The United States fights wars for democracy. Britain and France bomb Libya for democracy. The West as a whole stands on the sidelines and cheers for democracy in Egypt, Yemen, Tunisia and Syria -- though we muffle our cries in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. For more than 60 years in Western Europe and 20 years in Eastern Europe, the superiority of a system of government by elected leaders has gone largely unquestioned.

True, Greece, Spain and Portugal joined the party a little late. There were also a few hiccups along the way (such as when Italy came close to electing a communist government in 1976, prompting dire warnings of expulsion from NATO, or when Austria brought an extreme right party into a government coalition in 2000, leading to sanctions from the rest of the European Union). But, by and large, Europeans have been allowed the leaders they voted for.

Yet overnight the taboo has been lifted. Almost without protest, tiny Greece and, then, mighty Italy have dumped their elected leaders and brought in unelected technocrats to clean up the mess left by democracy. The new men are tough, smart, economically literate and internationally respected. Suddenly, politics has been given a time-out. The bad children of Southern Europe are like any other children. They want to know where the limits are, and are crying out for the firm hand of adult leadership. And, by God, they're going to get it!

How did it come to this? Well, first of all, let us admit that Italy has been here before. In 1994, Italians witnessed the spectacle of the resignation of the same Silvio Berlusconi, who again appalled and entertained the world in equal measure until his ouster this month. A technocratic administration was formed as a solution to an internal crisis, in a situation where no party was strong enough to form a government.

This time is different. The resignations of both Berlusconi and Greece's George Papandreou were instigated from outside. The financial markets drove both countries to the edge, but it was their democratically elected European peers, Germany's Angela Merkel heading the charge, who pushed them into the abyss.

Financial markets have forced governments to change tack before, although the sustained attack on Europe over the past few months seems to take the monstering to new, unprecedented levels. In their battle with the regulators and with the governments trying to claw back at least some of the vast wealth squandered on keeping the financial system afloat, the markets have shown no mercy. The financial services industry, largely based in London and backed with varying levels of enthusiasm by the British government (which has much the same kind of love-hate relationship with Europe as it has with the banks), is happy to divide and rule among European nations.

Michel Barnier, the unelected EU bureaucrat in charge of financial services, has been forced to scale back proposals to weaken the power of the rating agencies because too many of his colleagues in the multinational European Commission objected. Even the blunder by Standard & Poor's just days before, when it accidentally announced and then retracted a downgrade of France's triple-A rating, was not ammunition enough to get politicians on Barnier's side. It was a reminder that technocrats, too, have to build coalitions and develop a political base to deliver the goods. The new leaders of Italy and Greece still have that lesson to learn.

But Merkel's power over the rest of the euro zone is increasingly difficult to ignore. Low-key and slow to act, she seemed at first to be as indecisive and dithering as her European peers. But as the months have passed, the steely politician once underestimated by her countrymen has gradually taken control. Unlike previous leaders, she has assumed the leading role in Europe that the country's economic strength grants it. The Fourth German Reich will rule the Continent by the power of money, not guns. Germany's hegemony over the euro zone is one of the bases of its power, and other member nations will eventually come to do its bidding.

Whether consciously or not, Merkel has relegated other euro-zone leaders to the status of governors of Germany's client states. When their domestic systems function properly, elected leaders can continue to run the show, just as state premiers do within federal Germany itself. But if peripheral nations threaten the stability of the empire, then rule from the center is not unthinkable -- at least not as seen from Berlin.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that politics is too important to be left to politicians, especially the feckless leaders of ill-disciplined Mediterranean states. But Germany increasingly believes its politicians are a cut above the rest. The arrogance once shown by former imperial nations such as France and Britain now infects the new economic superpower. German politicians now feel free to lecture others on governance and self-discipline.

Italians and Greeks may have to accept the leaders Germany appoints. But German voters still have one advantage over the subjects of their euro-zone backyard. Germany itself is a vibrant democracy. Come election time, German voters can still throw the rascals out.