Waves of democracy

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In political science, the waves of democracy or waves of democratization are major surges of democracy that have occurred in history, in contrast with waves of autocracy or waves of autocratization, where democratic backsliding occurs. The third wave of autocratization is ongoing and began during the war on terror or Great Recession. Although the term appears at least as early as 1887, it was popularized by Samuel P. Huntington, a political scientist at Harvard University, in his article published in the Journal of Democracy and further expounded in his 1991 book, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century. Democratization waves have been linked to sudden shifts in the distribution of power among the great powers, which created openings and incentives to introduce sweeping domestic reforms. Scholars debate the precise number of democratic waves. Huntington describes three waves: the first "slow" wave of the 19th century, a second wave after World War II, and a third wave...

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