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2017 U. Ill. L. Rev. 767 (2017)
Paradoxes of Constitutional Politics in the Post-Soviet Space

handle is hein.journals/unilllr2017 and id is 781 raw text is: PARADOXES OF CONSTITUTIONAL POLITICS IN THE POST-SOVIET SPACE Anna Fruhstorfer* Constitutional politics in autocratic and hybrid regimes has be- come an increasingly popular topic in political-science research. The amendment of constitutions in countries with democratic deficits is a commonly identified-although rarely empirically addressed- phenomenon. While it is tempting to disregard the influence of consti- tutions in autocratic and hybrid regimes and treat them as shams, re- cent research suggests that the power of constitutional politics in a nondemocratic setting cannot be dismissed so quickly. In line with this research, I argue that constitutions and constitutional politics serve a variety of purposes in countries with democratic deficits- both in substance and in effect. Understanding the different roles of constitutional politics might contribute to our knowledge on why hy- brid and autocratic regimes endure and gain legitimacy. Thus, in this Article I aim to assess the extent to which explanations for the fre- quency and occurrence of constitutional amendments-developed for the democratic context-also apply for constitutional politics in non- democratic regimes, in particular in the post-Soviet area. Based on this, I will discuss the dominant role of constitutional politics in this regional setting, specifically as a power tool for a patrimonial presi- dent in Ukraine and as a trigger for democratization in Georgia. TABLE OF CONTENTS I. INTRODUCTION ...................................... 768 II. CONSTITUTIONAL POLITICS IN AUTOCRATIC AND HYBRID REGIMES................................................ 769 1II. RESEARCH DESIGN ................................ ....... 774 A. Case Selection: The Post-Soviet Area ................... 774 B. Operationalization...................... ....... 774 IV. DATA ANALYSIS: EXPLAINING THE OCCURRENCE OF CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS ............... ............ 776 767 * Ph.D., Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Texas at Austin and at Humboldt- Universitit zu Berlin. The author acknowledges the support of the Volkswagen Foundation for this project; Irina Avdeeva provided excellent research assistance. An online appendix and data replica- tion sets are available at: https://fruhstorfer.me/data/.

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