The multiple fronts of democratic backsliding: evidence from Israel, Hungary, and India

Democratic backsliding by populist leaders impacts democracies worldwide. Existing frameworks either focus on institutional dimensions while overlooking socio-cultural transformations or capture comprehensive breadth but conceptualise backsliding as sequential steps rather than concurrent dimensions. We introduce the backsliding protocol, a seven-category framework integrating both approaches to capture how right-wing populists simultaneously erode institutional checks and reshape social-cultural norms. Drawing on an original dataset of anti-democratic legislation in Israel’s 25th Knesset (December 2022–July 2023), we demonstrate backsliding across all seven categories: judicial overhaul, electoral manipulation, civil service politicization, media control, human rights violations, religious coercion and academic freedom constraints. Comparison with the 20th Knesset reveals an eightfold increase in anti-democratic bills. Temporal analysis shows tactical flexibility: when judicial reforms met resistance, the coalition pivoted to social-cultural legislation. Extending the protocol to Hungary and India reveals systematic patterns across contexts, providing tools to identify, monitor and counter these threats.