In recent years, and especially following the end of the cold war, democratization has become one of the most crucial issues on the international political scene. A great many states are undergoing an extraordinary and difficult transition to democracy. And, that transition is deeply influenced by the new international context.
In this first volume of a major new series, a range of highly respected scholars from around the world and several disciplines tackle the role and importance of international relations in the democratic development of states in the Americas and Europe. Combining...

This study analyzes the attempts by Chile and Uruguay to resolve the human rights violations conflicts inherited from military dictatorships. Alexandra de Brito sheds light on the political conditions which permitted--or prevented--the policies of truth-telling and justice under these successor regimes. She is the first to make comparative assessment of human rights abuse in Uruguay and Chile in this way and makes an original contribution to our understanding of the key political, legal, and moral issues involved.

Drawing on a systematic, empirical analysis of four key Southern European countries, Portugal, Spain, Greece, and Italy, this insightful study identifies several key aspects of democratic consolidation: consensus and legitimization, party system and party organization, and the ways in which organized and non-organized interests are related to parties and the institutions of state. This book offers the first extensive, comparative analysis of consolidation and crisis in these countries, and features a wealth of up-to-date information on party organizations, interest associations, the media,...

This ambitious study, by a leading Spanish social scientist, analyzes the mutual relationships between politics and the economy. Focusing on the experiences of Southern and Eastern Europe, it examines the complex interactions between democracies, economic growth, social redistribution, and political culture.

The 1990s have witnessed the ascendance of a new orthodoxy which asserts that democracy and development are mutually reinforcing. However, many new democracies are illiberal, non-participatory, and characterized by enormous inequalities. This important new study examines the extent to which it is possible to strive towards a new form of developmental state that can promote broad-based and equitable development in the context of legitimized, inclusive democracy.

This is a groundbreaking comparative study of the effect of institutional design on representation, political stability, and inter-ethnic/racial accommodation in the emerging democracies of Southern Africa. Analyzing the experiences of Malawi, Namibia, South Africa, Zambia, and Zimbabwe, the author presents a host of revealing conclusions that help shed light on the success or failure of democratic design in other fledgling democracies.

This book provides a systematic and comparative study of the way three countries in the Southern Cone of the Americas have confronted the legacy of past human rights violations. It examines their attempts to rebuild human rights through public accountability, compensation, educational policy, constitutional reform, and debates about national history and collective memory.

Against a broad backdrop of globalization and worldwide movement toward democracy, the essays in this important new collection examine the unfolding relationships among such phenomena as social change, equity, and democratic representation of the poor in nine different Latin American countries and Spain. Recent shifts in the composition of inequality and increases in overall disparities of wealth have coincided with governments turning away from historic redistributive politics, and also with the general weakening of political and social organizations traditionally identified with the...

This volume analyzes the evolution of selected public policies and the changing roles and structure of the state in Greece, Italy, Portugal, and Spain since the 1960s. It makes a major contribution to work on recent democratic regime transition in southern Europe, demonstrating how the state has responded and adapted to the challenges and pressures associated with the overarching processes of democratization, socio-economic development, and Europeanization.

One of the most important political and ethical issues faced during a political transition from authoritarian or totalitarian to democratic rule is how to deal with legacies of repression. This book explores the important aspect of transitional politics, assessing how Portugal, Spain, the countries of Central and Eastern Europe and Germany after reunification, Russia, the Southern Cone of Latin America and Central America, as well as South Africa, have confronted legacies of repression.