Voting in Authoritarian Regimes

• In Event: Democratic Institutions in Authoritarian Regimes

Abstract

When accounting for why elections, voting, and political representation are meaningful and valuable practices, political theorists tend to assume that the political system in which these institutions occur is broadly democratic. However, authoritarian regimes also make use of these institutions. Furthermore, recent empirical research shows that elections in ‘hybrid,’ ‘competitive authoritarian,’ or ‘pseudo-democratic’ regimes matter—they can stabilize authoritarian regimes and lend them legitimacy, although they can also provide opportunities for unseating incumbent regimes. Are the ethics of political participation, or, more specifically, of voting, fundamentally different in non-democratic regimes? Do the same civic imperatives that support voting in democracies come out in favor of boycotts, abstentions, or even civil disobedience in electoral authoritarianisms? Can citizens expect elections and electoral participation to increase the chances of a democratic transition? We argue that more complex moral considerations confront voters in authoritarian regimes compared to voters in democratic regimes, since the answers to these questions hinge in part on the role elections play in authoritarian states. We argue that a voter’s judgment must depend not merely on principled justifications for political participation but also on prudential considerations about the impact that electoral participation is likely to have on the regime’s longevity.

Authors

• Turkuler Isiksel, Columbia University

• Thomas Pepinsky, Cornell University