Voting \emph{Against} Autocracy

Svolik, Milan W.

doi:10.2139/ssrn.3847894

Cited by 5 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 53 publications

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“…In contrast to these expectations, we show that while citizens may not be swayed by incumbent sociocultural messages, incumbents can increase approval among citizens with economic appeals, especially regarding mega-projects and economic nationalism. These findings contribute to research on Turkey's electorate, which suggests that despite severe polarization, media consumption (Akbıyık et al, N.d.;O'Donohue, Hoffman and Makovsky, 2020) and the incumbent's anti-democratic behavior (Svolik, 2021) can still shift citizens' attitudes.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 52%

How Populist Incumbents Use Strategic Communication to Survive Economic Crises: The Surprising Effectiveness of Incumbent Economic Appeals

Akbiyik,

O'Donohue

2023

Preprint

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Why do populist incumbents retain public support despite economic crises? To win voters, populist incumbents may pursue two strategies. First, to reduce the salience of their poor economic performance, populist incumbents can shift the agenda to sociocultural issues like social status—a defining tactic of populist leaders. Alternatively, they can appeal to economic issues with macroeconomic populism by emphasizing social spending and economic nationalism. We tested the effectiveness of these strategies using a survey experiment with 2,400 Turkish citizens before Turkey’s 2023 elections, in which respondents were exposed to rhetoric simulating the incumbent’s campaign messaging about sociocultural or economic issues. Whereas sociocultural messaging had no significant effects, the incumbent’s economic rhetoric increased respondents’ likelihood of voting for the incumbent by five percentage points. Economic messaging also increased approval of the incumbent’s economic management, natural disaster response, and overall performance. Promises of social spending and economic nationalism emerge as key mechanisms swaying voters.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 52%

How Populist Incumbents Use Strategic Communication to Survive Economic Crises: The Surprising Effectiveness of Incumbent Economic Appeals

Akbiyik,

O'Donohue

2023

Preprint

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“…On the other hand, a consequential portion of regime voters in Turkey still hold basic democratic values and perceive Turkey as a democratic country. 3 Moreover, the Turkish public has shown itself able to punish Erdogan's more blatant authoritarian acts in the electoral arena, for example, his forcing a repeat election after his party lost the Istanbul mayoral election in 2019 (Svolik 2021). Thus, whether Turkish voters perceive Turkey as a democracy is important for the regime's survival.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Keep Positive and Defend Democracy: Building Democratic Support Under Authoritarianism

Öztürk¹,

Finkel²,

Neundorf³

et al. 2023

Preprint

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Building support for democracy and raising awareness about the consequences of its absence is essential to support the process of democratization in autocratic regimes; however, it is not an easy task. While an abstract discussion of the merits of democratic institutions might be ineffective, open discussions of the regime’s authoritarian nature can be counter-productive and dangerous. Our study builds on prospect theory to inform the design of three educational interventions to promote democracy as a political system while varying the tone of the message. Using a randomized-controlled trial we identify which treatment is most effective at building support for democracy in authoritarian contexts: the gains of democracy, the losses of non-democracy, or a neutral frame. Our study was conducted in Turkey where we recruited more than 4,000 respondents through online social media plat- forms to evaluate the impact of our interventions. Our results demonstrate that all civic education treatments could successfully build support for democracy among respondents. However, only respondents assigned to the gain-frame video evalu- ated Turkey’s regime as more authoritarian and became less likely to vote for the government in an upcoming election. Our paper discusses why this is the case and how this finding contributes to the existing literature on both civic education and public opinion formation under authoritarian regimes.

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“…Since the electoral turmoil following the 2015 elections, President Erdogan and his AKP party gradually established a presidential system with weak checks and balances and widespread suppression of oppositional forces in the country, slowly transforming Turkey into a competitive authoritarian system . And yet, as the 2019 Istanbul mayoral election demonstrated, oppositional parties stand a chance in electoral contests and even ousted the incumbent party at the sub-national level (Svolik, 2021).…”

Section: The Short-term Effects Of Electoral Eventsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Living in Different Worlds: Electoral Authoritarianism and Partisan Gaps in Perceptions of Electoral Integrity

Jöst¹,

Vergioglou²,

Jacob³

2022

Preprint

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Many authoritarian political regimes hold multiparty elections in which the opposition often stands a chance to defeat the incumbent. How do ordinary citizens perceive the integrity of elections in such systems? We argue that government supporters follow the incumbent's narrative in considering elections fair and legitimate. In contrast, opposition supporters regard elections in such systems as biased and not meaningful. We provide evidence from cross-country public opinion data and the unexpected 2018 Turkish snap election announcement to examine long- and short-term patterns of perceived electoral integrity. We find that the partisan gap in perceived electoral integrity is more substantial under electoral authoritarianism than under democratic rule. In the short term, electoral events can boost incumbent supporters' confidence in the quality of elections. Our study yields implications for the dynamics between elites and citizens in authoritarian regimes in which elections remain the primary source of legitimacy.

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Voting \emph{Against} Autocracy

Cited by 5 publications

References 53 publications

How Populist Incumbents Use Strategic Communication to Survive Economic Crises: The Surprising Effectiveness of Incumbent Economic Appeals

How Populist Incumbents Use Strategic Communication to Survive Economic Crises: The Surprising Effectiveness of Incumbent Economic Appeals

Keep Positive and Defend Democracy: Building Democratic Support Under Authoritarianism

Living in Different Worlds: Electoral Authoritarianism and Partisan Gaps in Perceptions of Electoral Integrity

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