Electoral Authoritarianism Research Articles

Кто и как оценивает выборы: особенности экспертного опроса качества региональных выборов 13 сентября 2015 года в России

Маргарита Андреевна Завадская – старший научный сотрудник, Лаборатория сравнительных социальных исследований, Национальный исследовательский университет «Высшая школа экономики»; научный сотрудник, Европейский университет в Санкт-Петербурге. Адрес: 191187, Санкт-Петербург, ул. Седова, д. 55, к. 1. E-mail: mzavadskaya@hse.ru
 Всеволод Дмитриевич Бедерсон – кандидат политических наук, младший научный сотрудник, Институт философии и права УрО РАН, сотрудник Центра сравнительных исторических и политических исследований ПГНИУ, старший преподаватель кафедры политических наук ПГНИУ. Адрес: 620990, Екатеринбург, ул. Софьи Ковалевской, д. 16. E-mail: vsbederson@gmail.com
 Цитирование: Завадская М.А., Бедерсон В.Д. (2018) Кто и как оценивает выборы: особенности экспертного опроса качества региональных выборов 13 сентября 2015 года в России // Мир России. Т. 27. № 3. С. 82–106. DOI: 10.17323/1811-038X-2018-27-3-82-106
 
 Метод оценки с помощью экспертных опросов весьма распространен в современных сравнительных исследованиях, однако возникает вопрос, насколько надежными и валидными являются результаты подобных опросов, полученных в условиях (1) политизации предмета исследования (проблема чувствительности), (2) политического режима, характеризуемого экспертами как «электоральный авторитаризм», и (3) продолжающегося процесса профессионализации экспертного сообщества. Основываясь на материалах экспертного опроса проекта Electoral Integrity Project, авторы исходят из предположения о том, что эти три фактора будут систематически влиять на характер экспертных оценок, оставаясь источниками смещения (bias), которые необходимо учитывать при использовании результатов экспертных опросов в дальнейших исследованиях. Цель исследования – выявить, есть ли систематические смещения в экспертных оценках, и если они есть, то каковы их источники. Результаты анализа показывают, что в экспертных оценках в качестве источников смещения имеют значение степень персональной «лояльности» или «оппозиционности» эксперта (голосования за партию власти или оппозицию), а также степень доверия телевидению.

Explaining incumbent re-election in authoritarian elections: evidence from a Chinese county

ABSTRACTDespite the burgeoning comparative literature on authoritarian elections, less is known about the dynamics of competition in authoritarian subnational elections where opposition is not allowed to organize into parties. Local elections without partisan competition in single-party authoritarian regimes provide considerable advantages to the incumbents and may well turn the incumbent advantage common in liberal democracies into incumbent dominance. What economic factors can break incumbent dominance in such competition without parties? With quantitative and qualitative evidence from grassroots elections in China, this article illustrates that economic growth and industrial economic structure offering more economic autonomy help to break incumbent dominance and increase the prospects of successful challenge to incumbency by non-party outsiders. The examination of the findings in a broad context in China and against the backdrop of local democratization in the developing world suggests that though we may observe successful challenge to incumbency, liberalization of the political system requires not only competition, but also a relatively autonomous economy to sustain liberalization prospects. The findings contribute to the literature on electoral authoritarianism, subnational democratization and China’s grassroots elections.

The Business of State Capture and the Rise of Authoritarianism in Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia

This paper will discuss the rise of authoritarian tendencies in the political systems of Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia. In all four countries, certain parties and political elites have become entrenched in the political system, and have been able to enhance their grip on power, often beyond, and in some cases through, constitutional frameworks. It will discuss how forms of state capture have enabled political elites to position themselves in a situation in which they not only control the political decision-making institutions, but also exercise excessive influence on the economic and social systems of these systems in transitional states. By extending their networks of patronage, limiting political access for opponents, and holding strong control over media and the judiciary, these elites have been able to develop semi-authoritarian systems, which utilise democratic elections to confirm their long-term dominance, veiling them in a veneer of legitimacy. This rise of electoral authoritarianism – and in turn illiberal democracy – is not only linked to the political actions of certain parties and elites, but also results from the political, social and economic changes that the countries under investigation have faced in recent years. What is more, the so-called transformative power of eu integration has failed to hinder or deter the rise of these new authoritarian regimes. The paper will progress in three main steps: In the first part, a theoretical framework will be introduced, by focusing on theories of democratization and authoritarian back-sliding. In the second part, the four countries under investigation will be discussed in more detail, to highlight why there has been an increase in authoritarian practices across these four countries. This section will also discuss how these authoritarian tendencies play out in practice and how they have been undermining the consolidation of liberal democracy. Finally, in the conclusion it will be discussed what the European Union (eu) and other actors could do in order to support those forces that focus on democratic governance in these countries, and make the accession process truly transformative.

The Perils of “Turkish Presidentialism”

AbstractTurkey has switched to a presidential system via a referendum held in April 2017 that will take full effect after the 2019 presidential elections. Turkish presidentialism increases the prominence of the executive at the expense of the legislative branch and concentrates power in the office of the president. Executive aggrandizement will deepen ideological polarization and electoral mobilization by significantly raising the stakes of the game for both the incumbent and the opposition. As such, we posit that the new presidential system will institutionalize the de facto personalism and majoritarian rule that the AKP has hitherto established in recent years. This trend is likely to trigger a transition from a competitive authoritarian to hegemonic electoral authoritarianism in case of Tayyip Erdoğan's election, thus placing Turkey on par with the strongest executive systems around the globe such as Russia and Venezuela.

The AKP after 15 years: emergence of Erdoganism in Turkey

In recent years, several observers of Turkey have recognised a novel development in Turkish politics: the rise of Erdoganism. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s personality and style have come to embody the Turkish nation, the state and its economic, social and political institutions. But what is Erdoganism? What are its main attributes? Is it a mere ideology or the name of the emerging political regime in Turkey? While commentators have provided several observations of Erdoganism, it has not been duly examined on its own in the academic literature. This paper’s main premise is that in Turkey, a new political regime has emerged in recent years which can best be defined as Erdoganism. Erdoganism has four main dimensions: electoral authoritarianism as the electoral system, neopatrimonialism as the economic system, populism as the political strategy and Islamism as the political ideology. We first explain why we think Erdoganism is a better concept to define the emerging political regime in Turkey. We briefly discuss Sultanism, Khomeinism and Kemalism in order to produce a set of references for our discussion of Erdoganism. We then provide a thorough analysis, explaining the ways in which Erdoganism manifests itself through electoral authoritarianism, neopatrimonialism, populism and Islamism.

Participation Dilemma: The Logic of Voter Turnout in Authoritarian Elections

Why do the electorate vote or abstain from voting under competitive authoritarianism? Elite rent seeking and rent distribution are recognized as main determinants of turnout in authoritarian elections, but the logic of voting decision on the side of an oppositional electorate remains understudied. I argue that when the discontent majority's cooperation is needed for producing spoils, the opposition are more likely to participate in authoritarian voting, expecting a credible rent sharing scheme afterwards. Collaborative rent generation and rent sharing schemes consolidate when highly skilled labor becomes indispensable to the authorities; such schemes break down when a resource-based economy takes hold. District-level data from a pervasive modernizing intervention in Iran, The White Revolution, between 1954 and 1975, while demonstrating signs of a resource curse on turnout, show rising literacy to exert a robustly significant and positive effect on turnout under authoritarianism, hence confirming the predictions of the authoritarian turnout model herein.

Legitimising Victories: Electoral Authoritarian Control in Russia’s Gubernatorial Elections

We explore the evolution of the Kremlin’s election control strategy in response to the reintroduction of gubernatorial elections in 2012. Our analysis focuses on the evolution of four tools used to engineer electoral competition: auxiliary institutions, subnational punishment regimes, ballot construction, and turnout manipulation. We argue that election managers deploy these mechanisms to maximise victories for state-sponsored candidates while minimising the possibility for post-election protest. The analysis demonstrates that electoral manipulation presents conflicting incentives for the Kremlin and its regional officials. It also shows the critical role that Russia’s systemic opposition plays in the electoral management system and regime stability.

The Popularity Costs of Economic Crisis under Electoral Authoritarianism: Evidence from Russia

AbstractWhile a large literature recognizes that economic crises threaten the stability of electoral autocracies, we know relatively little about how citizens form economic perceptions and how they attribute blame for worsening conditions in these regimes. To gain traction on these questions, I exploit subnational variation in economic performance across Russia's regions during a recent downturn, combining regionally representative surveys of more than 67,000 voting‐age respondents with data on growth and unemployment. Contrary to conventional wisdom that citizens are passive consumers of propaganda, I show that they extract objective economic information from personal experience and local conditions. Moreover, I find that they give greater weight to this information where regional party dominance makes economic performance a clearer indicator of the ruling party's competence and when they believe the media are biased. These results suggest limits on illiberal regimes' ability to exploit informational asymmetries to bolster popular support during economic downturns.

Constituency Delimitation and Electoral Authoritarianism in Malaysia

This article explains how the electoral one-party state of United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) in Malaysia is maintained through constituency delimitation. It examines how the means of inter-state malapportionment, intra-state malapportionment, gerrymandering, pre-delimitation boundary changes and seat increase are used in the on-going delimitation exercises. Malapportionment and gerrymandering in the last cycle of delimitation exercises in 2003–5 had secured Prime Minister Najib Razak a comfortable 60% parliamentary majority in 2013 despite winning only 47% of popular votes. While Razak may suffer greater attrition of votes due to his global financial scandal involving Malaysia’s state sovereign fund, 1MDB, he may still win a bigger parliamentary majority in the upcoming election, which must be held latest by August 2018. The article questions if the First-Past-the-Post (FPTP) electoral system, which is not only susceptible to manipulations, but also very winner-takes-all in nature, suits Malaysia’s plural society.

Voting Together: Economic Adversity and Voter Turnout in Authoritarian Elections

Why do constituents regularly vote in elections that are not competitive, or lack real choice on the ballot? Existing explanations of voting under such conditions emphasize the role of machine politics, patronage and clientelism. In contrast, we go beyond the explanations based on machine politics, and argue that under electoral authoritarianism patterns of collective voting among the electorate can motivate voter turnout, and such mobilizing effects are more apparent in larger polls. Against the predictions of the logic of patronage, economic adversity in the form of unemployment, is shown to have increased turnout in authoritarian presidential elections, but not in parliamentary ones. Furthermore, conformity tendencies in collective voting show signs of increase in support for status quo, under economic duress.

Imitational features of the 2018 presidential elections and their impact on the next electoral cycle: results of public opinion polls

The article provides assessment of the 2018 Russian presidential elections with the distinctive features of electoral authoritarianism. Drawn on the findings of VCIOM opinion polls the paper concludes that the nature of the elections at the state level is primarily imitational: compliance with electoral procedures does not lead to the redistribution of political power but merely consolidates the existing political system. However, despite the imitational characteristics, elections reflect changes in public opinion ignored by the authorities out of necessity. In this article, the authors describe a forecast scenario for the next electoral cycle.

Analysis of the Politico-Ecology of Electoral Management Towards Kenya's 2007 Post-Election Violence

By Using Political ecology as an expression which is contemporary yet with no clear and settled meaning, this study seeks to analyze the politico-ecology of Electoral Management towards Kenya’s 2007 Election Violence. Political ecology used herein refers to taking a political view within the context of electoral management especially on the Post-2007 election violence. Such analysis can be useful in understanding many interrelating variables in this mix. The study construes in its analysis that the violence was not a pop-up event, the historical behind the same activity show a progressive trend which players could have acted on to determine a desired outcome. Certain causal-effect objectives guided this study; evaluation of causes of the 2007 Post Election Violence (PEV), examining the effects of 2007 Post-Election Violence in Eldoret East District, and the purpose of the study itself. This research took an analytical descriptive method. It applied Lisa Blaydes trajectory of Authoritarian Elections and Elite Management Theory and employed content analysis framework. It was found out among others that post-election violence undermines stability of states and to a great extent in regionalizing age interferes with inter-state relations.

Introduction: State capacity and elections in the study of authoritarian regimes

Studies of multiparty elections in authoritarian regimes have proliferated in recent years. Nevertheless, the available evidence remains inconclusive in terms of when, where, or why elections work to sustain or undermine authoritarian rule. The contributions to the special issue ‘State Capacity, Elections and the Resilience of Authoritarian Rule’ argue that analyzing the extent to which the effect of elections on authoritarian regime resilience is mediated through the factor of state capacity helps to solve this puzzle. This introduction lays out the analytical foundation for this discussion by reviewing key terms and concepts, and by highlighting possible theoretical connections between the state capacity literature on the one hand and the electoral authoritarianism literature on the other. Furthermore, it considers the contributions in this special issue, and points out areas of agreement and disagreement between the authors, while simultaneously placing the different arguments within the broader field of enquiry.

Modifying Electoral Authoritarianism. What the 2016 Parliamentary Elections Tell us about the Nature and Resilience of the Putin Regime

Through a focus on the 2016 Russian parliamentary election, this article seeks to assess the strength of the Putin regime and the nature of the system itself. In contrast to those who have heralded its imminent decline, it is argued that the regime continues to display great resilience, the election providing evidence of the regime’s adaptability and its ability to cope with challenges. The nature of the regime is also questioned. It has become commonplace for scholars to refer to Russia’s political system under the presidency of Vladimir Putin as “electoral authoritarian”. The article examines the function of elections in such systems, with a particular emphasis on the way in which elections provide the regime with legitimacy. The conduct and outcome of the elections not only points to the confidence and resilience of the Putin regime but might also suggest that a declining reliance on elections to sustain the regime may lead to a re-appraisal of the electoral authoritarian model as a compelling conceptualization of the Russian political system.

Putin’s “Reset” since the Rise of Protest Movement : Toward Hegemonic Electoral Authoritarianism?

Putin’s “Reset” since the Rise of Protest Movement : Toward Hegemonic Electoral Authoritarianism?

The Strategic Origins of Electoral Authoritarianism

Why do autocrats hold multiparty elections? This article argues that transitions to electoral authoritarianism (EA) follow a strategic calculus in which autocrats balance international incentives to adopt elections against the costs and risks of controlling them. It tests this hypothesis with a multinomial logit model that simultaneously predicts transitions to EA and democracy, using a sample of non-electoral autocracies from 1946–2010. It finds that pro-democratic international leverage – captured by dependence on democracies through trade ties, military alliances, international governmental organizations and aid – predicts EA adoption. Socio-economic factors that make voters easier to control, such as low average income and high inequality, also predict EA transition. In contrast, since democratization entails a loss of power for autocrats, it is mainly predicted by regime weakness rather than international engagement or socio-economic factors. The results demonstrate that different forms of liberalization follow distinct logics, providing insight into autocratic regime dynamics and democracy promotion’s unintended effects.

Populism and political development in hybrid regimes: Russia and the development of official populism

Hybrid regimes like electoral authoritarianism blend elements of democratic and non-democratic political practices. Hybrid regimes can develop from populism or can themselves develop populism to explain and justify their democratic shortcomings. Where the latter occurs, populism is a tool of regime stabilisation rather than a form of ‘populism in power’. Moving from using some populist themes to assist regime stabilisation to official populism requires the development of populist discourse to a point where it becomes definitional of what constitutes the relationship between state and society. The paper uses the example of Russia to discuss the uses of populism in a hybrid regime. Populist rhetoric has been used by the Putin regime since the mid-2000s, but was initially balanced by other discourses. This changed during the 2011–2012 electoral cycle as a conservative-traditional populist discourse was deployed that redefined political agency and the relationship of the state to Russian society.

PREELECTION MOBILIZATION AND ELECTORAL OUTCOME IN AUTHORITARIAN REGIMES*

Does preelection protest have an effect on the outcomes of authoritarian elections? Electoral authoritarian regimes use elections to consolidate their power and claim democratic legitimacy. Nonetheless, on some occasions authoritarian incumbents lose elections despite their advantages, and a democratic breakthrough is achieved. I propose that preelection protests contribute to such election results. Existing scholarship focuses primarily on the effectiveness of postelection upheavals, and the effects of preelection protest are still theoretically and empirically understudied. This article proposes a theory for why preelection contention has an independent effect on incumbent defeat of authoritarian regimes and democratization. I present empirical support for the association between preelection protest activities, incumbent defeat, and democratization using data from 190 elections across 65 countries with nondemocratic regimes. The findings of this analysis have important implications for studies of social movements, authoritarian politics, and democratization.

The Instrumentalisation of Mass Media in Electoral Authoritarian Regimes: Evidence from Russia’s Presidential Election Campaigns of 2000 and 2008

The Instrumentalisation of Mass Media in Electoral Authoritarian Regimes: Evidence from Russia’s Presidential Election Campaigns of 2000 and 2008

Playing by the Rules: How Local Authorities Engineer Victory in Direct Congressional Elections in China

An emerging body of literature views authoritarian elections as an institutional tool utilized by ruling elites to sustain power. However, like a double-edged sword, elections may also destabilize authoritarian regimes and trigger the process of democratization. How do authoritarian rulers make sure elections serve their purposes? What electioneering mechanisms do they employ to engineer electoral victory? Do electoral institutions matter in single-party regimes? Based on intensive fieldwork, this article will lay out for the first time a menu of controlling strategies and tactics deployed in China’s direct congressional elections. Drawing on these mechanics allows local electoral authorities to play by the rules as they manufacture electoral certainties for the Communist Party. Furthermore, the political logic of ‘socialist democracy’ and its operationalization in local congressional elections will also be discussed. A closer look at the micro-level dynamics of authoritarian elections may help develop our understanding of why there has been a mixed record of ‘democratization by elections’.