Political order and the Arab Spring: an analysis of the political decay theory

The central argument of this thesis is that the political decay theory can be operationalised to explain incidences of political disorder, such as those of the Arab Spring. Its operationalisation allowed a variation of models to be tested against groups of countries. The regression tests constituted cross-sectional and longitudinal, including panel data analysis to test for the presence of confounding variables in those relationships. This resulted in the creation of a universal model of the political decay theory, whereby it can be applied to any country in any region to assess its political institutionalisation and indicate whether it is in a heightened risk mode prone to political disorder and instability.

When applied to the Arab Spring events, the results indicated that political institutionalisation was a strong predictor of political order and stability. The panel data analysis for this relationship, however, resulted in a two-way model and indicated the presence confounding variables. This meant that the relationship was correlational rather than causal, and therefore the model is useful for indicating countries in a heightened risk mode for political disorder and instability. The results supported the essence of the political decay theory, namely the importance of political institutionalisation’s interest articulation and aggregation features in accommodating increasing political voices because of social modernisation. The results indicated support for subsequent research areas into the ratio, to test whether it is the ratio of social modernisation to political institutionalisation which influences political disorder and instability.

This thesis contributes to the literature on two fronts. First, it progresses the political decay theory through robust statistical analysis which support both the essence of the theory and indicating areas of subsequent research to refine the model. Currently, the model created is useful for indicating countries in a heightened risk mode. Second, the results support the reframing of political development as political institutionalisation. This simultaneously progresses the multiple modernities paradigm, through the position that political institutionalisation should be regarded as the common denominator across all modernities, regardless of political system type. This is due to the function and importance of interest articulation and aggregation as the self-correction feature of modernities.