Chapters 3 and 4 examine the fate of hybrid regimes in Eastern Europe and the Americas, where proximity to Europe and the United States resulted in high linkage in 10 of 12 cases (and nearly high linkage in the other two). Extensive ties to the United States or Western Europe generated strong and persistent external democratizing pressure, which resulted in democratization in 9 of 10 high-linkage cases. In many of these cases, linkage-based pressure was so intense that democratization occurred in the face of significant domestic obstacles, including underdevelopment (e.g., Guyana, Macedonia, Nicaragua, and Romania); severe ethnic tension (Guyana and Macedonia) and/or civil war (Croatia and Serbia); powerful incumbents (Croatia, Guyana, Mexico, Nicaragua, Serbia, and Slovakia); and extreme civic and opposition weakness (everywhere except Mexico and Serbia). Among high-linkage cases, only Albania – which was characterized by underdevelopment, extreme state weakness, and a recent history of Stalinist rule – failed to democratize, and it came very close to democratization by 2008.

The mechanisms of external interference differed between the two regions. For example, EU democratization efforts in Eastern Europe were more institutionalized and top-down than anything seen in the Americas. The leverage of EU membership had no equivalent in the Americas. Yet, in both regions, linkage motivated extensive Western engagement – including strong diplomatic pressure, a high level of attention to even minor abuse, and even military intervention (Nicaragua and Serbia) that powerfully constrained autocrats and created openings for democratic opposition that were not seen in low-linkage cases.