That's all I needed to see.
Steven needs to take a little tour of the Middle East. He might find a couple of new democracies if he did.
I am not an expert on this but tribalism is the most basic form of organization known to man. If you look at these areas, typically they are low density , low level socio economic agrarian based systems. They have not yet had a need to evolve away from their "proven" methods of education, capital organization, tecnological advancement, government and government practices such as taxation. Sure you can give backwards people the ability to vote, but without the evolution in infrastructure this "democracy" to our standards will fail. It will tend to regress to what they understand and know. The thing that works for them.
If on the other hand they can see the need and benefits of education and deliver it to the masses, then socio-political advancement can occur. Then the necessary infrastrucrue will develope.
As long as they think tribal- as opposed to "national", they will be in the same rut