Yes / The history of the electoral process in Sierra Leone is at the same time tortuous and substantial. From relatively open competitive multi-party politics in the 1960s, which led to the first turnover of power at the ballot box, through the de facto and de jure one-party era, which nonetheless had elements of electoral competition, and finally to contemporary post-conflict times, which has seen three elections and a second electoral turnover in 2007, one can discern evolving patterns. Evidence from the latest local and national elections in 2012 suggests that there is some democratic consolidation, at least in an electoral sense. However, one might also see simultaneous steps forward and backward – What you gain on the swings, you may lose on the roundabouts. This is particularly so in terms of institutional capacities, fraud and violence, and one would need to enquire of the precise ingredients – in terms of political culture or in other words the attitudes and motivations of electors and the elected – of this evolving Sierra Leonean, rather than specifically liberal type, of democracy. Equally, the development of ‘electoral rituals’, whether peculiar to Sierra Leone or not and whether deemed consolidatory or not, has something to say as part of an investigation into the electoral element of democratic consolidation.1 The literature on elections in Africa most often depicts a number of broad features, such as patronage, ethno-regionalism, fraud and violence, and it is the intention of this article to locate contemporary Sierra Leone, as precisely as possible, within the various strands of this discourse.

Avec l’arrivée de Rafael Correa, l’Équateur a tenté de consolider la démocratie par la voie du populisme, en tant que pratique politique. Le but de cette recherche est d’analyser le lien entre le populisme comme une pratique politique et la consolidation démocratique comme une aspiration des jeunes régimes. Le document est divisé en deux parties : la première étudie le populisme et la consolidation démocratique en tant que concepts. L’idée est de déterminer comment le populisme a été instrumentalisé afin de renforcer la démocratie durant les années 90. Dans la deuxième partie, la relation entre le populisme et la consolidation démocratique en Équateur est étudiée. Pour approfondir la notion de populisme en Équateur, nous l’avons analysé comme pratique politique pendant le XXe siècle, notamment dans le discours de José María Velasco Ibarra. Ensuite, les principales réformes entamées par Rafael Correa sont analysées. Cette recherche a pour but l’explication du lien complexe entre le populisme, (conçu comme une déviation de la démocratie pour les uns, et perçu comme un instrument légitime de consolidation démocratique pour les autres), et la consolidation démocratique. Cette relation devient un sujet inéluctable pour l’analyse de l’évolution complexe des démocraties andines. / With the advent of Rafael Correa, Ecuador tried to consolidate democracy by resorting to populism as a political practice. The purpose of this dissertation lies in link between populism as a political practice and democratic consolidation as young democracies´ main aspiration. With this in mind, this investigation is divided into two parts: the first explores populism and democratic consolidation as concepts. The idea being to determine how, during the 90's, populism was used as a tool to strengthen democracy. The latter, studies the relationship between populism and democratic consolidation in Ecuador. Populism has been a recurrent practice throughout the twentieth century (especially with, José María Velasco Ibarra, Ecuador's main figure of populism). Accordingly so, this investigation seeks to understand the complex link between the populism -that some see as a deviation from democracy, and others as a legitimate mechanism of defense and democratic consolidation- and democracy. This relationship is an inexorable subject to understand the complex political evolution of Andean democracies.

This thesis presents an analysis of the extent of democratic consolidation in Ghana by examining the role of state institutions, the institutionalization of the political parties and the de facto two-party system, as well as civil society and interest groups. It addresses the following specific questions. What has been the role of state institutions in the democratic consolidation process? To what extent have the political parties and the de facto two-party system been institutionalized and what has been their contribution in the democratic consolidation process? How vibrant are civil society and interest groups and what has been their contribution in the democratic consolidation process? What are the challenges and constraints faced by state institutions, the institutionalized political parties and party system, as well as civil society and interest groups in contributing to the democratic consolidation process? What measures should be adopted to deal with these challenges and constraints? Focusing on the July 2012 presidential succession and the December 2012 general elections as case studies, the analysis in this thesis demonstrates that state institutions such as the Executive, Parliament, the Judiciary, the Electoral Commission and the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice, as well as an institutionalized political parties and party system and civil society and interest groups have made some contribution in the democratic consolidation process. However, the analysis also demonstrates that there are a few challenges and constraints that need to be addressed before Ghana can be considered a consolidated democracy

In the years preceding the Third Wave of democracy, the prevailing belief was that democracy in Africa will not flourish unless it delivers the crucial economic goods its citizens live and die for. In an area of the world where poverty is highlighted, the individual pursuit of improved living conditions is more likely to drive citizen faith in democracy as opposed to the political process itself. By this popular belief, society will support democracy, or not, mainly for its perceived economic benefits. In this study, I revisit the assumptions of the theory of `politics and poverty' espoused over 20 years ago using recent data on individual attitudes and scores of democratic development in Africa. I find citizen support for democracy overwhelmingly a function of political performance factors, as opposed to the expectations of material returns as once believed. This finding runs contrary to conventional wisdom, even among citizens who reside in lesser developed democracies where one would suspect more ambivalence to regime type in the face of pressing economic concerns. If poverty is no more the root source in explaining democratic commitment in Africa, then, what is? I probe further into the specific instances of Ghana, Mali, and Nigeria and find commitment to democracy closely tied to government policy aimed at promoting democratization. The ambitious policies arranged in struggling democracies of today, such as Mali and Nigeria, attempted to emulate policy of the West but failed at cultivating democracy from the ground up, subsequently creating tentative democrats. Policies in successful democratic cases such as Ghana, however, reflected a keen attentiveness to context through the inclusion of citizens in deliberative practices between society and state, creating an empowered, committed populace. Politics and policy, not poverty, best explains democratic commitment, or lack thereof, in Africa. The implications, of course, fall on the significant responsibility of policy makers in crafting bottom-up strategies for further democratization and on politicians in delivering upon their promises when elected.

This research will compare why two such comparable countries like Slovenia and Croatia have taken different paths towards consolidating democracy. The two countries on the same day in 1991 declared independence from Yugoslavia but only Slovenia managed to successfully consolidate democracy during the 1990s. The purpose of this study is to analyze what differences and similarities Croatia and Slovenia have had which has made them take different paths towards consolidating democracy. The theoretical framework will apply Linz and Stepans theory on consolidating democracy from the countries independence in 1991 until Croatia in 2013, like Slovenia in 2004, became member of the European Union. The results demonstrate that Croatia during the 1990’s were governed by a party and president in a non-democratic way while Slovenia since its independence has implemented all the necessary tools for a successful consolidation of democracy. In 1999 Croatia’s president died and this was the start of a new era in Croatian politics. In 2000 the ruling party was defeated by a coalition which immediately begun to integrate Croatia with the European Union and in essence started to consolidate democracy.

The purpose of this dissertation was to examine the process of democratic consolidation in Thailand between 1997-2006.  The country’s consolidation of democracy has been hampered by continuous cycle of coup d’états which throughout history have halted the overall process of democratization. The coup of 2006 is one example of those instances where the democratic consolidation process was interrupted.   The method used to examine the years of 1997-2006 was theory consuming by qualitative text analysis where the data used to assess the situation was qualitative. The theory of democratic consolidation was offered by Juan J. Linz and Alfred Stepan. The theory’s prerequisites were applied to examine the case study of Thailand. The theory chosen were hoped to give a plausible explanation for the failure of democratic consolidation in the case of Thailand. It was also hoped that it could assess the overall quality of Thai democracy and possibly give a better insight in why military coups seem to be a reoccurring phenomenon in the case of Thailand.

O presente artigo tem por objetivo examinar se – como aponta parte da literatura - há alguma similaridade entre situação econômica e valores democráticos, isto é, se a variação ou estabilização se manifestam da mesma maneira nas duas dimensões. A importância deste trabalho reside no fato de que durante a segunda metade do século XX aconteceram a segunda e terceira ondas democráticas, fazendo com que o número de regimes que se definem como democracias aumentasse significativamente: nesse sentido, no final deste mesmo século e início do século seguinte, muitos países sofreram o impacto de crises econômicas e de queda da satisfação com os regimes democráticos e da confiança em suas instituições. Desse modo, para observar de que maneira a opinião pública se comporta diante das flutuações de índices econômicos, são verificados os casos do Brasil, Uruguai, Espanha e Finlândia, propondo-se uma análise de dados econômicos do Banco Mundial – no que diz respeito ao desemprego, inflação, PIB per capita, PIB crescimento anual, Índice de GINI - e do PNUD - sobreÍndice de Desenvolvimento Humano (IDH) - em comparação com indicadores de atitudes democráticas, como satisfação e confiança nas instituições públicas, do Latino e Eurobarômetro nos últimos vinte anos, para tentar descobrir se há, de fato, similaridade de comportamento entre as duas dimensões nestes países. / This article aims to examine whether - as points of the literature - there is a relationship between economic status and democratic values, in other words, if the variation or stabilization manifest the same way in two dimensions. The importance of this work lies in the fact that during the second half of the twentieth century happened the second and third democratic wave, causing the number of schemes that call themselves democracies increased significantly: in this sense, at the end of this same century and beginning of the next century, many countries suffered the impact of economic crises and loss of satisfaction with democratic regimes and trust in their institutions. Thus, to observe how the public opinion behaves in the face of economic indices fluctuations, are verified the cases of Brazil, Uruguay, Spain and Finland, proposing a World Bank economic data analysis - with regard to unemployment, inflation, GDP per capita, GDP annual growth, GINI index and of the UNDP data about Human Development Index (HDI) - compared with democratic attitudes indicators such as satisfaction and trust in public institutions, of Latinobarómetro and Eurobarometer in the last twenty years to find out if there is, indeed, the relationship between the two dimensions in these countries.

This thesis focuses on the candidate selection method of the ruling party of Tanzania, Chama Cha Mapinduzi. The method was changed in 2008. Through interviews made with local politicians, state officials and voters in Babati an understanding of why and in what way the change was made is presented. The thesis also presents an understanding of in what way different stakeholders perceive this change. The changed candidate selection method is examined as part of Tanzania’s democratic consolidation. At the end of the thesis a discussion about obstacles and opportunities for a further democratic consolidation is presented.The thesis describes how the transformation of the candidate selection method is, by the party itself, presented as a way of widen democracy and fight corruption. While many of the informants believe that the transformation, at least to some extent, have contributed to increased democracy, most of them believe that the actual difference from the previous method is small, since the crucial decisions still are taken by the party elite. The informants' responses are describing a multi-party system with several major obstacles. They are also, however, describing how the situation slowly is changing for the better.

The aim of this paper is to examine Serbia’s democratic consolidation in the judiciary and public and state administration, as well as the  role of European Union and EU conditionality in this process. This paper discusses the democratic consolidation in the judiciary and public and state administration of Serbia between the years 2000 and 2010, the role of the EU in this process, and the effects of EU conditionality in these two areas. The theories applied are Linz’s theory of inter-relating arenas of consolidated democracies, and Whitehead’s international dimensions of democratisation. This paper is based on the method of qualitative study and through extensive reading and research, it has come to the conclusion that the judiciary and public and state administration between 2000 and 2010 have seen some improvement. However, democratic progress has been very slow due to remains from Slobodan Milosevic’s regime and communism. The EU, as one of the major actors in the region, has through various projects, agreements, cooperation, and conditionality, brought about improvements in the judiciary and public and state administration. Yet, EU involvement and conditionality have not had great democratic effects; they have been significantly slowed down by inefficiency, low professionalism and corruption.

O presente artigo tem por objetivo examinar se – como aponta parte da literatura - há alguma similaridade entre situação econômica e valores democráticos, isto é, se a variação ou estabilização se manifestam da mesma maneira nas duas dimensões. A importância deste trabalho reside no fato de que durante a segunda metade do século XX aconteceram a segunda e terceira ondas democráticas, fazendo com que o número de regimes que se definem como democracias aumentasse significativamente: nesse sentido, no final deste mesmo século e início do século seguinte, muitos países sofreram o impacto de crises econômicas e de queda da satisfação com os regimes democráticos e da confiança em suas instituições. Desse modo, para observar de que maneira a opinião pública se comporta diante das flutuações de índices econômicos, são verificados os casos do Brasil, Uruguai, Espanha e Finlândia, propondo-se uma análise de dados econômicos do Banco Mundial – no que diz respeito ao desemprego, inflação, PIB per capita, PIB crescimento anual, Índice de GINI - e do PNUD - sobreÍndice de Desenvolvimento Humano (IDH) - em comparação com indicadores de atitudes democráticas, como satisfação e confiança nas instituições públicas, do Latino e Eurobarômetro nos últimos vinte anos, para tentar descobrir se há, de fato, similaridade de comportamento entre as duas dimensões nestes países. / This article aims to examine whether - as points of the literature - there is a relationship between economic status and democratic values, in other words, if the variation or stabilization manifest the same way in two dimensions. The importance of this work lies in the fact that during the second half of the twentieth century happened the second and third democratic wave, causing the number of schemes that call themselves democracies increased significantly: in this sense, at the end of this same century and beginning of the next century, many countries suffered the impact of economic crises and loss of satisfaction with democratic regimes and trust in their institutions. Thus, to observe how the public opinion behaves in the face of economic indices fluctuations, are verified the cases of Brazil, Uruguay, Spain and Finland, proposing a World Bank economic data analysis - with regard to unemployment, inflation, GDP per capita, GDP annual growth, GINI index and of the UNDP data about Human Development Index (HDI) - compared with democratic attitudes indicators such as satisfaction and trust in public institutions, of Latinobarómetro and Eurobarometer in the last twenty years to find out if there is, indeed, the relationship between the two dimensions in these countries.