In this paper, I will analyze the participation of Egypt and Syria in the Arab Spring using Huntington’s theory of third wave democratization. I will begin this examination with a brief overview that will place the current Arab Spring issue into its historical context. I will follow this contextual information with an exploration of the revolution and uprising of Egyptian and Syrian citizens viewed through the lens of Huntington’s third wave democratization theory. I then will assess whether the states fall into the category of the third wave of democratization.Determining the correct categorization of both Syria and Egypt’s uprisings is important in making the argument that they should follow the examples of other countries like Poland, Turkey, and Uruguay in the establishment of democratic societies. If these countries have not joined the third wave, I will attempt to determine if they instead have started the fourth wave of democratization. Even though I will examine only the cases of Egypt and Syria, the paper’s findings can be generalized to all states involved in the Arab Spring, because Egypt and Syria’s political, social, economic, and ethnic structures serve as smaller models of the most states in North Africa and the Middle East. This means the paper’s findings will go beyond the two states Egypt and Syria.

– Abstract