Gerard Alexander on the consolidation of democracy

I strongly recommend this article, Making Democracy Stick, by Gerard Alexander, in the current issue of the Hoover Institution's Policy Review. Alexander, a professor at the University of Virginia, shrewdly covers what is necessary for democracies not merely to make the transition from authoritarianism (or worse) to democracy, but what it takes to consolidate democracy over the long term. (I see it is also listed at RCP, here.)