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We have the same problems now that they did more than three thousand years ago…and their globalized network of commerce and diplomacy collapsed. To say that we are too big to fail is simply hubristic. Read more from Eric Cline in Ideas.
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How do you know when the world is ending?
“Our civilization is collapsing,” Penelope says to her son, Telemachus, at one point in Christopher Nolan’s movie The Odyssey. Much later, near the end of the movie, Odysseus himself similarly says to...
![Voting in Authoritarian Elections
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 March 2025
TURKULER ISIKSEL
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THOMAS B. PEPINSKY
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Abstract
Democratic theorists hold that voting contributes to some political good: individual and collective autonomy, equality, justice, pluralism, stability, better policies, and many others. But elections are common under authoritarianism, and empirical research finds that holding elections can stabilize authoritarian regimes. This creates what we term the democrat’s dilemma, where citizens who vote in authoritarian elections may bolster the regimes they wish to unseat, even when they cast a vote for the opposition. We identify three major ways of thinking about the democratic value of electoral participation—justice-based, epistemic, and proceduralist approaches—and use them to examine the complex moral considerations that confront voters in authoritarian regimes. We contend that authoritarian elections’ residual democratic value can justify voting, even when doing so could further entrench the autocrat. Our argument also implies that the democratic principles that justify voting in authoritarian elections oblige citizens to choose the most democratic alternative.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:2c4hmyxdfk4aky3jeoulhog5/bafkreig6uaxlnavb3rnzc65gpm4f7rlwassqjaqgx5spnhay25qlar6h2y)
