Abstract
What are the effects of populists in power on democracy during apandemic? The paper seeks to distinguish the extent to which the COVID-19pandemic can (not) be traced to democratic erosion and democraticresilience. Are the changes in the quality of democracy resulting frompolitical leaders' actions or rather a path-dependent continuation ofprevious trends? This contribution focuses on two paths – democraticerosion and democratic resilience – in the Visegrad Four countries (theCzech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia), which are all governed bypopulist leaders. It builds on previous literature that focused principally onthe first wave of the pandemic by focusing on institutional guardrails andaccountability (vertical, horizontal, and diagonal) during the 18 months ofthe pandemic. It seeks to answer the following question: What conditionsare necessary and sufficient to prevent democratic erosion?
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