Democratic Regime Change Research Articles

Democracy Doesn't Always Happen Over Night: Regime Change in Stages and Economic Growth

Abstract How substantial are the economic benefits from democratic regime change? We argue that democratisation is often not a discrete event but a two-stage process: autocracies enter into ‘episodes’ of political liberalisation which eventually culminate in regime change or not. To account for this chronology and the implicit counterfactual groups, we introduce a repeated-treatment difference-in-difference implementation capturing non-parallel trends and selection into treatment. We find that modelling regime change in two stages rather than a single event yields stronger long-run growth effects. Among democratizers, experiencing repeated episodes without regime change reduces growth in democracy whereas length of episode does not.

Shielding Democracy: Foreign Correspondent Coverage Of The 1981 Military Coup Attempt In Spain In The Economist, Time And Newsweek

The role of the international press as an external contributing agent to the consolidation of democratic regime change within emerging democracies is a growing research area within the field of media history and political communication. Within the context of these press/power dynamics, this article analyses the intense coverage made by the influential transatlantic weekly magazines, Time, Newsweek and The Economist of the attempted military coup in Spain in February 1981. It argues that all three publications made editorial decisions and employed narrative strategies –based on contempt for the foiled military uprising, acritical elevation of the young King and the consensual projection of democratic consolidation in the country- in an indirect but strategic contribution to the defence of the institutional stability of a country emerging from 40 years of dictatorship and whose destiny was crucial to wider Cold War geopolitical considerations in the southern Mediterranean at the time.

Truth and Reparation for the U.S. Imprisonment and Policing Regime

AbstractIn the literature on transitional justice, there is disagreement about whether countries like the United States can be characterized as transitional societies. Though it is widely recognized that transitional justice mechanisms such as truth commissions and reparations can be used by Global North nations to address racial injustice, some consider societies to be transitional only when they are undergoing a formal democratic regime change. We conceptualize the political situation of low-income Black communities under the U.S. imprisonment and policing regime in terms of three criteria for identifying transitional contexts: normalized collective and political wrongdoing, pervasive structural inequality, and the failure of the rule of law. That these criteria are met, however, does not necessarily mean that a transition is taking place. Drawing on the American political development and abolition democracy literatures, we discuss what it would mean for the United States to transition out of its present imprisonment and policing regime. A transitional justice perspective shows the importance of not only pushing for truth and reparation, but for an actual transition.

Democracy Doesn’t Always Happen Over Night: Regime Change in Stages and Economic Growth

We motivate and empirically analyse the idea that democratic regime change is not a discrete event but a two-stage process: in the first stage, autocracies enter into an ‘episode’ of political liberalization which can last for years or even decades; in the second stage, the ultimate outcome of the episode manifests itself and a nation undergoes regime change or not. Failure to account for this chronology risks biased estimates of the economic effects of democratic regime change since this ignores the relevance of the counterfactual group in which liberalisation did not culminate in a democratic transition. Using novel Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) data on Episodes of Regime Transformation (ERT) for a large sample of countries from 1950 to 2014 we study this phenomenon in a repeated-treatment difference-in-difference framework which accounts for non-parallel pre-treatment trends and selection into treatment. Our findings suggest that a single event approach significantly underestimates the economic benefits from lasting democratic regime change.

The shift towards democratic governance: System change versus regime change analysis in The Gambia 2017-2019

Democratic governance has been seen as a catalyst for inclusive growth and meaningful development in many countries. Shifting from authoritarian rule to more democratic rule has also been seen as essential for many governments worldwide. Democratic governance is often a problem for developing countries, including most African countries and particularly The Gambia. This paper analyses the shift towards a more democratic governance style that is heated debated in The Gambia. The debate started when one of the coalition government members asserted that they could achieve regime change; however, a democratic system change remains lacking. This paper has sought to analyze whether the shift toward a more democratic leadership style in The Gambia is one of system change or regime change and ascertain what has democratically changed and bad governance in the new government. This article’s main objective is to create political awareness and enlighten the readers on the change’s misconceptions towards democratic governance. The discussion focuses on democratic governance and the collective action theory of governance to explain the democratic process in New Gambia. This study adopts qualitative case study research methods; the research employed a systematic review of the existing scholarly journal articles, books, newspapers, and television interview recordings. The observation used to identify, understand, and interpret the democratic governance situation in The Gambia from 2017 to 2019. The findings show that the coalition government has succeeded in achieving a democratic regime change; however, the democratic system change itself is too slow, or it is not happening. For the first time in The Gambia’s history, a seating president defeat through the ballot box. In conclusion, the democratic governance system change is far-fetched. It is vital to state that there is little or no difference between Jammeh’s regime and the current regime under President Barrow’s leadership. The same problems continue to persist. Finally, the transparency and accountability mechanisms must be enhanced to address the endemic problem of corruption.

Trust and Tolerance across the Middle East and North Africa: A Comparative Perspective on the Impact of the Arab Uprisings

The protests that swept the Arab Middle East and North Africa (MENA) are expected to have influenced two key civic attitudes fundamental to well-functioning democracies: trust and tolerance. However, systematic comparative assessments of the general patterns and particularities in this region are rare. This contribution theorizes the uprisings’ impact and presents new society-level measurements of trust and tolerance for the MENA, synchronizing over 40 Arab Barometer and World Values Survey surveys on Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Palestine, Tunisia, and Yemen, from before and after the uprisings. The analyses firstly show political-institutional trust falling in the uprisings’ aftermath in countries that went through democratic reform or regime change. It appears that politicians misbehaving and reforms not resolving social problems hurt people’s trust in politics. Secondly, in democratic transition countries Egypt and Tunisia, a decrease in social trust reflected the pattern of political-institutional trust indicating a spill-over effect. Thirdly, ethno-religious tolerance dropped region-wide after the uprisings, indicating that the aftermath of religious conflict impacted the entire Arab region. These results support rational-choice institutionalist theories, while at the same time refining them for the MENA context.

Anti-regime Uprisings and the Emergence of Electoral Authoritarianism

This paper explores the role of threats from below in the emergence of electoral authoritarianism. Mass uprisings for democratic regime change undermine closed authoritarian regimes by making it difficult for autocrats to maintain their regimes through repression and co-optation. Anti-regime uprisings also promote the establishment of electoral authoritarianism by toppling the existing closed regime or by compelling autocrats to offer political reform as a survival strategy. Looking at closed authoritarian regimes from 1961 to 2006, my analysis reveals that anti-regime mass uprisings are significantly associated with transitions to electoral authoritarianism. I also find that nonviolent uprisings are more likely than violent uprisings to result in the establishment of electoral authoritarianism and that the effect of anti-regime uprisings on transitions to electoral authoritarianism is greater when a country is surrounded by more democracies or is ethnically or religiously homogeneous.

Classical Liberalism, Democracy, and Economic Growth: A Hypothesis About the Lipset Hypothesis

Does economic growth create democracy, as suggested by the proposition known as the Lipset hypothesis? According to this paper, for the Lipset hypothesis to be valid, it is sufficient for an ideological and a technological condition to be fulfilled. The ideological condition is that the political agenda-setting ideology should be classical liberalism, which can be characterized as combining an aversion towards democracy with a positive assessment of economic and civil liberties. The technological condition is that the country in question should be advanced enough in the technological sense, because in such a country there is no economic growth without innovation maintained by a free market for ideas. Logit regressions run with panel data show that in the period up until the early 20th century a higher per capita income increases the probability of a democratic regime change, but afterwards it does not. The explanation is that before the early 20th century the two conditions were met, but they were not met in those countries that were about to become democratic after the first two decades of the 20th century.

Klasszikus liberalizmus, demokratizálódás és gazdasági növekedés: hipotézis a Lipset-hipotézisről

Ösztönzi-e a gazdasági fejlődés a demokrácia kialakulását, ahogyan azt a Lipset-hipotézisként elhíresült állítás mondja? A tanulmány szerint a Lipset-hipotézis érvényesüléséhez elegendő, ha egy ideológiai és egy technológiai feltétel teljesül. Az ideológiai az, hogy a politikai programalkotó ideológia a klasszikus liberalizmus legyen, amelynek az a sajátossága, hogy a demokráciával szembeni ellenszenvet kombinálja a gazdasági és a polgári szabadság pozitív megítélésével. A technológiai feltétel pedig az, hogy az adott ország technológiai vezető pozícióban legyen, mert ekkor a gondolatok szabad piaca által ösztönzött innováció nélkül nincs gazdasági növekedés. A paneladatokon végzett logit regressziók azt mutatják, hogy a 20. század elejét megelőző időszakban a nagyobb jövedelem növeli a demokratikus irányú átmenet valószínűségét, de utána már nem. A magyarázat az, hogy a Nyugat országaiban a 20. század elejéig fennállt a két feltétel, de a 20. század eleje után potenciálisan demokratizálódó országokra már nem.
 Journal of Economic Literature (JEL) codes: D70, O11, O43

Democratization and International Border Agreements

Does the removal of salient external threats foster democratization? Recent research proposes an affirmative answer but either fails to examine democratization at the monadic level, to consider small-scale democratization, or to account for factors known to influence the democratization process. The current study addresses this deficit by (re)examining democratization during the period 1919–2006. The findings suggest a strong relationship between border settlement and democratization. A state that settles all of its interstate borders democratizes; any outstanding unsettled borders, however, prevent significant democratization. Furthermore, although border settlement contributes to democratization, it does not significantly affect democratic regime change. This empirical evidence cumulatively specifies a more precise relationship between external threat and democratization than previous work and thereby contributes directly to the recent debate between the territorial and democratic peace theories. It als...

Choosing Your Neighbors: Networks of Diffusion in International Relations1

In examining the diffusion of social and political phenomena like regime transition, conflict, and policy change, scholars routinely make choices about how proximity is defined and which neighbors should be considered more important than others. Since each specification offers an alternative view of the networks through which diffusion can take place, one's decision can exert a significant influence on the magnitude and scope of estimated diffusion effects. This problem is widely recognized, but is rarely the subject of direct analysis. In international relations research, connectivity choices are usually ad hoc, driven more by data availability than by theoretically informed decision criteria. We take a closer look at the assumptions behind these choices, and propose a more systematic method to asses the structural similarity of two or more alternative networks, and select one that most plausibly relates theory to empirics. We apply this method to the spread of democratic regime change and offer an illustrative example of how neighbor choices might impact predictions and inferences in the case of the 2011 Arab Spring.

Editorial – Iraq and human rights

Human rights and democracy are the products of the active participation of people building their own societies. From the perspective of the Arab Spring the US-led war to enforce democratic regime change from the outside appears all the more arrogant and colonial. The involvement of the United Nations in giving legitimacy to the process is highly problematic especially as its own recent report assesses the human rights situation in Iraq as 'fragile'. It will be Iraqi citizens drawing on their own resources who will create an authentic human rights culture.

Retribution or Reconciliation: Young Americans’ Attitudes Toward Peaceful Transitions of Power

This exploratory study assessed the associations of age, gender, and a school climate of solidarity and pride with adolescents’ endorsements of democratic regime change. Middle- and high-school students ( N = 273) in the United States responded to three vignettes concerning how a society should transition from dictatorship to democracy and specifically, what should happen to the leaders, supporters, and opponents of the (former) dictatorship. Open-ended responses were coded for references to reconciliation, retribution, and reward. Older students were more likely to provide codable responses and the majority endorsed reconciliation for the leaders, supporters, and opponents of the old (dictatorship) regime. Males were more likely than females to endorse retribution against the leaders. Students were more likely to endorse reconciliation if they perceived that group solidarity and pride characterized the climate at their school. Discussion focuses on the potential of schools to develop feelings of membership and commitments to democratic norms in younger generations.

Indonesia in 2008: Democratic Consolidation in Soeharto´ s Shadow

Indonesia's political and socio-economic developments in 2008 were marked by two contradictory trends. On the one hand, the process of democratic consolidation continued, with Indonesia further strengthening its political institutions, making progress in its anti-corruption drive and generally maintaining healthy economic growth. Indeed, with very low levels of political and communal violence, Indonesia in 2008 appeared like a bulwark of stability in the Southeast Asian region, as Thailand was crippled by incessant mass demonstrations and the Philippines saw the Mindanao insurgency escalating once again. However, Indonesia's democratic consolidation was also challenged by a very divergent phenomenon: that is, the increasing proliferation of some form of nostalgia for the effectiveness of Soeharto's New Order, which had ruled the country with an iron fist between 1966 and 1998. Significantly, the year 2008 not only witnessed Soeharto's death after a long struggle with illness and the post-authoritarian judiciary, but also the tenth anniversary of the democratic regime change. Using both occasions to reflect on Soeharto's achievements, many Indonesians concluded that his regime had been superior to the existing polity in several important aspects, particularly health services, prices of basic goods and security. This sentiment was also reflected in the names that emerged as contenders for the 2009 presidential elections: several of Soeharto's former generals threw their hat into the ring, trying to profit from the growing sympathy for New Order policies. This chapter aims to take account of both developments: the remarkable stabilization of Indonesian democracy and the latent support in society for Soeharto's authoritative and tough leadership. Accordingly, it will discuss events,

The UE and Civil society in Serbia: Governance rather than politics

This paper looks at the impact of EU intervention on the third sector in post-Milosevic Serbia. We argue that the framing of EU pre-accession assistance to Serbia in terms of ‘developing civil society’ is a political distraction; it obfuscates the true purpose and outcomes of EU intervention by implying that the focus of aid is the empowerment and strengthening of civil society as an arena of political contestation and as the basis of democratic regime change. In practice, EU assistance has as its goal far less politically radical objectives: the aim is to build governance and state capacity.

The Third Wave in East Asia Comparative and Dynamic Perspectives

This article offers a comprehensive and dynamic account of democratization in East Asia over the past two decades. It first traces the history of democratic transitions in the region, and thereafter examines their contours, modes, and sources from a comparative perspective. It then considers the extent to which third-wave democracies have consolidated, by appraising the quality of their performances. Finally, it explores the prospect of democratic regime change in China and Singapore. Analyses of Freedom House and the World Bank data reveal that the East Asian region has been slow in responding to the surging wave of global democratization in terms of not only transforming authoritarian regimes into electoral democracies, but also consolidating electoral democracies into well-functioning liberal democracies. Analyses of the Asian Barometer surveys, on the other hand, suggest that the mass citizenries of China and Singapore endorse their current regime as a well-functioning democracy, and are not much in favor of democratic regime change in their respective countries.

Democratizing Economic Policymaking in South Korea: Painfully Slow Progress Toward an Executive-Legislative Balance of Power

In this study, we proceed on the assumption that where the rule of law prevails, parliament becomes the key institution of democratic governance. To transform delegative or limited democracy into a truly representative democracy, it is necessary to ensure not only vertical but also horizontal accountability. This study considers the horizontal dimensions of accountability in order to provide a fuller picture of the part that the Korean legislature has played during the course of democratic regime change. It examines the current process of economic policymaking under democratic rule, using evaluative data from the lawmakers who serve on the National Assembly Committee on Finance and Economy. The authoritarian “sunflower” model presented an extreme version of technocracy, featuring efficient decision – making mostly by technocrats with little or no consultation with other governmental and nongovernmental institutions, including the National Assembly. The current model has, on the other hand, moderated technocratic control such that technocrats formulate policies in consultation with other, more diverse interests. Obviously, this model falls far short of manifesting a fully democratic model of economic policymaking in which the president and elected lawmakers formulate policy jointly in the context of extensive consultation with civic groups and all other relevant governmental and non-governmental organizations and interests.

Democratization without a State: Democratic Regime-building in Kosovo

This article examines the relationship between democratization and the state with reference to recent political developments in the non-state entity of Kosovo. Existing analyses of the role of the state in democratic transitions provide critical insights into the politics of democratization, but have suffered from a lack of consensus regarding the concept of the state itself. This study distinguishes three separate dimensions of statehood – recognition, capacity and cohesion – and argues that each has separate implications for transition politics. Analysis of democratic political development in Kosovo suggests two conclusions: first, that international recognition of statehood should not be viewed as a prerequisite for democratization, and second, that problems of state capacity or state cohesion present far more fundamental challenges to successful democratic regime change.

The Security Council, Democratic Legitimacy and Regime Change in Iraq

This article examines the political transition in Iraq from the perspective of international law, which regards forcible democratic regime change as unlawful. The concern is to establish the extent to which the relevant Security Council Resolutions, 1483 (2003), 1511 (2003) and 1546 (2004), necessary to give legal effect to the fact of regime change, may be regarded as a legitimate exercise of the political authority provided to the Security Council under the Charter of the United Nations, and consequently a lawful exercise of that authority. The article will argue that Security Council resolutions enjoy ‘democratic’ political legitimacy to the extent that they are consistent with the constitutional framework provided by the UN Charter and wider international law, and that they accord with the practice of the Security Council in ‘like’ cases, or the Council is able to demonstrate sufficient justification for the exercise of political authority in the particular case. The article first reviews the process of political transition in Iraq, examining the role of Security Council resolutions. It concludes that the process involved a violation of the right of the Iraqi people to political self-determination, creating a conflict between the Security Council resolutions adopted under chapter VII and an international norm of jus cogens standing. Rejecting arguments that the resolutions should be regarded as void, or that they should command absolute deference, the work outlines a model of constitutional adjudication in cases of conflict between these ‘higher’ forms of obligations in accordance with a deliberative understanding of the nature of the system of international law.

Engaging autocratic allies to promote democracy

Diplomacy, particularly with dictatorships friendly toward the United States, is often overlooked as a means to promote democratic regime change. Yet, a closer look at three forgotten cases from the late 1980s yields several lessons for today's efforts to engage but reform autocratic allies.