ABSTRACT
Juan Linz and Alfred Stepan define a consolidated democracy, referring to its behavioral, attitudinal, and constitutional dimensions. Thus,
behaviorally, a democratic regime in a territory is consolidated when no significant national, social, economic, political or institutional actors spend significant resources attempting to achieve their objectives by creating a nondemocratic regime or turning to violence or foreign intervention to secede from the state.
Attitudinally, a democratic regime is consolidated when a strong majority of public opinion holds the belief that democratic procedures and institutions are the most appropriate way to govern collective life in a society such as theirs and when the support for antisystem alternatives is quite small or more or less isolated from the pro-democratic forces.
Constitutionally, a democratic regime is consolidated when governmental and nongovernmental forces alike, throughout the territory of the state, become subjected to, and habituated to, the resolution of conflict within the specific laws, procedures, and institutions sanctioned by the new democratic process.’
(Linz and Stepan 1996: 6)