The Myth of Civil Society: Social Capital and Democratic Consolidation in Spain and Brazil. By Omar G. Encarnación. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003. 244p. $55.00.

When a Google search for “civil society promotion” turns up 847,000 potentially relevant links, it is time for a provocative book like this one. Omar Encarnación takes on the prevailing wisdom that “a strong civil society lies behind successful democracies while a weak civil society is the root of failed or flawed democracies” (p. 3), arguing not only that strong civil societies fail to ensure democratic consolidation but also that democracies can be successfully consolidated without any civil society to speak of. Indeed, “a flourishing civil society can actually be a hindrance to democratization” (p. 5). Encarnación is not the only scholar to raise doubts about the efficacy of civil society to promote a host of social benefits, but he is one of the few to do so in the context of the newly democratizing nations, where civil society promotion has perhaps the most currency today.