The academic and the prescriptive literatures on democratisation are seldom separate and distinct; the former often tends, consciously or otherwise, to offer suggestions as to ‘what to do’ or ‘which path to take’, while the latter as frequently suggests generalisations as to why a specific policy or policies can contribute to understanding why democratisation will thrive.

The present volume is about as complete a blending of the two as one is likely to find. It draws on the proceedings of the first meeting of the Club of Madrid on democratic transition and consolidation (held in that city in 2001), and because that meeting brought together academics as well as practitioners, the resulting book has both. Its academic chapters are by a wide range of established scholars from Latin America and the United States, as well as Europe, but it also includes contributions by current and former elected officials such as I. K. Gurjal (former prime minister of India), Aníbal Cavaco Silva (former prime minister and also president of Portugal), César Gaviria (former president of Colombia) and Fernando Henrique Cardoso (former president of Brazil).

The book has four major sections. The first is devoted to macro issues of democratic construction (economic challenges, strengthening pluralism and participation); the second focuses on electoral institutions (constitutions, executive-legislative relations); the third looks at implementation (reforming the state, the roles of the military and police forces, corruption); the last consists of brief cases presented by the high-level practitioners already mentioned (leaders from and of Brazil, Latin America, India, Portugal).

There is little exceptionable from any of the essays. Many of the academic contributions are synthetic roundups (and extremely useful ones at that) that bring together much of the thought current at the time of the conference. To take but one of several examples: the Richards chapter on economic challenges presents a distillation of many of the pre-eminent political economists on the topic (Przeworski, Limongi, Maravall, Diamond), and then addresses the particular question of ‘… the role played by economic development in sustaining democracy once it has been established’ (p. 45). To do so Richards takes on several critical decision points (popular demands, costs of reform, liberalisation via ‘big bang’ or gradualism, relations between the market and the state); he also distinguishes between postcommunist ‘new’ democracies and Latin American ‘older’ but highly unequal democracies, between countries with some record of economic reform prior to democratisation versus those with none, and between those countries who confront democracy above or below certain developmental thresholds and how their chances for surviving their confrontations vary.

Most of the other academic chapters are analogous (at least roughly) in their scope and in their abilities to synthesise mainstream economics and political science, but go even further in their prescriptions. The Richard Simeon and Luc Turgeon chapter dealing with constitutional design, to take only one other example, not only lets the reader know what the recent relevant literatures have said and are saying, but also offers (as already discussed) step by step instructions on how to proceed to install a new constitution successfully (stakes in constitutional design, constitutional moments, constitution making, self-interest, timing, arenas, participants, decision rules and implementation).

The book has much to give. For professional scholars and graduate students it offers much synthesis and much in the way of the choices that must be made (a point emphasised in several places by the editors). For the practitioner, references to specific cases (even if such cases consist of little more than passing references) outline choices that must be made and not skimmed over.

As may be gathered, the scope of this rather slim volume is large indeed, and that is perhaps one of its shortcomings. The reader looking for detailed studies of a specific country or small cluster of countries will look in vain; likewise, a reader who wishes to find new empirical data or quantitative materials will not find them here. And the reader searching for serious debates between or among the contributors will not find those. It may well be, as the editors say (p. 5), that workshops held prior to the Club of Madrid meetings saw ‘… discussions … (that) were prolonged and intense’, but that intensity does not across in the final product.

In sum, the book is useful in a variety of ways, as I have discussed. It is not a breakthrough book theoretically or empirically, but its effort to include academics as well as practitioners makes it stand out from the crowd of other volumes on democratisation.