This research seeks to explain the conditions under which citizens in several post-Soviet nations prefer more or less authoritarian forms of government in order to understand why democratic transitions ultimately fail or succeed, as this research argues that the public's preferences are a central factor in determining whether or not democracy can survive. While the broader research program explores these issues in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and Estonia, this project conducts nationwide surveys of 2,000 respondents in Ukraine and 1,500 respondents in Belarus. The survey data will be combined with sub-national economic data to allow statistical analysis of the individual and community-level attributes that shape preferences for authoritarianism and to conduct cross-national comparisons with the other post-Soviet countries.
Unlike existing research on authoritarianism, this research explores the often-overlooked "demand side" of authoritarianism from the citizenry. Because the countries studied have met a minimal level of democratic governance in the post-Soviet era, understanding the factors that lead citizens in these nations to elect authoritarian leaders is an important aspect of regime transitions. Early examinations of democratization naively assumed that the post-Soviet states were developing toward democracy, ignoring the possibility that reverse transitions to authoritarianism were possible. Furthermore, literature on the breakdown of authoritarian regimes focuses on cataclysmic events such as coups and revolutions that replace previous regimes "from above." This project provides a theory of when citizens enable, tolerate, and prefer authoritarian rule in weakly democratic countries. Finally, the surveys conducted in this study will fill a void in research on democratization by providing questions that researchers can use to examine people's attitudes toward authoritarian government.
Broader Impact
In addition to advancing the political science scholarship on regime transitions and generating new data on topics that have been previously understudied, this research can have important impact beyond the academic realm. The question of why democracy succeeds in some contexts and fails in others is very important to academics and policymakers alike. Yet this question takes on increased significance in the current era when the United States is attempting to create new democracies in areas that have a history of authoritarian rule. Research into the demands by the citizenry for authoritarian forms of government not only allows policymakers to realistically evaluate the probability of successful democratization in the future, but also allows them to formulate policies that give democracy the strongest probability of success. Thus, the broader impact of this research has the potential to inform central aspects of foreign policy.
