Book Reviews 193 

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Islam and Democracy: The Failure of 

Dialogue in Algeria 

Frederic Volpi 

London: Pluto Press, 2003. 168 pages. 

In all of the Middle East and North Africa, Algeria was the first country 
to be infected by the wind of democratization that swept the developing 
world in the 1980s and 1990s. The country became a political laboratory 
for the rest of the Arab world, as liberalization opened spaces for moder­
ate and radical Islamic groups to contest elections. Unfortunately, these 
elections quickly descended into a long drawn-out and brutal war with the