Democracy in Latin America: Political Change in Comparative Perspective. By Peter H. Smith. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. 380p. $74.00 cloth, $28.95 paper.

Peter Smith set out to write a textbook and ended up compiling an original database of Latin American democracy from 1900 to 2000. Analyzing a century of democratic change, Smith has written an impressive book that is accessible to undergraduates, a great literature review for graduate students, instructive for policymakers, and a significant contribution to scholarly understanding of a complex phenomenon. All of this is done with a lively and jargon-free writing style.