Walter E. Meyer Professor of Law at New York University. Together with Ivan Krastev, author of The Light that Failed: How the West Won the Cold War and Lost the Peace (Penguin, forthcoming 2019).
For countries emerging from communism, the post-1989 imperative to ‘be like the West’ has generated discontent and even a ‘return of the repressed’. The origins of illiberalism in central and eastern Europe are pre-ideological, rooted in rebellion at perceived cultural humiliation.
Structural problems in conventional democracies are alienating citizens worldwide, writes Stephen Holmes. Political marketing, cross-party compromise and elite withdrawal threaten to rob democracy of its original role as instrument of justice.
Blatantly rigged elections are the easiest way for the Putin regime to mimic the authoritarian power it does not possess. December’s protests destroyed Putin’s reputation of being in control; even genuinely competitive elections would be unable to restore his legitimacy.
