the concepts of democracy have been around for centuries in different fields of human sciences. however, in most of these fields the idealistic and far-fetched features attributed to democracy have not been manipulated yet. it should be mentioned that there have been only a few serious attempts to find proper go-between elements, which could make such a concept as comprehensible and tangible as...

The stability and functioning of any kind of political regime—including democratic or representative ones—relies on the combination of the capacity of rulers and government officials to use coercion and the development of political legitimacy. Political legitimacy can be described as people's recognition and acceptance of the validity of the rules of their entire political system and the decisi...

Michael Remmert is project manager of the project "Making democratic institutions work" in the Council of Europe. The Council of Europe has been working since 2002 on a set of European standards on the legal, operational and technical aspects of electronic voting. This keynote gives insights on the progress and the work done so far. The Council of Europe is a pan-European inter-governmental org...

Costs associated with recognizing an internal armed challenger as a legitimate bargaining partner deter governments from initiating peace talks. Yet peaceful termination of conflict requires formal negotiations between the belligerents. This article presents evidence that democratic reforms provide window opportunity for Democratic represent to break away past policies state and render artifact...

In the eyes of many people, political parties, the hallmark of modern democratic government, have become the biggest obstacles to democratic consolidation and good governance in much of democratic Southeast Asia. The purpose of this article is to analyze some of the characteristics of the parties and party systems in this area of the world. I first review the role that parties and party systems...

Michael Remmert is project manager of the project "Making democratic institutions work" in the Council of Europe. The Council of Europe has been working since 2002 on a set of European standards on the legal, operational and technical aspects of electronic voting. This keynote gives insights on the progress and the work done so far. The Council of Europe is a pan-European inter-governmental org...

argue that democracy may be the best protection against the harmful effects of globalisation. This view is supported by, for example, the tobacco industry's exploitation of the situation in countries with widespread corruption and a lack of functioning democratic systems, 11 contrasted with the industry's growing record of failure when faced by democratic governments. So does the experience of ...

They include the treatment of the issues of self-determination, consent, and the status of Northern Ireland in the Irish Constitution and in British constitutional legislation; the establishment of new democratic institutions in Northern Ireland on a partnership basis; the creation of formal new links between the two jurisdictions in Ireland through a North/South Ministerial Council and a numbe...