Part 4 The Fragile Basis of Democracy and Development, 4.2 The Difficult Path toward Democracy: New Electoral Systems in Egypt, Libya, and Tunisia

The Arab revolutions share “some edifying similarities”:1 They were unexpected, spontaneous, and contemporaneous. For the Arab world, the revolutions brought enthrallment, and hope of proceeding at last to the bed of democracy. There have been a variety of paths taken toward this shared democratic objective, in a disconcerting acceleration of the constitutional histories of the countries concerned. In Tunisia, the path was shaped by a “political pact”,2 sealed by the Higher Authority for Realization of the Objectives of the Revolution, Political Reform, and...