SHAREThis paper draws on International IDEA’s experience in democracy building. It is presented in the context of its mission to produce high-quality and policy-relevant comparative knowledge on democracy promotion made available to, owned and used by key actors at local, national, regional and international levels, addressing the links between the consolidation of democratic institutions and the conditions for strengthening democratic processes.
The paper is divided in six sections, addressing: the nature of democracy building; current challenges to democracy; the crisis of representative democracy as emerging from the mistrust in political institutions; popular participation; democratic practice, with emphasis on divided societies; and capacity development for democratic politics.
