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Are we witnessing the decline of liberal democracy and the emergence of alternative forms of democracy? Today, democracy is first and foremost a language of political legitimacy. And more often than not, it serves as a language of self-justification, even self-praise. Almost all existing states—regardless of where they may be located in or beyond the matrix of polyarchy—purport to be democratic in nature. Faced with this situation of democratic inflation, it becomes important to explain and explore (by way of comparison) some of the defining features that distinguish one form from another.In recent years, it has become increasingly commonplace to criticize democracy of the liberal kind that historically emerged in modern Western Europe but eventually spread to the rest of the world by the end of the 20th century. Moreover, emerging countries like China, Russia, Indonesia, Nigeria, and even the Arab Emirates, while considerably less democratic by liberal standards, have become more and more vocal in stressing their own versions of democracy, thus posing some challenges to the liberal view. (Notable exceptions are Brazil, India and South Africa, though the equality component of democracy seems weak in these countries). In response to these challenges as well as to doubts about the meaning, the outreach and even the universality of democracy, there are attempts to explore various ways to improve representation, redistribution, policy-making, and legitimacy, both at state and inter-state levels. Some opt for the deepening of democracy within existing liberal regimes – this is at the roots of lively debates about the "quality of democracy" (vs. "malfunctioning democracy"), "democratic responsiveness", "accountability" and "transparency", as well as "participatory" or "deliberative" democracy. There is even a new quest for "cosmopolitan" democracy. Others seek to combine the demand for enhancing democracy with post-colonialist outlook, thereby claiming that the forms of regimes should match the diversity of political ...

The idea that the relations of production determine the political life so branded spirits from the 19th to 20th century ending one has failed in a major fact: to be visible, organized the relations between capital and labor must be crystallised in institutions. Better, it is not the economic policies that determine a country's future, but its political institutions. Moreover, the reasons that prevailed during the design calculations constrain subsequent actions of their inventors and their successors - and this has nothing to do with culture or religion, contrary to what is sometimes believed to draw a widespread conventional wisdom but never demonstrated. Finally, institutions are even more durable and efficient that resolvent two central problems in all societies since the beginnings of humanity: limiting extractive capacities of oligarchs and curb the arms race between them. They do so by allowing citizens to consent to delegate their powers to the State. Adapted from the source document.

The relationship between political & politest anthropology is obvious, as are the nuances of difference between the two. The foregoing article rehearses the formidable legacy of the former, & the uses thereof -- sometimes reductionist, sometimes innovative -- by the latter. Little versed in the mechanisms of kinship & the analysis of symbolism, political science has chiefly benefited from ethnology in two directions: the search for a political ontology (bringing out the universality of human preoccupations in the domains of coordination, cooperation & the avoidance of violence); & the study of forms of sociability apparently very remote from the authority & power specific to the political sphere but actually closely linked to its functioning (such as cooking, music, celebrations, rituals). Thus, in their recourse to political anthropology, ethnologists & politists cross paths: the former move from the particular to the general & from the private to the public; the latter move in the opposite direction, consolidating more & more from the bottom the fundaments of cultural practices upon which rests, at the summit of society, the analysis of regimes, ideas & political acts. Adapted from the source document.

Was democracy invented by the Greeks to replace the anarchy and imperial rule characteristic of earlier Near Eastern societies? Although what was explicitly borrowed from antiquity by modern political thinkers looks Athenian, there was democracy before the polis. Egyptian and Mesopotamian politics relied on public debate and detailed voting procedures; countless assemblies convened at the thresholds of public buildings or city gates; disputed trials were submitted to superior courts; countervailing powers reminded leaders that justice was their responsibility. This was not full democracy, but the Greek version was not perfect either. In this article, "archeopolitics" is used to contrast this efficient form of pluralistic regime ("hypodemocracy") with truly egalitarian ones ("hyperdemocracies") and group interests' polyarchies.