This paper distinguishes between nomological and historical explanations of democracy. The former searches for the general conditions under which democracies emerge (modernization theory is the most accomplished example). The latter asks about the historical origins of democracy and its expansion. It is argued that representative democracy was born at the end of 18th century in the West because this was the region of the world with higher levels of individualism, assuming a tight affinity between the values of individualism and democracy (equality and freedom).

Dr Layli Uddin joined the School of Politics and IR at QMUL as Leverhulme Early Career Fellow, and Lecturer in Politics and International Relations of South Asia, in September 2021. She is a political and social historian of modern South Asia, bringing together interdisciplinary questions on religion, class and mass politics. Her research reconstructs subaltern political thought and movements in the context of decolonisation, state-formation and the Cold War. Her broader interests are in liberation theologies and subaltern geopolitics in the Global South.

*Historian and former RAI Visiting Fellow Tamson Pietsch will present and discuss her new book, _The Floating University_ (Chicago UP, forthcoming May 2023)*

Abstract