I mean, democracy was conceptualized and began in what is now present day Greece back in Ancient times (when most nations were still ruled by monarchies) and the fact that the original nations who had democratic values are the UK or France (as they were real countries whom existed before the USA even became a country of its own).
I think the biggest difference is that many european states have parliamentary democracies vs. the US’ presidential democracy.
This, combined with proportional representation voting systems, that more accurately represent the will of the populace in parliament, leads to a need for governmental coalition building, necessitating a more concilliatory and a little more non-partisan politics. While usually allowing for a more effective government, since the head of government represents a legislative majority.
It does have its own challenges and is far from perfect, but I think the current US government is a fitting contrast of a minority elected, non-concilliatory, highly partisan government that might become completely and utterly unable to do any governing by the midterms.
The US is also a good example that the age of a democratic system doesn’t mean it’s a good system. In fact I far prefer the very young post-WW2 german system to the very old american or british systems, though it could stand to learn some from the nordics, especially Finlands open list voting system.