COMPETITIVE

AUTHORITARIANISM
ELECTION WITHOUT DEMOCRACY
 Video
Presentation
 INTRODUCTION
The post–Cold War world has been marked by the proliferation of
hybrid political regimes. In different ways, and to varying degrees,
polities across much of Africa (Ghana, Kenya, Mozambique, Zambia,
Zimbabwe), post-communist Eurasia (Albania, Croatia, Russia, Serbia,
Ukraine), Asia (Malaysia, Taiwan), and Latin America (Haiti, Mexico,
Paraguay, Peru) combined democratic rules with authoritarian
governance during the 1990s.
 Competitive Authoritarianism
⮚ is a type of hybrid regime where there are elections, but the ruling party
has a big advantage. The election process is often not fair because the
ruling party manipulates it. They control important things like state
resources, media, and institutions to make sure they stay in power,
making it hard for others to compete fairly.

⮚ In competitive authoritarian regimes, formal democratic institutions are

widely viewed as the principal means of obtaining and exercising
political authority. Incumbents violates those rules so often and to such
an extent, however, that the regime fails to meet conventional minimum
standard for democracy.
 DID YOU KNOW?
• COMPETITVE
AUTHORITARIANISM
The term was coined by Steven
Levitsky and Lucan A. Way in their 2010
book named The Rise Of Competitive
Authoritarianism that discuss a type of
hybrid regime that emerged during and
after the Cold War.

⮚ American Political Scientists and

Assistant Professors of Social Studies
and Political Science in Harvard
University.
 ⮚ Competitive authoritarianism must be distinguished from democracy
on the one hand and full-scale authoritarianism on the other. Modern
democratic regimes all meet four minimum criteria:

Executives and Virtually all Political rights and civil Elected authorities
legislatures are adults possess liberties, including possess real authority
chosen through the right to vote. freedom of the press, to govern, in
elections that are freedom of association, that they are not
open, free, and and freedom to criticize subject to the tutelary
fair. the government without control of military or
reprisal, are broadly clerical
protected. leaders.
⮚ Competitive authoritarianism must
therefore be distinguished from unstable,
ineffective, or otherwise flawed types of
regimes that nevertheless meet basic
standards of democracy, and this includes
what Guillermo O’Donnell has called“
delegative democracies”.

⮚ According to O’Donnell, delegative

democracies are characterized by low
levels of horizontal accountability (checks
and balances) and therefore exhibit
powerful, plebiscitarian, and occasionally
abusive executives.
⮚ Competitive authoritarianism is distinct from what might be called
“façade” electoral regimes- that is, regimes in which electoral
institutions exists but yield no meaningful contestation for power.
⮚ Such regimes have been called pseudo democracies.

⮚ Competitive authoritarianism must be distinguish from other types

of hybrid regimes. Regimes may mix authoritarian and democratic
features in a variety of ways, and competitive authoritarianism
should not be viewed as encompassing all of these regime forms.

A pseudo-democracy, also known as tactical

Facade democracy is the maintenance of the liberalization, is a political order designed to put on a
appearance of a democratic system while the democratic façade.
actual implementation of democratic
principles is limited or manipulated, allowing
non-democratic forces to influence decisions
or concentrate power.
 PATHS TO COMPETITIVE AUHORITARIANISM

Competitive authoritarianism regimes are not a new phenomenon, it emerged out of three different
regimes path during the 1990s.

1. One path was the decay of a full- blown authoritarian regime.

In this case, established authoritarian regimes were compelled
often by a combination of domestic and international pressure,
either to adopt formal democratic institutions or to adhere
seriously to what had previously been façade democratic
institutions. Due to the weakness of the opposition movements,
transitions fell short of democracy and incumbents proved adept at
manipulating or selectively adhering to the new democratic rules.
2. A second path to competitive authoritarianism was the collapse of
an authoritarian regime, followed by the emergence of a new,
competitive authoritarian regime. Weak electoral regimes emerged,
more or less by default, in the wake of an authoritarian breakdown.

3. Third path to competitive authoritarianism was the decay of a

democratic regime. Deep and often longstanding political and
economic crises created conditions under which freely elected
government undermined democratic institutions, either via presidential
“self- coup” or through selective, incremental abuses but lacked the
will or capacity to eliminate them entirely.
AWESOME WORDS
- Authoritarian - "Makapangyarihan" o "Diktador"
- Contestation - "Laban" o "Pagsusumpungan"
- Delegative - "Delegado" o "Inilaan"
- Hybrid - "Hibrido" o "Pinaghalo"
- Incumbents - "Kasalukuyang mga opisyal" o "Nakaupo"
- Plebiscitarian - "Plebisitaryo" o "Plebisito"
- Proliferation - "Pagdami" o "Paglawak"
- Tutelary - "Tagapagtaguyod" o "Tagapag-alaga”
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RESOURCES
● The Rise of Competitive Authoritarianism
https://scholar.harvard.edu
● Authoritarian Explained
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1h4A5aY00E&list=PPSV