Democratization in Asia

Abstract

Asia’s history of democracy is relatively short. Modern democracies, namely, polities in which representatives are elected through universal suffrage, emerged in Europe and the United States starting in the early nineteenth century.

1 Asia and Democracy

Asia’s history of democracy is relatively short. Modern democracies, namely, polities in which representatives are elected through universal suffrage, emerged in Europe and the United States starting in the early nineteenth century.¹ In Asia, some jurisdictions started to have elected governments in the late nineteenth century. However, it has only been since World War II that many Asian countries began to hold relatively free and fair elections with universal suffrage. This chapter focuses on the period after World War II and investigates the experiences of transition from autocracy to democracy in East, Southeast, and South Asian countries.

Samuel Huntington (1993) famously claimed that the history of democratization can be summarized in terms of “waves.”² According to his periodization scheme, the first wave of democratization started in 1828 in the United States when it held the first presidential election with white male suffrage and continued until 1926. Following the breakdown of democracy in Europe during the interwar years, the period from 1943 to 1962 is regarded as the second democratization wave: many newly independent countries in Asia and Africa became democracies while multiple nations in Europe re-democratized. The 1960s and 70s saw a reverse wave characterized by democratic breakdowns, followed by a third wave, which spread to the world having been sparked by Portuguese military officers retreating to their barracks in 1974. This chapter adopts this wave metaphor and periodization scheme to examine the history of democratization in Asia.

Another useful conceptual device is to classify the “mode” of democratization, which refers to the manner of transitioning from autocracy to democracy. In the second wave, as Huntington (1993, p. 112) notes, foreign imposition and decolonization were the two major modes of democratization. For the third wave, while scholars have proposed a handful of classifications,³ we adopt Huntington’s (1993, p. 114) three types: transformation, when regime elites took the initiative in democratization; replacement, when opposition groups took the lead in overthrowing authoritarian regimes and bringing about democracy; and transplacement, when the democratic transition took place through joint actions by both government (regime elites) and opposition groups. Table 12.1 classifies Asian cases of democratic transitions according to the modes proposed by Huntington.

Table 12.1 List of democratized countries and territories in the second and third waves

The following sections overview the situation in three of Asia’s sub-regions: Sect. 12.2 focuses on East Asia, Sect. 12.3 on Southeast Asia, and Sect. 12.4 on South Asia. For each sub-region, we provide graphical illustrations of regime trajectories using the V-Dem database’s Electoral Democracy Index (EDI).⁴ The EDI measures to what extent a polity approaches the principle of electoral democracy, that is, the government is elected through free and fair elections. Specifically, the extent to which a polity approximates this principle is evaluated using the following five components: universal suffrage, clean elections, freedom of assembly, freedom of media and alternative information sources, and elections determining the chief executive of the polity. The closer the score is to 1.00, the more democratic the polity is. In Sect. 12.5, we discuss the prospects for Asia’s democratization by applying existing major theories of democratization.

Before we proceed, some caveats are in order. First, since this chapter is concerned with democracy as a real-world political regime, it does not discuss ideals of democracy, such as the Asian democracy debate.⁵ Second, regarding conceptions of democracy as a political regime, we employ a minimalist view, under which the requirements for classification as a democracy mainly entail the electoral process.⁶ Put differently, as indicated by our choice of the EDI as the measure of democracy, we classify a country as a democracy when multiparty elections determine the chief executive and legislators; other conditions such as the rule of law and civil liberties are not included as necessary conditions.⁷ The democracy-autocracy threshold of the EDI also reflects this minimalist view of democracy (Kasuya and Mori 2022). Third, the list of democratization episodes discussed in this chapter is not exhaustive; there are other incidences regarded as democratization that are not included here. Readers are encouraged to consult with country-specific references for further examples.⁸ Fourth, due to space constraints, this chapter cannot provide extensive references for each case of democratization covered. Readers who wish to learn the specifics regarding a particular democratization process are encouraged to refer to Triesman’s (2020) online Appendix.

2 Democratization in East Asia

Japan’s democratization followed its defeat in World War II. Although a parliamentary system had been installed under the Meiji Constitution (1889), the emperor was endowed with the authority to override laws passed by the legislature. The Meiji Constitution provided suffrage to propertied men, a right later extended to all adult males in 1945 shortly before the end of the war. The Allied forces to which Japan surrendered introduced many democratizing reforms including universal suffrage, freedom of association and speech. The country regained sovereignty in 1952 and has been a democracy since then.

South Korea, Taiwan, and Mongolia belong to the third wave democratizers. South Korea became independent following decolonization from Japan and three years of the United States Army Military Government in Korea (USAMGIK). The first elected president of the Republic of Korea, Syngman Rhee, ruled the country as an authoritarian dictator, despite provisions in the 1948 Constitution for democratic institutions and procedures. Rhee’s personalistic rule ended after civic unrest in 1960 and was followed by several short-lived cabinets under a parliamentary system. A 1961 coup d’état led by Park Chung-hee was the beginning of a military regime that lasted until democratization in 1987. One hallmark of this democratization was the direct election of the president, newly stipulated in the 1987 Constitution.

South Korea’s democratic transition took the form of a “transplacement,” in which both the ruling military elites and the opposition forces—politicians, student activists, labor unions, and civic groups—were instrumental in the process. Park’s de facto successor, Chun Doo-hwan, maintained authoritarian rule under the new constitution of the Fifth Republic, ratified in 1980. Chun was elected president by the electoral college in 1981. In early June 1987, he handpicked General Roh Tae-woo, his longtime colleague, as his party’s presidential candidate, which put him in line to be his successor. This announcement ignited massive demonstrations across the country and people demanded direct election of the president. The US government pressured Chun not to use force to quell the demonstrations. On June 29, Roh made the “Declaration of Democratization,” announcing the direct election of the next president, amnesties for political prisoners, and the guarantee of free and fair elections.

Taiwan’s democratization can be characterized as democratization from above, which is “transformation” in Huntington’s terminology because of its elite-led nature. In the wake of the Japanese occupation, Taiwan was ruled by the Kuomintang (KMT) government that fled mainland China, where the KMT was fighting against the Communist Party. KMT leader Chiang Kai-shek placed Taiwan under harsh dictatorship. His son, Chiang Ching-kuo, succeeded to the presidency after Chiang Kai Shek’s death in 1978. Political liberalization proceeded under Chiang Ching-Kuo, who permitted opposition parties and lifted martial law in 1987. Lee Tung-hui, who became the president of the KMT after Chiang Ching-Kuo’s death in 1988, further liberalized Taiwanese politics, allowing the direct election of the National Assembly and Legislative Yuan. Taiwan’s democratic transition culminated in 1996, when direct election of the president took place, with Lee taking office as its first elected president.

Mongolia’s democratization occurred alongside the collapse of the Soviet Union and is classified here as a “transplacement.” After being ruled by a series of Chinese dynasties for centuries, Mongolia became independent in 1921 with the assistance of the Soviet army. Under heavy influence from the Soviet Union, the country had adopted one-party rule by the Mongolian Peoples’ Republic Party (MPRP), a Marxist-Leninist party, since its independence. When the Soviet Union embarked on political and economic liberalization under Gorbachev in 1985, the leaders of the MPRP began debating Mongolia’s own version of liberalization. In December 1989, the Mongolian Democratic Union (MDU), an opposition party, was allowed to be formed. The MDU organized a series of mass protests calling for reforms, and the resulting pressure led to the resignation of the entire Politburo in March 1990. The newly installed replacement members of the Politburo guided the country to hold a multiparty legislative election in July 1990.

The remaining East Asian countries and territories, namely, China, Hong Kong, and North Korea, have shown few signs of democratization as of the time of this writing. Since the birth of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, the Communist Party has ruled China without tolerating political pluralism. Even before the handover from the UK to China in 1997, China had pledged that Hong Kong would have a democratic political system under the “one country, two systems” principle. However, the territory’s autonomy has been increasingly encroached upon by the Beijing government, as indicated by the decline in its EDI score in Fig. 12.1. Since its independence in 1948, North Korea has been ruled by Kim Il-sung, the Korean Communist Party leader at the time of Japan’s defeat in 1945, and his heirs.

Fig. 12.1

Source Compiled by the author based on V-Dem’s Electoral Democracy Index (Varieties of Democracy 2021). Note The red dotted line indicates the threshold dividing democracies and autocracies, set at 0.39, following Kasuya and Mori (2022)

Democracy scores for East Asian Countries and Territories.

3 Democratization in Southeast Asia

Some countries in Southeast Asia were part of the second wave of democratization. Indonesia, Myanmar (then Burma),⁹ and the Philippines became democracies at the time of independence. The Philippines became independent in 1946 from the US, and Burma in 1947 from Britain. The Republic of Indonesia was born in 1949, upon the transfer of sovereignty from the Netherlands.

However, democratic politics in these three countries did not last long. In Indonesia, Sukarno, the first president of the Republic, staged a “palace coup” in 1957 and declared the country under martial law. He replaced the elected cabinet with appointed members to install a “guided democracy.” Sukarno’s rule ended through a military coup in 1965, and Suharto, one of the coup plotters, assumed the presidency in 1967. His authoritarian rule continued until he resigned in 1998. Burma’s fragile democracy came to an end when General Ne Win took power through a coup d’état in 1962 and became prime minister.¹⁰ In the Philippines, President Ferdinand Marcos, who was twice elected in 1965 and 1969, declared martial law in 1972 and suspended democratic institutions and processes.

Southeast Asia’s third wave of democratization began in the Philippines in 1986. Its mode of transition was “replacement” in Huntingtonian terms, as it was led by the anti-Marcos movement, later joined by the mutiny faction of the military. Marcos declared martial law during his second term as president, in September 1972, creating a government of what he called “constitutional authoritarianism.” His regime was characterized by gross corruption and human rights abuses, including incarceration, torture, and “disappearances.” Triggered by the assassination of Marcos’s political rival Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino, Jr. in 1983, street demonstrations calling for Marcos’ resignation mounted. Pressured by the US government, Marcos agreed to hold a presidential election in February 1986. Benigno Aquino’s widow, Corazon, became the opposition forces’ united candidate challenging him. Marcos was officially proclaimed the winner, but the fraud committed by the Marcos camp ignited massive protest rallies that caused this transition to be called the “People Power Revolution.” Eventually the Marcoses fled the country and a new government led by Corazon Aquino was installed.

Indonesia’s return to democracy in 1998 took a “transplacement” mode, as the ruling elites and opposition forces jointly led the process. The Indonesian economy grew rapidly during the early part of Suharto’s rule, but by the 1990s, criticism mounted against his regime for being corrupt, collusive, and nepotistic. Against this backdrop, the Asian financial crises of 1997 and 1998 triggered a series of massive anti-Suharto demonstrations. Amidst this turmoil, Suharto announced his resignation, with Vice President B. J. Habibie assuming the presidency in May 1998. Habibie initiated a number of liberalizing reforms, including the restoration of press freedom, free and fair electoral competition, and decentralization of government structures. In contrast to the Philippines’ 1986 democratization, Indonesia’s transition came through a series of incremental steps.

Timor-Leste (also known as East Timor) achieved democratization in 2002, after a period of transition from occupation by Indonesia. The island of Timor was colonized by the Portuguese in the sixteenth century, and the Dutch came to control the western part of the island a century later. The two colonizers concluded a treaty in 1859 to determine the border between Portuguese Timor (present-day Timor-Leste) and Dutch Timor (West Timor, which became part of Indonesia upon Indonesia’s independence). As civil war erupted among Timorese factions in the early 1970s, the Portuguese, preoccupied by their own upheaval at home, essentially pulled out of the territory. In 1975, one Timorese faction declared independence for the territory, a pronouncement recognized by only six nations. A mere nine days after this declaration, taking advantage of the chaos, Suharto brutally invaded the territory, annexing it the following year as Indonesia’s 27th province.¹¹ Human rights abuses including mass killings and enforced starvation followed, with many calling the occupation a genocide. Timorese resistance continued until Suharto’s fall in 1998. Habibie, Suharto’s successor, called a referendum in 1999, and the East Timorese overwhelmingly voted in favor of independence over special autonomy within the Republic of Indonesia. A United Nations interim administration assumed authority over Timor-Leste in 1999 as the territory undertook its transition to a democratic nation by ratifying a democratic constitution and holding elections. Timor-Leste became a fully independent nation in May 2002.

Thailand’s regime transitions are difficult to classify within the comparative framework used in this chapter. As shown in Fig. 12.2, the country’s democracy score fluctuates, with short intervals of relatively democratic periods interrupted periodically by autocratic dips. This reflects the so-called “vicious cycle of Thai politics,” which refers to the cycle of having a democratically elected government ousted by a military coup, followed by the withdrawal of the military from politics after a period of junta rule. This cycle appeared to have ended in 1992, when King Rama X brokered a pact between the military leaders and street demonstrators demanding democracy, resulting in democratically elected prime ministers holding office continuously from 1992 until 2006. However, in September 2006, military leaders staged a bloodless coup while Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, a populist leader perceived as a threat to the established elites, was abroad. The vicious cycle of Thai politics resumed, with another coup staged in 2014. Although rule by the military junta officially ended with the holding of the 2019 election, the political influence of the Thai military remains strong in the new government led by Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha, who headed the military junta from 2014 to 2019.

Fig. 12.2

Source Compiled by the author based on V-Dem’s Electoral Democracy Index (Varieties of Democracy 2021). Note The red dotted line indicates the threshold dividing democracies and autocracies, set at 0.39, following Kasuya and Mori (2022)

Democracy scores for Southeast Asian countries.

In 2018, Malaysia experienced its first-ever change in government through elections. The United Malays National Organization (UMNO), together with its minor coalition partners, ruled the country from its independence in 1957 until the UMNO-led coalition lost its majority status in 2018 to the Pakatan Harapan (PH) coalition led by former Prime Minister Mahathir. However, in 2020, the PH coalition lost its parliamentary majority upon the defection of some members, ushering in the return of the UMNO to the new ruling coalition Perikatan Nasional (PN), led by Prime Minister Muhyddin. As of the writing of this chapter, Malaysian politics can be best described as a regime in transition.

Myanmar (Burma) returned to democracy in 2015 but this was shuttered by the military coup staged in 2021. After General Ne Win took power in the 1960s, unelected governments ruled the country. Beginning in the 2000s, the military junta undertook gradual political liberalization, and the 2010 election marked the return of elected government although the ruling party (Union Solidarity and Development Party) was filled with former military officers. In the 2015 election, the National League for Democracy (NLD) won and replaced the military-backed government. The NLD was led by Aung San Suu Kyi, the daughter of the national foundational hero Aung San and the focal leader of the anti-military democratization movement since the 1980s. The 2020 general election gave another landslide victory to the NLD. However, on the day the new parliament was to convene, February 1, 2021, the military staged a coup d’état and annulled the results of the 2020 election.

Brunei,¹² Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, and Singapore remain authoritarian since independence, although to varying degrees. Brunei gained independence in 1984 as an Islamic sultanate. The country has been ruled by a sultan up to the present. Vietnam and Laos are one-party regimes ruled by the communist party. Cambodia experienced several decades of civil war from the 1960s until the early 1990s. In the wake of the 1991 Paris Peace Agreements, multiparty elections started in 1993. However, especially since the 1998 elections, Prime Minister Hun Sen and his Cambodian People’s Party (CPP) have ruled the country by harassing opposition parties, civic groups, and independent media. By the time of the 2018 election, viable opposition parties had vanished, resulting in all seats going to the CPP. Singapore’s democracy score temporarily surpassed the threshold level of electoral democracy until just recently (cf. Fig. 12.2). As this democracy score (EDI) focuses heavily on the holding of multiparty elections, this score faithfully reflects the fact that Singapore regularly conducts multiparty elections with universal suffrage. However, the reader is reminded that the EDI does not incorporate such factors as opposition forces being severely disadvantaged under the rule of the People’s Action Party (PAP), or civil liberties being harshly curtailed. It is worth noting that most area specialists, mindful of these factors, continue to regard Singapore as an autocracy.¹³

4 Democratization in South Asia

In South Asia, India and Sri Lanka emerged as democracies in the wake of decolonization. During the rule of the British in India, the institutions of self-rule were gradually introduced.¹⁴ For example, the Indian Civil Service started accepting local applicants in 1858. The Congress Party was established in 1885, and the 1909 Indian Councils Act introduced elections for Imperial Councils. Further, the 1935 Indian Government Act provided for elected legislatures at both the central and state levels. Upon independence in 1947, India inherited these democratic institutions. Nevertheless, India did experience crises of democracy: Fig. 12.3 shows that India’s democracy score dropped dramatically between 1975 and 1977. This reflects the period of the state of emergency proclaimed by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. During the 19 months of the state of emergency, basic political and civil rights were curtailed, with anti-Gandhi politicians and activists arrested. This dictatorial rule came to an end when the Congress Party lost the 1977 general election.

Fig. 12.3

Source Compiled by the author based on V-Dem’s Electoral Democracy Index (Varieties of Democracy 2021). Note The red dotted line indicates the threshold dividing democracies and autocracies, set at 0.39, following Kasuya and Mori (2022)

Democracy Score for South Asian Countries.

Sri Lanka (Ceylon until 1972) gained independence as a democracy in 1948. Similar to what had transpired in India, British colonial rule had gradually introduced institutions of self-rule, most of which remained in place after independence. The Legislative Council, an advisory body to the Executive Council made up of British colonial officers, started to include elected local elites in 1901, with the proportion of local members increasing over time. In 1931, 50 out of the 61 members of the State Council (the successor to the Legislative Council) were elected by locals, with voting rights enjoyed by all men 21 years of age or older, and all women 31 or older. Sri Lanka’s female suffrage was realized only three years after Great Britain introduced it. Although Sri Lanka experienced intermittent civil wars from 1983 to 2009 between the Sinhala-dominated government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, multiparty elections were held regularly.

Pakistan also gained independence in 1947 when the British left British India, but it did not start as a democracy as in India or Sri Lanka. The initial regime type after independence is best described as an oligarchy because the country was run by a handful of political elites without universal suffrage. In December 1970, the first general election to elect the members of the National Assembly was held, and the Awami League, a party based in East Pakistan, won the majority of seats. However, political turmoil surrounding the formation of the cabinet and other matters developed into a civil war, which resulted in the independence of East Pakistan as Bangladesh in 1971. Pakistan’s second general election was held in 1977, resulting in the government led by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto of the Pakistan People’s Party. Shortly after this election, General Zia-ul-Haq staged a coup d’état and placed the country under martial law.

South Asia’s third wave democratizers begin to emerge in the 1980s, ultimately including Bangladesh, Bhutan, the Maldives, Nepal, and Pakistan. Bangladesh’s mode of democratization can be characterized as “replacement,” similar to the Philippines. Its first regime after gaining independence from Pakistan in 1971 was a personalist dictatorship under elected politician Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and two military officers-turned-president, Ziaur Rahman and Hussain Muhammad Ershad. Although Bangladesh held general elections under these dictatorships, they were often marred by fraud, violence, and opposition party boycotts. By the 1980s, demands for democratic reforms gained momentum. In particular, a coalition of university student associations (All Party Students’ Unity or APSU) played an instrumental role in brokering the alliances of all major opposition parties and in organizing strikes against President Ershad. Ershad was compelled to resign in December 1990 in the face of a massive opposition campaign calling for his resignation and for free and fair elections. The election held in January 1991 was relatively free and fair, with multiple parties competing.

Bhutan’s democratization was a case of “transformation,” or reform from above. The absolute monarchy of the Wangchuk dynasty ruled the country since the early twentieth century. Its fourth king, Jigme Singye Wangchuk, initiated the transition from absolute monarchy to constitutional monarchy by transferring most of his political and administrative powers to the popularly elected parliament and the Council of Cabinet Ministers that are elected by the members of parliament. A new constitution was adopted in 2008, and the first multiparty election was held in 2007 and 2008. In contrast to other cases of third wave democratizers in Asia, there were few street demonstrations calling for the resignation of the incumbent leader as in the Philippines, or internal elite splits as in Indonesia. The initiative of King Jigme Singye Wangchuk was instrumental in this smooth democratic transition.

The Maldives’ democratic transition happened in 2008, in the form of “transplacement.” Like Bhutan and Nepal, the Maldives became a British protectorate in the late nineteenth century while recognizing the rule by its sultan for domestic affairs. Having achieved independence in 1965, in 1968, it became a republic with an elected president. However, its first two presidents, Ibrahim Nasir and Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, did not tolerate multiparty elections. In particular, President Gayoom publicly promised democratic reforms when he took office in 1978, but substantive changes were not seen during the first two decades of his rule. Starting in the mid-2000s, amid mounting civic discontent, reforms gradually started. Registering political parties became legal in 2005, a roadmap to reform was announced in 2006, and a new constitution was ratified in 2008. Under the new democratic constitution, a new president, Mohamed Nasheed, was elected through a relatively free and fair election. However, Nasheed was forced to step down in 2012 because of his alleged mishandling of the economy and his vice president Mohamed Waheed Hassan Manik assumed presidency until the next election. In the 2013 presidential election, Abdulla Yameen Abdul Gayoom, Gayoom’s half-brother, was elected president. Yameen oppressed his political opponents, and political crisis continued until 2018 when Ibrahim Mohamed Solih was elected as a new president.

Nepal’s 1990 democratization took the form of “replacement.” In 1951, the Rana dynasty, which started as the rule of prime ministers serving the Shah monarchs, was replaced by a constitutional monarchy upholding the Shahs as royals. The monarchs were expected to introduce democratic reforms, but such reforms never took place. Instead, the king introduced a partyless council system, which in essence was an absolute monarchy. Civic discontent grew despite dissidents being brutally repressed by the military and police apparatus. By 1989, opposition forces formed the Jana Andolan (People’s Movement) and staged a non-violent gathering of over 200,000 people in early 1990. Even though this gathering was brutally crushed by the government, protests continued for several months. In April, the king announced he would concede shifting to a multiparty democracy. Nepal’s democratic period did not last long, however, because of the civil war waged by Maoist groups beginning in 1996. After a peace agreement in 2006, the parliament, dominated by Maoist legislators, abolished the monarchy completely in 2008.

As for Pakistan, its 1988 democratization happened upon the sudden death of a dictator, so its mode of democratization can be categorized as “transformation.” General Zia-ul-Haq, who imposed martial law rule in 1977, died of a plane crash in 1988. His death was followed by a general election in which multiple parties were allowed to compete. From 1988 to 1999, civilians formed governments, but frequent changes in administrations resulted in political instability. Against this backdrop, the 1999 military coup led by General Musharraf was largely welcomed by the public, and it was legally legitimized by the Supreme Court. Although the military’s influence remains strong, electoral politics returned in 2002.

5 Prospects for Regime Transitions in Asia

This chapter provided a historical overview of democratization in Asia in the post-World War II era. Will more Asian countries become democracies? Will democratized cases remain democratic? Various theories of regime transition may help place these questions in perspective. In this final section, we apply some of these theories to countries in Asia.

One of the classic theories of democratization known as the Lipset thesis claims that countries with high levels of socio-economic development have a higher likelihood to democratize and remain democratic (Lipset 1959; Przeworski et al. 2000). Applied to Asia, this theory might fit well to explain why low-income countries such as Cambodia and North Korea remain autocracies.

However, the Lipset thesis fails to explain the case of Singapore’s prolonged authoritarian rule under the PAP. To make sense of Singapore’s case, comparative studies of authoritarian survival might be the place to look for answers. Many studies on this topic found that autocracies ruled by parties, in contrast to personal dictators or military junta, survive longer because the ruling party tends to have stable succession rules and the mechanisms to calibrate governance (e.g., Geddes et al. 2018). This institutional theory might explain how Singapore’s party-led autocracy continues on. Further, this perspective might also apply to China, Laos, and Vietnam, where communist parties have ruled these countries for decades.

Besides domestic politics, scholars emphasize that international factors also influence regime transition and non-transition. Levitsky and Way (2010) argue that the combination of two international factors is important. These two factors are leverage—the extent to which countries have ties with major democracies—and vulnerability—the extent to which countries cannot resist democratization. For example, Taiwan’s democratization was partly due to a high degree of economic, political, and social linkage with the US; Cambodia’s introduction of multiparty elections in the early 1990s was attributable to the country’s high vulnerability to democratization pressure, because the country was greatly dependent on foreign aid from the EU and the US around that time. Adapting this theoretical perspective to the recent context, the presence of China, an authoritarian country, as a major power in the region might make democratization more unlikely for those countries that have stronger linkage to China and greater vulnerability to authoritarianism.

To address the question about democratic survival, the literature on democratic consolidation, and more recently, on democratic backsliding, can be illuminating. Scholars found that conditions for democratic consolidation include a long history of democratic rule (Gerring et al. 2005), a developed economy (Svolik 2008), a well-developed state bureaucracy (Linz and Stepan 1996), the absence of military rule in the past (Svolik 2008), and a relatively homogenous society (Lijphart 1977). In light of these theories, the prospects for Asian countries’ survival as democracies are rather worrisome because many countries lack these conditions. Indeed, recent examples of democratic backsliding—the executive aggrandizement in India by Prime Minister Modi, and in the Philippines by President Duterte, the military coups in Thailand and Myanmar—have taken place in contexts that lack many of the above-mentioned consolidation conditions.