What is Democratic Resilience?

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This paper aims to transform the simple term ‘democratic resilience’ into a more complex analytical concept. Studies of democratic resilience can be seen as a fifth and most recent phase in democratization studies, which deal with systemic transformations: breakdown of democracy, transition to democracy, consolidation of democracy, backsliding of democracy and now, for only a few years, resilience of democracy. The paper examines the shift from democratization to democratic backsliding, the international structures, actors and functions which describe the resilience of democracy, and three modes of resilience: resist, adapt and recover.