Defining and Developing Democracy

Since April of 1974, when the Portuguese military overthrew the Salazar/ Caetano dictatorship, the number of democracies in the world has mul tiplied dramatically. Before the start of this global trend, there were forty democracies. The number increased moderately through the late 1970s and early 1980s as several states experienced transitions from au thoritarian rule (predominantly military) to democratic rule. In the mid 1980s, the pace of global democratic expansion accelerated markedly. By the end of 1995, there were as many as 117 democracies or as few as 76, depending on howpne counts.

Deciding how to count is crucial to some principal tasks of this book:

refining what we mean by.the term democraty; analyzing the degree of glob al democratic progress since 1974; considering whether democracy will continue to expand in the world; and determining what factors will shape the viability of the many new democracies that have come into being.

In a seminal formulation, Samuel Huntington termed this post-1974 period the “third wave” of global democratic expansion and has shown the central importance to it of regional and international demonstration ef fects. The democratizing trend began in Southern Europe in the mid l970s, spread to the military regimes of South America in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and reached East, Southeast, and South Asia by the mid to late 1980s. The end of the 1980s saw a surge of transitions from com munist authoritarian rule in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union and a trend toward democracy in Central America as well. Final1y the democratic trend spread to Africa in 1990, beginning in February of that year with the sovereign National Conference in Benin and the release of Nelson Mandela and the unbanning of the African National Congress in South Africa. By 1998 there were between nine and seventeen democra cies on the continent—again, depending on how one counts.

Huntington defines a “wave of democratization” simply as “a group of [ transitions. . . that occur within a specified period of time and that significantly outnumber transitions in the opposite direction during that period.” He identifies two previous waves of democratiza tion (along, slow wave from 1828 to 1926 and a second, post—World War II wave, from 1943 to 1964). Each of the first two waves ended with a re verse wave of democratic breakdowns (1922—42, 1961—75), in which some but not all of the new (or reestablished) democracies collapsed. Each reverse wave significantly diminished the number of democracies in the world but left more democracies in place than had existed prior to the start of the democratic wave

Will the new century bring a third reverse wave, challenging once again democratic ideas, models, and institutions?

The Best Form of Government

Why should we worry about the danger of a new reverse wave? Why study the determinants of democracy? Why democracy?

The normative perspective underlying this book is that democrati zation is generally a good thing and that democracy is the ‘best form of government. However, democracy is not an unmitigated blessing. Dat ing back to Aristotle (and to Plato, who had even less sympathy for democracy), the key shapers of democratic political thought have held that the best realizable form of government is mixed, or constitutional, government, in which freedom is constrained by the rule of law and pop ular sovereignty is tempered by state institutions that produce order and stability. Aristotle saw that, in a state ofpure democracy, “where the mul titude have the supreme power, and supersede the law by their decrees

- . . demagogues spring up,” and democracy degenerates into a form of despotism.

Thus, as Locke, Montesquieu, and the American Federalists as serted, only a constitutional government, restraining and dividing the temporary power of the majority, can protect indiudual freedom. This fundamental insight (and value) gave birth to a tradition of political though t_1ibera1ism— to a concept—liberal democracy—that are central to this book. As elaborated below, I use the term libei-alto mean a olitical system in which individual and group liberties are well protect ed and in which there exist autonomous spheres of civil society and pri vate life, insulated from state control. Conceptually, a liberal polity is in de of the existence of a competitive, liberal economy based on secure rights of property, although in practice the two are related, in part by their common need to restrict the power of the state.

Even if we think of democracy as simply the rule of the people, as a system for choosing government through free and fair electoral compe tition at regular intervals, governments chosen in this manner are gen erally better than those that are not. They offer the best prospect for accountable, responsive, peaceful, predictable, good governance. And, as Robert Dahi cogently observes, they promote “freedom as no feas ible alternative can “ “Democracy is instrumental to freedom in three ways.” First, free and fair elections inherently require certain political rights of expression, organization, and opposition, “and these funda mental political rights are unlikely to exist in isolation” from broader civil liberties. Second, democracy maximizes the opportunities for self- determination, “for persons to live under laws of their own choosing.” Third, it facilitates moral autonomy, the ability of each individual citizen to make normative choices and thus to be, at the most profound level, self-governing. Consequently, the democratic process promotes human development (the growth of personal responsibility and intelligence) while also providing the best means for people to protect and advance their shared interests.

Up to a point consistent with the principles of constitutionalism and representative democracy, government is better when it is more demo cratic. This is not to argue that even electoral democracy is easily attain able in any country at any time. However, more democracy makes gov crnrnent more responsive to a wider range of citizens. “The greater the Opportunities for expressing, organizing, and representingpolitical pref erences, the greater the number and variety of preferences and interests that are likely to be represented in policy making.”