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• External democracy support that accompanies post-conflict democratisation can help to foster peace after civil war. Importantly, it does not trigger renewed violence.

• Analysing the effects of two donor strategies to deal with trade-offs between stability (preventing renewed violence) and democracy shows that prioritising stability over democracy does not contain fewer risks than gradualist support, in contrast to widespread assumptions. In fact, the prioritising strategy can also fail, and even be counterproductive.
• The competitive elements of a democratic system explain both why it can help to avoid, or provoke, renewed violence. Democracy support facilitating “controlled competition” can mitigate the destabilizing effects: Support for political competition strengthens the peace-enhancing effects by promoting meaningful choice and enabling the peaceful allocation and withdrawal of political power. Fostering institutional constraints limits the discretionary power of the executive and enforces a commitment to democratic rules.

These results can provide guidance to policy-makers when engaging in post-conflict situations:

1. Donors should actively accompany post-conflict democratisation processes with substantial democracy support. They should not refrain from offering such support until stability has already proven to be sustain¬able, since it can make an important contribution towards strengthening peace and help in avoiding destabilising effects.

2. When facing trade-offs between stability and democracy in post-conflict situations, donors should bear in mind that prioritising stability is not less risk-prone than a gradualist approach, which promotes both stability and democracy in an iterative way. Thus, prioritising stability should not be the obvious choice in post-conflict situations. Instead, donors should carefully scrutinise the political dynamics before applying either strategy and recall that a gradualist approach offers considerable potential for strengthening peace sustainably.
3. Engaging in a context of post-conflict democratisation, donors should provide substantial support both for political competition and for institutional constraints.