Electoral Authoritarianism
Title
Electoral Authoritarianism
Author
Schedler, Andreas
Research Area
Social Institutions
Topic
Government Systems
Abstract
Electoral authoritarian regimes practice authoritarianism behind the institutional facades of representative democracy. They hold regular multiparty elections at the national level, yet violate liberal‐democratic minimum standards in systematic and profound ways. Since the end of the Cold War, they have turned into the most common form of nondemocratic rule in the world. Responding to the empirical expansion of nondemocratic multiparty elections, the study of “electoral authoritarian” regimes has taken center stage in comparative political science. This essay reviews the conceptual and empirical foundations of this flourishing new field of comparative politics, summarizes cutting‐edge research on regime trajectories and internal regime dynamics, and lays out substantive issues and methodological desiderata for future research.