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ABSTRACT
How do different kinds of democratic backsliding affect opposition pushback? To contribute to the answer, this article compares two divergent cases in the Asia-Pacific – “executive aggrandizement” in the Philippines and a “promissory” military coup in Thailand. An institutional explanation focused on remaining electoral, state institutional, and civil societal forms of democratic accountability despite autocratization does not elucidate significant variations in pushback. In the Philippines, elections have been fairer, state institutions less obviously manipulated and restrictions on civil society less overt. But opposition pushback has been significantly weaker than in Thailand despite more generalized repression and institutional manipulation there. An alternative explanation examines how opposition pushback is influenced by regimes’ efforts to legitimize autocratization. Thailand’s military-monarchical rulers had little success in framing recent elections as democratic while legitimacy linked to the monarchy has also eroded. This has catalysed the formation of a broad civilian opposition alliance, with strong parties, regular protests and critical social media. By contrast, while the Philippines’ Rodrigo Duterte acts illiberally, he claims continued democratic legitimacy based on competitive elections and high opinion ratings while ruling largely constitutionally. This has undermined electoral opposition and weakened civil society, with no sustained protests and activists out-“trolled” on social media.
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Notes
1 Croissant and Haynes, “Democratic Regressions in Asia”; Lührmann and Lindberg, “A Third Wave of Autocratization”; Laebens and Lührmann, “What Stops Democratic Erosion?”
2 Ibid.
3 Bermeo, “On Democratic Backsliding.”
4 Slater and Ziblatt, “Controlled Comparison,” 1302.
5 Ibid., 1304; Lijphart, “The Comparable-cases Strategy.”
6 Slater and Ziblatt, “Controlled Comparison,” 1304.
7 Ibid, 1305. Alternatively, cases can be selected with quite different starting points that have nonetheless yielded similar outcomes.
8 Claudio, “Taming ‘People’s Power’”.
9 Callahan, “Reading the ‘Events of May’ in Thailand.”
10 Hedman, “Spectre of Populism”; Thompson, “Reformism versus Populism”; Pasuk and Baker, “Thaksin’s Populism”; Hewison, “Reluctant Populists.”
11 A question beyond the scope of this aticle is whether Thaksin and Estrada engaged in “executive aggrandizement” during their time in power. The case is certainly stronger for Thaksin than Estrada – see Ferrara “Political Development in Thailand,” chp. 7 for a sympathetic but still quite damning assessment, particularly of Thaksin’s intimidation of critical media and his “drug war” (which, however, was much less deadly that Duterte’s more than a decade later). Estrada’s “sins” against democracy were rather more minor and much exaggerated by his opponents: Thompson, “The Politics Philippine Presidents Make.” But in both the case of Thaksin and Estrada, their (freely and fairly elected) governments were swept away by elite-led, military-backed uprisings/coups.
12 Gatmaytan, “Popular Uprisings and Philippine Democracy.”
13 Teehankee and Thompson, “Electing a Strongman.”
14 Thompson, “The Rise of Illiberal Democracy.”
15 V-Dem data cited in Croissant and Haynes, “Democratic Regressions in Asia” which uses these different classifications for the Philippine and Thai cases of backsliding.
16 Bermeo, “On Democratic Backsliding,” 8–9.
17 Ibid., 10.
18 Laebens and Lührmann. “What Stops Democratic Erosion?”
19 Ibid.
20 Kongkirati, “Why Thailand’s Generals Fail to Co-opt Elections”; Kongkirati, “Political Earthquakes”.
21 As is usual in Philippine politics, in the 2019 midterm elections the opposition complained about being outspent by the heavily patronage-advantaged candidates allied with the president (Duterte even complained himself about this when running for president in 2016). One difference though is that the Duterte administration used the threat of a “drug inclusion” list to intimidate local officials from hosting opposition candidate events. But as Arugay (2019) argues the main reason for the oppositon’s failure was their inability “to mobilize local political networks as most of their allies have already shifted their loyalties to the administration” and “their failed electoral strategy.” They “chose to face-off with Duterte” but “were no match to his populist style of campaigning.”
22 Croissant and Haynes, “Democratic Regressions in Asia”; V-Dem country data for the Philippines and Thailand: https://www.v-dem.net/en/analysis/CountryGraph/.
23 Ginsburg, “Constitutional Afterlife” and Mérieau, “Thailand’s Deep State.”
24 Kongkirati and Kanchoochat, “The Prayuth Regime.”
25 Deinla, Taylor, and Rood, “Justice Removed, Justice Denied.”
26 Quimpo, “Is Duterte now a Dictator?” Quimpo arges that, wary of Duterte’s rapprochement with China given the traditionally strong ties of the Philippine armed forces with the US and recent tensions with the national police empowered under Duterte, the military has blocked the Philippine president from full autocratization through declaring martial law nationally as Ferdinand E. Marcos did in 1972, forcing him to rule within formal democratic constraints. If true, as argued below, this has proved advantageous to the Philippine president in so far as his ostensible adherence to democratic rules has strengthened his legitimacy claims.
27 Freedom House, “Freedom on the Net: Thailand.”
28 Freedom House, “Freedom on the Net 2019,” 18, 26–7.
29 Freedom House, “Countries and Territories.”
30 Hutchcroft, “Midterms Deepen Duterte’s Domination.”
31 Cabato, “Duterte’s Drug War Wildly Popular.”
32 Simons, “Duterte’s Opposition in Disarray.”
33 Barry, “The Limits of Conservative Church Reformism.”
34 Rufo, Altar of Secrets. The revelations of sexual and financial scandals in Rufo’s carefully researched book about the Church, written before Duterte’s rise to power, have been politicized by the Philippine president who has made explicit reference to it in speeches lambasting the Church.
35 Baldwin and Serapio, “Once-powerful Philippines Church Divided.”
36 When thinking about the parallel situation in the Philippines, it is revealing that former president Estrada who, like Thaksin, claimed to speak for the poor, did not challenge autocratization like the latter did. Estrada’s national political party became inactive after his failed 2010 effort to again be elected president and his star dimmed further with the election of Duterte. Hoping (unsuccessfully) to stave off defeat while running for re-election as mayor of Manila in 2019, Estrada backed the violent drug war in an attempt to win the incumbent president’s favour even though it primarily targeted the urban poor, one of Estrada’s chief constituencies.
37 Naruemon and McCargo, “Urbanized Villagers.”
38 Naruemon, “Contending Political Networks,” 109–10.
39 Napisa and Chambers, “Battlefield Transformed.”
40 Kongkirati, “Political Earthquakes.”
41 Webb and Mooney, “Old-school Thai Junta Faces New Adversary”; Sinpeng, “Participatory inequality in the Online and Offline Political engagement in Thailand”; Stanford, “Anti-Government Protests Mount.”
42 Crispin, “Fever Pitch Call for Change in Viral Thailand.”
43 Kongkirati, “Political Earthquakes”; Napisa and Chambers, “Battlefield Transformed”; Ferrara, “Political Development in Thailand,” chps 5–6.
44 Booth and Seligson, “Legitimacy Puzzle in Latin America,” 1.
45 Weber, “Theory of Social and Economic Organization,” p. 382; Beetham, “The Legitimation of Power,” 11.
46 Weber, “Theory of Social and Economic Organization,” 124.
47 Beetham, “The Legitimation of Power,” p. 11 (italics in the original).
48 Ibid., chp. 1.
49 Mounk, “The People vs. Democracy.”
50 Takis Pappas, Populism and Liberal Democracy.
51 Kirsch and Welzel, “Democracy Misunderstood.”
52 Data cited in Shin, “The Third Wave,” 36.
53 Albritton and Thawilwadee, “Public Opinion”; Heydarian, The Rise of Duterte.
54 McCargo, “Democratic Demolition”; also Kongkirati, “Political Earthquakes.”
55 Hewison and Kengkij, “Thai-style Democracy.”
56 Connors, “Article of Faith”
57 Kuhonta, “The Paradox of Thailand’s 1997 Constitution”; Connors, “Article of Faith,” 151 quoting Bowonsak Uwanno, the primary framer of the 1997 constitution.
58 Pavin, “Neo-Royalism,” 1202.
59 Pavin, “Why Thais are Losing Faith in the Monarchy.”
60 Pavin, “Beware the New Thailand King’s Power Play”; Sopranzetti, “The Rise of King Vajiralongkorn”; Economist, “Changing the Guard.”
61 Teehankee and Thompson, “Electing a Strongman”; Heydarian, “The Rise of Duterte.”
62 Curato, “Penal Populism”; Thompson, “Why Duterte Remains So Popular.”
63 SWS, “Pres. Duterte’s Net Satisfaction Rating at ‘Very Good’ +65”; Thompson, “Why Duterte Remains So Popular”; Cabato, “Duterte’s Drug War is Wildly Popular.”
64 Cabato, “Duterte’s Drug War is Wildly Popular”: Johnson and Fernquest, “Governing through Killing.”
65 Sinpeng, “How Duterte Won the Election on Facebook”; Cabañes and Cornelio. “The Rise of Trolls in the Philippines”; Combinido, “When Illiberal Social Media takes over Democratic Philippines”; Sinpeng, Gueorguiev, and Arugay, “Strong Fans, Weak Campaigns.”
66 De Santos, “National Press Club Sees no Repression in Revoked Rappler Registration”; The Duterte administration, however, got more pushback on its shutdown (typically through legalistic manoeuvres) of the country’s most popular TV station, ABS-CBN in May 2020.
67 Parmanand, “Maculinity Contests in the Time of Pandemic”; Gita-Carlos, “80% of Filipinos Satisfied with Gov’t Response”; Asia Times, “Duterte Tightens Grip” (Sept. 24, 2020).
68 Teehankee, “Duterte’s War on Many Fronts.”
69 Bangkok Post, “Opinions Polarised over Prayut”; Jidapa, “Thailand’s COVID-19 Response an Example of Resilience.”
70 One other interesting comparison would be of the limited societal pushback during Vladamir Putin’s first eight years as president in Russia after being elected in 2000 (following a brief acting presidency) - a classic case of executive aggrandizement – compared to the stronger and broader opposition to military rule in Egypt since General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi led a military coup in 2013: White and Mcallister, “The Putin Phenomenon”; Middle East Monitor, “Sisi is Afraid of Egypt’s Growing Opposition”. Interestingly, it was only after Putin announced his intention to run again for president for a third term in 2012 (after trading places with Dmitri Medvedev as prime minister four years earlier to avoid the limit of two consecutive presidential terms) - alongside the egregious manipulation of the 2011 parliamentary elections - that the first major opposition protests against Putin’s regime occurred in 2011–12 as his increasing autocratization had become all too apparent: Petrov, Maria Lipman, and Hale, “Three Dilemmas of Hybrid Regime Governance,” 18.
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Mark R. Thompson
Mark R. Thompson is head and professor of politics, Department of Asian and International Studies, and Director, Southeast Asia Research Centre (SEARC) at the City University of Hong Kong. President of the Hong Kong Political Science Association and past president of the Asian Political and International Studies Association, he was Lee Kong Chian Distinguished Fellow for Southeast Asian Studies at the National University of Singapore and Stanford University. He is completing a Hong Kong Research Grants Council project on illiberal populism in the Philippines. The author or editor of 10 books and over 100 articles and chapters, his research focuses on democratisation, autocratisation, and leadership.