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The Spirit of Democracy: The Struggle to Build Free Societies Throughout the World

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The author opens this extremely interesting book by asking whether it will be possible for the entire world to become democratic and asserts that the answer is yes. What follows in the book is an explanation of why he believes this is the case and what can be done to help expedite the process.

The book is extremely impressive in both its breadth and its depth. The author has detailed chapters about the state and trajectory of democracy in Latin America, Africa, Eastern Europe, and the Middle East. These chapters provide not only cogent analysis of current events in those regions but also describe the historical context, which I found very helpful because I had not known much about the background of some of the countries that the author discusses.

The author also does an excellent job blending academic analysis with on-the-ground anecdotes from his extensive travels. For example, he spends a great deal of time discussing the issue of corruption, its relationship with democracy development, and the impact that it has had particularly in Africa --- and he follows this with an interesting story about the corruption that he encountered many years ago on his first trip to Nigeria. I found that these stories made the book much more readable than other books in this genre that often have an exclusively academic focus.

I highly recommend this book to anybody who is interested in current events, foreign policy, rule of law, or 20th century history.

Freedom House, which tracks democratic trends and elections around the globe, noted that 2007 was by far the worst year for freedom in the world since the end of the cold war. Almost four times as many states -- 38 -- declined in their freedom scores as improved -- 10.

Why is this? A big part can be explained by the recent rapid rise in oil prices. Oil wealth reduces a nation's need to obtain citizen support for its operations. At the same time, U.S. actions in Iraq, Guantanamo, within our own borders, and supporting oil-rich and/or anti-terrorism ally autocrats have tainted our efforts to promote democracy. Meanwhile, Russia, Venezuela, and others have denounced the activities of American groups within their borders as illegitimate political meddling.

"The Spirit of Democracy" points out that more than multi-party elections are required for democracy. Balanced access to media, impartial administration and dispute resolution, and independent observation are also essential. Sharing power and rule of law are essential.

Finally, Diamond sees the Internet and cell phones as strong forces that help undermine media control by autocrats, and help citizens build the foundation for democracy. He even makes the hopeful prediction that "countries like Iran and China, which now seem so immune to the global democratic trend, stand a very good chance of becoming democratic in the next two to three decades."

The Spirit of Democracy by Larry Diamond is a great book for those who are looking for insight into the often debated question of if democracy is a universal desire throughout the world. There are often discussions of democracy versus more controlled governmental systems, and the current state of democracy in the world.

Diamond goes deeply into the configuration of a democracy, demonstrating that it is not only elections, it is also a set of institutions that work together to guarantee a level playing field politically and certain freedoms, especially of minorities and of speech. The book is peppered with practical examples of successes and failures, with interesting analysis on the reasons.

For those who engage in discussions about the future of societies and whether democracy is a universal value (Diamond certainly thinks so) and if so, how to spread it, this book is a great reference point.

Probably the best and most comprehensive work on the state of democracies world wide.
Extremely well documented. Its only bias (if anyone would like to criticise it) is Larry Diamond forceful defense of democratic values

There is good introductory theory, but the main value is in the practical aspects. Starting with history based on Huntington's 'third wave' idea, Diamond points out that progress on world democracy has slowed since the 1980's. This is an excellent exploration of reasons.
He makes the strong point that democracy at home needs improving before we attempt to export it. He does a good job of justifying the stance. He makes the point that good governance precedes economic welfare, not the other way round

Acknowledging a moral obligation to the world's poor, Diamond points out that there is no obligation to contend with a repressive or corrupt government. He describes the phenomenon of 'Imperial overreach.' There are many detailed examples based on the author's study and travel. Portugal, Nigeria. Russia, and Singapore are interesting examples. India is given separate extensive treatment, having passed through many phases since independence.
There are useful tables mapping relative performance of countries. There could be more on the study of defining which performance indexes are most useful.

While admitting the difficulty of defining democracy apart from the obvious suffrage requirement, Diamond provides for practical reference (page 22) 10 constituents of democracy. He describes absence of democracy in the Arab world and reasoning behind the "curse of oil". He examines different kinds of democracies and how they often come under control of a dictator and studies why new democracies have performed poorly.

If there is a weakness in his approach, it's that the idea of tying sanctions and aid to results would seem to require government intervention. Who has the final say about when conditions are fulfilled is undefined. While rightly deploring encroachment of governments into welfare and foreign aid he doesn't say who would make the determination of when his conditions for good governance have been met. Aid financing must be gotten into the hands of local agencies although repressive governments tend to restrict aid distribution. NGOs are more efficient distributors of aid money than governments. It's similar to our domestic situation regarding welfare where private agencies are much more efficient than the government.

The final two chapters on promoting democracy and the status of democracy at home are especially good. Diamond seems to favor linking foreign aid to performance indicators as with the Millennium Challenge MCA and MCC mechanisms.

For signs of deteriorating domestic democracy Diamond cites how civic responsibility is on the wane, the expanding influence of the executive,called "caesarism", corruption, the government industry lobbying revolving door, campaign finance problems, lack of voter participation along with an explosion of earmarks.

Diamond refers to the views of Huntington, Fukuyama and Toqueville and others. This has a wider scope and is more specific and current than Fareed Zachariah's 'The Future of Freedom'. It should be read ahead of pointless recent diatribes mistaking populism, egalitarianism and altruism for democracy such as by Alan Wolfe, Thomas Hartmann, Thomas Friedman, Paul Krugman and Jeffrey Sachs.

Note that Diamond has an article in in the Great Decisions 2012 version entitled 'Promoting democracy: foreign policy imperative?' The question is clearly answered in the affirmative, a very different slant than presented in the book. It's amazing to me how a talented and knowledgeable writer can slant his views to accommodate his sponsor.

Good book, one of the many I'm using for my thesis on democracy, delivered on time.

In 1974, over 75% of the world was covered with some form of autocracy- but three decades later, most of them have fallen apart and many of them are now Democracies. "The Spirit of Democracy: The Struggle to Build Free Societies Throughout The World" is an examination of the developing democracies of the world and views on how to further its growth. It also doesn't turn a blind eye to potentially sham democracies such as Russia's growing oligarchy, deep with corruption from organized crime. A thoroughly researched and informative account, and intelligently composed account sure to provoke discussion, "The Spirit of Democracy: The Struggle to Build Free Societies Throughout the World" is highly recommended to political science collections.