Countering autocratization in a contested liberal international order
Comparing the role of EU conditionality in Georgia (2022–2024) and Slovakia (1994–1998)
Dados Bibliográficos
| ID | 19223291 |
|---|---|
| Autores | Anastasia Mgaloblishvili (Freie Universität Berlin, autor correspondente) |
| Ano | 2026 |
| Páginas | 1-30 |
| Data de publicação | 2026-04-13 |
| Peer Reviewed | Sim |
| Open Access | Sim |
| Tipo | ARTICLE |
| Periódico | Journal of European Public Policy (JOURNAL) |
| Identificadores do periódico | ISSN: 1350-1763 • E-ISSN: 1466-4429 |
| Editora | Routledge (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/13501763.2026.2657994 |
| OpenAlex | W7154001054 |
| Idioma | EN |
| Referências citadas | 35 |
This paper analyzes the conditions under which EU conditionality can counter autocratization through a comparative case study of Slovakia (1994–1998) and Georgia (2022–2024). In both cases, the EU employed negative conditionality against autocratizing candidate states ahead of pivotal elections. Given high public support for EU integration and vibrant civil societies, EU’s ‘sticks’ created favourable conditions for public mobilisation. Drawing on participant observation and secondary sources, the paper shows that pro-democratic groups in both countries united around the EU and framed elections as referendums on European integration. Yet outcomes diverged: mobilisation contributed to government change and democratisation in Slovakia, but to regime survival and autocratization in Georgia. To explain this divergence, the paper highlights the contested liberal international order in which EU enlargement unfolds. In Slovakia, liberal consensus within the EU and weakness of autocratic hegemons facilitated the translation of mobilisation into government change and democratisation. In contrast, external support from Russia and Hungary, combined with entrenched domestic authoritarianism, enabled the Georgian Dream party to withstand domestic and international pressure. The findings refine differential-empowerment theory by identifying a favourable international environment as a scope condition under which EU conditionality is most likely to promote change through the societal channel
Conditionality · European union · Foreign policy · International relations · Work (physics) · European Union Policy and Governance · Global Socioeconomic and Political Dynamics · Post-Soviet Geopolitical Dynamics
Europe Undivided
Autocratization in post-Cold War Political Regimes
Competitive Authoritarianism
Constructing a Framework of Authoritarian Diffusion
Using Europe
A climate of optimism? EU policy-making, political science and the democratization of Central and Eastern Europe (2000–2015)
Europeanization of Slovakia
Assessing external pressures
When democracy erodes at home, the EU loses clout abroad? The EU’s ability to promote democracy externally while backsliding internally
Complying with the European Union's Democratic Conditionality
Wartime EU
Why you don't always get what you want
They don't want us in
One voice, one message, but conflicting goals
Governance by conditionality
The Europeanization of Eastern Europe
Societal Empowerment and Europeanization
Liberal Intergovernmentalism, Illiberalism and the Potential Superpower of the European Union
The Community Trap
The Eastern Enlargement of the European Union
A Relational Approach to Study Europeanisation via Enlargement
Rhetorical action in a liberal international order in crisis
The politics of EU conditionality
Costs, Commitment and Compliance
Europe as a Regional Actor
Challenges to the Liberal Order
Patterns of competitive authoritarianism in the Western Balkans
A third wave of autocratization is here
The Slovak Republic
Two at one blow? The EU and its quest for security and democracy by political conditionality in the Western Balkans
An oasis of democracy in an authoritarian sea? Civil society, social, and institutional trust in Georgia
| Velocidade de citação | historical |
|---|---|
| Altamente citado | Não |