationship leading from N to the major component of MW/OP, so as to explain the reasons behind Lijphart's empirical observation. The note analyses separately the frequency of various types of cabinet coalitions that Lijphart's book has lumped together. It also offers a new way to visualize the effective number of legislative parties, as twice the minimal number of parties needed to form a minimal winning coalition. © 2002, Sage Publications. All rights reserved.
                  Cover page: Implications of the Effective Number of Parties for Cabinet Formation
                  • Article
                  • Peer Reviewed
                  UC Irvine Previously Published Works (1982)
                    Cover page: Size and ethnicity of Estonian towns and rural districts, 1922–1979
                    • Article
                    CSD Working Papers (2001)

                    This study introduces a new way to measure the visibility of political science journals. Journal citation frequencies in two overviews of political science are found to approximate the hyperbolic pattern. On this basis, the number of citations for the top journal enables us to calculate the total number of citations in the source within 1 percent and also, with much lesser precision, the total number of journals cited. The pattern observed is well known in a very different field, namely the size of cities. This pattern has thus considerable generality and deserves further attention to its theoretical basis. At the same time, the following empirical findings are of interest.

                    U.S. and non–U.S. political scientists agree on the predominance of journals published in the U.S. Shortfalls from hyperbolic expectations for third- and fourth-ranked journals may reflect the absence of strong central journals in Europe and East Asia. In terms of risk of rejection versus visibility: when accepted, one may be "most bang for the buck" by submitting work to European Journal of Political Research, Political Studies, and Public Choice –and the least when submitting to Philosophy and Public Affairs and Political Theory. Political science is found to receive impulses from economics and sociology, less so from psychology and philosophy, and almost none from anthropology.

                      Cover page: Journal Citation Frequency: The Hyperbolic Pattern
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