On Law and Tyranny

Abstract

The dominant Western conceptualisations of democracy, associated with Joseph A. Schumpeter and Robert A. Dahl, take certain institutional arrangements for granted, arrangements which safeguard the effectiveness of their various electoral and liberal rights. More particularly, they take the presence of the rule of law for granted. This is so because the fight for judicial equality was won in the West long before the fight for universal suffrage even appeared on the political agenda. Not so in Latin America, however. In the Southern part of the American hemisphere, the contemporary situation is one of Dahlian polyarchy in the absence of the rule of law. With this pernicious mix in mind, Guillermo O'Donnell invites us to consider ‘democratiness’ as an attribute of the state as well as an attribute of the political regime. O'Donnell's theoretical and empirical insights deserve praise and his new book goes to remind Western readers that our classical liberal heritage, so often taken for granted, is the historical point of departure for our stable liberal democracies.

Keywords:

• Latin America
• conceptualisation
• democracy accountability rule of law