International Security

Vol. 32, No. 2 (Fall 2007)

Can the West promote democracy? An examination of one critical case, the 2004 Orange Revolution in Ukraine, offers a unique method for generating answers to this important theoretical and policy question. Tracing the causal impact of external influences first requires a theory of democratization composed exclusively of domestic factors, specifically the changing distribution of power between the autocratic regime and democratic challengers. 

Throughout the history of the modern world, domestic regime change - be it democratization, autocratization, decolonization, decommunization, federal dissolution, coups, or revolutions - has often triggered international conflict and war. (...) The protracted regime transformation under way in Russia seems like a probably precipitant of international conflict.