This book offers a new approach to the study of European democracy showing how this has developed through key episodes in the long history of the process: precursors in the Low Countries; the founding of British parliamentary then American federal democracy; post-revolutionary France; post-war Germany; the European Parliament. It examines the significance of each episode in the development of national or federal democracy and concludes with a positive assessment of the prospects of liberal democracy. This is an important book for political scientists, historians and others concerned with the development of democracy in Europe and beyond.

COLIN BONWICK Professor of American History, Keele University RICHARD CORBETT Member of the European Parliament for Merseyside West; former Deputy Secretary-General of Socialist Group of MEPs ANTHONY GLEES Reader in Government, Brunel University JONATHAN I. ISRAEL Professor of Dutch History and Institutions, University of London E.H. KOSSMAN Emeritus Professor of Modern History, University of Groningen and Professor of Dutch History, University College, London R.C. VAN CAENEGEM Emeritus Professor, University of Ghent and Fellow of the British Academy BERNARD VOYENNE Emeritus Professor, Centre de formation et de perfectionnement des Journalistes, Paris, 1949-80 and journalist with Cesoir