In most cases, democratization has followed an authoritarian ruler\'s mistake.

With authoritarian rulers ascendant in many parts of the world, one wonders what must happen for their countries to liberalize. The likes of Vladimir Putin in Russia, Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Turkey or Xi Jinping in China are entrenched, experienced and not unpopular -- so should their opponents simply resign themselves to an open-ended period of illiberal rule?

According to Daniel Treisman, a UCLA political scientist, that\'s not necessarily the case. For a recent paper, he analyzed 218 episodes of democratization between 1800 and 2015 and found they were, with some exceptions (such as Danish King Frederick VII\'s voluntary acceptance of a constitution in 1848), the result of authoritarian rulers\' mistakes in seeking to hold on to power. The list of these errors is both a useful handbook.

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