Democratic backsliding in Honduras and MACCIH’s effects (2016–2021)

This study examines how state-led violence under the Duterte administration in the Philippines contributed to democratic backsliding, offering critical insights for understanding human rights violations in weak democracies of the Global South. The Philippine case, marked by mass killings under the guise of an anti-drug campaign, raises urgent questions about the relationship between coercive governance and democratic erosion. While existing scholarship on democratic decline focuses largely on electoral manipulation and institutional weakening, it often under-theorises the role of systematic state violence as a mechanism of autocratisation. Building on and extending this scholarship, the study contributes to global human rights debates by foregrounding how extrajudicial violence can erode democratic norms and institutions without direct electoral interference. It argues that in contexts like the Philippines, where formal institutions remain fragile and public support for punitive policies is high, state violence operates as a powerful tool to suppress dissent, consolidate executive power, and bypass institutional resistance. Methodologically, the research employs a comparative analysis of multiple democracy datasets including the Varieties of Democracy (VDem) and the Democratic Erosion Events Dataset (DEED) to trace temporal patterns of democratic decline. By incorporating state violence as a variable, the study reveals that democratic erosion began earlier and was more deeply entrenched than conventional indicators suggest. The findings underscore the need for more robust democracy assessment frameworks that systematically integrate civil and human rights violations, particularly in the Global South, where hybrid regimes increasingly blend formal democratic institutions with violent governance practices. The study concludes that addressing democratic backsliding in such settings requires rethinking standard metrics of democracy to include coercive practices and their legitimisation through popular support. It calls for future research to explore how state violence reshapes democratic trajectories and to develop interdisciplinary methods for capturing its complex impacts on governance and human rights.

This article discusses how electoral irregularities contributed to democratic backsliding in Venezuela under chavista rule (1999-2019). It draws from an original database of electoral irregularities created from primary and secondary sources covering a total of 24 electoral contests. I find that Venezuela experienced 117 electoral irregularities during this twenty-year period. Almost every electoral contest exhibited one irregularity, if not more. Electoral irregularities served two goals: to provide double insurance for the ruling party, and to encourage abstentionism (and divisions) across the opposition. They also increased every time the ruling party felt more electorally threatened. The article proposes a typology of irregularities applicable to other cases. It also evaluates how the opposition responded to the rise of irregularities, pointing out strategies that failed and those that worked. Resumen: Retroceso democrático por irregularidades electorales: El caso de Venezuela.Este artículo discute cómo las irregularidades electorales contribuyeron al retroceso democrático en Venezuela bajo gobiernos chavistas (1999-2019). Se fundamenta en una base de datos inédita de irregularidades electorales creada a partir de fuentes primarias y secundarias que cubren un total de 24 procesos electorales. Venezuela cometió 117 irregularidades electorales durante este período de veinte años. En casi todos los procesos electorales hubo al menos una irregularidad. Las irregularidades electorales cumplieron dos objetivos: proporcionar un doble seguro para el partido gobernante y alentar la abstención (y la división) en toda la oposición. También aumentaron cada vez que el partido gobernante se vio más amenazado electoralmente. El artículo propone una tipología de irregularidades aplicables en otros casos. También evalúa cómo respondió la oposición al aumento de las irregularidades, señalando las estrategias que fallaron y las que funcionaron.

The power of the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) has been steadily growing ever since 2012. The party has successfully taken control of all levels of government in Serbia, and the country has suffered from gradual democratic backsliding as a result. In this article, we focus on two protest waves in Serbia between 2017 and 2019. Crucially, a number of opposition parties involved in the more recent protest wave boycotted the 2020 parliamentary election. This article analyzes the characteristics of the citizen-led response in local communities across Serbia and estimates its electoral impact using a difference-in-differences approach. The case of Serbia not only elucidates modes of citizen response and their impact in post-Communist Europe but also provides comparative insights for the potential for citizen-led resistance to mobilize against backsliding in other countries. The objectives of the article are twofold. First, the article uses an original data set of Serbian protest events between 2017 and 2019 to ascertain how the two protest waves were conducted, and how citizens respond to democratic backsliding. Second, using data on municipal-level turnout and SNS vote share in the 2020 parliamentary election, we examine the average electoral impact of protest and, related to that, we evaluate the success of opposition parties in mobilizing voters for the electoral boycott. The article investigates whether SNS-led democratic backsliding is resilient to sustained citizen-led mobilization or whether this bottom-up resistance challenges the notion that “stabilitocracies” such as Serbia are immune to fundamental political change.

While scholars have studied democratic backsliding in the West, rapid democratic backsliding in the Global South is relatively underexplored, and the role of social media is unclear. Through a mixed-methods analysis of pro and anti-military Facebook and Telegram posts and offline protests and state violence in the backsliding democracy of Myanmar, our research expands current understandings of connective action in the Global South. Supported by both qualitative and quantitative data, we find that the interaction between offline state violence and offline protests is mediated by engagement on Facebook and Telegram, and thus that social media in Myanmar is integral to democratic social movements against the authoritarian state.

abstract: Since the 1970s, international influences on democratization have received increasing attention from scholars and policymakers. Scholars pointed to multiple mechanisms by which international factors could influence the transition to and the consolidation of democracy. While the arguments mostly pointed to positive influences, the optimism of the post–Cold War era have given way to concern about international sources of authoritarianism and democratic backsliding. The authors provide a framework for thinking about what we know about international forces and democratization, outlining several unanswered questions. Several research challenges remain, including how to best assess mechanisms linking international processes and actors to democracy (and democratization); while others concern threats to those democratic transitions via democratic backsliding. The article concludes by calling for more integration of existing theoretical frameworks on international factors and democracy with the current wave of research on authoritarianism and democratic backsliding.

Scholars have paid increasing attention to democratic backsliding, yet efforts to explain this phenomenon remain inchoate. This article seeks to place the study of democratic backsliding on sturdier conceptual, operational, and theoretical foundations. Conceptually, the challenge of backsliding is to define changes that take place within a political regime. Methodologically, the challenge involves measurement of intraregime changes, as alternative coding schemes change the population of units that have experienced democratic backsliding. Theoretical challenges are dual: First, despite a rich and diverse literature, we lack readily available theories to explain backsliding, and second, the theoretical debates that do exist—centered on the causes of democratic transitions, democratic breakdowns, authoritarian resilience, and democratic consolidation—remain unresolved. We consider how these theories might be called into service to explain backsliding. By doing so, the article aims to set the terms of the debate to create a common focal point around which research can coalesce.

It is generally assumed that stable democracies depend on sufficient economic freedoms that support ideas of individual independence and that shift resources from state to society. The growth and consolidation of economic freedoms under capitalism has been empirically linked to the growth and consolidation of democracy. Asia as a region has generally conformed to this theory, albeit with delayed democratic transitions due to the state-directed nature of development. This article revisits the capitalism/democracy relationship in East and Southeast Asia with a particular focus on contemporary concerns with global democratic backsliding. It shows the enduring analytic and empirical utility of capitalism to explain structural pressures on democratic development. It also shows how assaults on capitalism have predictive and descriptive value as indicators of authoritarian repression and democratic backsliding. The article highlights the continued relevance of capitalism for understanding democratic development, and underscores the significance of Asia to broader debates on democratic backsliding.

Since the 1970s, international influences on democratization have received increasing attention from scholars and policymakers. Scholars pointed to multiple mechanisms by which international factors could influence the transition to and the consolidation of democracy. While the arguments mostly pointed to positive influences, the optimism of the post–Cold War era have given way to concern about international sources of authoritarianism and democratic backsliding. The authors provide a framework for thinking about what we know about international forces and democratization, outlining several unanswered questions. Several research challenges remain, including how to best assess mechanisms linking international processes and actors to democracy (and democratization); while others concern threats to those democratic transitions via democratic backsliding. The article concludes by calling for more integration of existing theoretical frameworks on international factors and democracy with the current wave of research on authoritarianism and democratic backsliding.

In this thematic cluster, we explore why and how democratic erosion in post-Communist Europe has led to widespread civic mobilization. We set out the goals and motivations of citizens who choose to protest in defense of liberal democracy. We also compare across cases what pro-democracy protestors believe they have achieved by protesting—and what kinds of changes they believe are needed to end or attenuate the democratic erosion that sent them into the streets. The different contributions to this special section highlight variation in the role of elections: while protestors in some countries expect electing a new government to bring substantial, positive change, protestors in other countries consider that long-term structural reforms are needed. Still other protestors choose to back an electoral boycott as a way to express their opposition to the regime. Even when protests do not achieve short-term goals, such as spurring policy reversals, policy reforms, or changes in government, protestors believe that they raise awareness in society about democratic processes and the role of citizens in them. We also explore how democratic backsliding has impacted the rights of the LGBTQ+ community, which has generally benefited from democratization over the last three decades in post-Communist Europe.

This chapter explores the interplay between transitory constitutionalism, constitutional polycrisis and emergency constitutionalism and their impact on democracy and rule of law. It shows that constitutional transitions may be much more complex than usually assumed in accordance with 'democracy in transition' and 'democratic backsliding' paradigms. The chapter suggests that we may be living in times of stabilization of transition into a new form of constitutionalism – transitory constitutionalism. In addition, the chapter explores the transformation of constitutional emergency into 'new constitutional normalcy' with a view to the multiple and overlapping crisis – financial, migration, security, pandemic etc. The interference between constitutional polycrisis and emergency constitutionalism produces a durable reshaping of rule of law and democracy putting liberal-democratic constitutionalism in a state of flux. The chapter explores the internal and external threats to democracy and rule of law and the global, technological and technocratic challenges to our constitutional orders that produce a transition towards global algorithmic technocracy.

In light of the recent rise of authoritarianism and processes of ‘democratic backsliding’ in the Balkans (and other parts of CEE), the EU has projected an image of itself as a bastion of democracy and a counterweight to authoritarian tendencies and regimes. In contrast, this article points to the ways in which the EU – through its enlargement strategy – has legitimized authoritarian practices in candidate states. These practices have been inherently linked to the adoption of the EU acquis communautaire and deepening processes of neoliberal restructuring. In Serbia, the mandated transition to renewable energy, and the associated rise in small hydropower as a solution for meeting renewable energy targets, has led to an intensification of state-sponsored violence and coercion. By focusing on a small hydropower development in Rakita, Serbia, this paper highlights the inherently multiscalar nature of authoritarian state power and potential new avenues for contestation.

As president from 2016 to 2022, Rodrigo Duterte captured the judiciary, dominated the legislature, attacked the media, and presided over a campaign of mass killing, leaving an estimated 30,000 alleged drug criminals dead. Despite wielding vast amounts of power, Duterte stepped down after the national elections on May 9, 2022 in a largely peaceful transfer of power to Ferdinand Marcos Jr., son and namesake of the former dictator deposed in 1986. Why did Duterte amass power without causing full democratic collapse into authoritarian rule? The Philippines experienced backsliding to competitive authoritarianism: while elections remain free and somewhat fair, other features of democracy like civil liberties and political freedoms have eroded badly because of mass violence. The Philippine case demonstrates the autocratizing e ect of an emerging form of political violence: a focused campaign of state terror that produces fear and electoral success. I present evidence from two cases—the national "war on drugs" and its local antecedent in Davao City—to explain how violence escalates, provokes accountability, evades culpability, and contributes to democratic backsliding without immediate collapse to authoritarianism. With the election of Marcos Jr., the impunity of the former incumbent is likely to become institutionalized, and democratic backsliding is unlikely to be reversed.

The chapter argues that Kenya’s founding multiparty elections in 1992 were not a harbinger of the envisaged state restructure. The Kenyan politics did not change substantively beyond the elections and so there was no transformation beyond formation of multiple political parties. Ethnicity, political opportunism, and abuse of the incumbency derailed the quest for transformative politics. In substance, the 1997 elections were similar to the founding ones five years earlier. The 1997 elections did not mark a qualitative leap in comparison to the 1992 ones. State violence, electoral irregularities, and tribal politics marred these elections. The challenge of holding multiparty elections in a political milieu defined by single party mentality, unreformed institutions as a result of a top heavy Constitution, tribal fragmentation, and impunity persisted. It rendered multiparty politics more about style than substance.

This article explores the potential and limitations of integrated urban planning (IUP)—a key concept in the spatial planning paradigm of the European Union (EU)—in the context of democratic backsliding in contemporary Hungary. Following the country’s democratic transition from 1989/1990, which included the establishment of local governments with extensive mandates, among others, in urban planning, IUP emerged as a planning paradigm related to Hungary’s EU accession in 2004. However, since 2010, significant democratic backsliding, including a decrease in local autonomy, has affected urban planning in Hungary. This article reveals how trends associated with democratic backsliding challenge the principles of IUP and, drawing on a survey and semi‐structured interviews with urban planning practitioners, explores their impact on IUP in practice. The analysis identifies key factors influencing the implementation of IUP principles in this context, including reduced local political and economic autonomy, inadequate local government funding, the rise of individual bargaining in urban development, and non‐negotiated top‐down project allocation. While the findings are based on empirical evidence from Hungary, they may provide valuable insights into identifying risk factors concerning IUP in other contexts as well.

The civil-military relations of many Asian countries are subjectto important changes. In authoritarian, democratized, and autocratizing countries in South, Southeast and Northeast Asia, praetorianism—once prevalent in the region—has been in decline since the late 1980s, though it is still relevant in a number of countries. The erosion of praetorianism is mainly a consequence of the Asian-Pacific wave of democratization from the mid-1980s to the early 2000s. Democratic liberalization and transition had a positive impact on political control, military effectiveness and civilian supremacy in many transitional democracies. Since the late 2000s, however, the region has experienced a pronounced trend in autocratization or democratic backsliding. While endogenous modes of democratic weakening and termination , especially incumbent-driven executive aggrandizement,are dominant in post–Cold War Asia-Pacific, open-ended and promissory military coups are also very important. In many countries, soldiers either supported civilian efforts at democratic backsliding and autocratic consolidation. In other cases, they stood by while autocratization played out. Three key variables, combined, can account for the different roles of militaries in episodes of autocratization. The first one is the existence of a strong political organization which can be used by the incumbent executive to organize and mobilize political support and which can counterweight the political power of the military organization and its elites. The second factor concerns the existence of perceived threats to the organizational interests of a military. The third factor concerns strong praetorian legacies. The role that military officers and their organizations play in such episodes of democratic backsliding and autocratic hardening are important for the future trajectories of democracy, autocracy and civil-military relations. .