It has been said that Brexit was a solution in search of a problem. The campaign encouraged the idea that voting for Brexit could satisfactorily shift the practice and discourse of national political priorities; the downside proved to be the confusion over exactly what specific issues it was meant to address. An indeterminate number of loosely focused grievances could not easily be translated into a programme. The protracted parliamentary stand-off in the following years encouraged suspicion about any attempts to adjust or fine-tune precise legal provisions – suspicion of elite interests, of reversion to rule by anonymous experts and of legal process itself. A distinctly close vote in the actual referendum was rapidly mythologised as an overwhelming popular mandate, even though it was unclear what exactly it was a mandate for. The lasting legacy has been to reinforce a ‘theatrical’ approach to politics, in which actual problem-solving and long-term strategising yield to performative or gestural decisions. Both globally and nationally, this is an increasingly disturbing and destabilising trend; those on both sides of the Brexit debate need to acknowledge this as a real issue about the health of a critical and engaged democracy.

The political failure of community is the background against which a range of post-Marxist European philosophers have sought to rethink what community could be. This chapter focuses in particular on Jean-Luc Nancy, Roberto Esposito, and Giorgio Agamben, who have made substantial contributions to what we might call a new philosophy of community. Nancy, Esposito, and Agamben ask how community, not least because of its promise of solidarity, can continue to serve a political purpose, despite the violence of the Nazi Volksgemeinschaft, which appears to be the logical endpoint of any conception of community. But Nancy, Esposito, and Agamben also respond to the failure of community’s presumed revolutionary potential to become a site of resistance against both capitalism and the modern state. Should community be conceived in the plural (Nancy), as a gift economy (Esposito), or as a coming community of stateless refugees (Agamben)? Such attempts to save community come at a considerable cost, both philosophically and politically, since they make community irrelevant for a normative theory of democracy.

Chapter 1 introduces the book’s central puzzle: why some electoral management bodies earn public trust and develop real autonomy while others remain vulnerable to manipulation. It argues that formal institutional design alone cannot explain cross-national variation. Instead, de facto autonomy emerges through political negotiation, transparency, accountability practices, and structured partisan engagement. Drawing on fieldwork, elite interviews, and archival research across Latin America and Africa, the chapter outlines a new theoretical framework centered on partisan inclusion within administrative processes that can foster legitimacy, reduce uncertainty, and strengthen electoral integrity. The chapter also introduces the book’s cross-regional comparative strategy, explains case selection, and previews how the empirical chapters illustrate the mechanisms through which party consultation, institutional sequencing, and administrative practices jointly shape election quality. The chapter positions the book within broader debates on democratic resilience, institutional trust, and the conditions under which electoral authorities acquire real independence.

Appeals to “community” and to “the common” have become increasingly frequent in political thought. In this chapter, I focus on some of the reasons for the appearance of such appeals in the landscape of contemporary political thought. This chapter also highlights some of the uncanny intellectual links across the entire political spectrum, from European post-Marxist and American communitarian philosophers to the public intellectuals of the neofascist “New Right.” These links emerge and play out in a broader intellectual field that is shaped both by the political economy of Western Europe and North America after 1945 and by the failure to address the obvious shortcomings and negative effects of this political economy. Against this broader background, current appeals to community in political thought can be seen as a response to the lived experience of neoliberal capitalism, which has led to a legitimation crisis of liberal constitutional democracy. But I am also going to suggest that appeals to community invariably tend to drift into an antidemocratic direction.

Chapter 1 introduces the phenomenon of “democratic drain” – the steady depletion of democratic political capital in migrant-sending countries worldwide, derived from the departure of citizens who hold more liberal democratic values than the countrymen they leave behind. It contextualizes democratic drain in the more established understanding of “brain drain,” outlines its analogous consequences, and identifies the dissidents and “demigrants” that drive it. Just as brain drain can leave countries poorer and less productive, democratic drain can weaken the prospects for liberal democracy and reduce barriers to democratic backsliding by authoritarian governments. After a brief discussion of the thorny implications of “democratic drain” for international development and democracy promotion, this chapter previews the book’s findings and content.

Chapter 2 profiles prospective migrants around the world. Based on global polling, this chapter answers three related questions: What are the demographic and psychological attributes of prospective migrants? Do prospective migrants hold more liberal democratic values than their countrymen? And do prospective migrants prefer democratic destinations? Demographically, prospective migrants are likely to be younger, educated, socially connected, and open-minded adults. And crucially, they hold less authoritarian and more democratic political values than their countrymen.

This means that if they depart, the society they leave behind will not only become older, less educated, and more insular; it means that it will also become less democratic and more authoritarian in its orientation. Based on a conjoint survey design in five countries in the Middle East and North Africa, this chapter later finds that demigrants’ initial destination preferences draw them to democracies that reflect the political and civic values they hold, even if this means sacrificing their material well-being to some extent. Not only are many authoritarian countries being depleted of people with democratic values, these individuals are inclined to self-sort into a dichotomized world of free, democratic destinations and increasingly authoritarian holdouts.

Chapter 4 engages the average people behind these trends. In particular, it tells the stories of Hungarians compelled to leave after the reelection of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán to a fourth consecutive term with a parliamentary supermajority, Serbs crestfallen after the reelection of President Aleksandar Vučić to a second term, and Russians fleeing the Kremlin’s invasion of Ukraine and subsequent domestic crackdown on dissent. Some mundane, some extraordinary, their first-person narratives display the household considerations behind a mass population phenomenon. The chapter then leverages a unique study of European public opinion to reveal the way that Eastern Europeans who move West under the European Union’s free mobility rules likely hold more liberal democratic proclivities than those in their countries of origin who wish to migrate, and how those prospective migrants hold more liberal democratic proclivities than those of their countrymen who don’t wish to move at all – a sliding scale of liberal democratic views among people with the same origins.

Chapter 3 takes a closer look at the mechanics of Democratic Drain. More specifically, it asks when demigrants are likely to depart. Focusing on 127 countries worldwide, it finds that people’s interest in emigrating spikes in the immediate aftermath of national elections when an authoritarian-leaning party or ruler is elected to public office. Importantly, this effect is limited only to people who hold expectations of democratic norms and institutional integrity. Those who question the honesty of the election, suspect corruption among public officials, or feel that freedom of speech is constrained are significantly more likely to say they would like to leave when faced with the future deconsolidation of their country’s democratic institutions. This shows the way that elections are precipitating events for individuals disappointed by the results and concerned about the future of their civil life. Previously unnoticed over the ebb and flow of electoral cycles, Democratic Drain removes the people who are most likely to voice their dissatisfaction and most likely to demand institutional integrity in less democratic spaces.

Chapter 5 considers the possibility that, while people with liberal and democratic proclivities may leave their countries of origin, they may influence the democratization of their homelands from abroad – a possible “democratic gain.” Could emigrants’ advocacy from abroad offset the effects of their departure on prospects for democracy? After the oppressive Assad dictatorship was challenged by opposition groups in 2011, many activists in Syria’s massive diaspora mobilized to support and influence people living in rebel-held territory. However, in a social network analysis of Syrians in regions governed by the Free Syrian Army in 2015, there is almost no evidence of their impact. Despite their presumed prominence in the West, a majority of Syrians could not even name a single pro-democratic leader from abroad – let alone identify their influence. And perhaps most damningly, the departure of former Syrian citizens for other countries was viewed by most respondents as an abandonment of their cause – an offense worse than being previously complicit with the oppressive Assad regime. Taken together with other research showing the limits of democratic diaspora activism, the chapter concludes that the potential for “democratic gain” is severely constrained.

Chapter 6 concludes the book by turning the lens to exiled dissidents to contextualize the impact of emigrants’ departures. Unlike emigrants, who may hold opposing views but depart voluntarily without government involvement, dissidents are often pressured or coerced to leave their countries of origin because of their opposition to the government and its policies. As organizers of democratic movements, they offer a unique perspective about the cumulative effect of people’s emigration over time. Based on two dozen interviews with activists from across the Middle East several years after the Arab uprisings, the chapter tells their stories and demonstrates what their loss has meant to the pro-democratic movements they left behind. Through their narratives, the extent to which their political agendas rely on rank-and-file supporters who are also positioned to emigrate can be discerned. The chapter concludes by considering the political and policy implications of Democratic Drain.

Although oil is not the only potential source of rent from the rest of the world for contemporary states, it is by far the most important. The increase in oil prices post 1970 facilitated the emergence of rentier states, especially, but not exclusively, in the Gulf region, hugely increasing the volume of the rent at their disposal. This allowed consolidation of political regimes which otherwise would probably not have survived, and gave power holders an unprecedented degree of autonomy from their societies. The chapter then explains how the rentier state needs to engage in large-scale public expenditure to circulate the rent domestically, nurture a private sector and promote economic development along a peculiar model of its own. In order to counter the phenomenon known in economics as the ‘Dutch Disease’, the Gulf states have opened their doors to massive temporary immigration of foreign workers, creating a very peculiar labour market structure which has ended up damaging the opportunities for productive employment available to nationals, especially the young. This model must now be overcome, but while some states are in a position to remain rentiers, thanks to large accumulation of financial resources, others face an eroding oil rent and the need to increase domestic taxation to pay for their ever-increasing expenditure. Increasing reliance on taxation of nationals is inevitably coupled with increasing demand for accountability, which will eventually need to be accommodated through political reform.

A popular belief in democracy as the core value of the Constitution has contributed to several innovations that circumvent the Framers’ constraints on democracy. Primary elections for selecting candidates including for the president have empowered the political parties and their core constituencies. The Supreme Court’s one-person-one-vote mandate for all state legislative elections has disempowered local communities, gerrymandering has become the norm for the creation of representative districts, and the 17th Amendment has diminished the influence of states as distinct political entities. Direct democracy in the form of referenda and initiative has compromised the filtering benefits of representation.

This chapter investigates Pindar’s construction of the relationships by which communities are constituted: relationships between families, individuals, and the polis; between the inhabitants of the polis and their past; and between different polis communities.  It surveys civic values, as well as the passages where Pindar discusses specific constitutional forms.  Because Pindar’s lyric expresses political issues through the lens of poetic concerns, assimilating civic and military conflict to vicissitude, it maps some of the strategies by which Pindar subsumes the political into the poetic.  A final focus is the nature of Pindar’s Panhellenism and the connection of Panhellenism to elite mobility.  Pindar’s Panhellenism projects competitively local claims for eminence into a broad Greek arena and characterises the mythico-historical past of Greek cities as one of migration and elite movement. The interaction of local identity with the Panhellenic arena is thus driven by the mobility of heroic and then athletic elites.

The concluding chapter summarizes the book’s arguments and findings and discusses their implications. Whether we seek to understand the electoral viability of illiberal forces or their behavior in power, the legacies of critical junctures of market reform remain pivotal. Crucially, as institutional developments entail the interplay between historical legacy and human agency, illiberal outcomes unfold in the probabilistic shadow of prior neoliberal deepening. The chapter closes with a discussion of (1) the study’s contributions to research in the tradition of Karl Polanyi; (2) the social bases and neoliberal adaptations of illiberal incumbents; (3) the legacies of Eastern Europe’s transition to democracy and the market; and (4) the crisis of liberalism and the Left. Although intense market reforms have failed to produce democratic stability and illiberals have kept finding ways to opportunistically exploit neoliberalism to their own advantage, the book ends on an optimistic note. Far from inevitable, the illiberal challenge can be countered – and democracies strengthened – if forward-thinking political agents learn from past experiences and progressive examples, build parties around new ethical principles, and focus on delivering economic well-being to broad social coalitions.

As the Framers anticipated, factions remain a powerful force in American politics. The founding generation disagreed about much, but there was a broad consensus that factions, the inevitable companions of democracy, lead to democratic excess and the abuse of power. Ironically, the factor most responsible for the continued influence of factions and particularly for the dominant influence of majority faction has been the steady democratization of the American constitutional system. The Framers would not be surprised. The best prospects of constraining the negative influences of faction are restoration of the balance between state and national powers and acceptance of the need for constraints on simple majority-rules democracy.

Many in the founding generation believed that a virtuous citizenry would protect against abuses of power in a democracy. But their experience during the period of the Articles of Confederation revealed the limits of republican virtue as a check on abuses of power and underscored the challenge of limiting the opportunities for minority and majority factions to impose their will on their fellow citizens.

The founding generation condemned political parties as the archetypal manifestation of political factions. Yet they quickly sorted themselves into the Federalist and Jeffersonian Republican parties. As the Framers anticipated, the nation has experienced growing partisanship and a winner-takes-all, majority rules, understanding of the political process. A result has been what might be called a soft tyranny of the ruling majority faction.

Representation was believed to serve as a filter on the passions and excesses of direct democracy, but representatives could be influenced and even become the leaders of political factions. A central concern was to assure that representatives were insulated from such influence and focused on the public interest. As with the selection of executive and judicial officials, the questions that most occupied the Framers were the method of selection of representatives (appointment or popular election) and their term of service and eligibility for reelection.

The 1920s saw hope as well as gloom. Coexistent temporalities comingled. Key themes overarched: (a) novel metropolitan life; (b) shifting class differences; (c) changes in the state; (d) gendering of social relations, social practices, and political action; (e) Europe’s relation to empire; (f) cultural life and ideas; (g) democracy’s uneven fortunes. The welfarist complex crossed regime differences (democracy versus dictatorship), embracing population and national health; a normative family; social services delivery; goals of national efficiency. Eugenicist ideas claimed an appealing coherence, whose refusal presumed key enabling factors: intact democracy; strong labor movements; liberal systems of law; and pluralist public spheres. By 1939–1940, that left only Sweden and Britain. Widening of democracy brought the welfarist field distinct cohorts of educated young men and freshly enfranchised young women. The 1880s generation passed 1914–1918 as young adults; the “war youth generation” missed the war but craved an equivalent; interwar cohorts joined the post-1918 world as it started collapsing. Those lives turned on an enabling modernity. They knitted together the “modernist wish.”

After 1917–1923, Europe’s polities varied across democracy and dictatorship. The agrarian east and south passed under dictatorship: Iberia, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Lithuania, Yugoslavia, then Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, and Greece. Liberal constitutionalism lasted in France, Britain, the Low Countries, Switzerland, and Scandinavia. In Austria, Germany, and Czechoslovakia democratic republics faced polarized political cultures. Italy was fascist; the USSR socialist. Corporatism – government-brokered convergence of organized interests – shaped constitutional states, above all in Scandinavia, with its strong labor movements. Corporatism in Germany, Austria, and Czechoslovakia was inflected by social democracy, but in societies riven by liberal-conservative enmities and religious, regional or ethno-cultural cleavage. Fascism beckoned as an extreme remedy for chronic parliamentary instability, where leftist defense impeded capitalist stabilization. Nazism and its state mapped onto this topography. Via the Belgian Plan de Man, the French Popular Front, and the Spanish Civil War, the polarizing fallout from rightwing radicalization cast western Europe into crisis.