Deliberation Day

party families tend toward the nationalization of support. After the description of the broad trends, the author explores the causal patterns both from a dynamic and a comparative perspective. From a dynamic point of view, the nationalization of European electorates and party systems is attributed to two main factors: the supremacy of functional left-right alignments and electoral competition. First, the competition between the two main party families of the nineteenth century, liberals and conservatives, led them to spread into new areas in a process of mutual challenge. Then, the functional left-right supremacy imposed itself definitely with the clash provoked by the entry of parties of the working class. But, in the final analysis, the nationalization of party politics cannot be dissociated from the inclusion and mobilization of mass electorates: There is no nationalization without democratization. From a comparative perspective, the survival of territoriality in some countries today can mainly be explained by cultural cleavages that resisted the homogenizing impact of class politics. The extent to which the hegemony of the left-right cleavage leads to the domination of a functional and nonterritorial dimension in Western party systems depends on the more or less strong resistance of preindustrial cultural factors (Belgium and Switzerland), but also on the intersection of rural-urban differences (Finland), and on the nationalist cleavage (Ireland). In all these countries, the vote for the main left parties remains highly regionalized. As the author points out in the conclusion, the results of his analysis raise intriguing questions for the current process of European integration. Thus, the fact that nationalization processes took place early, that is, above all during the first phases after the transition to competitive elections, suggests that the transition from territorial to functional politics is typical of forming democratic institutional systems. One may ask, therefore, whether what has been happening at the national level can be used to interpret the structuring of a European political space. Deliberation Day, by Bruce Ackerman and James S. Fishkin. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2004. 278 pp. $30.00 cloth. ISBN: 0-300-10101-5.