xie xie xiao mei freetranslation.com: "will cost 49.95 to translate these four words!" :$ "there are a zillion thoieries on everything in humanties/scoial sicence.. you adhere to one beliefe due to your academic training and personal experience does not necessarily make all others that you don't agree with false." i take that last sentence back. "Nepal's transition took too long. Ours is always a "shishu prajatantra"..just how long should we wait to get this shishu to walk and talk? I think we have waited enbough and this shishu is yet to eat cerelec!" Not necessarily, there are more examples of states taking 25-30 yrs in average to democratize, than states who have democratized in less than 10 yrs. it does take a painstakingly long time (only in some states that have a history of political society, less repressive authoritarian regimes, and numerous other factors that contribute to democracy, have democratized relatively faster than others. How many years has it been since the French Revolution?), but as Anil Ji in his posting has said, if we can endure, the end result will be worth it. "People are suing the govt. in China and are winning the cases.. so what I am getting at is, even in the authritarian setting, you can have the rule of law and civil society, which only helps sustain the transition later. Another example is Chile." China is an entirely different and an exceptional case. you might already know, given China's type of regime and economic development, critics are examining China as a separate domain of political and economic system (i had a friend who compared India's liberal democracy and China's communism to compare development in these two countries).