Is a new autocratization episode imminent in the United States? Early warning signs and responses.

Once considered a beacon of democracy, the United States underwent an autocratization episode during the Trump presidency (Tomini, Gibril, and Bochev 2023). Some now consider the country a case of averted democratic regression (e.g. id), but there are clear warning signs that the threat of autoctatization is not over (Mounk 2022). This paper examines elite norm-breaking as an early warning sign of democratic recession. More specifically, it analyzes breeches of democratic norms by prominent members of the Republican Party in the United States in 2021 and 2022, the first two years after President Joe Biden’s inauguration ended the previous autocratization episode. In addition, it addresses responses to the breeches by different actors in society. Breeches of democratic norms pose a threat to democracy if they undermine the fundamental norms of mutual toleration between politically opposed groups and forebearance, which refers to intentional restraint of one’s power in order to follow the spirit of the law (Levintsky and Ziblatt 2018). The paper seeks to answer the following questions: 1) Did prominent members of the Republican Party break democratic norms in 2021 or 2022? 2) If so, what norms were broken and what were the breeches like? and 3) If democratic norms were broken, how did other politicians, the civil society, the media, and other relevant actors react to the breeches? For information, this case study relies on news reporting and opinion columns by the Washington Post and on reports and studies by non-government organizations and think tanks. The Washington Post was chosen due to its status as the dominant newspaper in the nation’s capital, its detailed coverage of American politics and its long history of keeping a watchful eye on politicians. The research material was analyzed using qualitative content analysis. This paper finds that prominent Republicans broke various types of democratic norms in 2021 and 2022: 1) They exhibited racist, antisemitic and Islamophobic behavior. 2) They made comments that seemed to express support or admiration of political violence. 3) They viewed the attack on the United States Capitol through a partisan lens and attempted to prevent congressional investigations of the attack. 4) They made admiring comments about authoritarianism and electoral subversion. 5) As candidates for office, they avoided media scrutiny and debating their opponents. 6) They engaged in politically motivated witch hunts. 7) They showed disdain of soft norms and protocol. 8) They supported fellow Republicans who had broken democratic norms. Several segments of the society such as prominent members of the Democratic party, the civil society and the media reacted to the breeches by calling them out and criticizing them. However, the response seemed insufficient to disincentivize similar behavior in the future. Bibliography Levintsky, Steven and Daniel Ziblatt. 2018. How Democracies Die. New York: Crown Publishing. Mounk, Yascha. 2022. The Danger Is Real. Journal of Democracy 33 (4): 150-154. Tomini, Luca, Suzan Gibril, and Venelin Bochev. 2023. “Standing up Against Autocratization across Political Regimes: A Comparative Analysis of Resistance Actors and Strategies.” Democratization 30 (1): 119-138.