Theories of ‘democratisation’ are about how to apply ‘liberal democracy’ to countries which often also tend to be developing countries. There have been various approaches to thinking about the possibilities, desirability, conditions and limits of ‘liberal democracy’ for countries in economic development and the forces shaping these possibilities, conditions and limits. This reflects changes in the understandings of what it is that has to be explained, giving rise to different ways of looking at the possibilities and feasibility of ‘liberal democracy’ for developing countries, with their particular assumptions about the nature of the end-product. In these various theories, one can find different ways of explaining the trajectories of democratisation, as a result of different questions being asked. Different questions were asked partly because questions were asked in response to differing contemporary world events, and partly because starting points, although sharing commonalities, have differences, as a result both of a different general international condition, and of different domestic ‘starting points’ even in the same country at different times. As a result there emerged various ways of conceptualising factors affecting the process of democratisation, and the interaction of these factors determines both the sustainability and/or consolidation of democracy and, if democracy survives and is consolidated, the nature of the resultant democracy.

The first section of this chapter explains how theorising about democratisation can be delineated into three phases, a ‘pre-conditions’ phase, a ‘political crafting’ phase and a ‘structured contingency’ phase.