David Beetham

The new edition of this classic text provides a comprehensive introduction to the concept of legitimacy as applied to political systems. Now addressing the issue of legitimacy beyond the state, the book also includes a new introduction and two major additional chapters which update the argument in the light of developments and debates.

The new edition of this classic text provides a comprehensive introduction to the concept of legitimacy as applied to political systems. Now addressing the issue of legitimacy beyond the state, the book also includes a new introduction and two major additional chapters which update the argument in the light of developments and debates.

As the U. S. strives to establish democracy in Iraq and contemplates its own democratic system in the wake of a series of controversial presidential elections, David Beetham offers new insights into democracy. He looks at real examples such as the role of the citizen and how large corporations affect democracy as well as contemplating the future of democracy in the developed and developing worlds.

What is democracy? How do we know when we have it? Is liberal democracy merely one, or the only, version of democracy, realizable at governmental level? What is the relation between democracy and human rights? This text attempts to answer these and other questions about democracy and human rights.

Democratic Institutions and Practices is the second study carried out under the Democratic Audit of the UK. This volume explores the formal institutions and processes of the liberal democratic state: including the executive, elections, parliament and the civil service.

Democratic Institutions and Practices is the second study carried out under the Democratic Audit of the UK. This volume explores the formal institutions and processes of the liberal democratic state: including the executive, elections, parliament and the civil service.

This textbook, specially commissioned by UNESCO, addresses eighty of the most pressing questions about democracy today.

This text assembles 80 of the most pressing questions about democracy, systematically arranged in six sections: basic concepts and principles; free and fair elections; open and accountable government; individual rights and their defence; democratic or civil society; and the future of democracy.

Max Weber's writings on the politics of Wilhelmine in Germany and the Russian revolutions of 1905 and 1917 are much less well known than his contributions to historical and theoretical sociology, yet they are essential to any overall assessment of his thought. Drawing on these writings, still mostly untranslated, David Beetham offers the most comprehensive account available in English of Weber's political theory. The book explores Weber's central concern with the prospects for liberal Parliamentarism in authoritarian societies and in an age of mass politics and bureaucratic organization, and shows how this concern led him to a revision of democratic theory which is still influential. It argues that Weber's analyzis of the class basis of contemporary politics necessitate a modification in some of the accepted interpretations of his sociology of modern capitalism. A special feature of the book is its full treatment of the extensive German literature on Weber's political thought. This second edition contains a substantial new critical introduction and an expanded bibliography. Otherwise the text of the widely acclaimed first edition remains unaltered. This is a book which adds an essential dimension to the understanding of Max Weber for students of sociology and politics who have previously only approached his work through his sociological writings.