A response to cultural democratic compatibility and asia

I find the topic of a state's compatibility with democracy a fascinating one, and one of the primary reasons I was so interested in this course. I will attempt to lay out my (granted very limited and based almost entirely on personal construction rather than evidence or fact) thoughts on the matter. These thoughts will probably be rambling and incoherent as I'm really not all together positive where I might end up. I'm also not sure whether I will be receiving a lollipop from Ben as I both agree and disagree that compatibility varies.

First off, I'm going to consider more than just cultural values as far as compatibility is concerned, I think economics and societal composition are also important elements to be considered. Although I agree with what was pointed out in lecture that the wording used (mainly 'maturity') was fairly condescending and typically Western, I think that there are definitely values that have been developed over time by Western societies (ie that are not innate or universally agreed on) that are necessary for democracy to work. The main one being recognition of the equality of all opinions and their right to be expressed and heard. There are others, but this one can commonly be considered the absolute most fundamental basis of democracy. So if a culture does not have this as a value, democratic institutions will be majorly flawed.
Cultural values tend to be considered as the personal beliefs within the culture, however another cultural value that must be developed and is necessary for democracy is the willingness of the people to participate. Almond and Verba's Civic Society has always been a piece that I find interesting (and one that seems to be reoccuring in political theory courses) and I find that I agree with a lot that they say. A democracy must have the right mixture of participation...too much and nothing gets done because no one agrees, too little and democracy crumbles into oligarchy or autocracy. So democracy cannot work unless the people are willing to put in the effort to make it work, in other words, the people must want democracy. So unless this is the case, I don't see democracy as compatible. But some people may question when its the case that citizens wouldn't want to participate and for Westerners who take such participation for granted, it is difficult to imagine. But countries who historically have little to no participation of the masses or severe poverty it can and does occur. Russia has a history of little mass participation and one of its struggles is that even with democratic institutions, it is far too easy for government and economic oligarchs to take control with little accountability since the majority of the citizens (most extremely poor) do not have the inclination/luxury to involve themselves in politics in order to MAKE politicians/economic elites accountable.
Poverty could be a huge reason behind this, who cares about politics when you must spend all your energy just to survive? There are lots of countries where the majority of the population is in such dire poverty that the luxury of being involved in politics is absurd.
To summarize this rambling thought process, I guess the way I see it is that there are three major pillars in a nation: Economy, Society, and Politics. If all three have serious conflict or are unstable, then it would seem to make democracy difficult to successfully institute. Severe poverty might put politics lower on the list of priorities for the average individual, society that is divided or has a history of unquestioned subordination may not adhere to democratic principles, and politics where its all too easy to slip into dictatorship provides little incentive for those few participating to maintain a legit democracy. I think it is difficult to create democracy first and then hope to fix the other problems, as democracy can be extremely fragile. However who's to say that an authoritarian leader can solve the problems of the other pillars since historically authoritarian leaders are self-interested and growth/societal conflicts tend to be slow or exacerbated as issues. So on that point, I hit an impasse for I'm not sure which is the more effective ways to proceed. I'm not sure there is really any answer yet or else so much of the world would have instituted such an answer and there would be a lot less problems in the world.
So while I don't think that it is impossible for any country to evolve to a point where democracy could be successful...I also don't think that you can just write up a democratic constitution, throw together a few elections, and expect democracy to work.
And perhaps, as a very Western cliche (flame me for being American if you want) I believe that democracy can be beneficial to any country that adopts it properly and correctly. Now I am by no means saying that any democracy is perfect, far from it, but I think that democracy when created improperly (ie forcing it rather than having it willingly adopted) and maintained improperly can be as useless as any other structure of governance that has its own major flaws. But democracy as an ideal (or as close to an ideal as it can practically get in the real world) can be positive for any culture or state no matter what social values (putting aside one necessary for democracy) a culture may hold. While communism may be the utilitarian ideal, in human experience a mediocre or better democracy has been the most successful and is the most adaptable to cultural norms.

On the Asia note--> "Asian Values" is extremely generalized and completely absurd.

So those are my thoughts, I'd like to hear critiques or points that people found interesting as I have never really hashed out such a thought in writing, it has up until now just been a wandering and unorganized notion in my head.