Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, Paraguay and Nicaragua, stay tuned to see how those end… (not de-facto dictatorships but applying the same methods)

Great question! There are very few examples. One of these, surprisingly enough, was that poster boy of repressive dictatorship, Augusto Pinochet of Chile. Seven years into his extra-constitutional rule, he promised to return the reigns of power to civilian rule ten years later, in 1990. In 1988, he conducted a referendum asking for another 8 year term, but this was rejected. So, true to his word, he organized a democratic election in 1990, and willingly handed power to the elected cilvilian government.

Yes, the Chilean dictatorship ended up in a referendum, but, d’you know why people voted against another term, because thousands of people were killed or disappeared, so in the end, it was a bloodbath…

I would think that I am still alarmed at how close Hitler,Mussolini, and Franco really came to ‘winning’. I personally think that would have been a bad thing. Does that make me biased. Absolutely not! Some would say that a benevolent dictator could possibly be the ideal, efficient way to manage the affairs of a country and its citizenry. We have not seen any longterm benevolent dictators to test that hypothesis, to my knowledge.

@flameboi Oh, he was nasty alright, but that makes it all the more surprising that he just peacefully left. He could easily have clung to power, as virtually all others like him have.

One reason, by the way, that dictators rarely abdicate is out of fear of prosecution by their successors. Pinochet did make an immunity agreement with the new civilian government, but it didn’t hold, and he fled the country.

After reading Harp’s answer I was going to say Argentina. But re-reading the question, I see it’s looking for benevolent dictatorial rule, not a peaceful end to dictatorship.

So that rules out Chile and Argentina.

@jaytkay Oh, right, I guess I was focusing too much on the ”...didn’t end in…” part of the Q.

How about Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s presidency in the two years from his inauguration to Supreme Court’s declaration that the National Recovery Administration was unconstitutional. It has been described as a benevolent dictatorship. from wikipedia

Then as my pick for benevolent dictator, I nominate Ashoka the Great. This is reaching back a bit…OK, a lot—Ashoka ruled the Indian sub-continent from 269–323 BC. He came to power in the usual way, by kicking ass, but after his biggest, bloodiest victory, he was so horrified by the realization of the destruction that he had caused that he did a complete about-face. Here’s what Wikipedia says about it:

“During the remaining portion of Ashoka’s reign, he pursued an official policy of nonviolence (ahimsa). Even the unnecessary slaughter or mutilation of people was immediately abolished. Everyone became protected by the king’s law against sport hunting and branding. Limited hunting was permitted for consumption reasons but Ashoka also promoted the concept of vegetarianism. Ashoka also showed mercy to those imprisoned, allowing them leave for the outside a day of the year. He attempted to raise the professional ambition of the common man by building universities for study, and water transit and irrigation systems for trade and agriculture. He treated his subjects as equals regardless of their religion, politics and caste. The kingdoms surrounding his, so easily overthrown, were instead made to be well-respected allies.

He is acclaimed for constructing hospitals for animals and renovating major roads throughout India. After this transformation, Ashoka came to be known as Dhammashoka (Sanskrit), meaning Ashoka, the follower of Dharma. Ashoka defined the main principles of dharma (dhamma) as nonviolence, tolerance of all sects and opinions, obedience to parents, respect for the Brahmans and other religious teachers and priests, liberality towards friends, humane treatment of servants, and generosity towards all. These principles suggest a general ethic of behaviour to which no religious or social group could object.”

@Harp Hello my gifted friend
About the Chilean issue, yes, I remember how all that went, and the Spaniard judge that wanted to put him in jail forever…
In a dictatorship, we can only say that there are no winners in the end…

@Harp Good answer. Forgot about Ashoka.

My (non-expert) impression is that, after Tiananmen Square in 1989, there hasn’t been mass violence against the Chinese people. Prosperity seems to satisfy enough that they aren’t pushing for political freedom.

The unprecedented economic expansion of China has brought economic well-being to hundreds of millions. Though China is so huge, for hundreds of millions of other people, little has changed over the past twenty years.

George W. Bush. Historians will see it as a dictatorship, yet he did release his power peacefully.

@jaytkay—What??

Sorry, there has been lots of violence in China since Tiannamen, overt and covert. Just in the past 2 years, there’s been a lot of unrest in a variety of regions including Tibet and Xinjiang and Urmuqi, Xinjiang.

There are many people here in China pushing for political freedom, but sometimes it’s hard to know how. Here in Hong Kong recently they just put back the promised date (previously 2012) of a full blown democratic election of the Chief Executive, and it’s frustrating, very frustrating.

However, in a protest of 500,000 people on July 1st, 2003 here, we managed to get Article 23, a national security law shelved, and our last chief executive to “retire for medical reasons” (a face-saving gesture for him to step down). So there are definitely voices demanding for democracy, sometimes with some success, sometimes with less.

There are people holding the government accountable to corruption and are being harassed or arrested (e.g., parents demanding investigation into badly constructed schools with regards to the Sichuan earthquake—see here). So not every one is happy here, and for every person brave enough to speak out, they are applauded by many who wish they had the guts to do the same.

In some ways, I think the violence of self-censorship, of mass brainwashing is even more scary than the “mass violence” of Tiannamen you talk about. Certainly the effects are more far-reaching.

@lifeflame …here in China…

You are fluthering from China?

uh, yeah… Hong Kong, China.
(why are you so surprised? we have internet here…)

@lifeflame wonderful.

By the way, does anyone know much about Bhutan? I heard that their king ushered in democracy and set the priorities for a great balance of modernisation + preservation of traditional cultures + environment…

@lifeflame Well, he abdicated. I favor of democratic demands.

Well, I don’t know if you would consider communism a dictatorship. But it certainly was authoritarian. And when the Soviet Union fell along with Eastern Europe it was for the most part peaceful, and most people were happy.

The wikipedia article should help.

When you are talking about governments working, they rarely do so in the long term no matter the system. Of those which have not yet men mentioned, Pakistan, Korea, and Greece seemed to not have royally screwed things up during their last dictatorships.

On the Chile case, while Pinochet gave up control without bloodshed, the government was responsible for a lot of missing people during that time. Its not a record he should be proud of and is why they tried to put him in jail for so many years (he changed the constitution to give himself immunity IIRC).

@lifeflame
Thanks, I am much better informed now

Up to a point, East Germany. Some people were killed when trying to get to West Germany. But East Germany never had the death penalty for example. Only the Soviets executed a few people in the early 50ies.