Democracy and Its Alternatives: Understanding Post-Communist Societies

by Richard Rose, William Mishler

The collapse of Communism has created the opportunity for democracy to spread from Prague to the Baltic and Black Seas. But the alternatives―dictatorship or totalitarian rule―are more in keeping with the traditions of Central Europe. And for many post-Communist societies, democracy has come to be associated with inflation, unemployment, crime, and corruption. Is it still true, then, as Winston Churchill suggested a half-century ago, that people will accept democracy with all its faults―because it is better than anything else? To find out, political scientists Richard Rose, William Mishler, and Christian Haerpfer examine evidence from post-Communist societies in eastern Europe. Drawing on data from public opinion and exit polls, election results, and interviews, the authors present testable hypotheses regarding regime change, consolidation, and prospects for stabilization. The authors point out that the abrupt transition to democracy in post-Communist countries is normal; gradual evolution in the Anglo-American way is the exception to the rule. While most recent books on democratization focus on Latin America and, to some extent, Asia, the present volume offers a unique look at the process currently under way in nine eastern European the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, Poland, Slovenia, Bulgaria, Romania, Belarus, and Ukraine. Despite the many problems these post-Communist societies are experiencing in making the transition to a more open and democratic polity, the authors conclude that a little democracy is better than no democracy at all.

272 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1998

Reviews

[William Smith · Rating 3 out of 5]

A review work that evaluates New Democracies Barometer (NDB) survey in the former soviet satellite states in Eastern Europe. Quite academic in delivery and scope but provides useful empirical contextualisation about the route to democracy (or not) in Eastern European countries. A verbose element of the work will do what well-trained academics are expected to perform - definitional and social theory quibbling, but the meat of the survey data is well displayed, explained, contextualised, and evaluated. A useful read if one wants to conceptualise why Belarus/Romania/Bulgaria/Ukraine has diverged from Greece/Czech Republic/Hungary.