How Democracies Die

by Steven Levitsky

Lindbergh—an advocate of “racial purity” who toured Nazi Germany in 1936 and was awarded a medal of honor by Hermann Göring—emerged as one of America’s most prominent isolationists in 1939 and 1940, speaking nationwide on behalf of the America First Committee.

The events that unfolded in Chicago—displayed on television screens across America—mortally wounded the party-insider presidential selection system. Even before the convention began, the crushing blow of Robert Kennedy’s assassination, the escalating conflict over Vietnam, and the energy of the antiwar protesters in Chicago’s Grant Park sapped any remaining public faith in the old system.

The commission’s final report, published in 1971, cited an old adage: “The cure for the ills of democracy is more democracy.”

Capturing a majority of delegates required winning primaries all over the country, which, in turn, required money, favorable media coverage, and, crucially, people working on the ground in all states. Any candidate seeking to complete the grueling obstacle course of U.S. primaries needed allies among donors, newspaper editors, interest groups, activist groups, and state-level politicians such as governors, mayors, senators, and congressmen. In 1976, Arthur Hadley described this arduous process as the “invisible primary.” He claimed that this phase, which occurred before the primary season even began, was “where the winning candidate is actually selected.”

The post-1972 primary system was especially vulnerable to a particular kind of outsider: individuals with enough fame or money to skip the “invisible primary.”

Although conservative outsiders Pat Robertson, Pat Buchanan, and Steve Forbes did not manage to overcome the effects of the invisible primary during the 1980s and 1990s, their relative success provided clues into how it might be done.

One was a dramatic increase in the availability of outside money, accelerated (though hardly caused) by the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United ruling.

A “candidate with qualities uniquely tailored to the digital age,” Trump attracted free mainstream coverage by creating controversy.

Echoing Ronald Reagan’s 1964 “A Time for Choosing” speech, Romney declared that Trump was a “fraud” who had “neither the temperament nor the judgment to be president.”

In the primary-based system we now have, votes confer a legitimacy that cannot easily be circumvented or ignored, and Donald Trump had the votes—nearly fourteen million of them.

Republican leaders were forced to face reality: They no longer held the keys to their party’s presidential nomination.

Donald Trump and the Four Key Indicators of Authoritarian Behavior

Rejection of (or weak commitment to) democratic rules of the game Do they reject the Constitution or express a willingness to violate it? Do they suggest a need for antidemocratic measures, such as canceling elections, violating or suspending the Constitution, banning certain organizations, or restricting basic civil or political rights? Do they seek to use (or endorse the use of) extraconstitutional means to change the government, such as military coups, violent insurrections, or mass protests aimed at forcing a change in the government? Do they attempt to undermine the legitimacy of elections, for example, by refusing to accept credible electoral results?

2. Denial of the legitimacy of political opponents Do they describe their rivals as subversive, or opposed to the existing constitutional order? Do they claim that their rivals constitute an existential threat, either to national security or to the prevailing way of life? Do they baselessly describe their partisan rivals as criminals, whose supposed violation of the law (or potential to do so) disqualifies them from full participation in the political arena? Do they baselessly suggest that their rivals are foreign agents, in that they are secretly working in alliance with (or the employ of) a foreign government—usually an enemy one?

3. Toleration or encouragement of violence Do they have any ties to armed gangs, paramilitary forces, militias, guerrillas, or other organizations that engage in illicit violence? Have they or their partisan allies sponsored or encouraged mob attacks on opponents? Have they tacitly endorsed violence by their supporters by refusing to unambiguously condemn it and punish it? Have they praised (or refused to condemn) other significant acts of political violence, either in the past or elsewhere in the world?

4. Readiness to curtail civil liberties of opponents, including media Have they supported laws or policies that restrict civil liberties, such as expanded libel or defamation laws or laws restricting protest, criticism of the government, or certain civic or political organizations? Have they threatened to take legal or other punitive action against critics in rival parties, civil society, or the media? Have they praised repressive measures taken by other governments, either in the past or elsewhere in the world?

Collective abdication—the transfer of authority to a leader who threatens democracy—usually flows from one of two sources. The first is the misguided belief that an authoritarian can be controlled or tamed. The second is what sociologist Ivan Ermakoff calls “ideological collusion,” in which the authoritarian’s agenda overlaps sufficiently with that of mainstream politicians that abdication is desirable, or at least preferable to the alternatives.

Once the election became a normal race, it was essentially a toss-up, for two reasons. First, intensifying partisan polarization had hardened the electorate in recent years. Not only was the country increasingly sorted into Republicans and Democrats, with few truly independent or swing voters, but Republicans and Democrats had grown increasingly loyal to their party—and hostile to the other one.

Second, given the uneven state of the economy and President Obama’s middling approval ratings, nearly all political science models predicted a tight election.

They take this step for another reason, as well: Democracy is grinding work. Whereas family businesses and army squadrons may be ruled by fiat, democracies

require negotiation, compromise, and concessions. Setbacks are inevitable, victories always partial. Presidential initiatives may die in congress or be blocked by the courts. All politicians are frustrated by these constraints, but democratic ones know they must accept them.

Modern states possess various agencies with the authority to investigate and punish wrongdoing by both public officials and private citizens. These include the judicial system, law enforcement bodies, and intelligence, tax, and regulatory agencies. In democracies, such institutions are designed to serve as neutral arbiters.

All this was done in secret; on the surface, Peru’s justice system functioned like any other.

Judges who cannot be bought off may be targeted for impeachment.

Governments that cannot remove independent judges may bypass them through court packing.

Most contemporary autocracies do not wipe out all traces of dissent, as Mussolini did in fascist Italy or Fidel Castro did in communist Cuba.

The easiest way to deal with potential opponents is to buy them off. Most elected autocrats begin by offering leading political, business, or media figures public positions, favors, perks, or outright bribes in exchange for their support or, at least, their quiet neutrality. Cooperative media outlets may gain privileged access to the president, while friendly business executives may receive profitable concessions or government contracts.

Players who cannot be bought must be weakened by other means. Whereas old-school dictators often jailed, exiled, or even killed their rivals, contemporary autocrats tend to hide their repression behind a veneer of legality. This is why capturing the referees is so important.

Governments may also use their control of referees to “legally” sideline the opposition media, often through libel or defamation suits.

As key media outlets are assaulted, others grow wary and begin to practice self-censorship.

Elected autocrats also seek to weaken business leaders with the means to finance opposition.

Finally, elected autocrats often try to silence cultural figures—artists, intellectuals, pop stars, athletes—whose popularity or moral standing makes them potential threats.

Usually, however, governments prefer to co-opt popular cultural figures or reach a mutual accommodation with them, allowing them to continue their work as long as they stay out of politics.

Authoritarians seeking to consolidate their power often reform the constitution, the electoral system, and other institutions in ways that disadvantage or weaken the opposition, in effect tilting the playing field against their rivals.

Perhaps the most striking example of rewriting the rules to lock in an authoritarian advantage comes from the United States. The end of post–Civil War Reconstruction in the 1870s led to the emergence of authoritarian single-party regimes in every post-Confederate state. Single-party rule was not some benign historical accident; rather, it was a product of brazenly antidemocratic constitutional engineering.

These “reform” measures effectively killed democracy in the American South.

Would-be autocrats often use economic crises, natural disasters, and especially security threats—wars, armed insurgencies, or terrorist attacks—to justify antidemocratic measures.

Most constitutions permit the expansion of executive power during crisis.

For generations, Americans have retained great faith in their Constitution, as the centerpiece of a belief that the United States was a chosen nation, providentially guided, a beacon of hope and possibility to the world.

Germany’s 1919 Weimar constitution was designed by some of the country’s greatest legal minds. Its long-standing and highly regarded Rechtsstaat (“rule of law”) was considered by many as sufficient to prevent government abuse. But both the constitution and the Rechtsstaat collapsed rapidly in the face of Adolf Hitler’s usurpation of power in 1933.

Many of the region’s newly independent republics modeled themselves directly on the United States, adopting U.S.-style presidentialism, bicameral legislatures, supreme courts, and in some cases, electoral colleges and federal systems. Some wrote constitutions that were near-replicas of the U.S. Constitution. Yet almost all the region’s embryonic republics plunged into civil war and dictatorship.

If constitutional powers are open to multiple readings, they can be used in ways that their creators didn’t anticipate.

One of the most disruptive forms of labor protests is a “work to rule” campaign, in which workers do exactly what is asked of them in their contracts or job descriptions but nothing more. In other words, they follow the written rules to the letter. Almost invariably, the workplace ceases to function.

Many factors mattered, including our nation’s immense wealth, a large middle class, and a vibrant civil society. But we believe much of the answer also lies in the development of strong democratic norms.

Democracies do have written rules (constitutions) and referees (the courts). But these work best, and survive longest, in countries where written constitutions are reinforced by their own unwritten rules of the game.

Because they are unwritten, they are often hard to see, especially when they’re functioning well. This can fool us into thinking they are unnecessary.

But two norms stand out as fundamental to a functioning democracy: mutual toleration and institutional forbearance.

Mutual toleration refers to the idea that as long as our rivals play by constitutional rules, we accept that they have an equal right to exist, compete for power, and govern.

A second norm critical to democracy’s survival is what we call institutional forbearance. Forbearance means “patient self-control; restraint and tolerance,” or “the action of restraining from exercising a legal right.” For our purposes, institutional forbearance can be thought of as avoiding actions that, while respecting the letter of the law, obviously violate its spirit. Where norms of forbearance are strong, politicians do not use their institutional prerogatives to the hilt, even if it is technically legal to do so, for such action could imperil the existing system.

As Shakespeare’s character Carlisle warns his compatriots in the play, abandoning forbearance meant “the Blood of English shall manure the ground….And future ages groan for this foul act.”