New Challenges for Maturing Democracies in Korea and Taiwan

Larry Diamond is a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford. He is also Director of Stanford's Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law.Gi-Wook Shin is Director of the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center, the Tong Yang, Korea Foundation, and Korea Stanford Alumni Chair of Korean Studies, and Professor of Sociology at Stanford.

"This book is an excellent reference for those who are eager to understand what Korea and Taiwan are struggling with as they 'deepen' of their democratic regimes in the era of globalization."—Byong-Kuen Jhee, Pacific Affairs "This volume, unlike all previous studies on Asian democratization, systematically compares the cultural, socioeconomic, and other important consequences of democratization in Korea and Taiwan. Comparing these two Confucian countries with those in the long-democratic West, it also confirms their maturity as democracies and as civilized nations, and thereby disputes the age-old Asian Values thesis that liberal democracy is not suitable for Confucian Asian countries."—Doh Chull Shin, University of California, Irvine "As two paradigmatic cases of democratic development, Korea and Taiwan are often seen as exemplars of both modernization and democratization. This volume both contributes and moves beyond this focus, looking forward to assess the maturation but also the risks to democracy in both countries. With its strong comparative focus and a sober appreciation of how hard it can be not to just to attain but to sustain democracy, it represents a major contribution."—Benjamin Reilly, Sir Walter Murdoch School of Public Policy and International Affairs, Murdoch University