924 Results
July 2011, Volume 22, Issue 3
The wave of unrest that swept through the Arab world at the end of 2010 and the beginning of 2011 originated in Tunisia. What happened— and what are the prospects that Tunisia will make a successful transition to democracy?
April 2011, Volume 22, Issue 2
Chinese authoritarianism has deftly adapted to the Internet Age, employing various forms of technological controls. China’s brand of networked authoritarianism serves as a model for other regimes, such as those of Iran and Russia.
April 2011, Volume 22, Issue 2
Even before Argentina’s landmark gay-marriage law was passed in July 2010, a gay-rights revolution was well underway across Latin America. But do gay rights by law equal acceptance of gays in practice?
April 2011, Volume 22, Issue 2
In late 2010, not long before seismic political change was to erupt across the Middle East, Jordan held parliamentary elections. Officials were eager to present these as a fresh start, but a closer look tells a different tale.
October 2010, Volume 21, Issue 4
Since the return of multipartism in sub-Saharan Africa, open-seat elections have been the most likely to yield opposition victories, suggesting that term limits may significantly contribute to democratic consolidation.
July 2010, Volume 21, Issue 3
The 2010 presidential election shows that Ukraine is both a surprisingly stable electoral democracy and a disturbingly corrupt one. The corruption, moreover, may have a lot to do with the stability.
July 2010, Volume 21, Issue 3
Although Ukraine’s regional divisions are often thought to be detrimental to state-building and democratization, they have in fact been a source of strength and helped to prevent tilts to the political extremes.
April 2010, Volume 21, Issue 2
Once touted as a regional success story, Mozambique has been backsliding toward one-party-dominant rule, and has now slipped off the Freedom House list of electoral democracies. How and why did this happen?
January 2010, Volume 21, Issue 1
The central problems now blocking democracy in Georgia and other parts of the former USSR are: 1) the use of power in order to gain wealth; 2) the absence of the rule of law; and 3) the passivity of citizens.
October 2009, Volume 20, Issue 4
Latin American social policy has at times worked backwards, widening rather than narrowing economic and social inequalities. But new conditional cash-transfer programs seem to be producing positive outcomes.
April 2009, Volume 20, Issue 2
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization played a key role in safeguarding Western democracy during the Cold War. With that conflict over, NATO must continually adapt and evolve in a fast-changing world.
April 2009, Volume 20, Issue 2
Ghana held its fourth successful elections in late 2008 and subsequently witnessed the peaceful handover of power from ruling party to opposition. The country’s leaders must now reform its institutions of governance.
January 2009, Volume 20, Issue 1
Structure, agency, and process all are critical in explaining the uneven pattern of electoral change in postcommunist Europe and Eurasia.
January 2009, Volume 20, Issue 1
Levels of regime strength and links to the West help to explain authoritarian breakdown, but the ruler’s popularity also matters.
July 2008, Volume 19, Issue 3
The journalistic and policy communities have been alive with speculation as to whether Islamist groups involved in politics—including Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood and Palestine’s Hamas— are true believers in democracy or calculating pragmatists who, in Steven Cook’s words, are “seeking to use democratic procedures in order to advance an antidemocratic agenda.”
April 2008, Volume 19, Issue 2
Despite sweeping political and constitutional changes in Africa, a notable feature of the ancien régime survives—the imperial presidency. African presidents may be term-limited, but they have not been tamed.
July 2007, Volume 18, Issue 3
For more than two decades, President Yoweri Museveni has been building an authoritarian regime that answers closely to his personal will.
July 2007, Volume 18, Issue 3
After a decade and a half, how do citizens of postcommunist Europe now feel toward their new governing regimes?
April 2007, Volume 18, Issue 2
Although the overall state of democracy in the world differed little from that in 2005, a series of worrisome trends seem to be contributing to a stagnation of freedom.
January 2007, Volume 18, Issue 1
A crucial requirement of government by consent is the willingness of defeated candidates and parties to concede when the voters' verdict goes against them. Events in Mexico following its July 2006 presidential election have sorely tested that country's young democracy in this regard.
