Researching Democracy in Times of Autocratization

On Novem­ber 15, 2022, Jonas Wolff delive­red his inaugu­ral lecture on “Resear­ching Demo­cracy in Times of Autocra­tization. Concep­tual Develop­ments and Latin Ameri­can Experi­ences.” He thus focused on his re­search on compe­ting understan­dings of demo­cracy in acade­mia and poli­tics. The star­ting point was the ques­tion of how demo­cracy research reacts and should react to proces­ses of autocra­tization. Using the example of develop­ments in Latin America, he discus­sed “post-liberal” transfor­mations of demo­cracy as a challenge for demo­cracy research. In doing so, he identi­fied the limits and blind spots of a libe­ral concep­tion of demo­cracy. In addition, he reflec­ted on recurring pat­terns in the global debate on demo­cracy, demo­cratiza­tion, and demo­cracy promo­tion. On April 1, 2022, Jonas Wolff has been appoin­ted Profes­sor of Politi­cal Science with a focus on transfor­mation studies, espe­cially in Latin America, at the Depart­ment of Social Sciences at Goethe Univer­sity Frank­furt.