The phase of open contestation should come after institutional reform is well under way, especially in multi-ethnic societies. Otherwise, political rivalry is likely to degenerate into ethnicity-baiting, patronage-grabbing and election-fixing. Indicators of readiness would include the growth of economic sectors other than oil, the curtailment of extreme corruption, and the beginnings of a capacity to offer effective legal redress to individuals who suffer ethnic discrimination. Malaysia, for example, is probably ready to democratize further; Pakistan and Iraq are not. Sometimes negative outcomes are unavoidable, but democracy promotion strategies should be sequenced to try to prevent them.

The danger is not just that the transition will be chaotic and violent, but also that anti-democratic groups and ideas will be mobilized and will become a long-lasting fixture on the political scene, as in much of former Yugoslavia and the Caucasus. Out-of-sequence, incomplete democratization often creates an enduring template for illiberal, populist politics--for example, the cycling between military dictatorship and illiberal democracy in Pakistan, the theocratic populism of Iran, and ethnic tyrannies of the majority in many transitional states. These political habits, once rooted in ideologies and institutions, are hard to break. Once an ethnic nationalist movement takes hold in a fairly literate society with a politically active population, that identity almost always becomes a permanent fixture of the political landscape. It is better to strengthen state institutions that can serve as the basis for an inclusive, civic form of national loyalty before spurring popular political action that could, in their absence, play into the hands of exclusionary ethnic national movements.

The United States, if it wishes to further the long-term goal of a democratic peace, needs a great deal of patience. This means recognizing the necessity of using the tools of diplomacy to protect its security interests in a world where non-democracies persist and where some democratic transitions are likely to proceed incrementally. President Bush had high praise for Natan Sharansky's book, The Case for Democracy (2004), which, among other things, argues the Israelis should not negotiate with the Palestinians until they are a full democracy of Sweden-like perfection. This is poor advice not only for Israel but for the United States as well. Diplomacy may be smoother between democracies, but it often works well enough between democracies and non-democracies to head off tensions and forge peace. After all, Israel's security was immeasurably enhanced by the Camp David accords with the undemocratic Egyptian President Anwar Sadat. Israel has made no attempt to overthrow Sadat or Mubarak and replace them with a more democratic regime. Normal diplomacy can often maintain peace between democracies and non-democratic states, not to mention gradually reform states. After all, diplomacy worked without regime change to neutralize the weapons-of-mass-destruction and terrorist threats from undemocratic Libya.

Rarely are matters so desperate that there is no alternative to forced-pace democracy promotion at gunpoint. It is better to be patient and get the sequence right.

1 This section is based on Edward D. Mansfield and Jack Snyder, Electing to Fight: Why Emerging Democracies Go to War (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2005)

Edward D. Mansfield is Hum Rosen Professor of Political Science and director of the Christopher H. Browne Center for International Politics at the University of Pennsylvania. Jack Snyder is Robert and Renée Belfer Professor of International Relations in the Political Science Department and the Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies at Columbia University.