Assessment of Political Barriers of Transition to Democracy in Bahrain

The first wave of transition to democracy began in Bahrain in 1995 and in 1999 led to a series of reforms from above. But slowness and the lack of serious progress in the implementation of reforms on the one hand and the changes that began in Tunisia on the other hand caused the formation of a second wave of protests against the government in 2011.
Al-Wefaq was the core of the protests on behalf of Shiites in this country who demand democratic reforms and implementing the 1999 National Charter. Political instability caused by the second wave of protests, not only did not strengthen the process of transition to democracy, but also political obstacles on both internal and external levels caused frustration and thus stop the process of political modernization. This article is a descriptive-analytic review of Bahrain's political obstacles in the process of transition to democracy. The main question is what factors caused failure of the second wave of transition in Bahrain? Both the ruling elite's coherence and incoherence of the opposition at local, regional and international levels, the role of Saudi Arabia and America, are among the factors that contributed to the failure of the transition to democracy in Bahrain. It should be noted that the impact of each of these factors, especially at the local level, are not the same.