How electoral systems matter for democratization

Electoral rules delimit the democratic game, but are also part of the game. In conjunction with political culture and skills they lead to an electoral system. This overview first addresses their effect in mature democracies, especially on the number of parliamentary parties and deviation from proportionality. The results are cautiously extended to early democratization. The main advice is to keep the electoral rules simple, so that world-wide empirical and analytical experience can be used to obtain somewhat predictable outcomes. Once chosen, keep the same rules for at least three elections, so that an electoral system has time to develop. For scholars the main lesson of the newly democratizing countries is modesty in prediction

Modos de transição em perspectiva comparada Modes of transition in comparative perspective

Embora a literatura sobre democratização tenha dedicado consideravel atenção ao conceito de modos de transição, as tentativas de explicar as perspectivas de consolidação democrática como conseqüência do modo de transição revelam-se inconclusivas. Revisitando esse debate, este artigo sustenta que o modo de transição afeta o padrão de competição entre elites, as regas institucionais elaboradas durante o período de transição e a disposição de atores-chave a aceitar ou rejeitar as novas regras do jogo. Dá-se conteúdo substantivo a esse argumento mediante uma comparação inter-regional que abrange os casos da Argentina, do Brasil, do Chile, da Bulgária, da Tchecoslováquia, da Hungria e da Polônia.<br>While the literature on democratization has devoted considerable attention to the concept of modes of transition, the attempts to explain the prospects of democratic consolidation as a consequence of the mode of transition have been inconclusive. Revisiting this debate, this article argues that the mode of transition affects the pattern of elite competition, the institutional rules that are crafted during the period of transition, and the disposition of key actors to accept or reject the new rules of the game. This argument is substantiated through a cross-regional comparison encompassing the cases of Argentina, Brazil Chile, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Poland