Three hundred years ago, wearing large wigs, speaking French, not bathing, and burning witches were considered "civilized" in Europe. Even fifty years ago, it was considered "uncivilized" for women to wear pants in western society. Obviously, the meaning of "civilized" has changed since then; we would not now recognize many of the things that had been considered "civilized" at various points in history.
There are also cultural differences in the definition that transcend any objective, factual basis. Since the beginning of Islam, Christian and Muslim societies have almost invariably held each other to be "uncivilized". At the height of the Muslim Empire, western Europe was in the Dark Ages; while the Muslims made major advancements in mathematics, astronomy, and other sciences, Europe was locked in feudal warfare. But even then, the Christian Europeans considered the Muslims "uncivilized", and indeed launched the Crusades to recover the Levant from the infidels. Now, many Muslim countries still cling to backward concepts like the subjugation of women and rule of the Quran rather than by law, while western societies have leapt ahead in scientific and humanistic achievement; and now, many Muslim extremists denounce the West as infidels.
Since the very term "civilized" is variable, it is impossible to forcibly make a society "civilized". There is quite a bit of chance involved. Sometimes a seemingly backward society becomes "civilized" very quickly, as in the case of Japan in the 19th century; within a single generation, Japan shed its medieval trappings and became highly advanced militarily and industrially. Other times, a society may spend a long time outside the shifting definition of "civilized"; such is the case of Turkey, which five-and-a-half centuries ago had just captured the heart of civilization at the time, Constantinople. After the Ottoman Empire lapsed (well before its dissolution after World War I), Turkey spent centuries in the wilderness. It is just now becoming increasingly reintegrated into the mainstream of what is now generally considered "civilized" (that is, western culture).
Historically, the extent of "civilization" has been independent of the system of government. France rose to the pinnacle of Europe under an absolutist monarch; Britain later displaced France under what was close to a parliamentary republic. Meanwhile, Poland lapsed into and out of existence with a federal system of government, and the Ottomans choked under the same absolutism under which France thrived. More modern examples include that selfsame Japan, which modernized remarkably quickly in the late 19th century under an emperor, and which again made striking gains in the 1960s with the parliamentary democracy set up after World War II. China, which had for about a thousand years been the preeminent empire in the world, started to fade during the middle Qing Dynasty, suffering a protracted demise similar to that of the Ottomans. Under the Nationalist dictatorship, it again failed; under the Communist dictatorship, China is quickly regaining stature in the world.
"Civilization" is such an undefinable concept that it is futile to use it to plan the progress of a government. It is merely a convenient and simplistic metric by which contemporary observers can categorize the world around them.
