>You also brought up Tito which poses a question (similar to that of Arafat). If that area (Yugoslavia) was so stable under his rule yet so unstable as to not even survive his death, was Tito an incredibly competent leader or were his tactics questionable?

Wrong, the trouble started about ten years after his death (1980 to 1990). He circumvented the dynastic infighting by installing a collective president, one from each state and autonomous province. These eight were rotating in the position of "the presiding member of presidency" anually.

What killed the system were the famous "thugs among our ranks". The system didn't recognize the danger nor the direction it was coming from. The new generation of politicians which have eventually split the country were posing as staunch defenders of Tito's "character and opus", while really just going for the power. Once they had the power, they started doing what they really wanted to do. But even Milosevic's power quest took several years - he won his first victory inside the party in 1986, and didn't dare say anything out of the party line until 1989. For yet another year it was all still just internal party struggle. The seams began to break during October of 1990.

In case of Arafat, my serious doubts that he had any way of making any sort of such an institution which would prevent the dynastic fights. I expect that within two weeks we'll see at least three guys saying Arafat personally appointed them as heirs.