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Democratic Globalization and the Arab Authoritarian Exception The Arab world is said to be an authoritarian exception on a worldwide scale. This argument, supported by the scholarly literature, coincides with the advent of a unipolar world order identified with a democratic globalization. It raises three sets of questions. What does ‘exception’ mean and what are its implications ? The democratic rule argument has actually only criticized exceptionality and promoted its abolition since September 11,2001. The relatively new stigmatization of the Arab exception is mainly based on an electoral deficit, with the underlying supposition that like all others, Arab societies would like to become democratic, and they could and should. To what extent is the Arab world a relevant unit of analysis of authoritarianism ? Beyond interpretations centered on coercive capacity and those claiming an intrinsically Arab authoritarianism, Arab regimes do seem to share certain features. This Arab dimension is characterized by conflicts focused on norms rather than on the representation of interests. It is thus conducive to government by self-proclaimed guardians of these norms. Is such an observation enough to make the exception argument relevant ? Arab regimes are undergoing changes that may lead to a consolidation of authoritarianism. Consolidated authoritarianism corresponds to some inherent trends of democratic globalization. Hence, political science would be better off discarding its erroneous assumptions about the new international order, that is, the democratic univocity of globalization and the very notion of Arab exception.