How Democracies Die Themes

Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, political scientists at Harvard who are experts on authoritarianism, wrote How Democracies Die in the first year of Donald Trump’s presidency to answer a fundamental question about 21st century American politics: “Is our democracy in danger?” They answered yes. While the U.S.’s democratic institutions were still intact, the nation faced a unique and unprecedented threat from Donald Trump’s extreme, intolerant, anti-democratic style of politics. With its democratic norms…

For centuries, democracies most often died in spectacular, decisive moments, through revolutions, wars, and coups d’état. But Levitsky and Ziblatt point out that, since the end of the Cold War, authoritarian leaders are more likely to gain power through elections than violent takeovers. Paradoxically, they then use democratic institutions to dismantle democracy itself. But even when they’re dead-set on doing so, other members of the government can stop them. In fact, this is why…

Donald Trump’s presidency represented an acute crisis for American democracy, but Levitsky and Ziblatt argue that this crisis didn’t come out of the blue: instead, it was actually a continuation of longer-term political trends. Since the civil rights movement in the mid-20th century, polarization has steadily worsened and democratic norms have steadily weakened in the U.S. Even absent a Trump presidency, this trend poses a fundamental threat to American democracy because it encourages both…

Many Americans believe that the United States is an exceptional nation. Whether they credit the Constitution, historical leaders, or a higher power, they think that the U.S. has a uniquely democratic political system that guarantees citizens more civil rights and liberties than any other country. But while Levitsky and Ziblatt agree that the United States’s democracy is historically strong and particularly long-lasting, they don’t think it’s exempt from the forces that have toppled other democracies…