Democratic backsliding

Democratic backsliding, also called autocratization, is "a process of regime change towards autocracy that makes the exercise of political power more arbitrary and repressive and that restricts the space for public contestation and political participation in the process of government selection". Democratic decline involves the weakening of democratic institutions, such as the peaceful transition of power or free and fair elections, or the violation of individual rights that underpin democracy, especially freedom of expression. Proposed causes of democratic backsliding include lack of public support for democracy, economic inequality, culturally conservative reactions to societal changes, populist or personalist politics, and external influence from great power politics. During crises, backsliding can occur when leaders impose autocratic rules during states of emergency that are either disproportionate to the severity of the crisis or remain in place after the situation has improved. While regime change through military coups has declined since the end of the Cold War, more subtle forms of backsliding have increased. During the third wave of democratization in the late twentieth century, many new, weakly institutionalized democracies were established; these regimes have been most vulnerable to democratic backsliding. The third wave of autocratization has been ongoing since 2010, when the number of liberal democracies was at an all-time high. One quarter of the world's population lives under democratically backsliding hybrid regimes as of 2021. Democratic backsliding occurs when essential components of democracy are threatened. Examples of democratic backsliding include: Free and fair elections are degraded; Liberal rights of freedom of speech, press and association decline, impairing the ability of the political opposition to challenge the government, hold it to account, and propose alternatives to the current regime; The rule of law (i.e.

About this result

This page is automatically generated and may contain information that is not correct, complete, up-to-date, or relevant to your search query. The same applies to every other page on this website. Please make sure to verify the information with EPFL's official sources.

Related publications (9)

Related concepts (17)

Related courses (1)

Related lectures (5)

CS-234: Technologies for democratic society

This course will offer students a broad but hands-on introduction to technologies of human self-organization.

A hybrid regime is a type of political system often created as a result of an incomplete democratic transition from an authoritarian regime to a democratic one (or vice versa). Hybrid regimes are categorized as having a combination of autocratic features with democratic ones and can simultaneously hold political repressions and regular elections. Hybrid regimes are commonly found in developing countries with abundant natural resources such as petro-states.

A peaceful transition or transfer of power is a concept important to democratic governments in which the leadership of a government peacefully hands over control of government to a newly-elected leadership. This may be after elections or during the transition from a different kind of political regime, such as the postcommunist period after the fall of the Soviet Union. In scholarship examining democratization and emerging democracies, study of the successful transitions of power is used to understand the transition to constitutional democracy and the relative stability of that government.

Political polarization (spelled polarisation in British English) is the divergence of political attitudes away from the center, towards ideological extremes. Most discussions of polarization in political science consider polarization in the context of political parties and democratic systems of government. In two-party systems, political polarization usually embodies the tension of its binary political ideologies and partisan identities.

Reducing CO2 emissions, restricting pesticides to protect health and biodiversity, enhancing corporate responsibility: why is Switzerland, one of the more democratic countries of the world, repeatedly failing to create a proper societal dialogue to face to ...

2021

Discrete-Choice Mining of Social Processes

Victor Kristof

Poor decisions and selfish behaviors give rise to seemingly intractable global problems, such as the lack of transparency in democratic processes, the spread of conspiracy theories, and the rise in greenhouse gas emissions. However, people are more predict ...

EPFL2021

MoleculARweb: A Web Site for Chemistry and Structural Biology Education through Interactive Augmented Reality out of the Box in Commodity Devices

Matteo Dal Peraro, Luciano Andres Abriata, Lucien Fabrice Krapp, Fabio Jose Cortes Rodriguez

Augmented/virtual realities (ARs/VRs) promise to revolutionize STEM education. However, most easy-to-use tools are limited to static visualizations, which limits the approachable content, whereas more interactive and dynamic alternatives require costly har ...

AMER CHEMICAL SOC2021

Democracy and Democratization CS-234: Technologies for democratic society

Covers essential elements of democracy, voting equality, and Usenet's democratizing role.

Economic Globalisation: Key Facts and Geography MGT-464: Globalisation, robotics and the future of work

Explores key facts and geography shaping economic globalisation, human population history, and climate change.

Technologies for Democratic Society CS-234: Technologies for democratic society

Explores the impact of technology on democracy and the phases of democratizing technologies.