Regime change policies are when one country, covertly or overtly, interferes with another’s government with the goal of replacing that government with a new government that is friendlier to the interfering nation. Modern examples include the U.S.’s efforts to support coups, intervene in civil wars and to invade countries to overthrow them.
Despite the many high-profile failures of regime change, some in the policy community still favor this tool, arguing that it can achieve objectives more cheaply and quickly than diplomatic pressure or engagement. But they overlook the evidence that shows how difficult it is to achieve a stable, functional state when imposing a leader from outside.
The problem is that domestically-based leaders are typically constrained by a host of domestic and regional factors, including limited economic resources. As a result, they cannot satisfy the needs of all domestic constituencies—even when they are doing their best to please them. This constraint makes it exceptionally challenging to forcibly oust antagonistic governments.
The fact that these domestic constraints make it so difficult to sustain a democratic system also helps explain why, once a regime is overthrown, it almost always moves back toward autocracy. For example, after the 1979 revolution in Iran, which removed Pahlavi and replaced him with Khomeini, the regime reversed the social reforms and secular policies of its predecessor and embraced fundamentalist theocracy. This shift pushed Iranian society away from the middle class that had supported Pahlavi’s earlier regime and towards the working poor.