Catholicism and Democracy A Reconsideration
نویسنده
چکیده
[1] It has long been believed that there is a relationship between a society‟s culture and its ability to produce and sustain democratic forms of government. The ancient Athenians maintained that their democracy depended, in part, on the fostering of “civic virtue” or democratic culture. Machiavelli, Montesquieu, Rousseau, and J. S. Mill also maintained that culture and democracy were related, and a wide variety of social scientists have come to broadly similar conclusions. For example, the cultural argument appears in S. M. Lipset‟s highly influential explanation of how democracy arises and is sustained (1959; 1981: chaps. 2-3; 1990; 1994). Lipset claims that democracy “requires a supportive culture, the acceptance by the citizenry and political elites of principles underlying freedom of speech, media, assembly, religion, of the rights of opposition parties, of the rule of law, of human rights, and the like” (1994: 3). He even claims that cultural factors appear to be more important than economic ones in accounting for the emergence and stability of democracy (1994: 5; see also 1990). Similarly, Almond and Verba argue that a certain “civic culture” is necessary for the establishment of democracy, and that this sort of culture is not easily transferable to nonWestern countries (5). Such conclusions have been echoed by many other writers and researchers (e.g., Kennan: 41-43; Bendix: 430; Tumin: 151; Inglehart 1988, 1990, 1997; Putnam; Granato, Inglehart and Leblang; Bova: 115).
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