how is it is a problem in the functioning
of democracy
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Answer:
The analysis of the quality of democracy – that is, an empirical scrutiny of what ‘good’ democracy is about – requires not only that we have a definition of democracy, but also that we establish a clear notion of quality.
Democracy Is … and Is Not’, in Larry Diamond and Marc Plattner (eds.), The Global Resurgence of Democracy (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993), pp.39–52 (pp.45–6).
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Among the countries that meet these minimal criteria, further empirical analysis is still necessary to detect the degree to which they have achieved the two main objectives of an ideal democracy: freedom and equality.
Thus, the analysis of a ‘good democracy’ should theoretically set alongside those regimes that are to varying degrees deficient in principal democratic features. Amongst them are hybrid regimes,3
Larry Diamond, ‘Thinking About Hybrid Regimes’, Journal of Democracy, Vol.13, No.2 (2002), pp.21–35.
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whose failure to ensure free and fair electoral competition and a minimum level of civil rights keeps them below the minimum threshold to be classified as democratic. Likewise, the defective democracies 4
Wolfgang Merkel and Aurel Croissant, ‘Formal Institutions and Informal Rules of Defective Democracies’, Central European Political Science Review, Vol.1, No.2 (2000), pp.31–47.
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should also be left out of the analysis. This category includes ‘exclusive’ democracies, which offer only limited guarantees for political rights; ‘dominated’ democracies, in which powerful groups use their influence to condition and limit the autonomy of elected leaders; and ‘illiberal’ democracies, which offer only partial guarantees of civil rights. In reality, the last three models may also be seen as institutional hybrids, and thus fall short of the minimum threshold specified above.