Democracy, Liberalism, and their Opposites

December 15, 2022January 10, 2023

Democracy, Liberalism, and their Opposites

First published in Democracy Paradox, December 15, 2022

Describing Political Systems

Say you want to construct an all-encompassing typology of political systems in the world. Now, since most knowledge is mediated by words, you had better start with establishing a clear vocabulary. Fine, but you are already stumbling upon the unclear and confusing terms used by such well-respected sources as the V-Dem Institute, the Economist Intelligence Unit, Freedom House, or in the academe. Here is a sampling of such terms: “flawed democracy” (as if there are democracies that are “flawless”), “electoral democracy” (as if there are democracies without elections), “hybrid regime”, “competitive authoritarianism” or “partly free regime” (as if there are democracies that are half-democratic and half-nondemocratic), and more. Is there a way of avoiding this terminological and notional hullaballoo?

Yes, there is! In fact, only two terms, and their opposites, should suffice to classify all political systems into a small number of categories that are mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive. This thinking yields two pairs of terms. The first pair includes democracy and its opposite, non-democracy; the second pair consists of liberalism and its own opposite, illiberalism. The next step is to define those terms.

Continue reading Democracy, Liberalism, and their Opposites“

September 25, 2022September 25, 2022

Anti-systemic Far Right or Systemic Nativism?

Originally published as an op-ed in the Sunday edition of Greek newspaper Kathimerini, Sunday 25 September 2022. Own translation.

Of all the national elections held this year in Europe, three parties, from three countries, garnered the most international attention. In France, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally received over 40% of the vote in the second round of the presidential election held in April. They hope to go beyond and win the next election. In Sweden, the fledgling Sweden Democrats party finished second, having quadrupled its electoral strength in a decade. In Italy, where the polls open today, the also young Brothers of Italy party is expected to come in first and its leader to become prime minister.

September 23, 2022September 25, 2022

Italy, Europe’s political laboratory

Originally published as an op-ed in Greek newspaper Kathimerini, 30 August 2022.

History often plays strange games. Take Italy, for example. Exactly one hundred years after Mussolini’s March on Rome, the so-called Brothers of Italy – a new party with roots in postwar fascism – look set to be the winner of the Italian elections to be held on September 25. In that case, the Brothers will almost certainly form a government with the right-wing parties of Matteo Salvini and Silvio Berlusconi. Italy will not suddenly turn fascist, of course. It will however continue to both flounder about in conditions of political instability and fret about its dire economic prospects.

May 17, 2022May 18, 2022

Populism as democratic illiberalism (and how it fits political systems theory)

The following is the text of a keynote address I gave at the 7^th Prague Populism Conference on May 16, 2022, in Prague, Czech Republic. To my knowledge, this is the first attempt to locate populism within a parsimonious general theory of political systems across time and space. The analysis is based on years of conceptual, theoretical, and comparative empirical research, originally encapsulated in this infographic .

I am happy to be once again in this Prague conference on populism, which by the years has become one of the most important in Europe on the subject. As this is not my first time to participate in this event, I recall some extraordinary thinkers who in previous years shared important ideas about populism in this room. I am humbled. For my more modest part, what I am going to try today to say something that is original, since I have never presented it before, and which I hope, will also appeal to your own interests on the subject of populism. So, the title of my presentation today is “Populism as democratic illiberalism” and my more particular focus will be on how this populism fits a general political systems theory. Ultimately, I am going to present a typology of the universe of political systems in which populism will take its own specific place. Let us then begin from the source of all contention, which is the concept of “populism.”

March 30, 2022May 24, 2022

Seven types of Illiberal leaders, and their regimes

According to all indices for measuring its health across the world (including Freedom House, the Economist Intelligence Unit, and V-Dem Institute), liberal democracy is under threat by illiberal regimes. By “liberal democracy” is meant a form of institutionalized government based on individual freedom and political moderation, safeguarding minority rights, and adhering to the rule of law as expressed primarily in written constitutions. But if liberal democracies are all alike, every foe of liberalism is illiberal in his own way. This infographic shows the global expansion of illiberal rule but also distinguishes among contemporary illiberal leaders by putting their main differences on display. (But if you still look for similarities, did you already notice that all illiberal leaders are men?)

To download the full infographic or print it in high-quality and professional form, click on the button below.

February 5, 2022February 6, 2022

What happens when populism wins power?

Many people think that, when in power, populism is a “corrective” to democracy. This view is theoretically naive at best and empirically fictitious at worst. Just look at the most important real-life cases of ruling populism and you have a most clear answer to this blog’s title question: When populists win power, liberal democracies turn into illiberal ones; some even turn into real autocracies. Here below are six cartoons depicting, in chronological and historical order, the important cases of populist rule in Argentina, Italy, Venezuela, Hungary, Greece, and the United States under Donald Trump. All six cases have been analyzed and explained in separate chapters in my book Populism and Liberal Democracy: A Comparative and Theoretical Analysis (OUP, 2019). As of the cartoons below, these are part of a little comic story I wrote in collaboration with cartoonist Alecos Papadatos, which you can find—and probably enjoy—here and, as a slide show, here.

October 25, 2021February 6, 2022

Europe was once a club of liberal democracies. Not any longer!

Following the expansion of EU over the last seventy years, this infographic depicts the evolution, and relative decline, of Europe’s post-war liberal democratic rule. Back in the 1950s, and for three decades thereafter, all member states had solid liberal democratic governments. The Union was in fact meant to be an exclusive club of liberal democracies. But things did not turn exactly that way. Already by the 1980s, populism, an amalgam of democracy and illiberalism (hence, minimally defined as democratic illiberalism), won power in Greece and then flourished elsewhere, particularly in the southern and eastern parts of the continent. During and after the 1990s, nativist parties—those standing in opposition to migration, further European integration, and globalization—grew strong in most developed countries in western and northern Europe. Meanwhile in Eastern Europe—because of national and ethnic divisions, persisting state corruption, or both—most countries have failed to this date to produce solid and durable liberal democratic governments; instead, as shown by the four CEE countries included herein, most governments in this region stand today as exemplars of democratic illiberalism.

May 6, 2021May 31, 2021

Spot the populists!

The universe of political parties is one of immense complexity. To make it comprehensible, one has to divide its countless units into a relatively small number of specific party types and subtypes that are well distinguished from each other. This requires that each type is defined minimally, that is to say, in a way that includes only its core characteristics, or properties. Ideally, at any given moment no two party types should fit under the same definition. And each definition should point to specific, real-life political parties that are out there in the world. Here is, then, my original attempt to produce a typology of the macrocosm of political parties that is useful for political scientists and practitioners of politics alike. Meanwhile, spotting the populists is now being made easy. Cat-dogs no more.

Spot_the_populists*Download

May 3, 2021May 5, 2021

Europe’s party politics transformed

Circa 1990, nearly all major parties in Europe belonged to the liberal type. Fast forward through the decades that followed since to our own day, and this isn’t the case any more. Liberal parties are currently in decline while other party types, such as populist and nativist parties, have emerged strong in several nations across the continent. How did that happen and what are the main consequences of such transformations? This essay and the interactive infographic that accompanies it explain.

The content of this blog has appeared in the form of policy brief published by the European Liberal Forum in May 2021.

stating THE ISSue

For a time, post-war European politics was dominated by the liberal type of party. These broadly liberal parties were who originally envisaged the idea of a united Europe and subsequently carried the torch for the advancement of open society in a progressively integrated Europe under rule of law. Over many decades, Europe’s party systems operated as liberal political cartels in which the major parties competed for power against each other, largely unchallenged by other party types. Fast forward to the present day, and the talk around town is about the decline of the formerly established liberal parties, the proliferation of new populist ones, and, ominously enough, the rise of various other so-called anti-system parties—leading to democratic backsliding and, potentially, the disintegration of the European Union. Which part of this narrative corresponds to empirical reality, and which is just hype and headlines? More to the point: What is the current picture of Europe’s party politics? And what is the outlook for the future at EU level?

March 27, 2021May 17, 2022

A Typology of Parties in Contemporary Europe, 1990-2020

This infographic presents an original typology of political parties in contemporary Europe during the last three decades. It differentiates between seven clearly defined types of parties that are exclusive to each other while collectively including all currently significant parties. The seven party types are: Liberal, populist, nativist, nationalist, regionalist, secessionist, and antidemocratic. The infographic is interactive. If downloaded, you may click on the party acronyms and visit their respective official web pages for more information. Enjoy your exploration to Europe’s ever-changing party and party system landscapes; get your concepts and definitions right; learn how to differentiate populist from non-populist parties (in a per genus et differentiam way); puzzle out how governments are formed; and get a hands-on understanding of your own about the dynamics currently developing, as well as the directions European liberal politics is likely to take in the future.

To download the full infographic, interact with it, and even print it in high-quality and professional form, click on the button below.

Europe’s Parties: A TypologyDownload