Democratic-elite theory : Stabilization versus breakdown of democracy

Abstract

The question of how Western-style democracies have evolved and stabilized, and conversely why some countries have experienced a breakdown of evolving democracy —or the question of the transition to, versus breakdown of, democracy— is central to both socio-political theory and sociopolitical history. Apart from being a fascinating topic on its own, it is a fruitful meeting point between theory and history. Perhaps it is for those very reasons that there has been a surge of interest in it in recent years (see e.g. Burton and Higley 1987; Cotton 1989; Higley and Burton 1989; O'Donnell and Schmitter 1986; Stephens 1989). In this article, I apply a democratic elite or demo-elite theoretical perspective to the explanation of the historical processes of stabilization vs breakdown of democracy in prewar Europe, using illustrations from two European countries: Britain as a positive, and Germany as a negative case.