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How democracies prevail: democratic resilience as a two-stage process.
Vanessa A Boese1, Amanda B Edgell1,2, Sebastian Hellmeier1,3
1V-Dem Institute, Department of Political Science, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden.
Democratization
|August 16, 2021
Summary
Democratic resilience, a two-stage process, has weakened significantly since the Cold War. While strong institutions aid resilience, economic development only helps prevent initial declines, not subsequent breakdowns.
Area of Science:
- Political Science
- Comparative Politics
- Democratization Studies
Background:
- Democratic resilience is crucial for understanding regime stability in the face of autocratization.
- The post-Cold War era has witnessed a concerning trend of democratic decline and regime breakdown.
- Existing literature often overlooks the multi-stage nature of democratic resilience.
Purpose of the Study:
- To introduce a novel conceptualization of democratic resilience as a two-stage process: avoiding decline and averting breakdown.
- To analyze the trends in democratic resilience since 1900, with a focus on the post-Cold War period.
- To identify factors associated with each stage of democratic resilience.
Main Methods:
- Utilized the Episodes of Regime Transformation (ERT) dataset, covering the period since 1900.
- Employed quantitative analysis to track episodes of democratic decline and regime breakdown.
- Conducted regression analysis to identify correlates of democratic resilience at different stages.
Main Results:
- Democracies exhibited high resilience to the onset of autocratization from 1900 until the end of the Cold War.
- Democratic resilience has substantially weakened since 1993, with 59 episodes of decline and 36 regime breakdowns.
- Once autocratization begins, only 20% of democracies avert breakdown; strong judicial constraints and past institutional strength are key resilience factors.
- Economic development is linked to resilience against the onset of autocratization but not against breakdown once it has begun.
Conclusions:
- Democratic resilience is a complex, multi-stage phenomenon that has significantly eroded in recent decades.
- Strong institutional factors, particularly judicial constraints and historical institutional strength, are vital for maintaining democratic resilience.
- The findings challenge the universal role of economic development in bolstering democratic resilience against breakdown.
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