<DIV>It is a commonplace claim of Western political discourse that capitalist development and democracy go hand in hand. Cross-national statistical research on political democracy supports this claim. By contrast, comparative historical studies carried out within a political economy approach argue...</div>

This paper develops a sociological perspective on the concept of social identities—that is relations of membership recognised as significant by members and outsiders. Social identities encompass face-to-face groups and local communities, as well as large groupings that transcend any...

Any account of the social and economic conditions of democracy must come to terms with the central finding of the cross-national statistical research: a sturdy (though not perfect) association between economic development and democracy. To tackle these questions of causation, we adopted a...