The Mahathir effect in Malaysia’s 2018 election: the role of credible personalities in regime transitions

The 14th Malaysian General Elections (Pilihanraya Umum, 14, PRU 14) in 2018 proved to be a watershed election as Barisan Nasional (National Front, BN) lost power for the first time in history. Pakatan Harapan (Alliance of Hope, PH), led by former BN leader and Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, captured the majority of parliamentary seats. This article analyses the impact of Mahathir specifically, and credible personalities in general, in unseating dominant one-party regimes. I argue that credible personalities are vital in causing transitions in dominant one-party systems. Explanations on transitions from authoritarian regimes in the literature have typically revolved around incumbent weakness and opposition strength. While dissatisfaction toward the regime is a necessary condition for transition, it is not sufficient. Personalities which can adequately appeal to the masses are important to bridge the credibility gap which the opposition may otherwise have to grapple with. Mahathir’s presence in the opposition was crucial to PH’s victory, as he provided the credibility boost which the opposition needed. This was particularly important for Malay voters. This study is situated within the literature on parties, elections and democratization.     

Elite coordination and popular protest: the joint effect on democratic change

Authoritarian elections offer a window of contestation where a democratic opposition may increase the pressure on authoritarian regimes to implement democratic change. Pressure may come either from popular protest (vertical threats), or from a coordinated counter-elite (lateral threats). Previous research on electoral authoritarianism has emphasized the importance of both lateral and vertical threats for democratization, but have not theorized how these two threats interact to promote higher levels of democracy. We argue that the effect of vertical threats is contingent on the existence of lateral threats. Popular mobilization is more likely to promote democratic change if a unified opposition translates popular grievances to democratic demands. Conversely, a mobilized population increases the probability that a unified opposition will enhance democratic change by increasing the reputational and organizational costs of repression and electoral manipulation. Our theoretical claims are corroborated by statistical analysis of 169 elections, held in 74 electoral autocracies around the globe 1991–2014.     

Capture the flag: local factionalism as electoral mobilization in dominant party Uganda

ABSTRACT

This article addresses a question relevant to many non-democratic regimes: how can a successful dominant party be an institutionally weak one? President Yoweri Museveni and his National Resistance Movement (NRM) have dominated Ugandan politics since coming to power in 1986. However, the NRM does not possess many of the institutional endowments that other dominant parties use to control mass and elite politics, such as central control of candidate selection, autonomous mobilizing structures, or dispensation of sufficient political finance to its candidates. Instead, the party secretariat has no real institutional power independent of the personalist Museveni regime, and its local branches house fierce internal competition each election in which most incumbents lose office. This article argues that the NRM mobilizes so well for Museveni despite its institutional deficits due to the precise nature of the competitive process its local elites go through to win its nomination (or “flag”) and the subsequent general election. This process sees self-organized and self-financed candidates and their factions rejuvenate the party and mobilize votes for the concurrent presidential election as a by-product of their competition with one another. The article makes this argument with qualitative data from three districts gathered during the 2016 elections.     

Populism and competitive authoritarianism in the Andes

Although military rule disappeared in Latin America after 1990, other forms of authoritarianism persisted. Competitive authoritarianism, in which democratic institutions exist but incumbent abuse skews the playing field against opponents, emerged in Peru, Venezuela, Bolivia, and Ecuador during the post-Cold War period. This article seeks to explain the emergence of competitive authoritarianism in the Andes. It argues that populism – the election of a personalistic outsider who mobilizes voters with an anti-establishment appeal – is a major catalyst for the emergence of competitive authoritarianism. Lacking experience with representative democratic institutions, possessing an electoral mandate to destroy the existing elite, and facing institutions of horizontal accountability controlled by that elite, populists have an incentive to launch plebiscitary attacks on institutions of horizontal accountability. Where they succeed, weak democracies almost invariably slide into competitive authoritarianism. The argument is demonstrated through a comparative analysis of all 14 elected presidents in Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, and Venezuela between 1990 and 2010.     

Is democracy the only game in town? Tension between immigrants' democratic desires and authoritarian imprints

This article borrows from the literature on transitional democracies to examine levels of support for democracy and non-democratic alternatives among immigrants travelling from partly and non-democratic countries to Canada. It evaluates how immigrants who grew up under authoritarian rule come to adapt to democracy. The findings indicate that immigrants from partly and non-democratic countries experience tensions in their adaptation to democracy, expressing strong democratic desires but also manifesting what could be interpreted as lasting imprints of their socialization under authoritarian rule. Immigrants from partly and non-democratic countries exhibit strong support for democracy (they almost all believe it is a good form of government, the best one, and understand democracy in broadly similar terms as the rest of the population). Yet, if democracy is the main game in town for the immigrants, it is not the only one; immigrants from partly and non-democratic countries are significantly more likely than people socialized in a democratic political system to support other forms of governments that are non-democratic. The article thus argues for the lasting impact of authoritarianism on people's democratic outlooks despite the presence of strong democratic desires.     

Iranian student activism between authoritarianism and democratization: patterns of conflict and cooperation between the Office for the Strengthening of Unity and the regime

This article examines the role of student activism in enhancing or weakening democratization in authoritarian contexts, focusing on the case of the Islamic Republic of Iran. It contends that while numerous studies indicate that student activism has been crucial in processes of regime change, insufficient attention has been paid to the circumstances under which it contributes to strengthening authoritarian rule. The case of Iran demonstrates that there are two different ways in which this occurs. First, much like many other civil society actors, student activism can be co-opted and at times willingly so because of a coincidence of material and/or ideological interests. Second, even when student activism genuinely pushes for democratization and becomes independent and autonomous from political power, the authoritarian constraints in place can contribute to marginalize it and defeat it. The Iranian case highlights the problems student activism faces when it attempts to disengage from the dominant structures of authoritarian politics, and in line with Jamal's findings, demonstrates how authoritarian structural constraints can undermine the democratic aspirations of well-organised groups.     

Justifying violence: legitimacy,ideology and public support for police use of force

Under what conditions do people support police use of force? In this paper we assess some of the empirical links between police legitimacy, political ideology (right-wing authoritarianism and social dominance orientation), and support for ‘reasonable’ use of force (e.g. an officer striking a citizen in self-defence) and ‘excessive’ use of force (e.g. an officer using violence to arrest an unarmed person who is not offering violent resistance). Analysing data from an online survey with US participants (n?=?186) we find that legitimacy is a positive predictor of reasonable but not excessive police use of force, and that political ideology predicts support for excessive but not reasonable use of force. We conclude with the idea that legitimacy places normative constraints around police power. On the one hand, legitimacy is associated with increased support for the use of force, but only when violence is bounded within certain acceptable limits. On the other hand, excessive use of force seems to require an extra-legal justification that is – at least in our analysis – partly ideological. Our findings open up a new direction of research in what is currently a rather sparse psychological literature on the ability of legitimacy to ‘tame’ coercive power.     

从《反垄断法》的颁布看市场竞争机制的法律构建

在市场经济条件下,企业要真正地开展市场竞争,必须创造一个良好的市场竞争环境。《反垄断法》的颁布实施可以说为建设一个公平竞争的市场环境,在立法上已迈出了最重要一步。但从实际的情况来看,要真正构建一个公平竞争的市场环境,仍然任重而道远。     

竞争法与消费者权益保护刍议

我国竞争法主要分为反不正当竞争法和反垄断法两大类,它们承担着对消费者进行保护和对企业社会责任进行规制的双重任务。由于存在某些漏洞,今后还需对我国竞争法再作进一步的完善。