**4. Building democracy: national factors**

*A level of civil and political liberties—freedom of expression, freedom of the press, freedom to form and join organizations—sufficient to ensure the integrity of political competition and participation" [23].* The minimalist perspective and the maximalist perspective on democracy have provided scholars on democratization with important theoretical notions of foundations of democracy. Overall, there has been a scholarly tradition to implement the minimalist definition of democracy when analyzing democracy-building, by focusing on free and fair election as an important mechanism to promote other political rights and civil liberties. This has resulted in the conclusion that building democracy is very much about institutionalizing free and fair elections. However, the scholarly studies on building liberal democracy have stressed the possibility and importance of further developing electoral democracies, beyond the free and fair elections, including political rights and civil liberties. Robert Dahl has presented a well-known conceptualization of a democracy (polyarchy). His definition of democracy may be seen as a midrange definition between a minimal and maximal definition of democracy. Dahl has presented two dimensions of a democracy in contestation and participation. First, contestation refers to structured political competition through free and fair elections and second, participation refers to the popular right to participate as voters and/or politicians. In his definition of democracy, eight important institutions are mentioned. These are freedom to form and join organizations, freedom of expression, right to vote, eligibility for public office, right of political leaders to compete for support and votes, alternative sources of information, free and fair elections and institutions for making government policies depend on votes and other expressions of preference. Although Dahl's definition focuses on electoral procedures, contestation and participation also embed other political rights and civil liberties. To ensure the implementation of democracy in contestation and participation, it is argued that civil liberties are crucial. Such liberties are, for example, freedom to think, believe, worship, speak and publish one's views as well as the freedom to form and join organizations among other

The scholarly discussion on definitions of democracy has come with studies on nondemocratic states. The process of democracy building starts in a nondemocratic environment which may be of different natures such as one-party-states, military regimes, dynastic rule, theocratic rule, tyranny, oligarchy, absolutism, despotism and monarchy, etc. The research on nondemocratic regimes has set out different types. At first, democracies stood in sharp contrast to the totalitarian type. The totalitarian regime was characterized as a regime-type enforcing state objectives and goals on society and citizens, by concentrating all power to the elite and by subordinating societal activities and people to the control of the regime. In sharp contrast to a democracy, the totalitarian society was defined as an atomized society with very limited independent political, economic, social and judicial institutions due to the total control by the regime through the use of propaganda and terror [25]. To uphold total control, research has come to stress the importance of the implementation of an official ideology, single mass party, secret police, full control of communication, monopoly of coercive methods and a central control of the economy [26]. Another and more common nondemocratic regime has been the authoritarian regime. The authoritarian regime, compared to the totalitarian, has said to have a limited official ideology that dictates societal sectors and with a less powerful, violent and controlling police. The authoritarian regime is also open for socioeconomic pluralism

things [24].

180 Globalization

The previous trends of democratic progress around the world, followed by recent pessimistic assessments of returning authoritarianism, have led to a redeveloped interest in how to build democracies worldwide. There is a long tradition of studying how to protect and promote democracy. The main focus has been to identify the explanatory factors or driving engines that encourage countries to transition to democracy and in how to consolidate new democracies to become stabile and enduring. There has been a dominating focus on national factors for the transitions to democracy. The research on explanatory factors for building democracy grew out of an increasing number of studies on domestic actors and structures of the 1950s and onward, focusing primarily on socioeconomic factors. This approach was tied to developmental studies and was referred to as the modernization school or the modernization thesis. One of the first and most important studies on economic development and its role in modernization was Dankwart Rostow's *Politics and the Stages of Growth* [27]. In the 1960s, in the context of decolonization and new independent states, studies focused on how to establish political order and stability. The modernization perspective on political order was illustrated by the famous study by Lipset, *Political Man* [28]. Lipset argued that modernization, in terms of a high level of gross national product, was an important driving engine for building democracy. By assessing democracies around the world, it was convincingly argued how high levels of modernized socioeconomic structures were related to democratic states. In other words, states with economic modernization would become transitional democracies and, with further modernization, also become consolidated democracies. Lipset's focus on economic factors for democratization could be summarized as the more well-to-do a nation, the greater the chances that nation will sustain democracy; this became a major insight on how to explain democratization and triggered further studies on when modernization has been an important explanatory factor to build democracies and when it has not.

Over time, new studies began to explore a more complex picture of modernization and democratization by unfolding a more detailed understanding about what economic and social indicators could trigger democracy building. These studies did not question the importance of modernization for political development, but pinpointed the economic and social structures that are needed to be developed to see democratization. It was argued that democracy building was based on economic progress embedding improved infrastructure, higher levels of education, shared societal values and improved health, etc. The main point made was that modernization embedded social issues that became explanatory factors to democracy rather than just focusing on pure economic growth. States with economic growth could through political reforms to facilitate social structures that were beneficial for developing and consolidating democracy. In more recent decades of research done on the modernization thesis, economic progress leading to improved technology and the flow of information and knowledge has become new emphasized indicators for building democracy. The IT revolution has empowered people to engage in societal issues and provided people the tools to hold politicians and governments accountable for their decisions and actions, although research also stresses how authoritarian regimes may use new technology to haunt down political oppositions [29].

institutions and the values and judgements of system performances). One pivotal study for this tradition of approaches for democracy building was Almond and Verba's *The Civic Culture*, where political culture referred to "the specifically political orientations—attitudes toward the political system and its various parts, and attitudes toward the role of the self in the system" [33]. Their study analyzed the nature of the political culture that promoted and protected stable democracies and when political culture was defined as the aggregation of individual political attitudes. They argued that there existed three types of political cultures: the parochial, subject and participant culture. In the parochial culture, citizens were only indistinctly aware of the political system; second, in the subject culture, citizens saw themselves as subjects to political affairs rather than participants and third, in participant culture, citizens are participants of the system. The above-mentioned study stressed a connection between stable democracy and participant culture, but added that the importance of elements of parochial and subject cultures. It was argued that in the participant political culture, citizens participated in political affairs and supported political affairs, as well as how the parochial and subject political dimensions made the participating citizens loyal to the existing political decisions and implementation procedures, and thereby, they were supportive to the existing democratic institutions. It was further argued that a grave danger to democracy existed in too much of a subject culture because it

Building Democracy: National and International Factors http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.71984 183

Other studies [34] about the role of political culture have focused on political culture as a multidimensional phenomenon and have measured people's political support of political community, regime principles, regime performance, regime institutions and political actors. These studies have assessed that the overall citizens' support of democracies is high around the world, but there are dissatisfied democrats in societies. Democracies embed an increasing tension between democratic values, which are highly supported, and the trust in existing democratic institutions, which is declining. It has been concluded that there is high confidence within established democracies regarding political objects in the political community and the regime principles, but less confidence and trust in regime performances, regime institutions and politicians. The reasons behind such tension may be the identified existing decline in social trust and civic engagement, failure in regime performances and constitutional design

Important studies on modernization and shifting norms and values have added insight about potential explanatory factors and challenges for democracy. Inglehart [35] conducted the famous World Values Survey, assessing the patterns of political attitudes in states worldwide. From a comparative perspective and over a long period of time, this survey has analyzed political attitudes toward the political community, democracy as an ideal form of government and regime performance. This survey has identified a decreasing respect for political authorities—such as in, for example, the police and political parties—and such declining respects is explained in terms of shifts in cultural values among citizens promoted by globalization, cultural transformations and modernization. The modernization process has fundamentally transformed the political and cultural system from being previously based on religious beliefs to political institutions, rational behavior and post-materialist values of maximizing individual well-being. Such fundamental transformation of culture may explain the identified shift-

could lead to an antidemocratic, authoritarian political system.

or cultural factors rooted in modernization and changing norms and values.

ing support to important political objects of democracy.

In addition, modernization was said to also impact the domestic class-structures. For instance, Moore [30], in the classical study *Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy*—*Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World*, argued the importance of the result of the modernization in the changes of the class structure. He stressed that modernization was not sufficient in deciding democratization, since such socioeconomic development with higher levels of gross domestic product (GDP) could also lead to authoritarian system. Modernization embedded more specific favorable factor for democratization in industrialization, urbanization, increased power to the middle class, decreased power to rural landlords and improved infrastructure, education and health care that all contributed to improved conditions for democracy. It was further argued that industrialization also integrated the commercialized countryside with urban areas, building ties between the urban middle class and rural peasants. Many studies have stressed the importance of a growing middle class to build democracy by integrating the lower and upper classes of the society into collaboration and unity. Socioeconomic modernization provides an economic and political ambitious middle class of business people, professionals, shopkeepers, teachers, civil servants, managers, technicians and clerical and sales-workers. However, some studies have pointed out that the working class is pro-democratic, whereas the middle class is less interested in political change and more interested in protecting its economic role as an antidemocratic force, while other studies have emphasized the alliances between the working class and the middle class to build democracy [31]. The main argument has been that democracy is likely to develop based on industrialization and a growing power of the organized middle class and/or working class. Democracy is less likely to emerge in less modernized, agrarian societies and the dominating body of studies have stated a correlation between higher gross domestic product (GDP) and a growing middle class as the the main pro-democratic forces.

A second set of domestic factors to democracy aside from socioeconomic modernization includes the political culture. The perspective on political culture has referred to people's aggregated political orientations/attitudes toward the political objects of a society, such as the institutions, politicians, norms and values. Such interest in political culture has also included the analysis of the political cultural in terms of existing religious and/or civilization codes within Protestantism, Catholicism, Confucianism and Islam [32].

The perspective on political culture was developed in the 1960s and onward and focused on issues of socialization and the political orientations in cognitive orientation (referring to the knowledge of and beliefs about the political system), affective orientation (feelings about the political system) and evaluation orientation (including commitment and support for political institutions and the values and judgements of system performances). One pivotal study for this tradition of approaches for democracy building was Almond and Verba's *The Civic Culture*, where political culture referred to "the specifically political orientations—attitudes toward the political system and its various parts, and attitudes toward the role of the self in the system" [33]. Their study analyzed the nature of the political culture that promoted and protected stable democracies and when political culture was defined as the aggregation of individual political attitudes. They argued that there existed three types of political cultures: the parochial, subject and participant culture. In the parochial culture, citizens were only indistinctly aware of the political system; second, in the subject culture, citizens saw themselves as subjects to political affairs rather than participants and third, in participant culture, citizens are participants of the system. The above-mentioned study stressed a connection between stable democracy and participant culture, but added that the importance of elements of parochial and subject cultures. It was argued that in the participant political culture, citizens participated in political affairs and supported political affairs, as well as how the parochial and subject political dimensions made the participating citizens loyal to the existing political decisions and implementation procedures, and thereby, they were supportive to the existing democratic institutions. It was further argued that a grave danger to democracy existed in too much of a subject culture because it could lead to an antidemocratic, authoritarian political system.

through political reforms to facilitate social structures that were beneficial for developing and consolidating democracy. In more recent decades of research done on the modernization thesis, economic progress leading to improved technology and the flow of information and knowledge has become new emphasized indicators for building democracy. The IT revolution has empowered people to engage in societal issues and provided people the tools to hold politicians and governments accountable for their decisions and actions, although research also stresses how authoritarian regimes may use new technology to haunt down political

In addition, modernization was said to also impact the domestic class-structures. For instance, Moore [30], in the classical study *Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy*—*Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World*, argued the importance of the result of the modernization in the changes of the class structure. He stressed that modernization was not sufficient in deciding democratization, since such socioeconomic development with higher levels of gross domestic product (GDP) could also lead to authoritarian system. Modernization embedded more specific favorable factor for democratization in industrialization, urbanization, increased power to the middle class, decreased power to rural landlords and improved infrastructure, education and health care that all contributed to improved conditions for democracy. It was further argued that industrialization also integrated the commercialized countryside with urban areas, building ties between the urban middle class and rural peasants. Many studies have stressed the importance of a growing middle class to build democracy by integrating the lower and upper classes of the society into collaboration and unity. Socioeconomic modernization provides an economic and political ambitious middle class of business people, professionals, shopkeepers, teachers, civil servants, managers, technicians and clerical and sales-workers. However, some studies have pointed out that the working class is pro-democratic, whereas the middle class is less interested in political change and more interested in protecting its economic role as an antidemocratic force, while other studies have emphasized the alliances between the working class and the middle class to build democracy [31]. The main argument has been that democracy is likely to develop based on industrialization and a growing power of the organized middle class and/or working class. Democracy is less likely to emerge in less modernized, agrarian societies and the dominating body of studies have stated a correlation between higher gross domestic product (GDP) and a growing middle

A second set of domestic factors to democracy aside from socioeconomic modernization includes the political culture. The perspective on political culture has referred to people's aggregated political orientations/attitudes toward the political objects of a society, such as the institutions, politicians, norms and values. Such interest in political culture has also included the analysis of the political cultural in terms of existing religious and/or civilization codes

The perspective on political culture was developed in the 1960s and onward and focused on issues of socialization and the political orientations in cognitive orientation (referring to the knowledge of and beliefs about the political system), affective orientation (feelings about the political system) and evaluation orientation (including commitment and support for political

oppositions [29].

182 Globalization

class as the the main pro-democratic forces.

within Protestantism, Catholicism, Confucianism and Islam [32].

Other studies [34] about the role of political culture have focused on political culture as a multidimensional phenomenon and have measured people's political support of political community, regime principles, regime performance, regime institutions and political actors. These studies have assessed that the overall citizens' support of democracies is high around the world, but there are dissatisfied democrats in societies. Democracies embed an increasing tension between democratic values, which are highly supported, and the trust in existing democratic institutions, which is declining. It has been concluded that there is high confidence within established democracies regarding political objects in the political community and the regime principles, but less confidence and trust in regime performances, regime institutions and politicians. The reasons behind such tension may be the identified existing decline in social trust and civic engagement, failure in regime performances and constitutional design or cultural factors rooted in modernization and changing norms and values.

Important studies on modernization and shifting norms and values have added insight about potential explanatory factors and challenges for democracy. Inglehart [35] conducted the famous World Values Survey, assessing the patterns of political attitudes in states worldwide. From a comparative perspective and over a long period of time, this survey has analyzed political attitudes toward the political community, democracy as an ideal form of government and regime performance. This survey has identified a decreasing respect for political authorities—such as in, for example, the police and political parties—and such declining respects is explained in terms of shifts in cultural values among citizens promoted by globalization, cultural transformations and modernization. The modernization process has fundamentally transformed the political and cultural system from being previously based on religious beliefs to political institutions, rational behavior and post-materialist values of maximizing individual well-being. Such fundamental transformation of culture may explain the identified shifting support to important political objects of democracy.

The scholarly interest in and study of the aggregated attitudes of citizens toward political objects has been related to research focused on the role of the civil society. Research on civil society has concerned people's attitudes in a society toward political objects and the articulation of such attitudes into organizations, associations, unions and interest clubs. One famous and now classical study on civil society is De Tocqueville's *Democracy in America* [36], where a nineteenth century American prosperous democracy was argued to be based on a highly developed civil society. The American democracy was dynamic, vital and stable due to the highly developed network of civil society across economic, social, cultural and religious organizations and associations. These patterns of civil society constituted a platform or arena for societal activities between the outer bounds of government and the inner bounds of family ties and provided an interesting and important function for political life in democracies. The focus on the role of civil society re-emerged in the early 1990s with Putnam's study, *Making Democracy Work*—*Civic Traditions in Modern Italy* [37], in which he analyzed potential ties between democratic stability, political institutions, socioeconomic factors and sociocultural factors in northern and southern Italy. Such an approach questioned existing theories on socioeconomic factors and democratization and stressed the importance of civil society for institutional functionality, efficiency and democratic legitimacy. Democratic governance, it was argued, was based on the existence of a dynamic civil society of civic engagement, trust and reciprocity between citizens, which would foster improved political and administrative performances and legitimacy.

argued that societal transformation led to increased societal demands on politics and how such demands had to be met by new institutional arrangements. Lack of institutionalization would jeopardize political order, as the political system would come under severe pressure and finally overload. Such institutional overload would provide grave danger to political order and lead to political illegitimacy and system collapse. Institutionalization, to safeguard political order, referred to the development of a strong multi-party system that could attract and mobilize people's political concerns into the political system in an orderly fashion. By channeling people's political demands into a political party's system, democracy could prevail and avoid being challenged by unsatisfied revolutionary groups. Building democracy was therefore argued to be a process of institutionalization, in the establishment of functional political parties, to ensure political participation. Political parties were essential for political order in that they provided instruments for attracting and representing interests and aggregating preferences. They were also tools for recruiting future politicians and institutionalizing elections by empowering political competitive alternatives and organizing the political agenda.

Building Democracy: National and International Factors http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.71984 185

Research on political factors for democracy has also focused on the specific type of institutions that best favor democratic progress and stability. Studies have explored how to design or institutionally structure democracies in the best way to promote democracy and have assessed parliamentarism versus presidentialism. Such focus has, to a high extent, been based on the scholarly contributions by Linz and his colleagues. In his study, *The Perils of Presidentalism* [40], Linz argued that presidentialism is less favorable than parliamentarism for promoting and protecting stable democracies. Such conclusion was based on four perils of presidentialism. First, he argued that the nature of presidential elections (winner-take-all) could result in a presidency based on support from a minority of the electorate and provide a legitimacy gap. Second, he further argued that the fixed presidential terms and the many hindrances to change a president faces could be problematic for democratic vitality and change, especially when considering how the parliamentary system is more adjustable to changing conditions. Third, another danger was the divided legitimacy between the elected president and the elected members of Congress. Potential different political opinions between these two branches could lead to policy gridlock, declining political vitality and functionality and, in the long term, result in increasing societal demands, political illegitimacy and political instability with opportunities for undemocratic forces to take power. Fourth and finally, presidentialism could potentially foster personality politics and become open for inexperienced leaders to become president. Overall, the focus on presidentialism as less favorable for democracy than parliamentarism led to a growing number of studies about how to design democracies with opposing views, using the pros and cons with different institutional arrangements. Dominating arguments have discussed potential weaknesses in the presidential systems, in minority presidents, rigid terms and difficulty of removal, policy gridlock and the election of inexperienced outsiders and how the parliamentary democracies have seemed to be more functional and long-lasting compared to presidential democracies. However, it should be stated that many studies have challenged these arguments or assumptions by pointing out favorable conditions within presidential democracies, but also how political instability may

be caused by weak democratic structures rather than by presidentialism).

The research on political explanatory factors for democracy was developed further in the 1980s by focusing on political actors in building democracy. Such an approach was referred to

The growing bulk of studies over time on civil society and democracy has focused on the relationship between civil society and the state and has concluded a positive versus negative definition of a civil society. First, it has been argued that civil society may be a counter force to the state and, second, an arena or platform for civic education and participation [38]. The negative definition of a civil society refers to the counter force role a civil society may play in regulating and controlling the state and its performances. A civil society may function as an arena of civil society actors who balance the power of state institutions in relation to societal forces and who make sure that state's institutions do not abuse their authority. On the other hand, the positive definition of the civil society refers to the assisting function civil society can have in relation to the state by providing an additional societal arena where citizens can meet, articulate, aggregate and associate freely and become aware of political life. A civil society may therefore contribute to ideas, expertise, norms and values and societal actions to alleviate the pressure on the state and to guide the state in new directions for policy-making. A civil society may therefore have different functions in a democracy and may be an essential part in a vital and consolidated democratic system.

A third and final set of identified domestic factors for democracy building—aside from socioeconomic factors and political culture—includes political institutions and the political role of domestic political elites and the masses. One of the first and most important studies about political institutions and democracy was written by Huntington: *Political order in changing societies*. In times of societal developments, it was argued that one of the unstable factors in a society was insufficient institutionalization: "[t]he primary problem of politics is the lag in the development of political institutions behind social and economic change" [39]. The focus on political institutions as pivotal to democracy stressed the danger of increased political and economic demands from societal forces and delayed political institutionalization. It was argued that societal transformation led to increased societal demands on politics and how such demands had to be met by new institutional arrangements. Lack of institutionalization would jeopardize political order, as the political system would come under severe pressure and finally overload. Such institutional overload would provide grave danger to political order and lead to political illegitimacy and system collapse. Institutionalization, to safeguard political order, referred to the development of a strong multi-party system that could attract and mobilize people's political concerns into the political system in an orderly fashion. By channeling people's political demands into a political party's system, democracy could prevail and avoid being challenged by unsatisfied revolutionary groups. Building democracy was therefore argued to be a process of institutionalization, in the establishment of functional political parties, to ensure political participation. Political parties were essential for political order in that they provided instruments for attracting and representing interests and aggregating preferences. They were also tools for recruiting future politicians and institutionalizing elections by empowering political competitive alternatives and organizing the political agenda.

The scholarly interest in and study of the aggregated attitudes of citizens toward political objects has been related to research focused on the role of the civil society. Research on civil society has concerned people's attitudes in a society toward political objects and the articulation of such attitudes into organizations, associations, unions and interest clubs. One famous and now classical study on civil society is De Tocqueville's *Democracy in America* [36], where a nineteenth century American prosperous democracy was argued to be based on a highly developed civil society. The American democracy was dynamic, vital and stable due to the highly developed network of civil society across economic, social, cultural and religious organizations and associations. These patterns of civil society constituted a platform or arena for societal activities between the outer bounds of government and the inner bounds of family ties and provided an interesting and important function for political life in democracies. The focus on the role of civil society re-emerged in the early 1990s with Putnam's study, *Making Democracy Work*—*Civic Traditions in Modern Italy* [37], in which he analyzed potential ties between democratic stability, political institutions, socioeconomic factors and sociocultural factors in northern and southern Italy. Such an approach questioned existing theories on socioeconomic factors and democratization and stressed the importance of civil society for institutional functionality, efficiency and democratic legitimacy. Democratic governance, it was argued, was based on the existence of a dynamic civil society of civic engagement, trust and reciprocity between citizens, which would foster improved political and administrative

The growing bulk of studies over time on civil society and democracy has focused on the relationship between civil society and the state and has concluded a positive versus negative definition of a civil society. First, it has been argued that civil society may be a counter force to the state and, second, an arena or platform for civic education and participation [38]. The negative definition of a civil society refers to the counter force role a civil society may play in regulating and controlling the state and its performances. A civil society may function as an arena of civil society actors who balance the power of state institutions in relation to societal forces and who make sure that state's institutions do not abuse their authority. On the other hand, the positive definition of the civil society refers to the assisting function civil society can have in relation to the state by providing an additional societal arena where citizens can meet, articulate, aggregate and associate freely and become aware of political life. A civil society may therefore contribute to ideas, expertise, norms and values and societal actions to alleviate the pressure on the state and to guide the state in new directions for policy-making. A civil society may therefore have different functions in a democracy and may be an essential part in

A third and final set of identified domestic factors for democracy building—aside from socioeconomic factors and political culture—includes political institutions and the political role of domestic political elites and the masses. One of the first and most important studies about political institutions and democracy was written by Huntington: *Political order in changing societies*. In times of societal developments, it was argued that one of the unstable factors in a society was insufficient institutionalization: "[t]he primary problem of politics is the lag in the development of political institutions behind social and economic change" [39]. The focus on political institutions as pivotal to democracy stressed the danger of increased political and economic demands from societal forces and delayed political institutionalization. It was

performances and legitimacy.

184 Globalization

a vital and consolidated democratic system.

Research on political factors for democracy has also focused on the specific type of institutions that best favor democratic progress and stability. Studies have explored how to design or institutionally structure democracies in the best way to promote democracy and have assessed parliamentarism versus presidentialism. Such focus has, to a high extent, been based on the scholarly contributions by Linz and his colleagues. In his study, *The Perils of Presidentalism* [40], Linz argued that presidentialism is less favorable than parliamentarism for promoting and protecting stable democracies. Such conclusion was based on four perils of presidentialism. First, he argued that the nature of presidential elections (winner-take-all) could result in a presidency based on support from a minority of the electorate and provide a legitimacy gap. Second, he further argued that the fixed presidential terms and the many hindrances to change a president faces could be problematic for democratic vitality and change, especially when considering how the parliamentary system is more adjustable to changing conditions. Third, another danger was the divided legitimacy between the elected president and the elected members of Congress. Potential different political opinions between these two branches could lead to policy gridlock, declining political vitality and functionality and, in the long term, result in increasing societal demands, political illegitimacy and political instability with opportunities for undemocratic forces to take power. Fourth and finally, presidentialism could potentially foster personality politics and become open for inexperienced leaders to become president. Overall, the focus on presidentialism as less favorable for democracy than parliamentarism led to a growing number of studies about how to design democracies with opposing views, using the pros and cons with different institutional arrangements. Dominating arguments have discussed potential weaknesses in the presidential systems, in minority presidents, rigid terms and difficulty of removal, policy gridlock and the election of inexperienced outsiders and how the parliamentary democracies have seemed to be more functional and long-lasting compared to presidential democracies. However, it should be stated that many studies have challenged these arguments or assumptions by pointing out favorable conditions within presidential democracies, but also how political instability may be caused by weak democratic structures rather than by presidentialism).

The research on political explanatory factors for democracy was developed further in the 1980s by focusing on political actors in building democracy. Such an approach was referred to as the transitology or the transition paradigm by stressing the importance of individual political actors in the transition to democracy. Previous studies about political explanatory factors had been foremost focused on structural conditions, while these new studies shed light on political actions taken by formal political actors and societal forces beyond the political system. O'Donnell et al. provided several studies in *Transitions from Authoritarian Rule*—*Prospects for Democracy* [41], *Transitions from Authoritarian Rule*—*Southern Europe* [42], *Transitions from Authoritarian Rule*—*Latin America* [43], *Transitions from Authoritarian Rule*—*Comparative Perspectives* [44] and *Transitions from Authoritarian Rule*—*Tentative Conclusions about Uncertain Democracies* [45] and focused on political actors and their preferences in the political and societal system. These studies identified different fractions of the political elite; two of these fractions within the dictatorial regime were the hardliners and softliners. Hardliners referred to the core of politicians against democracy and who viewed such a system as something that could bring chaos and disorder by undermining the existing privileges of the elite. It was further assessed how one group of hardliners firmly believed in the prevailing dictatorial system, but how softliners within the elite were less ideologically oriented and more pragmatic, foremost concerned with selfish political motives. The dictating political elite were therefore divided into two groups: hardliners and softliners. Where the hardliners were prepared to use their authority through repression and violence to keep stability and status quo, the softliners were open to limited political change to satisfy citizen demands or to increase quality of performances and receive legitimacy, as long as such political changes did not jeopardize the political survival of the elite. Therefore, softliners may be favorable for initiating democracy, but only if they believe that popular elections would result in a legitimate re-election of the same elite. These studies concluded that democracy could be built if there was a growing division between hardliners and softliners within the dictatorial elite and if softliners were able to convince or force the hardliners to democratize the system.

game of transition have stressed the importance of the pact transition for democracy. Such a path would ensure an orderly progress toward democracy based on compromises and the growing trust between powerful elites. This path, based on a pact-strategy between elites, also limits the number of people engaged in the transition, which is favorable for further democratization, as fewer people bring involved improves the chances of reaching compromises and does not led to an overload of political wants and demands. Further related studies on elites and masses have from an economic position argued that citizens prefer democratic systems due to the economic redistribution majority rule provide. This is in opposition to the elites that rather prefer nondemocratic political systems since they protect social and economic privileges and represent a favorable system of redistribution for the people in power. Transition to democracy may, however, happen if concessions from the elites are not credible and when repression and the use of violence are perceived as too risky and too costly [46].

Building Democracy: National and International Factors http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.71984 187

The above-identified domestic-oriented perspectives on socioeconomic, cultural and political factors have provided explanations for democratization. The complementary perspectives of explanatory factors for democratization shed light on important driving engines for building democracies around the world and have enlightened the public and those in academic life regarding when democracy is likely to happen. The bulk of studies have been comprehensive, but these perspectives have contained one important flaw: the neglect to focus on international factors for democracy building. Until the 1990s, most research on how to build democracy focused on domestic factors. The dominance of domestic factors was primarily due to two phenomena. One explanation for the domestic bias in research on democratization is the construction of separating academic disciplines in comparative politics and international relations where research on how to build democracy belonged to the former. The tradition of comparative politics was to focus on domestic structures and actors to explain political situations and changes. Scholars in international relations, however, were less interested in domestic politics and focused on how states and other powerful actors engage in diplomatic, economic and political relationships with others and with what motives and impact they do so. Another explanation for the domestic bias in research has concerned the fuzzy idea of what really constitutes the international factors, reaching for any structures and/or actors in the world beyond the state's territory. This has made potential international explanatory factors to democracy hard to pin down, which has left many scholars abandoning international

Some significant research efforts for identifying the international dimension to political change began in the 1960s. In a time of decolonization, a large number of studies focused on political and economic linkages and dependencies between developed and less-developed states. It was argued that international political and economic structures penetrated state borders and provided links between powerful and less-powerful actors. The notion of links and penetrated systems was especially explored among scholars within the dependency school,

**5. Building democracy: international factors**

perspectives on democracy building.

The role of softliners was, to some extent, dependent on the role of societal forces beyond the political system. Studies on political actors and their preferences for building democracy also focused on two more groups of actors in the moderates and the radicals (revolutionaries) within the society outside the formal political system. It was argued that the radicals wanted to overthrow the illegitimate elite of hardliners and softliners, while the moderates were open to forging alliances with softliners within the elite to see democratic change. It was stressed in in these studies that the transition phase to democracy often began with a division between hardliners and softliners within the authoritarian regimes, but strategic linkages between elites and the societal masses were important. This combination of alliances within the political elite and the societal groups outside the political system was referred to as the game of transition. The game of transition to democracy could take different paths. Democracy may result based on a pact between the dominating elite and the opposing elite to build democracy, through a reform when the societal masses are stronger than the elites and would build democracy from the bottom up, but without using violence; through imposition when one group of the political elite mobilizes and uses violence to overthrow the regime (such elite is often the military); and finally, through revolution, when the societal masses (revolutionaries) are strong enough to overthrow the traditional ruling elite by violence. Most studies on the game of transition have stressed the importance of the pact transition for democracy. Such a path would ensure an orderly progress toward democracy based on compromises and the growing trust between powerful elites. This path, based on a pact-strategy between elites, also limits the number of people engaged in the transition, which is favorable for further democratization, as fewer people bring involved improves the chances of reaching compromises and does not led to an overload of political wants and demands. Further related studies on elites and masses have from an economic position argued that citizens prefer democratic systems due to the economic redistribution majority rule provide. This is in opposition to the elites that rather prefer nondemocratic political systems since they protect social and economic privileges and represent a favorable system of redistribution for the people in power. Transition to democracy may, however, happen if concessions from the elites are not credible and when repression and the use of violence are perceived as too risky and too costly [46].
