Democratization : a critical introduction, 2nd ed., by Jean Grugel and Matthew Louis Bishop [book review]

Abstract

Democratization: A Critical Introduction offers what the title promises: a critical – but not dogmatic – introductory text to democratization in theory and practice. The book is divided into three parts: the Introduction and Chapters 1 – 3 set the stage by discussing conceptions of democracy and democratization, the historical evolution of democracy globally, and the way that theorizing about democratization has evolved over the last decades. In the second part (Chapters 4– 6), the authors delineate their own theoretical framework for understanding both the causes of democratization and why some democratization trajectories have been more successful than others. The proposed framework, centring on the role of the state, civil society, and the global context, builds on elements of previous democratization theories, and in particular historical sociology, the agency approach, and critical international political economy. Chapters 7 –11 are devoted to empirically applying the authors’ theory across the main regions of the world: Europe (including both Southern Europe and the countries of the former Eastern bloc), Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East (which is defined broadly to include also the Maghreb), and Asia. The focus is thus on “third wave” democratization attempts. Throughout the book, there are a number of boxes providing more detail on specific subjects touched upon in the text: Schumpeterian democracy, “uncivil” society, corporatism and populism in Latin America, political Islam and democracy, and so on.