Rohaizan Baharuddin
Abstract:
This study examines the trends, development and practices of democracy (DV), civil liberties and elections (IVs) in 47 Muslim countries between the years 1998 to 2008. Based on secondary quantitative data primarily collected from Freedom House and analysed using SPSS, this study demonstrates the aggregate findings as follows - the ‘not free not fair’ elections, the ‘limited’ civil liberties and the ‘Illiberal Partial Democracy’ were the most dominant nature of elections, civil liberties and democracy practised in the Muslim world; and with 66.67% occurrences, elections proved to be the better predictor of democracy compared to civil liberties with only 31.58%. While this study concentrates on political variables as determinants of democracy, future research may consider other socioeconomic variables such as economic development, citizens’ level of education, social mobilisation activities, etc.
Keywords: Civil liberties, democracy, election, Muslim world politics