Abstract
Azmi Bishara outlines and cross-references the various theories, paradigms and concepts of "tansitology", studies on democratic transition and those dedicated to modernization, highlighting their aporias and challenging their claim to universalism. Insofar as they were born and developed in the West, like the social sciences as a whole, these studies and approaches are, in reality, no more than area studies. Nevertheless, they should not be excluded from the analysis of Arab countries. He compares the way in which the transition to democracy took place in Tunisia and Egypt, and discusses the factors and reasons why Tunisia achieved democracy, while the process of democratic transformation was aborted in Egypt.
