Democratic Consolidations: Some Broad Comparisons and Sweeping Arguments

Abstract

for comments on earlier versions.1. The other authors under review here would generally agree with Rueschemeyer, Stephens, and Stephens that democracy entails "first, regular, free and fair elections of representatives with universal and equal [male] suffrage, second, responsibility of the state apparatus to the elected parliament ... , and third, the freedoms of expression and association as well as the protection of individual rights" (p. 43). Przeworski, following Robert Dahl, thinks the definition is simpler: "contestation open to participation ... is sufficient to identify a political system as democratic" (p, 10).