James Trinklein - 1748805 3/26/12 Putnam, Robert D. Making Democracy Work: Civic Traditions in Modern Italy. 5 printing.

Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993. 258 pages. Print.

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The question of why some democratic institutions work better than others has been a thorn in the side of political scientists since the invention of democracy. Accordingly, many theories have been developed in order to answer this question, some more effectively than others. In the book Making Democracy Work: Civic Traditions in Modern Italy, Robert Putnam attempts to explain the effectiveness of democratic institutions by studying the regional governments set up in Italy after the move from a strictly unitary system to a more federal system during the 1970s. The book itself is set up like a lab report, with 6 chapters, each representing a step in the process of determining what, exactly, causes some democratic institutions to be more effective than others. Chapter 1, titled Studying Institutional Performance, introduces the study he conducted in Italy between 1970 and 1991. Chapter 2, entitled Changing the Rules: Two Decades of Institutional Development, discusses the shift from a unitary to a somewhat federal system in Italy, with attention paid to the opinions of political elites in order to determine how that political upheaval changed Italian politics. Chapter 3, entitled Measuring Institutional Performance introduces his actual experiment, and here he explains his variables and research method before showing us some of the results of his studies. In chapter 4, entitled Explaining Institutional Performance, Putnam tells us his conclusions of the experiment, explaining his theory of civic participation in the meantime. Chapter 5, entitled Tracing the Roots of the Civic Community, Putnam attempts to give a historical account of why the data supports his thesis, and the final chapter, Social Capital and Institutional Success, discusses the idea of Social Capital and why that idea is important to understanding human behavior in the political arena. The first chapter, Studying Institutional Performance, does a very good job of introducing the central themes of the book. Putnam starts with a story of the towns of Seveso and Pietrapertosa, using them to describe the enormous difference between Northern and Southern Italy by highlighting the different crises they face. He then discusses the economic development of many of the regions in Italy, highlighting the differences between

regions in terms of modernization and political organization. After giving a snapshot of Italys different political and economic climates, he gives an account of the different explanations that have been given for the performance of democratic institutions, using this account to frame his explanation of the various research methods he used in his book. Finally he explains to the reader exactly what will be contained in the rest of the book. By starting with a story, Putnam manages to grab the readers attention while slowly making them aware of the nitty-gritty of his investigation into Italian politics. The chapter serves as an excellent introduction to the rest of the book by presenting a coherent background to Putnams investigation without getting too specific or technical. It also serves as an excellent roadmap to the actual research he conducts, guiding the reader into the proper mindset for absorbing his story and understanding his thesis. The second chapter, Changing the Rules: Two Decades of Institutional Development, starts out as an explanation of recent history in Italian politics for the uninitiated. Putnam starts by explaining how regional governments were created in Italy, along with an explanation of the previous, Napoleonic system of government whose failure to properly serve Italys different regions led to its ouster by constitutional reform. He gives a clear, easily understandable account of the shift of power in Italian politics from Rome to the different regions without becoming overly political, offering statistics to prove the effectiveness of these changes. He then goes on to discuss how the attitudes of the various actors in Italian politics changed over time as the regional governments of Italy had time to assert themselves, using his interview data of politicians, community leaders, and regular voters to show a definite and positive change in Italian political attitudes. He then shows how autonomy improved in the regions of Italy after the changes instituted in 1976 using those same interviews. Finally, Putnam shows to the reader and explains the significant gap in confidence in democratic institutions between the North and the South, framing his question for inquiry: Why are Northern regions so much better run that Southern regions when they are each given what they need, more or less, to succeed? He attributes this to the greater autonomy in each region, and segues to the next chapter. Overall, this chapter succeeds in its purpose. It makes clear to the reader the value of the regional governments while simultaneously bringing to the forefront how different the success rates of those governments are. It uses empirical data to justify Putnams central question without any real holes of logic, and successfully prepares the reader for the actual study of the effectiveness of regional governments.

Chapter Three, Measuring Institutional Performance, is where Putnam finally discusses his formal experiment. He attempts to describe institutional performance by tracking 12 variables across every single region in Italy. These variables, each one carefully defended by Putnam, range from the obviously important (Cabinet Stability, Budget Promptness) to the possibly irrelevant (Day Care Centers). However, he makes his case for each variable and they seem, together, to paint a useful picture of governmental efficiency. There do exist a few shortcomings in the variables he uses. The statistic for Day Care Centers was based on numbers found in an unpublished report that appears not to exclude privately-run day care centers from ones operated by the government. He does not go into specifics, so we cannot know how many of these day care centers were regionoperated instead of family-run. Other issues, like ideological factors, that may artificially depress or inflate specific indicators (and thereby have a detrimental effect on the accuracy of the report) were considered by Putnam, but he states that his model ended up being effective despite such shortcomings. Later in the chapter, he combines his results with the opinion data he gathered for the second chapter, and finds that more effective governments are more popular, even among the opposition, which eliminates the cultural argument for him. At least in Italy, he writes, People everywhere recognize the distinction between good government and bad They like good government, and they dislike bad. This does not mean that there is one best way to govern It does mean that the difference between better and worse is appreciated. (Putnam 81). He closes the chapter by reiterating the differences in government effectiveness and how they consistently show significant differences between regions, setting himself up for the revelation of his hypothesis in the next chapter. Though there are some minute problems with his measurements, his numbers seem not only to check out but also to reinforce the fact that there is a North-South divide in good governance. My primary issue, however, is the fact that, up to this point one half of the way through the book we have no idea what his hypothesis or theory is, and because he has only, up to this point, presented data that merely describes current conditions, the reader is left unable to properly organize this data, as he has no idea of what Putnam is trying to say. That aside, the data is presented neatly, and, aside from a few areas of vagueness, his model appears to check out. Chapter 4, Explaining Institutional Performance, is where Putnam finally takes a stand on why the North does so much better, and in such a consistent manner, than the South. He starts out by correlating his Institutional Performance data with economic modernity scores. He finds this lacking, stating that, although the results do

correlate rather neatly (All regions that performed greater than the average in performance had higher than average economic modernity scores), they do not account for the whole picture, taking into account the distribution of funds across the country. He then starts discussing civic participation, using Alexis DeTocquevilles Democracy in America to support his argument. Finally, he measures civic community across all the regions of Italy and comes to the conclusion that the level of civic community in a region is the most accurate predictor of government performance. He then attempts to justify this by overlaying the civic community scores he generated over various political attitude and institutional performance scores, and tries to show the connection between civic responsibility and effective government. To a large extent he does this; however, there are some problems with his data correlation that need addressing. In the presentation of his data, he presented two graphs for each variable he correlated with civic community a scatter graph of every region, plotted with Civic Community on the x axis and the correlatory variable on the Y axis. These graphs, by and large, do show more or less obvious correlations. However, his correlating variables seem to understate the amount of change in civic community shown by each region, especially in his bar graphs. This is particularly obvious in figures 4.7, 4.8, and 4.11, where he correlates Constituent Contacts per Week, Leaders Support for Political Equality, and Leaders Fear of Compromise against Civic Community. Instead of showing either a clear positive or negative correlation, each of these bar graphs show that, while there is an obvious correlation at the extremes, middling areas specifically Veneto and Lazio show the civic community scores of a prosperous region but the Contact, Equality, and Compromise scores of a dirt-poor southern region. This is especially egregious in figures 4.8 and 4.11, where the scores for Veneto and Lazio are only distinguishable from those of Basilicata and Puglia by a very slim margin. It seems Putnam either picked poor candidates through which we would see the correlation between those variables, or the data just doesnt match. Once he finishes with that, however, he explores alternative explanations for institutional performance, including some that seem immediately obvious (educational quality) and some that seem a little counter-intuitive (presence of the Italian Communist Party). In the end, he sticks with his original theory: Regions with greater levels of civic community will have, on average, more effective institutions. With the exception of his problems in properly presenting his findings, his theory appears sound. He carefully considers his argument and presents excellent evidence in favor of his theory, even if he presents it a little awkwardly.

Chapter 5, Tracing the Roots of the Civic Community, is all about Italian history and offers Putnams historical explanation for the existence of a civic spirit in Italy. He talks about how, during the Middle Ages, Northern Italy grouped into city-states based on the idea of, if not democracy, then oligarchic republicanism, leading to the creation of, at first, guilds and other medieval interest groups, which over time evolved into the unions and bird-watching clubs of today. He also tells of Southern Italy, which, after being conquered by Norman mercenaries, is turned into a highly efficient, highly centralized bureaucratic autocracy defined by vertical civic participation a society that ran on patronage and favors. While it was a model for the monarchical, bureaucratic states of the future during the tenure of its first two kings, after Frederick II passed away, the state of the Kingdom of Sicily became a different example predatory Patrimonialism in action. Over time (and over the course of multiple invasions and changes in dynasties), the historical dependence on contacts and higher-ups fostered a sense of amoral individualism in which people, concerned only for their own well being, trusted their patrimonial benefactors much more than they trusted each other. He ends the chapter by analyzing how economic factors present at unification ended up affecting the current political and economic landscape of Italy. What he found was that the only useful indicator of current institutional performance was the tradition of civic community in the region. In fact, to use his own words, Economics does not predict civics, but civics does predict economics, better indeed than economics itself. (Putnam 157). Early economic development, according to Putnam, had little to no bearing on the effectiveness of institutions or even current economic conditions. This chapter was not only interesting to read, but essential in developing his thesis. Though some might read it and call it a cultural analysis of Italian government, it instead shows beyond a shadow of a doubt how important civic community is to functioning governmental institutions. His historical prose was entertaining, and his conclusions were valid. By using the historical perspective, Putnam made his theory all the more convincing while making an otherwise dry thesis entertaining to read. The final chapter, Social Capital and Institutional Success, is Putnams attempt at defining Social Capital. He starts by explaining the collective action problem without a guarantee that the other will reciprocate, two people who can either work together for a collective profit or work alone and screw the other one over will do the latter almost every time, because they dont believe the other person has a reason to help them. Using this fundamental piece of game theory, he explains, through the example of rotating credit circles, that trust, and the

mutual fear of ostracism, drives people to do things that arent in their immediate self-interest. Inversely, where there is no fear of ostracism and no communal trust, people tend not to engage with each other. He defines both of these as being in social equilibrium, and that the tradition of either trusting or not trusting others is selfsustaining, depending on the existence of trust-building institutions. He concludes that social context and history are the most important tools to building functional institutions. This chapter perfectly summarizes his theory of Social Capital, and is immediately applicable to any and all regions, countries, and organizations. The use of game theory to explain his theory was very well pulled off, and made the chapter a very entertaining and effective way to finish the book. Overall, though there were some issues with the way the author presented his data, this was an interesting, entertaining look at the way history and civic participation affect politics. Putnam crafted an entirely new paradigm in political science with this book, and its significance is easy to understand. Easily readable yet extremely in-depth, this book provides an extremely interesting and important solution to the problem of ineffective government.