The author explores the practice and effects of the European Union's democracy promotion efforts vis-à-vis its authoritarian neighbours in the Middle East and North Africa. She argues that the same set of factors facilitated both international cooperation of authoritarian regimes on democracy promotion and their persistence during the Arab Spring. "van Hüllen's book is an insightful and well-documented contribution that puts EU democracy promotion 'in context' across time and space. Besides the rich and detailed empirical investigation in the seven chapters of the book, the author lays the groundwork for further theoretical debates on the limits, conditions, and paradoxes of cooperation on democracy. Scholars from political science and comparative politics will find the book very useful as a timely account that combines lessons of the past with prospective challenges." (Iole Fontana, The Journal of North African Studies, Vol. 23 (1-2), October, 2017)