Helen Saulnier 
When the Legislation Legitimizes Democratic Backsliding
Generally we feel democratic breakdowns require coups or civil wars. Having said that, democratic erosion “happens over time. It usually takes years for an executive with hegemonic aspirations to be successful in eroding democracy.” Moreover, democratic backsliding commonly occurs inside of the constraints of constitutional regulation. Viktor Orbán, Hugo Chávez, and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan all employed legal means to flip democracies into autocracies. Though they all created significant revisions to their constitutions, they utilized legal mechanisms to make all those changes.
Authoritarianism does not have to have to violate the letter of the law. Instead authoritarians switch the regulation in opposition to democracy alone. They alter election rules so they turn into neither absolutely free nor truthful. They limit the house readily available for free expression. Leaders like Orbán do not have to have to violate the legislation when they have the electric power to craft the regulation to fit their requires. Soon after Orbán received a two-thirds the vast majority in parliament, his celebration, Fidesz, rewrote the constitution and redrew the electoral map for parliamentary districts.
Hugo Chávez and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan also consolidated power by means of constitutional reform, but also by new regulations and appointments. Without a doubt, it was the opposition who pursued extraconstitutional means to remove them from electric power. In each Venezuela and Turkey, the navy staged unsuccessful coups to take out Chávez and Erdoğan from electrical power. However, the leaders survived and utilised the opportunity to consolidate their electrical power even even more.
The legislation is not a shield to defend a democracy from backsliding. Relatively, aspiring autocrats can craft guidelines, amend constitutions, or even entirely rewrite them to consolidate their electricity. The American Constitution has offered a stable framework for democracy in The usa. Nonetheless, it also has legacies of authoritarianism. Without a doubt, most democracies remain vulnerable to democratic erosion. At times the regulation even legitimizes democratic backsliding.
Democracy Paradox Podcast
Laura Gamboa on Opposition Methods to Resist Democratic Erosion
Stephan Haggard and Robert Kaufman on Democratic Backsliding
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