The things I've done that I thought were the best fun, best music, and the most "like wot a proper band should be" have been democratic, but with the proviso that everyone pulls their weight. Obviously there's going to be different levels of input but provided all members bring something to the table that works, then all good.
The couple of things I've been involved with that were dictatorships, were failures, in one case the "fuhrer" was a serial bull5hitter, not interested in any other ideas, and frankly don't think he really wanted the band to go forward anyway, I walked after a few gigs when there were no more in the pipeline, and clearly very little future prospect.
The other one was kind of a mate really, he had some good ideas but couldn't keep on one course, we'd record some stuff, then next week he'd totally remixed it,( without any input from me) and it was changed out of all recognition, a completely different direction.. not even that it was bad, but it was impossible, again to take it forward, I get the impression he'd rather just noodle around at home endlessly remixing a few pieces than get out there and do it. Unfortunately that wasted quite a few months of my time too, hey ho....