Recent debates on democratisation and autocratisation have increasingly focused on the phenomenon of democratic backsliding. While this literature has generated valuable empirical insights, it often remains conceptually anchored in liberal-teleological assumptions that treat democracy as a normative endpoint and political development as a linear process. Within this framework, deviations from liberal democratic standards tend to be interpreted as transitional failures, democratic deficits, or authoritarian reversals. This paper argues that such perspectives are insufficient to explain political trajectories in hybrid regimes where democratic institutions persist, elections are held, and democratic discourse remains dominant, even as democratic self-rule erodes. Building on Veith Selk’s critique of democracy theory (Demokratiedämmerung), the paper approaches democracy not primarily as a moral ideal but as a historically contingent form of rule whose reproduction depends on specific social, economic, and power conditions. Selk’s concept of democratic devolution allows for an analysis of erosion as an endogenous process: democracy does not collapse through abrupt authoritarian rupture, but is gradually transformed from within while its institutional shell and legitimating language remain intact. To operationalize this perspective, the paper integrates Selk’s theoretical intervention with Henry Hale’s concept of patronal politics and Magyar and Madlovits’s systemic analysis of post-communist regimes. Empirically, the paper examines Georgia as a critical case of democratic devolution. Tracing Georgia’s political development from independence through the Rose Revolution to the consolidation of power under Georgian Dream, it shows how electoral competition, constitutionalism, and democratic rhetoric have been maintained, while political alternation, institutional autonomy, and democratic accountability have become structurally constrained by informal patronal networks. Rather than representing a failed or incomplete democratisation, Georgia exemplifies the adaptive reproduction of a patronal political order operating through democratic forms. Conceptually, the paper contributes to democratisation and autocratisation research in three ways. First, it challenges the assumption that institutional continuity necessarily indicates democratic stability. Second, it reframes democratic backsliding as a transformation of democratic rule rather than a deviation from it. Third, it positions Georgia not as an exceptional post-Soviet case, but as an analytically revealing example that exposes the epistemic limits of dominant democracy theories. By doing so, the paper calls for historically grounded, power-sensitive approaches capable of capturing the complex interplay between democratic institutions, informal domination, and political legitimation in contemporary regimes.

The question of how individuals and groups resist authoritarian regimes has regained urgency in the contemporary global context. In public debate, scholarly analysis, and media commentary, the history of Soviet dissent has reemerged as a key reference point for interpreting current forms of political and cultural opposition in Eastern Europe, particularly in relation to Russia’s war against Ukraine and the repression exercised by the regimes of Vladimir Putin and Aliaksandr Lukashenka against their own populations. This paper argues that such uses of the past rely on uncertain and often reductive definitions of “Soviet dissent,” which continue to privilege a Russian-centered narrative shaped during the Cold War. The paper further explores how contemporary digital environments amplify inherited narratives of Soviet dissent, reinforcing a mythology that shapes external perceptions of Russian society while marginalizing alternative genealogies of resistance. By revisiting contemporary historiography and public representations of Soviet dissent, the paper critically examines how this dominant framework continues to obscure the historical diversity of resistance practices in the non-Russian Soviet republics and affects the ways in which these practices are perceived today. Within this framework, Moscow is frequently presented as the primary source of oppositional initiatives, while national, cultural, or religious struggles appear secondary to human rights activism. Ultimately, the paper argues that attending to these uncertain definitions is essential for understanding how the past is mobilized in the present and for developing a more nuanced conceptual framework for studying resistance in Soviet, as well as contemporary authoritarian and post-authoritarian, contexts.

Today, authoritarian tendencies are growing stronger in many countries, which is usually accompanied by restrictions on human rights. In Russia, this process has been ongoing for more than a quarter of a century, since Putin came to power in 2000. The regime's increasing repressiveness has become the strongest challenge for Russian human rights organizations. The Russian experience may be instructive to a certain extent for civil activists in other countries facing the arbitrariness of authoritarian regimes. In my presentation, I will focus on how Russian human rights organizations have responded to this challenge, ensuring the survival of their organizations on the one hand, and continuing to carry out their mission in the field of human rights protection on the other. The pressure exerted by the authorities on human rights defenders took various forms: increased bureaucratic reporting requirements, refusal to cooperate, public discrediting, administrative arbitrariness, and sometimes criminal prosecution. A particularly serious blow was the impact of the ‘foreign agents’ law, which made the discrediting of human rights defenders official and widespread, greatly hampered their activities in formal and legal terms, and significantly limited their opportunities for funding from international charitable organizations. The presentation will provide a number of examples of how human rights organizations have constantly found new opportunities to continue their activities, devised new projects and programs appropriate to the changed conditions, and found ways to defend human rights in an increasingly aggressive environment. The approaches of Russian civil activists to promoting human rights in unfavorable conditions have often been quite creative. Overall, it can be said that Russian human rights defenders have managed for a long time to partially contain the authorities' attack on human rights and achieve many of their goals even in a situation of growing arbitrariness. I will limit my account to the beginning of 2022, when Putin's repression became catastrophic against the backdrop of the aggressive attack on Ukraine. My main sources will be materials from human rights organizations and research interviews I conducted with a number of human rights defenders in 2022-2025.

The interplay between democratisation and autocratisation often manifests as cyclical patterns in political regimes, particularly in post-Soviet states. Theories of regime change highlight that transitions rarely follow linear paths; instead, periods of liberalisation alternate with consolidation of executive power, influenced by institutional weaknesses and socio-economic pressures (Hale, 2015). In Ukraine since independence in 1991, this dynamic is evident through oscillations between pluralistic openings and centralised control under successive presidents. Early post-independence leaders, such as Leonid Kravchuk (1991-1994) and aspects of Viktor Yanukovych's (2010-2013) initial tenure, operated within relatively open frameworks, allowing competitive elections and limited media freedom. However, subsequent administrations under Leonid Kuchma (1994-2005), Viktor Yushchenko (2005-2010), Petro Poroshenko (2014-2019) and Volodymyr Zelenskyy (2019– to present) exhibited tendencies toward autocratisation, including concentration of authority, restrictions on opposition, and economic stagnation linked to oligarchic influence (Lotiuk, 2025). The Ukrainian trajectory historical-materialist factors, including legacies of Soviet nomenklatura networks, combined with external pressures and internal elite competition, facilitated deviations from pluralistic ideals despite aspirations for democratic consolidation (Way, 2015). This pattern aligns with broader observations of regime cycles, where prosperity under stable rule fosters complacency, leading to institutional decay and crises that invite decisive leadership, only to repeat (Hale, 2015). Lessons from Ukraine emphasise the need for robust institutional safeguards. First, strengthening independent judiciaries and electoral bodies can mitigate executive overreach, preventing gradual erosion of checks and balances (Minakov&Rojansky, 2018). Second, fostering decentralisation and civil society engagement enhances resilience against autocratisation by distributing power and amplifying pluralistic voices (International IDEA, 2025). Ukraine’s fate lies should must in Ukrainian hands. No one from outside decides for us. References Hale, H. E. (2015). Patronal Politics. Cambridge University Press. International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance. (2025). Ukraine. https://www.idea.int/country/ukraine Lotiuk, K. (2025). “Ukrainian” political regime: A new concept for postwar prodemocratic hybrid political regime in Ukraine? Public Security and Public Order, 37(2), 214–222. Minakov, M., Rojansky, M. (2018). Democracy in Ukraine: Are We There Yet? Kennan Cable, 30. P. 1-17, 116. Way, L. A. (2015). Pluralism by Default: Weak Autocrats and the Rise of Competitive Politics. Johns Hopkins University Press.

Political disinformation thrives in environments where trust in institutions is weak and geopolitical orientations are contested—conditions that characterize much of Eastern Europe today. This paper presents original evidence from a large-N survey experiment in the Republic of Moldova that examines how individuals update factual beliefs when exposed to competing political narratives, and whether credible-source fact-checking or civic-identity appeals can mitigate uncertainty about both domestic and foreign actors. The analysis shows that warnings issued by either domestic NGOs or the European Union do little on their own to improve belief accuracy and, in some cases, trigger reactance—particularly on culturally or geopolitically sensitive issues. By contrast, short, non-political civic-identity appeals consistently strengthen factual discernment across true and false statements and dampen the polarizing effects of source cues. These findings illuminate how populations in frontier democracies negotiate information uncertainty amid overlapping pressures from Russia and the EU. They also suggest that interventions grounded in shared civic identity—not external authority—may offer more resilient pathways for strengthening public confidence in factual information in states facing hybrid influence, institutional fragility, and contested geopolitical alignments.