Saturday, 20. March 2010
Product Description
New governments established during the third wave of democratization in Latin America, Eastern and Central Europe, Africa, and Asia face increasing threats to stabilization and consolidation. Alfred Stepan, a major voice in democratization studies, gathers leading experts in political science and government to better understand what is going wrong and how it can be fixed.
The contributors identify and analyze three key problems that endanger these democracies: ethnonational conflicts, domestic security and the role of police and military, and power sharing in presidential and semi-presidential systems. For each of these issues, essays evaluate promising new policies, advance alternatives, and suggest political reforms that could increase the success of democratic governance.
Stepan’s introduction reflects on why these three critical issues have been neglected or misconceptualized by practitioners and theorists alike. A conclusion by Fernando Henrique Cardoso, former president of Brazil, offers unique insight on how to successfully manage and solve these problems.
Democracies in Danger is the product of informed and productive dialogue between former prime ministers and presidents of new democracies and leading democratization scholars. It will be essential in setting research agendas and policy discussions for a broad range of scholars and practitioners.
Democracies in Danger
Posted in Consolidation Books by -
Sunday, 14. March 2010
![]()
Product Description
Since 1974 there has been an unprecedented wave of democratization in the world. This trend has been particularly extensive in South America. But the problems confronting these new democracies are staggering, and the prospect for building consolidated democratic regimes are far from uniformly good. Focusing primarily on recent South American cases, “Issues in Democratic Consolidation” examines some of the difficulties of constructing consolidated democracies and provides a critical examination of the major issues involved. A prominent theme running through this collection is that the transitions from authoritative rule to civilian government may be arrested by political, economic and social constraints. The articles contain analyses of the varied modalities and complex processes related to the transitions. The first transition begins with the initial stirrings of crisis under authoritarian rule that generate some form of political opening and greater respect for basic civil rights, and ends with the establishment of a government elected in an open, competitive contest. The volume’s primary focus, however, is on the second transition, which begins with the inauguration of a democratic government and ends – if all goes well – with the establishment of a consolidated democratic regime.
Issues in Democratic Consolidation: The New South American Democracies in Comparative Perspective
Posted in Consolidation Books by -