Demokratisoituminen 1990-luvun maailmassa

Kirjoittajat

• Tatu Vanhanen

Abstrakti

It is argued in this article that the global trend of democratization is due to similar factors everywhere in the world because of our common human nature. The theory of democratization used in this study claims that democracy emerges when important power resources are so widely distributed that no group is any longer able to establish or maintain its hegemony. The theory is tested by empirical evidence covering 1,139 observation units since the 1850s, but attention is focused on 172 states during the period 1990-1993 in this article. The results show that the degree of resource distribution explains a major part of the variation in the level of democratization. The relationship between the level of democracy and the degree of resource distribution is approximately the same in all parts of the world, although there is some regional variation and although single countries deviate from the general pattern of relationship. The study shows, for example, that we can expect the emergence of new democracies in the Middle East region of Muslim countries, whereas the prospects of democracy seem still to be poor in Sub-Saharan Africa.