in what follows, i would like to contribute to a defense of deliberative democracy by giving an affirmative answer to the question in the title. the goal is admittedly humble. For the coherence of an ideal says nothing about its desirability, feasibility or overall appropriateness.1 and, indeed, i will not address these further issues here. but, though humble, the goal of assessing the coherenc...

The formerly socialist countries of Central and Eastern Europe have experienced profound political and economic changes since the demise of Communism in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Each country has its own particular history of transformation to a freer, more democratic, more market-based society. The timing and specific circumstances of the revolutions in each country vary. Even today, the...

In the aftermath of postcommunism, Slovakia did not consolidate liberal democracy. Yet the 1998 election did eventually trigger the democratic breakthrough in Slovakia. Thus this dissertation reflects upon what ushered Slovakia into a new democratic era following the pivotal election. It casts doubt at the European Union’s leverage as being a deus ex machina for rejecting an illiberal democracy...

This article considers the elite in Brazilian society as a core feature of political culture and examines its involvement in the development of democracy in post authoritarian Brazil from a socio-political and institutional point of view. Brazil’s elite have been criticized as having an ambiguous attitude towards democracy. Some scholars have suggested that Brazil’s elite exhibit no discernible...

In this paper, we discuss the role of ICT and social media on democratic activities. Some overview of political systems are presented to show its impact on governments’ decision making. At the end of research we suggest some recommendations to enhance the quality of online democratic activities. Keywords— e-democracy, e-participation, e-government,

The past decade has seen intensified calls for the reform of democratic political institutions in Canada, on the grounds that there is a “democracy deficit” at the level of federal politics. Some commentators have even begun to describe the country as a “banana republic,” or a “friendly dictatorship.” Yet any attempt to assess the state of democracy in Canada must naturally presuppose some theo...

Consensual and Conflictual Democratization We study the process of endogenous democratization from inefficient oligarchic systems in an economy where heterogeneous individuals can get involved in predation activities. The features of democracies are shown to be crucially related to the conditions under which democratization initially takes place. The political regime and the extent of redistrib...

Black Americans are a core Democratic constituency, despite holding views on social issues that put them in conflict with the party. Conventional wisdom attributes this partisan commitment to the salience of race and concerns about racial inequality. This paper considers whether the Democratic bias derives in part from low levels of political knowledge. Using data from the 2004 National Annenbe...