| Description: |
The significance of elections can only be understood in a historical and institutional context. In nineteenth century Europe there was lots of change, but there was not an inevitable process of democratization and elections involved elite competition far more than the expression of popular demands. This paper sets out a paradigm for the analysis of elections in early stages of development when many things such as the secret ballot cannot be taken for granted. The application of the paradigm is illustrated with contrasting examples of proto-democratic and undemocratic practices in countries from Britain to Prussia and beyond. The twentieth-century aftermath was the creation of democratic and undemocratic regimes and the alteration between the two, as illustrated by Germany, France, Italy and Spain.
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