Hizballah in Syria: the limits of the democracy/moderation paradigm

Hizballah is a popular case study for those seeking to understand democratic transformations in radical groups, although there has
never been consensus on whether Hizballah has genuinely transformed.
Although Hizballah appeared committed to parliamentary politics between 1992 and 2008, the group’s behaviour in the lead up to the 2008 Doha Agreement and its intervention in Syria in 2013 suggest that democracy has failed to fully ‘tame’ Hizballah. This article applies Schwedler’s model of democratic moderation to Hizballah, showing that there was evidence of a number of limitations in Hizballah’s transition long before 2008.