The Culture of Accountability: A Democratic Virtue

This book explores the cultural conditions that favor political accountability, examining the channels through which accountability can be secured and the role it plays in ensuring good governance. It suggests that accountability is the product of three processes and explores the relationship between accountability and political culture. It will be of interest to scholars, students, and practitioners in governance, political economy, democracy, and more.

Format: Hardback
Length: 170 pages
Publication date: 14 September 2022
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd

This comprehensive book delves into the cultural factors that promote political accountability. It explores the mechanisms through which accountability can be established and the significance of accountability in ensuring effective governance. In addition to challenging the concept of accountability, the book proposes that it arises from three interconnected processes: considering voter preferences, maintaining records of voter preferences, and providing accounts of one's performance in office. Furthermore, it examines the interplay between accountability and political culture by analyzing the relationship between accountability and various factors such as religion, religious denominations, familism, civicness, secularism, and postmaterialism. The study reveals that the level of accountability is influenced by the spread of post-material values and the level of civicness in a particular country.

This book holds immense value for scholars, students, and practitioners engaged in governance, the political economy of institutions and development, democracy, and various fields of political science, international relations, political theory, comparative politics, sociology, and cultural studies. Chapter 1 of this book is accessible for free in PDF format as Open Access from the individual product page at www.routledge.com. It has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.

Dimension: 234 x 156 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781032319100