Spring 2009
"Long Time Coming: Prospects for Democracy"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 4, volume 33
The odds of Iraq achieving democracy in the next twenty-five years are nearly zero, at best about two in thirty, but probably worse. Since the end of the nineteenth century, thirty nations have had long-lasting autocracies as extreme as Iraq's. Of those, only seven are now democratic. Their average transition time was fifty years, and only two managed it in twenty-five years. Their collective political experience indicates a similarly pessimistic future for Iraq and comparable nations. Furthermore, Iraq lacks the structural conditions necessary for a successful democratic transition. Thus the sober question of whether Iraq can democratize should deter policymakers from considering regime change in Iran or North Korea.
