The Aftermath of Democratic Erosion: Analyzing the Variance of Post-Erosion Outcomes in USA, Brazil and Poland

The end of democratic erosion does not automatically lead to a return to democracy. Even when the agents of erosion are voted out of office—such as Donald Trump in the U.S. in 2020 or Andrej Babiš in the Czech Republic in 2021—they can still return to power. In Brazil and Poland, the PiS and Jair Bolsonaro's supporters continue to enjoy considerable support, and it cannot be ruled out that they could succeed in the next elections. While the literature on democratic backsliding or erosion is burgeoning, its aftermath has hardly been systematically explored thus far. Within the field of research on democratic erosion, this paper therefore takes a novel perspective by focusing on the task of democratic reconstruction carried out by democratic governments in the post-erosion phase. Three aspects are examined: the constellation of actors involved (mainly the pro- and anti-democratic groups), the institutional conditions under which reconstruction unfolds, and the interaction of both the agency and institutional dimensions. So far, the literature has a strong focus on actors. There are obvious reasons for this, as erosion is driven by incumbents and their parties and supporters (Bartels 2023, Bermeo 2016). Without wishing to negate this, I suggest to expanding our view and pay more attention to the institutional dimension and structural vulnerabilities (Ding & Slater 2021, Ghandi 2018). Hence, my premise is that the dynamics of democratic reconstruction cannot be explained without taking into account both: actors’ strategies and decisions as well as the wider context distorted during erosion: judiciary, state administration, decision making procedures, but also newly established illiberal principles and norms. On this basis, the paper presents an analysis of three cases (USA, Brazil, Poland) examining how the governments of Joseph Biden, Ignacio Lula da Silva and Donald Tusk managed the aftermath of their countries’ erosion episode, and which institutional-structural constraints they were confronted with. The analysis follows the method of a structured comparison and bases on a) an extensive compilation of data on the governments’ activities and b) countering activities by the opposition resp. veto actors. The period of investigation covers USA 2020-2024, Brazil 2023-6/2026, Poland 2023-6/2026. The study constitutes an important contribution to the ongoing research on democratic erosion and recovery providing insights of the conditions of democratic reconstruction in the aftermath of democratic erosion and informs about the reasons why such reconstruction reflects a variance of outcomes.