An astonishing political transformation has taken place around the world over the past three decades. Today, a majority of countries are ‘electoral democracies’. Even the Middle East, a region that long seemed immune to democratisation, is in the midst of momentous change. In country after country, people have risked their lives to call for free elections, and elections have been held in all but 11 countries since 2000. Clearly, there is a lot more to democracy than elections — but elections are among its most visible elements, and they have become almost universal.