Diverging party outcomes in hybrid regimes: the cases of Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro.

• Author: Vukovic, Ivan

Introduction

Contrary to 'overly optimistic' scholarly expectations (Levitsky and Way, 2002), transitions from authoritarianism in the last quarter of the preceding century have, in rare instances only, led to creation of democratic political systems alike those that had already existed. (23) Instead, as Carothers effectively points out, thereby announcing the end of 'transition paradigm' based on the assumption that 'any country moving away from dictatorial rule can be considered a country in transition toward democracy', most of these regimes have ended up in a 'political grey zone...between full-fledged democracy and outright dictatorship' (2002: 7). As the third wave of democratization (Huntington, 1991) began to break, the world has witnessed an emergence of so-called hybrid political regimes (Karl, 1995). These ambiguous systems, writes Ottaway, combine rhetorical acceptance of liberal democracy, the existence of some formal democratic institutions, in the first place multiparty elections, and respect for a limited sphere of civil and political liberties with essentially illiberal or even authoritarian traits (2003: 3). The fusion of democratic procedures and authoritarian practices, in a way that the existence of the former masks the reality of the latter, thus provided the base for hybrid regimes' establishment. Formally embracing democracy while, at the same time, regularly resorting to blatant abuses of human and political rights, these regimes, in effect, failed to make clear-cut break with non-democratic past.

The end of the Cold War has given a particularly strong impetus to the process of their global proliferation. Following the collapse of communism, under conditions of emerging liberal hegemony, world-wide promotion of democracy and human rights, comprehensive economic change, and communication technologies' revolution, very few governments were willing to continue advocating non-democratic systems of governance. However, while increasingly adopting forms of democracy during this period, very few of them were actually willing to bring about substantive democratization. In effect, says Schedler, they would strive to constrain, contain, and control their own institutional creations, i.e. try to make sure that, nominally democratic, they remained substantively authoritarian (2009: 8) Throughout Latin America, Africa and Eurasia, by legalizing opposition parties and allowing for competitive elections whilst manipulating the process so as to ensure political survival, they discovered ways to acquiesce to internal and external demands for democratization while still maintaining their hold on power (Howard and Roessler, 2006: 365). At the end of the 1990s, autocrats allowing some form of multiparty elections thus outnumbered those who did not by more than two to one (Schedler, 2002: 47). By 2001, Brownlee reminds, five dozen of these regimes blended liberalization with repression and signified the durability of authoritarianism during a period that had augured global democracy (2007: 16). As a result, roughly a third of all regimes have arguably fallen into the hybrid category (Hale, 2008: 1). This way, hybrid regimes have become not only the modal form of government in the developing countries but also 'the most widespread political system in the world at the beginning of the twenty-first century' (Howard and Roessler, 2006: 365).

This new political dynamics in the course of the last two decades has, unsurprisingly, generated a considerable academic attention. (24) After acknowledging their significant presence within the realm of contemporary non-democratic political systems, students of hybrid regimes have recognized 'the need to shed light on this murky set of regimes by studying them relative to one another, rather than by highlighting the numerous ways in which they fall short of the standard set by advanced democracies' (Ibid). (25) The analytical focus, in that regard, has been on the specific conditions in which political competition in hybrid regimes takes place. (26) Namely, their formally democratic edifice and, in particular, multiparty elections as its most important structural element, guarantees--at least theoretical--opportunity for incumbent turnover by regular political means. Keeping in mind the risk of political defeat, hybrid regime governments have, therefore, mastered manipulative techniques that are supposed to enable them to stay in place without jeopardizing international standing. Instead of resorting to naked repression, open electoral fraud, or other--potentially very costly--sorts of blatant power abuse, they make use of incumbency to create unfair conditions of political game and thus thwart opposition challenges. More precisely, through the privileged access to resources, media, and the law, they construct so-called 'unlevel playing field' (Schedler, 2002) in which, as Levitsky and Way explain, state institutions are abused for partisan ends, and incumbents are systematically favored to the extent that the opposition's ability to organize and compete in elections is seriously impaired (2010: 10). However, despite considerable advantage of their incumbents over political rivals, a certain number of hybrid regimes did not manage to consolidate in the post-Cold War period. In fact, taken all together, we can identify three different developmental trajectories they followed during the last twenty years: a number of them went through the process of democratization; some regimes--most of which African (Kenya, Madagascar, Senegal, etc.)--failed to democratize despite experiencing at least one transition change; finally, in countries like Zimbabwe, Cameroon, and Russia, hybrid regimes remained stable to date (Ibid: 20). (27) Various factors brought to the light by the recent literature on hybrid regimes outcomes (28) can crudely be grouped into the following categories: the power of state and incumbent party, opposition strategy and public mobilization, and Western democratizing leverage. And while focusing on hybrid regimes' 'diverging faiths' in the last two decades (Levitsky and Way, 2005), scholars have paid little attention to the diverging faiths of ruling parties in these regimes. Namely, in the countries that have recently undergone democratic transition from hybrid regimes, regime collapse was, as a rule, causally linked with turnover in power. In other words, the process of democratization in these states--as a substantial alteration of the rules of political game hitherto serving interests of an incumbent party--would usually be initiated by its electoral defeat. (29) However, a few countries that have democratized during this period saw the end of hybrid regime without experiencing such political change. In Macedonia--to mention the most recent case--the ruling VRMO-DPMNE party remained in power even though democratization took place in the period subsequent to its 2006 electoral victory. (30)

How did it happen, one may ask, that while most of the parties that had been ruling in hybrid regimes lost their power when these regimes ceased to exist, some of them remained politically dominant notwithstanding democratic changes? Or, to paraphrase Levitsky and Way (2010), what are the determinants of the diverging party outcomes in hybrid regimes?

The central contention of this paper is that it is the structure of power in these regimes that determines whether an incumbent party stays in power or not. In that sense, by focusing on the cases of hybrid regimes in Croatia (1990-2000), Serbia (1990-2000), and Montenegro (1990-1998), I make a distinction between regimes whose power is 'personalized', i.e. structured around a charismatic leader (as it was the case in the former two), and those in which it is 'institutionalized', that is derived from a party organization (as was the latter). As a result, I posit, the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) and Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS)--even with a considerable organizational power (employed in electoral competition, clientelistic networks' maintenance, political recruitment, etc.)--served as mere 'transmission belts' of their leaders' political will, whereas the Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS) played the key role in political life of Montenegro. Due to this structural difference, I further argue, the HDZ and the SPS lost power as the regimes collapsed, where the DPS stayed in power despite democratic change. In addition, I maintain, thus refereeing to the larger theoretical debate on hybrid regime outcomes, the same rationale applies to the diverging levels of stability of the Croatian, Montenegrin, and Serbian hybrids.

2. Hybrid regimes in the Western Balkans: Croatia, Montenegro, Serbia

1. Contextual resemblance

To date, the literature on hybrid regimes has identified three ways in which they typically come into being. As argued by Morlino, these regimes arise out of: Different types of authoritarianism that had existed in recent decades, or earlier; Some form of traditional regime, most often monarchy or sultanism; The crisis of an earlier democratic system (2008: 7).

The Croatian, Montenegrin and Serbian regimes clearly fall under the first genealogical category. Their emergence followed the breakdown of the single-party authoritarian regime that had ruled socialist Yugoslavia for more than four decades. Historically contextualized, this is to be seen as a part of the broader wave of political changes that encompassed the region toward the end of the 1980s. And while, in that sense, the way they originated does not differ from other post-communist hybrid regimes, the three cases in question share certain features that make them distinctive within this particular group of political systems.

Firstly, as Alexander (2008) notices in the only related analysis that encompasses all of them, Croatia, Montenegro, and Serbia were the only countries in the Southeast Europe in which the initial change in power...