Thank you IF for taking some time to think on it. "I haven't read *ANY* of the books/authors mentioned, and that's the beauty of academia. You can assume extreme positions and as long as you can prove your hypothesis/thesis, you are fine." First I'd like to say a few things about the authors I mentioned. I don't know about IR students, but comparative politics students worship them like god :) I don?t mean to dig into your knowledge base (as long as the arguments are strong), but I think the authors that you mention, Thomas Friedman (is this the same guy, the NY Times Columnist?), Rudyard Kipling, they're magazine writers, or story writers, what we call in academia. Noam Chomsky (extreme left), Edward Said, are good writers, but I wouldn't quote them when I argue on democracy or democratization. These authors, Robert Dahl (on the concept of Democracy), Theda Skocpol (on Revolutions), Juan J. Linz and Alfred Stepan (on Democratization), Guillermo O Donnell (on Authoritative Regimes), Robert D. Putnam (on Historical Institutionalism); they're political scientists, celebrated for challenging the old literature and establishing a new trend in the field. So if I were to argue on communism or capitalism, I'd pick Marx than Chomsky or Kanak Dixit. And this is by no means to put down your knowledge on specific areas, I personally think you know a lot better than me, and its fun to argue with someone more knowledgeable than myself. Ok, about the arguments now. "You are right to some degree and I give credits to you for that, but you are not right entirely. Of course, that some countries are not ready for democracy justified American support for the dictators all over (and the same logic is used to justify the American support for Egypt, Saudi Arabia and places like that..)" If you're bringing in American diplomacy and foreign policy to argue why some countries democratized while some didn't, I have not much to say. Whether America will support dictators or want democracy in that country is a different game, of foreign policy. Their stance in a country will change depending on their political interest; I think you yourself mentioned this somewhere in the thread, with the example of US support in Pakistan. "..but after the cold ward, when people had access to those formerly unaccessible places or off limit places, people saw how they really were, and surprinsingly enough, the State Department proved right! Yes, certain countries were/are not ready for the transition" You haven't proved this point, how? "Yes, many nations went through this masive democratization phase in the 90s, but how many of them are functioning- fully functioning- democracies? Look at Rumania, Bulgaria, Georgia, Armenia and the Central Asian Countries, do you think they are functioning democracies? I don't think so.. In my view, the are autocracies- neo-authoririan rules in democratic disguise." I never said all of the countries that started the process are full democracies now. In fact, out of the 100 or so countries that entered into transition, only a few have attained a well functioning democracy, 20 or so are en route to becoming successful, while some countries have clearly failed letting the authoritarian regimes re-solidify, like in Uzbekistan, Togo, Belarus. Yes, there are reasons why democracy failed (and personally, I think the type of authoritative regime in the past has partially to do with it). But democracy failed doesn't mean authoritarian regimes are better. "Your example to compare Nepal with Italy vis-a-vis democratic consodilation is wrong. Italy is and was an industrial economy, with a significant already "politically charged" labor population. Nepal doesn't have that.. as a result the middle class is virtually non existant. Furthermore, when you talk about Italy, you have to talk about the political instability there too, hoina?" Yes, comparing Nepal with Italy would be a fatal mistake. I'm not comparing Italy and Nepal; I'm only using historical institutionalism to explain why the transition period in Nepal is so difficult. You can take any literature on historical insti. for that matter. Putnam in that article analyzes three or four different regions in Italy to see how institutions of the past shape the process of transition, thereby making one region industrially and politically developed than the other. Nepal's history of political institutions begins during the Rana period, but because they didn't get much chance to foster, political and social institutions that constitute the civil society are weak- one reason why transition is becoming painfully difficult today. "So when you do not resolve the coordination dilemma, which forms the basis of the new social contract between the three players- the soverign, elites and the commonmers- you are basically screwed. Westren European nations or where the democracies functions today, resolved this coordination dillema before or soon after they democratized, because then the world was still less interconnected, unlike today.. One of the ways they resoved this coordination dilelma was through economy- with economic development they bridged the ethnic and economic gaps in their respective societies. Where democarcy does not resolve- or solve?- this coordination dillema, like in Latin American countries ( and this explains why democarcies do not work there)" Interesting argument. But again, brings the question of correlation between development and democracy. There is a possibility that if a country is doing good in all aspects of development (socio-cultural, economic, political, ethnic etc.), the presence of civil society, and the tendency of rulers governing democratically, without infringing on constitution and violating the rights of the minorities, will be felt vividly. This is what you've called 'coordination', if I?m not mistaken. But the debate on democracy and development is still pending, so I don't want to base my argument on that. Also, your argument is kind of contradictory in itself. You say economic development bridges socio-economic and ethnic gap (you haven't said how), and give example of why Latin America is not democratic. In my earlier post I'd given example that some Latin American countries were economically advanced than some Southern European countries, but democracy in the former was doing worse than the latter. And lastly, you forgot to answer my biggest question. Why, would you still, support Monarchy?