Democracy’s Destruction? The 2020 Election, Trump’s Insurrection, and the Strength of America’s Political Institutions

Abstract

In Democracy’s Destruction, James L. Gibson investigates the degree to which the 2020 presidential election and its aftermath did lasting damage to American national political institutions. It focuses on the U.S. Supreme Court, the presidency, and the U.S. Senate—the institutions that most observers feel were put at risk by the election and its attendant events—as well as on the legitimacy of democracy in America itself. Gibson argues that the election and its aftermath undermined confidence and faith in American political institutions—and perhaps in American democracy as well. To assess the impact of the 2020 election on American political institutions, Gibson embeds the inquiry squarely within legitimacy theory writ large and particularly in the studies of institutional legitimacy that have accumulated over the years. Consequently, the book is not just an analysis of the election of 2020 but also a more general treatise that interrogates a variety of hypotheses about levels of legitimacy and how legitimacy changes.