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Remember that stable democracies always have the potential become authoritarian dictatorships. History is littered with examples: France, Germany, Japan, Chile, Turkey and to a lesser extent, the authoritarian strongmen who were elected in the US, India, Brazil, Venezuela and many more.

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>France, Germany, Japan, Chile, Turkey

Not a single one of these was ever a stable democracy before becoming a dictatorship. Unless maybe you're referring to Vichy France, but that's more of an occupation.

Turkey wasn't stable prior to Erdogan?

There was a coup in 1980. And the list at https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat is pretty convincing evidence that calling Turkey a stable democracy would be a stretch.

It has a long repetitive history of violent transitions in power, including the last couple hundred years.

Turkish democracy is barely 100 years old. If we are looking at a timeline of ~200 years, even the US won't come across as particularly stable, what with the Civil War and multiple Presidential assassinations since 1819.

None of those assassinations lead to a coup or revolution though, just peaceful transfer to the 2nd person in line. That seems like a vote for stability

Also, Rome and Greek city states.

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