Babel in Democratization Studies

Abstract

With democracy becoming the global norm, the field of democratization studies has boomed in the last quarter of a century. While early research focused on transitions, over time scholars have begun to pay closer attention to the performance of emerging democracies. Arguably, the major empirical finding of this latter research has been that, while the majority of these new regimes exhibit democratic features such as free and fair elections, a significant number of them deviate from standards and practices that are inherent in the very idea of democratic rule. In various new democracies, in fact, bypassing parliament and ruling by presidential decree appear customary. Packing the courts often paves the way for a heightened concentration of discretionary power in the executive. In some cases, drafting a new constitution and rigging an electoral contest has allowed the incumbent to prolong his stay in office. All too often, the violation of civil rights is common, devaluing the rule of law and eroding the foundations of democratic citizenship. Accordingly, students of democratization have coined a variety of terms to capture what they view as a novel form of political order: “delegative,” “imperfect,” “illiberal,” and “immature” democracy, among many more. 1 Different terminology notwithstanding, such qualifiers all indicate that these polities not only differ from the benchmark democracies of the West, but also represent a diminished version of democracy, a “half-baked” regime. More recently, the study of “hybrid” systems has inspired another taxonomical effort based on qualifying adjectives, though this time applied to authoritarianism. To depict a range of cases allegedly stuck in a gray zone of political evolution, this Ariel C. Armony is associate professor of government at Colby College and author of The Dubious Link: Civic Engagement and Democratization (2004). Hector E. Schamis is assistant professor at American University’s School of International Service and author of Re-Forming the State: The Politics of Privatization in Latin America and Europe (2002).