Why do unconsolidated democracies backslide? The case of Post-Yugoslavia

Abstract

Speaker: Dimitri A. Sotiropoulos, University of Athens Discussant: Hanspeter Kriesi, European University Institute This talk is based on my recent book titled The Irregular Pendulum of Democracy: Populism, Clientelism and Corruption in Post-Yugoslav Succession States (London: Palgrave Macmillan 2023). The main research question of this book is why and how contemporary democracies backslide, even if they have started on and have progressed along the road to further democratisation. The main point of the book is that the backsliding of democracy should be interpreted in a wider perspective of pendulum-like movements to and from democracy, i.e., to and from the political regime usually understood as contemporary liberal democracy. This is a perspective couched by a metaphor, namely the irregular pendulum of democracy, which I have constructed to imply that democratic regimes may swing between a democratic end (fully developed liberal democracy) and a semi-authoritarian end (competitive authoritarianism). It is not a typical pendulum, as it does not follow any predictable regularity of speed or repetition. It is easier to analyse such movements of the pendulum when democracy is not consolidated yet, as democratic institutions and processes are not stable enough. Such institutions and processes are curbed by entrenched state-society relations, such as populism, clientelism, and corruption. I have explored in my book the swing of unconsolidated democracy away from the democratic end in the cases of today’s Serbia and the swing back towards liberal democracy in the case of North Macedonia and to an extent Montenegro. These two countries until recently had slid into a competitive authoritarian regime, but then gradually embarked on the road to democratic recovery. I have written a comparative politics study of the above issues based on the relevant literature on democracy’s backsliding and on field research in three democratising post-Yugoslav successor states. I have conducted over 40 personal interviews in the three countries mentioned above and consulted official reports, including reports of international organisations, such as the EU and the OSCE, government documents, and articles from the press and electronic media. And I have analysed my data following the theoretical approach of historical institutionalism and more concretely Peter A. Hall’s “systematic process analysis”.