Elections Without Democracy: The Rise of Competitive Authoritarianism

Levitsky, Steven; Way, Lucan A.

doi:10.1353/jod.2002.0026

Cited by 1,913 publications

(721 citation statements)

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“…Repression, for instance, includes both 'high' and 'low intensity' repression (Levitsky & Way, 2002), where the first includes mostly violent visible acts, often directed at well-known opposition individuals or organizations. 'Low intensity' repression, on the other hand, is aimed at less visible groups, is more subtle, less violent or even non-violent at all (Levitsky & Way, 2002, p. 50).…”

Section: Study-abroad Programmes and The Pillars Of Authoritarian Stamentioning

confidence: 99%

Sponsoring student mobility for developmentandauthoritarian stability: Kazakhstan’s Bolashak programme

Sordi

2017

Globalizations

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Soon after independence, Kazakhstan established the state-sponsored student mobility programme 'Bolashak', which has since provided almost 12,000 young people with full scholarships for their studies abroad. Bolashak is considered here as a multidimensional tool, promoting development and channelling authoritarian rule at the same time. Through a series of qualitative interviews with alumni of the programme, this paper investigates the authoritarian and paternalistic features in Bolashak-related policies and discourses, looking at how they contribute to the three 'pillars' of authoritarian stability: repression, co-optation and legitimation. The findings of this paper question the assumption that globalization is bringing only challenges to autocracies. Kazakhstan is an example of how contemporary authoritarian regimes may open up to the world in order to seek development as well as political stability.

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Section: Study-abroad Programmes and The Pillars Of Authoritarian Stamentioning

confidence: 99%

Sponsoring student mobility for developmentandauthoritarian stability: Kazakhstan’s Bolashak programme

Sordi

2017

Globalizations

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“…However, these elections are either formally limited to roles that would prevent a complete power rotation or, when authorized to change executive power on paper, they fall short of the conditions necessary for free and fair elections. Incumbents in these regimes abuse public institutions to advantage the playing field in favor of the ruling party, violate civil liberties, and manipulate the election process to guarantee their electoral victory (Diamond 2002;Levitsky and Way 2002;Schedler 2006). Accordingly, some scholars argue that incumbent leaders use these elections to consolidate their power (Blaydes 2010;Lust-Okar 2006;Magaloni 2008).…”

Section: Authoritarian Elections Mobilization and Democratizationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Preelection Mobilization and Electoral Outcome in Authoritarian Regimes*

Kadivar¹

2017

Mobilization: An International Quarterly

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Does pre-election 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 pre-election protest contributes to such election results. Existing scholarship focuses primarily on the effectiveness of post-election upheavals, but the effects of pre-election protest are still theoretically and empirically understudied. This paper proposes a theory for why pre-election contention has an independent effect on incumbent defeat of authoritarian regimes and democratization. I present empirical support for the association between pre-election protest activities, incumbent defeat, and democratization using data from 190 elections across 65 countries with non-democratic regimes. The findings of this analysis have important implications for studies of social movements, authoritarian politics, and democratization. 2 Pre-Election Mobilization and Electoral Outcome in Authoritarian RegimesWhile elections are central to democracy, holding elections is not sufficient for a regime to be considered democratic. Most authoritarian regimes in the world hold elections in which the incumbents are almost always assured of victory due to abuse of power, violation of civil liberties, and electoral manipulation. Nonetheless, on rare occasions oppositions can defeat an authoritarian incumbent and achieve a democratic Democratization is one of the more significant consequences of popular mobilizations that has been understudied from the perspective of political process theory, the dominant approach of social movement studies (Tarrow 2012:21). The literature on the consequences of social movements, for instance, has mostly focused on the outcome of policy change since it studies the outcome of movements in the context of consolidated democracies (Amenta et al. 2010;Giugni 1998). To fill this gap, this paper builds on the general social movements scholarship and the few existing studies of movements in authoritarian states (Almeida 2003;Goodwin 2001;Wood 2000) in order to theorize the ability for contentious collective action to empower opposition groups and thus affect electoral outcomes in authoritarian regimes. Pre-election protest has an independent effect on electoral outcomes because it shows there are viable alternatives to the regime, encourages defection within the regime, signals the spread of grievances to both the regime and voters, and sometimes create new grievances when faced with repression.

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“…2 Steven Levisky and Lucan A. Way (2002) identify the electoral system, the legislature, the judiciary and the media as the four major arenas of contestation in the periodic challenge of incumbents. In his paper we interest ourselves in two of theseelections and the media.…”

Section: The Fourth Phase: Consequences and Possibilitiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Media games and shifting of spaces for political communication in Zimbabwe

Mazango

2005

WPCC

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Elaborate media games have been played to restrain growing political opposition and to maintain ZANU PF supremacy in Zimbabwe. From the dark days of Rhodesia, regime control of public communication remains one of the most enduring sources of ruling party dominance in the country. This history of government containment of a critical media laid the foundation for postindependence control of freedom of expression, something that has proved an effective instrument for blocking envisaged transition to an alternative democracy today. Since 2000 new restrictive laws have shut down four titles and 80 media workers have been arrested or detained for various transgressions. Is the government's recent strengthening of egregious media laws a defence of communicative sovereignty as it claims, or it is a manifest reversal into authoritarian rule as detractors claim?

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Elections Without Democracy: The Rise of Competitive Authoritarianism

Cited by 1,913 publications

References 18 publications

Sponsoring student mobility for developmentandauthoritarian stability: Kazakhstan’s Bolashak programme

Sponsoring student mobility for developmentandauthoritarian stability: Kazakhstan’s Bolashak programme

Preelection Mobilization and Electoral Outcome in Authoritarian Regimes*

Media games and shifting of spaces for political communication in Zimbabwe

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