Democracy wouldn't work if you tried to set it up in middle ages Europe either. All that proves is that the dominant kingdoms would close ranks and sabotage you, because you're an obvious threat to their power.

It doesn't mean that democracy is a bad system, or that it would never work. Although plenty of cogent and well lettered people over the centuries have spilled boatloads of ink arguing it was "unnatural" (goes against human nature) or "naive" (it might be nice, but the people can't be trusted). But it still happened. It just took a while to get there.

I'm a bit of a gradualist in that respect, I admit. But that's another topic.