Do international factors, including the democracy promotion policies of Western actors, play a significant role in encouraging or discouraging the opening up of political space in authoritarian regimes such as Burma, China, Libya, North Korea, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Syria or Turkmenistan? If so, when and how do external incentives, financial and technical aid, socialization techniques, diplomacy or demonstration effects play a role in liberalizing closed regimes? What combination of domestic conditions and external factors are most likely to do so? What are the pathways of external influence on domestic change and what does the nexus of interaction between external and domestic variables look like in reality?

CDDRL's research program Evaluating International Influences on Democratic Development aims to provide a comprehensive evaluation of the efficacy of available instruments to encourage democratic development, in an effort to learn what has worked, what has not, and under what conditions.

This research track, the third of four planned, will focus on understanding the international dimensions of liberalization of authoritarian regimes. By exploring a set of successful and failed cases of liberalization since the advent of the Third Wave of democratizations in 1974, the program seeks to gain a better understanding of external influence on domestic democratic development dynamics, and to provide a better guide to future academics and policymakers interested in promoting democracy abroad.

Work on this research track is scheduled to commence in October 2008.