Institutional Determinants of Democratic Breakdown (The Case of Weimar Republic)

Abstract

The paper aims to examine the institutional causes of the democratic breakdown of the Weimar Republic. To accomplish that purpose following problems were set: firstly, paper discusses current state of democracy throughout the world, its issues and challenges. Paper also underlines global trend of democratic decline. That discussion is provided to draw parallels and pinpoint relevance of the analysis. Afterwards, the research examines German political system, democratic roots and development. Moreover, constitutional changes and checks and balances are analyzed as well. The paper particularly scrutinizes evolution of German political parties and specifics of electoral system. Institutional heritage of regime change is also unveiled. The paper underlines pitfalls of Weimar Republic’s institutions that led to democratic breakdown. Apart from it, research generally outlines socio-economic background of Weimar Republic. During the research examination of documents, content analysis, comparative and historical methods were applied. The paper concludes that regarding to its institutional weakness, that is absence of electoral threshold, fragmentation of parliament and political parties, the abundance of social associations, semi-presidential system and socioeconomic situation created ground for an authoritarian takeover of the Weimar Republic.