When and how do voters punish politicians for subverting democracy? We develop a conceptual framework that differentiates between three mechanisms: vote switching, backlash, and disenchantment. The first mechanism entails defection by voters from a party that undermines democracy to one that does not; the latter two mechanisms entail transitions between voting and abstention. We estimate the magnitude of each mechanism by combining evidence from a series of original survey experiments, traditional surveys, and a quasi-experiment afforded by the re-run of the 2019 Istanbul mayoral election, in which the governing party attempted to overturn the result of an election that it lost. We find that turnout shifts serve as a democratic check at least as much as does vote switching, with backlash and disenchantment arising from different subsets of the electorate. Both persuasion and mobilization are viable tools for curbing the authoritarian tendencies of elected politicians. 

Cette série de conférences est financée par le Centre pour l’étude de la Citoyenneté démocratique.  

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DATE: vendredi 11 décembre, 15h