Winston Churchill’s bon mot comes to mind: "Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time…" (From a speech in the House of Commons on 11 November 1947.)

I have identified a few articles:

Casanova, P. G. (2009). Negotiated contradictions. Socialist Register, 38(38).

Xu, B. (2001). Chinese populist nationalism: Its intellectual politics and moral dilemma. Representations, 76(1), 120-140.

Glaser, D. (1991). Post‐apartheid democracy: a rejoinder to Patrick Fitzgerald.

Kurki, M. (2013). Democratic futures: revisioning democracy promotion. Routledge.

Stern, B. J. (1941). Alternative Proposals to Democracy: The Pattern of Fascism. Journal of Negro Education, 368-379.

I am thankful for your kind answer, work by Stern is known to me while few articles are really good in the contemporary political scenario,

@Arthur So

I have included the older and the most recent ones for your comparison.  Enjoy your reading.  

Based on historical evidence, there are plenty of alternatives. Populism, technocracy, monarchy, etc... You may want to narrow down your question. As a starting point, the page on Wikipedia "Forms of Government" lists many categories and subcategories. You might want to start from there.

Also, to put things into a larger perspective, you can look at the classifications of polities in ancient philosophy (Plato in "The Republic" lists 5 types of regimes, Aristotle in "Politics" lists in 6 regimes, 3 bad and 3 corresponding good ones, Cicero has its own categorizations).

In regards to the debate of the decline of democracy, you can look at three papers:

"The Signs of Deconsolidation", by Roberto Stefan Foa and Yascha Mounk in the Journal of Democracy (January 2017)

"The Crisis of Party Democracy, Cognitive Mobilization, and the Case

for Making Parties More Deliberative", by Carlo Invernizzi-Accetti and Fabio Wolkenstein in the American Political Science Review (2017)

"Will vs. Reason: The Populist and Technocratic Forms of Political

Representation and Their Critique to Party Government", by Daniele Carmani, in the American Political Science Review (2017)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forms_of_government

Winston Churchill’s bon mot comes to mind: "Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time…" (From a speech in the House of Commons on 11 November 1947.)

No matter how you call it, a system of checks and balances is likely to ensure inclusive and deliberative political system. Taking into account particular political cultures is necessary with regard to space and time. In other words, each population and each generation is called to negotiate and renegotiate these checks and balances.

Democratic ebb was occasioned as a result of global decline in the basic functional  principles of democracy which made it ''government of the people by the people  and for the people'', in common narrative. Any alternative to democracy must to a varying degree contain the qualities of democracy such as respect for fundamental human rights, accountable and transparent governance, citizens' participation, strong institutions and rule of law among others.

socialism

I think Daniel Bell's book, THE CHINA MODEL, has a very interesting critique of democracy and a very provocative of the meritocratic model as practiced in China and Singapore, including cogent critiques of the Chinese model. I don't ultimately agree with Bell, but find the book extremely interesting.