viii Preface Preface Felipe B. Miranda Democracy is an idea whose time has come. Nothing confirms this fact more than the great majority of constitutions proclaiming their faith in democracy. States as varied as Afghanistan, Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, Canada, China, India, Russia, the two Koreas, Indonesia, Myanmar, Thailand, France, Germany, Italy, Colombia, Brazil, Venezuela, Egypt, Israel, (Qaddafi's) Libya, Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Zimbabwe and Uganda – an incredibly wide assortment of political regimes -- all solemnly profess adherence to "democracy" or "democratic" norms in their constitutions. So, incidentally, does the Philippines. Indeed, constitutions without an explicit allusion to "democracy" comprise a rather small set, with Iran, the United States, Japan, Singapore and Australia notably present. It is obvious that most states would like to claim democratic status or, at least, to project an ongoing, successful transformation of their polities into democracies. The professional literature on democracy tends to be supportive of these claims as indicated by the big number of countries that academics liberally label democratic or democratizing. Democracy, in turning iconic, makes for much confusion. Stretched to accommodate multiple senses that reflect conflated meanings, it runs the risk of being a portmanteau term, carrying whatever sense someone loads it with. Thus, contrary to what might be hoped for, a firm consensus eludes this oftprofessed governance mode; it lacks precise definition in discourse and even