Book Review: Poli-Sci in SEA

Erik Kuhonta, Dan Slater, Tuong Vu (editors), Southeast Asia in Political Science: Theory, Region, and Qualitative Analysis (2008)

Here's a short review I wrote for Amazon.com on a new book called Southeast Asia in Political Science. It's a useful corrective to the overly qualitative, country-specific nature of Southeast Asian Studies. In addition to my comments below, I also wish the book had included a chapter discussing the literature (or lack thereof) of law and courts in the region. Here it is:

Southeast Asian Courts: "To Be Free, or Not to Be?"

I have been reading Dr. Maung Maung's book Burma's Constitution, which focuses on Burma's activist Supreme Court during the late 1940s and 1950s. It reminded me of an odd trend in Southeast Asia: courts in democracies tend to exercise strong judicial review and promote progressive constitutional norms, whereas courts in authoritarian regimes rarely challenge the executive.

At first glance, this might seem obvious. So why is this so surprising?