Summary ,— The article theoretically examines contemporary liberal democracy, focusing on the current dealing with the modern democratic idea that starts with the work of J.J. Rousseau. Although political democracy stems from the two democratic traditions, following the democratic revolutions in America and France, the democratic idea still involves the principle of government by the people. In the twentieth century, democracies embody another principle from the classical liberal tradition: the concept of limited government. Therefore, contemporary liberal democracies are the historical outcomes of this cultural synthesis.

In the European-continental model of democracy (based on the French revolutionary tradition) political institutions hardly embodied the liberal principle, which stresses the separation of power versus the majority principle (nowadays expressed by the preminency of Parliaments).

This paper analyzes over three sections the current relationship between democracy and liberalism, by focusing mainly on liberty, political power, and the political community.

At the end of the twentieth century the great compromise seems not to work as well as it did at the beginning. Furthermore, the democratic idea itself seems to lose its idealistic appeal. Democracy suffers internally from a segmented society and externally from a new global scenario involving the crisis of the nation-state.

These two developments challenge liberal democracy, which thus faces open criticism. In comparison with democracy, liberalism seems to be strong enough in the new context given that it can reshape the traditional holistic dimension of politics and lead a much more individualistic yet uncertain future.