John Higley and Richard Gunther have gathered together in their book Elites and Democratic Consolidation in Latin America and Southern Europe essays by a distinguished group of scholars examining the transition to democracy in Latin American countries in recent years with perspective developed around the theoretical perspective developed and explained by Higley and Gunther. The articles taken as a whole are comprehensive, covering the countries in latin America to which the thesis applies, and doing so in a way that elucidates the specific role of democratic consolidation. The book also provides a historical context against which to measure the essays, the democratic beginnings in these countries, and over time the course taken by democracy in the region.
The editors offer a justification for producing another volume on democratization in the fact that their book is distinct from the existing literature on the subject in two ways: 1) each of the country studies focuses on factors contributing to the successful consolidation of democratic regimes and not on the transition to democracy as such; and 2) this volume has a single theoretical framework:
Each of the case studies applies a common set of concepts dealing with first, the ability of elites to reach agreements that contribute to the consolidation of new democratic regimes and, second, with circumstances that facilitate such agreements.
The editors note that there is broad agreement about the elite precondition for consolidated democracy, but there is no agreement about how it is created or how it is sustained. These are among the questions addressed by the essays in this book in terms of recent Latin American and Southern European politics:
We advance and explore distinctive explanations for the occurrence and nonoccurrence of democratic consolidation in these countries. We contend that in independent states with long records of political instability and authori...