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As Ukrainians go to the polls on Sunday to elect a new president, Western observers should interpret the outcome in light of how the U.S. premier political scientist distinguished between good and bad government.

Back in 1968, in his now classic work “Political Order in Changing Societies,” the late Samuel P. Huntington, best known perhaps for his “Clash of Civilizations” thesis, claimed: “The most important political distinction among countries concerns not their form of government but their degree of government. … A government with a low level of institutionalization is not just a weak government; it is also a bad government.” After all, concluded Huntington, “The function of government is to...