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Review: Democracy and Dictatorship in Interwar Western Europe Revisited Author(s): Thomas Ertman Source: World Politics, Vol. 50, No. 3 (Apr., 1998), pp. 475-505 Published by: Cambridge University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25054049 . Accessed: 28/04/2011 08:07
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Review Article

DEMOCRACY DICTATORSHIP WESTERN

AND

IN INTERWAR

EUROPE REVISITED
ByTHOMAS ERTMAN*

Ruth Berins Collier and James Mahoney. Labor and Democratization: Com in First and Waves Third paring the Europe and Latin Americay Working no. 62. Institute of Industrial Relations. of California Paper University 1995,65 pp. Berkeley, May or Social Gregory Luebbert. Liberalism, Fascism Democracy. New York: Oxford pp. University Press, 1991,416 Michael Mann. The Sources of Social Power. Vol. 2, The Rise of Classes andNa tion-StateSy 1760-1914. Press, 1993, Cambridge: University Cambridge

826 pp.
talist

Dietrich

Rueschemeyer, Development

Evelyne Huber Stephens, and John Stephens. Capi and Democracy. Cambridge: pp. Polity Press, 1992,387

"\ T?THY did all the nations ofWestern Europe become democratic V V between 1848 and 1921, and why were somany of these young
This period unscathed? more for far social scientific and may surprising question, on historical the region's spectac energy has been expended explaining on ac ular cases of democratic failure (Germany, and Italy, Spain) than seem a counting Yet tors for its democratic successes?and understandably teaches and us more survival so given the democracies able to survive the crises of the interwar

horrors thatNazi Germany and its allies inflicted upon the Continent.
as the experience that contribute of recent decades to the appearance about the fac of democratic

regimes, the early breakthrough and ultimate durability of democracy in Switzerland, France, Britain, Belgium, the Netherlands, and the
three Scandinavian
*

monarchies

appears

all the more

comments

remarkable.
and suggestions as well as

Iwould like to thank Susan Pedersen for her many helpful for her general encouragement during the writing of this essay.

WorldPolitics 50 (April 1998), 475-505

476

WORLD POLITICS

We possess today a sizable and growing body of literature that seeks to specify the conditions under which democracies will flourish. Sum
marizing century evidence and a half, derived Samuel from study of seventy-one stresses the Huntington a countries over a of a significance international

Przeworski and Fernando Limongi s recent statistical analysis2 of 224 regimes in 135 countries between 1950 and 1990 convincingly con firms the overriding importance of this last factor, famously singled out by Seymour Martin Lipset, who nearly four decades ago asserted that
"the more well-to-do a nation, the greater the chance itwill sustain de

envi of a favorable previous experience with democracy, a in and of level of socioeconomic ronment, promot high development consolidation of new democratic ing the successful regimes.1 Adam

mocracy."3 Przeworski
by rapid economic to the acute versely point attendant loss of income, played at lower Yet

and Limongi

also highlight

the positive role

in democratic consolidation and con growth threat that sudden economic with their crises, pose to young democracies, democratic especially consolidation those ob

levels of economic of these

none

development.4 conditions favoring recently

tained during the interwar period in Western

that regions states had only embarked of the United meant

Europe.5 Nearly all of

upon their first experi

ment with

full democracy?and

after 1918 the ineffectualness of the

States, and the post little support for such international The community. that

of Nations, the isolationism League war weakness of Britain and France

was from the experiments forthcoming a time, moreover, interwar years were communism when and Fas as to cism/Nazism found wide alternatives support possible democracy.

1 in the Late Twentieth Century (Norman: University The Third Wave: Democratization Huntington, of Oklahoma Press, 1991), 14,270-74. 2 and Limongi, Przeworski Theories and Facts," World Politia 49 (January 1997). "Modernization: 3 Political Man, 2d ed. (London: Heinemann, 1983), 31. Lipset, 4 et al., Sustainable De See also Adam Przeworski Przeworski and Limongi (fn. 2), 167-69,177. Press, 1995), 11. mocracy (Cambridge: Cambridge University 5 Western Europe lends itself especially well to the study of variation in the process of democratiza tion. During the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries all of the states located there?with the ex autonomous Ireland, and Austria?were ception of Finland, polities with borders largely unchanged from 1815 through 1939, that is, throughout the whole period of liberalization and first-wave democ in ratization. The states newly created after 1918, whether Central, or Eastern Europe, faced Western, and democratic consolidation very different problems of democratization compared with the longer as a separate universe of established states ofWestern Europe and hence, in my view, should be treated cases (on this issue, see also the discussion in fn. 7). In addition, those twelve longer-established West ern the Netherlands, Switzerland, Britain, France, Denmark, European polities?Great Belgium, a common cultural, religious, and po Sweden, Norway, Germany, Italy, Spain, and Portugal?shared that set them apart from the Orthodox litical heritage and Muslim lands to the east and southeast. to explain divergent Since it is important to hold as many factors constant as possible when attempting the commonalities outcomes, together the fates of the just mentioned speak in favor of analyzing states during the interwar period. twelve longer-established Western European

DEMOCRACYAND DICTATORSHIP
Nor was the per capita income of even the wealthiest ofWestern

477
Euro

pean states between the wars at a level high enough to guarantee the durability of democratic systems.6And, furthermore, all of the Conti nent suffered sharp losses of income at some point during the 1920s
and 1930s Hence, a severe due given economic to hyperinflation the unfavorable crisis, Western or depression?or international and first-wave sometimes ideological democracies both. climate, were

theirmodest level of socioeconomic development, and victimization by

Europe's

highly susceptible to breakdown. Yet only four7 (Portugal, Italy,Ger many, Spain) suffered such a fate, whereas the other eight did not. How
be explained? and very ambitious books, as well as a substantial work areMichael new on cast issue. this These works Mann, ing paper, light The Sources of Social Power, volume 2, The Rise of Classes and Nation can this pattern recent Three of outcomes

States, 1760-1914, Dietrich Rueschemeyer, Evelyne Huber Stephens,

and John Luebbert, lier and James Mahoney, First and Third Waves Stephens, Liberalism, Capitalist Development Fascism or Social Democracy Labor in and Latin and Gregory Democracy, j and Ruth Berins Col the Comparing Manns massive

and Democratization: America.

Europe of a projected four-volume tome, the second volume work, argues for to in addition the more the importance of geomilitary competition, in familiar and political forces of class conflict, nationalism, reform, over course the the of the diverse destinies of great powers shaping

rich in its range of insights, the "long nineteenth the century." While on states and book focuses only three Western European principally cases. As a re of each of these the historical emphasizes particularity to a suited to contribute sult, it is not well general theory of European
that a democracy will die during any Przeworski and Limongi have found that a[t]he probability a an income above $4,000 [in 1985 U.S. dollars at purchasing power particular year in country with GDP per capita of all Western European countries throughout the in parity] is practically zero," yet the terwar period appears to have been below this level, lying instead between about 11,500 and $3,500. See Przeworski and also Paul Bairoch, "Europe's Gross National Prod and Limongi (fn. 2), 166,173; uct, 1800-1975," Journal ofEuropean Economic History 5 (Fall 1976), 296-97. 7 to assign it To these four could be added interwar Austria, but the literature is divided on whether or "Eastern to "Western Stephens, and Stephens and Rokkan do) Europe" Europe" (as Rueschemeyer, case from a It seems to me that excluding the Austrian (as does Luebbert). study of first comparative wave democratization more reason in Western and democratic durability Europe before 1939 is the is part of the "East" but because, like Ireland, Finland, able option. I say this not because Austria to theWest), itwas essentially (all of which arguably belonged Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Hungary a new state created in the aftermath ofWorld War in its borders, population, I. It was very different In general, I find the argument convincing from prewar Austria-Hungary. and form of government states faced very different pressures and challenges during the interwar years that such new post-1918 than did those states already in existence before the war and that therefore they should be examined case will be mentioned in my discussion of the Austrian (See fn. 5.) Hence while separately. not be included inmy concluding Rueschemeyer, Stephens, and Stephens's and Rokkan's work, itwill theoretical suggestions. 6

478
democratization interwar their work period.

WORLD POLITICS
or of democratic survival and breakdown during the

By contrast, Rueschemeyer,
to do just this.

Stephens, and Stephens have designed

to confirm and

It can be seen as an attempt

extend Barrington Moore s insights on the social origins of dictatorship and democracy by first judiciously amending his key contentions and
cases drawn from a then testing them against some thirty-eight variety of regions. For our purposes, the most result is a much more important treatment extensive and systematic of than democratization European inMoore's that found classic work. Nevertheless, their book suffers its analysis between and its impressive from incongruities empirical out some of these incon base. Berins Collier and Mahoney point gruities and as a consequence reject the claim by Rueschemeyer,

Stephens, and Stephens that the working class played the leading role
an account in European democratization. favor instead that They stresses the of and middle-class significance entrepreneurship political as well as at Leubbert pressure. Meanwhile, working-class indirectly tacks the second part of Rueschemeyer, and argu Stephens, Stephens's that itwas above claim, which they endorse, by rejecting Moore's or absence of a all the presence which landed elite determined powerful or remain demo a state would whether become fascist given European to arrive at an alterna cratic during the 1920s and 1930s. In seeking tive explanation, he nonetheless follows Rueschemeyer, and Stephens, ment

Stephens (and Stein Rokkan)

ofWestern nisms. He European concludes, cases however,

in examining nearly the entire universe

to uncover it was general causal mecha that

in order

the ability or inability of stable which ulti majorities political parties prodemocratic in a determined the fate of democracy country. Yet mately particular to to to account is surely right while Luebbert look the prewar period to ascribe those outcomes to differ for interwar outcomes, his attempt to form ent patterns of incorporation of the urban and rural working class is ul not timately convincing. in more detail the strengths This and limitations of essay discusses to their limitations, to In pointing I by no means wish these four works. detract from their real significance, still less to argue that the process of in nineteenthdemocratization and early-twentieth-century Western is simply Europe for parsimonious such a counsel work too complex and/or historically contingent to allow explanation.

At the end of this essay, then, Iwill suggest that before succumbing to
that focuses of despair, we consider an alternative frame explanatory on in the between patterns divergent relationships

DEMOCRACYAND DICTATORSHIP

479

as associational civil society?conceived of narrowly life?and political cases. Such a focus across the full range ofWestern parties European to sur into the conditions that help democracy may offer some insights as those circumstances vive even under unfavorable such relatively prevalent in interwar Europe.

I. Michael
Three examine. volume Second, tioned features set Mann it covers the s book only story

Mann

First, will extend

that I will apart from the other works the period up until 1914; a subsequent the remainder of this century. through

cases are men the Scandinavian, Italian, and Spanish though concentrates in framework Manns comparative prin passing, on Austria "great powers": Britain, France, Germany, cipally Europe's as well as on the United the author and Russia, States. Finally, Hungary, in like is as interested of the emergence general processes elucidating the modern state and the spread an account of the industrial of why, revolution as he is in and

delineating and explaining differences among the principal European

polities. before Nevertheless, 1914 does for example, the British

French political systems differed fundamentally from that of Germany

derstanding after 1914. In volume account that is surely relevant to an un emerge?an in these nations both before and of the fate of democracy 1 of The Sources Mann of Social Powery period. In accordance with stressed older the role of like

geopolitical competition in shaping the emerging states inEurope dur

ing the early modern authorities

Otto Hintze
exposed rounded

and contemporaries like Charles Tilly, he argued that the

sur territorial and the German of France states, position were as the emergence furthered enemies, they by potential centuries. and the seventeenth there of absolutism eighteenth during from the land Britain's isolation, protected geographic Conversely,

armies of the Continent by the natural barrier of the English Channel,

made albeit form of government, of a constitutional the preservation possible one tainted infra the bureaucratic and lacking by corruption structure of its continental neighbors.8 the extent to of course acknowledges In this second volume, Mann new of European and world development. Yet in contrast

which both the French and industrial revolutions ushered in a qualita

tively period
8 on the state are of the European These and other views of Mann, Tilly, and Hintze development Medieval examined critically inThomas Ertman, Birth of the Leviathan: Building States and Regimes in and Early Modern Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), chap. 1.

480
to those who tition would

WORLD POLITICS
see class or nation

compe supplanting geopolitical as the new master variables the long nineteenth century, during to Mann insists that war and preparations for war continued shape the new in which these forces affected the various European way powers.

Thus he argues (pp. 224-25)

mass which nations mobilizations classes were during

that fiscal-military pressures and, later,

the principal mechanism through self-conscious "democratic

for war were

and protonations became politicized the first part of the century. Furthermore,

idealswere born of war" (p. 225). Only during the second half of the century did industrial capitalism supplant militarism as the driving force behind the further development of states and nations (pp. 730-35).
In general of geopolitical and indus terms, the continued dynamic trial combined with the emergence of classes and nations, competition, terms "the rise of the modern in what Mann in resulted state." This volved increases along with in the size, shifts substantial of the state, scope, and bureaucratization in the direction its of activities. Thus mil

as a of total state spending percentage itary outlays decreased during the course of the nineteenth the armed forces became more and century and isolated from civilian society. By contrast, the rel professionalized ative weight of civilian spending rose from an average of about 25 per

cent of all state expenditure in the 1760s to about 75 percent by the

as governments to direct more resources toward in began social welfare and New pro education, (pp. 370-75,730). revenues economic for by higher by provided paid growth, even the rate of increase in government this growth outpaced of GNP cen state of the early twentieth than its late-eighteenth

early 1900s, frastructure, grams were but spending,

new European leaving the as a smaller tury actually percentage

century predecessor (pp. 361, 368).

its citizens into a national cases, this state was able to mold to the social interaction made thanks increasing community possible by and service. At the universal links, schooling, military transportation In most same time, the emerging middle legislatures, political gaining expanded to their which became newly responsive 727-35). citizenry (pp. also highlights the continuing these common trends, Mann Despite in the paths of development Western differences Europe's pursued by In Britain the industrial and Germany. France, great powers?Britain, crown dualism between revolution served to reinforce the constitutional and working within representation classes national succeeded in

and Parliament inherited from the medieval and earlymodern periods by strengthening the hand of civil society. At the same time, the long

DEMOCRACY AND DICTATORSHIP

struggle around against a program revolutionary of political and Napoleonic France gave birth

481
to a re

new kind of British nationalism and also mobilized bourgeois taxpayers form that eventually resulted in an end to "Old Corruption" and led to the Reform Bill of 1832 (p. 226). The large and powerful trade-union movement called forth by advancing industrialization then collaborated
with middle-class reformers corporation of the "respectable" to put pressure on the parties for the in com into class the political working and efficiency-oriented administrative

munity. Tories and Liberals, following the logic of party competition, responded with the 1867 and 1884 Reform Bills, which brought Britain to the threshold of full democracy (pp. 537-38). While the upheavals of the late eighteenth and the nineteenth cen tury served to solidify tendencies already deeply rooted within Britain, they provoked a substantial break with the past in France. Thus the Revolution not only gave birth to a new kind of French nationalism, but it also led to the elimination of an old regime administration based
on the sale of offices infrastructure. and to its replacement with much of the century, Throughout 1870 a modern bureaucratic strug to re From the bourgeoisie and the labor movement its time finally came.

1875 the Third Republic was built upon the foundations of universal manhood suffrage (pp. 207-8,580,668). Hence though they had taken
different to reach this point, both Britain and France entered the as twentieth advanced industrial democratic, bureaucratized, century states of substantial subordinated military clearly possessed capacities to civilian authority. That advanced industrial society need not assume the democratic routes

gled against monarchists, Bonapartists, alize its republican and after vision,

form found in Britain and France is underlined by the case of imperial

as "a new which Mann characterizes Germany, . . . militarist and semi-authoritarian" capitalist, route towards modern ternative industrialism" form of modern society and "an al 325) (p. In his 326). view, (p. of incorpora process industrial co class, for the state elite. This

a dual underwent Germany nineteenth-century states into a new nation and of the new tion: of the territorial bourgeoisie optation into the old militarist-bureaucratic in turn drove the German And of the bourgeoisie the arms

lack of a potential

working that

liberal partner of the kind found in Britain and

of Marxist socialism. reinforced army, and bureaucracy, of Manns politics model all fearful of revolu and early any other

into France, bond between The

bourgeoisie, character

tionary upheaval (pp. 307, 318-26).

general of nineteenthmore than twentieth-century European resembles

482

WORLD POLITICS

that of Stein Rokkan, whose work is cited approvingly several times. Both authors see the fate of any given state during the era of mass pol itics as shaped by the cumulative and differential impact of a series of
common, formative historical experiences (the Reformation, the na

tional and industrial revolutions), all of which unfolded within a gen eral context of intense geopolitical competition. In this vision, the path followed by eachWestern European country was at once historically
unique, yet

building and nationalism, and diplomatic and military rivalry that are best understood with the help of social science theory.
This tory particular is compelling, the social sciences and his way of bringing together to ac but it poses special problems for any attempt

shaped

by the

same

general

forces

of class conflict,

nation

count for variations

interwar following

in the durability of democracies

efforts the latest show. version In one of his of his

during

the

Rokkans years?as an of exposition

last essays,

"geoeconomic

geopolitical" model of European development, Rokkan asks whether this model can help explain why democracy collapsed in Italy, Ger many, Austria, Spain, and Portugal during the 1920s and 1930s but not
in the other account success for countries these ofWestern differences In his words: "How can we Europe. in the mobilization between processes

these five and the others? How

and the conditions under leading competitive Despite simonious conclusion map;

can we

identify the prerequisites for

in the struggle mobilization?"9 to maintain

to failure

pluralism full-suffrage his best efforts, Rokkan was not in fact able to provide a par answer to these As he is forced to admit, "One questions. is clear; our five cases fall into several distinctive cells on the one single cluster."10 And inAustria and in later, "The five cases

not form they do national

clearly differ in their territory-building histories: early center-building

but arrested

building but frustrated empire-building in the case of Portugal, late center-building with highly homogeneous territories inGermany and
cases of democratic failure also differ among them Italy."11 The five selves on a range of other historical variables and employed by Rokkan, same even more even more true is the of the group larger and disparate of states in which survived the interwar years. Perhaps democracy
9 for the Ex Parties: Toward a Geoeconomic-Geopolitical Model Rokkan, "Territories, Nations, of Variation within Western and Bruce Russett, eds., From Na planation Europe," in Richard Merritt to Global tional Development Community: Essays inHonor ofKarl W Deutsch (London: George Allen andUnwin,1981),88. 10 Ibid. 11 Ibid., 91.

integration

Spain,

early nation

DEMOCRACY AND DICTATORSHIP

483

Mann, in his next volume, will succeed in identifying a limited number of discrete variables capable of explaining why the fate of Britain,
France, and many

many during this period. But it seems more likely that he will instead further deepen his sociologically informed account of the historically unique path pursued by each of these powers through 1945. While satisfying in its richness of detail and analytic insight, such an account is troubling from a political science perspective both because it is not parsimonious and because in its historical particularity it could Western Europe's experience of democratization is of limited imply that
or no relevance however, meyer, to that of other it is worth Stephens, this conclusion, regions. Before accepting the alternatives offered considering by Ruesche and Stephens, Berins Collier and Mahoney, and

of their neighbors

was

so different

from

that of Ger

Luebbert, all of whom emulate Rokkan's methodologically

all or nearly all countries of examining practice cases while at the same time to avoid attempting istic explanations. in a given excessively

preferable
universe particular of

II. Rueschemeyer, Stephens, and Stephens on Democratization Though

position

the fate of democracy inEurope before 1939 occupies a central

within Rueschemeyer, Their Stephens, and Stephens's dense and

wide-ranging
els of economic mocracy antagonistic more

book, their ambitions extend far beyond the bounds of

to between lev goal is clarify the relationship as and de (or, they put it, "capitalist") development the often by bringing together mutually generally, quantitative and historical-comparative lit

the old continent.

cross-national

erature on this subject. Thus the book begins with the claim that the statistical work of Lipset, Cutright, and others has definitely estab
exists that a positive correlation a claim further substantiated mocracy, recent above. findings mentioned lished tion between and de development Przeworski and by Limongi's

It is the general causal mechanism this positive correla underlying set out to uncover. and that Rueschemeyer, Stephens, Stephens is that classic of historical-comparative Their research, starting point

Barrington Moore's
authors construct a
12 Barrington Moore, Modern World ing of the

Social Origins ofDictatorship andDemocracy}2 The

hypothetical model of the relationship
and Democracy:

between

de

Jr., Social Origins ofDictatorship (Boston: Beacon Press, 1966).

Lord and Peasant

in the Mak

484 velopment own and various

WORLD POLITICS
political these regimes modifications based on Moore of Moore s arguments as

modified by the sympathetic criticisms of Theda Skocpol13 and their

insights. Taking and Stephens Rueschemeyer, Stephens, hypothesize level of economic will favor the advent development guaranteed a minimum ment and the executive all adult males into account, that an increasing of "democracy," by

which theymean a political regime inwhich a full arrayof civil rights is

to a at is responsible legislature elected by secret ballot. Economic the using develop it tends to weaken the eco they argue, because

favors democracy, of antidemocratic nomic, and hence political, position large landowners that of the prodemocratic and strengthen and middle classes. working a In addition, income is level of associated with the per capita rising as a acts to author of civil society, which crucial growth counterweight itarian tendencies and forces within the state. These trends can be ac celerated further tively, and/or by mass mobilization for war and/or a and weakens defeat, which military old elites. Alterna

strengthens can be they the presence class.

labor organized retarded by strong ties of economic dependency state apparatus, of a strong, autonomous both of

which tend to buttress the position of old elites andweaken that of the
working How of can their explanation economic development for the positive and democracy level between relationship be adequately tested?

in one of their most and Stephens, significant Stephens, to which do so by examining the extent innovations, methodological their schema can account for the pattern of dictatorship and democracy found among three large groups of polities from the nineteenth century to the present: all South American and states; all Central American Rueschemeyer, Caribbean states; and English-speaking white and Britain's of Western Europe the advanced settler colonies industrial states (the United New and Zealand). States, Canada, Australia, justify this proce They that each of the three groups contains both a signifi dure by arguing cant number of democratic of cases and a substantial number and

a characteristic that sets them apart from other regimes, as where East Asia and Africa, nondemocratic such regimes regions some the three Taken groups encompass thirty together, predominate. in cross-national quantita eight cases, fewer than those often analyzed in comparative tive studies, but far more than are normally scrutinized nondemocratic historical works. ables" problem cases-too thereby avoid the "too many They research. that so often plagues qualitative few vari

13 Social Origins ofDictatorship Skocpol, "A Critical Review of Barrington Moore's in the Modern World (Cambridge: Cambridge University in Skocpol, Social Revolutions

and Democracy," Press, 1994).

DEMOCRACYAND DICTATORSHIP
A crucial the heart test for Rueschemeyer, Stephens, is the ability of our own concerns, and Stephens, of their model

485
and one at to account

for (1) the advent of democracy in Western Europe between about 1848 and 1921, (2) its successful consolidation during the troubled 1920s and 1930s in eight states ofthat region (Britain, France, Switzer
land, Belgium, mentioned the Netherlands, Norway, Denmark, and Sweden), and

(3) its reversal in four others (Italy, Spain, Germany, andAustria).14 As

contrast to Marx and Moore?hy above, the authors?in was that it the class rather than the bourgeoisie pothesize working was force responsible which the primary for the democratic break as across Western and in other areas of the world Europe through both as move on to a more detailed examination well. However, of their they a to rather different twelve European cases, emerge. picture begins s own ac to and Stephens Thus Rueschemeyer, according Stephens,

count, the democratic breakthroughs in Switzerland (1848) and France (1877) were largely thework of multiclass movements that included ar
tisans

case, a significant body of smallholding farmers.Armed conflict in both

instances

and professionals also helped Swiss

as well determine

as "the bourgeoisie"15 the timing

and,

in the Swiss with in

Catholic
democratic

defeat in the Sonderbund civil war of 1847 ushering in the

constitution of 1848 and France's defeat at Sedan

of political

change,

1870 leading to the overthrow of Louis Napoleon theThird Republic.

Concerning the working troduction for his

III and the advent of

tended suffrage to all adult males in 1912 in an attempt to gain support

was the Liberals, venture" Libyan (p. 104). It government's urban upper middle "based in the provincial classes," who first intro in 1890, into duced universal monarchy suffrage Spain's parliamentary

state that and Stephens Italy, Rueschemeyer, Stephens, an not role in but the in class "played important, leading ex that "Giolitti but they then concede of democracy,"

and the transition to democracy in 1931 following the Primo de Rivera dictatorship (1923-31) was "rather like the same process in Italy, as the
of the introduction class forces were the beneficiary working more it" initiator of than the racy (pp. 120-21). of democ

(and largely upper class-led) parties [which] unilaterally extend[ed] effective suffrage to substantial sections of the working class" through the Reform Bills of
14 not include Portugal in their analysis because they do Rueschemeyer, Stephens, and Stephens do not consider it ever to have experienced full democracy during the interwar period (p. 153). 15 a In somewhat confusing way, the authors apply the term "bourgeoisie" only to industrial capital and other groups ists, using "middle classes" for white-collar shopkeepers, employees, professionals, on the other. the landed elite on the one hand and workers and peasants/farmers that fall between

In Britain itwas likewise "middle-class-based

486

WORLD POLITICS

1867 and 1884 (p. 96). At best, the authors can argue that such reforms were "adelayed response to earlierworking-class agitation" (p. 96) and that the 1918 act,which established universal and equal male (and un equal female) suffrage in the United Kingdom, was the result of
"Labour-Liberal who were co-operation," based though once again war was

tating factor in this development.

Liberals,

Similarly in Sweden
classes,

"

precipi reli

[i]t was the

in the urban middle

dissenting

gions and in small farmers in the north andwest, who joined the Social Democrats in the push for suffrage extension" (p. 93, though itwas only Germany's defeat in 1918 that finally forced conservatives to grant full
government. parliamentary More Rueschemeyer, promisingly, Stephens, there, and Stephens assert

that inNorway
the drive

and Denmark

the working class "played some role in

however, working-class

for democracy"

Even (p. 91).

parties and organizations took the lead only in the final push for uni versal suffrage (introduced into both countries in 1915); earlier steps in
in Norway "largely the work of the urban of sections the of the middle class," and in peasantry, help and medium small involved an alliance of "the working Denmark class, to and urban middle-class farmer, push segments" (p. 91). Likewise, the process of democratization with were

through equal manhood suffrage inBelgium (1919) and in theNether lands (1917), socialist workers required the support of Catholics, liber
as the as well case, fundamentalist Protestants, own ac I. In fact, by the authors' from World War pressures emanating class in Germany alone that the working it was and Austria count, as a true consistent the and of functioned democracy through vanguard for social democratic of their parlia respective parties solitary support their antidemo after and universal mentary government suffrage. Only als, and, in the Dutch cratic World weakened defeat had been decisively opponents through in succeed did these War I, however, transforming parties two countries into (short-lived) democratic republics. in the

III. Berins Coluer

Thus, they based on the evidence

and Mahoney's
from twelve Western hard to it seems

Critique
European cases that

accept Rueschemeyer, provide, statement of the transi that "[o]ur overview and Stephens's Stephens, ... contention that the work confirmed Therborn's tion to democracy . . was . force in the majority of the single most important ing class in the final male countries suffrage and responsible push for universal

themselves

DEMOCRACY AND DICTATORSHIP

487

government" (p. 140).16My skepticism about the persuasiveness of their argument is shared, moreover, by Ruth Berins Collier and James
who conducted their own independent Mahoney, analysis of the first wave in democratization of the twelve and process eight European cases studied three of the eleven Latin American by Rueschemeyer,

Stephens, and Stephens.17 As Berins Collier andMahoney

hypothesis mocracy ther, that
as a

put it, "The

to de that the working class was central in early transitions wave is not supported the first cases" say, fur by (p. 5). They

general

proposition

...

an elite

project

was

more

important

than

working

in the first wave. Indeed, in class demands as the source of democratization most cases the story of democratization could be told with scant reference to the ... or entered the story primarily as working class, which either played no role the target of elite mobilization, (p. 62) In their detailed (Britain, from France, reexamination Switzerland, cases of eight European first-wave Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Italy, and

Spain), Berins Collier andMahoney

Rueschemeyer, their programmatic

confirm the impression derived

evidence that (as opposed to class the working

played at best a collaborative role in the breakthrough to democracy in Norway, Denmark, and Sweden and little direct role in France (at least in 1877) or Switzerland. They also suggest (albeit inmy view less per suasively) that theworking class was largely indifferent to the English franchise reforms of 1867 and that itwas deeply divided over, if not ac
toward to, moves tively hostile Primo de Rivera's Spain. democratization in Giolitti's Italy and

and Stephens's Stephens, or statements) conclusory

16 Nor is this claim made more plausible by taking into account the four "advanced capitalist coun tries" from outside Europe also examined and New by the authors (the U.S., Canada, Australia, no for their discussion of these cases mentions role in democratization Zealand), except working-class in Australia. Their forces analysis of evidence drawn from other areas of the world subsequent to retreat ever further from their initial desire to Rueschemeyer, Stephens, and Stephens assign the class a vanguard role in first- and second-wave democratization. Thus they admit (p. 181) that working "[i]f one analyzes the class forces behind successful and failed attempts to install democratic regimes the middle classes emerge as the crucial forces behind the alliances effecting ini [in Latin America], to restricted democracy tial breakthroughs and, in collaboration with the working class, to full democ racy" (p.181). And the authors are forced to explain the "democratic exceptionalism" of Costa Rica and not by or activism, but rather the English-speaking Caribbean, working-class strength by, respectively, the presence of a prosperous agrarian middle class (p. 259) and the positive legacy of British colonial ism, which allowed the emergence of a robust civil society (pp. 265-66,281). The Therborn work referred to in the quote in the text isGoran Therborn, "The Rule of Capital 103 (May-June and the Rise of Democracy," New Left Review 1977). like to thank John Zysman and David Collier for bringing this very significant working 171would the argument further in her forthcom paper to my attention. Ruth Berins Collier has now developed Europe ing book, Between Elite Negotiation and South America. and Working-Class Triumph: Labor and Democratization inWestern

488

WORLD POLITICS class in bringing about first

authors claim, then one so much attention, scholarly and Rueschemeyer, works of social history.

If the role of the organized working

wave democratization was as limited it has ask why might reasonably not in the contributions only attracted

as these

of Therborn

and Stephens, but also in many Stephens, a very an and Mahoney Berins Collier themselves provide plausible swer to this the predecessor argue that because question. They regimes were to in first-wave democracies liberal oligarchies Europe's generally which were limited through property voting rights mentators at the time and conceived subsequently com requirements, of democratization

as "the class-defined this period extension of participation" during (p. a out It in which those was, they believed, 63). process groups standing side the polity?generally the petite bourgeoisie, and some workers, times those and most that mates to wrest the right of admission from farmers/peasants?sought the landed upper class, capitalists, already enfranchised, namely, some middle-class as a whole Since the workers had the groups. to gain from an full democratization, both it seemed the logical size of to assume that

they would be the driving force behind this process. The problem is
such assumption overestimates of its organizations prior and even hostility of those even what and socialists, many anarcho-syndicalists, saw as activists "bourgeois democracy." class and the strength the ambivalence Berins hypothesis Collier that and Mahoney itwas to 1918 the working and underesti

to organizations some trade union refute the

than do more, however, simply the class which was principally working ofthat

responsi

ble for the breakthrough to democracy in Western

offer an alternative view patterns of first-wave Latin America. In the first of these, which

Europe. They also

process, one that identifies four distinct democratization both on the old continent and in

ratization" (Switzerland 1848, Denmark

1848, aswell as Chile 1874).

they call "pre-labor

democ

labor played no role in the establishment of a democratic regime due to the sim ple fact that the transition to democracy occurred prior to the development of a
significant struggle_This mocratization class working class. pattern Here reveals democracy that in no working was sense class the of an intra-elite product can one that first-wave de say or in fact pressures any working

necessarily required role whatsover. (p. 8)

Thus

the democratic of 1847

Swiss

constitution

of 1848 was and

the direct not

result of

the religion region, lines and of the overthrow of Danish and cleavage; principal of universal in the wake of the introduction suffrage in 1848 occurred in a country that was still almost the 1848 revolution entirely agrarian.

the civil war

in which

class, were absolutism

DEMOCRACYAND DICTATORSHIP In the second pattern, "electoral support mobilization" 1867,1884, Italy 1912, aswell asUruguay 1919),
the enfranchisement of the working class can be understood as a strategy

489 (England
of po

litical entrepreneurship to mobilize a larger support base in a context of politi cal competition. Here democratization was an elite project, and the working class was the recipient rather than the initiator of democracy, (p. 11) The frage best-known in 1867 of this was Disraeli's of the suf expansion example voters in order to capture newly enfranchised for the

Conservatives, followed in 1884 by Gladstone's attempt to do the same

for the Liberals. In the third pattern, the efforts "middle sector democratization" . . . Political (France reform was 1875, thus for in

Spain 1931, aswell asArgentina

of middle-sector as a defensive brought working decision about class"

1912), democracy was "aproduct of

to middle-sector pressures

groups. response

clusion, which,

in taking the form of democracy, also included the

examples of this pattern include the in France follow republican regime

(p. 18). Prominent a democratic, to establish

ing the defeat of 1871 and the replacement of the Spanish monarchy with a republic in 1931, both in thewake of largelymiddle-class mobi lization. Finally, in Norway (1898), Denmark (1915), and Sweden
(1918), democratization to extend was a "joint project" in which "the working or uni

class had already been partially enfranchised and labor-affiliated parties

managed the franchise to the point of full manhood

versal suffrage" (p. 25). Illuminating as this typology is for understanding democratic break
it still in nineteenthand early-twentieth-century Europe, throughs one to rather than another of why road democracy begs the question a was taken and do not really Berins Collier Mahoney by given country. a most an answer, but in in succeed convincing refuting they provide of classes (Marx and that one class or fixed combination way the notion and Therborn and Rueschemeyer, Moore: the bourgeoisie; Stephens, theorists: middle modernization the the class; many working Stephens: can claim to be the carrier of democracy. Further classes) principal

more, Berins Collier andMahoney's

patterns of first-wave War ways democratization

identification of four disparate

in Western Europe (and Latin into being in

America)
on

accords well with Przeworski and Limongi's findings based

can come II cases, that democracies reasons.18 and for many different
(fn. 2), 158.

post-World many different

18 Przeworski

and Limongi

490

WORLD POLITICS stephens, Breakdown

had

iv. rueschemeyer,
Once Western in others

and stephens and Survival

whatever

on democratic

democracy Europe, during

arrived?under

circumstances?in countries this question but not (not

why did it prove irreversible the interwar period? In answering that itwas

in some

addressed by Berins Collier andMahoney),

and Stephens argue, with Moore,

Rueschemeyer,
the absence

Stephens,

of a politically

powerful landed elite which permitted democracy to survive in eight Western European states during the 1920s and 1930s. Conversely, it
was the presence elements within of such an elite, allied as it was with antidemocratic that was responsible the state apparatus, for fascist tri case in interwar Europe and Japan. Aside from the problematic

umphs

of Britain, where a strong landed elite coexisted with stable democracy, theMoore thesis seems at first glance to hold up well when extended
the small number beyond the presence of a powerful as with their of countries group examined in Social of large landowners Origins^ in Italy, Spain, since and

Germany did in fact go hand in hand with democratic breakdown. Yet,

of the advent of democracy, discussion Rueschemeyer, examination and detailed of these three authoritar Stephens, Stephens's ian cases fails to provide convincing support for their general argument.19 In Italy, for example, the authors concede that "the landed upper

class did not assume the political leadership of the country, thus Italy
does not fit Moore's the pattern of a landholder-dominated state in alliance

with a dependent bourgeoisie" (p. 103). In addition, they admit that, in

over other land of Gramsci, "upper-class ideological hegemony outcome in is less in the Ger for the than groups important accounting man or Austrian cases" (p. 105). While and Rueschemeyer, Stephens, can the important role played by Po Val Stephens correctly underline ley landlords ment drew in supporting from support crucial the Fascists, they also allow across the class spectrum, in permitting them to come the Moore initial that the move at least to power. thesis. Thus of in the

North. Furthermore, the sympathy that the Fascists enjoyed within the
security forces was

The authors also point to interesting parallels between Italy and

Spain?none state they of which, however, help support that "as in the Italian case, the development

[Spain's] ruling political coalition in the nineteenth century does not

19 This not been true of their discussion of the Austrian case, a detailed evaluation of which has to the instances of interwar here because it is not, in my view, strictly comparable states that already existed before 1918 (see fn. 7). In sev breakdown among those Western European eral places on page 118, the authors admit the extent to which Austria presents problems for their gen eral argument. is even more included

DEMOCRACYAND DICTATORSHIP

491

seem to point in the direction of the laftdlord-bourgeois-state alliance as responsible for the development of modern authoritarianism" (p. 119). Further, a[a]s in Italy, it cannot be said that the bourgeoisie was state." (p. 120). And finally, dependent on a landholder-dominated low level the of capitalist development of the country and thus "given theweakness of civil society, ideological hegemony of the authoritarian (upper class) forces did not play such a crucial role in the Spanish case" was the army that was primarily responsible for the (p. 121). Rather, it overthrow and defeat of the Spanish Second Republic; it had a long tradition of political interventions throughout the nineteenth century,
and most of its officers were, as the authors note, of humble origin.

Even the case of Germany?in which landed elites in the person of the Junkers seem to have played the most clear-cut role both in hinder ing the transition to democracy before 1918 and inweakening the Weimar Republic thereafter;?is no longer considered to fit theMoore
paradigm David as well which as it once did. As Rueschemeyer, Stephens, and

Stephens point out, the work of David Blackbourn, Geoff Eley, and
Calleo, "the dominant view which has gained wide argues that acceptance, scholarly authoritarian locates the cause of German

ism and imperialism in the political dominance of the Junkers and the politically dependent, indeed 'supine' posture of the bourgeoisie is itmay well be true that the Junkers exercised a flawed" (p. 106).While of political influence during the Kaiserreich both di significant degree rectly and indirectly through their positions within the army and bu
reaucracy, "the role of the agrarian upper classes and the authoritarian is... in the breakdown ofWeimar coalition more generally democracy a point of contention" (p. 109). and Stephens As Rueschemeyer, note, the mass electoral Stephens,

and membership base for the Nazis was furnished not by the Junkers,
who even in the eastern provinces owned only 40.5 percent middle Here of the agri strata and the authors

cultural land,20 nor by the peasants living in these sparsely populated

provinces. peasant it was provided Rather, by the Protestant of central and western Germany. smallholders

attempt to save theMoore thesis by arguing (without much evidence) that "[i]n part through deliberate political campaigns, the dominant
classes an [a much broader hegemony ideological urban middle and peasantry much counter to current concept over elites"?T.E.] developed of the Protestant sections significant classes" claim runs very (p. 115). This which research on Germany, historical rejects
of theEconomies of Continental Europe, 1850-1914

than "landed

20 and S. B. Saul, The Development Alan Milward Press, 1977), 57. (Cambridge: Harvard University

492
the notion that the wide

WORLD POLITICS
prevalence of antidemocratic thinking and

movements
simply ther a "ruling seen

Weimar during both the imperial and the

periods can be

as the result of from above on the part of ei "manipulation" or the Junkers more elite" more generally specifically.21 between either direct or "lagged" political interven

Given
causal

the great difficulties

they exhibit in establishing a decisive

connection

tions on the part of a landed elite and the collapse of democracy in Italy, Spain, and even Germany, it is difficult to agree with Herbert
Kitschelt Stephens, 's assessment and Stephens that "[Consistent with Moore, Rueschemeyer, show that labor-intensive and labor-repressive

agriculture under the direction of large landowners is inimical to de

there is one very important and that "in the spirit of Moore, mocracy"; comes across in hard-and-fast that consistendy message Rueschemeyer, countries and with and labor-intensive Stephens, study: Stephens's not become will stable democracies."22 labor-repressive agriculture even were mere true it if that the of an antidem Furthermore, presence ocratic landed elite in a given Western country was sufficient European as the au to undermine not this would mean, democracy, necessarily of such an elite would thors imply, that the mere absence alone be enough to secure seem alysts, war Western was Rather an future. They, democracy's along with many other to assume that the survival of democratic in inter systems was the outcome and their that Europe expected collapse result most buttress in need the Moore of explanation. thesis, then, Rueschemeyer, thanks to their methodological innova some survival,

the deviant than

and Stephens have, Stephens, tions and scrupulous of the evidence, demonstrated presentation that the process of democratic transition, thing quite different: complex to be accounted evidence to for adequately within the classical

and breakdown in Europe (and in the rest of the world aswell)

is too

frameworks are As

offered byMarx orMoore. Yet while they perhaps unwittingly provide

sufficient not able Kitschelt troduce to undermine them with older analytic frameworks, they replace parsimonious. anything equally to in also notes,23 the authors are instead driven repeatedly new causal factors (war, level state-building legacies, divergent religion,
Blackbourn, Fontana, 1997),

of institutionalization of right-wing political parties, strength of civil

society,
21 David (London:

the

impact

of British

colonialism)

in order

to do

the

The Fontana History The Long Nineteenth of Germany, 1780-1918: Century 426-32; James Retallack, Germany in theAge ofKaiser Wilhelm //(London: Explanations?" American Po

Macmillan,1996),51. 22 "Political Regime Change: Structure and Process-Driven Kitschelt, litical Science Review 86 (December 1992), 1030,1031. 23 Ibid., 1031.

DEMOCRACY AND DICTATORSHIP

or Social a more

493

historical record justice.Might Gregory Luebbert's Liberalism, Fascism

Democracy offer convincing explanation of democratic

Western durability and failure in

Europe before 1939?

V. LUEBBERT
Luebbert's ambitions are, perhaps wisely, more and Stephens. Rather Stephens, and democracy on explaining to limited than across than those of to iden of dis found in

Rueschemeyer, tify the origins parate regions, interwar Europe. Luebbert mocracy cism

of dictatorship he concentrates In contrast

seeking a number

the outcomes

identifies (democratic

and Stephens, Rueschemeyer, Stephens, liberal de four rather than just two such outcomes: polity plus orthodox economic policies); and social tradi

democracy (democratic polity plus stimulatory economic policies); fas

(totalitarian than polity

tional dictatorship
mobilization

(greater toleration of dissent and a lower level of

and corporatist

economic

policies);

in fascism). in his view were during this period entirely Instead, he focuses nearly all of Europe. for the distribution of the other three regime Like Rueschemeyer, argument by Moore's in his and hence includes European cases with the confined

Only in passing does Luebbert discuss the origins of traditional dic

tatorships, which to East-Central his efforts types across on and Eastern

accounting the western

Stephens, about the analysis

and Stephens,

portion of the Continent. he remains unconvinced of small universe made itwas countries ofWestern

insignificance nearly the entire

of Portugal.24 exception For Luebbert, the claim and Stephens?that Stephens, erful whether conclusion landlords' cultural nomic landed elite democracy

and by Rueschemeyer, by Moore or absence of a pow the presence state the that determined years?is the interwar

on a friendly dependent failed or survived during he asserts on

empirically flawed. In two short but hard-hitting

(pp. 308-9), that no correlation to protect them

paragraphs in the
exists between

size of the dependent agricultural labor force (and hence the degree of
Second, regime mean the part of landed elites did not necessarily in of the control over voting behavior, support tendency citing agricul tural laborers in southern Spain to vote socialist. And finally, he argues control on
24 no mention of Portugal. As Like Rueschemeyer, Stephens, and Stephens, Luebbert makes case in my view?together with earlier, he briefly considers the Austrian (pp. 263-65)?righdy states created after 1918 in the wake of the collapse of the great empires. of other European stated those

dependence and workers)

the state

outcome.

their agri against stresses he that eco

494 that those for fascism support areas not dominated and northern about fascist

WORLD among

POLITICS peasants was strongest precisely such as north-central in

Germany bringing more

Spain

by large landowners, and Italy.

Not only does Luebbert

think that landlords were not crucial in

but he also believes that, as a result of

outcomes,

their small numbers, they became relatively insignificant for politics

once had entered the age of mass mobilization generally Europe as well as with and mass parties. Where he does agree with Moore, as is in viewing and Stephens, classes funda Rueschemeyer, Stephens, as the structural actors and class coalitions mental political underpin Luebbert types. However, nings of particular regime with the authors we have discussed that classes should the sole unit must of political act does not agree as be employed out, classes ulti

mately behavior

since, as he points analysis, it is to party and Hence through parties. configurations that he first looks to explain why certain liberal democratic of the interwar years rather and why convoluted others gave way to social de

regimes in the Europe of the 1920s and 1930s successfiilly withstood

the crises mocracy Luebbert's rized or fascism. sometimes argument In three Western countries, European liberal ideas and liberal parties were can be summa Britain, politically France, hege

as follows.

and Switzerland,

monic prior to World War

I.This hegemony was rooted both in the

the fact that "[the liberal parties'] most natural potential constituencies, within them divided by antagonisms middle classes, were not politically in religious, differences" and urban-rural rooted linguistic regional, in the fact that, given this secure electoral base, liberals were (p. 7) and the emerg concessions them to ally with which able to make permitted nascent movement workers' This workers' and, later, prewar parties. ing and weak trade unions forth organizationally "lib-labism" brought socioeconomic the liberal-created workers' parties that largely accepted order ridden and were interwar unwilling years. or unable Stability was to it during the crisis challenge in these three countries assured isolated and ineffective" the Great and De

during the 1920s by "the formation of center-right coalitions of middle

class consolidation that held that left socialist economic parties policies to conservative those throughout experienced

pression (p. 8). mony" prior to 1918 could not, in Luebbert s view, become stable lib
rather faced the choice during the interwar years, but or "aliberal" cases include Norway, social democracy. These of fascism as well as In none of and Denmark, Sweden, Italy, and Spain. Germany, eral democracies By contrast, countries that had not "liberal hege

DEMOCRACYAND DICTATORSHIP
these states, according to Luebbert, were liberal parties War able to mobi

495

lize sufficient support to transform themselves into dominant parties of

in the decades government prior ties were unable to form effective Hence the workers' toWorld lib-lab I; as a result such par alliances with workers' groups. and gathered strength in these

parties that emerged countries during the late nineteenth and the early twentieth century were not moderate and accommodationist in character but rather were strong, on the German SPD. self-contained parties modeled organizationally or so itwould for social democrats be possible years was whether common cause with other classes cialists to make representing parties in order to create durable, democratic governments capable of stabiliz through corporatist ing the economy In Scandinavia workers found such interventions allies in the labor market. in the form

For Luebbert, the key question in aliberal societies during the inter
war

of farmers' par was 1930s the of social dem the and the result ties, emergence during to this ocratic regimes that have remained day in Sweden, hegemonic a to In Denmark. lesser extent, and, Germany, Italy, and Norway, were to effec find left unable the of democratic Spain, however, parties tive coalition urban middle mass ers' movement partners classes because rather farmers in those countries sided with the a than with workers, thereby providing the aim of which was to smash the work

regimes, in the this critical difference by force. Luebbert explains with workers' in the social demo behavior of farmers?alliance parties cratic cases, repudiation of those parties and support for the far right in to differences in the level of success en the fascist cases?by pointing

base for fascist

joyed by socialist parties in organizing farm workers in the two groups

their union In Germany, affiliates were

such parties and Italy, and Spain, he argues, number of agricul able to enroll a significant their farmer-employers, tural laborers after 1918, thereby alienating in this area be in Scandinavia socialists had far less success whereas of countries. cause most This relative farm workers failure then had already left the door been open other parties. "captured" by to the future worker-farmer

alliance thatwould emerge in the 1930s. How convincing is Luebbert's parsimonious, highly original argu ment? A first objection, already made by Kitschelt, is that two of the
eleven cases he discusses were not do not seem

bert classifies the Netherlands

parties hegemonic

and Belgium as states inwhich

to 1914 and hence states where

to fit his argument.25

Thus

Lueb

liberal
lib

prior

labism did not develop. As a result, they should have become social de
25 Kitschelt (fn. 22), 1029.

496

WORLD POLITICS

mocracies during the 1930s but did not do so. In fact, religious parties (Catholic in Belgium and both Catholic and Calvinist in the Nether lands) dominated the governments of both countries during the inter war period and held fast to classically liberal economic policies in
to the response depression. Yet even if we consider instead these two cases to be anomalous and focus

on the nine countries, other difficulties appear. The remaining core of Luebbert's can be reduced to two claims: that the argument presence whether or absence a of "liberal prior hegemony" Western country would given European or would the interwar period during social democracy by whether "ensnared to 1914 become be determined a liberal de to a

mocracy choice between was cratic party

condemned

itself determined became

or fascism; and that this latter choice the country's socialist/social demo in rural class conflict" by attempting to

organize ruralworkers (fascism) or desisting from doing so (social de mocracy). The problem with the liberal hegemony argument is that this
seems difficult hegemony extremely Thus, posed interwar consequences. classes, to measure of its sup independent in both Denmark and Norway, the

Venstre (Left), a liberal party that attracted support from the middle
and farmers, was the leading political force before workers, as to states Luebbert refuses these "liberal 1914, yet categorize hege a country without a monic." At the same time France, dominant single lib-lab party, earns this designation. the contention that itwas the degree of success enjoyed Meanwhile, in organizing democratic by socialist/social parties agricultural workers

to enter into coali the willingness of family farmers seems to lack any such parties, while clever and original, was not in basis it fact. the numbers of strong Surely agricultural work ers enrolled in socialist unions but the effort to such workers organize at all?whatever success of the endeavor?that the ultimate would have that determined tions with antagonized family cialist International farmers and the member most, parties of the So in such efforts from the 1890s onward.26 engaged

Furthermore,
farmers in

given the deep hostility of Protestant

toward the social democrats

(and Catholic)
as the

in Germany was

as far back

1890s, it defies belief to assert that the possibility of a red-green alliance

Germany

farm laborers after 1918, as Luebbert claims (pp. 298-300).

Where democracy does this leave us? Luebbert during the interwar s survived contention underlying in eight Western period is that Euro

precluded

only by sudden

SPD successes

in organizing

26 Hans Georg Lehmann, Sozialdemokratie (T?bingen:

Die Agrarfrage J. C. B. Mohr,

in der Theorie und Praxis der deutschen und internationalen 1970), 48,267-69.

DEMOCRACYAND DICTATORSHIP
gave their votes able to cooperate in three others because classes

497

pean states because, during the crisis-filled years after 1929, either the
middle failed their farmers were or workers to and parties prodemocratic to defend it the political whereas system, the middle threw classes and farmers forces. as to why This contention may be and voters acted

antidemocratic support behind it but true, merely begs the question own in the way they did. Luebbert's pointing to divergent patterns

attempt of working-class

parties to answer

this question by rural work (including

ing-class) incorporation before 1914 is highly original, but inmy view

unconvincing. Is there an alternative?

VI. An Alternative Approach: AND ASSOCIATIONAL PARTY-CENTER POUTICS LlFE, PARTIES,

I believe ments war there is an alternative, and it is one that builds on the achieve in inter of the literature just discussed variations by examining across the full range ofWestern outcome cases, just as European

Rueschemeyer,
them Rokkan)

Stephens, and Stephens,

did. Furthermore, Luebbert's

and Luebbert
concentration

(and before
on the abil

ity of prodemocratic parties to hold on to their supporters and to build

seems a to coalitions with rival parties committed governing democracy more for first-order democratic under plausible explanation durability of the interwar years than either the class the unfavorable conditions or the coalitional of and Stephens Rueschemeyer, approach Stephens, the historical of other merits of these Mann, particularism despite I would that rather than works. suggest, however, focusing exclusively 1914 as the key independent before incorporation working-class in accounting for interwar party strength and behavior?as variable on

Luebbert does?we

"bring civil society back in" and examine instead

in our the relationship associational life and political between parties twelve cases during that time period. states of It has long been recognized that most Western European in common the late nineteenth centuries possessed, and early twentieth

with theUnited States and Britain's white dominions, highly developed

associational tential

landscapes played a significant role in defending liberty against the po

for despotism citizens lurking within modern society. They accom

landscapes

and that,

ifTocqueville

is to be believed,

such

plished this both by furthering participation,

trust, and civic virtue

to an ever and by acting as a potential among counterweight more state. The of associational life by vertical overshadowing powerful areas of rural across 1914 ties before paron-client large Spain and Por

498
tugal?countries

WORLD POLITICS
that would later experience democratic breakdowns?

lends prima facie plausibility to the idea that a direct correlation might exist between the strength of associational life and the durability of
democracy. However, the deviant the pattern associational a substantial cases of Germany of outcomes and northern found before across Italy forcefully interwar Western

contradict the hope that variations in the strength of civil society alone
might

Europe during the 1920s and 1930s. Germany possessed one of the
densest won landscapes popular socialism following and yet national recent there. Moreover, 1933

explain

world's

Weimar Germany has detailed the crucial role that local scholarship on associational networks played in promoting the rapid spread of support
for the Nazis, areas tional identified

of September 1930 and July 1932.27 In Italy itwas precisely the two
by Robert life between 1860 Putnam and as possessing the richest associa 1920?Emilia-Romagna movement its earliest with and Lom

thereby

permitting

the latter s spectacular

electoral

gains

and most bardy?that provided one was most it of from fervent Indeed, supporters. Italy's Bologna, as to Ferrara and the civic cities, that Fascism radiated outward highly the Fascist

sociational Po Valley after 1920.28

These comes cases indicate that some other factor or factors combined with

divergent patterns of associational life before 1914 to produce the out

search for such a fac the interwar period. The during tor or factors was first taken up ago in a number of nearly three decades on most Stein Rokkan of Eckstein and those works, Harry notably on the Netherlands. works These and Arend Norway Lijphart explored observed the connection favor.29 More between

the durability of democracy, but this analytic approach soon fell out of
recently, however, historians have produced a consider
27 1880-1935 (Chapel Hill: University Rudy Koshar, Social Life, Local Politics, and Nazism: Marburg, of North Carolina Press, 1986), 179-208,298-99; of Nazi idem, "Two 'Nazisms': The Social Context inMarburg Social History 7 (January 1982); Zdenek Zofka, Die Aus Mobilization and T?bingen," R W?lfle, Nationalsozialismus 1979), auf dem Lande (Munich: Kommissionsbuchhandlung breitung des of the 37, 81. Sheri Berman has made a similar argument in Berman, "Civil Society and the Collapse Weimar Republic," World Politics 49 (April 1997). 28 Modern Robert Putnam, Making Democracy Work Civic Traditions in Italy (Princeton: Princeton (Oxford: Oxford Uni Press, 1993), 148-51; Paul Corner, Fascism in Ferrara, 1915-1925 University more than 250,000 versity Press, 1975), 137-38. Paolo Farnetti also provides figures that indicate that over 130,000 of inMay 1922 were found in the North, of the Fascist movements 332,310 members In and Emilia alone. See Farnetti, "Social Conflict, Parliamentary them in Lombardy Fragmentation, stitutional Shift, and the Rise of Fascism: Italy," in Juan Linz and Alfred Stepan, eds., The Breakdown Press, 1978), 22. ofDemocratic Regimes: Europe (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University 29 in theNetherlands, 2d ed. Arend Lijphart, The Politics ofAccommodation: Pluralism and Democracy and Cohesion inDemocracy: of California Press, 1975); Harry Eckstein, Division (Berkeley: University A Study of (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1966); Stein Rokkan, "Geography, Religion Norway

particular

kinds

of associational

landscapes

and

DEMOCRACY AND DICTATORSHIP

able number provide nineteenth of monographs, a substantial amount a local or regional on associational of information often with

499
focus, that life and its

ties to politics What

in all of theWestern

European
century.30

states during the late

and the early twentieth

this literature, both old and new, seems to imply is that polit

ical change and the character of civil society in late-nineteenth-century to interacted with one another the distinctive patterns Europe produce

in the relationship between political parties and associational life that

underlay and divergent interwar outcomes. More concretely, where parties

and party competition stood at the center of political life before 1914
was well (Britain, France, landscape developed the the two came to Scandinavia, Switzerland, Netherlands), Belgium, and in reinforce each other in such away as to further democratization the associational the durability of the resulting after 1918. democratic regimes was well where the associational but Conversely, landscape developed were not central to and life (Ger party competition parties political and only forces were fragmented many and Italy), conservative political weakly uation created tied to bourgeois conditions and agrarian associational to the sudden favorable defense networks. success This sit of far-right the crisis condi crease

movements The

of agrarian and bourgeois tions of the interwar period.

under

weak

1914 was life before associational situation, where opposite to re and tended but party government strong (Spain Portugal), with associated networks and the cacique politics inforce patron-client more modern after 1918 in them. When right-wing parties emerged to in rooted associational subcultures, response parties firmly left-wing
inNorwegian and Social Class: Crosscutting Politics," in Seymour Martin Lipset and Stein Cleavages Cross-National eds., Party Systems and Voter Alignments: Perspectives (New York: Free Press, are on Norway: Rokkan, S tat, of Rokkan's essays, the majority of which 1967). See also a collection

Rokkan,

1987). Nasjon, Klasse (Oslo: Univesitetsforlaget, 30 of such works include Eugenio Biagini and Alistair Reid, eds., Currents of Radicalism: Examples and Party Politia in Britain, 1850-1914 (Cambridge: Cambridge Popular Radicalism, Organised Labour (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, Press, 1991); Martin University Pugh, The Tories and the People, 1880-1935 en (Paris: Presses de la F.N.S.P., 1985); Raymond Huard, Le mouvement Bas-Languedoc r?publicain 1982); idem, La naissance du parti politique en France (Paris: Presses de la F.N.S.P., 1996); Hans Righart, De Katholieke Zuil inEurope (Amsterdam: Boom Meppel, 1986); Jan van Miert, Wars van Clubgeest en en 1850-1920 (Amsterdam: Amsterdam Partijzucht: Liberalen, Natie Verzuiling, Tielen Winschoten, idet Svanska Samh?l Sven Lundkvist, Folkr?relserna Press, [1994]); Koshar (fh. 27,1986); University Sozialmilieus und poli andWiksell, let 1850-1920 (Stockholm: Almquist 1977); Siegfried Weichlein, Tobias D?rr, in der Weimarer Republik (G?ttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1996); Franz Walter, and Klaus Schmidtke, Die SPD in Sachsen und Th?ringen zwischen Hochburg und Diaspora (Bonn: Verlag J.H. W. Dietz Nachf., 1993); Anthony Cardoza, Agrarian Elites and Italian Fascism: The Province of Bologna, 1901-1926 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982); Mary Vincent, Catholi in Salamanca, 1930-1936 cism in the Second Spanish Republic: Religion and Politia (Oxford: Clarendon (Lis Press, 1996); Pedro Tavares de Almeida, Ele?oes e Caciquismo no Portugal Oitocentista, 1868-1890 bon: Difus?o Editorial, 1991). tische Kultur

500

WORLD POLITICS

they remained weak and divided among themselves, leading their sup
porters to seek military assistance the borders politics 1914. The to counter ofWestern nor an result the threat Europe, from the left. pos as Finally, moving beyond sessed neither party-centered sociational landscape before the Bolshevik The second overthrow Russia

extensively developed there was a pattern of very Perhaps some

weak parties and conspiratorial organizing that helped make possible

of the Kerensky government.

additional historical detail will render the logic of this argument clearer.
saw a tremendous upsurge century in Britain, in and creation Sweden the of France, Norway, Denmark, in voluntary and membership trade unions, organizations: cooperatives, educational associations, pressure groups, temperance agricultural sects in and and Britain trade unions, Scandinavia; groups, dissenting half of the nineteenth agriculture pressure groups, educational associations, reading circles,

andMasonic

lodges in France.31 Such organizations helped mobilize

citizens, bind them to one another, and involve them in public affairs dur a and disorienting social dislocation. At the same ing period of massive came states to assume in and all of these time, parties party competition in central importance life. In Britain, France, and Norway this political was a direct result of both and Sweden over

ble solely to a parliamentary majority) and expansion of suffrage; in

Denmark it was the result ongoing struggle servatives forces within The to number and parliamentarization the national legislatures of the modern networks 1850s these and of suffrage expansion and an that pitted liberal and con against one another. political of offices were parties that began or committees in War varied the Liberals, Labour. In Scandi on the left, Venstre in the cen running from

full parliamentarization

(executives

responsi

and character between after the

crystallize these countries case

erect national In Britain

the First World of course

from

to case.

Conservatives, navia the usual Conservatives ter.32 The

and, party

parties the turn of the century, included the socialists pattern and, somewhat was more

(the Left, often rendered in English as the Liberals) on the center left,
on the right, party later, Agrarians fragmented, French landscape

31 und Christiane Eisenberg, "Arbeiter, B?rger und der 'b?rgerliche Verein,' 1820-1870: Deutschland im Vergleich," in J?rgen Kocka, ed., B?rgertum im 19, Jahrhundert: Deutschland im Europ?is England chen Vergleich, 3 vols. (Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch Jean-Marie Mayeur, Verlag, 1988), 2:195-208; sous la Troisi?me La vie politique 1870-1940 du Seuil, 1984), 76-78; (Paris: ?ditions R?publique, Lundkvist (fn. 30), 66-86; Tim Knudsen, Den Danske Stat Righart (fh. 30), 100-119,147-68,209-37;

32 T. K. Derry, History of Scandinavia of Minnesota Press, 1979), 257-63, (Minneapolis: University Press, 1955), 266-68; Dankwort Rustow, The Politics of Compromise (Princeton: Princeton University Rokkan (fh. 29), 391,394-95. 44-54,56-60,65-78;

102-3;Rokkan (fh.29), 374.

iEuropa

(Copenhagen-Jurist-

og okonomforbundets

Forlag,

1993),

96-99,151-54;

Eckstein

(fh. 29),

DEMOCRACY AND DICTATORSHIP

a number of socialist groups on the left through the radicals ter left, various republican groupings several parties close to the Catholic in these the center ground, occupying church on the right.33 countries to

501
on the cen and

Finding themselves confronted with diverse andwell-organized

civil

societies, emergent parties forge sought associations and win over their members, but the be resulting overlap was tween the associational and party far from perfect. landscapes Thus, to support, albeit in lesser known as the Liberals numbers, and, later, Labour, to support both the Liberals and dissenters were known In and Labour. farmers split their votes among the Conservatives, Scandinavia the Lib erals and, later, the Agrarians; dissenters voted for the Liberals, Social and Agrarians; and trade unionists voted for the Liberals Democrats, trade unionists in Britain the Conservatives as well and Social groups across This the Democrats. chose from could in France members of associational Finally, at least two at every political point groupings correspondence between associational were

ties with

political spectrum.34 lack of a one-to-one

groupings and political parties had a beneficial effect on the long-term

political trajectory of these nations. On views may have differed viduals whose nize reform with the one hand, it allowed indi on many other issues to orga that cut across party and class lines, as happened

campaigns and the free trade, temperance, and suffrage issues in both Britain to it On the the remain Scandinavia. other hand, forced prag parties matic in their positions in order to win and flexible the support of a civil society. range of interest groups and react to new currents within The cases however, sociational one The that of Belgium, and the Netherlands Switzerland, that this particular between pattern of interaction indicate, a dense as

tively early as a result of full parliamentarization (Belgium 1847; Switzerland 1848; theNetherlands 1868). In all three cases liberal par
ties that attracted from business an initial support from participants groups to workers' aid societies within government. in a range of associations? toMasonic lodges ?enjoyed The liberals' opponents?

was not the and powerful only political parties landscape interwar years. could lead to durable the democracy during came to all of these countries of party competition rela centrality

dominance in Switzerland;

Catholics
farmers

and socialists in Belgium; Catholics,

Catholics, socialists, to their control system,

socialists, and later

Calvinists in

and orthodox of state

the Netherlands?responded of the education especially

33 Mayeur(fn. 34 Ibid. 31), 193-204.

by creating

and institutions, their own dense associ

502
ational subcultures

WORLD POLITICS

and leisure time and workers, youth, comprising from liberal in in order to protect other organizations their supporters to fluence in and to mobilize them more the effectively struggle gain seats.35 parliamentary

Once they obtained a foothold in government, the antiliberal parties did not attempt to dismantle liberal state institutions. Rather, they sought to obtain public funds for their own schools and, later,welfare funds, which they themselves administered. They also often pressed for
a further expansion of the suffrage, since their support base extended

further down the social scale than did that of the liberals. By the turn of
the century, Catholics in the wake

replaced the liberals as the dominant force in Belgian politics, while the
and Calvinists were about to do the same in the Netherlands.

of suffrage

reform,

the Catholics

had

already

Both trends continued following the introduction of universal (Nether lands 1920) and equal manhood suffrage (Belgium 1919). Even in Switzerland, long since fully democratic, the hegemonic liberalswere forced in 1891 to share power with the Catholic party and, after the in troduction of proportional representation in 1919, with the farmers as well. Thanks to the financial backing for their subcultural institutions,
which received from the state, and to their parties all were firm supporters now-entrenched government, positions within of the democratic order. Furthermore, because party leaders across the on the firm support count of their voters could spectrum political in all-encompassing associa thanks to the membership of those voters these nonliberal to reach with they enjoyed the freedom compromises in the national their opponents interest, may have been that, although to their own followers.36 distasteful naturally cases stand in contrast to the sit three consociational These striking tional subcultures, uation over triumph also pos democracy period. sessed a well-developed the associational landscape during bourgeois case a second half of the nineteenth did century, but in neither party Germany These countries 1914. emerge before pattern of politics executive the extensive retained powers tended to emasculate In Germany this was both and emperor by in and Italy, where the interwar during of course fascism was to

centered because chancellor

the Reichstag and, as Max Weber talented men to enter the bureaucracy, the army, out, encourage pointed or business did possess par rather than party politics.37 In Italy, which
35 (fn. 30), 100-119,146-69,209-37. Righart 36 (fn. 29), 190-91. 37Lijphart im neugeordneten Max Weber, "Parliament und Regierung Deutschland," Politische Schriften, 4th ed. (T?bingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1980), 311-21,337-50.

in Weber,

Gesammelte

DEMOCRACY AND DICTATORSHIP

liamentary undermined The government, it was the practice of trasformismo

503
or the co

optation of individual opposition deputies into the ruling coalition that

of party discipline.38 any semblance result in both cases was a pattern of at best weak ties between

the bourgeois and agrarian associational milieus and the debilitated, in effectual liberal and conservative parties, which aspired to be their po
litical representatives. networks of patriotic, nomic interest groups bureaucratic In Germany choral, cultivated In Italy and in the very extensive the participants and the eco associations shooting a growing antipathy toward party on the

politicians in favor of a belief in the superiority of government through

experts.39

center-right of the political

spectrum barely existed as such. At the

deputies circle of so

trasformismo

meant

that parties

same time, the self-interested of parliamentary maneuverings an ever wider for fostered among contempt parliamentarism Italian society.40 Outside nizations of the bourgeois and agrarian milieus, however,

effective were cases,

cialist and social Catholic parties did arise, primarily as defensive orga
to protect seeking antiworker and anticlerical their supporters against what states. As in the consociational in seen as these

and, later, the Germany own in their extensive associa up Populare Italy?built trade leisure-time and tional subcultures unions, youth, embracing and mutual woman's aid societies. Under the crisis con organizations, parties?the PSI and Partito ditions and Catholic after 1918, the compact socialist as par were subcultures politico-associational perceived and agrarian milieus, which ticularly threatening by the bourgeois a re As of and cohesion. lacked political parties comparable strength that reigned in both countries

SPD and Zentrum

somewhat

sus members from these milieus sult, association proved particularly movements at to the of all aimed center-right ceptible appeals uniting states and forces for the purpose of overthrowing corrupt parliamentary As the of socialist and clerical mentioned power breaking parties. net and agrarian associational above, the dense nature of bourgeois turn in and national social works support for both Fascism permitted

ism to spread extremely rapidly through (economically

northern ational and central If Germany Italy and all of Germany, cases where and Italy represent in the absence respectively. a well-developed politics

advanced)
associ brought

landscape

of party-centered
to Fascism, 1870-1925

38 Seton-Watson, Christopher Italy from 246-48,390. 1967), 51-52,91-92 39 Koshar (fn. 27,1986), 6,45-90. 40 Seton-Watson (fn. 38), 91-92,390.

Liberalism

(London: Methuen,

504

WORLD POLITICS

forth results fatal to democracy, the opposite set of conditions produced

similar centered 1870s results around in Spain two and Portugal. Here government parliamentary and Liberal-Conservatives in (Liberals parties party-centered chains rather in the electoral a of politics pattern in Latin America.41 in soci arose, however, politics associations were than voluntary districts built to their own around local purposes, or bosses

Spain; Regenerators and Progressists in Portugal) was in place by the

at the latest. This patron-client eties where nessed and the

still the prevalent form of social organization. The political parties har
such networks result was

also found caciques By the first decades had given political publicans

of this century, however, socioeconomic change on the center-left modern of the parties re in and anarchists socialists, spectrum?republicans, Spain; was in in extensive, and socialists Each embedded Portugal. rise to new, more to create equally modern parties to counter

though geographically limited associational networks. Political forces

on the not attempt right did 1930s in Spain,

this challenge from the left until the 1920s in Portugal and the early
and this proved too late to match the electoral strength in a range of voluntary of their opponents, rooted as it was organiza on the on the to look to tions. Hence the temptation part of many right

the army to help meet a threat that they believed could not be defeated
ultimately

means of course alone.42 This temptation by electoral the overthrow in both countries. of democracy I have argued in this essay during that one will the interwar not find a

led to

parsimonious,

gener in

alizable explanation for the durability of democracy in eightWestern

European countries

four others in a class-coalitional

Stephens,

period

and for

its collapse

analysis of the kind employed by

in the spirit of Moore or of the

Rueschemeyer,

and Stephens

kind developed by Luebbert; nor will

such as that of Mann

one find it in a historical

or Rokkan. A better chance analysis genealogical is offered by a new approach, which fo of success, I have suggested, cuses on variations in the relationship life ("civil between associational across and political conceived) society" narrowly parties Europe during an the of voluntary this period. Such approach underlines significance associations
41 Tavares

structured

along many

different

lines

(class,

religion,

gen

de Almeida (fn. 30), passim; Juan Linz, "The Party System of Spain: Past and Future," in Cross-National eds., Party Systems and Voter Alignments: Seymour Martin Lipset and Stein Rokkan, (New York Free Press, 1967), 198-99,202-8. Perspectives 42 Antonio Costa Pinto, Salazars Dictatorship and European Fascism (Boulder, Colo.: Social Science Linz (fn. 41), 200-201,259-64. 1995), 92-106,135-46; Monographs,

DEMOCRACY AND DICTATORSHIP

505

der, region, leisure-time interests) in bringing together citizens during periods of rapid social and economic change. At the same time, it high lights the ways inwhich political parties and associations could affect
or undermine in such a way as to development strengthen the prospects for democratization and democratic survival under unfa vorable economic and international conditions. each others'