Chapter 1 introduces the study’s core puzzle and overall logic of inquiry. It discusses main themes, locates arguments relative to relevant scholarship, and establishes the analytical framework. Early in the chapter, the puzzle of varying illiberal electoral outcomes is presented and contextualized. Captured by two distinct yet related indicators – illiberal voting and post-neoliberal populist magnitude – illiberal electoral outcomes not only varied persistently across countries but also signaled the high salience of economic issues in postcommunist Europe. The next section establishes the rationale for explaining outcomes by drawing insights from Latin America – another semi-peripheral space that experienced consequential neoliberal junctures. Having argued, based on key economic and political parallels between the two regions, that a critical juncture approach is appropriate also for making sense of developments in Eastern Europe, I spell out the work’s central propositions and highlight theoretical, methodological, and empirical contributions. The final sections discuss matters of research design and evidence – namely, the mixed method approach, case studies, and quantitative and qualitative data, including 100 interviews – as well as the book’s organization.