Sebastian Hellmeier
Biographic Data
| ID | 1417318 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Sebastian Hellmeier |
| GIVEN NAMES | Sebastian |
| FAMILY NAME | Hellmeier |
| SIGNATURE | HELLMEIER S |
| AFFILIATIONS | WZB Berlin Social Science Center |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-9423-7150 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 17 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 377 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 17 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2016 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 11 |
Pathways to democracy after authoritarian breakdown
Mass movements that are able to overthrow a dictator do not always lead to democracy. Transition periods present narrow windows of opportunity in which activists face difficult decisions to build democracy and prevent authoritarian relapse. Existing scholarship offers limited guidance for pro-democracy forces because it focuses on unchangeable structural factors and cases with a known outcome. We propose an innovative approach for finding informa…
The Long Arm and the Iron Fist
The emerging literature dealing with transnational repression has identified several strategies used by authoritarian states to control and coerce their populations abroad. This article builds on existing research by investigating the domestic determinants of transnational repression. It argues that an increase in domestic repression is likely to lead to a subsequent increase in transnational repression because crackdowns at home drive dissent ab…
State Concessions and Protest Mobilization in Authoritarian Regimes
Autocrats typically respond with coercion when citizens take to the streets demanding political reform. Sometimes, however, they tolerate mass protests and even give in to protesters’ demands. While the effect of coercion on mobilization is well-studied, we know less about the role of concession-making. We argue that accommodating demands is rarely an effective strategy in demobilizing opposition movements. Authoritarian rulers are usually neithe…
Episodes of regime transformation
This article provides a new conceptualization of regime transformation that allows scholars to address democratization and autocratization as related but obverse processes. We introduce a dataset that captures 680 episodes of regime transformation (ERT) from 1900 to 2019 and offers novel insights into regime change over the past 120 years. The ERT has three main advantages over other approaches. First, it avoids problematic assumptions of unit ho…
From masks to mismanagement
The Covid-19 pandemic changed contentious politics worldwide. After causing a short-lived decline in global protest activities in early 2020, it has led to the emergence of a variety of pandemic-related protests. While previous work has mostly looked at how event frequencies have changed over time, this paper focuses on changes in protest issues. It applies quantitative text analysis to protest event descriptions and makes the following contribut…
Dynamics and determinants of right-wing populist mobilisation in Germany
Western Europe has recently experienced increasing protest mobilisation by right-wing populist movements. Although these movements are receiving increasing scholarly attention, systematic data on protest activities is limited. In this research note, original data is used to describe the protest activity of Germany’s Pegida movement across space and time and to explore the city-level determinants of protest mobilisation. The protest dataset record…
Regime Transformation From Below
Mass mobilization (MM) is an important driver of political change. While some citizens organize in favor of more democratic institutions, others take to the streets to support an authoritarian status quo. This article introduces measures of pro-democratic and pro-autocratic MM using expert assessments for 179 polities from 1900–2021. The data allow us to trace patterns in MM over time, across regions and regime types. We use this new data to syst…
Polarisierung auf der Straße – Die politischen Folgen der Dynamiken von Protest und Gegenprotest
Über das letzte Jahrzehnt hat die politische Mobilisierung von Rechts in Deutschland und Europa zugenommen. Insbesondere die Migrationsbewegungen seit 2015 waren für Netzwerke wie Pegida Anlass auf die Straße zu gehen. Auf der anderen Seite haben sich diverse zivilgesellschaftliche Akteure von antifaschistischen Gruppen über Gewerkschaften bis hin zu Kirchen organisiert, um in Form von Gegendemonstrationen ein Zeichen gegen Rechts und für Weltoff…
Thin-skinned leaders
The literature on autocracies has argued that repression of protest is either a result of the political environment in which protest occurs, or depends on particular characteristics of the protest events themselves. We argue that the interaction of both matters. Authoritarian regimes vary in how they legitimize their rule, and they should be particularly thin-skinned if protesters challenge the basis of their legitimacy. Using event-level data on…
Does counter‐mobilization contain right‐wing populist movements? Evidence from Germany
Right‐wing populist (RWP) movements have been on the rise in Western democracies. Outside of party politics, such movements regularly organize demonstrations against political elites and minority groups. At the same time, civil society coalitions have mobilized against these movements. Yet we know little about the effect of counter‐demonstrations on RWP protest activities. We derive competing theoretical expectations from previous work. On the on…
How democracies prevail
This article introduces a novel conceptualization of democratic resilience - a two-stage process where democracies avoid democratic declines altogether or avert democratic breakdown given that such autocratization is ongoing. Drawing on the Episodes of Regime Transformation (ERT) dataset, we find that democracies have had a high level of resilience to onset of autocratization since 1900. Nevertheless, democratic resilience has become substantiall…
State of the world 2020
This article analyses the state of democracy in 2020. The world is still more democratic than it was in the 1970s and 1980s, but a trend of autocratization is ongoing and affecting 25 countries in 2020, home to 34% of the world’s population. At the same time, the number of democratizing countries has dwindled by nearly half, reducing to 16 countries, home to a mere 4% of the global population. Freedom of expression, deliberation, rule of law and …
How foreign pressure affects mass mobilization in favor of authoritarian regimes
Authoritarian regimes are frequent targets of international pressure in the form of economic sanctions or threats thereof. Existing research shows that foreign interventions can carry several unintended consequences for politics and the economy in the targeted countries. One of the side effects of such interventions is boosting support for incumbent autocrats. Public demonstrations in support of embattled leaders are one aspect of this dynamic. T…
State of the world 2019
This article analyses the state of democracy in the world in 2019. We demonstrate that the "third wave of autocratization" is accelerating and deepening. The dramatic loss of eight democracies in the last year sets a new record in the rate of breakdowns. Exemplifying this crisis is Hungary, now the EU's first ever authoritarian member state. Governmental assaults on civil society, freedom of expression, and the media are proliferating and becomin…
Pulling the Strings? The Strategic Use of Pro-Government Mobilization in Authoritarian Regimes
Protest against authoritarian rule is a well-studied phenomenon in the social sciences, but mass rallies in favor of authoritarian regimes have received only limited scholarly attention. While previous work has portrayed authoritarian regimes as characterized by mass apathy and political demobilization, we show that this is only partially true today. We argue that autocrats mobilize their supporters selectively as a strategic response to politica…
In the Spotlight
During waves of contention, international media attention can be of crucial importance for activists and protest participants. However, media attention is a scarce resource and the competition over news coverage is high. While some emphasize the agenda-setting power of news outlets and argue that receiving coverage is determined by factors outside the protest movement, others suggest a dynamic relationship between media attention and activism whe…
The Dictator's Digital Toolkit
Following its global diffusion during the last decade, the Internet was expected to become a liberation technology and a threat for autocratic regimes by facilitating collective action. Recently, however, autocratic regimes took control of the Internet and filter online content. Building on the literature concerning the political economy of repression, this article argues that regime characteristics, economic conditions, and conflict in bordering…
State of the world 2019
This article analyses the state of democracy in the world in 2019. We demonstrate that the "third wave of autocratization" is accelerating and deepening. The dramatic loss of eight democracies in the last year sets a new record in the rate of breakdowns. Exemplifying this crisis is Hungary, now the EU's first ever authoritarian member state. Governmental assaults on civil society, freedom of expression, and the media are proliferating and becomin…
State of the world 2020
This article analyses the state of democracy in 2020. The world is still more democratic than it was in the 1970s and 1980s, but a trend of autocratization is ongoing and affecting 25 countries in 2020, home to 34% of the world’s population. At the same time, the number of democratizing countries has dwindled by nearly half, reducing to 16 countries, home to a mere 4% of the global population. Freedom of expression, deliberation, rule of law and …
How democracies prevail
This article introduces a novel conceptualization of democratic resilience - a two-stage process where democracies avoid democratic declines altogether or avert democratic breakdown given that such autocratization is ongoing. Drawing on the Episodes of Regime Transformation (ERT) dataset, we find that democracies have had a high level of resilience to onset of autocratization since 1900. Nevertheless, democratic resilience has become substantiall…
Pulling the Strings? The Strategic Use of Pro-Government Mobilization in Authoritarian Regimes
Protest against authoritarian rule is a well-studied phenomenon in the social sciences, but mass rallies in favor of authoritarian regimes have received only limited scholarly attention. While previous work has portrayed authoritarian regimes as characterized by mass apathy and political demobilization, we show that this is only partially true today. We argue that autocrats mobilize their supporters selectively as a strategic response to politica…
Episodes of regime transformation
This article provides a new conceptualization of regime transformation that allows scholars to address democratization and autocratization as related but obverse processes. We introduce a dataset that captures 680 episodes of regime transformation (ERT) from 1900 to 2019 and offers novel insights into regime change over the past 120 years. The ERT has three main advantages over other approaches. First, it avoids problematic assumptions of unit ho…
Does counter‐mobilization contain right‐wing populist movements? Evidence from Germany
Right‐wing populist (RWP) movements have been on the rise in Western democracies. Outside of party politics, such movements regularly organize demonstrations against political elites and minority groups. At the same time, civil society coalitions have mobilized against these movements. Yet we know little about the effect of counter‐demonstrations on RWP protest activities. We derive competing theoretical expectations from previous work. On the on…
The Dictator's Digital Toolkit
Following its global diffusion during the last decade, the Internet was expected to become a liberation technology and a threat for autocratic regimes by facilitating collective action. Recently, however, autocratic regimes took control of the Internet and filter online content. Building on the literature concerning the political economy of repression, this article argues that regime characteristics, economic conditions, and conflict in bordering…
In the Spotlight
During waves of contention, international media attention can be of crucial importance for activists and protest participants. However, media attention is a scarce resource and the competition over news coverage is high. While some emphasize the agenda-setting power of news outlets and argue that receiving coverage is determined by factors outside the protest movement, others suggest a dynamic relationship between media attention and activism whe…
The Long Arm and the Iron Fist
The emerging literature dealing with transnational repression has identified several strategies used by authoritarian states to control and coerce their populations abroad. This article builds on existing research by investigating the domestic determinants of transnational repression. It argues that an increase in domestic repression is likely to lead to a subsequent increase in transnational repression because crackdowns at home drive dissent ab…
Regime Transformation From Below
Mass mobilization (MM) is an important driver of political change. While some citizens organize in favor of more democratic institutions, others take to the streets to support an authoritarian status quo. This article introduces measures of pro-democratic and pro-autocratic MM using expert assessments for 179 polities from 1900–2021. The data allow us to trace patterns in MM over time, across regions and regime types. We use this new data to syst…
Thin-skinned leaders
The literature on autocracies has argued that repression of protest is either a result of the political environment in which protest occurs, or depends on particular characteristics of the protest events themselves. We argue that the interaction of both matters. Authoritarian regimes vary in how they legitimize their rule, and they should be particularly thin-skinned if protesters challenge the basis of their legitimacy. Using event-level data on…
How foreign pressure affects mass mobilization in favor of authoritarian regimes
Authoritarian regimes are frequent targets of international pressure in the form of economic sanctions or threats thereof. Existing research shows that foreign interventions can carry several unintended consequences for politics and the economy in the targeted countries. One of the side effects of such interventions is boosting support for incumbent autocrats. Public demonstrations in support of embattled leaders are one aspect of this dynamic. T…
State Concessions and Protest Mobilization in Authoritarian Regimes
Autocrats typically respond with coercion when citizens take to the streets demanding political reform. Sometimes, however, they tolerate mass protests and even give in to protesters’ demands. While the effect of coercion on mobilization is well-studied, we know less about the role of concession-making. We argue that accommodating demands is rarely an effective strategy in demobilizing opposition movements. Authoritarian rulers are usually neithe…
From masks to mismanagement
The Covid-19 pandemic changed contentious politics worldwide. After causing a short-lived decline in global protest activities in early 2020, it has led to the emergence of a variety of pandemic-related protests. While previous work has mostly looked at how event frequencies have changed over time, this paper focuses on changes in protest issues. It applies quantitative text analysis to protest event descriptions and makes the following contribut…
Dynamics and determinants of right-wing populist mobilisation in Germany
Western Europe has recently experienced increasing protest mobilisation by right-wing populist movements. Although these movements are receiving increasing scholarly attention, systematic data on protest activities is limited. In this research note, original data is used to describe the protest activity of Germany’s Pegida movement across space and time and to explore the city-level determinants of protest mobilisation. The protest dataset record…
Pathways to democracy after authoritarian breakdown
Mass movements that are able to overthrow a dictator do not always lead to democracy. Transition periods present narrow windows of opportunity in which activists face difficult decisions to build democracy and prevent authoritarian relapse. Existing scholarship offers limited guidance for pro-democracy forces because it focuses on unchangeable structural factors and cases with a known outcome. We propose an innovative approach for finding informa…
The Dictator's Digital Toolkit
Following its global diffusion during the last decade, the Internet was expected to become a liberation technology and a threat for autocratic regimes by facilitating collective action. Recently, however, autocratic regimes took control of the Internet and filter online content. Building on the literature concerning the political economy of repression, this article argues that regime characteristics, economic conditions, and conflict in bordering…
In the Spotlight
During waves of contention, international media attention can be of crucial importance for activists and protest participants. However, media attention is a scarce resource and the competition over news coverage is high. While some emphasize the agenda-setting power of news outlets and argue that receiving coverage is determined by factors outside the protest movement, others suggest a dynamic relationship between media attention and activism whe…
State of the world 2019
This article analyses the state of democracy in the world in 2019. We demonstrate that the "third wave of autocratization" is accelerating and deepening. The dramatic loss of eight democracies in the last year sets a new record in the rate of breakdowns. Exemplifying this crisis is Hungary, now the EU's first ever authoritarian member state. Governmental assaults on civil society, freedom of expression, and the media are proliferating and becomin…
Pulling the Strings? The Strategic Use of Pro-Government Mobilization in Authoritarian Regimes
Protest against authoritarian rule is a well-studied phenomenon in the social sciences, but mass rallies in favor of authoritarian regimes have received only limited scholarly attention. While previous work has portrayed authoritarian regimes as characterized by mass apathy and political demobilization, we show that this is only partially true today. We argue that autocrats mobilize their supporters selectively as a strategic response to politica…
How democracies prevail
This article introduces a novel conceptualization of democratic resilience - a two-stage process where democracies avoid democratic declines altogether or avert democratic breakdown given that such autocratization is ongoing. Drawing on the Episodes of Regime Transformation (ERT) dataset, we find that democracies have had a high level of resilience to onset of autocratization since 1900. Nevertheless, democratic resilience has become substantiall…
State of the world 2020
This article analyses the state of democracy in 2020. The world is still more democratic than it was in the 1970s and 1980s, but a trend of autocratization is ongoing and affecting 25 countries in 2020, home to 34% of the world’s population. At the same time, the number of democratizing countries has dwindled by nearly half, reducing to 16 countries, home to a mere 4% of the global population. Freedom of expression, deliberation, rule of law and …
How foreign pressure affects mass mobilization in favor of authoritarian regimes
Authoritarian regimes are frequent targets of international pressure in the form of economic sanctions or threats thereof. Existing research shows that foreign interventions can carry several unintended consequences for politics and the economy in the targeted countries. One of the side effects of such interventions is boosting support for incumbent autocrats. Public demonstrations in support of embattled leaders are one aspect of this dynamic. T…
Polarisierung auf der Straße – Die politischen Folgen der Dynamiken von Protest und Gegenprotest
Über das letzte Jahrzehnt hat die politische Mobilisierung von Rechts in Deutschland und Europa zugenommen. Insbesondere die Migrationsbewegungen seit 2015 waren für Netzwerke wie Pegida Anlass auf die Straße zu gehen. Auf der anderen Seite haben sich diverse zivilgesellschaftliche Akteure von antifaschistischen Gruppen über Gewerkschaften bis hin zu Kirchen organisiert, um in Form von Gegendemonstrationen ein Zeichen gegen Rechts und für Weltoff…
Thin-skinned leaders
The literature on autocracies has argued that repression of protest is either a result of the political environment in which protest occurs, or depends on particular characteristics of the protest events themselves. We argue that the interaction of both matters. Authoritarian regimes vary in how they legitimize their rule, and they should be particularly thin-skinned if protesters challenge the basis of their legitimacy. Using event-level data on…
Does counter‐mobilization contain right‐wing populist movements? Evidence from Germany
Right‐wing populist (RWP) movements have been on the rise in Western democracies. Outside of party politics, such movements regularly organize demonstrations against political elites and minority groups. At the same time, civil society coalitions have mobilized against these movements. Yet we know little about the effect of counter‐demonstrations on RWP protest activities. We derive competing theoretical expectations from previous work. On the on…
From masks to mismanagement
The Covid-19 pandemic changed contentious politics worldwide. After causing a short-lived decline in global protest activities in early 2020, it has led to the emergence of a variety of pandemic-related protests. While previous work has mostly looked at how event frequencies have changed over time, this paper focuses on changes in protest issues. It applies quantitative text analysis to protest event descriptions and makes the following contribut…
Dynamics and determinants of right-wing populist mobilisation in Germany
Western Europe has recently experienced increasing protest mobilisation by right-wing populist movements. Although these movements are receiving increasing scholarly attention, systematic data on protest activities is limited. In this research note, original data is used to describe the protest activity of Germany’s Pegida movement across space and time and to explore the city-level determinants of protest mobilisation. The protest dataset record…
Regime Transformation From Below
Mass mobilization (MM) is an important driver of political change. While some citizens organize in favor of more democratic institutions, others take to the streets to support an authoritarian status quo. This article introduces measures of pro-democratic and pro-autocratic MM using expert assessments for 179 polities from 1900–2021. The data allow us to trace patterns in MM over time, across regions and regime types. We use this new data to syst…
Pathways to democracy after authoritarian breakdown
Mass movements that are able to overthrow a dictator do not always lead to democracy. Transition periods present narrow windows of opportunity in which activists face difficult decisions to build democracy and prevent authoritarian relapse. Existing scholarship offers limited guidance for pro-democracy forces because it focuses on unchangeable structural factors and cases with a known outcome. We propose an innovative approach for finding informa…
The Long Arm and the Iron Fist
The emerging literature dealing with transnational repression has identified several strategies used by authoritarian states to control and coerce their populations abroad. This article builds on existing research by investigating the domestic determinants of transnational repression. It argues that an increase in domestic repression is likely to lead to a subsequent increase in transnational repression because crackdowns at home drive dissent ab…
State Concessions and Protest Mobilization in Authoritarian Regimes
Autocrats typically respond with coercion when citizens take to the streets demanding political reform. Sometimes, however, they tolerate mass protests and even give in to protesters’ demands. While the effect of coercion on mobilization is well-studied, we know less about the role of concession-making. We argue that accommodating demands is rarely an effective strategy in demobilizing opposition movements. Authoritarian rulers are usually neithe…
Episodes of regime transformation
This article provides a new conceptualization of regime transformation that allows scholars to address democratization and autocratization as related but obverse processes. We introduce a dataset that captures 680 episodes of regime transformation (ERT) from 1900 to 2019 and offers novel insights into regime change over the past 120 years. The ERT has three main advantages over other approaches. First, it avoids problematic assumptions of unit ho…
Political science (17 works) · Law (16 works) · Political economy (16 works) · Politics (14 works) · Sociology (14 works) · Law (13 works) · Democracy (11 works) · Political Conflict and Governance (9 works) · Authoritarianism (8 works) · Economics (7 works)