From Tyranny of the Minority (Steven Levitsky & Daniel Ziblatt, 2023) pp40-4
Politicians who are committed to democracy, or what the political scientist Juan Linz called loyal democrats, must always do three basic things. First, they must respect the outcome of free and fair elections, win or lose. This means consistently and unhesitatingly accepting defeat. Second, democrats must unambiguously reject violence (or the threat of violence) as a means of achieving political goals. Politicians who support military coups, organize putsches, incite insurrections, plot bombings, assassinations, and other terrorist acts, or deploy militias or thugs to beat up opponents or intimidate voters are not democrats. Indeed, any party or politician that violates either of these two basic rules should be considered a threat to democracy.
But there is a third, more subtle action required of loyal democrats: they must always break with antidemocratic forces. Democracy’s assassins always have accomplices— political insiders who appear to abide by democracy’s rules but quietly assault them. These are what Linz called “semi-loyal” democrats.
From a distance, semi-loyal democrats may look like loyal democrats. They are mainstream politicians, often in suits and ties, who ostensibly play by the rules and indeed even thrive under them. They never engage in visibly antidemocratic acts. So when democracies die, their fingerprints are rarely found on the murder weapon. But make no mistake: semi-loyal politicians play a vital, if hidden, role in democratic collapse.
Whereas loyal democrats clearly and consistently reject anti-democratic behavior, semi-loyal democrats act in a more ambiguous manner. They try to have it both ways, claiming to support democracy while at the same time turning a blind eye to violence or antidemocratic extremism. It is this ambiguity that makes them so dangerous. Openly authoritarian figures-like coup conspirators or armed insurrectionists-are visible for all to see. By them-selves, they often lack the public support or legitimacy to destroy a democracy. But when semi-loyalists— tucked away in the hallways of power—lend a hand, openly authoritarian forces become much more dangerous. Democracies get into trouble when mainstream parties tolerate, condone, or protect authoritarian extremists when they become authoritarian enablers. Indeed, throughout history, cooperation between authoritarians and seemingly respectable semi-loyal democrats has been a recipe for democratic breakdown.
How can we tell a loyal democrat from a semi-loyal one? A litmus test is how politicians respond to violent or antidemocratic behavior on their own flank. It’s easy to oppose authoritarians on the other side of the political spectrum. Progressives are quick to denounce and oppose fascists. Conservatives reliably denounce and oppose violent radical leftists. But what about antidemocratic elements that arise within one’s own party —a radical youth wing, an emergent faction, a newly arrived political outsider, or an allied group that many party leaders and activists belong to or sympathize with? Or perhaps a new political movement that excites much of the party base?
When faced with these challenges, loyal democrats follow four basic rules. First, they expel antidemocratic extremists from their own ranks, even at the cost of antagonizing the party base. In the 1930s, for example, Sweden’s largest conservative party expelled its forty-thousand-member youth wing, the Swedish National Youth Or-ganization, which embraced fascism and Hitler. By contrast, semi-loyalists tolerate and even accommodate antidemocratic ex-tremists. Although they may privately disapprove of the extrem-ists, they remain silent, out of political expediency: they fear dividing the party, and ultimately losing votes.
Second, loyal democrats sever all ties public and private with allied groups that engage in antidemocratic behavior. They not only eschew alliances with them but also refuse endorsements from them, avoid public appearances with them, and abstain from secret or closed-door conversations with them. Semi-loyal democrats, on the other hand, continue to cooperate with extremists. They may form political alliances with them, as when Spain’s center-left Republicans forged a coalition with leftists who had participated in an armed uprising in 1934. More often, though, cooperation is loose and unofficial. Semi-loyalists may keep their distance from extremists in public but still quietly work with them or accept their support.
Third, loyal democrats unambiguously condemn political violence and other antidemocratic behavior, even when it is committed by allies or ideologically proximate groups. During periods of extreme polarization or crisis, antidemocratic positions may enjoy considerable rank-and-file support. Even then, loyal democrats resist the temptation to condone, justify, or accommodate these positions. Instead, they publicly and unequivocally condemn them. When supporters of the losing Brazilian presidential candidate Jair Bolso-naro stormed the Congress in January 2023, seeking to overturn the results of the recent presidential election, the leader of Bolsonaro’s own party immediately and forcefully condemned their actions. And when ideological allies are responsible for violent or antidemocratic acts, loyal democrats take steps to hold them accountable before the law.
Semi-loyal democrats, by contrast, deny or downplay their allies’ violent or antidemocratic acts. They may blame violence on “false flag” operations. They may minimize the importance of anti-democratic behavior, deflect criticism by drawing attention to similar (or worse) behavior by the other side, or otherwise justify or condone the acts. Semi-loyalists frequently try to have it both ways: expressing disapproval of the perpetrators’ methods while sympathizing with their goals. Or they may simply remain silent in the face of violent attacks on democracy.
Finally, when necessary, loyal democrats join forces with rival pro-democratic parties to isolate and defeat antidemocratic extremists. This is not easy. Forging broad coalitions to defend democracy often requires that loyal democrats (temporarily) set aside cherished principles and policy goals and work with politicians from the opposite end of the ideological spectrum to defeat groups that are ideologically closer to them. Semi-loyal democrats, by contrast, refuse to work with ideological rivals even when democracy is on the line.
These principles of loyal democratic politics may appear simple and straightforward, but they are not. When much of a party’s base sympathizes with antidemocratic extremists, leaders of that party who denounce or break ties with those extremists often run a substantial political risk. Loyal democrats do it anyway. And they help preserve democracy in the process.
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