Military Responses to Democratic Erosion

The military often faces a choice in eroding democracies: follow the demands of civilian leaders and support their anti-democratic actions or uphold the principles of democracy. This article explores how militaries navigate that tension, presenting a typology of military responses to democratic erosion. We highlight five key ways anti-democratic politicians can implicate the military in their erosion efforts, and we delineate six types of military response: partnering, abetting, enabling, evading, dissenting, and blocking. We illustrate the typology of responses empirically with examples of militaries in states from diverse regions and levels of democratic development. The typology and analysis highlight the military’s importance for democratic erosion research, integrating it with civil-military relations scholarship. Building on insights from the analysis, we specify future research directions, including the causes and consequences of military responses to erosion. We conclude with normative reflections on how military responses affect democracy in the short and long term, raising vital questions regarding the risks of looking to militaries to save democracy.