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Article: The people's road; American democracy.(Book Review)
- Article from:
- The Economist (US)
- Article date:
- October 29, 2005
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2005 Economist Newspaper Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Swirled in myth
Achieving democracy in earlyAmerica was a long, slow haul
DEMOCRACY is a word that gets bandied about. George Bush likes to remind voters of the pressing need to "secure freedom and democracy" in Iraq. Afghanistan's recent elections signal that it is on the "road toward a stable democracy". The United Nations has lately (at America's urging) started up a "Democracy Fund" as a bulwark for fragile democracies. And so it goes.
Yet democracy is a fluid concept. No one knows this better than the world'soldest continuous democracy. Minority rights, which Mr Bush says are among the "common principles" of democracies, were non-existent ...