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Swerving Towards Deconsolidation? Democratic Consolidation and Civil Society in the Czech Republic

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Czech Democracy in Crisis

Abstract

This chapter takes a deeper look at the consolidation of democracy in the Czech Republic and contrasts the picture of Czech Republic as a poster child for economic transition in the early 1990s with the decreasing quality of the Czech democracy in recent years. This paradox, it argues, makes the Czech Republic a compelling case for democratisation research. The term “swerving towards consolidation” is advocated. There are no attempts to renegotiate the rules of the democratic game, even though the political system has become polarised, governance has become more difficult and new actors have emerged. At the same time, civic engagement is growing. The findings show that democratic consolidation is not a linear process. Instead, the quality of democracy is dynamic—reacting to domestic and external factors. A more nuanced approach is needed in order to understand the dynamics of democratic consolidation in Central and Eastern Europe.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Following the IMF approach, an economic crisis is defined here as an economic contraction and labor market impacts, leading to a drop in private consumption, GDP formation and subsequent cuts in government expenditures (Verick and Islam 2010, p. 49).

  2. 2.

    This may change soon. Andrej Babiš is openly soliciting support from the Freedom and Direct Democracy party SPD) . In exchange for support for the ANO-led minority government, SPD received leadership in key committees of the Parliament including the Security Committee.

  3. 3.

    In the nineties continuously; it was a right-wing extremist Association for the Republic–Republican Party of Czechoslovakia (SPR-RSČ) and Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia (KSČM). SPR-RSČ was represented in the Chamber of Deputies in 1992–1998, and in 2013 was dissolved, as another radical right party, Dawn of Direct Democracy entered parliament (with zero coalition potential, similar to its predecessor). On the other hand, KSCM is a continuous parliamentary party, with a stable gain of votes and a very stable electoral base.

  4. 4.

    Any change in the set of parties holding cabinet membership is regarded as a change of cabinet.

  5. 5.

    A new political party Úsvit—the Dawn of Direct Democracy of the Senator Tomio Okamura, which emerged in 2012, was not able to gather broad public support for its covert xenophobic agenda and sank into obscurity in 2014. Okamura’s new party Freedom and Direct Democracy surged in 2017 thanks to anti-refugee and anti-Muslim sentiments (cf. Bustikova and Guasti 2017).

  6. 6.

    The main goals of this coalition are: transparent party finance, asset declaration of elected officials, publishing of public procurement contracts online, the abolition of anonymous shares, transparent appointment procedures for the boards of state companies, independent public administration, protection of police investigations from political inference, transparent legislative process (removal of ad hoc amendments—so-called riders) and extension of the powers of the Supreme Audit Office.

  7. 7.

    The political concessions made in the process include the introduction of minimal contractual value (CZK 50,000, the equivalent of EUR 1800). Exemption from the need to publish contracts in the Central Public Procurement Registry for small municipalities, the Parliament and the Office of the President, Constitutional Court, Supreme Audit Office, and the Office of the Ombudsman.

  8. 8.

    The economic sector established a close and often clientelistic connection with politics; the legislative regulation which should prevent such processes was implemented slowly or was absent because of insufficient political will.

  9. 9.

    Currently, the Czech law stipulates that children can be adopted by a married couple, or by single individuals. In 2016 the Constitutional Court prohibited discrimination of individuals living in same-sex registered partnership and were until than banned from individual adoption.

  10. 10.

    In 2015 the Ministry of Interior received 1525 applications for asylum, of which 71 were approved, and 399 applicants received additional protection (the possibility of 1–3 years residency in the Czech Republic).

  11. 11.

    Media analysis of the TV coverage in 2015 by Masaryk University showed that the ‘refugee crisis’ dominated the main evening news both in public and the private media (39.5% coverage on the public TV, 36.5% in the largest private TV—Nova).

  12. 12.

    Czechs are opposed to all refugees, regardless of their country of origin—the willingness to take refugees from the Middle East and North Africa decreased from 25% in 2015 to 15% in 2017. In the same period, the willingness to accept refugees from Ukraine decreased from 43% to 41% (CVVM 2017).

  13. 13.

    According to the European Value Study data between 1999 and 2008 the trust to trade unions (on a four-point scale where 1 is great trust, and 4 is no trust at all) grew from 3.02 to 2.92. Average trust to trade unions in old EU member states was 2.67 in 2008 (Henning 2015, p. 67).

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  1. Research Unit “Democratic Innovations”, Institute of Political Science, Goethe University, Frankfurt am Main, Germany

    Petra Guasti

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  1. Leipzig University, Leipzig, Germany

    Astrid Lorenz

  2. Leipzig University, Leipzig, Germany

    Hana Formánková

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Guasti, P. (2020). Swerving Towards Deconsolidation? Democratic Consolidation and Civil Society in the Czech Republic. In: Lorenz, A., Formánková, H. (eds) Czech Democracy in Crisis. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-40006-4_3

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