Elections Under Colonialism: Contradictions of Externally Imposed Democracy

• In Event: Democratic Backsliding and Challenges of Regime Transitions

Abstract

An enormous literature seeks to explain variation in the rise and consolidation of democratic rule across countries. Prominent existing theories focus on domestic or contemporary international factors that affect democracy. However, for most of the non-European world, electoral competition and democracy originated during colonial rule. Across 108 countries that experienced European colonial rule, 80 experienced at least one legislative or executive election under colonial rule; yet variance in the quality and stability of democracy both during and after colonialism has varied considerably. In this book project, we propose a parsimonious framework for understanding colonial institutions across centuries of European rule that spanned the globe. Groups with credible rebellion threats could compel elections and representation, in particular in metropoles with a history of representative government. This helps to explain two waves and contractions of colonial democratic institutions, which we document using a new global dataset. 1. Early gains in British settler colonies, followed by reversals to prevent natives and forced migrants from exercising the franchise. 2. Universal franchises after World War II followed by post-independence democratic reversals in the hostile Cold War international system.

Authors

• Alexander Lee, University of Rochester

• Jack Paine, University of Rochester