PEACEW RKS

DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS

the ingredients of successful revolts

Ray Salvatore Jennings

[ [
Cover photos: iStock.

The views expressed in this report are 

those of the author alone. They do not 

necessarily reflect the views of the 

United States Institute of Peace.

United States Institute of Peace

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Washington, DC 20037

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Peaceworks No. 81. First published 2012.

© 2012 by the United States Institute of 

Peace

About the Report

This study, funded by a grant from the United States Institute 

of Peace and hosted by Stanford University’s Center on 

Development, Democracy and the Rule of Law (CDDRL), 

examines fifteen instances of democratic breakthrough. 

Eleven of these breakthroughs were considered successful, 

and four failed. This comparative review of breakthroughs 

is part of a larger effort by the CDDRL that examines four 

types of democratic change, including political liberalization, 

democratic consolidation, postconflict democratic development, and democratic breakthroughs. This project will result 

in four volumes, one for each type of democratic change, 

and each volume will contain approximately eight to fifteen 

case studies of success and failure. An initial volume of 

breakthrough case studies is due out in 2012. In the course of 

preparing this study, Arab Spring revolutions began unfolding 

throughout the Middle East and North Africa, prompting an 

unexpected—but welcome—chance to evaluate the value of 

the case study findings against a new set of breakthroughs in 

progress. This report reflects the iterative process of not only 

looking to breakthrough attempts of the past, but also toward 

the future of revolutions that have just begun throughout the 

Arab world.

About the Author

Ray Salvatore Jennings’ twenty-five years of operational 

and academic work on conflict and democratic change 

includes country director posts and field missions with 

the United States Institute of Peace (USIP), the United 

Nations, United States Agency for International Development, and the World Bank in over thirty-five countries. 

He has served on the faculty of Georgetown and Syracuse Universities, as a senior fellow with USIP in 2002–04 

and the Wilson Center in 2006–07, and as a visiting 

researcher at Stanford University in 2008–09. His current 

fieldwork and writing focuses on community-based 

democracy promotion strategies and social accountability 

mechanisms in the Middle East, North Africa, and Asia.
PEACEWORKS • AUGUST 2012 • NO. 81

CONTENTS

[Ten domestic 

influences were found 

to be common to 

each of the successful 

cases of democratic 

breakthrough.]

Introduction ... 4

Domestic Influences ... 6

Ten Conditions for Successful Breakthrough ... 8

Domestic Factors and Failed Breakthroughs ... 13

External Influences ... 15

External Factors and Failed Breakthroughs ... 21

Balance of Domestic and External Variables ... 24

Implications for Policy and Field Practice ... 27

Democratic Breakthroughs: 

The Right Moment in the Middle East and North Africa? ... 37

3

DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

Summary

■ The cases of successful breakthrough examined in this study are the Soviet Union in 

1991 and Russia in 1993, Poland in 1989, Serbia in 2000, Ukraine in 2004, Indonesia by 

1999, Chile in 1988, and South Africa by 1996. Cases of failed and then ultimately 

successful democratic transition are Ghana by 2000, Mexico by 2000, South Korea by 

1987, and Turkey by 1983. Finally, the cases of failed transition examined are Algeria in 

1991, Iran in 1979, China in 1989, and Azerbaijan in 2005. 

■ Ten domestic influences were found to be common to each of the successful cases of 

democratic breakthrough examined in this study, including incremental reform victories 

preceding breakthrough attempts, the presence of coherent oppositions, economic distress and poor service delivery, rising expectations and increasing levels of literacy and 

education, mass mobilization, a growing influence of civic actors, preservation of independent information flows, reform offers by regimes that only embolden oppositions, 

robust “get out the vote” and “protect the vote” efforts, and breakthroughs that are 

largely free from violence.

■ Seven types of external influence were identified as influential, including passive factors, 

such as economic shocks, diffusion, and the influence of norms and ideas; and active 

factors, such as direct democracy aid, diplomatic influence, economic influence, and 

reputational influence.

■ Even though all of these domestic factors and most of the external ones featured in every 

successful case of breakthrough, the impact of these precipitants varied in influence from 

case to case. 

■ Moreover, the balance of influences ranged considerably. For example, in South Africa, 

external variables such as diplomatic and economic pressure, democratic socialization, 

and direct democracy assistance were critical in pressing the regime toward a pacted 

solution, whereas in Turkey, breakthrough was driven almost entirely by domestic 

considerations. 

■ Contributing to the peaceful conduct of breakthroughs is in the interests of the conflict 

resolution community as much as it serves as an important objective of democracy 

promotion.

■ Implications for democratization policy include the need to identify a breakthrough paradigm to avoid diffuse, poorly coordinated, and sometimes counterproductive external 

assistance efforts; the importance of providing long-term and fast-track democracy 

assistance; and the importance of preserving free information flows, especially in states 

with breakthrough potential.

■ Implications for democracy assistance in the field include recognizing the importance of 

preconditions and sociopolitical context, not overlooking “irregular communities” of 

dissent, and being willing to utilize liberation methodologies in conjunction with liberation 

technologies as required.

■ Applying the criteria, the countries with the best prospects for successfully completing 

democratic breakthrough among current Arab Spring revolts are Tunisia and Egypt, 

with democratic movement, if not breakthrough, possible in Yemen. Libya also holds the 

potential for completing breakthrough, but the challenges are formidable. 

■ Important reforms are likely in Morocco and Jordan, where King Abdullah II has 

become more vulnerable to pressure for political reforms in recent months, and Bahrain 

may yet host additional democratic reforms in the coming year. 
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PEACEWORKS 81

■ Little progress is likely in Saudi Arabia, Iran, or Algeria, and Syria continues to be 

convulsed by violence with few prospects for stability in the near future, leaving the 

region a mix of success stories, flawed democracies, hybrid regimes, and retrenched 

autocracies.

Introduction

Years ago I sat on a lawn among an audience that came to listen to the Dalai Lama speak at 

Middlebury College in Vermont. At one point, he paused, looked up to the darkening sky 

and clapped his hands. It began to rain. “It is no trick. You just wait for the right moment.” 

He smiled. Seeing the recent revolts unfold in North Africa and the Middle East reminded 

me of the problem of understanding “the right moment.” What was it that triggered the apparently spontaneous revolts removing President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in Tunisia and 

Hosni Mubarak in Egypt? Wikileaks revelations? The sacrifice of a desperate street vendor, 

Mohamed Bouazizi, in Tunisia? And what circumstances have, thus far, sustained these and 

other unfinished revolutions while igniting others? 

Although these uprisings and their fallout have surprised democracy proponents and autocrats alike, the conditions provoking unrest in Tunisia, Egypt, and elsewhere have been present for decades. In Egypt, an important precursor to recent events could be seen in the 2008 

Malhalla textile strike, when the April 6 Youth Movement first took to the streets. That same 

year, hundreds of job applicants demonstrated in Redeyef, Tunisia, over rigged hiring practices 

at a local phosphate plant. Poor governance, hard-line repression, pervasive corruption, the 

condescension of an elite class, and collisions of rising expectations with worsening economic 

prospects have sustained discontent in each country for years. These conditions are common 

across the Arab world. They are the region’s storm clouds. 

Rapid, broad, and often violent repudiation of the status quo has taken place in Tunisia, 

Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Syria, and Bahrain. Tremors from these uprisings have unnerved autocrats 

and mobilized dissent from Morocco to Iran. But growing frustration and popular mobilization are not necessarily enough to erase autocracy or inaugurate democracy. To date, only the 

breakthrough attempts in Tunisia and Egypt have culminated in postrevolt elections. The political course of postauthoritarian Libya is still undefined. A referendum more than an election 

has launched a new president in fractious Yemen, and conditions in Syria continue to worsen—

approximately 9,000 have died and nearly half a million have been displaced inside and across 

Syria’s borders. After a remarkable year of political change in the region, it is still unclear 

whether these revolts are the beginning of a new wave of democratization, dress rehearsals for 

later more potent uprisings, or a warning for surviving regimes to repress dissent with ever 

greater force. Will this be the “right moment” for successful democratic breakthroughs in 

North Africa and the Middle East?

Data from other instances of democratic revolution may provide insight into what characterizes “the right moment,” or set of circumstances favoring the collapse of autocratic regimes. 

In 2010, Stanford University’s Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law 

(CDDRL) conducted a study of attempts at rapid democratic transition, also called democratic 

breakthroughs.1 Fifteen cases of successful and failed transitional moments form the basis of an 

examination into the question of what kinds of international and domestic factors best bring 

about rapid democratic change. Among the cases of successful breakthrough studied were the 

Soviet Union in 1991 and Russia in 1993, Poland in 1989, Serbia in 2000, Ukraine in 2004, 

Indonesia by 1999, Chile in 1988, and South Africa by 1996. Cases of failed and then ulti-
5

DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

mately successful democratic transition studied were Ghana by 2000, Mexico by 2000, South 

Korea by 1987, and Turkey by 1983. Finally, the cases of failed transition examined in the 

CDDRL study were Algeria in 1991, Iran in 1979, China in 1989, and Azerbaijan in 2005.2

I am indebted to CDDRL for access to these case studies and to the authors of each country 

study for their original insights and commitment to detail. This comparative synthesis would 

not be possible without their efforts.

The threshold defining democratic breakthrough in the context of these case studies is the 

removal of an autocratic regime and the establishment of a system for free and fair multiparty 

general elections. It is a minimalist and conventional conception of democratic achievement, 

and it is a precondition for additional democratic development. Among Arab Spring revolts, 

only Tunisia and Egypt are close to accomplishing breakthrough. Either the old regime has 

not been swept away, as in Egypt, or interim bodies have yet to schedule general elections for a 

full-fledged government, as in Tunisia. A breakthrough is simply the first stage of democratic 

transition in many countries, and it is often the most difficult and dramatic step at that, with 

no guarantee of avoiding a resurgence of tyranny. 

A useful definition of democracy, as opposed to democratic breakthrough, is Larry Diamond 

and Leonardo Morlino’s typology of the quality of democracy that describes five dimensions of 

democratic political systems: the rule of law, participation, competition, vertical accountability, 

and horizontal accountability.3 Transitioning from autocracy to electoral democracy registers 

a political system on Diamond and Morlino’s democratic spectrum but does not imply the 

system is a consolidated participatory polity with the rights and freedoms more established 

democracies take for granted. 

To be clear, the CDDRL study and this analysis only examine cases of democratic breakthrough. This is only one type of democratic change. There are at least three other types of 

democratic development, including democratic consolidation (a stage of democratic transition 

following successful breakthroughs), postconflict democratization (the creation of democratic 

institutions after war has collapsed a regime or created a new state), and democratic liberalization (a slower process by which an authoritarian state becomes democratic—think Brazil). 

These are worthwhile distinctions. Democratic consolidation, for instance, is exceedingly 

hard work. Russia, Serbia, Ukraine, and Indonesia are cited in the CDDRL study as successful cases of democratic breakthrough, but each has stalled and even shifted into reverse 

during their subsequent democratic consolidation phase. As useful as it might be, identifying the conditions and variables that characterize successful democratic consolidations 

in addition to democratic breakthroughs is beyond the scope of the CDDRL study and 

this analysis.

Most previous studies of rapid democratic transition have focused on uniquely American 

contributions to democratic breakthroughs, have been geographically narrow in scope, or 

have focused solely on socioeconomic determinants of political change, the role of elites, or 

only domestic or international influence. For instance, even in a remarkably developed field 

where authors such as Thomas Carothers, Laurence Whitehead, Richard Youngs, and Francis 

Fukuyama have convincingly described the influence of international variables on democratization, far less consideration is given to internal factors, and even less to the interaction 

of external and internal variables.4 And in the literature that does attend to internal factors, 

such as the seminal work of Guillermo O’Donnell and Phillipe Schmitter, Carles Boix and 

Susan Stokes, Stephan Haggard and Robert Kaufman, and Larry Diamond, among others, 

the focus is on the role of elites, civic actors, or socioeconomic factors.5 Again, there is little 

Democratic breakthrough 

is a minimalist and 

conventional conception 

of democratic 

achievement, and it 

is a precondition for 

additional democratic 

development. 
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discussion of the interaction of external and internal variables and the number of internal factors examined is typically small.6

Additionally, earlier analyses have often shied away from blending the perspectives of academics, policymakers, and field practitioners on such questions. If anything, a review of the 

literature in both camps reveals a disconcerting breach between each community. Moreover, 

many studies, such as those by Thomas Carothers, Tony Smith, and Michael Cox, John Ikenberry, and Takashi Inoguchi, focus on the influence of one country, typically the United States.7

The CDDRL’s review of democratic breakthroughs and this comparative analysis advances 

existing literature on the topic by addressing these shortcomings. Among the strengths of the 

CDDRL’s examination of these cases are the practitioner and academic credentials that the 

authors bring to their analyses and their comprehensive treatment of the internal and external 

variables influencing attempts at democratic breakthrough. 

In the following sections, instances of both successful and failed breakthrough attempts 

will be examined for a comparative sense of the domestic conditions and international influences that facilitate, and in some cases undermine, breakthrough attempts. This is not a statistical study in which regression analysis is applied to isolate causal factors. It is an interpretative 

analysis of a set of country case studies. And although important commonalities were identified among these case studies, this analysis does not suggest that these conditions and influences constitute an iron rule of breakthroughs. An excellent next step would be to apply these 

findings to instances such as the Philippines, Georgia, Malaysia, Haiti, Kyrgyzstan, Lebanon, 

or East Germany—but this task rests with other researchers of the topic. This analysis will, 

however, apply the findings from this case study analysis to revolts in the Middle East and 

North Africa to see how well these commonalities pertain in that context.

Domestic Influences 

Rarely do domestic factors alone create conditions that bring about successful regime change. 

International variables such as commodity price shocks, diplomatic and economic sanctions, 

direct democracy assistance, norms of democratic conduct, and diffusionary influences from 

other revolutions often combine with domestic variables to create circumstances that are conducive to breakthrough. However, in each instance of successful regime change among these 

case studies, the necessary ingredients were indeed domestic. In no case were external influences enough, on their own, to induce and accomplish successful breakthrough.

For example, throughout the 1990s, foreign donors and private foundations provided increasing amounts of democracy assistance to opposition forces in Serbia that crescendoed in a 

1999–2000 push to remove the autocrat Slobodan Milosevic. It was a remarkably coordinated 

campaign that proceeded in lockstep with diplomatic and economic sanctions against a leader 

who had become an international pariah and the subject of NATO’s first combat operation in 

fifty years of existence. Ultimately, however, the success of the breakthrough depended on the 

unification of the domestic opposition, the emergence of an iconic opposition leader, the creative and determined use of free media by local actors, splits in the country’s security forces, and 

the inventive mobilization tactics of a youth-based resistance movement and hundreds of civic 

groups. It was much the same in Ukraine. Russia’s breakthrough from 1991 to 1993 was driven 

to an even greater degree by many of the same internal forces. Among the case studies of successful breakthrough examined in the CDDRL study, only South Africa and perhaps Ghana could 

be said to be significantly more dependent on international influence than on domestic factors. 

In no case were external 

influences enough, on 

their own, to induce and 

accomplish successful 

breakthrough.
7

DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

The interplay of external factors with domestic actors matters, but what are these critical 

domestic variables? Ten domestic factors are common among successful instances of breakthrough. They are also, interestingly, nearly all present in two of the four instances of failed 

transition. In Algeria, nearly all domestic factors were present, with the compelling exceptions of a coherent opposition and violent military intervention that returned the country 

to authoritarian rule. In Iran, one important missing factor was consensus among a unified 

opposition on post-autocracy rules of the game. After Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi was 

removed from power in 1979, Islamist elements neutralized the democratic ambitions of the 

larger movement, replacing one authoritarian regime with another. It was also the case that 

violence characterized the period before and after the departure of the Shah. More on these 

failed cases later.

The ten conditions found in successful breakthroughs were as follows: 

1. Important reforms or small electoral victories for opposition forces preceded successful 

regime change, giving anti-autocratic forces valuable platforms and footholds to organize additional effort.

2. In successful breakthroughs the political opposition managed to unify around a singular 

agenda or iconic figure, illustrating the power of individual agency and coordinated 

effort in breakthrough moments.

3. Societies in which regime change occurred experienced economic crises and chronically 

poor service delivery prior to breakthrough that collided with the fourth feature found 

in successful transition venues. 

4. Rising expectations from increasing levels of literacy and education prior to breakthrough, which when paired with poor economic performance typically resulted in 

unrest.

5. Effective mass mobilization by opposition forces attracted large numbers of citizens 

from diverse economic pursuits, social classes, and generational cohorts to the breakthrough effort.

6. The influence and capacities of civil society organizations increased in the years preceding breakthroughs, typically making significant contributions to democracy discourse 

and mass mobilization efforts.

7. In each successful transition venue, the opposition’s inventive use of free media outmaneuvered government attempts to control information flows. 

8. Autocrats who made concessions to opposition forces in the midst of revolts were often 

perceived as being vulnerable or weak, more often than not engendering greater ferocity 

and fearlessness in subsequent protests. 

9. In each instance of democratic transition, get out the vote initiatives and efforts to protect and independently tally election results proved critical to the integrity of key 

elections. 

10. In each instance of successful breakthrough, the transition of power passed in a relatively 

nonviolent manner due to wavering loyalty among security forces, a negotiated exit for 

the authoritarian leader or a decision by an autocrat to avoid violent repression. 

There is a natural temptation to rank these domestic criteria in order of importance and 

influence. However, this would imply that certain variables among the ten cited had a consis-
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PEACEWORKS 81

tent degree of influence across all instances. This is not the case. Each of the societies examined 

among the case studies were unique and complex systems. These ten variables were present in 

each instance and together contributed to successful breakthrough (see table 1), but these factors 

often varied in influence from case to case. For example, a united opposition proved to be critical 

in the majority of cases, with Turkey, South Korea, and Mexico being notable exceptions, 

where it was an important variable but less so than other factors, such as the relative lack of 

violence at breakthrough, the influence of civil society, and mobilization to protect the vote. 

The absence of a severe crackdown or street violence was a key variable in many instances 

except in South Africa, Poland, and Chile, where regimes chose pacted or other solutions. 

In these three countries, it could be argued, for instance, that a unified opposition proved to 

be more important. 

Additional examples of how these variables exerted varying degrees of influence among the 

case studies follow, as does a treatment of domestic factors in failed cases of transition.

Ten Conditions for Successful Breakthrough

Small Victories Precede Big Ones

In Russia, Boris Yeltsin’s legislative victory in 1989 and later election as leader of a democratic 

bloc in the Russian Congress of People’s Deputies positioned him and the opposition for influencing breakthrough events in 1993. In Serbia, Ukraine, and Poland, political and economic 

reforms as well as electoral victories in legislative and municipal elections created islands of 

Table 1. Common Domestic Variables 

Soviet Union (SU); Poland (P); Serbia (S); Ukraine (U); Indonesia (In); South Africa (SA); Chile (C); Ghana (G); Mexico (M); 

South Korea (SK); Turkey (T); Algeria (A); Iran (Ir); China (Ch); Azerbaijan (Az)

* In many cases, security forces used violence on protestors during events that preceded the final breakthrough push. In 

the successful cases noted, however, security forces did not shoot protestors at critical moments in the transition period. 

Successful Breakthroughs

Domestic Variables at the Time of 

Breakthrough Attempt

Failed 

Attempts

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(In)(SA)(C)(G)(M)(SK)(T) Incremental victories precede breakthrough effort(Ir)(A)

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(In)(SA)(C)(G)(M)(SK)(T) Unified/coherent opposition

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(In)(SA)(C)(G)(M)(SK)(T) Economic distress and poor service 

delivery

(A)(Ir)(Ch)

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(In)(SA)(C)(G)(M)(SK)(T) Rising expectations, increasing education 

& literacy

(A)(Ir)(Ch)(AZ)

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(In)(SA)(C)(G)(M)(SK)(T) Mass mobilization and/or defections from 

ruling party

(Ir)(Ch)(A)

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(In)(SA)(C)(G)(M)(SK)(T) Growing influence and capacity of civic 

organizations

(Ir)(Az)(A)

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(In)(SA)(C)(G)(M)(SK)(T) Maintenance of independent information 

flows

(Ir)(A)

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(In)(SA)(C)(G)(M)(SK)(T) Reforms/concessions embolden 

opposition

(A)(Ir)(Ch)

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(In)(SA)(C)(G)(M)(SK)(T) Sizeable “get out the vote” & “protect 

the vote” effort

(A)(Az)

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(In)(SA)(C)(G)(M)(SK)(T) Breakthrough is largely free from 

violence* 
9

DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

support from which to launch later initiatives. In 1983, protests over economic conditions 

forced Augusto Pinochet of Chile to introduce reforms that eventually ensured his opposition 

would grow in strength and numbers until his removal from power in 1988. Reforms enacted 

after unrest in the early 1990s also played an important role in Suharto’s downfall in Indonesia. 

United, Oppositions Stood; Divided, They Often Fell

After more than a decade of contentious relations, Chile’s two main opposition groups formed 

a coalition in 1983 to challenge Pinochet, marking a critical milestone in that country’s eventual transition to democracy. In Chile, as in Serbia and Ukraine, this union of opposition forces 

became an important achievement that attracted foreign aid and domestic credibility as a political alternative capable of postregime governance. In Ghana, opposition forces rallied behind 

the New Patriotic Party (NPP) in 2000 to dislodge Jerry John Rawlings after disunity and a 

lack of consensus on electoral rules helped undermine a similar attempt in 1992. In Poland, it 

was the aptly named Solidarity movement that consolidated dissent ahead of a pacted transition. In South Africa, the African National Congress (ANC) emerged as the counterweight 

to the apartheid regime. South Korea is the one case where an argument can be made that 

the opposition was not unified, and this cost it the 1987 election. However, the platform and 

democratic orientation of both South Korean opposition parties was very similar, as was their 

general consensus on postregime governance. As such, the opposition was coherent, but it was 

not unified under a single figure and thus the opposition vote was split. It wasn’t until 1992 that 

an opposition figure won the presidency. 

In many successful cases, unified oppositions eventually elevated figures such as South 

Africa’s Nelson Mandela, Serbia’s Vojislav Kostunica, Ukraine’s Victor Yushchenko, Poland’s 

Lech Walesa, and Ghana’s John Agyekum Kufuor. Two of these figures helped facilitate the 

only instances of pacting among these case studies: Nelson Mandela negotiated with F. W. de 

Klerk to ultimately create South Africa’s Interim Constitution in June 1993, and Lech Walesa 

negotiated with a trio of proregime parties to outline Poland’s future democratic institutions. 

Economic Decline and Poor Service Delivery

A recent Pew Global Poll in Egypt revealed Egyptians’ top four reasons for the uprising were 

poor economic conditions, corruption, unemployment, and poor access to services such as 

electricity and water. By comparison, only 4 percent of the population cited reasons such as 

the regime was “not Islamic enough” or the government was “too connected to the United 

States.”8 Clearly, as in the CDDRL cases, economic considerations played a significant role 

in ousting Mubarak. In every instance of breakthrough among the case studies, economic 

distress and inequities in service delivery contextualized the transition. In Mexico, long-term 

economic decline leading up to the 2000 breakthrough elections was punctuated with numerous shocks, including the 1996–97 economic crisis resulting from the devaluation of the peso. 

Russia, Ukraine, Serbia, and Poland each experienced inflation, a frustrating lack of access 

to consumer goods, rising unemployment, and either chronically poor or declining levels of 

public service delivery in the years prior to breakthrough. Thirty years of growth in Indonesia 

ended with an 18 percent contraction in GDP during the Asian financial crisis of 1997–98, 

which contributed to unrest, splits among regime elites, and Suharto’s resignation in 1998.9

Oil price shocks in 1979 drove the South Korean economy into a deep recession that fueled 

demonstrations, created rifts among regime elites, and inspired a nascent civic movement 

In every instance of 

breakthrough, economic 

distress and inequities 

in service delivery 

contextualized the 

transition. 
10

PEACEWORKS 81

to mobilize against the regime. Although the opposition’s attempt at breakthrough failed in 

1980, the lessons the South Korean resistance movement learned from the period had a direct 

bearing on regime collapse in 1987. 

Crises of Rising Expectations

Some of the vigor of protests over economic conditions originated with improvements in 

literacy and education level, growing awareness of Western consumer culture and with rising 

numbers of citizens joining the ranks of the middle class. In Serbia, Russia, Ukraine, and 

Poland, demonstrators feared that the world was simply passing them by. Hyperinflation in 

Serbia, for example, stood at 100 percent in 1998, even while unemployment increased to 32 

percent and real salaries declined by 38 percent, leading Serbs to lament that even Bulgaria, 

their perpetual inferior, was better off than they were now.10 An economic crisis in 1979 created status panic among upwardly mobile South Koreans, helping a broad-based, nascent 

opposition materialize and eventually displace their autocrat. After a multiyear economic 

boom, the Latin American debt crisis of 1982 contributed to 20 percent unemployment and 

a 14 percent decline in GDP in Chile. Faith in Pinochet’s economic model was shaken and 

subsequent unrest forced the authoritarian on a course of economic and political liberalization that would be his undoing. Capital flight from South Africa polarized politics in the 

1980s, splitting the Afrikaner regime and business community into hard-line and reformist 

wings with the latter advocating accommodation with the ANC as a way to return to economic growth. 

Safety and Success in Numbers: Mass Mobilization

In Indonesia, South Korea, Chile, South Africa, Serbia, Ukraine, and Poland, attracting large 

numbers of citizens from diverse backgrounds to the resistance effort proved to be a key ingredient to success. Broad public support was important for mass street protests and strikes 

to be effective in splintering solidarity among regime elites, in the success of pacting negotiations, in convincing security forces to refrain from shooting demonstrators, and in the success 

of calls for multiparty elections and electoral victories. In Ghana, Mexico, and Turkey, places 

where regimes introduced (or reintroduced) multiparty competition, mass mobilization was 

vital in rallying support behind candidates that challenged regime proxies and in ensuring that 

regimes did not renege on promises to respect electoral outcomes.

Contributions from Emergent Civil Society

In each successful case of transition, an existing or emergent civic sector matured into an effective element of the political resistance in the period preceding breakthrough. After suffering 

the consequences of breakthrough failure in 1979, civil society groups in South Korea overcame their fragmentation to organize into networked umbrella organizations, or chaeya, to help 

force the regime to permit direct presidential elections by 1987. In Ukraine and Serbia, civil 

society groups finally overcame their internal divisions to form broad and effective coalitions 

ahead of breakthrough elections. By 1997, civic groups in Mexico had grown from incipient 

movements to professional organizations that played an especially critical role in election observation. The ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) lost control of the legislature in 

fair elections that year and would lose the presidency in closely watched polls in 2000. In Chile, 

In each successful case 

of transition, an existing 

or emergent civic sector 

matured into an effective 

element of the political 

resistance in the period 

preceding breakthrough.
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DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

existing think tanks matured from academic institutions into key elements of the political 

opposition, filling the gap left by human rights groups, universities, and advocacy organizations that struggled under regime oppression. 

Free Media

Another striking feature of successful breakthroughs is the role played by free information 

flows in exposing corruption, informing domestic and international publics, and in organizing 

dissent. Russia’s strong samizdat tradition helped mobilize democratization discourse leading 

up to 1993. That year, a newly independent press helped Yeltsin consolidate that country’s 

breakthrough—although many outlets were not models of journalistic integrity. By 1989 in 

Poland, pamphlets, faxes, shared audio and video recordings, and even theater productions 

helped unify and mobilize dissent, contributing to reforms and an eventual opposition victory. In Serbia, innovative use of the Internet and satellite technology kept independent radio 

alive, even after the regime forced the closure of nearly all alternative print outlets and terrestrial broadcasters. Ukraine also saw creative use of Internet and private broadcasting. As 

nascent independent print and broadcast media outlets slowly professionalized in Ghana and 

Mexico over their breakthrough periods, each began to expose government corruption with 

investigative reporting and increasingly sophisticated coverage of election preparations. Also 

compelling is the South Korean opposition’s ability to maintain an alternative, informal web 

of communication among its chaeyas and how these networks organized several mass demonstrations in June 1987 using only faxes, illegal pamphleting, and word of mouth. The kinds of 

social media used so effectively by democracy activists in Tunisia and Egypt were not available 

over the period of breakthrough attempts covered in the CDDRL study. 

The Curse of Concessions

In cases of successful transition, autocratic regimes made concessions under pressure, introducing reforms from a position of weakness rather than strength. In doing so, autocrats frequently emboldened their detractors rather than appeased them. After the Chilean regime 

lost its performance legitimacy as the economy weakened, the government embarked on a 

liberalization campaign under duress that marked the start of the transition period in 1983. 

Turkey’s military leaders were under pressure the same year to end their three-year coup and 

reopen the political system with a new constitution and elections. They did so, but rather 

than curry support for their handpicked candidate, the public defected and supported a rival. 

Amnesties in the early 1980s and negotiations with the opposition in 1989 drove increasing 

numbers of Poles to support the Solidarity movement, not the diminished regime. Milosevic’s concessions to his opposition as he fumbled through Serbia’s fraudulent elections and 

their aftermath in 2000 only convinced greater numbers of citizens to march against him. 

The South African regime’s commitment to moderation and consensus seeking with its opposition in 1993 opened the doors for the ANC, helping the movement prevail in the 1994 

elections. Mexico’s electoral reforms, reluctantly enacted after heavy criticism from within the 

country and abroad, drove voters into the arms of PRI rivals. Indonesia’s Suharto recognized 

this “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” dilemma of weakening strongmen, choosing to 

reject the idea of making concessions to his opposition even as the country slipped into chaos. 

As regime solidarity dissolved, rival elites offered concessions that brought even more people 

to the streets, forcing Suharto aside. Democratic reforms followed. 
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Rallying and Protecting the Vote

Efforts to ensure voter turnout and fairness in elections worked hand in hand with mass mobilization initiatives to tip the scales toward successful democratic transition. In Chile, Poland, 

Serbia, and Ukraine, civic groups ensured high turnouts and managed sophisticated systems of 

parallel vote counting. Civic campaigns in Mexico and Ghana organized high turnout in their 

breakthrough elections and undertook elaborate preparations to train poll observers. In Turkey, a 

civic sector that was more unified than the political opposition carried out parallel vote counting 

that confirmed the victory of Turgut Özal, dissuading the military from refusing to recognize 

election results. In South Korea, extraordinary voter turnout and parallel tabulation of the 1985 

polls gave the opposition their first symbolic victory amid election conditions that were biased 

against them. 

Relative Absence of Violence 

Many of the successful cases of democratic breakthrough in the Stanford study describe moments of high drama, in which protestors squared off against security forces or “the guys with 

guns” refused to follow orders to fire on demonstrators. So it was in Indonesia when the commander of the armed forces, General Wiranto, informed Suharto that the military was no 

longer prepared to use violence to quell protests. In Serbia, late-night negotiations between the 

opposition and security elements of the regime convinced the army, police, and paramilitary 

groups protecting Milosevic to stand down or to remain in their barracks the next day. Milosevic fell after hundreds of thousands of protestors surged into the capital twelve hours later. 

In 1991, Boris Yeltsin convinced the military not to fire on civilians and to side with him and 

Russia against coup plotters attempting to preserve the Soviet Union. But it was also the case 

in many of the successful transitions that the regime itself refrained from resorting to violence, 

either out of a sense of diminishing returns or due to self-interest or a pacted retreat from 

power. In a pivotal moment of transition in South Korea, leader Chun Doo Hwan declined 

to order troops to fire on demonstrators in 1987. Chun instead chose to meet the opposition’s 

demands as a result of U.S. pressure and concerns about his legacy and the country’s public 

image. In Chile, Pinochet decided not to use violence against his opponents in 1983 and in 

1988. In 1983, as unrest swelled with the country’s economic crisis, Pinochet chose to liberalize 

instead of cracking down. In 1988, as the normally intransigent general lost a critical plebiscite 

vote that would end his tenure, he again chose to avoid violence and stepped aside. In South 

Africa and Poland, pacted resolutions to standoffs between oppositions and regimes helped 

ensure that the transition of power in those countries remained peaceful. 

Together, these domestic precipitants influenced transitions in ways that appear to be greater 

than the sum of their parts. Generically and in a typical chain of interrelationships, unrest 

resulting from deteriorating economic and social conditions and the frustration of rising expectations creates opportunities for mobilization of dissent by existing or nascent civic and 

political agents (see Poland, South Korea, Indonesia, Ukraine, and Ghana). Unrest builds 

over time, creating pressure on regimes to reform and for contentious political oppositions 

to professionalize and unify (see Serbia and Ukraine, for instance). Reforms often accelerate 

mobilization (Poland, Chile, Serbia, and Ghana, among others) and spur additional growth 

and coordination within the civic sector (Soviet Union, South Korea, and South Africa, for 

example). The opposition becomes more resilient, anticipating regime harassment by preserv-
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DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

ing alternative information flows and preparing to monitor rigged elections (Chile, Serbia, 

Ukraine, South Korea, and Mexico offer compelling illustrations). Regimes, aggravated by 

intensifying opposition, ineffectively crack down (South Korea and Indonesia), call for elections they intend to steal (Serbia and Ukraine), or split under pressure (Mexico and Indonesia), 

with security forces defecting (Serbia, Soviet Union, Ukraine, and South Korea, for instance) 

or reformist elites pushing hard-liners aside (Indonesia, again). Forces like these are at work in 

the cases of successful breakthrough. 

Domestic Factors and Failed Breakthroughs

Algeria

An examination of failed attempts is revealing. Algeria in 1991 had all but two critical variables in evidence: the political opposition was not convincingly unified around the Islamic 

Salvation Front (FIS) and, rather than stand down, the Algerian Army violently intervened 

to reverse the FIS’s electoral gains and roll back political liberalization in the country. Iran in 

1979 had all but three factors: opposition unity, nonviolence, and efforts to ensure voter turnout and fairness. China also saw the army intervene but, in all, had only four of these domestic 

variables. Azerbaijan had three. 

By 1988, Algeria experienced an economic crisis brought about by a fall in world oil prices, 

chronic structural deficits, and rising food prices. As case study author Richard Youngs writes, 

the crisis catalyzed demonstrations that eventually threatened to topple the single party autocracy that had ruled since Algeria’s independence from France in 1962. Prior to the plunge in 

world oil prices in 1988, Algeria’s economy grew at a modest but steady pace. However, with 

98 percent of state revenue dependent on oil rents, the country was particularly vulnerable to 

commodity price shocks. As revenue declined, so did service delivery and the legitimacy of 

the regime. As demonstrations grew, the regime relented. The regime’s concessions animated 

the opposition and opened the political process to civic and political mobilization. By 1990, 

a new political party, the FIS, had become popular and counted several victories in local elections, marginalizing a strong but less attractive democratic opposition. By late 1991, the FIS 

prevailed in the first round of parliamentary elections.

Algeria had political and economic reforms and local election victories that the opposition 

could leverage and economic decline that frustrated citizen’s sense of entitlement. An emergent 

civic sector and newfound political parties took advantage of nascent independent media outlets to mobilize dissent, ensure high voter turnout, and protect the vote. So far, so good. But the 

opposition was largely divided on post-regime governance, with many of the more democratic 

elements of the opposition fearful of the intentions of the popular FIS. By the time the FIS 

had achieved national prominence and threatened to control Parliament, however, the army 

intervened to annul the electoral outcome, cutting short democratic breakthrough. It was an 

intervention that some elements of the secular opposition did not oppose. The opposition’s failure to successfully surge against military intervention stemmed in large part from this disunity. 

The FIS was banned, the majority of political reforms enacted since 1988 were reversed, and a 

civil war ensued that claimed tens of thousands of lives over the next decade.

Iran

Iran shares many of the features of Algeria’s breakthrough attempt. By 1978, inequities in service delivery, flagrant corruption, brutality, and long years of erratic dictatorial modernization 
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practices had angered both a burgeoning underclass and growing numbers of upwardly mobile, 

westernized professionals. The Shah’s worsening illness, flagging international reputation, and 

last-minute attempt at reform all signaled the autocrat’s vulnerability. To make matters worse, 

a dramatic decrease in world oil prices diminished revenue flows for the embattled regime. 

Case study author Abbas Milani writes that opposition to the regime was diverse, ranging 

from the growing ranks of moderate middle-class dissenters that the Shah feared most to a 

growing network of Islamic clergy and institutions that the autocrat left largely intact. The 

country’s military and intelligence apparatuses were thrown into disarray as domestic dissent 

grew. Strikes and demonstrations swelled and overwhelmed the regime’s security forces by 

January 1979. The Shah left Iran that month. Remnants of the royal forces were overtaken by 

guerillas and splinter factions of the armed forces loyal to Ayatollah Khomeini within weeks. 

The regime’s opposition in Iran was profoundly successful in deposing an autocrat. Democratic and Islamist elements of the revolt leveraged long-simmering dissent and new discord 

over the weakening economy. Reforms came too late to do anything but attest that the normally intransigent ruler was mortally weakened. In sheer numbers and breadth, the effectiveness of mass mobilization was compelling. Information flows were robust and well utilized. 

Islamic networks and, to a lesser degree, secular civic groups were instrumental in preparing 

for and organizing resistance. Security forces split, and those that remained loyal to the regime 

were no match for their armed opponents. Yet, though the courage and inventiveness of the 

Shah’s critics was commendable, the opposition was an uneasy collection of forces agreeing on 

the overthrow of the Shah and little else. Irreducible rifts between Islamists and democracy 

proponents openly erupted after regime collapse, but the better-organized and financed cadres 

surrounding Ayatollah Khomeini outmaneuvered and decimated the ranks of the liberal opposition. The breakthrough remained incomplete and the tension between disparate revolutionary camps has come to define the convulsions of Iranian politics ever since.11

China

As author Minxin Pei writes, China presents a different case but has an outcome similar to 

that of Algeria. Over the 1980s, Deng Xiaoping struggled to liberalize the Chinese economy 

within the moribund party apparatus that still controlled the country’s financial sector. Instead 

of steady growth, reforms tended to create a cresting and crashing of the economy as hyperinflation wracked Chinese consumers. By 1989, China’s GDP growth had shrunk to 5.2 percent 

from an average of 14 percent over the decade. Hyperinflation ran at nearly 18 percent. Moreover, a brief foray into political liberalization in 1986 and a price reform package in 1988 both 

failed, contributing to the erosion of trust in the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and to a 

schism within the party between liberal and conservative factions. By 1989, a student-centered 

democracy movement attempted to restage a crushed 1986 rebellion, beginning in Tiananmen 

Square in Beijing and eventually involving several million demonstrators in 132 cities throughout the country. But the attempt at democratic breakthrough failed despite the commitment 

and courage of the demonstrators and their supporters.12

China clearly contained several of the domestic variables that characterize successful rebellions: economic distress, the dashing of rising expectations, mass mobilization during the 

fifty-day political crisis, and attempted reforms that signaled the regime’s weakness rather than 

strength. Critically, however, there were no previous victories to leverage and an absence of 

leadership or common ideological agenda to lend coherence to the demonstrations. Civil society was exceptionally weak, forcing protestors to try to instrumentalize state organs such as 
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DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

union offices and government agencies to help mobilize dissent. Information flows were constrained and ad hoc. In a defining moment, Deng sided with the hard-liners in the CCP and 

authorized the People’s Liberation Army to violently suppress the revolt, killing hundreds and 

ending the historic attempt at breakthrough.13

Azerbaijan

Valerie J. Bunce and Sharon L. Wolchik, authors of the Azerbaijan case study, describe economic conditions in the country that distinguish it from other cases of transition. During 

failed breakthrough elections in 2005, GDP increased by 25 percent and would increase by a 

remarkable 36 percent in 2006 primarily due to foreign investment in Azerbaijan’s oil and gas 

assets. That is not to say that considerable dissatisfaction didn’t exist with the endemic corruption, nepotism, and inequities characterizing opportunities for advancement under the regime. 

However, President Ilham Aliyev’s willingness to use violence against his critics, the loyalty 

of the security forces, clan solidarity, strong patronage networks, and a symbiotic relationship between business and political elites made dissent physically dangerous and economically 

self-destructive. 

Despite this, a weak but unified political opposition did exist in Azerbaijan in 2005, 

as did a civic sector that focused a great deal of effort on observing the semiautocratic 

regime’s periodic elections. There was reasonable access to independent sources of information although not enough media penetration to overcome the government’s information 

monopoly over the broadcast spectrum. The opposition’s ability to attract support and articulate an agenda was also complicated by the presence of pseudo-opposition parties and 

civic groups that were covertly aligned with the government. They proved to be too much 

to overcome. Mass mobilization never truly occurred in the face of the monolithic regime’s 

ability to confuse the public and consolidate its own broad support. Aliyev rigged elections, 

and despite evidence from international and domestic election monitors of election fraud, 

the government claimed victory and proceeded to crack down and fragment the civic and 

political opposition in the postelection period.14

External Influences

In many cases of successful breakthrough, external factors deepened the important contributions of the ten identified domestic conditions. It is also clear that in certain instances, external influence also neutralized domestic momentum for breakthrough. For example, direct 

democracy assistance to Solidarity in Poland contributed to the cohesion and viability of the 

movement, consolidating its leading role within the Polish opposition and Walesa’s ability to 

mobilize workers. In South Africa, economic sanctions, a growing reputational crisis abroad, 

divestment, and diplomatic isolation were important contributors to F. W. de Klerk’s decision 

to free Nelson Mandela, lift the ban on the ANC, and begin negotiations. But a lack of serious 

foreign interest in political change in Azerbaijan, by contrast, kept the amounts of democracy 

aid to that country low ahead of 2005 elections and ensured little censure of the regime after 

fraud was revealed. In another move that helped marginalize Iran’s democratic opposition, 

mixed messages from the United States on the revolution helped Khomeini exploit both annoyance and disdain for the West after the Shah’s demise in 1979. 

In all, at least seven types of external influence can be identified among the CDDRL case 

studies. Three influences can be characterized as passive and four can be considered active 
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(see table 2). Passive influences are those that are not targeted specifically at the breakthrough 

country but impact domestic events regardless. These include economic shocks, the influence 

of norms and ideas, and diffusion. Active influences are those that have direct bearing on, and 

are directed at, the country where the breakthrough attempt is undertaken. Four active external influences identified in these case studies are direct democracy aid, diplomatic influence, 

economic influence, and reputational influence.

As in the previous section on domestic influences, descriptions of each external variable are 

provided along with illustrative examples from successful case studies. This is followed by a separate treatment of failed breakthrough attempts that reviews the role of external factors in those 

instances. A look at the balance of domestic and international influences in each case follows. 

Passive Influences

Economic Shocks

Among passive influences, economic shocks are relatively self-explanatory and refer to dramatic 

fluctuations in global commodity prices, regional debt crises, and the influence that events such 

as the collapse of the Soviet Union have on subsidies and trade relationships. Unlike active 

economic influences on breakthroughs, these passive shocks are generalized events that have 

a broad impact on a region or a group of countries with similar vulnerabilities. Ghana found 

itself more reliant on the West and international financial institutions (IFIs) after the Soviet 

Union dissolved, for example. The Asian financial crisis collapsed the Indonesian economy 

after years of strong growth, escalating calls for political reform. The Latin American debt 

crisis in 1981 and 1982 precipitated a decline of 14 percent in Chile’s GDP, contributing not 

only to unrest but also to consolidation of the opposition and Pinochet’s decision to embark 

on a course of political and economic liberalization. In Turkey, the culmination of externally 

induced economic crises throughout the 1970s precipitated chaotic unrest ending in a publicly 

endorsed military coup. Minimal democracy in the form of tightly controlled elections followed as the military stepped aside three years later. In South Korea, Mexico, and to a lesser 

extent the Soviet Union, oil price shocks created inflation, worsened service delivery, and increased the vulnerability of regimes. 

Table 2. Common External Variables

Successful Breakthroughs External Variables Failed Attempts

Passive

(SU)(In)(C)(G)(M)(SK)(T) economic shocks (Ir)(A)

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(In)(SA)(C)(G)(M)(SK)(T) democratic norms and ideas (Ch)(Az)(Ir)

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(C)(M) diffusion (Az)(Ch)

Active

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(SA)(C)(G)(M) direct democracy assistance (Az)

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(SA)(C)(G)(SK)(T)(M) diplomatic influence (Ir)* (A)*

(SU)(P)(S)(U)(In)(SA)(C)(G)(M)(T) economic influence (Az)* (A)*

(P)(S)(U)(In)(SA)(C)(G)(M) reputational influence (Ir)* (Ch)

Soviet Union (SU); Poland (P); Serbia (S); Ukraine (U); Indonesia (In); South Africa (SA); Chile (C); Ghana (G); Mexico (M); 

South Korea (SK); Turkey (T); Algeria (A); Iran (Ir); China (Ch); Azerbaijan (Az)

* In these instances, the external influence weakened rather than contributed to prospects for breakthrough. 
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DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

Democratic Norms and Ideas

Democratic norms and ideas refer to the role played by liberal democratic principles in breakthroughs—principles such as open elections, constitutionalism, checks and balances, and fundamental rights of assembly and free speech. Normative ideas like these animate democracy 

activists indirectly and are part of a body of generally accepted conventions, standards, and 

practices that have influenced international understandings about legitimate authority since 

1945. Over the last twenty years, the promotion of these ideals has become less the provenance 

of the United States and more generally the work of the United States with Europe, Canada, 

Australia, and Japan. Understandings about electoral democracy and fundamental civic rights 

now enjoy near universal appeal, suggests Mike McFaul. Democratic norms have become 

global “world values.”15 Such ideas currently ricochet throughout the Arab world, driven by 

what Nader Habibi calls “democracy envy,” a force now as powerful as economic discontent in 

Middle Eastern countries.16

Democratic oppositions are not the only ones moved by such influences. Many autocrats 

also feel obliged to maintain small windows of press, assembly, and electoral freedoms in order 

to appear legitimate. In some cases, these small openings in semiautocracies and the latent 

influence of democratic norms function much like a pilot light on a gas stove—available, constant, and waiting for more fuel to increase the heat. 

In the Soviet Union, Western ideas about constitutions, markets, checks and balances, 

and electoral systems were important organizing principles in completing the breakthrough 

in 1993. In Chile and Poland, international norms drove activists in each country to expose 

their regime’s dismal human rights records and constrained their leaders to offer opportunities 

for their public to vote. In Serbia and Ukraine, democratic norms concerning press freedoms, 

freedom of assembly, civic mobilization, and electoral conduct helped give ideological consistency to domestic oppositions and constrain both Leonid Kuchma and Slobodan Milosevic to 

semiautocracy for most of their rule. In South Africa, human rights norms, transitional justice 

models, and Nobel recognition of Desmond Tutu in 1984 and then Mandela and de Klerk in 

1993 lent moral weight to the reconciliation effort. In South Korea, capital flows, a strong U.S. 

military presence, as well as cultural and academic exchanges influenced both leader Chun 

Doo Hwan’s critical relationship with the West and the opposition’s appeals for reform. 

Diffusion

Diffusion is similar to democratic norms and ideas but instead refers to a form of bounded 

emulation. Multiple examples of diffusion can be found among the CDDRL case studies. 

Ukraine’s opposition adopted many of the tactics and strategies used by activists in earlier opposition victories in Serbia and Georgia. Reformers in Serbia learned from activists involved 

in previous electoral revolutions in Slovakia and Croatia. Polish oppositionists were influenced by Mikhail Gorbachev’s political liberalization initiatives in the late 1980s. Democrats 

in the Soviet Union were later inspired by Poland’s reformers during their own subsequent 

breakthrough from 1991 to 1993. Yet another example would be the contributions that Uruguay’s victorious civic opposition made to the Chilean opposition’s success in its plebiscite 

defeating Pinochet. Worth mentioning, even though it falls outside of the CDDRL case 

studies, is how Egypt’s April 6 Youth Movement sought advice from activists that played a 

important role in regime change in Serbia. In a remarkable example of diffusionary influence, 

several Serbian activists have educated democracy reformers in nearly fifty countries through 

their Belgrade-based Center for Applied Nonviolent Action & Strategies (CANVAS) since 
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their own October revolution in 2000. The influence of CANVAS in Egypt, for example, 

could be seen in the icons and tactics used by April 6 organizers.17

As Valerie Bunce and Sharon Wolchik explain, diffusion entails the sharing of “precedents 

that are unusually appealing to actors in other states . . . and when domestic conditions are perceived, either rightly or wrongly, to be similar in the ‘sending’ and ‘receiving’ states.”18 Diffusion 

does not only refer to mimicry among critics of regimes. It can also describe the emulation of 

nondemocratic ideas and practices by autocrats and their security forces. Methods of crowd control, censorship, interrogation, and surveillance are closely observed and often imitated by autocrats that are attuned to the fate of their peers. The best example may be Alexander Lukashenko, 

one of the last surviving autocrats in Europe. Lukashenko has thus far successfully applied the 

lessons-learned from his failed equals in the region by periodically opening and closing political 

space to disarm rivals, cultivating important relationships with the European Union and Russia, 

adopting the latest censorship and surveillance technology from China, and ensuring his beleaguered political opposition remains divided and unappealing to the voting public.19

Active Influences

Direct Democracy Assistance

Among the four active influences identified in these case studies, the role of direct democracy assistance was the easiest to discern. Among the case studies, democracy support included training media professionals and equipping media outlets; building the organizational capacity of 

civic groups; providing technical and financial assistance with “get out the vote” and “protect 

the vote” efforts; working to consolidate political oppositions; funding opinion polling; training 

political leaders and parliamentarians; and providing expertise and resources to support mass 

mobilization initiatives. In the Soviet Union, Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty provided 

news and information programming representing “the voice of the opposition forces” within 

range of its signal.20 In Serbia and Ukraine, technical and financial assistance to civic groups, 

political parties, youth movements, and alternative media outlets expanded their organizational 

and outreach capabilities. Foreign assistance was particularly important in developing the poll 

observation and parallel vote counting systems that helped with the transparency of transformative elections in both countries. In Mexico, external technical and financial assistance 

was also important for the viability of opposition parties, civic groups, and poll observation. 

External democracy assistance was particularly influential in South Africa. Combined with 

other influences mentioned elsewhere in this section, technical and financial support to victims of regime harassment, trade unions, human rights groups, ANC operations, and elections 

systems contributed to the end of the apartheid regime in a way that domestic pressure from 

indigenous civic groups alone could not. 

In Chile, Western democracy assistance facilitated the important rapprochement of Pinochet’s political opposition in 1983 and ensured a variety of think tanks and policy centers 

kept a discourse about the country’s alternative futures alive and well. Ghana benefited from 

significant elections, civil society, media training, and capacity-building assistance, especially 

once Rawlings liberalized and established a schedule of elections. In Indonesia, democracy 

assistance played a very small role in breakthrough, with most assistance having gone to microcredit, health, and small infrastructure development. Most Western aid to the country was 

consciously steered away from “political” projects that might undermine the useful autocrat 

Suharto. It was much the same in Turkey, with the United States, in particular, being careful 
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DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

to avoid antagonizing the military regime. However, moderate amounts of long-term aid to 

human rights and other civic organizations from European sources helped keep pressure on 

the regime to hold elections and to respect their outcome. 

Diplomatic Influence

Diplomatic influence includes the role played by personal relationships between leaders, the 

impact of efforts to politically isolate an autocrat and regime elites, efforts to facilitate negotiations or pacting arrangements, the use of international criminal indictments, and back channel 

or more vocal condemnation of autocratic practices. It may also include efforts to protect an 

autocrat or regime perceived to be a guarantor of stability or guardian of vital interests. 

This type of external influence tended to have significant influence in certain cases. In 

South Korea, leader Chun Doo Hwan’s warm relationship with President Ronald Reagan 

contributed to the South Korean president’s decision to open the country to fair elections in 

1987. Reagan’s request that Chun refrain from violence and meet the opposition’s demands 

that year helped avoid further bloodshed and allowed the opposition to seize the opening to 

organize and win the presidency by 1992. In the Soviet Union, the influence of Reagan’s close 

relationship with Gorbachev was almost undone by President George H.W. Bush’s disdain 

for Yeltsin. President Clinton’s closeness to Yeltsin reignited the relationship and helped ensure significant amounts of economic aid went to Russia in the run-up to events in 1993. In 

Serbia, international court indictments, diplomatic isolation, targeted travel and visa bans, and 

threats to prosecute Milosevic’s inner circle helped collapse the regime around the dictator. 

Diplomatic pressure in Ukraine helped keep that regime semiautocratic. In Poland, U.S. and 

European pressure, and even Soviet signals at the time, persuaded Wojciech Jaruzelski to grant 

amnesties for political prisoners, helping Solidarity and other elements of the opposition regroup by 1988. There was little U.S. desire to pressure Turkey’s military regime (the Europeans 

differed in this regard). In fact, U.S. economic and military assistance increased during military rule and U.S. officials provided consistently supportive statements on Turkey during visits 

and speeches. The United States even exhibited proclivities to “protect” the regime against 

its European detractors. When the Council of Europe weighed whether to expel Turkey, the 

Reagan administration pressed the Europeans to reconsider and to resume economic aid.21 In 

1982, the United States also defended the junta’s human rights record before the European 

Commission of Human Rights, arguing that the regime’s behavior was far preferable to “human rights violations due to terrorism that were rapidly eroding the viability of democracy in 

Turkey.”22 The United States also maintained good relations through the Turkish-U.S. Defense and Cooperation Agreement, which gave the United States influence over the military 

regime’s eventual transition to democracy. 

Economic Influences

A third active variable, economic influence, includes direct investment and divestment, economic 

sanctions or incentives, the conditions attached to bilateral or IFI aid packages, the economic 

distress caused by arms races or military confrontation, and effects related to the internationalization of economies. 

An intense arms race with the United States, competition in Afghanistan, technical sanctions from 1982, and an export ban on a wide variety of products created economic distress 

within the Soviet Union. Combined with the liberal orientation of Gorbachev, these pressures contributed to centrifugal forces that eventually dismembered the Soviet bloc. Poland 
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lost its most favored nation status, had its membership to the International Monetary Fund 

(IMF) blocked, and suffered through economic sanctions throughout most of the 1980s. To 

make matters worse, the regime lost the subsidies and markets it had formerly depended on 

as the Soviet Union contracted. After 1987, these economic sticks turned into carrots as access to loans, trade preferences and IMF resources were granted as Jaruzelski liberalized. Serbia endured comprehensive sanctions throughout most of the 1990s, although the economic 

blockade of the country was imperfect and arguably led to the creation of a sanctions-busting 

nouveau riche criminal class with strong ties to the regime. Later, targeted sanctions sought a 

direct impact on the dictator’s inner circle and regime elites, affecting their access to foreign 

accounts and lucrative partnerships abroad. 

An arms embargo and other sanctions from 1977, coupled with an effective divestment 

campaign, helped break the impasse between the apartheid regime and the ANC in South 

Africa. After 1986, economic incentives and investment preferences attempted to reverse the 

punishing impact of sanctions but continued to pull the regime toward constitutional reform. 

The growing involvement of the Mexican economy in foreign trade, as exemplified in the North 

American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), made that economy vulnerable to international 

external markets, oil shocks, and foreign investors’ fears over uprisings and assassinations. This 

in turn opened up the regime to pressure from external sources that could offer conditioned aid.

The IMF played a role in several breakthroughs, most notably in Ghana, where loan package conditionalities proved to be extraordinarily influential on a regime that had become 

overreliant on structural adjustment and other technical and financial assistance since 1983. 

Rawlings’s willingness to liberalize appeared to be directly related to the perceived impact he 

thought a failure to open up Ghana’s political process would have on trading relationships and 

continued access to IMF resources. The IMF also appeared to play a role in Indonesia’s breakthrough, although not in the same manner. An aid package intended to rescue Suharto and the 

economy failed to deflect the impact of the region’s economic crisis in the late 1990s. Suharto 

ultimately looked more corrupt and inept as he resisted requested economic reforms, triggering 

additional riots and discouraging foreign investors. In Chile, the IMF played a role, along with 

the U.S. Treasury and the World Bank, by imposing conditions on Pinochet. He ultimately 

ended martial law and embarked on a liberalization program due in part to such pressure. 

Reputational Influences

Finally, reputational influence refers to the manner in which concerns over public image may 

determine behavioral decisions. Regime elites concerned over their personal legacy, opposition movements careful to hold to the high ground in the court of international opinion, and 

regimes’ attempting to manage their own notoriety may each be vulnerable to such influence. 

While South Korean leader Chun Doo Hwan was influenced by Reagan’s diplomatic appeal to accommodate protestors in 1987, he also did not want to lose the summer Olympic 

games in Seoul the following year. Moreover, a significant number of mid-level military officers had implied that they would not fire upon protestors the way they had at Kwangju in 1980, 

an event that brought shame and reputational damage to the armed forces. In Ghana, Rawlings’ pride at being the first African military ruler to become legitimate through elections was 

an additional influence keeping him on a path of reform. In Poland, the West’s canonization 

of Lech Walesa and the cause of Solidarity constrained the regime’s hand in dealing with the 

movement, especially given the regime’s desire to cultivate better relations with the West. The 

vilification of Milosevic and Ukraine’s Viktor Yanukovych in foreign policy circles and in the 
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DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

Western press helped rally foreign aid in support of opposition forces in both countries. Media coverage of an apparent preelection poisoning attempt on Yanukovych’s liberal challenger, 

Viktor Yushchenko, also galvanized the domestic and foreign public. The effect was intensified 

by the toxin’s disfigurement of Yushchenko’s face. 

Another example of reputational influence can be found in Indonesia. The presence of 

satellite news reporters on the streets of Jakarta during the riots of 1998, including CNN and 

other networks, constrained the military to avoid using excessive violence against demonstrators. By Defense Minister Juwono Sudarsono’s own admission, it was a concern driven out of 

maintaining the small reserve of legitimacy the military had managed to retain as the regime 

headed toward collapse. South Africa serves as yet another example, especially after the antiapartheid campaign grew to international proportions after the 1986 imposition of the government’s loathed state of emergency. International condemnation, partly driven by graphic news 

coverage, fueled eventual splits in the apartheid regime and a termination of the U.S. policy of 

constructive engagement the same year.

What happened in failed instances? While at least one passive variable had some positive impact on each failed case, active influences were almost all negative.

External Factors and Failed Breakthroughs

Algeria

The passive influence of falling world oil prices in 1988 contributed to unrest in Algeria. Algeria’s overreliance on oil revenue made the regime particularly vulnerable to such shocks. Dissent over subsidy cutbacks, combined with existing service delivery shortfalls and rising prices 

for basic goods welled into the “Black October” riots that eventually forced the regime into a 

process of liberalization. But democratic norms and ideas as well as diffusion had less of an impact. While the marginalized secular opposition in Algeria may have drawn inspiration from 

democratic norms and values, the more popular FIS drew literal and ideological sustenance 

from Iran. Iran’s Islamic revolution was a more significant influence within the opposition than 

the potentially more powerful events in Eastern Europe at the time. 

Active external influences were also negligible, or negative, in Algeria. Unlike Islamist 

social and political organizations that received support and charitable contributions from 

international networks, the country’s secular opposition suffered from the paucity of direct 

democracy assistance. Compounding their difficulties were diplomatic influences that were 

decidedly negative. France was clearly interested in a perpetuation of the regime, fearing an 

interruption in oil and gas supplies, refugee flows, Algerian terrorism on French soil, and damage to economic investments in the country. Most southern European countries and Arab governments were similarly relieved by the military coup. Economic influences also proved to be 

negative. European arms sales and international financial aid to the military regime increased 

significantly after the coup, not only negating the prospects for a return to reform politics but 

giving the authoritarian regime a pass as it reversed reforms begun under the previous civilian government. World Bank loans to the military regime increased over the five-year period 

following the military coup and the IMF offered, but the regime declined, an attractive debtrestructuring package. Reputational factors only came into play as the military regime was 

careful to protect its image with oil and gas interests. As case study author Youngs writes, there 
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are few cases in which the combination of domestic and international variables conspired so 

thoroughly against successful democratic breakthrough. 

Iran

Passive influences were slightly more favorable in Iran, but active influences were equally negligible or detrimental to democratic transition. Oil price shocks were a factor here, as in Algeria, in creating unrest. Democratic norms and ideas, despite Khomeini’s eventual subversion 

of the democratic process, also featured in the breakthrough attempt. As case study author 

Milani writes, Khomeini was clever enough to know that a professed allegiance to democratic 

principles in the months preceding the regime’s collapse would help deflect international 

criticism and the domestic opposition behind his network of clerics. At the time, the West 

saw Khomeini as the best hope for both stability and resistance against Soviet encroachment 

in Iran.

As for active variables, there was little in the way of traditional democracy promotion 

assistance to Iran under the Shah. Externally, and more in the realm of reputational influences, international human rights criticisms and media coverage of the regime’s treatment 

of its critics helped weaken the Shah, only to eventually strengthen nondemocratic forces. 

Diplomatic influences, driven largely by U.S. interests at the time, revolved primarily around 

Iran’s internal stability and ensuring that Iran did not fall into the Soviet orbit. This resulted 

in both support for the Shah during his years of excess and human rights abuses and in 

rising ambiguity about his future as he weakened. Both stances ultimately worked in Khomeini’s favor and decidedly against the United States. Compounding this complexity, the 

KGB also worked to undermine the Shah and to create anti-American sentiment among 

the opposition. 

China

China’s uprising did have some basis in economic grievance, but more as a by-product of poorly implemented domestic reforms, not external shocks. Democratic norms and ideas, however, 

played a clear role. Students studying abroad, foreign scholars, and Western investors served 

as conduits of Western liberal influence. Youth, intellectuals, and even CCP elites referenced 

Western economic and political models. China was also in a democratizing neighborhood, 

aiding diffusion. Taiwan, South Korea, and the Philippines had all recently begun transitions 

to democracy. Moreover, demonstrations centering on Tiananmen Square occurred in 1989, an 

auspicious year for democratic political change. So far, passive influences would seem to auger 

well for successful transition.

Active influences were tepid, however. There was no real consequential democracy assistance presaging unrest. Diplomatic response was ambiguous once the demonstrations began, 

with the West’s attention focused on events on the Soviet Union. As Pei writes, “the prodemocracy movement in 1989 caught all concerned by surprise.” The reaction was mixed, 

with implied guarantees of better relations and possible sanctions in the event of a crackdown. 

But Pei concludes these were not direct or serious enough incentives for the insular CCP. It 

was much the same with economic influences. China was not sufficiently integrated into the 

global economy, and foreign interests were not convinced enough to make this an opportunity 

to press for change. Reputational influences were a factor at least temporarily, with foreign 

media coverage of Gorbachev’s visit in the midst of demonstrations staying the hand of the 
23

DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

regime, at least until the Soviet leader left. The presence of foreign media lent morale to the 

protestors and did give international actors an opportunity to weigh in on events. But it was 

an opportunity that most nations chose to sit out. 

Azerbaijan

Azerbaijan’s opposition did not have an economic crisis to leverage, but it did benefit from 

the passive influence of democratic norms and ideas in much the same way China’s activists 

did. Moreover, diffusion from revolutions in Ukraine, Serbia, and Georgia inspired and motivated reformers in Baku. Azerbaijani youth, for instance, tried to template the resistance 

models used by the OTPOR ( “Resistance” in Serbian) and PORA (“It’s time!” in Ukrainian) student movements in Serbia and Ukraine. Putting these influences into practice 

proved to be another matter. The regime effectively deployed its security and intelligence 

assets to disrupt nearly all mobilization activity by civic groups, students, and opposition 

political parties. As a result, nothing approaching mass mobilization was ever achieved in 

Azerbaijan, despite the normative value of democratic ideas and the precedents of these 

successful revolutions. 

Among active influences, direct democracy assistance was the most promising in Azerbaijan. The United States provided political party training, elections support, voter education, media monitoring, media capacity building, anticorruption campaign assistance, and 

rule-of-law programming. The European Union supported administrative reform and some 

civil society capacity building. Private foundations provided assistance for community-based 

development, health, and education initiatives. (Russia, with a strong interest in maintaining 

the regime, is widely suspected of helping the ruling party falsify election results and gather 

intelligence on regime critics in a display of nondemocratic direct aid.) 

In actual amounts, however, the value of democracy aid was small compared with Ukraine 

and Georgia. This may have been due to the fact that local partners were weak and too few 

in number to absorb more assistance. But, as in Algeria, it was also attributable to the fact 

that few Western diplomats had a strong interest in regime change. There were calls for free 

and fair elections but only weak incentives for compliance. As Bunce and Wolchik write, the 

calls for reform were not regarded as credible by the regime: 

US and other Western diplomats hinted at closer relations with Baku if the 2005 elections were free and fair, but they did not threaten the regime with concrete sanctions if 

they were not. Nor did they impose such penalties when the regime falsified the election. 

Competing foreign policy priorities, including security issues, the war in Iraq, and 

energy needs, clearly influenced these actions in the case of the US and may have also 

influenced those of European countries.23

Economic influences ran in the wrong direction. Regime stability was perceived as necessary for the protection of foreign investments in the country’s energy sector, a sector the 

United States helped to develop and market. Economic investment in Azerbaijan increased 

after elections, helping GDP grow even more dramatically the year after fraudulent polls. In 

Azerbaijan, a deficit of corroborative domestic conditions and counterproductive external influences merged to undermine the breakthrough attempt. President Ilham Aliyev was never 

vulnerable, there was no economic crisis, and petrodollar liquidity guaranteed that patronage 

networks remained intact and that security forces would remain loyal. The lack of serious foreign interest in political change ensured the regime could exercise its will against its critics with 

little consequence. 
24

PEACEWORKS 81

Balance of Domestic and External Variables

How did these domestic and external influences compare in individual CDDRL cases? For an 

interpretative analysis of the interaction of external and domestic variables among these case 

studies, see figure 1.

South Africa provides the most potent example of how external factors can be essential in 

producing successful breakthroughs. Case study author Tim Sisk concludes that diplomatic 

and economic pressure, democratic socialization, and direct democracy assistance were the 

most critical variables pushing the regime toward a pacted solution. Without such influences, it 

is unlikely the apartheid regime would have responded to domestic pressures alone, despite the 

courage of antiapartheid activists and the agency of figures like Mandela, Tutu, and de Klerk. 

Among the case studies, it is the most externally driven transition.

Ghana is the next example of significant external influence. If Rawlings had not believed 

that IMF assistance would be jeopardized by a failure to liberalize, it is unlikely he would 

have done so. Case study author Antoinette Handley maintains that this perception, along 

with diplomatic pressure and democratic aid to Ghana’s civic sector, were the most significant 

influences creating a web of political constraints that induced Rawlings to step aside. It was a 

revolution led from the top, in response to foreign pressure, kept honest from below. Domestic 

actors ensured the veracity of the reform effort, raised public pressure on the regime as breakthrough elections approached, stimulated a wider discourse on the country’s democratic future, 

and helped identify, then elect, new leadership.

In South Korea, oil shocks created unrest in 1979 that ultimately convinced the autocrat 

Chun Doo Hwan to embark on a slow, and some claim disingenuous, course of reform. Frustration over the pace of reform boiled over into riots in 1987 when Chun tried to handpick his 

successor. He eventually acceded to protestors’ demands for direct presidential elections and 

civil liberties that year in a pivotal moment for the country’s transition. But it almost didn’t 

happen. Domestic pressure was significant, due in large part to the effort of well-organized 

civic networks, or chaeyas. Mass mobilization, a split but coherent opposition, and incremental 

reform victories had also emboldened regime critics. But Chun seriously weighed declaring 

martial law and cracking down in 1987, the same way he did as he violently consolidated his 

power in 1980. Several external factors intervened. U.S. congressional resolutions, demarches 

by then U.S. ambassador James Lilley, and a personal appeal from Reagan were profoundly influential on Chun. Reputational concerns also factored in. In the end, external variables tipped 

the balance in favor of successful breakthrough by persuading Chun to open political space for 

his rivals in 1987. As case study authors Sunhyuk-Kim and David Adesnik write, “More than 

any specific demand or concession, the US and the ROK valued the persistence of a relationship that had lasted for more than thirty years. Even at the pivotal moment in 1987 when 

South Africa

Ghana

South Korea

Poland

Chile

Ukraine

Serbia

Mexico

Indonesia

Russia

Turkey

Greater International Influence Greater Domestic Influence

Figure 1. Balance of Domestic and International Influences
25

DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

Chun Doo Hwan had to decide whether or not to mobilize the armed forces against the opposition, the US government clothed its message to Chun in vague platitudes about negotiation, 

compromise and unity. Yet the message was heard.”24

The next several cases each fall in the tipping point category. In Poland, decreasing Soviet support and growing reliance on the West for economic ties made the Jaruzelski regime 

particularly vulnerable to U.S. and European pressure to liberalize and grant full amnesty to 

regime dissidents by 1986. Subsequent direct aid to Solidarity, liberal diffusion from the collapsing Soviet Union, and the influence of human rights norms also contributed to pressure on 

Poland’s regime. Released Solidarity leaders were able to reanimate their movement and rely 

on foreign democracy assistance to consolidate support and press their demands. The country 

had every important domestic variable in its favor, especially the important agency of Lech 

Walesa. But case study author Greg Dombor concludes that “international efforts did tilt the 

existing order to accelerate and insure democratic breakthrough.”25

Chile is another tipping point intervention. Domestic actors provided strategic guidance and compelling models of democratic futures for the country that rivaled the regime’s 

more managed options. But the three most influential domestic influences on breakthrough 

in Chile required external facilitation. First, by the late 1970s, international human rights 

criticisms had pressured Pinochet to seek a modicum of legitimacy through small reforms 

and a plebiscite in 1978. It was an important precedent. He would reenact plebiscites in 

1980, and then again in 1988, when he would lose power. Second, international support and 

mediation helped unify the warring camps of Chile’s political opposition in 1983. Third, 

the economic crisis that created pressure on Pinochet to introduce significant political and 

economic reforms starting in 1983 came as a result of an external economic shock. There 

was also important but less significant pressure on Pinochet in the democratic expectations 

expressed by U.S. and European diplomats. Conditionality by the U.S. Treasury and the 

World Bank sharpened these expectations with economic pressure. There were diffusion 

effects from Uruguay’s plebiscite experience in 1980 and direct democracy support to think 

tanks, political parties, civic groups, and unions after 1983. Every domestic and external variable was at work in Chile, but ultimately external variables were required to tip the balance 

in favor of success. 

The domestic and international variables influencing Ukraine’s breakthrough were also 

well matched, with external influences tipping the balance in this instance as well. Ukraine’s 

opposition benefited from several favorable domestic conditions during the breakthrough period, including important opposition unity, mass mobilization, alternative media, reforms to 

leverage, and security forces that resisted firing on protestors. Most of these influences were 

fully developed products of internal negotiation, domestic organization, and preparation. External factors also helped level the playing field, however. As President Leonid Kuchma tilted 

toward the West over the decade preceding breakthrough, he was constrained to maintain 

pockets of pluralism within a semiautocratic republic. Additionally, Kuchma’s reluctant engagement in Western-mediated talks prior to breakthrough resulted in the opening in which 

multiparty elections for the presidency would occur. Democratic norms and ideas played a role, 

Europe serving as a normative reference point for both the autocrat and his opposition. Diffusion was also a particularly influential variable, as illustrated by the manner in which Ukraine’s 

youth movement, PORA, adopted many of the strategic approaches and tactics of its Serbian, 

Georgian, and Slovak counterparts. Direct democracy assistance from private foundations and 

bilateral donors in the West strengthened independent media outlets, civic groups, and cultural 
26

PEACEWORKS 81

organizations. Technical assistance was also provided to Parliament and to opposition parties, 

as well as for elections support. As case study authors Richard Youngs and Michael McFaul 

conclude, “These imported inputs from the West were consequential in tipping the balance in 

favor of democratic challengers” (emphasis in the original).26

Serbia marks the point at which domestic variables begin to outweigh the influences of international factors in determining success. It is likely that breakthrough would have occurred in 

Serbia without significant outside assistance, but the character and timing of such a transition 

is open to interpretation. Like Ukraine, Serbia was fortunate to have strong domestic conditions favoring breakthrough. Many of the critical elements of Serbia’s domestic resistance were 

in place by the time significant external support became available in 1998. With little outside 

assistance, for instance, Serbia’s political opposition, though feckless at times, won important 

victories in the 1996–97 local elections. Subsequent mass demonstrations in the dead of winter 

eventually defeated concerted attempts by Milosevic to annul those victories. 

Even so, external influences on Serbia’s revolution were significant. As in Ukraine, Serbian 

strongman Slobodan Milosevic felt constrained by the West to maintain a semiautocratic polity for most of his rule. Direct democracy assistance contributed to the confidence, resilience, 

and sophistication of youth activists, civic movements, the political opposition, and free media. 

Diffusion from previous Croatian and Slovak electoral revolutions inspired and comforted Serbian activists, especially during the period of hard dictatorship accompanying a war in Kosovo 

and NATO bombardment. Economic sanctions, diplomatic isolation, and military intervention each had mixed results but on balance contributed to the exasperation and dissatisfaction 

of the Serbian public with the regime. Economic collapse, growing disenchantment with the 

regime, and international court indictments meant Milosevic had an expiration date. Breakthrough was all but ensured—at some point. International influences hastened its arrival and 

in all likelihood ensured that the October 2000 revolution was peaceful and relatively orderly.

International variables were even less of a factor in Mexico. Several domestic developments 

initiated reform processes in Mexico, including an assassination, internal rebellion in Chiapas in 1994, elite splits within the ruling party, and a growing assertiveness by the country’s 

civic sector. However, external factors helped provide momentum to the transition. Weak oil 

prices contributed to stagnation in Mexico’s economy. Mexico was clearly subject to socializing 

democratic norms from its proximity to the United States and also from the growing internationalization of its economy through compacts such as NAFTA. Funds to human rights and 

civic groups were modest but did help support election observation, an election commission, 

and parallel vote tabulation in the 1996–97 polls. The Organization of American States, the 

United States, and the European Union did exercise limited pressure on the ruling party, especially after the Chiapas uprising, but this had less impact than did embarrassing coverage 

by international media of both the insurrection and Mexico’s democratic shortcomings. Case 

study authors Alberto Diaz-Cayeros and Beatriz Magaloni conclude that Mexico’s prolonged 

regime change certainly benefited from external influences. Elections in 1997 could have been 

far more difficult for the opposition, for example. But these influences were not indispensable. 

Events and actors within Mexico set the course of the transition, making this breakthrough 

one that was largely “made in Mexico.”27

In Indonesia, foreign governments had little interest in seeing Suharto step down. Democracy assistance did not challenge the regime. Diplomatic pressure to liberalize was notably 

absent. An IMF package designed to support Suharto unintentionally highlighted corruption, 

triggering riots. There was some diffusion and socialization from regional democratic break-
27

DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

throughs in addition to limited pressure by human rights groups receiving foreign funding. But 

the role played by external economic shocks and international media coverage proved most 

important among external influences. External economic shocks dramatically reversed years of 

GDP growth in Indonesia, creating intense unrest. Pressure from international media present 

in Jakarta did dissuade the military from firing on protestors in Suharto’s last days. But even 

these factors are less significant than the crisis of legitimacy the regime faced as a result of corruption, intransigence, poor service delivery, and a history of brutality and human rights abuses. 

The United States called on Suharto to step aside only after his political base had collapsed 

around him and internal influences had already taken their toll on the autocrat. 

In Russia, too, external forces played only an indirect role in breakthrough. There were 

contributions in the form of falling oil prices in the mid-1980s, Western democratic norms 

and values, market capitalism, as well as the economic distress from long-standing sanctions, 

an arms race, and proxy competition in Afghanistan. Foreign broadcasting also provided an 

alternative news and information stream that was often critical of the Soviet regime. But the 

Soviet Union’s prolonged collapse and the democratic breakthrough in Russia was more a consequence of internal structural deficiencies and demographic challenges, and of Gorbachev’s 

policies and elite divisions, than of influences like these. Case study authors Kathryn StonerWeiss and Michael McFaul maintain that Gorbachev and Yeltsin were certainly aware of the 

atmospherics created by external forces. These atmospherics may, in the end, have had far more 

influence on the character of consolidation than they did on the breakthrough. In Russia, internal forces deserve nearly all of the credit for successful breakthrough by 1993. 

Turkey provides the best example among the CDDRL case studies of a breakthrough driven 

almost entirely by domestic influences. In all likelihood, the Turkish military would have returned 

the country to managed democracy in 1983 without external assistance once stability had been 

restored. The military coup in 1980, after a decade of economic hardship and growing instability, 

was popularly endorsed. Outside the country, the regime also found significant support, apart 

from muted criticism from European countries that Washington helped deflect. Washington’s 

military-to-military assistance and contacts with Ankara deepened after 1980. The World Bank 

and IMF stepped up assistance with loans and reform packages. External actors chose to draw 

close to the regime rather than establish adversarial distance from it. In this closeness an opportunity to assess the military’s intentions and to engineer the end of the coup. But the regime was 

a willing participant in transition. Ankara’s technocrats worked closely with the World Bank and 

IMF as they monitored progress on reforms. Foreign capitals largely refrained from democracy 

promotion activities, outside of European human rights funding, in an effort to avoid creating 

controversy or unrest. Diplomatic contacts would regularly extract commitments from the regime to return to democracy, but it typically took the form of gentle persuasion. Nevertheless, the 

regime did not exhibit any designs on long-term governance that would have required a more 

forceful approach. As case study authors Senim Aydin and Yaprak Gursoy argue, “The case of 

Turkey introduces new dimensions to the debate on external influence on transition to democracy,” suggesting that in certain situations, political and economic support to autocratic regimes 

rather than sanctions and harsh criticism may best promote breakthrough.28

Implications for Policy and Field Practice

External influences may have helped ignite local resistance and even determine the timing of 

democratic breakthroughs, as happened in Serbia, Indonesia, and South Korea, for instance. 

But exogenous variables did not unilaterally accomplish successful breakthrough in these cases. 
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One of the clearest lessons from comparative analysis of these cases is that specific domestic 

conditions were necessary contributors to revolts. These domestic conditions included economic distress, rising expectations, poor service delivery, incremental reforms, and a disinclination by security forces to use violence against protestors and regime critics. Necessary local 

capacities refer to coherent oppositions, the extent of alternative information flows, the status 

of the civic sector, and an ability to mobilize public support both horizontally and vertically. In 

these studies, the presence or deficit of these contextual variables gave each CDDRL case its 

measure of breakthrough potential. 

External factors frequently fortified this potential. Direct democracy assistance, for instance, was often useful to improve access to information and to make up for deficits in local 

civic capacities in almost all successful breakthroughs. Diplomatic and economic sanctions 

amplified domestic pressure on regimes in Poland, South Africa, Chile, Serbia, Ghana, and 

the Soviet Union. External reputational pressure opened space for domestic actors in South 

Korea, Ghana, Serbia, Indonesia, and South Africa. Direct diplomatic and economic support 

for Turkey’s autocratic regime also advantaged external and domestic observers intent on 

holding the military regime to its word on elections. But external influences leveraged only 

existent domestic factors. Serbia’s Radio B92 labored long before most outside aid agencies 

discovered and supported the station. PORA in Ukraine, Solidarity in Poland, and policy 

centers in Chile were key domestic creations that only later attracted outside assistance. In 

South Africa, the most externally driven of all breakthroughs among the case studies, courageous mobilization by antiapartheid forces went on for years before international pressure 

became a factor in breakthrough. 

Finally, economic grievance played a role in prompting unrest in every case of successful breakthrough, affirming a well-trod theme in democratic revolutions literature about the 

catalytic effect of socioeconomic disruption on political stability.29 But in each successful case 

of breakthrough, economic distress was insufficient in itself to topple autocrats. It was a potent 

force, but required civic and political coherence to strategically mobilize dissent.

Consequently, there are two challenges for democratization policy and the practice of democracy promotion in the field: first, to understand the balance of domestic conditions and 

local capacities that give each breakthrough context its breakthrough potential; second, understanding how to apply external leverage in a manner that augments these conditions and 

capacities, predisposing breakthrough attempts toward success. 

Implications for Democratization Policy

Conceptual Coherence and Unity of Effort

As Thomas Carothers suggests in his seminal article “The End of the Transition Paradigm,” 

democracy promotion has labored for too long under the misleading assumptions of an outdated model of democratic change.30 Instead of the tenets of a transition paradigm that stresses 

the importance of elections for democratic development while discounting the relevance of 

social conditions, Carothers suggests that preconditions like sociocultural considerations, state 

capacity, and economic conditions do matter. Moreover, an overreliance on elections for pivotal 

political change neglects the contributions of civic reformers, free media outlets, moderate 

elites, and a mobilized citizenry. 

Data from these case studies bear out Carother’s perspective. In Ukraine, Chile, Serbia, 

Mexico, Ghana, and Turkey, for instance, incremental civic accomplishments and reforms as 

Necessary local capacities 

refer to coherent 

oppositions, the extent 

of alternative information 

flows, the status of the 

civic sector, and an 

ability to mobilize public 

support both horizontally 

and vertically. 
29

DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

well as electoral victories were signature moments in each country’s transition. But democratic 

reformers prevailed only after significant preparation, public outreach, and consensus building. Perhaps it is too much to ask that a transition paradigm apply to all types of democratic 

change. Perhaps what is required is a breakthrough paradigm that provides a more nuanced 

acknowledgement of the multiple domestic and external factors influencing rapid democratic 

change. What would a breakthrough paradigm propose?

First, not all openings are equal. The type of external commitment should be calibrated 

to coincide with the best opportunities to establish critical domestic conditions conducive to 

breakthrough. Second, as demonstrated in both failed and successful cases, the universe of 

important influences is far greater than the tools of direct democracy assistance alone. Third, 

while these cases have many internal and external influences in common, the mixture and 

weight of each influence differed from case to case. Breakthroughs are idiosyncratic. Formulaic approaches are less valuable than ones that recognize the path dependent character of 

revolutions that evolve as a consequence of their own histories and social conditions. 

Larry Diamond’s 1999 Developing Democracy: Toward Consolidation begins to develop a 

derivative of the transition paradigm for democratic consolidations, but no single conceptual 

framework currently exists that may be pressed into the service of helping to determine 

whether breakthrough potential exists and what influences may best apply to a case at hand. 

As a consequence, the external influences that may be brought to bear in breakthrough contexts, including direct democracy assistance, are diffuse and poorly coordinated. Within the 

United States Agency for International Development (USAID), for example, conceptual 

and operational differences of opinion often keep the Democracy and Governance Office, 

the Office of Transition Initiatives, and regional bureaus at odds and insistent on working 

with disparate partners toward different objectives in rapid transitions. Zooming out to other 

actors such as the U.S. Treasury, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), and the 

U.S. State Department’s Middle East Partnership Initiative introduces even more disunity 

of effort. Zoom out further to other bilateral and multilateral actors and even greater dissonance often emerges. It is rare for the international community working in breakthrough 

contexts to exhibit the kind of consensus it often exhorts domestic oppositions to display. At 

times, as in Azerbaijan, and in at least two instances not included among these case studies 

(Uzbekistan since the 2005 Andijan massacre and Belarus’s elections in 2010), an incoherence of external factors arguably undermined prospects for democratic breakthrough.

Two-Track Assistance 

Long-term capacity-building support to civic groups, media outlets, and political oppositions 

proved to be important in Poland, Serbia, South Korea, Ukraine, South Africa, Chile, Ghana, 

and Mexico. Long-standing economic and diplomatic pressure on many of the same governments, plus the Soviet Union, convinced several regimes to remain semiautocratic, providing 

political space for opposition activists to operate while establishing a set of normative democratic expectations for autocrats. This long-term foundation building, often appearing to go 

nowhere, was to be particularly important when transitional moments emerged. As economic 

shocks, attempted coups, assassinations, or elections prompted regime critics to rally, local actors and donors usually increased their tempo of engagement—and not always for the better.31 

Events in Chile, Ghana, Serbia, South Korea, Mexico, and Ukraine provide illustrations 

of the swarming effect surrounding elections, for example. In this cacophony, established local 

actors may sometimes find themselves awash in support and praise but puzzled by contraBreakthroughs are 

idiosyncratic. Formulaic 

approaches are less 

valuable than ones that 

recognize the path 

dependent character 

of revolutions.
30

PEACEWORKS 81

dictory expectations, exasperated by slow disbursements, frustrated at burdensome reporting 

requirements, and dismayed at the numbers of domestic NGOs that have sprung up around 

them, competing for assistance. The need to coordinate external influences is obvious, but less 

noticeable is the negative impact all this heightened attention often has on local ownership of 

democracy movements, the responsiveness and time management capabilities of local partners, 

and on consensus among civic and political actors. 

At minimum, a second type of direct democracy assistance is warranted in these higher 

velocity settings with breakthrough potential. As many of the CDDRL breakthroughs picked 

up steam, quick dispersing “surge” assistance for locally conceived and executed initiatives 

helped domestic actors leverage their local knowledge, keep pace with events, and maintain 

autonomy over their ideas. How funding was provided was as important as the type of activity that was supported. Fast-track surge assistance was rapidly disbursed and relatively easy 

to obtain, with minimal reporting requirements. There was also a venture capital character to 

such support, with a higher tolerance for failure in an effort to encourage innovation and local ownership in dynamic transition environments. Examples of those benefitting from such 

assistance included OTPOR, EXIT and the Association of Independent Electronic Media 

(ANEM) network in Serbia; Black and Yellow PORA, Znayu, and the Freedom of Choice 

Coalition (FCC) in Ukraine; Solidarity and the Institute for Democracy in Eastern Europe 

(IDEE) in Poland; and the Center of Study for Development in Chile. 

USAID’s Office of Transition Initiatives, the NED, and several private foundations made 

this fast-track support available for activities such as the printing of posters and banners; visits 

by regional activists to aid diffusion; the purchase of newsprint, radio transmitters, and audio 

production facilities; rent and communications costs for public events; purchasing tents and 

other props for street performances; and the replacement of confiscated computer and communications equipment used in “protect the vote” efforts. In doing so, they supported traditional civic actors that had received long-term aid as well as nontraditional partners that were 

new converts to resistance movements. 

Ivan Marovic, former Serbian democracy activist and CANVAS trainer, describes the challenge this way: 

Revolutions are often seen as spontaneous. It looks like people just went into the street. 

But it’s the result of months or years of preparation. It is very boring until you reach a 

certain point, where you can organize mass demonstrations or strikes. If it is carefully 

planned, by the time they start, everything is over in a matter of weeks.32

In these case studies, not all breakthroughs were over in weeks, but a willingness and ability 

to provide long-term and fast-track democracy assistance—when transitions looked distant and 

when they seemed possible—maximized both the effectiveness of external democracy assistance 

and the impact of local partners throughout the course of democratic breakthrough attempts. 

Preserving Information Flows

With so much focus on the role of social media in the current wave of revolts throughout 

the Arab world, there is a great deal of renewed attention on the importance of information 

flows in democratic revolutions. In the CDDRL case studies, alternative information transactions outside of the reach of regimes were critical features in successful breakthroughs, and 

they were notably subdued in failed attempts. Where present, free media and information 

flows revealed the duplicity and brutality of regimes while helping organize civic resistance 

and connect exiles, isolated dissidents, and foreign observers to unfolding events. 

Quick dispersing “surge” 

assistance for locally 

conceived and executed 

initiatives helped 

domestic actors leverage 

their local knowledge, 

keep pace with events, 

and maintain autonomy 

over their ideas.
31

DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

None of these case studies chronicles a transition where social media like Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, or smartphones played a role, unlike the way such tools have captured the imagination in current revolutions. But traditional broadcast and print media, satellite links, mobile 

texting, and the nascent Internet were critical to many of these revolutions nonetheless. 

In the Soviet Union, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Voice of America provided 

alternative viewpoints and information, augmenting a strong samizdat tradition within the 

country. These radio services also were available in Poland by 1989, in addition to the pamphlets, faxes, shared cassettes and video recordings, and underground films that helped unify 

and mobilize dissent within the country. In Ukraine, public service announcements, journalist 

training, the funding of production content, and the upgrading of radio and television equipment helped small independent media outlets survive. Several Internet news sources had also 

come to be trusted by the public. Maidan and PORA youth also made use of short message 

service (SMS) texting and information sharing Web sites that proved particularly effective for 

elections monitoring. After Serbia’s semiautocracy turned into hard dictatorship, the provision of newsprint for struggling print media, the replacement of confiscated radio broadcast 

equipment, and the supplying of satellite link equipment to the ANEM network and its flagship station Radio B92 proved to be critically important for the opposition in Milosevic’s last 

months. Banned radio outlets like B92 would produce digital news and information content 

and stream it to London via the Internet, where it was uplinked to a satellite available to the 

Serbian public and to local ANEM stations to downlink and rebroadcast. In the darkest days 

of severe autocracy in Serbia, the international community also created the “ring around Serbia,” a series of temporary terrestrial radio transmitters near the Serbian border that beamed 

alternative, international news and information content into the country. In Indonesia, SMS 

texting was used creatively to organize street protests in the last weeks of the Suharto regime. 

In South Africa and Ghana, investigative journalism pieces aired by independent broadcasters 

challenged the regimes’ versions of events. In Chile, it was the underground press and academic 

papers that punctured Pinochet’s attempt to curtail public discourse about alternative futures.

Among the failed cases, only Azerbaijan had a modicum of free press. However, its few 

independent journals and newspapers were overwhelmed in sophistication and influence by 

state-controlled broadcast media outlets in a country where only 3 percent of citizens claim 

to get their news in print.33 Opposition forces in Iran effectively used Khomeini’s networks 

of clerics for information dissemination—but ultimately to nondemocratic ends. Algerian Islamists used similar networks and in China, demonstrators had no such openings to leverage. 

An obvious policy implication of the CDDRL case studies is that conscientious and creative support to preserve the free flow of information in breakthrough environments benefits 

democratic oppositions. But in an era of increasing reliance on digital propagation of information, what might this mean? Have the tasks of circumventing regime control and organizing 

resistance to autocrats become easier?

Philip Howard, director of the World Information Access Project, maintains that the new 

tools of social networking are a game changer. Not only have applications like Facebook and 

Twitter simplified timely mass mobilization, they have also made it easier for offshore communities of dissidents and supporters to be informed and to provide tangible support. Social 

networking tools also make transnational diffusion easier with the creation of digital portals 

where common experiences and grievances are shared and where strategy, tactical insights, 

and policy may be discussed and debated. Social media also make it far easier to attract international attention to the excesses of regimes, amplifying the reputational pressures of an 
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Al Jazeera effect, for example, with real-time citizen-journalism on the ground. To Howard, an 

important new policy imperative is the need to press for Internet access as a basic right and to 

better understand how traditional family and friend networks now become mass movements 

for political change using tools like these.34

To Evgeny Mozorov, author of The Net Delusion, regimes have begun to climb the steep 

learning curve that once gave their more youthful detractors an edge in the use of such tools. 

Multiple regimes have now compromised Skype’s formidable encryption wall. Hugo Chavez 

in Venezuela uses Twitter to denounce his enemies and dispense political guidance. Russia and 

China employ thousands of commentators to ridicule dissent and steer online opinion away 

from criticism of the Kremlin and the CCP.35 But there are darker elements to regimes mastering the Internet than simply engaging in spin and vitriol. 

Iran used crowdsourcing to identify and arrest demonstrators in 2009. Tunisian government officials used a virus to obtain Facebook passwords in 2010. Egypt’s ability to turn 

off the Internet revealed a critical weakness in the way Internet trunk lines are vulnerable 

to manipulation by state-owned telecommunications companies and has sparked an ethical 

debate about the appropriateness of Internet “kill switches.” China’s censors continually 

update their own Internet firewalls to screen, among other items, mention of the potentially contagious revolts now underway in North Africa and the Middle East. Syria and 

Saudi Arabia use Blue Coat, software produced in the United States, to censor the Internet 

and identify dissidents.36 More ominously, detained dissidents in several autocracies report 

hearing evidence of Facebook and Twitter account infiltration during their interrogations.37

Clay Shirky notes that the Sudanese government recently set up a Facebook page calling 

for a protest against the government and arrested those that showed up at the designated 

time and place.38 If anything the net is neutral, claims Mozorov. With both regimes and 

their critics using these new tools it is simply a more sophisticated continuation of cat 

and mouse.

Whether these tools are game changers for oppositions or neutral instruments that may 

easily be put to nondemocratic ends, the traditional challenge of preserving free information 

flows remains.39 As in interventions predating social media, when local reformers and international democracy promoters would conjure up ways to circumvent regime control of analog information flows in autocracies, so too are a new generation of activists coming up with ways to 

do the same thing with data, only with the tools of digital mobilization. Scholars and activists 

describe such tools as “liberation technologies,” and they include everything from anonymizing software like Pshiphon and The Onion Router (TOR) to software that collects and disseminates citizen-generated content like “speak2tweet,” “Storyful,” “Redphone,” “textsecure,” 

and “Citizentube.” Emergent technologies include aerial Internet server drones, an “Internet 

in a suitcase” (a U.S. State Department–funded project), and “freedom box,” a plug-in server 

that will make it harder for regimes to shut down Internet access altogether. While the policy 

implication from the CDDRL cases is to ensure free information flows, the challenge going 

forward will be to do so in a way that will continue to give reformers in autocratic states equality with, if not an advantage over, increasingly sophisticated regimes.

Implications for Field Practice

Implementing democracy assistance in the field differs from the worlds where democratization policies are typically framed. This is the sharp end of democracy promotion, where the 

best-conceived policies mature into action or warp into counterproductive fiascos. Examples 
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DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

of plans gone awry include how a policy supporting uncensored Internet access for democracy 

activists in Iran dangerously unraveled when Haystack software was prematurely released to 

that country’s dissidents. Haystack, conceived as a tool to help Internet users conceal their 

identity, contained dangerous flaws that could expose them instead. In Indonesia, an IMF 

package intended to support Suharto became instrumental in his downfall almost as soon as it 

was introduced in Jakarta. Examples of well-implemented policy include how public opinion 

data and personal persuasion by respected external advisers helped convince Serbia’s egoistic 

and divided political opposition to unite around a single candidate to challenge Milosevic. In 

Poland, a policy of aiding Solidarity found effective application through subversive implementation practices of smuggling cash, communications equipment, and printer ink to the 

underground movement. 

In the best cases, policy and practice are in alignment and attuned to conditions and opportunities as they exist on the ground. In the worst cases, blind infatuation with policy imperatives or formulaic approaches to democracy promotion regardless of context trump reasoned 

and effective implementation. 

The Importance of Sociopolitical Context 

Ethnic chauvinism and selective historical memory merged to create powerful, revisionist sociopolitical memes throughout the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s. In Serbia, populism and 

appeals to ethnic solidarity were indispensable to Milosevic as he consolidated his authority 

and ridiculed his critics. By 1995, however, increasing numbers of nationalist ideologues sensed 

betrayal in the regime’s poor treatment of Serbian refugees from wars in Croatia and Bosnia 

and political neglect of Kosovo’s Serbian population. Milosevic’s disinterest in the plight of 

Serbs remaining in postwar Croatia and Bosnia also troubled the regime’s nationalist supporters. By the end of the war in Kosovo in 1999, the regime was barely able to rally traditional 

bases of support with jingoistic appeals. Instead, the regime’s Serbo-centrism was perceived as 

inauthentic and self-serving. Eventually, the political opposition was able to leverage the unquestioned ethnic-nationalism of challenger Vojislav Kostunica to attract attention away from 

the Milosevic regime during the 2000 campaign. 

Ethnic self-awareness permeated the political opposition’s campaigns and several successful civic mobilization initiatives in Serbia. As one student organizer prominent in antiMilosevic politics maintained at the time, “only our real nationalism can defeat Milosevic.” Despite this strong undercurrent of ethnic pride, several donors from 1997 onward thought that 

civic campaigns accentuating ethnic diversity, tolerance, and an accommodation of new political realities within the former Yugoslavia could effectively counter Milosevic’s Serbo-centric 

appeal. Most local aid recipients in Serbia attempted to deflect this imported liberalism, some 

more successfully than others. By 2000, most donors had caught on that there was practically 

no resonance for such high-minded themes in Serbia at the time.

In Azerbaijan, extended families and regional clans control nearly all aspects of economic 

and political life. Success in business, government employment, and access to the spoils of 

endemic corruption depend on closeness to powerful state officials and the ruling family. This 

gives the regime resilience and near complete control over the bureaucracy, economy, and financial wealth of the state. It also makes those benefiting from such access to power quick to 

defend this system of patronage. As one informant for the Azerbaijan case study maintains, 

“this is the source of their unity in crisis.”40 Yet another contextual factor is Azerbaijan’s loss 

of territory in the Nagorno-Karabakh war with Armenia. The regime has successfully pinned 
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blame for this searing loss on many of the current opposition figures who were in power at the 

time of that conflict. 

Structural considerations like these present a very difficult set of challenges for the opposition in Azerbaijan, ones not always understood by donors intent on simply promoting 

free and fair elections, improved media access, and opposition unity. For successful democratic 

breakthrough in Azerbaijan, these features of transitional democracy would be important, but 

insufficient. Success will depend on the opposition’s recruitment of new and visionary leadership, effective outreach to key families and clan figures, mobilization of the disenfranchised and 

“unconnected,” and a successful campaign that spelled out the benefits of a new order based on 

accountability and transparency. Punishing diplomatic and economic sanctions that constrained 

regime interference in such domestic mobilization would certainly be beneficial as well.

Without acknowledging sociopolitical issues like these that underlie transition environments, there is a significant danger of external influences missing their mark or alienating civic 

and political oppositions from their publics.

Working with Civic Entrepreneurs, Promoting Diffusion, and 

Staying Backstage

Democracy assistance to civil society often privileges professional civic organizations over 

loose, volunteer-based civic formations. Thomas Carothers and Marina Ottaway write that 

while it is an understandable predisposition given the accountability, application, and reporting 

requirements of most donors, the result is too often the alienation of much of the public from 

established civic organizations and difficulty in targeting assistance on the kinds of day-to-day 

grievances citizens typically face in tenuous autocracies.41

In the Ukraine, Ghana, Serbia, Chile, Mexico, and South Korea case studies, for example, 

donors generally favored organized civic groups oriented around democratic ideals over other, 

less organized civic expressions focusing on concrete grievances, despite the fact that the latter were more broadly reflective of societal concerns. Mothers worried over failing schools 

and medical care facilities in Serbia, business leaders in South Korea were bitter about poor 

economic conditions, and truck drivers and cab owners in Mexico were upset over fuel prices. 

Each group presented an opportunity that was overlooked by donors and most domestic 

civic organizations. In fact, professional civic organizations often see little to be gained in 

working with such populations unschooled in high politics. This disinclination to reach out 

to such groups and instead work within an insular community of donors and elite activists 

is part of the reason why, in Serbia and Ukraine, for example, public antipathy toward most 

established professional civic organizations ran high. Such organizations were frequently regarded as largely ineffective, self-interested actors collecting a foreign paycheck while being 

unconcerned about what “real people” endured. 

Yet as revolutionary potential builds in breakthrough venues, “irregular” communities of 

dissent (like the mothers, business persons, and cab/truck drivers in the earlier example) increasingly test the political waters, some for the first time, driven by exasperation and the courage that comes with growing numbers of disgruntled associates. In successful breakthroughs, 

these interests were swept into mass movement politics, frequently organized by less experienced civic entrepreneurs rather than civic professionals. But the lowest common denominator 

politics of mass mobilization that attracted wide swaths of public support among the CDDRL 

case studies came at the expense of inaction on the particular issues that galvanized these 

micropublics in the first place. 

As revolutionary potential 

builds in breakthrough 

venues, “irregular” 

communities of dissent 

increasingly test the 

political waters, some 

for the first time.
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DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

One implication for field implementation from these data, then, is that early intervention 

with informal groups makes it possible to address concrete grievances, create linkages to civic 

professionals, and to build support for principles like advocacy, accountability, and mass movement politics in the process. In truth, private foundations may have an easier job of providing 

support for such emergent civicism. However, there is little reason why governmental donors 

should not also be able to establish funding streams that also support such informal groups in 

an entrepreneurial fashion.

Another implication from the data is that diffusion helped mitigate the consequences of 

external influences that were not necessarily synchronized with local political, social, legal, 

and economic contexts. Where regional activists were vectors of diffusion, as in Ukraine, Serbia, and Chile, local activists felt outside assistance to be particularly relevant and credible. In 

these instances, regional activists were instrumental in encouraging domestic oppositions to 

organize both horizontally through homogenous social strata and vertically into elite and less 

privileged classes. They also assisted civic actors as they “pushed” their political oppositions 

together and weighed the merits and drawbacks of confrontational versus nonadversarial tactics to challenge regimes. 

Donors generally excelled at one aspect of providing donor support in breakthrough venues. They remained backstage. Most local prodemocracy activists were careful to cultivate a 

homegrown character to their initiatives, even when many were receiving significant support 

from foreign sources. Donors generally acquiesced in this, understanding that higher-profile 

assistance might compromise a local partner’s legal status, endanger their safety, or plummet 

their popularity with the public. Social movements like OTPOR in Serbia and PORA in 

Ukraine were particularly careful to appear native despite the fact that they received the financial resources that enabled their spectacular growth from abroad. They understood that foreign 

money can rapidly delegitimate energetic appeals for grassroots citizen solidarity. This circumspection by donors and activists helped deflect attempts by regimes to discredit their critics. 

The Case for Liberation Methodologies

In Poland, the AFL-CIO working with the Committee in Support of Solidarity sent parcels 

to trusted Poles inside the country disguised as care packages. In these packages were censored 

books, cash, and tins of Hershey’s syrup that had been emptied and filled with printing ink. 

Other methods were used to smuggle audio and cassette recorders, shortwave radios, two-way 

radios and antennas, and additional printing equipment and supplies into the country. The 

NED also worked through a third party, the IDEE, to surreptitiously support underground 

publishing houses in Poland.42

Satellite and terrestrial broadcasting equipment, cash, and grant documentation was shuttled over the border into Serbia using the diplomatic pouches of embassies remaining in Belgrade after most Western countries had evacuated. In Russia, American media-related NGOs 

went to great lengths to import radio and television equipment for independent media outlets 

in ways that circumvented customs restrictions. In Chile, Catholic priests carried sensitive 

project documentation destined for opposition groups and their benefactors in and out of the 

country under their garments. In other instances among the CDDRL case studies, offshore 

bank accounts were used, or aid was delivered directly or through third parties in ways meant 

to elude regime controls. 

Generally, democracy assistance is rarely this clandestine or as oriented toward regime 

change. More often, it entails less politicized capacity building, skills training, and elections-
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oriented initiatives, for instance. Transparent programs like these were implemented in nearly 

every country among the CDDRL case studies where successful breakthrough occurred. Even 

so, it was also true that democracy assistance was also provided secretively in many of these 

countries to local actors whose intent was to weaken autocrats. This aid was often furnished 

in ways that sought to avoid the legal and extralegal means that regimes employed to constrain the work of prodemocracy activists. This aid typically enabled local actors to engage in 

prohibited activity such as printing, broadcasting, and organizing unauthorized street rallies. 

Moreover, this kind of assistance helped domestic activists maintain connections with supporters inside and outside the country as autocrats became unnerved over the welling of dissent in 

breakthrough venues.

Authoritarians characteristically regard democracy assistance, whether it attempts to 

circumvent their controls or not, as an attempt at regime change by stealth. “All [those] 

colored revolutions are pure and simple banditry. . . . There will be no pink or orange, or even 

banana revolution,” insisted President Lukashenko of Belarus in reaction to democratic 

“color” revolutions in his neighborhood. By 2005, Lukashenko and Kazakhstan’s president 

Nursultan Nazarbaev instituted new restrictive measures in the wake of these revolts, declaring that “they have seen the dangers that arose in neighboring countries when foreign 

NGOs insolently pumped in money and destabilized society. The state was defenseless 

against this.”43 Vladimir Putin has dramatically weakened the influence of international 

democracy organizations and local civic groups in Russia, warning against their complicity 

in social engineering attempts by Western interests.44 China has also signaled its alarm over 

recent revolutions and now unrest in the Middle East by tightening controls over domestic 

civic activity, the latitude of international NGOs, and Internet usage. Moreover, in a retrograde form of diffusion, China has sent researchers to Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Ukraine, 

Georgia, and Belarus to assess the role of prodemocracy NGOs and to adopt, and then 

export, countermeasures. Lukashenko is among the latest autocrats to acquire China’s Internet filtering technology, for example. In February 2011, the military-controlled interim 

government of Egypt announced that sixteen Americans and twenty-seven other employees of prodemocracy groups would stand trial for licensing and financial irregularities. In 

the weeks that followed, more than four hundred Egyptian civic organizations have come 

under investigation for inappropriate links with “foreign hands.”45

At present, most hard dictatorships, closed societies, and hybrid regimes are intensely 

suspicious of the role of foreign democracy assistance and have developed innovative and 

often blunt methods to curtail its influence. Arbitrary bureaucratic interference, physical 

harassment, arrests, kidnapping, torture, imprisonment, and even murder are used to subdue local democracy activists. Foreign democracy assistance organizations, if they can operate in a country at all, may be subject to sophisticated surveillance, registration difficulties, 

restrictions on disbursing funds, arbitrary interpretations of banned activity, unreasonable 

taxation policies, deportation, and arrest.46 In much the same way that regimes have become more proficient at infiltrating social networking media and controlling Internet access, authoritarians are becoming more adept at severing the relationship between foreign 

democracy advocates and local activists. 

Today’s autocrats are both vigilant and predisposed to intimidate and impose limitations 

on local and foreign democracy advocates precisely because of these past and present revolutions. Consequently, an implication for field practice is that liberation methodologies should be 

part of the operational repertoire of democracy assistance portfolios in breakthrough environ-
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DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

ments in much the same way that liberation technologies now attempt to give prodemocracy 

activists a technological edge over their autocratic opponents’ command of digital media. Liberation methodologies should be innovative and circumspect, as necessary, to ensure domestic 

actors have access to mobilization resources when they request and require such assistance. This 

circumvention approach to assistance operations acknowledges the need to counter autocratic 

regimes’ growing sophistication in controlling political expression, the right of democracy activists to such assistance, and the need to regularize new implementation approaches that challenge the sovereignty claims of authoritarian regimes. 

Democratic Breakthroughs: The Right Moment in the 

Middle East and North Africa? 

Citizens in Tunisia and Libya are moving to assemble a new political order amid the wreckage 

of their ancien régimes, although divisions among Libya’s tribal leaders and military commanders threaten the formation of an effective government. Yemen’s opposition is equally 

fractious, perhaps more so, and significant remnants of the old regime are still in power as the 

country enters a two-year period of national dialogue. In Egypt, much of the old regime also 

remains intact, promising to complicate efforts to repudiate the worst excesses of the previous government. Few democratic gains are in evidence within Morocco, Jordan, Bahrain, and 

Saudi Arabia, and well-entrenched monarchies in these countries enjoy the firm support of 

much of the West—in stark contrast to the support for democratic transition the West has 

offered in other parts of the region. Regimes in Algeria and Iran did not experience serious 

breakthrough attempts last year, and conditions in Syria continue to deteriorate, spilling instability across its borders.

The 2011 Arab Spring did not bloom everywhere, and it is premature to compare events 

in the region to the waves of democratization that overtook Latin America and Eastern 

Europe, for example. Instead, 2012 and 2013 have the potential to be transformative years 

in the region as breakthrough attempts run their course, but they also may be remembered 

as the beginning of intermittent, often bloody, and inconclusive contestations over power 

like those that occurred as regimes were challenged throughout sub-Saharan Africa after 

the fall of the Berlin Wall. Judged by the domestic and external influences on democratic 

breakthrough attempts identified in this study, what are the prospects for successful breakthrough among Middle East and North African states currently seized with citizen-led calls 

for fundamental political reform? 

Each of these ongoing attempts at democratic breakthrough has been influenced by passive external variables (see table 3). Global economic contractions and rising food prices were 

external shocks that disproportionately impacted the young and the poor. Liberal norms 

and ideas disseminated through transnational digital networks and with improved access to 

education also fuel protests. Diffusion spread by activists experienced in social movements 

elsewhere and emulation of the Tunisian and Egyptian revolts also inspires dissent. Other 

commonalities include an explosive mix of rising expectations, particularly among youth, with 

grievances over high levels of corruption, a lack of economic opportunity, economic disparities, and regime repression.

Another common feature is the lack of a united, coherent political opposition in nearly 

all of these breakthrough venues. Tunisia’s opposition was among the weakest in the Arab 

world until a postrevolt merger of three major centrist democratic parties in April 2012 helped 

Another common 

feature is the lack of a 

united, coherent political 

opposition in nearly all 

of these breakthrough 

venues.
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Table 3. Domestic and External Influences in Countries with Breakthrough 

Attempts Under Way in North Africa and the Middle East ( June 1, 2012)

Breakthrough Influences

Tunisia

Egypt

Morocco

Jordan

Libya

Yemen

Syria

Bahrain

Iran

Algeria

S. Arabia

Domestic Influences

Incremental victories 

precede breakthrough

• • • • • • •

Unified/coherent 

oppositions

• w

Economic distress and 

poor service delivery

• • • • • • • • • • •

Rising expectations • • • • • • • • • • •

Mass mobilization • • • • • • • •

Growing influence/

capacity of civic groups

• • • • • •

Independent information 

flows*

• • • • • • w w w w w

Reform offers embolden 

opposition

• • • • • • • • •

Get out the vote/protect 

the vote efforts

• • n/a n/a n/a • n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a

Breakthrough attempts 

to date largely free from 

violence

• • •

External Influences

Passive

Economic shocks** • • • • • • • • • • •

Democratic norms and 

ideas

• • • • • • • • • • •

Diffusion • • • • • • • • • • •

Active

Direct democracy aid • w • • • w

Diplomatic influence • • • • • •

Economic influence • w • • • •

Reputational influence • • • •

* A w indicates qualified effect. For example, while information flows are constrained in certain countries at present, 

there is access to satellite television and the Internet (although Internet freedom—and penetration—varies from state 

to state).

**External economic shocks common to each country are the rise in global food prices since 2008 and impacts associated with slowing activities in finance, construction, tourism, real estate, and services due to the global economic 

recession. Combined Arab GDP declined by $200 billion in 2009 and a minimum of 1.5 percentage points in each 

subsequent year. 
39

DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

consolidate momentum toward breakthrough. Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood is the most powerful political force in the country, with a strong constituency and an extensive organization 

built up over decades of resistance to President Hosni Mubarak. However, divisions over ideology within the organization, disputes over the degree of the party’s involvement in politics, and 

friction with Salafists, secularists, and the Supreme Council of Armed Forces constrains the 

Muslim Brotherhood’s ability to delineate a clear political option for Egyptian voters. 

It remains striking how unified oppositions are absent in each of the remaining countries, however. It is useful to remember that breakthroughs require not only the toppling of 

an autocratic regime but also the establishment of a system of free and fair multiparty general 

elections. If unity behind the barricades fades as regimes fall and the hard work of forming 

a postregime government begins, breakthrough momentum may languish as well. If breakthroughs succeed in these states with divisive political communities, however, it will dispel a 

powerful theme in democracy promotion literature that suggests tenacious unified political 

oppositions are a staple of successful democratic revolts. 

Finally, despite the fact that independent media outlets in most of these countries are 

subject to severe restrictions (or do not exist), satellite programming and Internet access often make circumvention of regime controls on information flows possible. Only six countries 

can be said to have a lively free press within their borders that augments both satellite and 

Internet-based information streams, providing improved coverage of local events. Yemen is the 

most recent addition to this group as media professionalism and the number of media outlets 

increased inside the country after former president Ali Abdullah Saleh stepped down from 

office in November 2011.

This is where the commonalities end. 

Active external influences were relatively weak, if not contradictory among these states. In 

a situation reminiscent of Azerbaijan’s failed electoral breakthrough, few influential Western 

governments have acted with one mind in a region characterized by relationships of convenience with autocratic regimes. Countervailing interests have curtailed Western pressure on 

Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, and Jordan. Governments in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, and 

Libya may have fallen, but the region’s monarchies remain secure with a mix of enough oil 

money to appease critics, religious legitimacy in some cases, and the West’s uncritical support 

for autocrats that are helpful on security and economic matters.47

Direct democracy assistance to the region prior to the Arab Spring is illustrative. For decades, Western governments’ vested interests generally constrained the aggressiveness of democracy aid throughout the Middle East and North Africa. Where democracy aid was provided it ranged from support for professional civic groups, service delivery, and relatively mild 

institutional reforms in Egypt, Jordan, and Morocco to more limited engagement with activists 

and civic groups in other countries in the region. Such aid may arguably be said to have created 

pressure for small democratic openings to remain in states like Egypt, but it did not create a 

class of civic reformers intent on rapid democratic transition. This fell to new political actors. 

As in Ukraine, Serbia, and Indonesia, revolutionary mobilization in the Arab world has been 

more the work of new political entrepreneurs than the result of civic professionals benefitting 

from long-term foreign support.48

After the Arab Spring began, Western countries hailed the political changes under way as 

“historic,” and the U.S. “hurriedly disavowed” the logic of supporting useful dictators in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, Libya, and Syria.49 After a year, however, the United States and most of the 

West remains of two minds in the region, both riding the tide of historical developments and 
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providing firm support for most of the remaining nondemocratic governments in the region. 

It is a dichotomous policy that does not go unnoticed in the region. 

Two additional influences are notable. First, as identified in the case studies, late-hour concessions by eight regimes appear to have simply fueled additional demand for reform. Iran and 

Saudi Arabia are the exceptions and have not ventured political reforms, similar to Suharto’s 

intransigence in Indonesia. In Libya, Muammar Gaddafi made cash payments to residents in 

an attempt to shore up his base of support, but this did not appear to purchase authentic or 

particularly efficacious loyalty to the regime. President Bashar al-Assad in Syria has done the 

same, granting citizenship rights, promising reforms, and holding elections with little effect.

Second, only breakthrough attempts in Tunisia, Jordan, and Morocco have remained relatively peaceful. Elsewhere in the region, security forces regularly fire on demonstrators and 

rebels in an effort to dissuade dissent. Should breakthrough in Egypt, Libya, Yemen, and even 

Syria succeed after the varied brutality of their transitions, yet another tenet of transitology 

that posits that a peaceful demise of regimes helps secure successful democratic change will be 

challenged.

In an extraordinarily complex region, the variables derived from the case study analysis 

are not the only considerations by which the prospects of Arab world breakthrough attempts 

should be judged. As suggested earlier, using the examples of Serbia and Azerbaijan, sociopolitical context matters when implementing democracy programs. In the Middle East and 

North Africa region, important contextual factors include whether there is a technocratic and 

bureaucratic infrastructure in place to manage elections and assume the burdens of interim 

governance as regimes change. Egypt, Tunisia, Jordan, Morocco, Syria, Iran, and Saudi Arabia 

each have well-developed bureaucratic institutions that could ensure the continuation of the 

state as transitions occur. Yemen and Libya may yet experience postregime collapse as a result 

of institutional weakness. 

Another important consideration is the demographic profile of each state. Tunisia, Egypt, 

and Iran have relatively homogenous populations, while the remaining states are characterized 

by tribal and sectarian divides that may hijack cohesive, secular reform agendas. In addition, the 

presence of monarchies in Bahrain, Jordan, and Morocco offer an element of stability to potential transitions but also introduce divisions among regime critics. Publics in each country are 

split over whether monarchs or simply parliaments must go. In Saudi Arabia, where protests 

are currently the most muted, the fact that the royal family numbers more than seven thousand 

individuals would certainly complicate a transition. Finally, exchanges of fire between Israel 

and militants in Gaza or eruptive tensions with Hezbollah in southern Lebanon may threaten 

to veer the narrative of reform throughout the region in less secular, more anti-Western directions. In the Middle East, not only domestic preconditions matter; regional conflicts also play 

an extraordinarily important role. 

Taking into account these factors and the internal and external variables derived from comparative analysis of the case studies, the countries with the best prospects for successfully completing democratic breakthrough are Tunisia and Egypt, with democratic movement, if not 

breakthrough, possible in Yemen. Libya also holds the potential for completing breakthrough, 

but the challenges are formidable. Important reforms are likely in Morocco and even Jordan, 

where King Abdullah II has become more vulnerable to pressure for political reforms in recent 

months. Bahrain, despite external support for the monarchy and relatively mild international 

condemnation for attacks on its critics, may yet host democratic reforms in the coming year. If 

Only breakthrough 

attempts in Tunisia, 

Jordan, and Morocco 

have remained 

relatively peaceful.
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DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

so, it will be due to the persistence of a courageous opposition, and it is doubtful that reforms 

will come peacefully or without resistance by neighboring Saudi Arabia. 

Little progress is likely in Saudi Arabia, Iran, or Algeria. Oppressive state security apparatuses, extraordinary wealth in the case of Saudi Arabia, and a divided populace in Algeria 

contribute to a stagnation of political development in these countries. Syria continues to be 

convulsed by violence with few prospects for stability in the near future. In all, this leaves the 

region a mix of success stories, flawed democracies, hybrid regimes, and retrenched autocracies.50 This says nothing about the extraordinarily difficult task of surviving postbreakthrough 

consolidations, or as Ian Bremmer would say, ascending the steepest point of the J-curve 

trajectory as nations move from stable closed societies to stable open ones.51

Pittacus, one of the seven sages of ancient Greece and hero of many battles, was known 

to say to those who were impatient around him, “Know thy opportunity. Know the right moment.” Like the Dalai Lama who clapped the rain from the sky, both suggested that knowing 

the right moment entails a good deal of watchfulness, understanding of the variables at play, 

and then the courage of deliberate action. It is much easier said than done. History, certainly 

democracy assistance, is replete with missed opportunities. When it comes to breakthrough 

attempts and all the risks they entail, those making such attempts deserve the humble respect 

of those watching their ordeal, and they deserve the most determined and mindful exertions to 

make efforts to assist them count. 
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Notes

1. For a description of Stanford University’s Center on Democracy, Development and Rule of Law (CDDRL) 

Program on Evaluating International Influences on Democratic Development, see http://cddrl.stanford.

edu/research/program_on_evaluating_international_influences_on_democratic_development/. The overall study will look at four types of democratic change in particular, including political liberalization, democratic consolidation, post-conflict democratic development, and democratic breakthroughs. This will result 

in four volumes, one for each type of democratic change, and each volume will contain approximately eight 

to fifteen case studies of success and failure. 

2. I served as the author of the CDDRL case study on Serbia, drawing on my experience as country director 

of the United States Agency for International Development’s Office of Transition Initiatives for Serbia from 

1997 to 2000.

3. See Larry Diamond and Leonardo Morlino, Assessing the Quality of Democracy (Baltimore, MD: Johns 

Hopkins University Press, 2005). Diamond and Morlino’s typology of the quality of democracy and elements of democratic development addresses: one, the rule of law (equality and fairness of law, equally applied 

to all citizens by an independent judiciary, and laws are publicly known and stable); two, participation (not 

only in voting, but in the life of political parties and civil society organizations, in the discussion and critique 

of policy, in communicating with elected representatives); three, competition (free and fair electoral competition between different political parties; legal and constitutional order guarantees these things); four, vertical 

accountability (the obligation of elected political leaders to answer for their decisions in public office when 

asked by voters or constitutional bodies); and, five, horizontal accountability (office holders are accountable 

not only to voters, but also to other officials and state institutions monitoring them).

4. See Laurence Whitehead, “Democratization with the Benefit of Hindsight: The Changing International 

Components,” in The UN Role in Promoting Democracy: Between Ideals and Reality, ed. Edward Newman and 

Roland Rich (New York: United Nations University Press, 2004); Francis Fukuyama, State-Building: 

Governance and World Order in the 21st Century (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004); 

Richard Youngs, International Democracy and the West: The Role of Governments, Civil Society, and 

Multinational Business (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004); and Thomas Carothers, In the Name of 

Democracy (Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1993), Assessing Democracy 

Assistance (1996), Aiding Democracy Abroad (1999), Critical Mission (2004), and Promoting the Rule of Law 

Abroad (2006).

5. Guillermo O’Donnell, Philippe Schmitter, and Laurence Whitehead, eds., Transitions from Authoritarian 

Rule: Southern Europe (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986). See also Carles Boix and 

Susan Stokes, “Endogenous Democratization,” World Politics 55, no. 4 (July 2003): 517–549; Stephan 

Haggard and Robert Kaufman, The Political Economy of Democratic Transitions (Princeton, NJ: Princeton 

University Press, 1995), and Larry Diamond, Developing Democracy: Toward Consolidation (Baltimore, MD: 

Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999).

6. O’Donnell, Schmitter, and Whitehead, Transitions from Authoritarian Rule. Examples of literature focused 

more narrowly on international factors and regional studies include Geoffrey Pridham, ed., Encouraging 

Democracy: The International Context of Regime Transition in Southern Europe (Bristol: University of Bristol 

Center for Mediterranean Studies, 1991); Laurence Whitehead, ed., The International Dimensions of 

Democratization: Europe and the Americas (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996); and Steven Levitsky and 

Lucan Way, “The Rise of Competitive Authoritarianism,” Journal of Democracy 13, no. 2 (April 2002).

7. See Thomas Carothers, Aiding Democracy Abroad (Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International 

Peace, 1999) and Critical Mission (2004); Tony Smith, America’s Mission: The United States and the Worldwide 

Struggle for Democracy in the Twentieth Century (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994); and 

Michael Cox, John Ikenberry and Takashi Inoguchi, American Democracy Promotion: Impulses, Strategies, and 

Impacts (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000). 

8. Frida Ghits, “World Citizen: What Will Egyptian Voters Choose,” World Politics Review, February 17, 

2011, www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/7913/world-citizen-what-will-egyptian-voters-choose. 

9. Anne Booth, “Growth Collapses in Indonesia: A Comparison of the 1930s and the 1990s,” in European 

Journal of Overseas History 3, no. 4 (2002): 73–-99.

10. United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, “Humanitarian Risk Analysis No. 8: 

Federal Republic of Yugoslavia,” January 31, 2000. Shortages of heating oil, basic commodities, health-care 

supplies, and the curtailment of school hours were a source of exasperation and aggravation. 

11. Abbas Milani, “Transition to Democracy in Iran: Observations on International Influences on 

Democratization in Iran” (working paper no. 109, CDDRL, Stanford University, March 2009), 12–13. 

12. Minxin Pei, “China in 1989: An Anatomy of a Failed Transition” (working paper, CDDRL, Stanford 

University, 2009). 

13. Ibid., 1.

14. Valerie Bunce and Sharon Wolchik, “Azerbaijan’s 2005 Parliamentary Elections: A Failed Attempt at 

Transition” (working paper no 89, CDDRL, Stanford University, 2008). 
43

DEMOCRATIC BREAKTHROUGHS: THE INGREDIENTS OF SUCCESSFUL REVOLTS

15. See, for instance, Michael McFaul, “Democracy Promotion as a World Value,” Washington Quarterly 28, no. 

1 (Winter 2004/5): 147–163.

16. Nader Habibi, “From Democracy Deficit to Democracy Envy in the Middle East,” World Politics Review, 

February 24, 2011, www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/7989/from-democracy-deficit-to-democracyenvy-in-the-middle-east. 

17. Among many recent articles on the topic, see David D. Kirkpatrick and Davis Sanger, “Dual Uprisings Show 

Potent New Threats to Arab States,” New York Times, February 13, 2011. Also see Al Jazeera’s “People and 

Power” profile at http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/peopleandpower/2011/02/201128145549829916.

html. Yet another piece on the character of CANVAS’s work can be found in Tina Rodenberg’s “Revolution 

U: What Egypt Learned from the Students Who Overthrew Milosevic,” Foreign Policy, February 18, 2011, 

www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/02/16/revolution.

18. Valerie Bunce and Sharon Wolchik, “International Diffusion and Postcommunist Electoral Revolutions,” 

Communist and Postcommunist Studies 39, no. 3 (September 2006): 283–304. 

19. Ludmila Krytynskaia, “Lukashenko’s Nine Lives,” Foreign Policy, December 17, 2010.

20. Kathryn Stoner-Weiss and Michael McFaul, “Domestic and International Influences on the Collapse of the 

Soviet Union (1991) and Russia’s Initial Transition to Democracy (1993)” (working paper no. 108, CDDRL, 

Stanford University, 2009). See also Joshua Muravchik, Exporting Democracy: Fulfilling America’s Democracy 

Abroad (Washington, DC: American Enterprise Institute, 1991), 190–91.

21. Leonard Downie Jr., “Council of Europe Votes for Probe of Rights in Turkey,” Washington Post,

January 30, 1982.

22. “U.S. Defends Turkey on Human Rights,” New York Times, July 10, 1982.

23. Bunce and Wolchik, “Azerbaijan’s 2005 Parliamentary Elections,” 22.

24. A. David Adesnik and Sunhyuk Kim, “If At First You Don’t Succeed: The Puzzle of South Korea’s 

Democratic Transition” (working paper no. 83, CDDRL, Stanford University, 2008), 28.

25. Gregory Domber, “Evaluating International Influences on Democratic Development: Poland 1980–1989” 

(working paper no. 88, CDDRL, Stanford University, 2008). 

26. Richard Youngs and Michael McFaul, “International Actors and Democratic Transitions: Ukraine 2004” 

(working paper no. 106, CDDRL, Stanford University, 2009), 37.

27. Alberto Diaz-Cayeros and Beatriz Magaloni, “International Influences in the Mexican (Failed and 

Successful) Transition to Democracy” (working paper no. 110, CDDRL, Stanford University, 2009), 3.

28. Senem Aydin-Düzgit and Yaprak Gürsoy, “International Influences on the Turkish Transition to 

Democracy in 1983” (working paper no. 87, CDDRL, Stanford University, 2008), 54.

29. Stephen Haggard and Robert Kaufman, The Political Economy of Democratic Transitions (Princeton, NJ: 

Princeton University Press, 1995). This contrasts with the work of Boix and Stokes, “Endogenous 

Democratization,” who suggest that economic growth, left intact, contributes to democratic development as 

GDP and per capita wealth increases.

30. Thomas Carothers, “The End of the Transition Paradigm,” Journal of Democracy 13, no. 1 (2002): 5–21.

31. It is instructive that in China, Iran, and Algeria there was little long-term capacity building support to civic 

groups or political actors prior to their own breakthrough attempts. 

32. As quoted by Tina Rosenberg in “Revolution U,” 2.

33. See Liz Fuller, “Azerbaijan: Authorities Intensify Pressures on Independent Media,” Radio Free Europe/

Radio Liberty, November 29, 2006, www.rferl.org/content/article/1073092.html, as cited by Bunce and 

Wolchik, “Azerbaijan’s 2005 Parliamentary Elections.”

34. Philip N. Howard, “The Cascading Effects of the Arab Spring,” Miller-McCune, February 23, 2011, 

www.miller-mccune.com/politics/the-cascading-effects-of-the-arab-spring-28575/ 

35. See Vadim Isakov, “Russia: Human Bots Fight Opposition,” Global Voices, March 21, 2011, http://globalvoicesonline.org/2011/03/21/russia-human-bots-fight-opposition/.

36. Sari Howitz, “Syria Using Internet to Censor Internet, Experts Say,” Washington Post, October 22, 2011. 

37. See Scott Shane, “Spotlight Again Falls on Web Tools and Change,” New York Times, January 30, 2011. 

38. See Oliver Burkeman, “SXSW 2011: The Internet Is Over,” Guardian, March 15, 2011, www.guardian.

co.uk/technology/2011/mar/15/sxsw-2011-internet-online. 

39. Thank you to Malcolm Gladwell for the “tipping point reference.” See his eponymous book, The Tipping 

Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference (New York: Little Brown 2000). Also see Liz Gannes, 

“Does Social Media Help Foment a Revolution? A Theory From Within Twitter,” AllThingsD.com, 

March 18, 2011, http://networkeffect. allthingsd .com/20110318/does-social-media-help-fomentrevolution-a-theory-from-within-twitter/?mod=googlenews. 

40. Interview with Baku State University professor, as cited in Bunce and Wolchik, “Azerbaijan’s 2005 

Parliamentary Elections,” 6.

41. See, for instance, Marina Ottaway and Thomas Carothers, eds., Funding Virtue (Washington, DC: 

Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2000), 293–310. 
44

PEACEWORKS 81

42. Domber, “Evaluating International Influences,” 31–32.

43. National Endowment for Democracy (NED), “The Backlash Against Democracy Assistance” (a report 

prepared by the National Endowment for Democracy for Senator Richard G. Lugar, chairman, Committee 

on Foreign Relations United States Senate, June 2006), 6, www.ned.org/docs/backlash06.pdf.

44. See “China Keeps a Nervous Eye on Color Revolutions,” Sydney Morning Herald, August 15, 2005, as cited 

in NED, “The Backlash Against Democracy Assistance,” 7.

45. “Egypt’s Attacks on NGOs—Crazy or Clever,” Democracy Digest, February 6, 2012, www.demdigest.net/

blog/2012/02/egypts-attack-on-ngos-crazy-or-clever.

46. See NED, “The Backlash Against Democracy Assistance,” 18–30. For additional information on these 

topics, see also the Web site of the International Center for Not-for-Profit Law (ICNL), www.icnl.org.

47. Thomas Carothers, “Washington’s Bow to Mideast Monarchs,” Washington Post, February 3, 2012.

48. In Egypt, where new youth formations and ad hoc citizens’ councils led labor unions in organizing dissent, 

it was new talent and not the traditional local partners of foreign donors that drove mass mobilization. In 

Jordan and Morocco, university-based student organizers are inspiring human rights, labor, and communitybased groups and women’s organizations to develop a coherent resistance platform, even as the lack of foreign 

diplomatic and economic pressure undermines the utility of their efforts. In Bahrain, Syria, Algeria, and 

Saudi Arabia, civic resistance appears rudderless by comparison as a result of years of persecution of entrepreneurial novices and civic professionals alike.

49. Carothers, “Washington’s Bow.” 

50. For an excellent discussion of the nature of hybrid regimes, see Larry Diamond, “Thinking About Hybrid 

Regimes,” Journal of Democracy 13, no. 2 (April 2002): 21–35. 

51. Ian Bremmer, The J Curve: A New Way to Understand Why Nations Rise and Fall (New York: Simon & 

Schuster, 2006).
 3

About the Institute

The United States Institute of Peace is an independent, nonpartisan 

institution established and funded by Congress. Its goals are to 

help prevent and resolve violent conflicts, promote postconflict 

peacebuilding, and increase conflict management tools, capacity, and 

intellectual capital worldwide. The Institute does this by empowering 

others with knowledge, skills, and resources, as well as by its direct 

involvement in conflict zones around the globe.

Board of Directors

J. Robinson West (Chair), Chairman, PFC Energy, Washington, D.C. •

George E. Moose, Adjunct Professor of Practice, The George Washington University, Washington, D.C. • Judy Ansley, Former Assistant to the 

President and Deputy National Security Advisor under George W. Bush, 

Washington, D.C. • Eric Edelman, Hertog Distinguished Practitioner in 

Residence, Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International 

Studies, Washington, D.C. • Kerry Kennedy, President, Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights, Washington, D.C. • 

Ikram U. Khan, President, Quality Care Consultants, LLC, Las Vegas, Nev

• Stephen D. Krasner, Graham H. Stuart Professor of International 

Relations, Stanford University, Palo Alto, Calif. • John A. Lancaster, 

Former Executive Director, International Council on Independent Living, 

Potsdam, N.Y. • Jeremy A. Rabkin, Professor of Law, George Mason 

University, Fairfax, Va. • Judy Van Rest, Executive Vice President, International Republican Institute, Washington, D.C. • Nancy Zirkin, Executive 

Vice President, Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, Washington, D.C.

Members Ex Officio

Michael H. Posner, Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, 

Human Rights, and Labor • James N. Miller, Principal Deputy Under 

Secretary of Defense for Policy • Nancy McEldowney, Acting President, 

National Defense University • Richard H. Solomon, President, 

United States Institute of Peace (nonvoting)
4 Looking for Justice

In 2010, Stanford University’s Center on Development, 

Democracy and the Rule of Law (CDDRL) concluded a 

study of fifteen instances of democratic breakthroughs. 

Eleven of these revolts were considered successful 

and four had failed. To be successful, a democratic 

breakthrough removes an autocratic regime and 

establishes a system of free and fair elections. This 

study compares domestic and international factors 

influencing each of the breakthrough attempts identified 

in the CDDRL project. It then assesses the implications 

for democratization policy, the implementation of 

democracy assistance abroad, and the prospects for 

revolts in the Middle East and North Africa. 

PEACEWORKS • AUGUST 2012 • NO. 81 

UNITED STATES INSTITUTE OF PEACE • 2301 CONSTITUTION AVE. NW • WASHINGTON, DC 20037 • USIP.ORG 

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