This article demonstrates that low corruption and high female representation are two characteristics of elite quality that go closely together and help make “formal” democracy increasingly “effective.” However, the quality of elites is not an inherently independent phenomenon but is shaped by a pervasive mass factor: rising self-expression values that shift cultural norms toward greater emphasis on responsive and inclusive elites. Self-expression values, in turn, tend to be strengthened by growing human resources among the masses. Considered in a comprehensive perspective, these various components are linked through the emancipative logic of Human Development: (1) human resources, (2) self-expression values, (3) elite quality, and (4) effective democracy all contribute to widen the scope of human autonomy and choice in several aspects of people’s lives, including their means and skills, their norms and values, as well as their institutions and rights.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
ALMOND, Gabriel A. and Sidney Verba . 1963. The Civic Culture: Political Attitudes in Five Western Democracies. Princeton: Princeton University Press .
2.
AXELROD, Robert . 1980. The Evolution of Cooperation. New York: Basic Books .
3.
BARNES, Samuel H. and Max Kaaseet al.1979. Political Action: Mass Participation in Five Western Democracies. Beverly Hills: Sage .
4.
BOLLEN, Kenneth and Pamela M. Paxton . 2000. “Subjective Measures of Liberal Democracy.”Comparative Political Studies33(2): 58-86 .
5.
BRINT, Steven . 1984. “New Class and Cumulative Trend Explanations of the Liberal Political Attitudes of Professionals.”American Journal of Sociology90(1): 30-71 .
6.
CASPER, Gretchen and Michelle M. Taylor . 1996. Negotiating Democracy: Transitions from Authoritarian Rule. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press .
7.
DAHL, Robert A.2000. On Democracy. New Haven: Yale University Press .
8.
DALTON, Russell J.1985. “Political Parties and Political Representation: Party Supporters and Party Elites in Nine Nations.”Comparative Political Studies18: 267-299 .
9.
DONNELLY, Jack . 1993. Human Rights and World Politics. Boulder: Westview Press .
10.
ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA . Various volumes. Britannica Book of the Year. London: Encyclopaedia Britannica .
11.
FINER, Samuel E.1999. The History of Government. Vol. 1. Oxford: Oxford University Press .
12.
FÖRSTER, Jens , E.T. Higgins , and L.C. Idson . 1998. “Approach and Avoidance Strength during Goal Attainment: Regulatory Focus and the ‘Goal Looms Larger’ Effect.”Journal of Personality and Social Psychology75: 1115-1131 .
13.
FREEDOM HOUSE . Various volumes. Freedom in the World. Lanham: University Press of America .
14.
FUKUYAMA, Francis . 1989. “The End of History.”The National Interest16(Summer): 4-18 .
15.
GASTIL, Raymond Duncan . 1993. “The Comparative Survey of Freedom: Experiences and Suggestions.” Pp. 21-46 in On Measuring Democracy: Its Consequences and Concomitants, edited by Alex Inkeles . New Brunswick: Transaction .
16.
GURR, Ted R. and Keith Jaggers . 1995. “Tracking Democracy’s Third Wave with the Polity III Data.”Journal of Peace Research32(4): 469-482 .
17.
HAAS, Michael . 1996. “Empirical Dimensions of Human Rights.” Pp. 43-72 in Human Rights and Development, edited by David Louis Cingranelli . Greenwich: JAI Press .
18.
HALMAN, Loek , ed. 2001. The European Values Study. Tilburg: EVS, WORC, Tilburg University .
19.
HELLER, Patrick . 2000. “Degrees of Democracy: Some Comparative Lessons from India.”World Politics52(July): 484-519 .
20.
HIGLEY, John and Richard Gunther , eds. 1992. Elites and Democratic Consolidation in Latin America and Southern Europe. New York: Cambridge University Press .
21.
HOFFERBERT, Richard I. and Hans-Dieter Klingemann . 1999. “Remembering the Bad Old Days: Human Rights, Economic Conditions, and Democratic Performance in Transitional Regimes.”European Journal of Political Research36(1): 155-174 .
22.
HUMANA, Charles . 1992. World Human Rights Guide. 3d ed.New York: Oxford University Press .
23.
HUNTINGTON, Samuel P.1991. The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press .
24.
HUNTINGTON, Samuel P.1996. The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of the World Order. New York: Simon and Schuster .
25.
INGLEHART, Ronald . 1997. Modernization and Postmodernization: Cultural, Economic and Political Change in 43 Societies. Princeton: Princeton University Press .
26.
INGLEHART, Ronald and Wayne E. Baker . 2000. “Modernization, Cultural Change, and the Persistence of Traditional Values.”American Sociological Review65(February): 19-51 .
27.
INGLEHART, Ronald and Pippa Norris . 2003. Rising Tide: Gender Equality in Global Perspective. New York: Cambridge University Press .
28.
IVERSEN, Torben . 1994. “Political Leadership and Representation in Western European Democracies.”American Journal of Political Science38: 46-74 .
29.
JACKMAN, R.W. and R.A. Miller . 1998. “Social Capital and Politics.”Annual Review of Political Science1: 47-73 .
30.
LINZ, Juan J. and Alfred Stepan . 1996. Problems of Democratic Transition and Consolidation: Southern Europe, South America, and Post-Communist Europe. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press .
31.
LIPSET, Seymour M. and Gabriel S. Lenz . 2000. “Corruption, Culture, and Markets.” Pp. 112-124 in Culture Matters: How Values Shape Human Progress, edited by Lawrence E. Harrison and Samuel P. Huntington . New York: Basic Books .
32.
MASLOW, Abraham . 1988. Motivation and Personality. 3d ed. New York: Harper and Row .
33.
MULLER, Edward N. and Mitchell A. Seligson . 1994. “Civic Culture and Democracy: The Question of Causal Relationships.”American Political Science Review88(3): 635-652 .
34.
O’DONNELL, Guillermo and Philippe C. Schmitter . 1986. “Tentative Conclusions about Uncertain Democracies.” Pp. 1-78 in Transitions from Authoritarian Rule, vol. 4, edited by Guillermo O’Donnell , Philippe C. Schmitter , and Laurence Whitehead . Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press .
35.
O’DONNELL, Guillermo . 1993. “On the State, Democratization and Some Conceptual Problems.”World Development21(8): 1355-1369 .
36.
OLSON, Mancur J. , Sarna Naveen , and Anand W. Swamy . 2000. “Governance and Growth.”Public Choice102: 341-364 .
37.
PAXTON, Pamela . 2000. “Women’s Suffrage in the Measurement of Democracy: Problems of Operationalization.”Studies in Comparative International Development35: 92-111 .
38.
PUTNAM, Robert D.1993. Making Democracy Work: Civic Traditions in Modern Italy. Princeton: Princeton University Press .
39.
PYE, Lucian W.1990. “Political Science and the Crisis of Authoritarianism.”American Political Science Review84(March): 3-19 .
40.
RAWLS, John . 1993. Political Liberalism. New York: Columbia University Press .
41.
ROSE, Richard . 2001. “A Divergent Europe.”Journal of Democracy12(1): 93-106 .
42.
SEN, Amartya . 2001. Development as Freedom. New York: Knopf .
43.
UNITED NATIONS DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM . Various volumes. Human Development Report. New York: Oxford University Press .
44.
VANHANEN, Tatu . 1997. Prospects of Democracy: A Study of 172 Countries. London: Routledge .
45.
WEBER, Max[1904] 1958. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Boston: Allen and Unwin .
46.
WELZEL, Christian . 2002. Fluchtpunkt Humanentwicklung: Die Grundlagen der Demokratie und die Ursachen ihrer Ausbreitung [Focus Human Development: The Foundations of Democracy and the Causes of its Spread]. Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag .
47.
WELZEL, Christian , Ronald Inglehart , and Hans-Dieter Klingemann . 2003. “The Theory of Human Development: A Cross-Cultural Analysis.”European Journal of Political Research42(2).
