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Electoral authoritarian regimes transgress democratic norms in severe and systematic ways. Grounded in democratic theory, the chapter first delineates the minimum norms of democratic elections. It then describes the repertoire of manipulative strategies authoritarian rulers may deploy to suffocate the democratic spirit of multiparty elections. Their strategies of manipulation are mutually substitutive. They include the banning and repressive treatment of parties and candidates, their exclusion from finance and mass media, the disenfranchisement and intimidation of voters, the design of discriminatory election rules, and the commission of electoral fraud. Due to normative and empirical ambiguities, the external boundary that separates electoral autocracies from electoral democracies is essentially contested. Their most salient internal boundary runs between hegemonic and competitive regimes that differ in their degrees of institutionalization. Hegemonic regimes display high levels of institutional certainty. They are in equilibrium. Competitive regimes show high levels of uncertainty. They are in disequilibrium.

This chapter charts and explains Steven Levitsky and Lucan Way’s celebrated model for explaining regime transition. It is divided into four sections. The first provides an overview of the dimensions of leverage, linkage and organisational power focusing, in particular, on the inter-play between them; how the strength of one renders the others more or less important. The second section examines the dimension of leverage – the principal ways in which it is exercised and how it is quantified – and defines a Black Knight patron (what a state or regime must do to qualify as one). The third section examines the dimension of linkage; the main forms it takes and how its strength is measured and categorised. And the fourth section examines organisational power; the state and other structures on which it is based.

The global rise of populism is driving a process of democratic erosion. Accordingly, scholarly attention has shifted from processes of democratization to de-democratization trajectories; or, how democracies perish after they have transitioned from authoritarianism. This chapter distinguishes between populism (a political strategy) and competitive authoritarianism (a regime type). The chapter enumerates the conceptual contributions of this book, primarily, that the rise to power of populism can lead to regime change by creating significant power asymmetries. However, while unconstrained populism in power can lead to hybrid regimes or even full-scale authoritarianism, strong judiciaries, and other institutional actors, can contain or constrain populism in power, preventing regime change. The chapter offers a new definition of populism that includes a governance dimension that is missing in other definitions and argues that Alberto Fujimori, Hugo Chávez, Álvaro Uribe, Evo Morales, and Rafael Correa are examples of populism.

This chapter compares two waves of transitions from authoritarianism to democracy in postcommunist Europe and Eurasia. The first wave took place in 1989, when the communist party's monopoly disintegrated throughout the region. The second wave, the color revolutions, took place between 1998 and 2005. There are a number of similarities between the two waves. For example, both waves exhibit characteristics typical of diffusion dynamics, such as the rapid spread of similar changes among a group of neighboring states, and both were fueled by the willingness and ability of publics to mobilize in large numbers in order to remove authoritarian leaders from office. However, while the first wave was primarily a “street” affair and targeted fully authoritarian regimes, the second one focused on elections and took place in competitive authoritarian regimes. Moreover, 1989 was more the product of demonstration effects, while the color revolutions reflected the well-planned efforts of a transnational network that brought together local oppositions, members of the international democracy assistance community, and participants in earlier successful electoral confrontations in the region.

This chapter examines the rapid swing from would-be authoritarian electoral control to democratic spring and back again. The end of the Second World War fostered the rise of democratic regimes across Latin America. In Mexico the shift was particularly marked for domestic reasons that included pent up demand, a powerful tradition of competitive politics and an increase in the level of violence necessary to rig elections. The emerging civilian elite consequently introduced under pressure primary elections inside the single party, which brought with them a new level of democratic representation. While elections remained flawed, committed voters could choose from a wide range of candidates and exercise a reliable veto power unpopular party choices. This was particularly the case in municipal elections, the ones that mattered most to voters. State and federal governments would let opposition victories stand when the cost of repression was too high. The ensuing polyarchy ended when the PRI ended primary elections in 1950. However the political genes and memories of representative local elections endured and were critical to the democratic transition of the later twentieth century.

This chapter analyzes each of the three major components of a democratic coup. First, the military overthrows an authoritarian government. Coups that target democratically elected governments are inherently not democratic. Second, after a coup deposes an authoritarian government, the military temporarily governs the nation as part of an interim government that rules only until democratic elections of civilian leaders take place. During the transition, the military must support the transition to democracy and prepare for elections. Third, the transition ends with the free and fair elections of civilian leaders and the military’s retreat to the barracks. A coup that fails to produce at least a procedural democracy is not democratic under my definition.

This chapter applies the idea of “intentional citizenship” to real-world states and their citizens. It examines people’s attitudes to their state as reported in cross-national attitude surveys on national identity. This data demonstrates that in most democratic countries, large majorities of the population have a fairly strong attachment to their country or their state, and are its intentional participants. As such they are liable for a nonproportional distribution of their states’ remedial obligations. The chapter then turns to examine the scope of intentional citizenship in nondemocratic states. Using recent studies from comparative politics on the nature of nondemocratic states, it examines the ways in which patterns of civic participation, state oppression and state manipulation affect intentional citizenship.

This chapter examines Ukraine, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, and Belarus to illustrate how political competition and geopolitical ties affected the frequency and content of conspiracy claims. It uses quantitative data to show broad trends, and case studies of individual countries to illustrate the mechanisms at work. The analysis highlights how conspiracy claims emerge from the real preoccupations of politicians and commonly held beliefs about geopolitics. Unlike Russia, in none of these cases was conspiracy invoked consistently for offensive purposes. Instead conspiracy claims came about reactively and intermittently, though at moments of high intrigue or anxiety they could appear all-consuming.

Autocratic regimes differ in the extent of individual freedoms they grant their citizens. In particular, in some autocracies, citizens are allowed to form organizations, while in others, freedom of association is severely restricted. Does digital communication serve as an alternative means to mobilize, thereby bypassing traditional restrictions in autocracies? The book analyzes the effect of Internet penetration on protest across different national environments, to test if the effect varies across depending on existing strategies of autocratic rule. In particular, it distinguishes between two scenarios: reinforcement of traditional forms of authoritarian control, where the Internet is used to strengthen traditional repression, and substitution, where the Internet helps autocratic governments regain control they have given up by partly liberalizing the political arena. The chapter presents empirical evidence in support of the latter scenario, which suggests that the Internet helps autocrats maintain political control that they no longer have through institutional channels.