Moissei Jakowlewitsch Ostrogorski
Moisey Ostrogorsky ( Russian Моисей Яковлевич Острогорский ., Scientific transliteration Moisej Jakovlevic Ostrogorskij * 1854 in Grodno , Russian Empire ; † 10. February 1921 in Petrograd ) was a Russian political scientist , known for his studies on the comparative today party system research is known.
Life
Ostrogorski studied law in Saint Petersburg and worked for the Russian Ministry of Justice for several years . In the 1880s he was forced to emigrate. He went to Paris and studied there until 1885 at an independent institute for political science. There he wrote works on Russian history that were used in schools and wrote a treatise on women's rights in public law in French .
Ostrogorski's main field of activity as a researcher was the study of political parties . To do this, he stayed for many years in the United States and Great Britain . In 1902 he published Democracy and the Organization of Political Parties (original in French). After his return to Russia, he was elected to the Duma in 1906 on the Jewish electoral roll in Grodno , where he became an important representative within the constitutional democratic parties. After the dissolution of the Duma, Ostrogorski left active politics .
plant
The most important result of his observations and scientific work is the finding that democratic parties also have a quasi pathological tendency to become bureaucratic - oligarchic organizations . This was announced by Robert Michels little later for the Social Democratic Party in the German Empire proved the then only German party with a (basic) democratic self-claim in which to run the decision-making from the bottom up (te). Maurice Duverger confirmed Ostrogorski's statements again on a broader material basis in 1951.
Ostrogorski was the first to attempt a systematic theory comparing different political systems , namely the United States and Great Britain. In doing so, he paid particular attention to the two party systems of the two societies and offered hypotheses about voting behavior and opinion- forming that cannot be explained by the right to vote , which in both systems is a majority vote .
Ostrogorski was not ready to come to terms with the oligarchic tendencies that lead to undemocratic structures and suggested various countermeasures. One of his more radical proposals was to completely abolish the parties and replace them with a system of temporary associations . These should only be set up to achieve a specific purpose and should be dissolved again immediately after the goal has been achieved. Ostrogorski wanted to prevent the oligarchic tendency of parties, which was recognized as inevitable, that certain circles of power always develop over time . In view of the omnipresent lack of opportunities to participate, he was understandably less concerned about the lack of professionalism of the staff and efficient work processes in such a rotation system than about securing and expanding emancipating democratic structures.
reception
The political scientists Hans Daudt and Douglas W. Rae call the election paradox formulated by them in 1976 the “ Ostrogorski Paradox ”. This means that there can be strong distortions of the actual “will of the electorate” in elections and referendums if the entire party program is voted on and not separately on the individual issues.
See also
literature
- Encyclopaedia Judaica , 1971, Vol. 12, Col. 1514
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Ostrogorski, Moissei Jakowlewitsch |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Ostrogorski, Moisei |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Belarusian political scientist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 1854 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Hrodna , Belarus |
| DATE OF DEATH | February 10, 1921 |
| Place of death | Petrograd |