Arguably, liberal democratic societies are seeing the emergence of a ‘Fifth Estate’ that is being enabled by the Internet. This new organizational form is comparable to, but potentially more powerful than, the Fourth Estate, which developed as a significant force in an earlier period with an independent press and other mass media. While the significance of the press and the Internet to democrat...

The paper is concerned with democratisation in the Third World since the 1980s, a period when dozens of Third World countries underwent at least some measure of democratic change. The paper, both general and comparative, rather than specific and focused on one or several countries, aims to try to help locate discussions in the workshopÕs analytical framework: to assess the extent of democratic ...

As liberal democracies, what can the United States, Europe, and Japan be expected to embrace as “democratic” solutions to global environmental problems such as climate change? It is our argument that contradictions in liberal democratic politics lead these states to advocate solutions that are nature-ascommodity oriented and that idealize the notion of “managed nature.” In the case of climate c...

The metatheory on the democratic process poses a conceptual framework for the empirical analysis of democratic processes in liberal democracies. A model of democratic processes is being developed which proceeds from certain metatheoretical presuppositions. It distinguishes, inter alia, between three subsystems of the political system and defines their relevant collective actors. Moreover, a con...

the ninth constitution of afghanistan (1382 /2003) was ratified according to the bone agreement and with a democratic orientation. this paper compares the principles of this constitution with principles of two models of liberal democracy. for this purpose, five indexes have been used for our analysis: the view on man, the notion of right, political system, democracy, and the process for the act...

One key paradigmatic subtext of Naomi Klein’s argument runs in her The Shock Doctrine (London: Penguin, 2008) is how the supposed undemocratic, violent character of ‘‘totalitarian’’ Marxist movements serve to justify repressive measures by the neo-liberal state. In inviting such a repressive response from the state, ‘‘undemocratic’’ revolutionary left movements are presented as causing the eros...

In a path-breaking article, Wade Huntley (1996) reinterpreted Immanuel Kant’s pacific union as a systemic phenomenon. Huntley’s argument spawned a new wave of inquiry into the evolutionary expansion of the democratic peace, with several empirical studies finding a positive relationship between global democracy and systemic peace (e.g. Crescenzi and Enterline 1999; Gleditsch and Hegre 1997; Kade...

In a path-breaking article, Wade Huntley (1996) reinterpreted Immanuel Kant’s pacific union as a systemic phenomenon. Huntley’s argument spawned a new wave of inquiry into the evolutionary expansion of the democratic peace, with several empirical studies finding a positive relationship between global democracy and systemic peace (e.g. Crescenzi and Enterline 1999; Gleditsch and Hegre 1997; Kade...