When do revolutions lead to democracy ? [Ressource électronique] : the conflict between democracy and governance in Georgia and Tunisia / Josh McCrain

Bibliogr. p. 39-43

Master of arts : Political science, concentration transAtlantic studies : University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill : 2013

The revolutions that began in Tunisia in late 2010 spread across the region and toppled many seemingly durable authoritarian regimes in the Arab world. These revolutions in the name of democracy drew many comparisons to the popular color revolutions of the early 2000s that ousted leaders of post-communist regimes in Georgia, Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan. Through the benefit of time, observers have noted that the democratic quality of these Eurasian regimes is lacking, and many now exhibit the same characteristics of the regime they deposed through revolution - a worrying sign for democrats in the Arab world. This thesis compares the cases of Georgia and Tunisia by focusing on the conflict between the progressions of democracy versus governance in democratizing, post-revolutionary regimes. In post-revolutionary regimes, either democracy or governance will prevail at the cost of the other, lending key insights into the future democratic development of the case in question.