1. Theories of democratization and consolidation
Master of Science in INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION, FINANCE AND DEVELOPMENT Lesson 11:
Theories of democratization and consolidation
Prof. Daniel Pommier Vincelli

2. Democratization and consolidation
INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION, FINANCE AND DEVELOPMENT

3. Huntington: Authoritarian regimes and democratization processes 1974-1990.
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4. MC Faul: Fourth Wave towards democracy and Authoritarianism (2002)
The transition from communism in Europe and the former Soviet Union has only sometimes produced a transition to democracy. Since the crumbling of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, most of the twenty-eight new states have abandoned communism, but only nine of these have entered the ranks of liberal democracies. The remaining majority of new postcommunist states are various shades of dictatorships or unconsolidated “transitional regimes.” This article seeks to explain why some states abandoned communism for democracy while others turned to authoritarian rule. Situations of unequal distributions of power produced the quickest and most stable transitions from communist rule. In countries with asymmetrical balances of power, the regime to emerge depends almost entirely on the ideological orientation of the most powerful. In countries where democrats enjoyed a decisive power advantage, democracy emerged. Conversely, in countries in which dictators maintained a decisive power advantage, dictatorship emerged. In between these two extremes were countries in which the distribution of power between the old regime and its challengers was relatively equal. Rather than producing stalemate, compromise, and parted transitions to democracy, however, such situations in the postcommunist world resulted in protracted confrontation between relatively balanced powers. The regimes that emerged from these modes of transitions are not the most successful democracies but rather are unconsolidated, unstable, partial democracies
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5. Hale: No transition to democracy but cyclic movements to democracy and authoritarianism (2005).
Research on regime change has often wound up chasing events in the post-Soviet world because it has frequently assumed that regime change, if not simple instability, implies a trajectory toward a regime-type endpoint like democracy or autocracy. A supplemental approach recognizes that regime change can be cyclic, not just progressive, regressive, or random. In fact, regime cycles are much of what we see in the postcommunist world, where some states have oscillated from autocracy toward greater democracy, then back toward more autocracy, and, with recent "colored revolutions," toward greater democracy again. An institutional logic of elite collective action, focusing on the effects of patronal presidentialism, is shown to be useful in understanding such cyclic dynamics, explaining why "revolutions" occurred between 2003 and 2005 in Ukraine, Georgia, and Kyrgyzstan but not in countries like Russia, Azerbaijan, and Uzbekistan.
• why did revolutions occur after controversial elections in Georgia, Ukraine and Kyrgzstan but not after controversial elections in Armenia, Russia, and Uzbekistan between 2003 and 2005?
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6. Hale: Presidential Patrimonialism
• Patronal presidentialism: defined by two key components 1. a directly elected presidency is invested with great formal powers relative to other state organs 2. the president also wields a high degree of informal power based on widespread patron-client relationships at the intersection of the state and the economy • patronal : refers to the exercise of political authority primarily through selective transfers of resources rather than formalized institutional practices, idea-based politics, or generalized exchange as enforced through the established rule of law. (this is an ideal type) • lame-duck syndrome: that precipitates elite defection from the incumbent president’s team when elites believe the incumbent may leave office. Key factors inducing the lame-duck syndrome and determining who wins resulting contests are found to include formal presidential term limits and public opinion as well as such variables as international intervention. • patrimonial communism: In practice, this means that a patronal president wields not only the powers formally invested in the office but also the ability to selectively direct vast sources of material wealth and power outside of formal institutional channels.
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7. What went wrong with post-communist transitions after 25 years
What went wrong with post-communist transitions after 25 years? (Hale, 2016)
A quarter century after the USSR’s breakup, the region it occupied has become more rather than less authoritarian on average. The rise has been neither steep nor steady, however, and the dominant regional pattern has been regime cycling, with movement both toward and away from authoritarianism at different points in time. Key causes are the tenacious pre-Soviet legacy of patronalism, the prevalence of presidentialist constitutions, and strong leadership popularity without the strong Western linkage and leverage that has often mitigated similar authoritarian tendencies in places like Africa and Latin America.
INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION, FINANCE AND DEVELOPMENT