Democracy Challenged: The Rise of Semi-Authoritarianism

by Marina Ottaway

During the 1990s, international democracy promotion efforts led to the establishment of numerous regimes that cannot be easily classified as either authoritarian or democratic. They display characteristics of each, in short they are semi-authoritarian regimes.These regimes pose a considerable challenge to U.S. policymakers because the superficial stability of many semi-authoritarian regimes usually masks severe problems that need to be solved lest they lead to a future crisis. Additionally, these regimes call into question some of the ideas about democratic transitions that underpin the democracy promotion strategies of the United States and other Western countries.Despite their growing importance, semi-authoritarian regimes have not received systematic attention. Marina Ottaway examines five countries (Egypt, Azerbaijan, Venezuela, Croatia, and Senegal) which highlight the distinctive features of semi-authoritarianism and the special challenge each poses to policymakers. She explains why the dominant approach to democracy promotion isn't effective in these countries and concludes by suggesting alternative policies.Marina Ottaway is senior associate and codirector of the Democracy and Rule of Law Project at the Carnegie Endowment.

Genres: Political Science

256 pages, Hardcover

Published January 1, 2003

Reviews

[Patricia Roberts-Miller · Rating 4 out of 5]

Depressing, but important to read. It's frightening how many of the things attributed to semi-authoritarian governments the GOP has been doing for two years, such as allowing the state legislature to overrule what precincts report--a strategy taken from other regimes.

[Samira Farokhmanesh · Rating 5 out of 5]

واقع بین و آموزنده