Conceptualizing and Measuring Successful and Failing Episodes of Democratization

• In Event: Debating Causes of Democratization Failures

Abstract

How do we determine when a democratization process begins and how and when it ends? In the study of comparative democratization this is a critical question that must be answered in order to systematically compare democratization efforts across time and space. The goal of this paper is to conceptualize and identify democratization episodes: sustained periods of institutional reform that move an autocratic regime closer to becoming democratic. A democratization episode can either result in a consolidated democracy (successful episode) or not (failed episode). After establishing the conceptual dimensions of democratization episodes, we then identify the appropriate procedures and data necessary for operationalization. By maintaining a consistent conceptualization of democratization episodes and properly mapping the conceptual dimensions to empirical data, we uncover the set of failed and successful democratization episodes that occurred between 1900-2016 in 178 countries. We can then use the component-level Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) data to determine whether distinct patterns or sequences exist in successful and failing democratization episodes.

Authors

• Laura Maxwell, University of Gothenburg

• Richard Kenneth Morgan, University of Gothenburg

• Staffan I. Lindberg, University of Gothenburg