Illiberal democracy
An illiberal democracy is a governing system that "hides its nondemocratic practices behind formally democratic institutions and procedures". While there is no universal consensus on its precise definition, the term broadly describes governments that present themselves as liberal democracies while subtly suppressing opposing views. It is described by researchers as a 21st-century form of fascism, maintaining electoral democracy while employing state power for largely nationalistic, anti-minority, and anti-freedom purposes, often under the leadership of dominant figures and their close associates.
The rulers of an illiberal democracy may disregard, circumvent, or undermine constitutional limits on their power. Whereas liberal democracies safeguard individual rights and freedoms, illiberal democracies may fail to do so, or such rights may be significantly restricted or gradually eroded. Elections in an illiberal democracy are often manipulated, rigged, or lopsided, whether overtly or subtly, legitimising and consolidating the incumbent rather than genuinely choosing the country's leaders and policies. Illiberalism rejects rational discourse, instead promoting intolerance, fear of difference, the cult of force, discipline, and moral authority. Illiberal constitutions are generally anti-pluralist and anti-institutionalist.
Some scholars have challenged the view that illiberal democracies are genuine democracies, contending that liberal principles and democracy are inseparable and that elections cannot be considered free and fair without freedom of the press and speech. Other theorists contend that classifying illiberal democracy as democratic is overly sympathetic to such regimes, and therefore prefer terms such as electoral authoritarianism, competitive authoritarianism, or soft authoritarianism. It is also seen as a type of a defective democracy.
Origin and usage of the term
Antiquity to the 20th century
Elements of illiberalism date back to Plato's embrace of an illiberal social order, with democracy viewed as inferior to monarchy and aristocracy. Since antiquity, the terms liberal and illiberal lacked any connection with democracy and political government until the French Revolution, and were instead used to describe the noble or ignoble personal qualities of individuals. In the eighteenth century, liberal came to be viewed as character traits of an enlightened gentleman, associated with reasonableness, politeness, open-mindedness, and tolerance; whereas illberal was described as being ungenerous, mean, narrow-minded, bigoted, and offensive. For example, Lord Chesterfield wrote: "Whenever you write Latin, remember that every word or phrase which you make use of, but cannot find in Caesar, Cicero, Livy, Horace, Virgil; and Ovid, is bad, illiberal Latin." By the 20th century, liberalism was primary viewed in a European context, eventually becoming Americanized and associated with liberal democracy. While totalitarian regimes during the 1930s and 1940s criticized liberalism, they did not embrace the label of "illiberal democracy" partly due to its prior negative connotations, although anti-totalitarian critics soon came to use the term.Modern usage
The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 led to Francis Fukuyama's influential book The End of History and the Last Man, announcing that the last "beacon of illiberal forces" in the world had been extinguished and that Western-style liberalism was ascendant through Americanization, liberalization, and globalization. The modern term and concept of illiberal democracy derives from the 1995 book Towards Illiberal Democracy in Pacific Asia. Challenging Francis Fukuyama's end-of-history thesis that political history was culminating in the global rule of capitalist liberal democracy, the book countered that Pacific Asia was not converging on liberal democracy but had instead taken an illiberal turn. Political philosopher Daniel A. Bell contributed a chapter on Confucianism as offering an alternative, illiberal approach to democracy.The term illiberal democracy was then used and popularized by Fareed Zakaria in a regularly cited 1997 article in the journal Foreign Affairs. According to Zakaria, illiberal democracies were "democratically elected regimes often re-elected or reinforced by referendums that ignored the constitutional limits of their power and deprived their citizens of basic rights and liberties." Zakaria stated that in the West, electoral democracy and civil liberties go hand in hand but that around the world, the two concepts were coming apart. According to Zakaria, democracy without constitutional liberalism was producing centralized regimes, the erosion of liberty, ethnic competition, conflict, and war. Recent scholarship has addressed why elections, institutions commonly associated with liberalism and freedom, have led to such negative outcomes in illiberal democracies. Hybrid regimes are political systems in which the mechanism for determining access to state office combines both democratic and autocratic practices. In hybrid regimes, freedoms exist and the opposition is allowed to legally compete in elections, but the system of checks and balances becomes inoperative.
By the decade after the Cold War, a rise in right-wing nationalist and populist parties began openly declaring themselves against liberal democracy. Beginning in Russia and Central and Eastern Europe, political scientists Ivan Krastev and Stephen Holmes described the emergence of an "illiberal counter-revolution". Prime Minister of Hungary, Viktor Orbán, gave an oft-cited speech in 2014 where he proclaimed Hungary an illiberal democracy, stating that "a democracy does not necessarily have to be liberal" and that "the new state we are constructing in Hungary is an illiberal state, a non-liberal state." Modern advocates of illiberal democracy insist they are more democratic than others, and generally define themselves as being against liberal democracy, the West, and the United States. Vladimir Putin of Russia is an outspoken critic of liberalism, with him and Orban described as re-defining it in ways that suit their agendas by equating it with multiculturalism, immigration and LGBTQ rights. The election of Donald Trump saw a large increase in scholarly research about illiberalism, what it means, and heavy debates on whether or not America is on the road to fascism.
Definition
Scholars have generally criticized the claim that illiberal democracies are democracies, arguing that liberal principles and democracy cannot be separated and that without freedom of the press and speech, elections cannot truly be free and fair. According to jurist András Sajó, illiberal democracy should be counted as a type of democracy because it is "democratic in a plebiscitarian sense". Other theorists say that classifying illiberal democracy as democratic is overly sympathetic to the illiberal regimes, and therefore prefer terms such as electoral authoritarianism, competitive authoritarianism, or soft authoritarianism.Contemporary usage of illberalism indicates an opposition to liberalism or liberal democracy. Fritz Stern, a historian of Germany, understood by illiberalism anti-democratic mentality and anti-democratic practices such as suffrage restrictions. Marlène Laruelle defines illiberalism as a backlash against today's liberalism. According to her, illiberalism is "majoritarian, nation-centric or sovereigntist, favouring traditional hierarchies and cultural homogeneity", calling for "a shift from politics to culture and is post-post-modern in its claims of rootedness in an age of globalization". defines illiberalism as opposition to the main principles of liberal democracy: limited government, open society, and state neutrality. He distinguishes between authoritarian, populist, traditionalist, religious, paternalist, libertarian, nativist-nationalist, materialist, and left-wing varieties.
Types
There is a spectrum of illiberal democracies: from those that are nearly liberal democracies to those that are almost openly dictatorships. One proposed method of determining whether a regime is an illiberal democracy is to determine whether "it has regular, free, fair, and competitive elections to fill the principal positions of power in the country, but it does not qualify as Free in Freedom House's annual ratings of civil liberties and political rights." A 2008 article by Rocha Menocal, Fritz and Rakner describes the emergence of illiberal democracies and discusses some of their shared characteristics. Rocha Menocal, Fritz, and Rakner try to draw the similarity between illiberal democracies and hybrid regimes. The authors make the case that the "democratic optimism" in the 1990s—following the collapse of the Soviet Union—has led to the emergence of hybrid regimes holding illiberal values. Initially, the Western powers assumed that democratic consolidation would occur automatically and disregarded the alternatives. In reality, the non-consolidation of democracy has led to the rise of hybrid regimes that possess "illiberal values".Regime type is important for illiberal democracies. This is because illiberal democracies can rise from both consolidated liberal democracies and authoritarian states. Zakaria initially wrote his paper using the term illiberal democracy interchangeably with pseudo-autocracies but today they are used to describe countries that are potentially democratically backsliding as well.
According to Marlène Laruelle, there are "significant differences between illiberalism and conservatism" as it has been "traditionally understood".
Author Jennifer Gandhi says that many autocrats allow elections in their governance to stabilize and reinforce their regimes. She first says that elections help leaders resolve threats from elites and from the masses by appeasing those capable of usurping power with money and securing the cooperation of the general public with political concessions. Gandhi also claims that illiberal elections serve other useful purposes, such as providing autocrats with information about their citizens and establishing legitimacy both domestically and in the international community, and that these varied functions must be elucidated in future research. One example of the regime durability provided by illiberal democracy is illustrated in Mubarak's Egyptian regime. Lisa Blaydes shows that under Mubarak's lengthy rule, elections provided a mechanism through which elites bought votes to support the government to acquire regime-enforced parliamentary immunity. This enabled them to accumulate illicit wealth and draw from state resources without legal consequence. Such research suggests that, given the stability-providing function of illiberal elections, states governed under illiberal democracies may have low prospects for a transition to a democratic system protected by constitutional liberties.
In order to discourage this problem and promote the development of liberal democracies with free and fair elections, Zakaria proposes that the international community and the United States must promote gradual liberalization of societies. Zakaria advances institutions like the World Trade Organization, the Federal Reserve System, and a check on power in the form of the judiciary to promote democracy and limit the power of people which can be destructive. Illiberal democratic governments may believe they have a mandate to act in any way they see fit as long as they hold regular elections. Lack of liberties such as freedom of speech and freedom of assembly make opposition extremely difficult. The rulers may centralize powers between branches of the central government and local government. Media are often controlled by the state and strongly support the regime. Non-governmental organizations may face onerous regulations or simply be prohibited. The regime may use red tape, economic pressure, imprisonment or violence against its critics. Zakaria believes that constitutional liberalism can bring democracy, but not vice versa.