Session Description:
Democracies globally are increasingly threatened by elected leaders who erode democratic institutions through incremental and often legalistic means. While a growing literature examines democratic backsliding, we still know relatively little about opposition actors: how regimes seek to neutralize them, how oppositions adapt across institutional and extra-institutional arenas, and how domestic opposition struggles intersect with international politics. This panel advances a more actor-centered understanding of opposition under democratic erosion. It brings together research examining opposition politics across local, parliamentary, societal, and international arenas, and across a diverse set of backsliding regimes.
Tuncel analyzes state-appointed trusteeship in Turkey as a mechanism of authoritarian control, showing how the removal of elected opposition mayors reshapes electoral competition and redistributes political and economic power. Sato and Musil examine opposition strategies under autocratization: Sato demonstrates, using a new cross-national dataset, that moderate opposition tactics are associated with lower levels of political polarization whereas radical extra-institutional strategies have the inverse effect, while Musil shows how parliamentary opposition in competitive authoritarian regimes functions performatively to sustain contestation and constituent ties. And finally, Yoel and Samet turn to the international arena, shedding light on how opposition actors cultivate international support and how foreign messages can shape public opinion. Yoel uses survey experiments in Hungary and the Philippines to show how international rhetorical pressure can shape public support for opposition movements, depending on message content and citizens’ democratic commitments. Samet examines “opposition diplomacy” in an era of democratic backsliding, arguing that increased polarization across leading democracies and international institutions has led to a decline in the supply of sympathetic venues and that incumbents increasingly attempt to frame cross-border engagement as foreign interference.
Taken together, the panel highlights opposition actors as strategic, multifaceted agents operating across arenas and scales. Methodologically, this panel offers insights using diverse approaches, such as survey experiments, causal analysis using observational data, and interpretive analysis of social media content, reflecting the complexity of opposition politics under democratic erosion. It demonstrates that opposition to authoritarian actors is shaped not only by regime type and institutional constraints, but also by opposition choices and transnational linkages.
2026 APSA Theme Panel: New Approaches to Measuring Polarization, Democracy, and Cooperation
Mark Johnson Receives the 2026 APSA Community College Faculty Award
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