Relative Mobilization Capacity, Elections, and Civil Liberties Across Polity Analysis

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to shed a light to this particular phenomenon. Under what conditions do elections lead to furthering democratization? Based on these conditions, are they more effective in certain types of authoritarian regimes over the others or do elections have a uniform effect at lower and higher levels of democracy? In order to answer this question, we identify direct qualities of elections in both democratic and autocratic ones, including winning party’s vote share, runner up’s vote share, and turnout at the election. Developing a competitiveness measure using such qualities, we expect to find positive associations between an electoral competitiveness in presidential and legislative elections and incremental democratization. Research shows that the vote shares of parties and candidates are independently associated with regime type in post-communist settings (Kaya and Bernhard 2012). In this paper, we will create a new variable on electoral competitiveness and search for an effect in multiple frameworks.