Research

From autumn 2024, funded by the Fritz Thyssen Foundation

The Rising autocratisation in democracies project investigates how a country's experience with democracy influences processes of autocratisation. In political science, it has long been assumed that democracies stabilise and strengthen themselves after a certain period of time. However, recent developments, such as in Hungary, which has gone from being a model of democratisation to a prime example of autocratisation, call this assumption into question.

The project Rising autocratisation in democracies aims to explore the factors that influence the resilience of democracies to autocratisation and to understand what distinguishes democracies from other regimes. The main research question is how a country's political opportunity structures and democratic experiences influence potential autocratisation. Three specific research questions are addressed:

1. are democracies more resilient to autocratisation than other regimes?

2. how do the interactions between autocratic governments and their opponents differ in democratic and non-democratic regimes?

3. under what conditions can autocratisation be stopped in (formerly) democratic countries?

In order to answer these questions, a three-part research approach will be pursued, including statistical analyses, comparative case studies and systematic evaluations of autocratisation processes in specific countries. The project contributes to understanding how democracies can survive in times of autocratisation and which factors play a role in this.