There and back again: democratization, autocratization and democratic resilience

Nadine Sika; Balázs Szent-Iványi

doi:10.1080/13510347.2026.2628860

There and back again: democratization, autocratization and democratic resilience

Nadine Sika^*
, Balázs Szent-Iványi

^*Corresponding author for this work

American University in Cairo

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

2 Citations (SciVal)

Abstract

The article introduces the “Fifty Years of the Third Wave” special issue of Democratization. The special issue brings together 11 contributions which commemorate the 50th anniversary of the start of the Third Wave of Democratization with Portugal’s Carnation Revolution in 1974. Together, they take stock of the state of democracy globally and regionally. They discuss historical and recent trends in democratization and autocratization, the performance of democracies in creating peace, as well as threats to democracy and the capacity of democracies to remain resilient in the face of these threats. Building on the insights from the articles in this issue, this introduction first presents an overview of the drivers and processes of democratization during the Third Wave, followed by a discussion of the challenges to democracy that have led to the wave’s demise and the start of a wave of autocratization during the early 2010s. The article ends with a synthesis of our understanding of democratic resilience, based on the contributions and the broader literature. This synthesis shows that democratic resilience is best understood as a dynamic, continuously evolving process, rather than a static set of determinants.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	451-471
Number of pages	21
Journal	Democratization
Volume	33
Issue number	3
Early online date	24 Mar 2026
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1080/13510347.2026.2628860
Publication status	Published - 1 Apr 2026

Bibliographical note

This is an Accepted Manuscript version of the following article, accepted for publication in Democratization: Sika, N., & Szent-Iványi, B. (2026). There and back again: democratization, autocratization and democratic resilience. Democratization, 33(3), 451–471. https://doi.org/10.1080/13510347.2026.2628860
It is deposited under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

SDG 10 Reduced Inequalities

Keywords

Third Wave of Democratization
autocratization
democratic backsliding
democratic resilience
economic inequality
political polarization

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10.1080/13510347.2026.2628860

Cite this

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abstract = "The article introduces the “Fifty Years of the Third Wave” special issue of Democratization. The special issue brings together 11 contributions which commemorate the 50th anniversary of the start of the Third Wave of Democratization with Portugal{\textquoteright}s Carnation Revolution in 1974. Together, they take stock of the state of democracy globally and regionally. They discuss historical and recent trends in democratization and autocratization, the performance of democracies in creating peace, as well as threats to democracy and the capacity of democracies to remain resilient in the face of these threats. Building on the insights from the articles in this issue, this introduction first presents an overview of the drivers and processes of democratization during the Third Wave, followed by a discussion of the challenges to democracy that have led to the wave{\textquoteright}s demise and the start of a wave of autocratization during the early 2010s. The article ends with a synthesis of our understanding of democratic resilience, based on the contributions and the broader literature. This synthesis shows that democratic resilience is best understood as a dynamic, continuously evolving process, rather than a static set of determinants.",

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KW - democratic resilience

KW - economic inequality

KW - political polarization

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There and back again: democratization, autocratization and democratic resilience

Abstract

Bibliographical note

UN SDGs

Keywords

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