What is autocratization?

Working English version. The Spanish edition is the reference text. This translation is published for reach and will be revised before the final launch.

A minimal definition

Autocratization is the process through which a democracy steadily loses the mechanisms that constrain the power of those who govern. It is not the same as an authoritarian regime that never democratised: it describes a change, a trajectory, a deterioration.

The image of the military coup still shapes much of the public imagination. But comparative scholarship shows that the dominant form of contemporary backsliding is different: an elected government uses its mandate and the tools of the state to erode the checks that should hold it accountable. Law, once the grammar of democracy, becomes the instrument of its dismantling.

What erodes

A democracy is not just the holding of elections. It is a system of brakes. At least six dimensions are worth distinguishing:

1. Freedom of expression and plural information. People can report, investigate and criticise the government without fear.
2. Judicial constraints on the executive. Courts can say no to an abuse of power.
3. Legislative constraints. Parliament can scrutinise and limit the government.
4. Electoral integrity. Elections are competitive and results are respected.
5. Civil society participation. People can organise in associations, unions and movements.
6. Freedom of association. Groups and parties can be created without government permission.

Autocratization does not require all six to deteriorate at once. A frequent sequence starts with freedom of expression and judicial constraints, continues with electoral fairness and ends with associational dimensions. The sequence is a tendency, not a universal law, but it helps identify where to look.

How it is measured

Projects such as V-Dem code these dimensions for almost every country in the world. The ERT (Episodes of Regime Transformation) project identifies episodes of autocratization and democratization with a public algorithm. Together, they make it possible to study not only the final outcome but the process.

Measuring autocratization requires distinguishing three things:

• Level: how democratic a country is at a given moment.
• Change: how far it has moved relative to its own past.
• Breakdown: whether the change culminates in a non-democratic regime.

A country can deteriorate without breaking. It can also recover. Recent literature insists that reversal is possible, although the cost grows as capture consolidates.

What it is not

Not every controversial reform is autocratization. A government can change a law, win an election or disagree with a court without dismantling democracy. The difference lies in direction and accumulation: does the change reduce the capacity of social actors to hold power accountable? Does the pattern repeat? Does it attack the independence of the referees?

Nor is it an inevitable destiny. Autocratization is a process with resistance, mistakes and costs. Political and social actors can slow it down; sometimes they do.

Why the sequence matters

If deterioration follows an order, that order can serve as an early warning. Not to predict with certainty, but to identify signals before the regime changes category. Freedom of expression and judicial independence are good places to start looking.

The next piece explains how democracy is measured with V-Dem. The one after that shows what GDELT adds, and what it distorts, when studying protest.

References

1. Lührmann, A., & Lindberg, S. I. (2019). A third wave of autocratization is here: What is new about it? Democratization, 26(7).
2. Bermeo, N. (2016). On democratic backsliding. Journal of Democracy, 27(1).
3. Levitsky, S., & Ziblatt, D. (2018). How Democracies Die. Crown.
4. Scheppele, K. L. (2018). Autocratic legalism. The University of Chicago Law Review, 85(2).
5. V-Dem Institute (2026). Democracy Report 2026: Unraveling the Democratic Era? University of Gothenburg.

Related data

• V-Dem Dataset v16

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