What Is Soft Authoritarianism or Illiberal Democracy? An Illustration
Worldwide Shifts Towards Hybrid, Illiberal Democracies
In the past decade, many countries around the world have shifted from democracies to what’s known as soft authoritarian governments. “Soft authoritarianism” describes a relatively new phenomenon also known as “illiberal democracy”, “democratic backsliding”, “hybrid democracy”, or “competitive authoritarianism”. Soft authoritarianism operates in a gray zone between democracy and autocracy.
It can serve as a bridge or stepping stone between two opposite types of government: democracy and autocracy, also known as totalitarianism. Indeed, countries with soft authoritarian governments often become autocracies with a head of state or small group wielding unchecked power.
This diagram shows the differences and commonalities between democracy, soft authoritarianism, and autocracy.
What Does Soft Authoritarianism Mean?
As the new kid on the block, soft authoritarianism does not yet have a Merriam Webster definition. It’s a little bit like the Supreme Court’s definition of pornography: you know it when you see it.
In 1997, Fareed Zakaria defined “illiberal democracy” as:
“. . . democratically elected regimes, often ones that have been reelected or reaffirmed through referenda, [but] are routinely ignoring constitutional limits on their power and depriving their citizens of basic rights and freedoms.” Foreign Affairs
Almost thirty years later, we have some more data points about this hybrid form of democracy. Governments viewed as soft authoritarian or illiberal democracies share the following shared characteristics:
Charismatic leader originally democratically elected
Consolidation of executive power
Exploiting norms and institutions to reduce democratic freedoms and the rule of law
Populist, anti-elite message
Promotion of hyper-nationalism, discrimination of minorities, hatred, and violence
Minimizing of checks on leaders’ power
Using power to give advantage to incumbent in elections
Government not based on an ideology
Raison d’etre is to consolidate and keep power
Focus on their base rather than the country as a whole; prefer one group of citizens over another
Oppression of political opponents and critics
Stifling of free speech, free press, and freedom of assembly
Propaganda, misinformation, taking over media
Cronyism, spoils system for hiring and government contracts
Soft authoritarian governments:
“espouse the importance of democratic elections, while positioning themselves explicitly against Western liberalism and the rule of law. These regimes come to power through winning large majorities in regular, free elections. In many cases, they even claim to champion the cause of true democratic participation for groups previously excluded by “out-of-touch elites”. The slow and gradual changes thus brought about do not at first appear to constitute a radical break with democratic norms. Yet they have far-reaching consequences in hollowing out democratic institutions from within.”
Thus, any citizen of a democracy who sees any of the above conditions in their country should become aware of soft authoritarianism. Those who wish to preserve the freedoms of democracy should band together and think about ways to prevent gradual seeping towards totalitarianism or autocracy.
What It Looks Like: Viktor Orban’s Illiberal Democracy
Examples of soft authoritarian governments include Viktor Orban’s Hungary and Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Turkey. Both leaders were democratically elected. But once elected, they pursued policies which transformed their countries into hybrids between democracy and autocracy.
Orban undertook a number of steps which curtailed democracy and democratic freedoms:
Took over state media and exerted control of non-state media run by favorites so that critical views of government are not aired (freedom of the press, freedom of speech)
Redrew voting districts to include supporters of Orban who don’t live in the districts they vote in (right to free and fair elections)
Changed electoral system to favor large parties (right to free and fair elections)
Rewrote constitution, forced independent judges to retire (system of checks and balances; no one branch can have unchecked power, independent judiciary)
Installed cronies in charge of prosecutions (anti-meritocratic spoils system; cronies advance leaders’ and their own interests, not the people’s)
Created oligarchy of insiders with control over banks and media institutions
Tightened control over academic institutions (freedom of speech)
Promoted Christian religion and culture as part of the state: demonized LBGTQ, non-Christians, immigrants and “others” (freedom of religion; equal protection and rights to all citizens)
Despite being an EU member, advanced Russia’s interests over EU, forsook traditional alliances in favor of Russia; refused to criticize Putin for any actions (unitary government advances leader’s views and interests- no independent branches)
Used government funds to air propaganda and misinformation about opponents; (free and fair elections)
For all of these reasons Hungarian citizens no longer live in a liberal democracy but rather in an “illiberal democracy” or soft authoritarian country. Indeed, the EU issued a report stating that Hungary was now an electoral autocracy.
It might look like a democracy at first, but can head in the opposite direction.
Autocracy Dressed Up To Look Like Democracy
It’s important to note that these changes in Hungary, and countries like Turkey, India, Brazil, and Poland, occurred without a revolution, war, or coup. Rather, a democratically-elected leader effected radical change.
But while Orban was elected democratically the first time and while Hungary still nominally has elections, observers around the world view these elections as shams unfairly set up to yield victory for the incumbent.
These countries do NOT enjoy the freedoms generally recognized as democracy, including:
Freedom of speech, the press, and assembly
Free and fair elections
Independent media; freedom of information
Government with checks and balances; separation of powers among independent branches
Meritocratic civil service and awarding of government contracts rather than spoils system
Freedom from discrimination
Rule of law: access to and acceptance of equal justice
Political egalitarianism
Respect for human rights
Representative government subject to being voted out
It’s important for citizens of democracies to understand the different types of government so that they can watch out for signs of unwanted changes and avoid becoming “spectators”, victims of misinformation or unwitting agents supporting destructive changes. Indeed, often citizens vote for populists with extreme messages because they decide to trade off (or discount) democratic principles for partisan interests.
Those who may feel that a little less democracy isn’t a bad thing should be aware that it can be a “slippery slope” once a leader begins an “executive takeover”, encroaching on traditional democratic rights and freedoms.
What’s At Stake
Citizens of democratic countries cannot afford to ignore this new type of government when making decisions at the ballot box, and afterwards. For Winston Churchill’s view of democracy remains correct:
“Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.…” Winston Churchill
Studies bear this out; people who live in liberal democracies are happier than those who live in illiberal democracies. While imperfect, democracy remains the best type of government humans have ever created.
To paraphrase Benjamin Franklin, hopefully we can keep it.
