Democratic Vulnerabilities and Pathways for Reform

• Author: Robert C. Lieberman,Jamila Michener,Suzanne Mettler,Kenneth M. Roberts,Thomas B. Pepinsky
• DOI: 10.1177/00027162221077516
• Date: 01 January 2022
• Published date: 01 January 2022
• Subject Matter: Introduction

8 ANNALS, AAPSS, 699, January 2022

DOI: 10.1177/00027162221077516

Democratic

Vulnerabilities

and Pathways

for Reform

By

SUZANNE METTLER,

ROBERT C. LIEBERMAN,

JAMILA MICHENER,

THOMAS B. PEPINSKY,

and

KENNETH M. ROBERTS

1077516ANN THE ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMYDEMOCRATIC VULNERABILITIES AND PATHWAYS FOR REFORM

research-article2022

Keywords: democracy; backsliding; political develop-

ment; institutions; reform

American democracy is in trouble. Even

before the 2016 election, the United States

had slipped in international democracy rankings,

losing its long-held stature as a “full” democracy

and joining the “flawed” democracies (Economist

Intelligence Unit 2020; V-Dem Institute 2021).

Scholars of democracy around the world have

identified several key weaknesses in American

democracy, such as an increasingly dysfunctional

government and fraying social cohesion, that

undermine the regime’s accountability and

responsivness. For decades, political scientists

have observed key threats to democracy that

have been on the rise: political polarization;

conflict—incited by racism and nativism—over

the boundaries of American citizenship and the

civic status of those in different social groups; soar-

ing economic inequality; and executive aggran-

dizement (Mettler and Lieberman 2020). The

confluence of these threats fueled the candidacy

Suzanne Mettler is John L. Senior Professor of American

Institutions at Cornell You don’t have sufficient rights

to edit this element. Please add a comment for the

Production EditorUniversity. She is the co-author of

Four Threats: The Recurring Crises of American

Democracy (with Robert C. Lieberman; Macmillan

2020), and co-editor of Democratic Resilience: Can the

United States Withstand Rising Polarization? (with

Lieberman and Kenneth M. Roberts; Cambridge

University Press 2021).

Robert C. Lieberman is Krieger-Eisenhower Professor

of Political Science at Johns Hopkins University. He is

the co-author of Four Threats: The Recurring Crises of

American Democracy (with Suzanne Mettler), and co-

editor of Democratic Resilience: Can the United States

Withstand Rising Polarization? (with Mettler and

Kenneth M. Roberts).

Correspondence: suzanne.mettler@cornell.edu