Socio-economic hardship breeds not only repression to force people to live with hardship, but also resistance, often in turn provoking repression in initial rounds, but in subsequent rounds quite possibly forcing dictatorial regimes to give in, partially or thoroughly, and to concede democratic reforms. This is another way, twisted as it may look, in which structural adjustment may indeed lead up to democratization.

p. 20 - Politics and Structural Adjustment in a West-African Village (1990). AKUT, Uppsala universitet