Understanding Third World Politics gives a comprehensive and critical introduction to the main theories of political science used to understand political change in developing countries. It provides an overview of the variety of political institutions and processes in the third world, and critically evaluates the major explanatory frameworks used by political scientist to understand them. The discussion is supported throughout by carefully-chosen, contemporary examples from around the world. The book concludes by considering the political instability that so frequently plagues poor countries and by identifying the conditions required to establish democratic stability. This third edition has been extensively revised and updated throughout and offers a clear and theoretically rigorous introduction to the politics of the third world.