Democratic Consolidation and Electoral System Change in Croatia: What Is Wrong with the Proportional Representation?

Abstract

This article focuses on the politics of electoral system change and its effects on the process of democratic consolidation in Croatia. After the first decade of democratisation when electoral rules were strategically engaged in order to secure one-party domination, the consensual introduction of proportional representation in 1999 marked the start of the full-scale consolidation of democracy. However, after only a decade, when faced with strong pressure caused by a deep economic recession and omnipresent political corruption, democracy in Croatia started to deteriorate, followed by significantly lower levels of trust in representative institutions and widespread citizen disaffection with the functioning of democracy. The proportional representation system was identified as the main cause of the crisis of Croatian democracy, raising strong critical voices asking for its reform or even replacement. The Croatian case thus shows that the interplay between electoral institutions and democratic (de)consolidation is far from being straightforward.